Fragmentation in Ancient Greek Drama 9783110621693, 9783110621020

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Fragmentation in Ancient Greek Drama

Trends in Classics – Supplementary Volumes

Edited by Franco Montanari and Antonios Rengakos Associate Editors Stavros Frangoulidis · Fausto Montana · Lara Pagani Serena Perrone · Evina Sistakou · Christos Tsagalis Scientific Committee Alberto Bernabé · Margarethe Billerbeck Claude Calame · Jonas Grethlein · Philip R. Hardie Stephen J. Harrison · Stephen Hinds · Richard Hunter Christina Kraus · Giuseppe Mastromarco Gregory Nagy · Theodore D. Papanghelis Giusto Picone · Tim Whitmarsh Bernhard Zimmermann

Volume 84

Fragmentation in Ancient Greek Drama Edited by Anna Lamari, Franco Montanari and Anna Novokhatko

ISBN 978-3-11-062102-0 e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-062169-3 e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-3-11-062219-5 ISSN 1868-4785 Library of Congress Control Number: 2020939976 Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available on the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de. © 2020 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston Editorial Office: Alessia Ferreccio and Katerina Zianna Logo: Christopher Schneider, Laufen Printing and binding: CPI books GmbH, Leck www.degruyter.com

Foreword This volume has its origin in the 12th Trends in Classics International Conference that was held in Thessaloniki in May 2018. It is a pleasure to record here our thanks for the help received from so many quarters; the staff of the Department of Philology at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (especially Stavros Frangoulidis and Martin Vöhler), the Aristotle University Research Committee (for generous financial support), the Università degli Studi di Genova, the “A und A Kulturstiftung” and the Stiftung “Humanismus Heute”, the Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften, as well as the Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg. Special thanks should go to Bernhard Zimmermann, whose herculean project on comic fragments has opened new paths in a vastly unexplored field. The KomFrag project (Kommentierung der Fragmente der griechischen Komödie, AlbertLudwigs-Universität Freiburg), under his supervision, is an international research program on an unprecedented scale, providing new insights into the study of fragmentary Greek comedy. It is from engagement with this project that the idea of a conference on the concept of fragmentation originally sprung up. This was further enhanced by the incorporation of the study of tragic fragments, as well as various other subfields. None of the Trends in Classics conferences, this one included, would have ever taken place without Antonios Rengakos, the driving force behind this notable 14-year-series of uninterrupted, annual academic gatherings. It is thanks to his ingenuity, efficiency and problem-solving talent that this and every Trends in Classics conference has been made possible. Anna Lamari, Franco Montanari, Anna Novokhatko Thessaloniki – Genova – Freiburg, May 2020

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Contents Foreword  V List of Figures  XI List of Tables  XIII Anna A. Lamari, Franco Montanari and Anna Novokhatko οὐ σῴζεται or σῴζονται: Preliminary Remarks on the Study of Dramatic Fragments Today  3

Part I: Quotation, Transmission, and Reconstruction of Fragments Bernhard Zimmermann On the Hermeneutics of the Fragment  21 Jeffrey Henderson Old Comic Citation of Tragedy as Such  39 Ralph Μ. Rosen On Literary Fragmentation and Quotation in Aristophanes: Some Theoretical Considerations  49 Anna A. Lamari On Types of Fragments  61 Matthew Wright How Long Did the Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy Survive?  83 Francesco Paolo Bianchi What we Do (Not) Know About Lost Comedies: Fragments and Testimonia  105 S. Douglas Olson The Fragments of Aristophanes’ Gerytades: Methodological Considerations  129 Oliver Taplin Fragments of Aeschylus and the Number of Actors  145

VIII  Contents

Part II: Fragmented Tragedy Alan H. Sommerstein Revisiting the Danaid Trilogy  155 Patrick J. Finglass Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta Volume II: Old Texts, New Opportunities  165 Kyriakos Tsantsanoglou παῖς μάργος  183 Nikos Manousakis Aeschylus’ Actaeon: A Playboy on the Greek Tragic Stage?  201 Martin J. Cropp Euripides or Critias, or Neither? Reflections on an Unresolved Question  235 Ioanna Karamanou Fragmented Intergeneric Discourses: Epinician Echoes in Euripides’ Alexandros  257 Massimo Giuseppetti Wink or Twitch? Euripides’ Autolycus (fr. 282) and the Ideologies of Fragmentation  275 Efstathia Papadodima Barbarism and Fragmentation in Fifth-Century Tragedy: Barbarians in the Fragments and “Fragmented” Barbarians  299

Part III: Fragmented Comedy Michele Napolitano Epicharmus, Odysseus Automolos: Some Marginal Remarks on frr. 97 and 98 and K–A  321 Anna Novokhatko δηλαδὴ τρίπους: On Epicharmus fr. 147 K–A  337 Serena Perrone Crates and the Polis: Reframing the Case  353

Contents  IX

Andreas Bagordo On Some Short (and Dubious) Fragments of Aristophanes  369 Ioannis M. Konstantakos Heracles’ Adventures at the Inn, or How Fragments and Plays Converse  379 Massimiliano Ornaghi Ethnic Stereotypes and Ethnic Mockery in Ancient Greek Comedy  407

Part IV: The Reception of Tragic Fragments Piero Totaro Aeschylean Fragments in the Herculaneum Papyri: More Questions than Answers. Prometheus Unbound in Philodemus’ On Piety  437 Anton Bierl Paratragic Fragmentation and Patchwork-Citation as Comic Aesthetics: The Potpourri Use of Euripides’ Helen and Andromeda in Aristophanes’ Thesmophoriazusae and Their Symbolic Meaning  453 Christian Orth Fragmentary Comedy and the Evidence of Vase-Painting: Euripidean Parody in Aristophanes’ Anagyros  481 Poulheria Kyriakou A Cause for Fragmentation: Tragic Fragments in Plato’s Republic  501 Richard Hunter Dio Chrysostom and the Citation of Tragedy  527 Patrick O’ Sullivan From the Great Banquets of Aeschylus: Gorgias, Aristophanes and Xenakis’ Oresteia  545

Part V: The Reception of Comic Fragments Eric Csapo How Cratinus fr. 372 Made Theatre History  573

X  Contents Kostas Apostolakis Increasing Comic Fragmentation: Some Aspects of Text Re-uses in Athenaeus  603 Athina Papachrysostomou πλῆθος ὅσον ἰχθύων ... ἐπὶ πινάκων ἀργυρῶν (Ath. 6.224b): A Different Kettle of Fish  617 Benjamin W. Millis Fragments of Menander in Stobaeus  647 Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén The Long Shadow of Fame: Quotations from Epicharmus in Works of the Imperial Period  663 List of Contributors  691 Index of Sources  697 General Index  717

List of Figures Fig. 1: Framed fragments in Ar. Ran. 1119–1245  70 Fig. 2: P.Oxy. 2256 fr.9a and 9b = Aesch. fr. 281a + 281 b, lines 31–41  188 Fig. 3: Red-figure bell krater attributed to the Lykaon Painter, portraying Zeus, Lyssa, Actaeon (Euaion), and Artemis/00.346 © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston MA  214 Fig. 4: J.-P. Braun, P. Amandry 1973: The base of the victory tripod of the dithyramb poet Cedeides (5th cent. BC) / 7296 © École française d’Athènes  347 Fig. 5: The base of the victory tripod of the dithyramb poet Cedeides (5th cent. BC) / ΕΜ 10330, N. 3028/2002 © Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Sports / Epigraphic Museum  348 Fig. 6: The base of the victory tripod of the dithyramb poet Cedeides (5th cent. BC) / ΕΜ 10330, N. 3028/2002 © Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Sports / Epigraphic Museum  349 Fig. 7: “Green Krater”, Lucanian bell krater (410–390 BC), attributed to the Creusa Painter/ NM2013.2 © Nicholson Museum, The University of Sydney, gift of James Ede in honour of Professor J.R. Green  498 Fig. 8: Stemmatic representation of the transmission of the contaminated gloss “From Poplar(s)”  591

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List of Tables Tab. 1: Tab. 2: Tab. 3: Tab. 4: Tab. 5:

Definitely attested performances of lost tragedies during antiquity  98 Remains of ancient papyrus books containing parts of lost tragedies  99 Ethnic titles of comedies (in plural)  419 The legend of Anagyros  484 Authors (or works) that mention Epicharmus between the 1st and 5th century AD (arranged alphabetically within each period)  685

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

Introduction

Anna Lamari, Franco Montanari and Anna Novokhatko

οὐ σῴζεται or σῴζονται: Preliminary Remarks on the Study of Dramatic Fragments Today

In Plato’s Phaedrus, Socrates argues that a text should follow the principles reflected in the composition of a human body: δεῖν πάντα λόγον ὥσπερ ζῷον συνεστάναι σῶμά τι ἔχοντα αὐτὸν αὑτοῦ, ὥστε μήτε ἀκέφαλον εἶναι μήτε ἄπουν, ἀλλὰ μέσα τε ἔχειν καὶ ἄκρα, πρέποντα ἀλλήλοις καὶ τῷ ὅλῳ γεγραμμένα. every discourse should be set together like a living creature, by having a kind of body of its own, so that it is neither headless nor footless, but having middle parts and edges, written in such a way as to fit together with each other and with the whole. (Plat. Phdr. 264c)

The Oxford English Dictionary defines literary form in terms similar to Plato, as “including the arrangement and order of the different parts of the whole”. 1 On these grounds, a discourse includes the arrangement of the fragments, which, as segments of the whole, have by definition a complex relationship with formality. 2 Thus, Plato’s corporeal metaphor of the text as a body with its natural connections and proportions not only introduces a principle of text composition and interpretation, but also questions the interrelation of the whole and its (dissociated) parts within a text. 3 Should a fragment be considered by and in itself? What happens when the body of the text is lost? Plato’s metaphor serves as an appropriate starting point for discussing fragments and fragmentation. Texts may have been incomplete for a variety of reasons and in different ways; the historical work of Thucydides, for example, breaks off in the middle of the sentence. His eighth book survives in what would seem to be a rough version, the author having died before he could complete his work. The fragmentary could be the vestige, all that is left behind from a fractured whole. But it might also have been left incomplete from the outset, only positing an incipient or potential

 1 OED entry no. 1,9. 2 See Varley-Winter 2018, 6–21. See also Elias 2004, 7–8. 3 Lamm 2005, 98. On the metaphorical relationship of a text with a body, see also Arist. Poet. 1450b31–1451a6 and 1459a16–23. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-001

  Anna Lamari, Franco Montanari and Anna Novokhatko wholeness. 4 Imagination serves as a vehicle for connecting philosophical and philological treatments of fragmentation. The literary theorist Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht addresses one of the most crucial methodological issues in approaching fragments: the question of reconstruction. In the case of a landscape, imagining the wholeness of what is present merely as a fragment must rely on geological and physical probability, supported perhaps by a certain kind of aesthetic judgment that may come from remembering other mountains and other valleys. For the case of any artefact that we consider to be a fragment, in contrast, imagining its state of wholeness will come from imagining the intention of its producer. Once we have imagined, on the basis of a fragment, a Gestalt that we think corresponds (however roughly) to the primary intention of a producer, we can begin to establish a typology of different kinds of fragments by distinguishing different principles that may have interfered with the (product of the) producer’s original intention. 5 Being by its very nature incomplete, the fragment stimulates our imagination as we attempt to complete it or reconstruct the lost whole. Here lies the core of the scholarly philological work, and of textual criticism in particular. The extent to which imagination and creativity should play their role in reconstructing the context or lacunae remains a matter for philological debate. In order to progress beyond the first associations and in order to reconstruct and restore an original entity, we need to combine imagination and creativity with precise textual and contextual knowledge, and also with detailed observations on the fragment. 6 Fragmentation as a concept and model is crucial for modern and even more for postmodern literature. Jacques Derrida referred to “la forme de l’écrit”, where various elements, plot, character, themes, imagery and factual references are fragmented and dispersed throughout the work. 7 The fragment was developed into a literary genre in early German romanticism, primarily in the journal Athenäum, founded by the brothers August Wilhelm and Friedrich Schlegel. 8 According to Friedrich Schlegel, a good novel should remain a fragment. A purposely enigmatic reading should therefore emphasize the contradictory semantic segments of the text to the point where its unity breaks up. Those forces which cannot be reconciled in a harmonious way, as though the reconciliation was

 4 Ostermann 2004, 2. 5 Gumbrecht 1997, 319. 6 See the discussion in Gumbrecht 1997 in general and p. 321 in particular. 7 Derrida 1967, 107–108. On the close relationship of modernism and fragmentation, see also Varley-Winter 2018, 11–41. 8 Frank 1984; Ostermann 1991. See also Zimmermann in this volume.

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planned, are forced together through form, by being placed alongside one another, and through this, a new range of meanings are released. Perhaps contrasted to traditional narratives of wholeness, fragments have been called “metaphor[s] of modernity”, and fragmentation has been understood as a concept constituting the essence of modernity itself. 9 Susan Sontag has suggested that fragments are really the art form of our time, and that “everybody who has reflected about art and thought has had to deal with this problem”. 10 As the fragmentary posits the whole, deconstruction must operate within the whole by mobilizing the separate and disjointing the various properties of a text. The consequent de-empowerment of the reader and interpreter is, however, not viewed as a failure, but is considered the objective of deconstruction. Fragments and fragmentation have come to refer less to the text itself and more to chasms in the process of understanding. The focus has shifted from the fragmented text to the reader’s fragmented mind. At the same time, the experience of radical illegibility is the only authentic experience of a text which is itself dismembered. It is precisely the taste of the fragmentary and the abrupt, the incomplete completeness described above, that has rendered the fragmentation in ancient texts a focus of scholarly attention. Ancient fragmentary literature is found in all possible forms. The text can be interspersed with lacunae and elements of everyday language, and intermixed with poetry and biblical references, all of these contributing to syntactical interruptions and grammatical deformities. Works of Greek and Latin literature are preserved often only in the form of quotations, or of summaries in later, better-preserved authors. At times, it is only the titles or topics of lost texts that are known. Such a fragmentary transmission can occur due to external influences like damage caused by mould, worming, water and fire. But it may also result from the circumstances of the time: politics, cultural upheavals, migration and wars. The complex problems associated with the interpretation of fragmentary texts and the concept of fragment itself are dealt with extensively by Glenn Most. 11 This volume builds on Most’s considerations, and in particular on the idea that the transmission and collection of (textual) fragments can contribute to the formation of (literary) canon. 12 An author whose fragments have been collected in later times is an author whose fortunes straddle the division between the cano-

 9 See Nochlin 1994. 10 Sontag 2013, 54–55. 11 Most 1997; 1998; 2009; 2010; 2011. 12 See e.g. Most’s preface in Most 1997, v–viii, especially p. vi.

  Anna Lamari, Franco Montanari and Anna Novokhatko nical and the uncanonical. “Fragments and canon formation are linked by a particularly close relation: the processes by which fragments are first formed and then collected and studied depend upon shifts over time in the boundaries that separate canonical writers from noncanonical ones”. 13 Most also discusses the tendency to regard fragments as partes pro toto. Our approach to texts which we have through direct transmission in toto might perhaps be contrasted with our understanding of those same texts had they been transmitted only indirectly as fragments. Various hermeneutic circles render this issue even more complicated. Important considerations include the quotation context and the reasons for an author/text-bearer quoting a text. The reasons for quotation are influenced by the completeness, the exactitude, and, more generally, the manner in which the author makes the quote, and his or her relation to the quoted passage. For Most, genre is critical. Poetic, philosophical and historical fragments cannot be regarded in the same light. Poetic fragments are usually cited for their particular wording, at least by grammarians, metricians, and scholiasts, and, as a result, they have for the most part been transmitted with a high degree of sincerity. The exact wording of philosophical fragments was perhaps less important than the doctrine or argument they convey; often they were cited by opponents who may not have been inclined to quote them with exactitude. Historical fragments were usually cited for the chronological or geographic information they contained and are the least likely to have preserved the wording of the original. This present volume on fragmentation in drama draws on Most’s discussion of genre. Dramatic fragments belong to his first group – poetic fragments quoted with a high degree of sincerity. The performative context and history of Ancient Greek theatre, however, and also modes of thought connected to the life of theatre more generally, are particularly significant for the interpretation of such fragments. In the past, fragments of texts were examined in isolation, serving the purposes of grammatical and linguistic commentary, metrical analysis, factual references, or textual criticism. Increasingly, however, it is argued that the tragic or comic fragment cannot be properly appreciated when examined in isolation. To disclose its full hermeneutical and literary-historical potential, the fragment needs to be viewed as a part of the entire panorama of ancient theatre as an art form. Every fragmentary text must be constantly examined together with other fragments, in correlation with those of the same dramatic genre, bearing in mind

 13 Most 2009, 10.

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the broader synchronic panorama and the plays which have been integrally preserved. Thus, the fragments of tragedy and comedy find their place in the complex network of mutual influences, borrowings, and intertextual relations, which were woven by the playwrights. The extant dramas, with their fully developed themes, integral characters, and amply observable techniques, often help us guess at the subject-matter of the dramatic fragment, allowing us to place its text within the overall scheme of the play, or to connect it to particular characters, patterns of action, and scenic artifices. Conversely, the fragmentary excerpts, by indicating a broader tradition of dramaturgical trends and thematic concerns in tragic or comic writing, provide the background against which the variation and innovation exhibited by any given poet may be interpreted and assessed. At the same time, it is important to analyze the fragments diachronically, their long durée journey through various genres and periods. The present volume represents the first attempt to concentrate on Ancient Greek dramatic fragments whilst discussing their reception and broader literary and cultural context. The volume thus explores the inherently dramaturgic dynamics of both the fragmentation procedure and the fragmentary material, with regard to the literary notions of dissociation and cohesion, while also evincing the overwhelming impact of fragmentation upon our perception/interpretation of the surviving literary material. During the last decades, scholars started paying more explicit attention to the methodological issues involved in the collection and study of fragments. A volume of collected papers on dramatic fragmentation was published recently in Lecce; 14 the majority of its papers deal with particular plays and fragments, five essays discussing comedy, and five tragedy. Other studies have dealt exclusively with either tragedy or comedy. Two editorial projects should be mentioned here in detail. The Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta (TrGF) is an extensive collection of scattered fragments of Greek tragedy writers. It was published from 1971 to 2004 in five volumes at the Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen, edited by Bruno Snell, Stefan Radt and Richard Kannicht. Further fragmented plays by Sophocles and Euripides were translated and published in Loeb by Hugh Lloyd-Jones, Christopher Collard and Martin Cropp, while selections of fragmentary plays are published in the series of Aris and Phillips with introductions, translations and commentaries by Alan Sommerstein, Thomas Talboy, David Fitzpatrick, Christopher

 14 Melero, Labiano, and Pellegrino 2012.

  Anna Lamari, Franco Montanari and Anna Novokhatko Collard, Martin Cropp, and John Gibert. 15 Patrick O’Sullivan and Christopher Collard edited and translated major fragments of satyr-play. 16 In parallel, a massive new collection of fragments of ancient Greek comedy, Poetae Comici Graeci (PCG) was edited by Rudolf Kassel and Colin Austin. From 1983 to 2001, eight volumes have been published by Walter de Gruyter. Volumes 3.1 and 6.1 (fragments of Aristophanes preserved on manuscripts and fragments of Menander preserved on papyri) are still pending, whilst Rudolf Kassel and Stephan Schröder are currently working on volume 6.1. A further three volumes of the fragments of Old comedy were translated for the Loeb series by Ian Storey, whilst Jeffrey Henderson translated the fragments by Aristophanes. 17 Various projects of commentaries on fragmentary drama are running simultaneously. Martin Cropp has just published the first volume on the 5th century BC tragic fragments with translation and commentary, whilst a major international project of commenting on all Attic comedy preserved in fragments is currently taking place in Freiburg (KomFrag, 28 volumes are planned). This project, established and led by Bernhard Zimmermann, involves many of the authors participating in the present volume. 18 In 1991, Heinz Hofmann published a prolific volume on tragic fragments, which he posed as the first attempt to test the new TrGF edition. 19 In 2005, a volume of collected papers on fragmentary tragedy was published in Exeter and featured discussions on issues such as the fragments and their collectors, the tragic fragments in the 19th and 20th centuries, the philosophical fragments (and those of other genres), as well as further analysis of specific fragmentary plays. 20 Analogous discussions were recently brought up by Ioanna Karamanou in a volume with essays on the interaction of tragic fragments inter-dramatically as well as in iconography and pottery. 21  15 Sophocles, Fragments, ed. and transl. by H. Lloyd-Jones, Cambridge, Mass., 1996; Euripides, Fragments, 2 vols, ed. and transl. by C. Collard and M. Cropp, Cambridge, Mass., 2008; Sophocles, Selected Fragmentary Plays, 2 vols, ed. with introductions, translations, and commentaries by A. H. Sommerstein, D. Fitzpatrick and T. Talboy, Exeter 2012; Euripides, Selected Fragmentary Plays, 2 vols, ed. with introductions, translations, and commentaries by C. Collard, M.J. Cropp and J. Gibert, Chippenham 2004. 16 Euripides, Cyclops and major fragments of Greek Satyric Drama, ed. with a translation, introduction and commentary by P. O’Sullivan and C. Collard, Aris & Phillips, 2013. 17 Fragments of Old comedy, ed. and transl. by I.C. Storey, 3 vols, Cambridge, Mass., 2011; Aristophanes, Fragments, ed. and transl. by J. Henderson, Cambridge, Mass., 2007. 18 Cropp 2019. On the project KomFrag see http://www.komfrag.uni-freiburg.de 19 Hofmann 1991. 20 McHardy, Robson and Harvey 2005. 21 Karamanou 2019.

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With respect to comedy, the revolutionary Rivals of Aristophanes of David Harvey and John Wilkins was the first to put forth serious discussion of fragmentary preserved comedies. 22 A collection of the most challenging fragments of Greek comedy with an extensive introduction discussing the history of comedy was edited and commented by Douglas Olson. 23 In 2010, another important piece on the text transmission and attribution problems of Old, Middle and New comic texts was written by Heinz-Günther Nesselrath. 24 Furthermore, Stylianos Chronopoulos and Christian Orth recently published a Fragmentary History of Greek Comedy based on a workshop held in Freiburg in 2012 about the methodology of commenting comic fragments. 25 How is then the present volume different from previous publications on fragmentary drama? Mainly, in that it explores the relationships of dramatic fragments not only within the sphere of drama (tragedy, comedy and satyr-play), but also with reference to other genres, both in the synchronic and the diachronic level. Through questions raised by authors who have studied mainly tragedy or comedy respectively, the problematic around fragments and fragmentation is considered from (new) methodological viewpoints that bring forth the dialogue of fragments, but also, the dialogue of genres. The first section discusses general theoretical methodological issues such as fragmentation, quotation, transmission and reconstruction of fragments (Zimmermann, Henderson, Rosen, Lamari, Wright, Bianchi, Olson, Taplin), while the next two sections deal with the fragments of tragedy (Sommerstein, Finglass, Tsantsanoglou, Manousakis, Cropp, Karamanou, Giuseppetti, Papadodima) and comedy (Napolitano, Novokhatko, Perrone, Bagordo, Konstantakos, Ornaghi) respectively, focusing on specific text analysis. The last two sections gather papers exploring the afterlife of fragmentary tragic (Totaro, Bierl, Orth, Kyriakou, Hunter, O’Sullivan) and comic (Csapo, Apostolakis, Papachrysostomou, Millis, Rodriguez-Noriega Guillen) plays. The volume begins with Bernhard Zimmermann’s analysis of fragments as a hermeneutical problem of classical Philology both on the level of content and above all, on the level of methodology. The possibilities and the limits of working

 22 Harvey and Wilkins 2000. See also Belardinelli, Imperio, Mastromarco, Pellegrino, and Totaro 1998. 23 Olson 2007. 24 Nesselrath 2010. 25 Chronopoulos & Orth 2015. See also Rusten 2011. On methodology in commenting fragments see particularly Stephens 2002.

  Anna Lamari, Franco Montanari and Anna Novokhatko with fragments are discussed, and a hermeneutic theory for dealing with fragments is also provided. Examples from the Palamedes-tragedies of Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides are examined, as also a comic example, the Dionysalexandros of Cratinus. Jeffrey Henderson examines instances in which a fifth-century comic speaker is motivated as to identify a tragic borrowing as such. Henderson maintains that until late in the fifth century, comic poets expected their spectators to know tragedy only through performance, regardless of the audience’s familiarity with written texts of other genres. Ralph Rosen then asks the ontological question “what even is a literary fragment?” and discusses how Athenians understood the very concept of a fragment. By close examining Aristophanes’ practice of literary quotation in the Frogs, Rosen argues that “fragmentation” can work as an actual mechanism for literary criticism and evaluation and maintains that in the time of Aristophanes, all quotations seem to have been conceptualized as fragmentary. Anna Lamari embarks on a theoretical study of the different types of fragments and the mechanisms of their creation, as part of a procedure of constant de- and re- construction. According to the means of their formulation, as well as their narrative function, Lamari distinguishes between five types of fragments: “surviving fragments”, “framed fragments”, “fragments within fragments”, “pseudo-fragments”, and “fragments of ancient scholarship”. Matthew Wright brings up the question of transmission of the Greek tragedies, focusing mostly on what is lost, tracing down, as far as possible, the last recorded sightings of lost works, as well as the circumstances in which they became lost. Wright maintains that tragedies did not survive in their wholeness due to a combination of deliberate choice and accident. Francesco Paolo Bianchi discusses four comedies of Cratinus, Dionysalexandros, Nemesis, Odyssēs and Pytinē, for each of them there are on the one hand some testimonia and on the other hand the fragments of indirect tradition. Bianchi analyzes the interactions between fragments and testimonia and how the one or the other allows the reader to understand some aspects of the comedies, raising particular problems of interpretation. Concentrating mostly on Aristophanes’ Gerytades, Douglas Olson discusses some of the most common pitfalls of fragmentary material, insisting on how modern readings of fragmented drama can potentially be misleading. Olson’s ultimate goal is to address a series of questions about what we can really infer about fragmentary dramas as well as some basic methodological rules that ought to be followed when working with fragmentary plays.

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Oliver Taplin subsequently argues that the fragments of Aeschylus are evidence for early tragedy, to be set beside the canonical account in Aristotle’s Poetics (1449a). After a close examination of a series of fragments, Taplin pins down scenes that called for two actors (besides the chorus-leader), calling in question Aristotle’s assertion that Aeschylus increased the number of actors from one to two. Further research also throws doubt on Aristotle’s teleological account of gradual development from solely choral origins by showing that tragedy was serious and dramatic from the very beginning. The second part of the volume explores several aspects of some fragmentary tragedies. It begins with Alan Sommerstein, who reviews the evidence bearing on the sequence of plays within Aeschylus’ Danaid trilogy and offers fresh and strengthened arguments in support of his theory that the Egyptians preceded the Suppliants and that Danaus had received an oracle telling him he would be killed by his daughter’s bedfellow. Patrick Finglass brings out the plethora of anonymous, and admittingly unknown and understudied fragments that are scattered in Tragicorum Graecorum fragmenta volume V part 2. Finglass examines three different anonymous tragic fragments (one a quotation, one written on a potsherd, one from a papyrus), and highlights certain points that makes them worth studying. Kyriakos Tsantsanoglou tackles the enigmatic phrase παῖς μάργος, mentioned in Aeschylus’ so-called “Dike-play” as a violent son of Zeus and Hera (frr. 281a and 281b), making a further attempt at identifying it. Tsantsanoglou’s investigation includes a re-examination of the papyrus text (P.Oxy. 2256, frr. 9a and b), a new edition, and a commentary of the relevant lines (27–41). The identification proposed is Eros, in a story fully concocted by Aeschylus. Nikos Manousakis discusses the plot of Aeschylus’ Toxotides, drawing on the surviving fragments, but also on various other accounts, such as literature, myth, and art. Manousakis argues that the death of Actaeon in Aeschylus is directly tied to his overconfident “commitment” to sensual pleasures, which leads him to offend Semele, a bedfellow of Zeus himself. Martin Cropp addresses the debate regarding the authorship of the tetralogy of Pirithous, Rhadamanthys and Tennes, with Sisyphus being the satyr-play. Much of the discussion has been so far concerned with the language and subject-matter of the fragments, but the relevant testimonia also raise questions about the nature and transmission of our information about them. Cropp focuses on such questions and suggests that there are viable, perhaps better alternatives to ascribing all four plays together either to Euripides or to Critias. Ioanna Karamanou seeks to explore Euripides’ interplay with epinician poetry in his fragmentarily preserved Alexandros, which features an athletic contest

  Anna Lamari, Franco Montanari and Anna Novokhatko as a pivotal element of its dramatic plot. It is pointed out that Euripides appropriates epinician vocabulary, imagery and ideology to describe this competition, as also engaging in a dialogue with the aristocratic values of the victory ode, juxtaposing them to late fifth-century ideology. Karamanou thus argues that Euripides’ reception and refiguration of epinician poetry could bring to the fore the dialectic, as well as the tension between the traditional criteria of excellence and the quiet moral virtues of his own era. Massimo Giuseppetti focuses on Euripides’ fr. 282, a fragment from the satyr play Autolycus. The fragment’s difficult understanding lies in the fact that very little is known about the dramatic context of the fragment. Commentators have for the most part based their readings of fr. 282 on larger scholarly narratives, namely Euripides’ own biography or the broader conflict between physical and intellectual occupations. Giuseppetti maintains that the interpretation of fr. 282 cannot be separated from a cautious and careful investigation of its possible dramatic function within a play where the ideas of bodily strength, sophia, justice and honour are some of the basic elements of the narrative. In the last chapter of this section, Efstathia Papadodima explores the representation of tragic barbarians and of the theme of barbarism in conjunction with the concept of “fragmentation”. In her chapter, “fragmentation” and the concept of barbarism is either understood literally – with respect to the representation of barbarians in tragic fragments and their connection to the extant tragedy, or in a more abstract way – with respect to the “fragmentary” status of barbarians both in terms of perception (in Greek literary imagination) and in terms of the actual roles barbarians play in tragic theatre. The third section of the volume explores a series of comic fragments. It begins with the chapter of Michele Napolitano who examines Epicharmus, frr. 97–98 K–A (Odysseus Automolos) and focuses on three main questions: a) In which epic hypotext should the model reused by Epicharmus for his comedy be identified? b) Who does Odysseus converse with in the verses corresponding, today, to fr. 97 K–A? c) How should the title transmitted by the ancient sources for the comedy be understood, and, in particular, what sense should we attribute to the adjective automolos? Having addressed these issues, Napolitano also heads to some more general remarks regarding the meaning and function of paraepic in Epicharmus. Anna Novokhatko discusses Epicharmus fr. 147 K–A and in particular the meaning and function of the object tripod (on stage). She argues that the traditional interpretation of this fragment can be disputed and with the support of archaeological evidence proposes a new contextualisation of the scene such as a ritual sacral space of Delphi, Heraion and Mithraion.

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Serena Perrone seeks to challenge the traditional view of Crates as an apolitical and non-topical comic poet, maintaining that such an approach originates from a disputable reading of ancient testimonia (Ar. Eq. 537–540 = test. 6; Arist. Poet. 1449b = test. 5) and builds on out-dated interpretive categories. By an analysis of some titles and fragments, Perrone reframes the case, suggesting that the radicalization of this prejudice has often prevented the investigation of possible historical hints in Crates’ fragments. Andreas Bagordo looks at four cases of very short Aristophanic fragments: 938, 941, 900, as well as 969 K–A. With respect to Ar. fr. 938 [dub.] K–A, he argues that the word κνιστά (like στέμφυλα) is autonomous from λάχανα (also in the lexicographical tradition). Regarding Ar. fr. 941 [dub.] K–A, he maintains that the fragment (ἀμφήκη γνάθον) is a further instance of sophistic and/or Euripidean parody and shall not be considered a misreading or variant of Ar. Nub. 1160 (ἀμφήκει γλώττῃ). Bagordo argues further that Ar. fr. 900 K–A (τετραχίζειν) should be attributed to Aristophanes of Byzantium (or at least be edited among the Aristophanic Dubia) and proves that in Ar. fr. 969 [dub.] K–A (βροτολοιγός) one could read a more pointed (and therefore Aristophanic) βροτολοιχός. Ioannis Konstantakos examines the theme of “Heracles at the inn”, traceable in a number of fragments and testimonia from different periods in the history of Attic comedy. By bringing out the possibility that this routine arose as a popular variation of the traditional theme of “Heracles at the symposion”, Konstantakos offers a reading of Aristophanes’ Frogs 549–578 against this background: he maintains that Aristophanes offers a meta-version of the routine of “Heracles at the inn”, inserted as a miniature comic play within Dionysus’ dramatic adventures. Massimiliano Ornaghi offers a survey of all the comic fragments (about 600) in which we can recognize ethnic references used as comic tools, deliberately excluding surviving plays. Paying attention to the limits posed by their fragmentary nature, this huge amount of items seemly allows to outline some topics, or stereotypes, on the depiction of certain ethnic groups. Ornaghi maintains that these stereotypes can go back to the common and traditional opinions attested about some ancient population: often opinions shared by the Athenian audience (of the classical period) towards other Greeks, or non-Greek people. The volume’s fourth section includes chapters which bring out tragic quotation by focusing on the literary “reuse” of tragedy in other genres. The section begins with Piero Totaro, who provides an overview of the references to Aeschylus as found in the Herculaneum papyri, a vast source of dramatic quotations that

  Anna Lamari, Franco Montanari and Anna Novokhatko has today been relatively neglected. In lack of an updated edition, Totaro examines all types of Aeschylean and (pseudo-) Aeschylean references, such as Prometheus Unbound in Philodemus’ On Piety. Anton Bierl examines Aristophanes’ parodic use of Euripides’ Helen and Andromeda as central to the meaning of the Thesmophoriazusae. According to Bierl, the fragmenting paratragodia is not just a paradigmatic comic intertextual and metatheatrical play in endless repetitions, but it supports the syntagmatic course of action on a deeply symbolic level, finally re-establishing the ideas about marriage and sexual intercourse. In a discussion of Aristophanes’ Anagyros, Christian Orth argues that the play was at least in part modelled on Euripides’ Hippolytus and thus contained a parody of the scene with Phaedra and the nurse. He further maintains that this very scene from Anagyros is represented on a vase painting from ca. 400 BC, which J.R. Green has already identified as representing a comic parody (possibly by Aristophanes) of the scene with Phaedra and the nurse from Hippolytus. Poulheria Kyriakou then examines some instances of tragic fragments quoted in Plato’s Republic. Kyriakou maintains that albeit preserving the fragments, Plato has also formulated and produced them, by turning quotes into isolated utterances taken out of context, long before the plays they belonged to were really and practically lost. Quotations are also the main focus in the chapter by Richard Hunter, who considers two cases of citations of surviving Euripidean plays in Dio Chrysostom. Hunter maintains that Dio’s narrative and use of citations could be seen as a type of “window allusion”, in which one text which reflects an earlier text is combined with it in order to form a new “combinatory” writing. Patrick O’Sullivan examines aspects of the reception of Aeschylus both in antiquity and in the twentieth century, such as Gorgias of Leontini, Aristophanes, but also the Rumanian-born/Greek-national musician Iannis Xenakis, who composed an operatic version of Aeschylus’ Oresteia in separate stages over a 26-year period. A key theme to emerge is that, for the ancients, Aeschylus is celebrated and parodied as a poet whose works are stylistically grand, “heavy” and “stun” the audience out of their senses. Regarding Xenakis, O’Sullivan notices how he focuses on what he considered to be the Oresteia’s most visceral moments in order to produce a new synthetic whole. The last section of the volume deals with comedy, exploring quotations of comedy in other genres. Eric Csapo addresses the reception history of Cratinus fr. 372 K–A, since it tells a cautionary tale for all who hope to build on fragments. Csapo lays out the stages by which a perfectly respectable commentary by Era-

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tosthenes, once absorbed by the lexicographical tradition generated through abbreviation and misunderstanding then led to a theory that formed the foundation of much modern scholarship on theatre’s early history, including “evidence” for more theatre buildings than the fragment has words. Kostas Apostolakis considers some indicative techniques of quoting comic fragments in Athenaeus’ Deipnosophists. By using Middle Comedy playwright Timocles as his case study, Apostolakis exhibits how Athenaeus’ comic quotations have been artificially strung together through a narrative on deipnological and sympotic issues and focuses on connective narrative passages, through which Athenaeus attempts to revive an old material in a new composition. Athina Papachrysostomou offers an examination of an outstanding section of the Deipnosophists (6.224b–228c), where Athenaeus compiles a number of comic fragments (from the periods of Middle and New Comedy), all of which constitute invectives against Athens’ professional group of fishmongers (on account of their scheming and profiteering ways). By focusing on this case, Papachrysostomou studies the quintessence of fragmentation (as both a mechanical process and a conscious literary choice/phenomenon), its concomitant implications, as well as its powerful impact upon our perception of surviving literary material (in this case, the evaluation of comic satire against fishmongers). Benjamin Millis explores quotations from Menander that once were known only from Stobaeus (and thus were book fragments) but that now are also known from papyrus finds (and thus belong to the “extant” plays and are no longer considered fragments). This dual tradition allows a check on earlier work done when the quotations were known only as fragments. According to Millis, the fact that the quotations now have a context allows some tentative conclusions about Stobaeus’ quotation of Menander which can then be applied to fragments that still lack a fuller context. Finally, Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillen offers a study of the explicit mentions of Epicharmus in Greek writers between the 1st and 5th century AD. Rodriguez-Noriega Guillen is analysing why and how each author cites Epicharmus, and how this material (whether they be fragments or testimonies) is inserted in the work in question, as she also tracking down the routes through which knowledge of Epicharmus was circulated in that period. We hope that this diachronic approach to dramatic fragments and the concept of fragmentation demonstrates the vitality of the old question of why reading fragments of Ancient Greek drama.

  Anna Lamari, Franco Montanari and Anna Novokhatko

Bibliography Belardinelli, A.M./O. Imperio/G. Mastromarco/M. Pellegrino/P. Totaro (eds) (1998), Tessere. Frammenti della commedia greca: studi e commenti, Bari. Chronopoulos, S./Orth, C. (eds) (2015), Fragmente einer Geschichte der griechischen Komödie/Fragmentary History of Greek Comedy, Heidelberg. Cropp, M.J. (2019), Minor Greek Tragedians: Fragments from the tragedies with selected testimonia, ed. with introductions, translations and notes, vol. 1: The 5th century, Liverpool. Elias, C. (2004), The Fragment: Towards a History and Poetics of a Performative Genre, Bern. Derrida, J. (1967), L’Écriture et la différence, Paris. Frank, M. (1984), “Das ‘fragmentarische Universum’ der Romantik”, in: L. Dällenbach/C.L. Hart Nibbrig (eds), Fragment und Totalität, Frankfurt a.M., 212–225. Gumbrecht, H.U. (1997), Eat your fragment! About imagination and the restitution of text, in: G. Most (ed.), Collecting Fragments – Fragmente sammeln, Göttingen, 315–327. Hofmann, H. (ed.) (1991), Fragmenta dramatica: Beiträge zur Interpretation der griechischen Tragikerfragmente und ihrer Wirkungsgeschichte, unter Mitarbeit von A. Harder, Göttingen. Karamanou, I. (2019), Refiguring tragedy: studies in plays preserved in fragments and their reception, Berlin/Boston. Lamm, J.A. (2005), “The art of interpreting Plato”, in: J. Mariña (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Friedrich Schleiermacher, Cambridge, 91–108. McHardy, F./Robson, J./Harvey, D. (eds) (2012), Lost dramas of Classical Athens: Greek tragic fragments, Exeter. Melero, A./M. Labiano/M. Pellegrino (eds) (2012), Textos fragmentarios del teatro griego antiguo: problemas, estudios y nuevas perspectivas, Lecce. Most, G. (ed.) (1997), Collecting Fragments – Fragmente sammeln, Göttingen. Most, G. (1998), “À la recherche du texte perdu: On collecting philosophical fragments”, in: W. Burkert/M.L. Gemelli Marciano/E. Matelli/L. Orelli (eds), Fragmentsammlungen philosophischer Texte der Antike/Le raccolte dei frammenti di filosofi antichi, Göttingen, 1–15. Most, G. (2009), “On fragments”, in: W. Tronzo (ed.), The Fragment: An Incomplete History, Getty Publications, 9–20. Most, G. (2010), “Fragments”, in: A.T. Grafton/S. Settis (eds), The Classical Tradition, Cambridge, Mass., 371–377. Most, G. (2011), “Sehnsucht nach dem Unversehrten. Überlegungen zu Fragmenten und deren Sammlern”, in: P. Kelemen/E. Kulcsár Szabó/Á. Tamás (eds), Kulturtechnik Philologie: zur Theorie des Umgangs mit Texten, Heidelberg, 27–43. Nesselrath, H.-G. (2010), “Comic fragments: transmission and textual criticism”, in: G.W. Dobrov (ed.), Brill’s Companion to the Study of Greek Comedy, Leiden/Boston, 423–453. Nochlin, L. (1994), The Body in Pieces. The Fragment as a Metaphor of Modernity, New York. OED = The Oxford English Dictionary, 20 vols 2nd ed., ed. by J. Simpson and E. Weiner. Oxford 1989. Olson, S.D. (2007), Broken Laughter. Select Fragments of Greek Comedy, Oxford. Ostermann, E. (1991), Das Fragment: Geschichte einer ästhetischen Idee, München. Ostermann, E. (2004), “Der Begriff des Fragments als Leitmetapher der ästhetischen Moderne (05.02.2004) ”, in: Goethezeitportal. URL:

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, 12.12.2019 Rusten, J. (ed.) (2011), The birth of comedy: texts, documents, and art from Athenian comic competitions, 486–280, Baltimore. Sontag, S. (2013), The Complete Rolling Stone Interview, by J. Cott, New Haven/London. Stephens, S. (2002), “Commenting on fragments”, in: R.K. Gibson/C. Shuttleworth Kraus (eds), The Classical commentary: histories, practices, theory, Leiden/Boston/Köln, 67–88. Varley-Winter, R. (2018), Reading Fragments and Fragmentation in Modernist Literature, Brighton.



Part I: Quotation, Transmission, and Reconstruction of Fragments

Bernhard Zimmermann

On the Hermeneutics of the Fragment  It is a truism to be constantly remembered that we must consider ourselves not only Classical Philologists but equally philosophers, historians, and literary scholars: our knowledge of Greek and Latin literature is extremely fragmentary, based on a pile of rubble. 1 Misfortunes in transmission mean that large sections of pre-Christian literature have not been preserved, with the specific reasons for these losses numerous and highly varied depending on the texts’ genre, author and epoch. 2 It often seems paradoxical, upon consideration, what has been lost and what survived. Normally it was ancient syllabi that passed judgement on the fate of authors, texts or even entire genres: 3 what we have preserved is often material that Late Antiquity assigned in schools, examined with commentaries, and “published”, meaning copied in numerous papyri. The authors who were not part of the canon, meanwhile, gradually vanished from the process of transmission. But, with a few exceptions, most of the works by even those authors who were read in schools have not been passed down to us directly through manuscripts. The transmission process primarily favored those few works that belonged to the ancient canon. A particularly clear case is the tragedian Sophocles, who composed 113 plays, only seven of which are entirely extant. 4 Any potential discrepancies between lost and extant works should serve as an ever-present warning to keep in mind whenever engaging with ancient texts. In what follows, two leading categories of literary history from the fifth and fourth centuries BC, tragedy and comedy, are taken as test cases for this admonition. The methodological challenges of these texts are considered, as they involve a constant interplay between what is extant and what is lost. Additionally, the relationship between complete works and fragments will be considered, as well as the scholarly arguments that deal with the two genres of tragedy and comedy. For, as a look into any popular literary history demonstrates, people are all too

 1 Translated by Rachel Bruzzone. A modified version of this article was published in German: B. Zimmermann “Hermeneutik des Fragments”, IYH 18 (2019), 1–20. 2 On the history of transmission, see Landfester 2007. 3 On the history of education in antiquity, see Marrou 1977. 4 For a summary of the transmission history of Greek tragedians cf. Zimmermann 2018, 10–14. In more detail, see Erbse 1975. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-002

  Bernhard Zimmermann quick to emphasize features of a genre or particulars of any given author in comparison to others, for example to discuss “typical” Sophocles or Aeschylus, or “typical” comedy or tragedy, without noting that our judgements are based on about seven percent of Sophocles 5 and a quarter of Aeschylus, Euripides and the comic poet Aristophanes. Given the enormous discrepancy in the quantity of what remains and what was lost, the fragments that we do possess of Greek comedy and tragedy are enormously significant. 6 The starting point for studying the two genres, tragedy and comedy, however, is fundamentally different. We have numerous fragments of the 256 comic poets who are attested by name, which are masterfully edited in the eight-volume Poetae Comici Graeci (PCG). 7 There are 200 minor tragic poets for whom we often have only names (i.e. all of the tragedians except Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides), with no or few fragments attached to them, and, in contrast to the extensive PCG, the 325 pages of the first volume of Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta (TrGF) suffice for this content. 8 To be sure, the fragments of Aeschylus 9 and Sophocles 10 fill an extensive volume. After the 386 BC permission

 5 To make matters worse with regard to Sophocles, only two of his seven extant tragedies are datable, Philoctetes from 409 BC and the posthumously produced Oedipus at Colonus of 406 BC. For the other five, we rely on textual indications, which are, as might be expected, controversial. 6 In this context, the history of fragmentary research is too extensive to be discussed. Reference is made to Most 1997; 2010; 2011. On the history of the word “fragment”, see Zinn 1994, 29–41. On fragments as an aesthetic concept, see Fetscher 2001. It should be noted in passing — although this still requires a thorough investigation – that there was no conscious fragmentation in classical antiquity, that is, no writings which, in the view of the author, were only provisional, sketching, that wore the apparel of a fragment, as Johann Gottfried Herder puts it in Über die neuere deutsche Literatur (1797), to which he gave the subtitle Erste Sammlung von Fragmenten. Accessible in: Gaier 1985, 161–259. 7 R. Kassel/C. Austin (eds), Poeti Comici Graeci, 8 Vols, Berlin/New York 1983–2001. 8 B. Snell/R. Kannicht (eds), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta, Vol. 1: Didascaliae tragicae, catalogi tragicorum et tragoediarum, testimonia et fragmenta tragicorum minorum, Göttingen 19862. 9 S. Radt (ed.), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta, Vol. 3: Aeschylus, Göttingen 1985. 10 S. Radt (ed.), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta, Vol. 4: Sophocles, Göttingen 19992.

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for reenactments of “Old Tragedy”, 11 Euripides 12 appeared not only in theaters but also on the syllabi of so-called grammarians — people we would today call highschool literature teachers. Only for Euripides’ work do we have so many fragments and hypotheses written by early philologists and preserved on papyri, which contain sufficient material that we can justifiably claim to know this tragedian reasonably well. The major sources for dramatic fragments are not so much papyri or palimpsests but rather primarily citations which appear in later authors. We have many more examples of this type of “indirect transmission” 13 of individual words, verses, partial verses or longer quotations for comedy than its sister genre tragedy, primarily because of one of the most important authors to cite comedy, Athenaeus of Naucratus (Second or Third Centuries BC). In his enormous work, Deipnosophists or The Learned Banqueters, everything that constitutes or concerns a spectacularly luxurious dinner takes place in the course of a learned conversation among educated men who are, fortunately, equally lavish with their citations of Greek literature. This conversation thoroughly discusses every type of dish and drink, and also the mechanisms of a feast including the necessary personnel, music and dance, dishes on which the food is served, and drinking vessels. As a look into extant comedies of Aristophanes (ca. 450–385 BC) and Menander (ca. 342– 290 BC) makes clear, food and drink are some of the favorite topics of Attic comedy, and therefore Athenaeus exploits these particular texts for his narrative. A further reason that Greek authors are richly cited from the Hellenistic period into the Byzantine is found in a particularity of the ancient education system. In the Roman Empire, in which the political significance of Greece was lost, schoolmasters oriented themselves toward authors of the heyday of Greek litera-

 11 Previously, the dramas performed at Athens on the occasion of two festivals to Dionysus, the Great Dionysia and the Lenaia, were only allowed to be performed once in the festival context. Performances in other locations and on other occasions were possible. Since the dramas were understood as spiritual offerings of the city of Athens to the god Dionysus, a performance in the sense of a spiritual sacrifice was only possible once; otherwise it might have offended the honor of the god and incurred punishment. Euripides’ Bacchae shows the lengths to which a wrathful god with injured pride can go. However, the re-enactments after 386 BC had devastating consequences for the condition of the texts, as directors and actors intervened, enlarging and abbreviating them according to their needs and the expectations of the audience; see Page 1934 and Mauer 2017. On the practice of reperformance, see Lamari 2017; Stewart 2017. 12 R. Kannicht (ed.), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta, Vols 5/1 and 5/2: Euripides, Göttingen 2004. 13 See Tosi 1988.

  Bernhard Zimmermann ture, namely the culture of the Fifth and Fourth Centuries and so-called Atticism. 14 Aristophanes, whose works are closely bound to their chronological context and whose often stinging jokes draw from the political circumstances of the time of their performance, has this type of education to thank for the survival of eleven complete comedies and numerous fragments. 15 In this period, it was thought that the spoken Greek of the Fifth Century could be learned from the works of Aristophanes. Because both the comedic language of Aristophanes — which in any case was never the daily language of Athens 16 — and all of the allusions to historical events and persons that appear in his comedies require comprehensive explanations, Aristophanes and the other comic authors of the Fifth Century BC were supplemented with explanatory guides to both their language (Glossaries) and their content (Scholia). These commentaries were frequently supplemented with citations of other comic poets whose work has subsequently been lost. The vocabulary of comedy, and especially its many neologisms, was not necessarily immediately comprehensible to a reader in Late Antiquity or Byzantine times, and it was therefore collected and deciphered in Atticist, Late Antique and Byzantine Lexica. As a result we have, for example, the Suda lexicon from the 10th Century with more than 5,000 entries on comedy. Such works are complemented by other material from the Lexicon of Pollux, a contemporary of Athenaeus who also comes from the Egyptian city of Naukratis, and the Lexicon of the patriarch Photius (9th century), as welcome additions. 17 The plays of Menander, on the other hand, have to do with lucky and unlucky love and are immediately comprehensible without extensive explanatory commentaries. They disappeared from the tradition in the Byzantine era because the poet did not write in “pure” Attic, at least according to the Atticist criteria. As a result, the “Sentiments of Menander” (Μενάνδρου γνῶμαι), a collection of universally-applicable aphorisms from Menander’s comedies, is the most important sources of information — at least from a didactic point of view. Only since the end of the 19th century has this author gained an increasing profile through numerous papyrus finds and palimpsests, a resource that continues to increase today. 18 But it is even the case for two authors who still have some complete comedies that there is an enormous gap between what is extant and what is lost. We have

 14 On this topic see Schmitz 1997, 67–96; Hose 1999, 162–184. 15 On the characteristics of Aristophanic comedy, see Zimmermann 2006a, 14–60. 16 See Willi 2003. 17 On the transmission of Attic comedy, see Zimmermann 2006a, 9–13. 18 Cf. Zimmermann 2006a, 178–179.

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about a quarter of what Aristophanes wrote: eleven of the 46 comedies with attested titles, or 15,284 verses out of the roughly 56,000 that should have made up these 46 plays. In addition, there are 924 fragments of varying sizes. For Menander, the mismatch is much more striking: due to papyrus discoveries made since the 19th century, one complete play has reemerged from the sands of Egypt, a character comedy with the title The Misanthrope (Dyskolos). Five more plays from the 105 to 109 comedies with attested titles are basically legible, so we possess only about 5,000 verses of the more than 110,000 that Menander must have written. 19

 Dealing with fragmentary drama in the realm of tragedy is often considerably methodologically simpler. In contrast to comedy, which must always offer its viewers something new, the tragedian is bound to specific materials. The comic playwright Antiphanes in the Fourth Century BC characterizes the distinction between the genres in the competition for the favor of the public: 20 Tragedy is a fortunate genre (ποίημα) in every respect, because first of all the stories are known to the viewers before a word is even spoken. It is therefore sufficient if the playwright gives only the smallest of hints. If I simply say “Oedipus”, the audience knows everything else: the father is Laius, the mother Jocasta, they know who the daughters and sons are, what he will endure, what he has done […] even if the tragedian then says nothing more. If tragedians have nothing more to say and their pieces have already lost their momentum, they must only lift the machine 21 like a finger and that is enough for the spectators. It is not like this for us, but rather we must invent everything new: new names, new stories and the actions that preceded them, what is now the issue, the events as they occur, and the opening moment of the story. And if a Chremes or Pheidon 22 leaves any of those out, he is booed offstage, while a Peleus or a Teucer 23 is free to do anything he likes.

With this plaintive monologue in Antiphanes’ comedy titled Poiesis (Poetry) the personified comedy or poetry herself describes in the form of a ritual makarismos

 19 On Menander see Zimmermann 2006a, 177–206. 20 Fragment 189 of Antiphanes appears with minor comments in: PCG, vol. 2, 1991, 418–419. A succinct study of Antiphanes appears in Orth 2014, 1012–1022. — All translations are my own. 21 This refers to géranos, the crane, on which a deus ex machina could appear at the conclusion of a tragedy. On the mechanics of staging in the classical Greek theater, see Taplin 1974, 434– 451; Newiger 1996, 96–106. 22 Typical comic names in the fourth century BC. 23 Typical tragic characters.

  Bernhard Zimmermann the difference between tragedy and comedy. The speaker underlines the pressure on comic poets to innovate: in contrast to the work of tragedians, everything must be new, everything invented, while the tragedian can adhere to the structure of the myths as they have been passed down, and, as a last resort, finding the play at a dead end, has at his disposal the deus ex machina, the god from the machine, who can with a word bring about a positive conclusion, or at least one consistent with the pre-existing myth. The advantages that comic poets have over tragic ones also apply — at least at first glance — to philologists who work with tragic fragments, because on the whole they have a well-known myth informing the plot of the pieces. A look at the attested titles of tragedies shows that, precisely as Aristotle writes in Poetics, 24 the tragedians largely limit themselves to a few mythological complexes. Precisely because of this restriction to a few limited myth cycles, they were able to foster a competitive dialogue with their rivals in the tragic agon for the favor of the public. They sought to show that their poetic talents could bring out new aspects and surprising twists even in a thoroughly treated subject. Aeschylus (d. 456 BC) counted among these rival tragedians of the second half of the fifth century because his pieces, unusually, were allowed to be performed after his death due to the admiration he enjoyed in Athens. 25 Aeschylus was — and this should not be forgotten in interpretation of classical tragedy — a contemporary for Sophocles and Euripides and likewise all others of their generation, because they competed against his plays in their contest. 26 We can see this directly agonal conversation in the treatment of the Electra-Orestes tragedies of Aeschylus (Choephori), Sophocles (Electra) and Euripides (Electra and Orestes). 27 At any rate the tragedians, in contrast with their colleagues in comedy, were compelled to search out alternative interpretive possibilities to win the approval of the public through “new ideas” (καιναὶ ἰδέαι,) as they endeavored to bring “something new” (καινὰ λέγειν) on the stage about the myth which they reinterpret. The framework of these stories, their mythical core, may not be touched — so says Aristotle in the 14th chapter of Poetics. Clytemnestra must die at Orestes’ hand, for example. Eriphyle must be killed by her son Alcmaeon. The poet, however, is entirely free in conceiving of his specific “new” play around this mythological kernel. The comparison of the Orestes-Electra dramas of Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides is an impressive example of how the same myth, and even

 24 Aristotle, Poetics, 14.1453b22–26. 25 On the normal requirement that each performance be unique, see above at n. 11. 26 On this see Zimmermann 2006b. 27 Cf. Zimmermann 2000, 119–124.

On the Hermeneutics of the Fragment  

the same episode of one myth — Orestes’ return home and Clytemnestra’s death at the hand of her son — can produce three entirely different plays. But still, the myth, as we know it from various sources, possesses a fixed framework and a fixed set of plot elements, and these can offer a great deal of help in the reconstruction of fragmentary plays. The first step in the tragedians’ process of conceptualizing a play must have consisted of considering the tragic nucleus of the myth in question. This nucleus would often consist in one of the Dionysian spheres of dual tensions, in which tragedies were embedded: in the relationship between individual and community, man and woman, humanity and god, young and old, exterior and interior, war and peace, or right and wrong, just to name a few. From these tensions arise threats and the transgression of boundaries, which can cause an existential crisis or a confrontation with death. 28 Around the mythological nucleus, which is responsible for the tragic tension — for whatever is “tragic” 29 in the piece —, the tragedians develop their own plots, which are in turn created through literary renovation of the myths 30 but with the known structures, motifs and the Bauformen 31 that are available for the genre. 32 The interplay of narrative structures largely found in Homeric epic, including the Iliad, Odyssey and the

 28 Burkert 1990, 26, shows how this basic situation derives from the ritual origins of tragedy: “Der Mensch im Angesicht des Todes”. — The threat of death is played out especially in constellations inside the household of the royal family: Transgression against the incest taboo (material from the Oedipus myth), the murder of children and mothers (from myths involving Iphigenia, Medea and Orestes), defence of the family against external intrusions (Sophocles’ Antigone). This crisis of the oikos often takes place in the context of a failed or only partially successful transition from youth to adulthood (Euripides’ Hippolytus and Iphigenia at Aulis; Sophocles’ Antigone). Cf., however, Hyllus in Sophocles’ Trachinian Women and Neoptolemus in Sophocles’ Philoctetes, characters who have successfully transitioned to adulthood. Both types of transition are modelled in the character of Telemachus in Homer’s Odyssey: initially, his initiation into adult life threatens to fail, but, under the guidance of Athena, he takes the initiative, breaks away from his worried mother, and becomes a son worthy of Odysseus. 29 On the meaning of this see Zimmermann 2011a. 30 It is only rarely possible to understand the development of a myth in different genres due to gaps in transmission. In particular, the lyric poet Stesichorus (sixth century BC) played an inestimable role as a bridge between epic and tragic traditions; see Garvie 1986, XVIII–XXII. 31 Jens 1971, referring to the recurring structural elements like the Parodos, the choral songs (stasima), transition songs (amoibaia), messenger speeches etc. 32 Arist. Poet. 17–18, 1455a22–1456a32, outlines the work of a tragedian: 1. basic plot sketch, 2. division into scenes, 3. elaboration to full drama length, 4. distribution of the people and separation into individual episodes.

  Bernhard Zimmermann epic cycle, 33 offers certain plots such as the nostos, 34 anagnorisis, 35 hikesie, 36 or vengeance as the core of the drama, 37 where the dominant structure can also be enriched with one or more sub-plots. 38 Let us proceed from this background back to the question of reconstructing the plot of a tragedy that is preserved only in fragments. The Palamedes myth can serve as an example. 39 Palamedes is one of the great heroes of the Trojan War, a man who competes with Odysseus in his intelligence. Because he exposed Odysseus’ trick when he attempted to avoid involvement in the Trojan War through feigned madness, he earned Odysseus’ relentless hatred. Odysseus takes revenge at Troy, falsely accusing him of treason. Palamedes is sentenced to death and executed. Like Prometheus, Palamedes was given credit for a series of inventions that ease human life. Thus Palamedes insists in the Aeschylean drama that he invented the various officer positions and “the possibility of distinguishing between meals, specifically to have breakfast, lunch and thirdly dinner”. 40 Or he emphasizes: And then I organized life in Greece and Its allies, which was previously chaotic and animal-like. First I discovered numbers and mathematics, the foremost of all sciences. Aesch. fr. ** 181a TrGF III  33 The epic cycle contains all of the other epics that surround the Iliad and Odyssey and from which we have only some fragments and tables of contents from late antiquity. The material contained in them had a great influence on tragedians of the fifth century BC, however cf. Reichel 2011, 69–71. 34 The nostos-structure originates in Homer’s Odyssey and appears in Aeschylus’ Persians, Agamemnon, Choephoroi; Sophocles’ Electra, Trachinian Women; and Euripides’ Electra and Bacchae. The first part of Euripides’ Heracles is – in connection with a katabasis theme, representing the journey into the underworld and originating in the Odyssey – also formed on a pattern established in the Odyssey. On this see Stanchi 2007. 35 Again on an Odyssean pattern (the recognition of Odysseus by his nurse Eurycleia due to his scars). This is found in the Orestes-Electra myths in connection with a nostos-structure: Aeschylus’ Agamemnon, Choephori; Sophocles’ Electra; Euripides’ Electra, Iphigenia at Taurus, Ion, and Helen. 36 Aeschylus’ Suppliants; Sophocles’ Oedipus at Colonus; Euripides’ Heracleidae, Suppliants, and as a secondary theme in his Medea. 37 Aeschylus’ Agamemnon, Choephori; Sophocles’ Ajax, Electra; Euripides’ Medea, Hippolytus, Hecuba, Electra, Orestes. The idea of revenge, modeled on the insult in the Iliad, frequently appears in connection with a burial prohibition (cf. the body of Hector in the Iliad, which is only through the supplication of Priam “set free” to be buried), for example in Sophocles’ Ajax and Antigone. 38 Arist. Poet. 18.1452b32–1456a32, lists four types in his “Addendum” to tragedy: complex, pathetic, ethical and a fourth form, which is unclear due to textual problems. 39 On this material cf. Usener 1995. 40 Aesch. fr. *182 TrGF III.

On the Hermeneutics of the Fragment  

The fragments from the Sophoclean and Euripidean versions have a similar tenor: the tragic hero accusingly holds up the good deeds he has performed for humanity. 41 Now the question arises of how these fragments fit into the myths and which position they might have held in their respective dramas. The tragic nucleus of the Palamedes myth is clearly to be found in the tension between individual and society. This foundational constellation of individual and society is thereby charged with a tragic potential: the individual undeservedly suffers the most terrible injustice from his own society, for which he had performed outstanding service. The tragic conflict between individual and society runs through other tragedies as well, from various starting points. In the three Philoctetes tragedies of Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides, of which only the Sophoclean version exists, the society needs the help of the specific individual to whom it had long since done an injustice. 42 The individual must decide if he wants to persist in his wounded pride and hatred for the society or to be re-incorporated into it. Yet another variation on the story is that of the benefactor of humanity who suffers injustice, a version that appears in the Prometheus and Heracles myths, 43 but in these cases it is the gods who severely punish the benefactor. This basic pattern of the individual and the community that harms him in the Palamedes myth is enriched by sub-themes, especially the intelligence (σοφία) that allows the individual to discover clever and useful inventions (σοφίσματα, εὑρήματα, ὠφελήματα) and thus become a benefactor for the community. Palamedes is accused of treason, with Odysseus as his accuser and Agamemnon as judge, able to perform his duties either willingly or reluctantly (as in the Euripidean Hecuba). The debate (ἀγὼν λόγων) taking place between Odysseus and Palamedes thus serves as a statement on his merits as a benefactor. As often occurs in such verbal showdowns — and especially because the master of speaking, Odysseus, takes part in the argument — the speeches furthermore reflect on the power of speech and the relativity of words like σοφία.

 41 The sophist Gorgias, probably under the influence of the tragic treatments of Palamedes, writes a fictitious defence of Palamedes; text and translation can be found at Buchheim 1989, 17–37. 42 Philoctetes, in possession of the bow of Heracles, is bitten by a snake on the island of Lemnos on the journey to Troy. The festering wound creates such a stench that the Greeks leave Philoctetes behind on the island. Ten years later, they learn from the seer Helenus that they can only take Troy with Philoctetes’ bow and his voluntary assistance and participation in the war. 43 Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound; Euripides, Hercules Furens.

  Bernhard Zimmermann We can see from the fragments of the Palamedes pieces taking in consideration also the Prometheus Bound ascribed to Aeschylus 44 how the agonal dialogue took place among the tragic figures. Apparently one tragedian, usually Aeschylus, established a theme which his rivals subsequently tackled. In the catalogue of inventions that are attributed to the protagonist, found among the Palamedes fragments, subsequent tragedians — so far as we can see — seem to have adhered to the repertoire developed by Aeschylus, although they have employed variety in the language and supplemented or completed the list. The comparison becomes very clear for the discovery of mathematics, writing and astronomy. Context is not clear in the Aeschylean and Sophoclean plays, but one can assume that the idea of order and an organized human life through skill (τέχνη) played a role and therefore gave this catalogue of inventions a polis-related dimension. It can also be assumed that the problems of right and wrong, gratitude and ingratitude, and power and rhetoric — which are also otherwise associated with Odysseus in choral lyric 45 and tragedy — played a role. The Euripidean Palamedes fragments presumably reflect on the meaning of intelligence (σοφόν) for the community and in relation to right and wrong. 46

 The problems of working with comic fragments can be explored through the example of a comedy of one of the older contemporaries and rivals of Aristophanes, Cratinus, entitled Dionysalexandros and performed at the beginning of the Peloponnesian War (431/430 BC). 47 Through the indirect transmission of citations in late antique and Byzantine authors, we have a number of fragments, presented here in translation and initially without comments: Crat. fr. 39 “And there are scissors in it, with which we shear the sheep and the goats”; fr. 40 “A. And what did he have on and with him? Tell me!” “B. A thyrsus, a colorful and gold robe, and a wine vessel”; fr. 41 “And as you heard the words, a shudder that shook you to your eye-teeth came over you”; fr. 42 “Do you want some kind of columned halls and colorful porticoes?”; fr. 43 “No, but instead to walk in the fresh dung of cattle and sheep”; fr. 44 “And I will bring sardines from Pontus in baskets”; fr. 45  44 On the question of authenticity of citations cf. Zimmermann 2018, 48–49. 45 Pind. Nem. 7.17–33; Nem. 8.20–34. 46 Eur. Frr. 580, 581 TrGF V 2. 47 A comprehensive commentary can be found at Bianchi 2016, 198–301. Text in: PCG IV, 140– 147. A literary profile of Cratinus can be found at Zimmermann 2011b, 718–730.

On the Hermeneutics of the Fragment  

“And the idiot runs around screaming ‘baaah, baaah’ like a sheep”; fr. 49 “Goosebreeder, cattle-herd”; fr. 50 “a boxwood bed”. Even this sparse material can offer some clues to serve as a basis for interpretation of the piece. The title of the comedy, Dionysalexandros, refers to a form of comedy which can also be found among other authors: one person assumes the role or identity of a second person, leading to comic confusion. The most famous example is Amphitryon. In the comedy of Cratinus, Dionysus, the god of the theater, wine, intoxication, and ecstasy, takes on the identity of the Trojan prince Paris (also called Alexander), who set in motion the Trojan War with his abduction of the Spartan queen Helen, the wife of Menelaus. Fragment 40 suggests our Dionysian context: the thyrsus staff and wine pitcher are clearly identifiable as attributes of the god and his followers, the Maenads or Bacchants. Since the name Paris/Alexander appears in the title, the plot of the comedy must take place at the time of the Trojan War. We therefore have before us a comedy that is similar to contemporary tragedy in its use of Homeric myth — a form of comedy that is not attested in extant Aristophanes. Fragments 39, 43, 45, 48 and 49 have to do with a banquet or a celebration and 42 and 50 with luxury; furthermore, fragments 39, 43, 45, 48 and 49 have a bucolic ambiance, such as we recognize from Satyr plays, for example Euripides’ Cyclops. This admittedly not yet very enlightening picture nevertheless serves as a substantial enlargement of what is found in a papyrus from an ancient landfill at Oxyrhynchus and published in 1904 (P.Oxy. 663), 48 which preserves a part of the Hypothesis, or “Table of Contents” of Dionysalexandros. The text, which unfortunately has not been completely preserved, begins shortly before the “Parabasis”, one of the typical elements of a comedy of the Fifth Century, in which the chorus, standing on an empty stage, addresses the audience directly and in a metapoetic form speaks about the author and the comic Muse, expressing itself in a kind of agonal dialogue about other poets and about their artwork. As we learn from the Hypothesis, the play included a discussion between Hermes and Dionysus about the “Judgement of Paris”, the beauty contest between the three goddesses Hera, Athena and Aphrodite. Dionysus, bewitched by the beauty of the goddesses and at the prospect of seeing them naked, seems to have persuaded Hermes to allow him to pronounce the judgement in the role of Paris/Alexander, to whom the duty fell in myth. We can therefore speak of the comic “myth alteration” 49 that Cratinus has made. The three goddesses appear: Hera promises eternal rule, Athena sincere courage in battle, and Aphrodite

 48 Grenfell/Hunt 1904, 69–72. 49 For this specifically tragic technique, cf. Vöhler/Seidensticker 2005.

  Bernhard Zimmermann the marriage of the greatest beauty and attractiveness. Dionysus awards Aphrodite the victory, sails straight to Sparta, and returns with Helen — the leap forward in time, which defies logic and has no place in non-Aristotelian comedy, must have been bridged by a choral song. Dionysus hears shortly afterward that the Greeks have already arrived in Troy in search of Helen and are pillaging the countryside. He quickly hides Helen in a basket — here we see this element of slapstick comedy for the first time — and changes himself into a ram. 50 But the metamorphosis does not appear to have been entirely successful, as fr. 45 suggests: “this idiot is running around shouting ‘baaa’ like a sheep”. Now, alarmed by the approaching Greeks, the proper Paris/Alexander appears, discovers Helen and Dionysus and intends to deliver them over to the Greeks. But, faced with the beautiful Helen, he is overwhelmed with pity and wants to take her as his wife while surrendering Dionysus to the Greeks. The Satyrs, who make up the chorus, accompany their lord and promise not to abandon him. Concerning the plot before the Parabasis, we can only guess. We can assume that the play depends on the well-known topos of satyr-plays involving the separation of satyrs from their lord Dionysus. Dionysus may have announced in the Prologue — perhaps in the mode of an exposition such as we see in Euripides’ Bacchus — the reason for his presence in the Troad, namely the search for his satyrs. The Parodos, the choral entry song, can be imagined as a rustic scene comparable to that of the Euripidean Cyclops. Hermes appears to win over Paris as the judge in the beauty contest between the three goddesses, but instead he encounters Dionysus, who, probably through bribery, convinces Hermes to allow him to serve in the role of Paris/Alexander. In Dionysalexander Cratinus is clearly depending on satyr plays: 51 both in the conception of the story — the heroic myth is played out in the bucolic and animalistic world of the Satyrs — and also in the characters, namely those of Dionysus and the satyrs. The satiric elements of the Dionysalexander can be seen as Cratinus’ efforts to broaden the repertoire of comedy by enlarging it with another genre and bringing in something new onstage to win the approval of the public.

 50 This is mythologically and ritually completely appropriate, because the ram is a holy animal for Dionysus. 51 Fundamental to this poorly-attested genre of Greek theater is Lämmle 2013.

On the Hermeneutics of the Fragment  

Dionysalexander is nonetheless a comedy, and not a satyr-comedy, because it unfolds according to the motif of satyr plays that depends on the conception of a comic spectacle. 52 The play on mistaken identity — Dionysus as Paris — becomes even much more complex in that Cratinus “convincingly”, as the last sentence of the Hypothesis notes, “through hints” uses this comedy to mock the politician Pericles for leading Athens to war. How this hint that Dionysus/Paris represents Pericles was made clear is not evident in the fragments; nor is it possible to determine whether it depended on visual signals — such as the well-known and frequently-mocked onion-shaped head of Pericles — or whether it depended solely on verbal elements and dramatic action. That enemies devastate the country and that the protagonist Dionysus is characterized as a coward can easily be imagined as representing the situation of Athens at the beginning of the Peloponnesian War and especially with respect to Pericles. The Periclean strategy of abandoning the land to the Spartans and depending on the fleet could well be interpreted as cowardice. The fact of war having broken out is represented as the personal responsibility of Dionysus/Pericles – he wants to be the most beautiful and attractive — and, driven by sexual desire, he courts the retaliation of the Greeks in the comedy and the Spartans in reality. However, even the proper Paris, who would like to avoid the risk of war by exiling both Dionysus and Helen, succumbs to his emotions and impulses: to the compassion he has for Helen and his desire to win her as his wife. He, too, is in no way better than his divine doppelgänger. The political message that emerges from this burlesque plot is therefore entirely pessimistic: even if the man who desires war for egotistical reasons is banished, 53 nothing changes, because the other politicians also allow themselves to be led entirely by their personal interests and emotions. Further insights can be gained from this short overview of the Dionysalexander about genre history and generic questions concerning the elements that constitute comedy. While Aristophanes interacted primarily with the sister-genre tragedy, and especially with Euripides, as well as contemporary choral lyric, Cratinus apparently preferred models and reference points in the Archaic period: Homer in the Dionysalexander and the roughly contemporary Nemesis, in which  52 In general, the question of genre arises only in circumstances when the “Sitz im Leben” of a work has been lost and one is engaged with philological and literary concerns. This begins in Greece in the Hellenistic period in the third century BC. For the viewers in the Theater of Dionysus, every play which was put on in a contest between comic poets was per se a comedy. 53 The extradition of Dionysus might recall the Spartans’ demand for the expulsion of Pericles due to the miasma associated with the Cylonian Conspiracy, discussed by Thucydides in his History of the Peloponnesian War (1.27).

  Bernhard Zimmermann the strange birth of Helen from an egg was a central element – Zeus had seduced Leda in the form of a swan —; Hesiod and the Hesiodoi (Hesiod and his Companions); and Archilochus in the Archilochoi (Archilochus and his Companions). Cratinus seems to have developed the form of “transparent” comedy, which served Aristophanes so well in his Knights: behind the actual stage action — in this case the previous history of the Trojan War — a second level comes to light, which receives its meaning from the first, in Dionysalexander the question about the outbreak of the Peloponnesian war and the search for the guilty party and his motives. The fact that the god Dionysus appears as a character as he does in the Frogs of Aristophanes has to do not only with reasons of the content of the place but also suggests a particular “Dionysian poetry” of Cratinus, whose irrepressible and rousing power Aristophanes hints to in his Knights (424 BC) 54 and which Cratinus makes into a comic theme the following year in his Pytine (Wineflask), a retort to Knights, in which the younger poet represents the ideal of a sober, intellectual and thrifty comic art (v. 537 ff.). 55 It also points in this “Dionysian” direction that he appears to have put on the comedy in the entirely Dionysian form of a satyr play.

 The preceding remarks should have made it sufficiently clear that anyone who deals with the fragments of Greek tragedy or comedy should see himself as a restorer working with a picture, who, in addition to well-preserved, coherent sections of a mosaic also has a box containing thousands of pebbles, some of which are sure to fit with the mosaic. Others might be part of it, but must be laid to the side until in the course of time there may be other indications that conclusively suggest they belong to this specific mosaic. The trained eye can see that still other stones conclusively do not fit with the project currently under consideration. Thus, as a restorer-philologist, one is constantly faced by the challenge of laying the stones together so that they form, as much as possible, a full picture, in a way that respects both certainty and coherence, which is not generally speaking a large overlap. Some pieces will be easier and others more difficult or indeed incomplete. Some mosaic stones blend smoothly onto others and yet do not pro-

 54 Ar. Eq. 526–528. 55 Ar. Eq. 537–540.

On the Hermeneutics of the Fragment  

duce a whole, because experience suggests that something may be amiss. Intuitive “feeling” is also a part of philological thinking that somehow plays into our convictions. Importantly, we must take into account and be conscious of the fact that in all of our beliefs, literary taste, divinatio, always plays a role. 56 And although we may not be certain that certain stones really fit together, we can still fit together shards, while reserving the right to move them to another place later, or to put them back in the box as unassignable. Any philologist who is not satisfied with what is often the very small selection that we have of the complete works of an ancient author is obliged to include the fragments in his reflections. And like a restorer, he can orient himself based on the larger, extant units that suggest a framework and offer indisputable expectations. 57 Inevitably he will constantly work with parallels, always looking for similarities (similia), be it in word choice, meter, title, or anything else, although he must always be conscious that these parallels stand on shaky legs, because it is precisely a feature of good literature to always surprise or confound its reader. 58 We can of course read the fragments as aesthetically coherent, without requiring an answer about their complete form, like the poems of Sappho or the supposed “aphorisms” attributed to Heraclitus, which are not really aphorisms in the true sense, but part of a larger work that has not been preserved. 59 Or we can be content with understanding the language of the fragments and the facts and objects mentioned in them, namely the “Realia”. However, a philological engagement with fragments has other challenges. This approach seeks not only to reconstruct the place of the fragments in their original whole but also to consider the question of why a text fragmented in the tradition and how the resulting fragment was used in various literary discourses. We also often have testimonies about the life and work of an author that must be taken into consideration, which usually initially appears to be helpful but in the end can prove to be a complicating factor. The necessary considerations in reconstructing a text, while keeping the whole in mind and having to accept quite a number of assumptions, inevitably  56 On the conceptual history of divinatio: Schaeffer 1977. 57 On this, see Dällenbach 1984, 7: “Fragment und Totalität sind korrelativ; über das eine ist nicht zu sprechen ohne das andere”. 58 This recalls Aristophanes’ Frogs, in which the frog-chorus, contrary to the expectations of the viewers imagining a play like Wasps or Birds, play only a minor role and are probably never visible. It could also recall Euripides’ Phoenician Women, the name of which recalls the identical name of Phrynichus but with which it had no relationship. For the signalling effect of titles, cf. fragment 189 of Antiphanes, discussed above. 59 See Erler 2011, 270.

  Bernhard Zimmermann lead to a hermeneutic circle, 60 and one that is historically determined, because any text is read differently from how it would have been read 100, or even ten, years ago. But with appropriate awareness of this hermeneutic process, this factor represents not a risk but enrichment. 61 One is challenged to question the process of interpretation constantly, to be open about its dependence on the time period that produces it, and the types of expectations that are reasonable in approaching the text. Thus the “hermeneutic correlation”, the relationship between interpretation and the text being interpreted, becomes a process that is open and never complete, but rather inspires constant rethinking. 62 This hermeneutic of fragments requires courage in establishing a hypothesis which, especially when such a hypothesis turns out to be unsustainable in the course of discussion, can also suggest new paths to a solution. For it is only through building hypotheses that touch on either new theoretical approaches — which can serve as a heuristic tool but should not be uncritically applied to an ancient text — or new questions pertaining to a literary work or fragment that we can achieve a new view of texts that have been frequently read and interpreted. The hermeneutics of fragments is by nature a process of constant revision and questioning of the results, which can only ever be provisional. One could, with some exaggeration, say that this method is obliged to reveal mistakes as well as illuminating the text. Such a hermeneutic is from the beginning transdisciplinary and interdisciplinary, because the work with fragments is always an act of contextualization. So it is not only the literary context of the work of any particular author but also the genre and the particular rules and norms of the literary context and the text’s complex relationship to other literary works, as well as the contemporary and diachronic political, cultural and religious contexts that must be taken into account. The work with fragments is therefore an open science and an interdisciplinary dialogue about an experimental field of hermeneutics.

Bibliography Bianchi, F.P. (2016), Kratinos, Archilochoi – Empipramenoi, Heidelberg. Buchheim, T. (1989), Gorgias von Leontinoi. Reden, Fragmente und Testimonien, Hamburg. Burkert, W. (1990), Wilder Ursprung, Berlin.

 60 Gadamer 1986, 271. 61 In particular see Susan Sontag in her Essay “Against Interpretation” (in: Sontag 2013, 10– 20). Every interpretation changes the text, or even rewrites it. On this cf. Figal 2017, 107f. 62 Cf. Figal 2009, 216–219.

On the Hermeneutics of the Fragment  

Dällenbach, L. (1984), “Einleitung,” in: L. Dällenbach/C.L. Hart Nibbrig (eds), Fragment und Totalität, Frankfurt am Main, 7–17. Erbse, H. (1975), Überlieferungsgeschichte der griechischen klassischen und hellenistischen Literatur, in: H. Hunger et al. (eds), Die Textüberlieferung der antiken Literatur und der Bibel, München, 207–283. Erler, M. (2011), “Philosophie,” in: B. Zimmermann (ed.), Handbuch der griechischen Literatur der Antike. Vol. One: Die Literatur der archaischen und klassischen Zeit, München, 254– 288. Fetscher, J. (2001), “Fragment,” in: Karlheinz Barck et al. (eds), Ästhetische Grundbegriffe, Vol. 2, Stuttgart/Weimar, 551–588. Figal, G. (2009), Verstehensfragen, Tübingen. Figal, G. (2017), “Überraschungen. Zur Hermeneutik des Unvorhersehbaren,” in: Freiburger Universitätsblätter 217, 107–108. Gadamer, H.-G. (1986), Wahrheit und Methode, 5. Auflage, Tübingen. Gaier, U. (ed.) (1985), Johann Gottfried Herder, Frühe Schriften 1764–1772, Frankfurt am Main. Garvie, A.F. (1986), Aeschylus, Choephori, Oxford. Grenfell, B.P./A.S. Hunt (1904), “Argumentum of Cratinus’ Διονυσαλέξανδρος,” in: The Oxyrhynchus Papyri 6, 69–72. Hose, M. (1999), Kleine griechische Literaturgeschichte. Von Homer bis zum Ende der Antike, München. Jens, W. (ed.) (1971), Die Bauformen der griechischen Tragödie, München. Lämmle, R. (2013), Poetik des Satyrspiels, Heidelberg. Landfester, M. (ed.) (2007), Geschichte der antiken Texte. Autoren- und Werklexikon, Stuttgart/ Weimar. Lamari, A.A. (2017), Reperforming Greek Tragedy. Theater, Politics, and Cultural Mobility in the Fifth and Fourth Centuries BC, Berlin/Boston. Marrou, H.I. (1977), Geschichte der Erziehung im klassischen Altertum, München. Mauer, K. (2017), Leben und Werke des Interpolators. Eine Blindstelle der Klassischen Philologie?, Freiburg im Breisgau/Berlin/Wien. Most, G. (ed.) (1997), Collecting Fragments – Fragmente sammeln, Göttingen. Most, G. (2010), “Fragments”, in: A.T. Grafton/S. Settis (eds), The Classical Tradition, Cambridge, Mass., 371–377. Most, G. (2011), Sehnsucht nach dem Unversehrten. Überlegungen zu Fragmenten und deren Sammlern, in: P. Kelemen/E. Kulcsár Szabó/Á. Tamás (eds), Kulturtechnik - Zur Theorie des Umgangs mit Texten, Heidelberg, 27–43. Newiger, H.-J. (1996), Drama und Theater. Ausgewählte Schriften zum antiken Drama, Stuttgart. Orth, C. (2014), Antiphanes, in: B. Zimmermann/A. Rengakos (eds), Geschichte der griechischen Literatur der Antike, Vol. Two: Die Literatur der klassischen und hellenistischen Zeit, München, 1012–1022. PCG = Rudolf Kassel/Colin Austin (eds), Poeti Comici Graeci, 8 Volumes, Berlin/New York, 1983–2001. Page, D. (1934), Actors’ Interpolations in Greek Tragedy, Oxford. Reichel, M. (2011), “Epische Dichtung”, in: B. Zimmermann (ed.), Handbuch der griechischen Literatur der Antike, Vol. One: Die Literatur der archaischen und klassischen Zeit, München, 69–71. Schaefer, H. (1977), “Divinatio. Die antike Bedeutung des Begriffs und sein Gebrauch in der neuzeitlichen Philologie”, Archiv für Begriffsgeschichte 21, 188–225.

  Bernhard Zimmermann Schmitz, T. (1997), Bildung und Macht. Zur sozialen und politischen Funktion der Zweiten Sophistik in der griechischen Welt der Kaiserzeit, München. Sontag, S. (2013), Essays of the 1960s & 70s, ed. David Rieff, New York. Stanchi, N. (2007), La presenza assente. L’attesa del personaggio fuori scena nella tragedia greca, Milano. Stewart, E. (2017), Greek Tragedy on the Move. The Birth of a Panhellenic Art Form ca. 500–300 BC, Oxford. Taplin, O. (1974), The Stagecraft of Aeschylus. The Dramatic Use of Exits and Entrances in Greek Tragedy, Oxford. Tosi, R. (1988), Studi sulla tradizione indiretta dei classici greci, Bologna. Usener, K. (1995), “Palamedes. Bedeutung und Wandel eines Heldenbildes in der antiken Literatur”, Würzburger Jahrbücher für die Altertumswissenschaft. New Series 20, 49–78 Vöhler, M./B. Seidensticker (eds) (2005), Mythenkorrekturen. Zu einer paradoxalen Form der Mythenrezeption, Berlin/New York. Willi, A. (2003), The Languages of Aristophanes. Aspects of Linguistic Variation in Classical Attic Greek, Oxford. Zimmermann, B. (2000), Europa und die griechische Tragödie. Vom kultischen Spiel zum Theater der Gegenwart, Frankfurt am Main. Zimmermann, B. (2006a), Die griechische Komödie, Frankfurt am Main. Zimmermann, B. (2006b), Aischylos-Rezeption im 5. Jahrhundert v. Chr., in: Lexis 24, 53–62. Zimmermann, B. (2011a), “Über das Tragische bei den Griechen”, in: L. Hühn/P. Schwab (eds), Die Philosophie des Tragischen, Berlin/New York, 133–141. Zimmermann, B. (2011b), “Die attische Komödie,” in: B. Zimmermann (ed.), Handbuch der griechischen Literatur der Antike. Erster Band: Die Literatur der archaischen und klassischen Zeit, München, 718–730. Zimmermann, B. (2018), Die griechische Tragödie, Stuttgart. Zinn, E. (1994), Viva Vox. Römische Klassik und deutsche Dichtung, Frankfurt am Main u.a.

Jeffrey Henderson

Old Comic Citation of Tragedy As Such Fifth-century comedy borrowed from tragedy in three principal ways: by incidental quotation of tragic verses either unchanged or only slightly altered; by parody, that is, by distorting particular tragic verses or their scenic environments to make them seem ridiculous; and by paratragedy, that is, the incorporation or re-composition of tragic verses or scenes in order to enhance the comedy tonally, scenically, or thematically. In each case, there was a complete tragedy to which the comic borrowing originally belonged. But beyond this, much is still unclear. What form did these complete tragedies take when comic poets borrowed from them? Were they performances recalled, or texts read? Were most spectators expected to recall a whole tragedy, so that they could appreciate the original context of a borrowing? Or had there been intermediate excerption or dismemberment, so that comic borrowing and spectator recognition centered not on recollection of complete originals but rather on well-known excerpts: quotations, arias, speeches, or scenes? If so, who were the excerptors? Candidates would include the poets, the producers, or the performers themselves, and also members of the theatrical public such as scholars, teachers, public speakers, symposiasts, connoisseurs (including past or future performers), and fans. On what criteria would the excerpts have been chosen? Would these excerpts somehow have become popular, or would they become popular only after excerption? These questions center on a literary aspect of fifth-century comedy that bears on the broader transition from performance culture to the reading cultures that we find in place by the fourth century. What stages of this transition can we discern, and when did they happen? Looking back on the fifth century in light of later comic practice, do we see continuity or change? These are spacious questions to be sure, but something can be learned by focusing on those particular instances in which a comic speaker is in some way motivated to identify a tragic borrowing as such, whether the borrowing was paratragic, incidental parody, or a straight quotation. I will suggest that until very late in Aristophanes’ fifth-century career, most spectators still knew, and comic poets expected them to know tragedy only through performance, however familiar the spectators may have been with written texts of other kinds of poetry.

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-003

  Jeffrey Henderson Although Aristophanes was aware in the 420s that some tragic texts or excerpts were circulating, 1 he speaks of reading knowledge of tragedy not as characterizing his normal audience but as being limited to small groups of specialists, whom he associates with Euripides and the sophists and whom he decries. By the end of the century, however, and rather suddenly, reading knowledge of tragedy was apparently becoming general enough that in Frogs (Lenaea 405) Aristophanes no longer decries only these specialists for their book-reading but the entire audience along with them. In Frogs Aeschylus held on to his chair, but in the real world the winner was to be Euripides and his books, as amply shown by the literary culture of tragedy that continued to develop in the fourth century. 2 Incidental parody and straight quotation of tragedy are very frequent in comedies of Aristophanes’ era, 3 which has suggested to some that the poets must have counted on a significant number of spectators having the kind of literary knowledge that is attested for the fourth century. 4 But incidental parodies and straight quotations do not in fact presuppose spectator familiarity with their original contexts: each had been excerpted (sundered) from its original context and made part of the present comic performance, so spectators needed only to recognize it as tragic or tragic-sounding. More revealing, though less frequent, is paratragedy, which at least to some extent always does presuppose familiarity with its model, whether or not a comic character explicitly identifies the model. By contrast with incidental parody and straight quotation, paratragedy always assumed spectator recollection not only of the original but also, as the Aristophanic examples show, of the original as performed in a theater: unlike parodies and straight quotations, paratragedy always contains scenic elements of the original that could not be captured in texts. Labeling of paratragedy occurs in our earliest extant comedy, Aristophanes’ Acharnians (Lenaea 425), when Dicaeopolis borrows from Euripides elements of his play Telephus (438) so that, like Telephus, he could make a convincing speech and thus save his life and recover his honor. Dicaeopolis seeks not words from a script, however, but specifically a scenic identity, namely Telephus’ original costume and props. These inspire clever speech on their own: as he suits up, Dicaeopolis exclaims (line 447), “Bravo! I’m filling up with pithy sayings (ῥηματίων)

 1 Already in Clouds (D 423) speeches (rheseis) by Euripides are said to be learned at least in the “Phrontisterion”, the sophistic school in which Strepsiades had enrolled his son (lines 1353– 1390), but there is no evidence that whole plays were circulating at that time. 2 Recent studies are Hanink 2014, Wright 2013, and Zanetto 2014. 3 But much less frequent earlier; for possibilities see Bakola 2010. 4 As recently e.g. Wright 2012 and Farmer 2017.

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already!” This scenic emphasis establishes the pattern for paratragedy in subsequent comedies as well: in Peace, for example, Trygaeus’ announces his impersonation of Bellerophon as re-enacting a famous scene on the mechane, with a dung-beetle standing in for Pegasus: “My little Pegasus, my thoroughbred wings, you must pick me up and fly me straight to Zeus!” (lines 76–77). In Birds Sophocles’ Tereus (line 100) and in Thesmophoriazusae (lines 1059–1063) Euripides’ Echo (from Andromeda) are transported to the comic stage in their original costumes in order to take on new comic roles. In Thesmophoriazusae the women complain that Euripides slanders them not in texts but from the stage: “Where, on any occasion where there are spectators, tragic actors, and choruses, has he spared us his disparagement…” (lines 390–391), and the play’s extensive paratragedy of Telephus no longer needs labelling: an indication of that tragedy’s now-classic status. Inlaw’s escapes from the women do not merely quote the originals but re-enact them as what Euripides himself had called them: “contrivances of escape” (line 765 μηχανὴ σωτηρίας ~ Eur. Hel. 1034) using costumes and props, so that for example in re-enacting the recognition scene from Helen, Helen again recognizes Menelaus not merely by his words but, more crucially, by his original costume (lines 906–912). What seems clear is that when Aristophanes labels paratragedy, he expects the spectators to recall what they had seen in the theater. 5 The words, which could be captured in texts, were less essential to paratragedy than the music, dance, costumes, props, and staging, which could not. 6 Presumably most spectators acquired their knowledge of the originals not from texts but from theatrical performances: of new plays at the major festivals, of re-stagings of older plays at rural Dionysia. 7 Nor, apparently, did their knowledge or theater-going experience need to be extensive or récherché: parodies that assume familiarity with the original were drawn from relatively few plays: recent sensations like the escape-plays that Euripides produced after the failure of his Trojan trilogy in 415, or evident classics like Telephus (first produced in 438). Thus Inlaw’s tirade “à la Aeschylus’ Lycourgeia” when mocking Agathon (Th. 134–145 κατ᾿ Αἰσχύλον ἐκ τῆς Λυκουργείας) must recall a revival, since the paratragedy is re-enacted, both visually and verbally. 8 Many of the spectators will also have been theatrical performers themselves, like the old juror Philocleon in Wasps, who boasts that he can still dance

 5 This is the also the conclusion reached in the very detailed study by Mastromarco 2006. 6 On the visual and musical aspects see now Sills 2018, esp. pp. 147–179. 7 See Vahtikari 2014, Lamari 2017, and Stewart 2017. 8 For posthumous revivals of Aeschylus’ plays during Aristophanes’ career see Biles 2006– 2007.

  Jeffrey Henderson “those old dances with which Thespis used to compete” and challenges “today’s dancers” to match him (lines 1476 ff.). 9 Philocleon also lists among the privileges of being a juror that he can make the tragic actor Oeagrus “select the best rhesis from Niobe and recite it” (line 580): he has no thought of a text. Recollection solely of performance without the aid of texts may explain cases of originals inaccurately cited in comedy, unless the texts that have been transmitted to us derive from a different performance than the one cited. For example, the chorus leader of Clouds 534–536 recalls Electra in Aeschylus’ Libation Bearers as hoping to find the lock of Orestes’ hair instead of being surprised when she finds it, as in our text. In Frogs 1029 Dionysus cites the chorus in Aeschylus’ Persians as reacting loudly to the apparition of Darius, which does not occur in our text. Clouds 1371–1372 illustrates another kind of citation, one that recalls an excerpt rather than a complete performance: Strepsiades reports having heard his son recite a rhesis from Euripides’ Aeolus about Macareus and Canace, which he has recently learned in Socrates’ school, and understands it to refer to incest rather than rape. Evidently the old-fashioned Strepsiades had not seen this play, so his understanding may be a legitimate inference from a speech excerpted without context; spectators who had seen the play would recognize his mistake. These testable cases of inaccurate citation should make us wary of trusting citations that are untestable by reference to a lost original, for example Ar. fr. 696 (from an unidentified play), where the speaker imitates one of the dances from Aeschylus’ Phrygians (“they did lots of this and they did lots of that while they danced”), which he recalls watching (θεωρῶν) at the point in the play “when they came to help Priam ransom his dead son”. When spectators recalled performances, they will have recalled complete plays, whether new plays or revivals: as Nervegna 2007 has demonstrated, in every era of Greek theater “excerpting has a place among teachers, pupils and musicians perhaps, but does not belong to the world of actors performing in a public theatre before a popular audience” (41). This does not mean that no complete texts of tragedy were available, only that Aristophanic parody calling for recognition of the original context did not rely on them. 10 When Aristophanes began his career in 427, the circulation, redaction, and study of complete texts in such venerable traditions as epic, choral, personal, sympotic, occasional, and

 9 Plutarch notes that Phrynichus, Philoclean’s favorite tragic composer (line 220), was famed for his choreography (Mor. 732f). 10 We might compare the role of screenplays today: they are available but of interest primarily to critics and scholars. The general audience is expected to watch the whole film or TV show on screen, so that cinematic allusion and parody do not presuppose textual familiarity.

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oracular poetry was well established, 11 but there is no evidence of widespread circulation of complete texts of tragedy before 405, when Dionysus mentions “reading [Euripides’] Andromeda to myself (ἀναγιγνώσκοντί μοι)” in Aristophanes’ Frogs 52–53. This is unsurprising for a relatively new genre: except for Aeschylus, who enjoyed the unique right of posthumous production, 12 we have practically no textual attestation of tragedy (or of comedy) before the late 440s. In addition, tragedy was not an elite but a popular, even democratic, genre that through most of the fifth century was performed by amateurs. Nor do we find evidence even of a concept of whole tragedies apart from their performance contexts that would have motivated a desire for complete texts in addition to copies of select speeches or songs that had become popular apart from performance. The earliest articulation of such a critical concept is in Plato’s Protagoras 264c, applied to speeches: “every logos must be organized like a living being (ὥσπερ ζῶιον συνεστάναι) … so as to be neither headless nor footless but to have a middle, and members written in fitting relation to one another and to the whole (πρέποντ᾿ ἀλλήλοις καὶ τῶι ὅλωι γεγραμμένα)”. The critical concept of unified whole works was thereafter enshrined by Aristotle in the Peripatetic tradition, but as readers of dramatic scholia or the testimonia of fragments know, ancient scholars (Aristarchus is the exception) show little awareness of it, or indeed much interest in the original context of any comic borrowing. There was nevertheless some circulation of tragic texts and Aristophanes does acknowledge it, but when he mentions the existence of tragic texts in biblia he associates them not with the average spectator but with subgroups of whom the average spectator should be very suspicious: technicians and charlatans, immoral sophists, and deceptive orators, all of them sources for Euripides and other trendy poets. 13 Aristophanes does not applaud but rather decries the cultural pivot then taking shape in Athens from song- and performance-culture to literary culture. They are succinctly contrasted by Trygaeus, the hero of Peace: the goddess enjoys inter alia “pipes, performers of tragedy, songs by Sophocles” but not “pithy sayings for the courtroom” by Euripides (lines 531–534), as perhaps also in fr. 506 (play unknown), where “either a book has been the ruin of this man, or else Prodicus, or one of those idle chatterers”: the speaker sounds much like Theseus in Euripides’ Hippolytus, who regards as elitist and sinister the devotion of the young and crowd-shunning Hippolytus to “the vaporousness of many texts”

 11 Cf. Ford 2002, 2003; West 2011; Maslov 2015. 12 See Biles 2006–2007. 13 See the survey of Aristophanic references to books in Anderson and Dix 2014.

  Jeffrey Henderson (πολλῶν γραμμάτων καπνούς, lines 953–954). Strepsiades’ celebratory graduation party for his son in Clouds (lines 1353–1390) epitomizes Aristophanes’ attitude, contrasting songs by Aeschylus learned and performed to the lyre – a traditional educational and sympotic practice regarded by Pheidippides as “antiquated” (archaeon, lines 1357–1358) – with the recitation of a rhesis from Euripides that Phidippides has learned in Socrates’ school: clearly a novel and (to Strepsiades) a shocking development, though by Plato’s day this combination of songs with recitation would become standard in schools, and by extension at symposia. 14 In Frogs, meanwhile, it is Euripides, not Aeschylus, who relies on books for his compositions, as a source of “chatter-juice” (line 943). The poet who speaks in fr. 595 (from Gerytades?) is more eclectic, and careful not to include such chattiness: “taking [ ] of Sophocles, from Aeschylus [ ] as much as is [ ], Euripides entire, and on top of these toss in some wit (ἅλας), but make sure it’s witty not twitty (μὴ λάλας)”. In Frogs, what is different from earlier plays is that this sort of bookishness is no longer the exclusive province of the elite but has recently infected the spectators at large, as stated in the well-known statement by the Initiate chorus to the contestants, Aeschylus and Euripides, in lines 1111–1114: “if you’re afraid of any ignorance among the spectators, that they will not appreciate the subtleties (τὰ λεπτά) of what you two are saying, have no terror: that’s no longer the case, for they are veterans (ἐστρατευμένοι, i.e. of theater-going), and since each one has a book, he knows the fine points (τὰ δεξιά)”. That every spectator now has a book is no doubt an exaggeration, but it is clear that the general audience for tragedy can now be called literate. The play accordingly calls for a restoration not only of an old-school poet but also of the old-school audience: the current spectators represent the majority who favor Euripides, as opposed to the better element (τὸ λῶιστον) who favor Aeschylus. Earlier in the play, current spectators are characterized as muggers, purse-snatchers, father-beaters, burglars, and “rascals” (πανοῦργοι), who love Euripides’ “disputations and twists and dodges”, and among the criminals in the Underworld’s “ever-flowing shit” is “anyone who had a speech by Morsimus copied out” play (lines 151–153). 15 Sure enough, the evaluation of tragedy in Frogs includes the kind of close reading and practical criticism

 14 cf. Prt. 326a–b (stichic passages for reading-class, songs for lyre-school) and Leg. 810e–811a (teachers compile highlights [κεφάλαια] from the poets and combine them with entire dramatic rheseis). 15 One wonders where such a person would have gone to copy it: to Morsimus himself, à la Dicaeopolis to Euripides in Acharnians? Or to someone else who had a copy of the complete work? Or to a collection of excerpts, and if so, who would have created the anthology?

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that reflects sophistic practice and looks forward to (indeed informs) the literary criticism proper that would be further developed in the fourth century. The poetic contest that occupies the second half of Frogs may be a clue to how this kind of literary sophistication developed among spectators of tragedy. The poetic-contest format that operated with quotations from the recitative or stichic poetic genres seems to have predated the contest we see in Frogs, which focused on tragedy, and Aristophanes may well have innovated by making tragedy the main event of such a contest. 16 Parody with tragedy as its main target seems to develop only in the 420s. Earlier parody, like the earlier poetic contests, drew from the epic, hymnic, iambic, didactic, paraenetic (e.g. the Theognidea), and oracular poetry that was already circulating in both complete and anthologized texts well before Aristophanes’ career, and that informed festive contexts like the Panathenaea as well as private contexts like schools and symposia. These texts were thus well enough known to the audience to be subject to the kind of literary critique plus moral evaluation that was evidently possible for tragedy only later, toward the end of the century. In Frogs Aeschylus states that tragedy should be judged on the same criteria on which such recitative poets had traditionally been judged, and cites as his examples the same poets – Orpheus, Musaeus, Hesiod, and Homer – in the same order as they appeared in the contemporary anthology by Hippias the sophist. 17 This contest pattern is visible in comedies as early as the 430s, e.g. Cratinus’ Archilochus & Company (iambic poetry) and Telecleides’ Hesiod & Co. (didactic or theogonic). Most of them are very fragmentary, but the pattern is clear enough in our extant Aristophanes, for example the contest in Banqueters (427) between the old education based on Homeric values vs. the new education based on lawbooks; the oracle-contest in Knights (424), whose combatants boast of having whole buildings full of oracle-books; 18 and the contest of preludes in Peace (421), which tracks the Contest of Homer and Hesiod and quotes two of its verses (lines 1265–1304). As in Frogs, these contests both employed literary criticism based on representative quotations and used the quotations to create a representative persona for the poet and his adherents: Homer for the martial arts and the battlefield,

 16 Fragmentary plays include Aristophanes’ Gerytades (ca. 408); Phrynichus’ Muses (405, competing against Frogs) and Tragoidoi (?400); and ?Pherecrates’ Krapataloi (date uncertain). 17 Lines 1030–1036, cf. Hippias D–K 86 B6, describing his anthology as containing “sayings by Orpheus, Musaeus, Hesiod, Homer, and by many other poets, and by prose writers, some Greek and some foreign”. 18 For oracular contests see Yu 2017.

  Jeffrey Henderson Hesiod for peace and the countryside, Archilochus for criticism and abuse, and so on. 19 The close connection between poetic sentiment and moral value that we observe in the contests we can also see in the incidental parody and straight quotation of tragedy by comic characters. It matters who is quoting and whom (s)he quotes, so that quotation is an element of characterization. Characters who seek to appear clever and urbane, who seek to deceive, who are less manly, who are effeminate or misogynistic, tend to quote Euripides; more traditional, often older characters tend to quote Aeschylus or (like Philocleon in Wasps) even earlier tragedians. We also observe the importance of the tragedian’s stature both personal and poetic: and so Euripides’ mother, his wife, his associates, and his civic allegiance were relevant triggers for parody and quotation, as were Aeschylus’ martial valor, Sophocles’ geniality and avarice, and so forth. Conversely, while many other fifth-century tragedians are derogated, they are hardly ever parodied or quoted; the main sources of quotes and parodies were our triad of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, plus Euripides’ protégé Agathon in the years following his apparently memorable debut in 416, but not thereafter. 20 The situation is quite different in the fourth century. Tragedy is no longer a performance genre irreducibly separate from comedy and distinctly more elevated; it is now an increasingly textual, classical, and canonical repertory, library, and syllabus available to comedy as part of the spectators’ lives and is thus absorbed into the natural fabric of comedy itself, especially the more naturalistic Euripides. 21 Freely available for study, emulation, and enjoyment were both complete texts and collections of excerpts. 22 Thus fourth-century comedy begins to generate gnomic quotations of its own, quite unlike fifth-century comedy, which relied almost exclusively on the higher poetic genres for gnomai and could quote good ones as well as bad ones, like the notorious tongue that swears but not the mind (Eur. Hipp. 612). 23 Tragedy’s authority and prestige are unquestioned, its literary value, moral utility, and cultural quality unproblematically accepted. 24 The  19 See Henderson 2018, 303–307. 20 Cf. Kaimio and Nykopp 1997. 21 On the role of comedy in classicizing tragedy see Rosen 2006; for Menander’s use of tragedy as a common textual repertory Zanetto 2014. 22 Cf. Konstan 2011. 23 Cf. Gutzwiller 2000. Lysistrata’s citation of a gnome by the comic poet Pherecrates (line 158) is a rarity, but without such labeling the unelevated language of comedy no doubt obscures other instances that would have been obvious to the spectators. 24 As Ford 2003, 36 observes of song-texts, “texts helped Greeks shift their criticism from evaluating songs in moral and social terms to focusing on their intrinsic formal properties.”

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personal lives and relevant standing of tragic poets are no longer relevant, so that Euripides is just as authoritative as Aeschylus, and certainly more often quoted; a little exchange from Antiphanes captures the attitude: “(A) Hand me around the limb-pleaser, as Euripides said. (B) Euripides said that? (A) Who else? (B) Surely Philoxenus. (A) It doesn’t matter, my good man; you’re splitting hairs with me” (Antiphanes fr. 205.6–10, from Traumatias). Parody and paratragedy, which, like contests by citation, question and challenge the cultural status of the targeted play and use it to characterize or construct the comic situation, gradually disappear. Quotation becomes mainly a natural and normal way to display one’s knowledge and mastery of important literature, and it invariably elevates the tone of the conversation. 25 It was not even necessary to go to the theater to enjoy a play or to quote from it.

Bibliography Anderson, C.A./Dix, K.T. (2014), “Λάβε τὸ βυβλίον: Orality and Literacy in Aristophanes”, in: R. Scodel (ed.), Between Orality and Literacy: Communication and Adaptation in Antiquity, Leiden, 77–86. Bakola, E. (2010), Cratinus and the Art of Comedy, Oxford. Biles, Z. (2006–7), “Aeschylus’ Afterlife: Reperformance by Decree in 5th C. Athens?”, ICS 31– 32, 206–242. Farmer, M. (2017), Tragedy on the Comic Stage, Oxford. Ford, A. (2002), The Origins of Criticism: Literary Culture and Poetic Theory in Classical Greece, Princeton. Ford, A. (2003), “From Letters to Literature: Reading the ‘Song Culture’ of Classical Greece”, in: H. Yunis (ed.), Written Texts and the Rise of Literate Culture in Ancient Greece, Cambridge, 15–37. Gutzwiller, K. (2000), “The Tragic Mask of Comedy: Metatheatricality in Menander”, CA 19, 93– 122. Henderson, J. (2018), “Hesiod and Comedy”, in: S. Scully/A.C. Loney (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Hesiod, Oxford, 295–309. Hanink, J. (2014), Lycurgan Athens and the Making of Classical Tragedy, Cambridge. Kaimio, M./Nykopp, N. (1997), “Bad Poets Society: Censure of the Style of Minor Tragedians in Old Comedy”, in: J. Vaahtera/R. Vainio (eds), Utriusque linguae peritus: studia in honorem Toivio Viljamaa, Turku, 23–37. Konstan, D. (2011), “Excerpting as a reading practice”, in: G. Reydams-Schils (ed.), Thinking Through Excerpts: Studies in Stobaeus, Turnhout, 9–22. Lamari, A.A. (2017), Reperforming Greek Tragedy: Theater, Politics, and Cultural Mobility in the Fifth and Fourth Centuries BC, Berlin/Boston.

 25 Cf. Webster 1960, 155–162, Farmer 2017, 59–63.

  Jeffrey Henderson Maslov, B. (2015), Pindar and the Emergence of Literature, Cambridge. Mastromarco, G. (2006), “La paratragodia, il libro, la memoria”, in: E. Medda/M. Mirto/ M. Patoni (eds), Kōmōidotragōidia: intersezioni del tragico e del comico nel teatro del V secolo a.C., Pisa, 137–191. Nervegna, S. (2007), “Staging Scenes or Plays? Theatrical Revivals of ‘Old’ Greek Drama in Antiquity”, ZPE 162, 14–42. Rosen, R.M. (2006), “Aristophanes, fandom, and the classicizing of Greek tragedy”, in: L. Kosak/J. Rich (eds), Playing Around Aristophanes, Oxford, 27–47. Sells, D. (2018), Parody, Politics and the Populace in Greek Old Comedy, New York. Stewart, E. (2017), Greek Tragedy on the Move: The Birth of a Panhellenic Art Form c. 500–300 BC, Oxford/New York. Vahtikari, V. (2014), Tragedy Performances outside Athens in the Late Fifth and the Fourth Centuries BC, Helsinki. Webster, T.B.L. (19602), Studies in Menander, London. Wright, M. (2012), The Comedian as Critic: Greek Old Comedy and Poetics, Bristol. Wright, M. (2013), “Poets and Poetry in Later Greek Comedy”, CQ 63.2, 603–622. Yu, K.W. (2017), “The Divination Contest of Calchas and Mopsus and Aristophanes’ Knights”, GRBS 57, 910–934. West, M.L. (2011), “Pindar as a Man of Letters”, in: D. Obbink/R.B. Rutherford (eds), Culture in Pieces. Essays on Ancient Texts in Honour of Peter Parsons, Oxford, 50–68. Zanetto, G. (2014), “La tragedia in Menandro: dalla paratragedia alla citazione”, in: A. Casenova (ed.), Menandro e l’evoluzione della commedia greca, Florence, 83–104.

Ralph M. Rosen

On Literary Fragmentation and Quotation in Aristophanes: Some Theoretical Considerations What even is a literary fragment? The answer may well at first seem obvious and not even especially interesting. As classicists, we routinely use the term for something that does not seem, at any rate, very complicated. In our efforts to reconstruct the texts or artefacts from the historical periods that interest us, we often find ourselves dealing with evidence that has through time become detached from an original whole — no remaining record of a given Athenian tragedy or comedy, for example, but plenty of words, lines, even passages, preserved for serendipitous reasons, purporting to come from such a work. Further thought, however, shows the question to be far from straightforward, and in fact laden with philosophical import, both ontological and ethical. Answering the question ‘what is a fragment’ (an ontological question) becomes particularly fraught when juxtaposed with related questions, such as how it differs from a ‘quotation’ when embedded within another literary text, or, as recent discussion has queried, whether it is even legitimate to speak of a fragment in an ancient context, when the term itself seems to be relatively modern and lacking a good ancient lexicography of its own. 1 And then there are questions of what we do with fragments (the ethical question) — how do we use them in our project of textual reconstruction or reimagination, and what exactly do we suppose we are trying to accomplish? The specific problems that interest me here concern the question itself of literary fragmentation in Classical Greek culture — not practical or philological questions of textual reconstitution, but a more fundamental question of how (or whether) Athenian authors and audiences understood the very concept of a fragment in a literary culture that could look quite different from the one that produced our own concept of the fragment. I will focus on quotations from other authors embedded in Aristophanic comedies, and consider occasions when quotation seems to become — conceptually for Aristophanes and his audience — a “fragment”. Greek comedy is a particularly fruitful genre for considering this question, because its authors quote other literary texts so self-consciously, aware that they are highly marked as literary excerpts and usually come from non-comic

 1 See Most 2009, 9–14. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-004

  Ralph M. Rosen authors. In other words, the clash of genre or tone so common in comic quotation — often through its parodic effect — readily highlights the very “excerptedness” of its quotation and directs spectators to ponder, even if only glancingly, the “whole” work from which an excerpt is taken. I begin by asking a few questions about what an Aristophanic literary quotation (I will not yet call it a fragment) might have conjured in the minds of its audience, when notions of textuality were different from our own, and when so many of these quotations came from works that were primarily consumed as performances rather than material texts. I will then turn to Aristophanes’ practice of literary quotation in Frogs, to show how a very specific notion of “fragmentation” as an actual mechanism for literary criticism and evaluation is implicit in this play. As I will argue, Frogs suggests that for Aristophanes a quotation can be conceptualized as (what we could call) a fragment in contexts where it self-consciously calls attention to itself explicitly as a part of a discrete and unified whole. In our own era, and especially within classical studies, a fragment always implies loss. Once upon a time, one supposes, there was a complete text or artefact — now all we have is this piece or pieces of it — a few lines, a word, a hand from a statue, a shard of a pot. As Most (2009, 11) has pointed out in his conceptual discussion of the fragment, in antiquity the “fragment” refers only to “physical objects never to portions of discourse”, and the vocabulary is always violent — Lat. “fragmentum” from “frango”, break, and similarly valenced Greek terms, such as apospasmata or klasmata. But, as Most also notes, the image of broken pieces from whole works was available metaphorically for texts in antiquity too, as we see in Horace’s phrase at Sat. 1.4.62 “disiecti membra poetae”, referring to verses of Ennius, whose poetry, Horace says, is strong enough to endure a hypothetical reordering of his individual words, his “membra”. A fragment, however, implies a more dire fate: it has not just been separated from another part of its whole, but it cannot be reunited with its whole, simply because the rest no longer exists. As long as the whole exists somewhere, a citation can be considered a “quotation” — reunitable, in theory, with its whole. If we are interested in how literary “fragmentedness” may have been understood by a Greek audience when an actual discourse of “the fragment” only came later, we would do well, I think, to consider as well an ancient concept of literary “wholeness” in an era when “texts” themselves were less accessible and stable artifacts than they have since become. By way of example, let us consider a case of literary quotation in Aristophanes which presents a complicated set of problems, both of attribution and kind. At Frogs 659–662, in the scene where Aeacus is flogging Xanthias and Dionysus to determine which is a god and which a slave, Dionysus at one point tries to

On Literary Fragmentation and Quotation in Aristophanes  

mask his pain by claiming he is quoting from two poets, first from Hipponax (who is named), then from Sophocles’ Laocoon (fr. 371 Radt; though no attribution is made in the text). ΔΙ. Ἄπολλον,—ὅς που Δῆλον ἢ Πυθῶν᾿ ἔχεις. ΞΑ. ἤλγησεν· οὐκ ἤκουσας; ΔΙ. οὐκ ἔγωγ᾿, ἐπεὶ ἴαμβον Ἱππώνακτος ἀνεμιμνῃσκόμην. ΞΑ. οὐδὲν ποιεῖς γάρ· ἀλλὰ τὰς λαγόνας σπόδει. ΑΙΑ. μὰ τὸν Δί᾿, ἀλλ᾿ ἤδη πάρεχε τὴν γαστέρα. ΔΙ. Πόσειδον— ΞΑ. ἤλγησέν τις. ΔΙ. ὃς Αἰγαίου πρωνὸς ἢ γλαυκᾶς μέδεις ἁλὸς ἐν βένθεσιν.

660

664

(Ar. Ran. 659–667) AEAC. What’s going on here? Got to go back over here. (strikes Dionysus) DION. Apollo!—who abides perchance on Delos or in Pytho. XAN. That hurt him, didn’t you hear? DION. No it didn’t! I was just recollecting a line of Hipponax. XAN. (to Aeacus) Look, you’re getting nowhere: go ahead and bash him in the ribs. AEAC. God no; (to Dionysus) stick out your belly now. (strikes Dionysus) DION. Poseidon! XAN. Somebody felt that! DION. —who hold sway on the cape of Aegae or in the depths of the deep blue sea. (Translation by J. Henderson)

  Ralph M. Rosen Although, for us, both of the quotations embedded in Aristophanes’ text are considered “fragments”, since the complete works from which either is taken have been lost to us, how were they perceived and conceptualized by Aristophanes and his audience? The two authors cited are different in genre, chronology and manner of aesthetic consumption by the audience: Hipponax composed short iambic poems which were probably popular at symposia, both in the 6th century when they were composed, and a century later in Athenian literary culture; 2 Sophocles, of course, was Aristophanes’ older contemporary, and produced tragedies at the dramatic festivals for Dionysus. We can say almost nothing about a contemporary fifth-century textual tradition of either poet, so it is not even clear what Aristophanes would have thought his quotations were quotations “of”. 3 Put another way, if these quotations were supposed to call to his audience’s minds a complete work — Sophocles’ Laocoon or a complete poem of Hipponax — was it even a material text that they would have thought of, as we might visualize a quotation wrested from lines on a written or printed page? If most people would not have had access to full texts, 4 how “whole” were these texts felt to be from which quotations were extracted? And if, for the majority of people, there was generally little hope of consulting (or remembering) a “whole” text, were Athenian audiences thinking of such Aristophanic quotations more as fragments (in our sense of quotations that can never be reunited with an original whole) than quoted excerpts?

 2 See Bartol 1992 and Bowie 2001, 2002, 39–40, and Rotstein 2010, 253–278, on ancient performance venues of iambic poetry. 3 On written texts and “books” in the fifth-century BC, Turner 1952; Pfeiffer 1968, 26–32; Pickard-Cambridge 1953 [1968] 68–74 (on dramatic texts); Thomas 1989, 35–48; Harris 1989, 65–115; Morgan 1998, 9–20. On the earliest stages of a Sophoclean text, see Avezzù 2012, 40–41. We know even less about the textual forms of Hipponax’ poetry in the 5th c. Masson 1962, 33 sums up succinctly: “On ne peut savoir non plus si l’auteur, après avoir fait mettre par écrit chaque poème, s’occupa lui-même d’établir une édition, ou si le premier recueil d’ensemble fut constitué après la mort du poète. Cependant, une copie en plusieurs exemplaires sur des feuilles de papyrus doit être postulée”. See also Degani 1984, 30–34; Rotstein 2010, 27–34. 4 Scholars have long debated the meaning of Aristophanes Frogs 1114, which suggests at first glance that Athenian audience members could, and did, refer to texts of the plays they were watching: ἐστρατευμένοι γάρ εἰσι, | βιβλίον τ᾿ ἔχων ἕκαστος | μανθάνει τὰ δεξιά· (“[don’t worry about the audience might not understand the subtleties of the play] for they’re disciplined, and each one has a book and understands the clever parts”. But by now there is near consensus that it is far from clear what reality lies behind these ambiguous lines. See, e.g., Harvey 1966, 602– 603; Woodbury 1976; Harris 1989, 87; Thomas 1989, 20–21 (“This image of the literate and bookish Athenians in its exaggerated form grossly underestimates the extent to which Athenian life was conducted orally”); Dover 1993, 35; Sommerstein 1996, ad loc. 256.

On Literary Fragmentation and Quotation in Aristophanes  

Specifically in this passage from Frogs, when Dionysus says, “No it didn’t [hurt me]! I was just recollecting a line [lit. ‘an iambus’] of Hipponax!” (οὐκ ἔγωγ᾿, ἐπεὶ | ἴαμβον Ἱππώνακτος ἀνεμιμνῃσκόμην, 660), what we really want to know is whether by “iambus” he means a specific poem of Hipponax, or just “some poem”. In this context, in any case, Dionysus seems to invoke Hipponax — the iambic poet famous for causing pain to others through his invective — to explain why he was himself crying out in pain. But it is unclear whether (or how) the “whole” of the Hipponactean work from which Dionysus quotes this line was accessible to the audience of the play — either memorized in advance as a complete work, or readily available as a textual artifact which could be consulted afterward by anyone who wanted to “track down” the quotation. The matter is further complicated by the question of attribution: a scholiast claims the line ascribed to Hipponax by Dionysus was in fact composed by the iambographer Ananius. 5 If this is true (as most editors believe it to be), 6 and if Aristophanes was intending a joke by having Dionysus misattribute the quotation to Hipponax instead, the excerpt would seem intended to float even more freely in the audience’s minds as a disembodied fragment with only tenuous moorings to an actual text. The quotation from Sophocles’ Laocoon presents a set of conceptual problems that arise from the ontology itself of works composed primarily for performance. What is Dionysus supposed to be remembering when he quotes from the Sophoclean play? As the god of theater, we could imagine that he would remember every line ever composed in his honor at an Athenian dramatic festival. But the textuality of a tragic performance would have been far more ambiguous and unstable to an Athenian audience than it is to us today. 7 Dionysus is made to quote lines from an event in the past (and here, too, if we can trust the scholia, he does not quote accurately or fully), 8 which, in order to be fully realized required all the accoutrements of a performance: actors, costumes, props, etc. Once again,

 5 See Rotstein 2010, 202–203: “Since the scholiast says that it is the character and not Aristophanes who does not know what he is saying, he or his source probably believed that the confusion was intentional”. 6 See Rotstein 202, n. 82, and 203. I have also discussed this passage in a different context at Rosen 1988, 15–16. 7 For reasons noted above in nn. 3 and 4. We cannot gauge with any confidence the extent of a literate (= “reading”) public in Classical Athens, nor do we know what exact form a text of Sophocles’ play would have taken in this period, even though we have to assume that something resembling an official written text did exist. 8 Dover 1993, ad loc., p. 274: “What [Dionysus] sings is a passage from Sophocles’ Laokoon (fr. 371), given by ΣVE in a version which is both divergent and more extensive”. See ad Soph. fr. 371 Radt, p. 331 for textual details.

  Ralph M. Rosen in other words, it is not at all clear if the quotation was actually meant to conjure up an actual text. As such, a quotation of this sort really maps more as a fragment of an experience on to a “whole” which — for the audience at any rate — is never really capable of being fully reconstituted. Someone in fifth-century Athens may well have been able to find whole texts that represented the occasions ex post facto from which Aristophanic quotations were drawn 9 — scholars or other intellectuals with access to archives or libraries — but it seems likely that the great majority of Aristophanes’ audience would have heard these quotations, ontologically speaking at least, as “fragments”. The celebrated poetic agon between Aeschylus and Euripides in Aristophanes’ Frogs even seems to suggest that the only way to talk about poetry in this period was to conceptualize it as a collection of fragmentary parts, where this very fragmentation is privileged over literary “wholeness”, at least when it comes to aesthetic analysis and assessment. Plato later analogized the idea of a whole “logos” to a living body with its parts “composed in fitting relation to each other and the whole” (πρέποντ᾿ ἀλλήλοις καὶ τῷ ὅλῳ γεγραμμένα) at Phaedrus 264 b– c, and this “biological cast”, as Ford puts it (2002, 265), clearly influenced Aristotle’s discussion of tragedy in the Poetics. 10 But Aristophanes’ poetic contest in Frogs strongly suggests that poetry had already been anatomized into constituent bits suitable for “fragmentation” insofar as they could be treated as autonomous poetic sherds with intrinsic value, good or bad. Porter (2010, 265) has discussed what he calls this “componential method” of literary analysis as inchoate in the agon of Frogs, and aligns it as well with Polyclitus’ contemporary theory of proportion (symmetria) in his Canon concerning the parts of a work of art. Indeed, the contest in Frogs is famously announced by a slave character at 798ff., with the promise of “bringing out rulers, and measuring tapes for words, and folding frames…and set squares and wedges; because Euripides says he’s going to examine the tragedies word for word.” From this perspective, the only way to conceptualize a whole is by assessing and measuring its parts.

 9 See Rosen 2006, 29–31 on the problem of ascertaining the prevalence of textual versions of dramatic works in Classical Athens, which I referred there as the “artifactualizing of an ephemeral performance” (29). 10 Ford 202, 265: “There is, then, a strong biological cast to Aristotle’s exposition of the ‘parts’ of plays and how they work together…Aristotle’s conception of organic composition had a payoff for critical practice as well: if we place the arts within a teleological nature that ‘does nothing in vain’…critics are then justified in examining each perceived detail of a literary text and asking what role it plays in the overall design”.

On Literary Fragmentation and Quotation in Aristophanes  

This notion is affirmed later in this scene at Frogs 1296–1305, where Aeschylus responds to Euripides’ critique of his lyrics. Here Dionysus asks Aeschylus where he collected (πόθεν συνέλεξας…) the components that went into his songs: ΔΙOΝ. τί τὸ φλαττοθρατ τοῦτ᾿ ἐστίν; ἐκ Μαραθῶνος ἢ πόθεν συνέλεξας ἱμονιοστρόφου μέλη; ΑΙΣΧ. ἀλλ᾿ οὖν ἐγὼ μὲν εἰς τὸ καλὸν ἐκ τοῦ καλοῦ ἤνεγκον αὔθ᾿, ἵνα μὴ τὸν αὐτὸν Φρυνίχῳ λειμῶνα Μουσῶν ἱερὸν ὀφθείην δρέπων· οὗτος δ᾿ ἀπὸ πάντων μὲν φέρει, πορνῳδιῶν, σκολίων Μελήτου, Καρικῶν αὐλημάτων, θρήνων, χορειῶν. τάχα δὲ δηλωθήσεται. (Ar. Ran. 1298–1303) DION. What’s this brumda brumda brumda brum? Did you collect these rope-winders’ songs from Marathon or someplace? AESCH. Never mind that; I took them from a good source for a good purpose: so I wouldn’t be caught culling the same sacred meadow of the Muses as Phrynichus, whereas this one takes material from everywhere: whore songs, drinking songs by Meletus, Carian pipe tunes, dirges, and dances. (Translation by J. Henderson)

Aeschylus picks up the general notion of “collecting” and concretizes it with the metaphor of collecting flowers from the meadow of the Muses — a common metaphor among Greek lyric poets. 11 The operative image lies in the verb δρέπω, “pluck”: whereas Aeschylus “carries his material from a good place, and for a good purpose” (1298, ἀλλ᾿ οὖν ἐγὼ μὲν εἰς τὸ καλὸν ἐκ τοῦ καλοῦ | ἤνεγκον αὔθ᾿), and Euripides takes his material “from everything”: whore-songs, drinking songs of Meletus, Carian aulos-songs, dirges and dances (οὗτος δ᾿ ἀπὸ πάντων μὲν φέρει, 1301). The implication is, of course, that Euripides’ lyrics are bad because their components are bad, and the only way to really get to the bottom of their value is to assess the parts, lopped off, as it were, from a whole. Not only are quotations embedded within works conceptualized as fragmentary, as we discussed earlier, but now it seems that all components that make up a whole work can be

 11 See Taillardat 1965, 436–438 for examples from the Classical period of the metaphor of “le poète-jardinier”.

  Ralph M. Rosen traced to antecedent genres and their constituent parts — like flowers in the meadow of the Muses. Because the parts can be contemplated independently of any wholes (like individual flowers in a meadow), our own term “fragment” begins to seem appropriate to describe a particularly Athenian unit of literary analysis. Even earlier in this scene, when Euripides had been preparing the audience for his critique of Aeschylus’ lyrics, there appears to be some play on the etymology of the Greek word for “lyric”, μέλος, in its derivation from its other meaning “limb”: 12 ΕΥΡ. πάνυ γε μέλη θαυμαστά· δείξει δὴ τάχα· εἰς ἓν γὰρ αὐτοῦ πάντα τὰ μέλη ξυντεμῶ. (Ar. Ran. 1261–1262) EUR. A great many wonderful lyrics, eh? We’ll soon find out, because I’m going to trim all his lyrics to a single pattern. (Translation by J. Henderson)

The meaning of line 1262 is not entirely clear, but the idea of “cutting back” or “cutting short” (ξυντεμῶ) the lyrics (as if they are bodily limbs) suggests that Euripides is criticizing Aeschylus’ lyrics for its fragmentary feel, i.e., they are all disconnected but taken together add up to a similar, singular badness. 13 As Euripides had said at 1249–1250: “I’ve got what I need to show that he’s a bad lyric poet  12 Del Corno (1992, 232 ad loc.) “…la ripetizione enfatica di μέλος fa pensare pure che s’intenda giocare sul significato alternativo di ‘membra’: Euripide, facendo a pezzi i canti di Eschilo, annientera pure lui stesso”. 13 The imagery behind “trimming” (ξυντεμῶ) Aeschylus’ lyrics to some sort of singularity (εἰς ἕν) seems at first glance to imply simply that he will do to Aeschylus what Aeschylus had just done to him in “testing” Euripides’ prologues with the “lost his little oil bottle” routine (1205– 1248). Possibly, as well, Euripides’ ξυντεμῶ here implies that Aeschylus’ lyrics float around as disconnected fragments which might be quotable but are too disconnected from each other to form a single whole. Pruning them, in this case, would help unify the fragments as parts of a notional whole, even though, as we have seen in 1250, that wholeness will be “bad” because (Euripides alleges) they are repetitive. This seems to be Radermacher’s reading (1921, 315 ad loc.): “Das ξυντεμεῖν τὰ μέλη εἰς ἓν…kann doch nur ein Potpourri aus samtlichen Liedern zusammengestellt bezwecken, was wir auch ‘gedrangte ϋbersicht’ nennen”. See also Del Corno 1992, 232 ad loc., although his second alternative seems preferable to the first: “Il significato e che i versi di Eschilo sono tanto uniformi che, mettendo insieme tutti i loro pezzi, riesce comunque possible

On Literary Fragmentation and Quotation in Aristophanes  

and is always composing the same thing” (καὶ μὴν ἔχω γ᾿ οἷς αὐτὸν ἀποδείξω κακὸν | μελοποιὸν ὄντα καὶ ποιοῦντα ταὔτ᾿ ἀεί). The famous weighing scene that follows the contest of choral lyrics, though obviously designed for high comedy, is nevertheless premised on a conception of poetry as a collection of fragmentable pieces which can be subjected to independent evaluation: ΧΟΡΟΣ ἐπίπονοί γ᾿ οἱ δεξιοί· τόδε γὰρ ἕτερον αὖ τέρας. νεοχμόν, ἀτοπίας πλέων, ὃ τίς ἂν ἐπενόησεν ἄλλος; μὰ τόν, ἐγὼ μὲν οὐδ᾿ ἂν εἴ τις ἔλεγέ μοι τῶν ἐπιτυχόντων, ἐπιθόμην, ἀλλ᾿ ᾠόμην ἂν αὐτὸν αὐτὰ ληρεῖν. (Ar. Ran. 1370–1377) CHORUS Experts are indefatigable, for here is another marvel, startling and altogether eccentric; who else could have thought it up? Gee, even if some chance passerby had told me about this, I wouldn’t have believed him, I’d have thought he was drivelling. (Translation by J. Henderson)

The chorus find the entire conceit incredible, a novelty (νεοχμόν, ἀτοπίας πλέων, 1372), but even Aeschylus had said (1365) that it is the only way to test their poetry: 14  tirarne fuori un insieme apparentemente omogeneo; oppure che i suoi corali sono tanto sconnessi, che non si distinguono da uno messo insieme a caso”. 14 Contra Porter 2010, 266: “The idea of resorting to calipers, square rules, and other calibrated instruments in order to scrutinize the aesthetic particulars of the two tragedians’ verses strikes the old-fashioned Aeschylus as abhorrent”. I assume that Porter draws this conclusion from Frogs 798–804, a passage in which Xanthias and Pluto’s slave discuss the imminent weighing scene (“poetry will be weighed in a balance”, καὶ γὰρ ταλάντῳ μουσικὴ σταθμήσεται, 797). At 803, Xanthias assumes (ἦ που…) that Aeschylus would “take badly” (βαρέως…φέρειν) the whole idea of applying such measuring techniques to poetry. Pluto’s slave responds that he “bent his head

  Ralph M. Rosen AΙΣΧ.

κἄμοιγ᾿ ἅλις· ἐπὶ τὸν σταθμὸν γὰρ αὐτὸν ἀγαγεῖν βούλομαι, ὅπερ ἐξελέγξει τὴν ποίησιν νῷν μόνον· τὸ γὰρ βάρος νὼ βασανιεῖ τῶν ῥημάτων. (Ar. Ran. 1364–1367) AESCH. I’ve had enough too; what I’d like to do is take him to the scales. That’s the only real test of our poetry; the weight of our utterances will be the decisive proof. (Translation by J. Henderson)

Aeschylus eventually tires of the weighing game and calls an end to it at 1407, telling them to stop with the “line-by-line” examination, since no amount of Euripidean verses could ever outdo the (literal) gravitas of his own: ΑΙΣΧ. καὶ μηκέτ᾿ ἔμοιγε κατ᾿ ἔπος, ἀλλ᾿ εἰς τὸν σταθμὸν αὐτός, τὰ παιδί᾿, ἡ γυνή, Κηφισοφῶν, ἐμβὰς καθήσθω, ξυλλαβὼν τὰ βιβλία· ἐγὼ δὲ δύ᾿ ἔπη τῶν ἐμῶν ἐρῶ μόνον. (Ar. Ran. 1407–1410) AESCH. No more of this line-by-line for me; he could get in that pan himself, with his wife and kids and Cephisophon, and take his books along too, and I’d have only to recite two of my lines. (Translation by J. Henderson)

In the context of the play the fragmentary approach to evaluating poetry proves aporetic, mostly because conceptualizing a poetic work in material terms is so easily susceptible to absurd, comic literalizing. But for all the obvious comedy, the agon does suggest that the practical business of talking about poetry in any kind of detailed, systematic way was felt to be accomplished best by thinking of it as a collection of independent bits and gobbets — fragments — configured as

 down and had a bull-like look” (ἔβλεψε γοῦν ταυρηδὸν ἐγκύψας κάτω, 804). But, as Dover (1993, 291) and Sommerstein (1996, 226) point out, ταυρηδόν is not always hostile, so it may simply refer to a posture of resignation, not disapproval. Certainly 1365 implies an active embrace on Aeschylus’ part of measuring poetry by weight, not disdain: ἐπὶ τὸν σταθμὸν γὰρ αὐτὸν ἀγαγεῖν βούλομαι.

On Literary Fragmentation and Quotation in Aristophanes  

wholes by a poet, but then literally de-constructed for contemplation and assessment. In the absence of other evidence, it is hard to know how much this particular conception of poetry simply arose from the fun Aristophanes realized he could have by literalizing it, i.e., whether this is a specifically comic view of poetry. But this question can take us back to our earlier discussion of whether fifth-century Athenian audiences thought of poetic works as “whole texts” and quotations from them as “excerpts implying that whole”; or whether our lexicon of fragmentation offers a more accurate way of understanding the relationship between excerpt and original, at a time when poetic works were not necessarily, or routinely, consumed as material texts. As Most has noted, there is no real discourse of “lost literary texts” and “surviving fragments” in this period, 15 but our discussion of literary quotation in Aristophanes has suggested that the reason for this derives from a different sense of textual wholeness than we are used to. In an era when accessing a complete written text of a work was for most people not straightforward or consistent, all quotations seem to have been conceptualized as fragmentary — the wholes from which they came “existed” in some notional sense, but practically speaking, they could only be scrutinized and appreciated through the constituent parts of these wholes.

Bibliography Avezzù, G. (2012), “Text and Transmission”, in: A. Markantonatos (ed.), Brill’s Companion to Sophocles, Leiden, 39–57. Bartol, K. (1992), “Where was Iambic Poetry Performed? Some Evidence from the Fourth Century BC”, CQ 42.1, 65–71. Bowie, E.L. (2001), “Early Greek Iambic Poetry: The Importance of Narrative”, in: A. Cavarzere/ A. Barchiesi/A. Aloni (eds), Iambic Ideas: Essays on a Poetic Tradition from Archaic Greece to the Late Roman Empire, Lanham MD, 1–27. Bowie, E.L. (2002), “Ionian Iambos and Attic Komoidia: Father and Daughter, or Just Cousins?”, in: A. Willi (ed.), The Language of Greek Comedy, Oxford, 33–50. Degani, E. (1984), Studi su Ipponatte, Bari. Del Corno, D. (19922), Le Rane, Rome. Dover, K.J. (1993), Aristophanes: Frogs, Oxford.  15 Most 2002, 13: “… [I]f we understand by the study of textual fragments the systematic search through the works by those authors that survive in order to gather up as far as possible actual pieces from texts that have not survived and information about them and their authors…then it must be recognized that the traces of such a scholarly practice during antiquity are virtually nonexistent”.

  Ralph M. Rosen Ford, A. (2002), The Origins of Criticism: Literary Culture and Poetic Theory in Classical Greece, Princeton. Harris, W.V. (1989), Ancient Literacy, Cambridge MA. Harvey, F.D. (1966), “Literacy in the Athenian Democracy”, REG 79, 585–635. Masson, O. (1962), Les Fragments du poète Hipponax, Paris. Millis, B.W./Olson, S.D. (2012), Inscriptional Records for the Dramatic Festivals in Athens IG II2 2318–2325 and Related Texts, Leiden. Morgan, T. (1998), Literate Education in the Hellenistic and Roman Worlds, Cambridge. Most, G. (2009), “On Fragments”, in: W. Tronzo (ed.), The Fragment: An Incomplete History, Los Angeles, 9–20. Pfeiffer, R. (1968), History of Classical Scholarship: From the Beginnings to the End of the Hellenistic Age, Oxford. Pickard-Cambridge, A.W. (19682), The Dramatic Festivals of Athens, Oxford. Porter, J. (2010), The Origins of Aesthetic Thought in Ancient Greece: Matter, Sensation, and Experience, Cambridge. Radermacher, L. (1954), Aristophanes’ ‘Frösche’. Einleitung, Text und Kommentar, Wien. Radt, S. (ed.) (1977), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta, vol. 4, Göttingen. Rosen, R.M. (1988), Old Comedy and the Iambographic Tradition, Atlanta. Rosen, R.M. (2006), “Aristophanes, Fandom and the Classicizing of Greek Tragedy”, in: L. Kozak/J. Rich (eds), Playing around Aristophanes, Liverpool. Rotstein, A. (2010), The Idea of Iambos, Oxford. Sommerstein, A. (ed.) (1996), The Comedies of Aristophanes, vol. 9 (Frogs), Warminster. Taillardat, J. (1965), Les images d’Aristophane, Paris. Thomas, R. (1989), Oral Tradition and Written Record in Classical Athens, Cambridge. Turner, E.G. (19522), Athenian Books in the Fifth and Fourth Centuries, London. Woodbury, L. (1976), “Aristophanes’ Frogs and Athenian Literacy: Ran. 52–53, 1114”, TAPA 106, 349–357.

Anna A. Lamari

On Types of Fragments As closely bound to the vague concept of wholeness, the meaning of fragmentation can be drastically variant. Dionisotti maintains that “what you call a fragment can depend very markedly on what you consider to be whole or complete”1 and she is right in the sense that most of the times, a fragment cannot avoid the lurking antithesis to completeness which, by itself, is also a relative concept. As classicists, but also as modern narratees, our perception of dramatic fragments is chaotically different from the perception of dramatic fragments experienced by ancient playwrights, ancient audiences, or ancient readers. What we have received as fragments it is often what ancient writers have fragmentized and what we are struggling to rebuild, it is often what ancient narrators intentionally mutilated. “On a theoretical level, the act of excerption from a complete text could be seen as an act of deliberate fragmentation” Wright argues, and he is right since in the context of ancient Greek literature, “the person who selects a portion of the text and makes it into a quotation, is, in a sense, transforming or rewriting that text by subtracting the remainder”.2 Fragments that were transmitted as such have reached us in secondary of tertiary degree of fragmentation, while a fragmentary façade could also be a stylistic selection from a narrative’s first beginning. These basic observations set the theoretical framework of my discussion, which aims at studying the different types of fragments, as well as the mechanisms of their creation, which often consist of deconstruction and excerption from their source text, followed by reconstruction and insertion in a new context. In this chapter I attempt to examine the creation and narrative function of five types of fragmentation: 1. Fragments that are part of a longer work, the adjacent parts of which are not accessible to the speaker or writer (“Surviving Fragments”) 2. Fragments that are created by deliberate selection, although their source text survives (“Framed Fragments”) 3. Fragments that survive within other fragments (“Fragments within Fragments”) 4. Fragments that are really the primary narration which nevertheless is given a fragmentary façade (“Pseudo-Fragments”)

|| 1 Dionisotti 1997, 1. 2 Wright 2016, 602. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-005

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5.

Fragments that exist only through the transmission of the source text (“Fragments of Ancient Scholarship”)

The categories I note often overlap, their criteria coexist, one type is not excluding of the other and in most cases, fragments are characterized by an ambiguous temporality: although they look back to the source text from which they were excerpted, they mainly look forward, functioning as novel narrative units in a new unified context. After a theoretical discussion of the concept of fragmentation, I will address all those five categories, with specific examples.

Fragmented Narratives In narratological terms, fragmentation is a process which brings together two or more genres and results in a new genre or subgenre. This is achieved by the use of stereotypes from separate genres, which, when interwoven, they create a genre hybrid. In this sense, fragmentation is a mechanism that can transform the generic characteristics of a narrative into a new product, a mechanism that transforms framed segments into new wholeness. From the viewpoint of the author, such a procedure grows according to an organized narrative plan that aims at giving new life to a piece extracted from its narrative surroundings. Extracts from larger works have thus a double identity, functioning both as parts of the new texts, as well as independent short texts on their own right.3 This was indeed the way ancient Greek drama interacted with fragmentation. At a time when tragic fragments were not fragments and still belonged to their initial narrative environment, Greek literature de-contextualized them, causing fragmentation that led to narrative novelty and eventually — in some cases — to those fragments’ textual transmission. When used outside their initial context, fragments are described as minimal units, specimens of bigger wholes, which could nonetheless represent successfully the narrative they belonged to and grant for example Athenian captives in Sicily, their freedom. It is the story of Plutarch who tells us that the Sicilians were fond of Euripidean poetry by means of the little “morsels” Athenian visitors brought with them. When their captives recited it, the Sicilians gave them food and water and sometimes also their freedom:

|| 3 Wright 2016, 602.

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ἔνιοι δὲ καὶ δι᾽ Εὐριπίδην ἐσώθησαν. μάλιστα γάρ, ὡς ἔοικε, τῶν ἐκτὸς Ἑλλήνων ἐπόθησαν αὐτοῦ τὴν μοῦσαν οἱ περὶ Σικελίαν: καὶ μικρὰ τῶν ἀφικνουμένων ἑκάστοτε δείγματα καὶ γεύματα κομιζόντων ἐκμανθάνοντες ἀγαπητῶς μετεδίδοσαν ἀλλήλοις. τότε γοῦν φασι τῶν σωθέντων οἴκαδε συχνοὺς ἀσπάσασθαι τὸν Εὐριπίδην φιλοφρόνως, καὶ διηγεῖσθαι τοὺς μέν, ὅτι δουλεύοντες ἀφείθησαν ἐκδιδάξαντες ὅσα τῶν ἐκείνου ποιημάτων ἐμέμνηντο, τοὺς δ᾽, ὅτι πλανώμενοι μετὰ τὴν μάχην τροφῆς καὶ ὕδατος μετέλαβον τῶν μελῶν ἄισαντες. (Plut. Vit. Nic. 29.2–3) Some also were saved for the sake of Euripides. For the Sicilians, it would seem, more than any other Hellenes outside the homeland, had a yearning fondness for his poetry. They were forever learning by heart the little specimens and morsels of it which visitors brought them from time to time and imparting them to one another with fond delight. In the present case, at any rate, they say that many Athenians who reached home in safety greeted Euripides with affectionate hearts, and recounted to him, some that they had been set free from slavery for rehearsing what they remembered of his works; and some that when they were roaming about after the final battle they had received food and drink for singing some of his choral hymns. (Translation by B. Perrin)

Tragic fragments are in this case described as samples (δείγματα), smacks (γεύματα) of poetry, as the remains of bigger poetic units that were impossible to be memorized in their wholeness. A similarly fragmentary recital of Euripides is given in the Clouds when Phidippides rejects his father’s pleas for Simonides and performs some speech (ῥῆσίν τινα) by Euripides about how a brother was sleeping with his very own sister: (ΣΤΡΕΨΙΑΔΗΣ) ὁ δ᾽ εὐθὺς ἦγ᾽ Εὐριπίδου ῥῆσίν τιν᾽, ὡς ἐκίνει ἁδελφός, ὦ ᾽λεξίκακε, τὴν ὁμομητρίαν ἀδελφήν. (Ar. Nub. 1371–1372) (STREPSIADES) And he right away tossed off some speech by Euripides, about how a brother was sleeping god forbid, with his sister by the same mother.

The reference must be to Aeolus, and Macareus’ love with Canace and as in many other Aristophanic passages, fragmentary intertextual references are used as part of a memorized playlist of popular passages.

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In recent times, the idea of the fragment as a literary form developed in the 18th and 19th centuries, by means of the romantic trend of contemplating ruins.4 The capricci of romantic painters provided idealized collages of ancient ruins as fragmentary revivals of Egypt, Greece, and especially Rome, just as seen in the 18th-century paintings of Giovanni Pannini, or Francesco Guardi.5 And while Pannini and Guardi made compilations of already fragmented ruins, such as the remains of the Colosseum or the Temple of Hadrian, or even the Obelisk of Thutmose,6 collages can also include parts of paintings that were not “broken” before their immersion in a new context. Such is the case of the paintings of Barry Kite, a contemporary American artist who diverts famous masterpieces in order to create hybrid compositions featuring the Mona Lisa and Vincent van Gogh, or openly alluding to Michelangelo.7 Fragmentation however can also arise as an elliptic genesis; as in a freshly new artifact which was intentionally created as incomplete from the very beginning, like Rodin’s broken-off sculptures,8 or Degas’ scenes that imply a glimpse chopped out of a larger continuum.9

Playing with Fragments: Conscious Use of Fragmentation in Theater In the fourth century, dramatic reperformances were a vital part of the theatrical mechanism. Fragmentation by choice was a useful, perhaps even necessary theatrical practice exploited by dramatists and certainly commented upon by ancient theorists. Aristotle tells us about the institution of the embolima, the detached choral parts that were composed out of context and could thus be attached or substitute the choral odes of any tragedy. Dramatic poets exploited fragmentation by recycling dramatic parts that led to different narrative results when attached to different contexts:

|| 4 See Sistakou 2009, 381. 5 The romantic motif of “unfinished structure” was first detected by Rauber 1969. See also Harries 1994; Janowitz 2003; Thomas 2005; Bradshaw 2008. 6 For the cultural context of viewing ruins see Thomas 2008, 40–94. 7 See https://beautifulbizarre.net/2015/12/05/barry-kite-classic-paintings-have-more-fun-thanyou/ 8 See e.g. August Rodin’s L’Homme qui marche (c. 1900, National Gallery of Art, Washington DC). 9 See e.g. Edgar Degas’ Danseuses vertes (1879, Thyssen-Bernemisza Museum, Madrid).

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καὶ τὸν χορὸν δὲ ἕνα δεῖ ὑπολαμβάνειν τῶν ὑποκριτῶν, καὶ μόριον εἶναι τοῦ ὅλου καὶ συναγωνίζεσθαι μὴ ὥσπερ Εὐριπίδηι ἀλλ᾽ ὥσπερ Σοφοκλεῖ. τοῖς δὲ λοιποῖς τὰ ἀιδόμενα οὐδὲν μᾶλλον τοῦ μύθου ἢ ἄλλης τραγωιδίας ἐστίν: διὸ ἐμβόλιμα ἄιδουσιν πρώτου ἄρξαντος Ἀγάθωνος τοῦ τοιούτου. καίτοι τί διαφέρει ἢ ἐμβόλιμα ἄιδειν ἢ εἰ ῥῆσιν ἐξ ἄλλου εἰς ἄλλο ἁρμόττοι ἢ ἐπεισόδιον ὅλον; (Arist. Poet. 1456a25–32) It is necessary to consider the chorus as one of the actors, a part of the whole and a participant in the action, not as in Euripides, but as in Sophocles. The songs of the later tragedians have no more connection with the story than they do with any other tragedy, and so they sing embolima (“throw-ins”). Agathon was the first to produce this sort of thing. And yet what difference does it make if they sing embolima or insert as speech or a whole episode from one drama to another? (Translation by E. Csapo/W.J. Slater)

Aristotle might prefer the old-school choral parts of Sophocles, but he is here embracing fragmentation as an existing tool used in theatrical practice nevertheless. Aristotle testifies to the fact that choral odes, monologues, even entire episodes can be attached to any given tragedy, the way it happens with Agathon’s embolima. Dramatic poets exploited fragmentation by recycling dramatic parts that led to different narrative results when attached to different contexts.10 A scholion on the Clouds informs us of the possibility of a different beginning of Archelaus, that Aristarchus says, it might have been altered by Euripides himself. The scholion corresponds to lines 1206–1208, where Euripides the character recites the beginning of one of his plays: Aἴγυπτος, ὡς ὁ πλεῖστος ἔσπαρται λόγος, ξὺν παισὶ πεντήκοντα ναυτίλωι πλάτηι Ἄργος κατασχών (Ar. Ran. 1206–1208 = TrGF V2 fr. 846) Aegyptus, as the dominant story has been disseminated, accompanied by his fifty sons, with ship’s oar came to land at Argos. (Translation by S. Scullion)

|| 10 For a discussion of the use of a fragment from Eupides’ Stheneboea in the prologues-section of the Frogs and the different levels of its appreciation by the spectators, see Wright 2016, 604– 605.

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The passage leads happily to the audience’s reaction of calling out the recurring catch phrase ληκύθιον ἀπώλεσεν (“lost his little oil jar”) (also 1208, 1213, 1218)11 and it would have not troubled us further, were it not for the scholion below: Ἀρχελάου αὕτη ἐστὶν ἡ ἀρχή, ὥς τινες ψευδῶς. οὐ γὰρ φέρεται νῦν Εὐριπίδου λόγος οὐδεὶς τοιοῦτος. οὐ γάρ ἐστι, φησὶν Ἀρίσταρχος, τοῦ Ἀρχελάου, εἰ μὴ αὐτὸς μετέθηκεν ὕστερον, ὁ δὲ Ἀριστοφάνης τὸ ἐξ ἀρχῆς κείμενον εἶπεν. (Schol. Ar. Ran. 1026 = TrGF V2 ad fr. 846) This is the beginning of Archelaus, as some say; falsely. For no such passage of Euripides is now in circulation. For it is not, says Aristarchus, from Archelaus, unless he himself (sc. Euripides) altered it later, but Aristophanes quoted the original beginning. (Translation by S. Scullion 2006)

Broad consensus today does not consider these lines the beginning of Archelaus.12 This is of little importance to our argument however, especially since the authority of Aristarchus testifies to the possibility of a selected fragment altering the initial narrative orchestrated by the poet himself. If the hypothesis of Aristarchus is correct, Euripides exploited the transforming power of a fragment and used an alternative prologue in order to lead to a different narrative result.

Types of Fragments Surviving Fragments This category consists of fragments whose source text is not available in full to their narrator or their narrates. Ewen Bowie’s definition of a fragment is a useful start to the discussion: [A fragment is] a text of at least one letter, and in no case forming a complete work, cited by a speaker or writer in the knowledge that it constitutes only a part of a longer work, whether oral or literary, the adjacent parts of which are not accessible to the speaker or writer.13

In this type of fragmentation, a later author is quoting a fragment of an earlier text for a variety of purposes (generic, stylistic, narrative), but as it happens, his

|| 11 On ληκύθιον ἀπώλεσεν as a catch-phrase and its comic effect, see Dover 1993, ad 1200. 12 Harder 1985, 181; Collard/Cropp/Gibert 2004, 351 pace Page 1934, 93. 13 Bowie 1997, 53.

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access to the source text was also fragmentary. In this category, a narrator reproduces a fragment which is already created and does not create it by deliberate selection. A characteristic example of this sort of fragmentation is the Theognidea, a heterogenous corpus in elegiac verse, preserving poems and parts of poems of Theognis, but also of other elegiac poets such as Tyrtaeus, Mimnermus, Solon, and Euenus.14 There has been much discussion regarding the compiler and date of compilation of the collection, as well as the line of transmission of the different florilegia that led to the synthesis we now have as Theognidea.15 Irrespective of scholarly squabbling pertaining to this labyrinthine textual tradition, it is by now an established and indisputable fact that a “Xenophon” quoted by Stobaeus (4.29.53) did not have in front of him Theognis’ poetry, but was already quoting Theognis’ lines on the basis of some collection or florilegium. The text from Stobaeus reads as following: Ξενοφῶντος ἐκ τοῦ περὶ Θεόγνιδος. ῾Θεόγνιδός ἐστιν ἔπη τοῦ Μεγαρέως᾽. Οὗτος δὲ ὁ ποιητὴς περὶ οὐδενὸς ἄλλου λόγον πεποίηται ἢ περὶ ἀρετῆς καὶ κακίας ἀνθρώπων, καί ἐστιν ἡ ποίησις σύγγραμμα περὶ ἀνθρώπων, ὥσπερ εἴ τις ἱππικὸς ὢν συγγράψειεν περὶ ἱππικῆς. (Stob. 4.29.53) By Xenophon, from his book on Theognis: “The words are those of Theognis of Megara” [Theognidea 22–23]. This poet has composed his work about no other subject than about human excellence and worthlessness. And the poetry is a monograph about man, as if someone who was an expert in horses were to write a monograph on horsemanship. (Translation by E. Bowie)

No such work of Xenophon is elsewhere recorded and it has been strongly debated whether he is indeed the real author of the passage.16 Whoever its author, it is very probable that not the entire work was περὶ Θεόγνιδος, but merely a section devoted to him.17 What interests us more in our argument however is the fact that the quotation of “Xenophon” could not have been the beginning of the text.

|| 14 See West 198. 15 According to the divisions of West (1974), a Florilegium Magum is the source of the most predominant section of book 1 of the Theognidea (19–254), which West names florimegium purum, while the two other sections (excerpta meliora — 255–1002 — and excerpta deteriora — 1002 —) have derived from another one (according to West 1974) or two (according to Bowie 1997) other anthologies. See a review of major discussions in Bowie 1997, 62 n. 11. 16 See a review of the discussion in West 1974, esp. 56–57. 17 West 1974, 56.

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This means that “Xenophon” had a text before him in which the beginning of Theognis’ text,18 is actually verse 183 ff. and this means that what “Xenophon” was using was a kind of compilation composed earlier than the fourth century.19 The citation of Stobaeus encompasses a reference to fragments of a poet (Theognis), the narrator of which (“Xenophon”) did not have access to their main source. In this sense, the reference of Stobaeus and his citation of Xenophon is an example of citation of Surviving Fragments.

Framed Fragments This is the most easily identifiable type of fragmentation, in which a fragment is created for theatrical reasons while the primary text is still “alive” and in full circulation. These fragments are created by deliberate selection when parts of texts are intentionally extracted from their context in order to be immersed in a new whole and then, in some cases, even survive only as part of it. This category is strictly tied to specific narrative goals, according to which a fragment is created and used in order to lead to specific narrative results, be it a comment or parody. The mechanisms of this type of fragmentation dictate the knowledge of the source text both from the narrator and the narratees.20 If this knowledge did not exist, the allusion would have been narratively useless and would have never happened in first place. Aristophanes provides some of the most characteristic examples of this type of fragmentation and in this section, I will mostly focus on a well-known list of such fragments, the one found in the prologues-part of the Frogs.

|| 18 West 1974, 56–57. 19 Bowie 2012, 131–132 opts for an early date (fifth century) and tracks down the compiler as the poet Euenus of Paros, who allegedly composed a collection in order to provide his students with an aide-memoire of elegiac poetry. 20 I still consider these passages fragments, even if their narrator is aware of the full source text from which they were deliberately extracted (pace Bowie 1997, 57). Similarly, Wright considers analogous passages “quotations”, regardless the different levels of recognition of the passage by the spectators, maintaining that “Aristophanes can be seen as subtly differentiating between the effects of his play on different types of audience member — the bookish and the not-so-bookish” (2016, 604–605).

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The prologues section (Ran. 1119–1245) starts with a narrative frame: Euripides the character announces a section in which he will examine Aeschylus’ art systematically, from one end of his plays to the other.21 (ΕΥΡΙΠΙΔΗΣ) καὶ μὴν ἐπ᾽ αὐτοὺς τοὺς προλόγους σοι τρέψομαι, ὅπως τὸ πρῶτον τῆς τραγωιδίας μέρος πρώτιστον αὐτοῦ βασανιῶ τοῦ δεξιοῦ. (Ar. Ran. 1119–1121) Now then, let me turn just to your prologues, so as first off to examine the first section of this competent man’s tragic drama. (Translation by J. Henderson)

The section ends with Dionysus, finalizing the criticism of prologues and inaugurating the beginning of the parody of lyrics:22 τὸ ληκύθιον γὰρ τοῦτ᾽ ἐπὶ τοῖς προλόγοισί σου ὥσπερ τὰ σῦκ᾽ ἐπὶ τοῖσιν ὀφθαλμοῖς ἔφυ. ἄλλ᾽ εἰς τὰ μέλη πρὸς τῶν θεῶν αὐτοῦ τραποῦ. (Ar. Ran. 1246–1248) Yes, that oil bottle grows on your prologues like sties on eyes. For heaven’s sake turn to his choral lyrics now.

This wider narrative section is however further compartmentalized in narrower frames, which engulf the beginnings of nine tragedies. In this sense, a big narrative frame created by the lines spoken by Euripides and Dionysus encapsulates nine framed narratives of prologues, i.e. nine framed tragic fragments. I call the fragments of those prologues framed because their position in the narrative is marked as something narratively different through a clear introduction like “go ahead and recite your prologue” spoken by one of the characters and a clear finalizing statement either in the form of an evaluating comment from the characters or with the λυκήθιον ἀπώλεσεν catch phrase.

|| 21 See especially Euripides’ insistence on a systematic order of examination in lines 1120–1121, ὅπως τὸ πρῶτον τῆς τραγωιδίας μέρος / πρώτιστον αὐτοῦ βασανιῶ τοῦ δεξιοῦ (see Sommerstein 1997 ad loc.). 22 Lines 1251–1363.

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Fig. 1: Framed fragments in Ar. Ran. 1119–1245.

As you can see in the table above (fig. 1), the wider frame which is created by the two statements of Euripides encompasses nine framed fragments, consisting of Aeschylus’ Choephoroi and Euripides’ Antigone, Archelaus, Hypsipyle, Stheneboia, second Phrixos, Iphigeneia in Tauris, Meleager, and Melanippe Wise. The fragments are framed by very characteristic introducing statements by Dionysus, Aeschylus and Euripides, such as ἴθι δὴ λέγ᾽ (1180), καὶ δὴ χρὴ λέγειν (1205), or λέγ᾽ ἕτερον … πρόλογον (1210), and in almost all cases, the Euripidean prologues are concluded by the ληκύθιον ἀπώλεσεν catch phrase (1208, 1213, 1218, 1226, 1233, 1238, 1241, 1245) spoken by Aeschylus and in the last case by Dionysus. The clear narrative boundaries of each fragment signal the structured and coordinated foreignness of the passages to the Aristophanic text. Aristophanes wants to highlight the function of those sections as an intertextual addendum and for that he uses clear indications that create fragments and also signify their beginning and end. This type of fragmentation captures the attention of the audience, and its extrovert signaling works as a detection method that invigorates the spectators’ theatrical and intertextual alertness.

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We are very much tempted to connect this meticulous signaling with the lines sung by the chorus just before the prologues section: the chorus encourage Euripides to speak of the old and the new, and to speak subtly and wisely (1105– 1108). They exhort him not to be afraid of the intellectual poorness of the spectators because the audience are now competent enough: εἰ δὲ τοῦτο καταφοβεῖσθον, μή τις ἀμαθία πρόσῆι, τοῖς θεωμένοισιν, ὡς τὰ λεπτὰ μὴ γνῶναι λεγόντοιν, μηδὲν ὀρρωδεῖτε τοῦθ᾽· ὡς οὐκέθ᾽ οὕτω ταῦτ᾽ ἔχει. ἐστρατευμένοι γάρ εἰσι, βιβλίον τ᾽ ἔχων ἕκαστος μανθάνει τὰ δεξιά· αἱ φύσεις τ᾽ ἄλλως κράτισται, νῦν δὲ καὶ παρηκόνηνται. μηδὲν οὖν δείσητον, ἀλλὰ πάντ᾽ ἐπέξιτον, θεατῶν γ᾽οὕνεχ᾽, ὡς ὄντων σοφῶν. (Ar. Ran. 1109–1118) And if you’re afraid of any ignorance among the spectators, that they won’t appreciate your subtleties of argument, dont worry about that, because things are no longer that way. For they’re veterans, and each one has a book and knows the fine points; their natural endowments are masterful too, and now sharpened up. So have no fear, but tackle it all, resting assured that the spectators are sage.

Aristophanes’ use of fragmentation in the Frogs is exquisite in many ways. It is instigated by the poet although the source texts are still in circulation in their full form, and perhaps even because of this, it is carefully signalled through linguistic frames that set the beginning and end of every fragment.23 Framed fragmentation

|| 23 If we tried to visualize Aristophanes’ structure of framed fragmentation we would find multiple analogies in the cappriccio of Pannini, the 18th century painter and architect, who, in his painting Ancient Rome (1757) he manages to depict thirty-five architectural sites and sculptures from ancient Rome without interrupting the flow of the main visual narrative. The archaeological remains are clearly signaled by the golden frames in which they are inserted, while the green and red curtains are dexterously pulled aside in order to give us visual access to the treasury, but also visually set the wider frame in which the thirty-five golden frames are encapsulated.

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can lead to a departmentalized narrative result, which however still maintains an uninterrupted narrative flow.

Fragments within Fragments This category stays very closely to that of the framed fragments. In this case however, fragments are not surrounded by narrative frames, but they provide information that most likely have been gathered via a mediated source. In this case, the fragment does not have its initial verbal form, but it is comprised of information regarding its content. When a tragic fragment is nested within another fragment, information about an ancient drama is channelled through an intermediate source that was what the author that are finally able to read consulted when he was writing his book. This category is dominated by Apollodorus.24 In a discussion of the parenthood of Argos Panoptes, Apollodorus refers to the father of Io and quotes the tragedians, many of whom say that she was the daughter of Inachos.25 A few lines later, Apollodorus turns to the tragic tradition again, this time quoting Asclepiades of Tragilus (Tragoidoumena) in specific: the text juxtaposes Asclepiades with Pherecydes, who attibutes the parenthood of Argos either to Arestor or to Inachos. The two possibilities interchange and the selection of the one excludes the other. Manuscript tradition reads ὃν Ἀσκληπιάδης μὲν Ἰνάχου λέγει, Φερεκύδης δὲ Ἀρέστορος, but as first noticed by Heyne back in 1783,26 a scholion on Phoenissae 1116 makes clear that in Pherecydes, Argos is the son of Arestor (τοῦ δὲ γίνεται Ἀρέστωρ, τοῦ δὲ Ἀργος),27 especially since the scholiast

|| 24 When quoting sources, Apollodorus does not eliminate himself to a single genre: his references might include epic poets, tragedians, and mythographers alike. His references are often structured as Zitatennest, namely a long reference to multiple authors that might have been even reproduced by a single source. The ground is slippery and the text of Apollodorus has been recently called a “textual artefact, built by editors upon the slippery basis of sources which are themselves also textual artefacts (scholia and lexicographical works)” (Villagra 2017, 59). Some of his references however can still fall under a category of minimal fragments quoted by later authors. 25 Aesch. PV 589; Soph. El. 5 and the fragmentary Inachos (TrGF IV frr. 269–295), where Io is also a plot character. Io’s ancestry is also frequently brought up in Aeschylus’ Supplices (see esp. 291–324). For the role of Io in Prometheus Bound see Murray 1958; Griffith 1983, 12. For Inachos see Griffith 1983, 188–190; Sutton 1979; Lloyd-Jones 2003, 112–135. 26 Heyne 1783, 252–253. 27 Schol. Eur. Phoen. 1116 (Schwartz I 365.23–366.2), ὁ μὲν γὰρ Φερεκύδης [frg. 22] φησὶν αὐτὸν ἐπὶ τοῦ ἰνίου ἔχειν ὀφθαλμὸν ἅμα δηλῶν ὅτι δύο ἐγένοντο Ἀργοι. Γράφει δὲ οὕτως· ‘ Ἄργος ὁ Διὸς

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quotes a long passage from Pherecydes, proving that he had direct access to it. The passage would then run as follows: Ἄργου δὲ καὶ Ἰσμήνης τῆς Ἀσωποῦ παῖς Ἴασος, οὗ φασιν Ἰὼ γενέσθαι. Κάστωρ δὲ ὁ συγγράψας τὰ χρονικὰ καὶ πολλοὶ τῶν τραγικῶν Ἰνάχου τὴν Ἰὼ λέγουσιν· Ἡσίοδος δὲ καὶ Ἀκουσίλαος Πειρῆνος αὐτήν φασιν εἶναι. ταύτην ἱερωσύνην τῆς Ἥρας ἔχουσαν Ζεὺς ἔφθειρε. φωραθεὶς δὲ ὑφ’ Ἥρας τῆς μὲν κόρης ἁψάμενος εἰς βοῦν μετεμόρφωσε λευκήν, ἀπωμόσατο δὲ ταύτῃ μὴ συνελθεῖν· διό φησιν Ἡσίοδος οὐκ ἐπισπᾶσθαι τὴν ἀπὸ τῶν θεῶν ὀργὴν τοὺς γινομένους ὅρκους ὑπὲρ ἔρωτος. Ἥρα δὲ αἰτησαμένη παρὰ Διὸς τὴν βοῦν φύλακα αὐτῆς κατέστησεν Ἄργον τὸν πανόπτην, ὃν Φερεκύδης μὲν Ἀρέστορος λέγει, Ἀσκληπιάδης δὲ Ἰνάχου, Κέρκωψ δὲ Ἄργου καὶ Ἰσμήνης τῆς Ἀσωποῦ θυγατρός· Ἀκουσίλαος δὲ γηγενῆ αὐτὸν λέγει.28 (Apollod. Bibl. 2.1.3 [5–6] (Asclep. Trag. FGrH 12 fr. 16)) Apparatus: Φερεκύδης … Ἀσκληπιάδης Heine : Ἀσκληπιἀδης … Φερεκύδης Α (conf. schol. Eurip. Phoen. 1116) Argos and Ismene daughter of Asopos had a son, Iasos, who they say was the father of Io. But the chronicler Castor and many of the tragedians say that Io was the daughter of Inachos. Hesiod and Acousilaos say that she was the daughter of Peiren. Zeus seduced her while she was serving as priestess of Hera. When he was caught by Hera, he touched the girl and turned her into a white cow, swearing that he had not had intercourse with her. That is why Hesiod says that oaths made in matters of love do not draw the ire of the gods. Hera got the cow from Zeus and set all-seeing Argos to guard her. Pherecydes says that Argos was the son of Arestor, Asclepiades that he was the son of Inachos, and Cercops that he was the son of Argos and Ismene daughter of Asopos. But Acousilaos says that he was an autochthon. (Translation by R. Scott Smith/S. Trzaskoma)

The passage provides a great number of references, bringing together information from the tragedians, but also from Castor, Hesiod, Acousilaos, Pherecydes, Asclepiades, and Cercops. It has been maintained that ‘the vagueness of the reference to the tragic texts and its insertion in a chain of references make it … very doubtful that Apollodorus would have consulted here the tragic passages themselves: rather he used learned commentaries or previous mythographers’.29

|| γαμεῖ Πειθὼ τὴν Ὠκεανοῦ. τοῦ δὲ γίνεται Κρίασος, τοῦ δ᾽ Ἐρευθαλίων, ἀφ᾽ οὗ Ἐρευθαλίη πόλις καλεῖται ἐν Ἄργει, καὶ Φόρβας. Τοῦ δε γίνεται Ἀρέστωρ, τοῦ δὲ Ἄργος, ὧι Ἥρη ὀφθαλμὸν τίθησιν ἐν τῶι ἰνίωι καὶ τὸν ὕπνον ἐξαιρεῖται καὶ ἐφιστᾶι φύλακα αὐτὸν τῆι Ἰοῖ. ἔπειθ᾽ Ἑρμῆς αὐτὸν κτείνει’. 28 Text is of Wagner 1926. 29 Huys 1997, 315.

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The accumulation of the sources certainly decreases the possibility of Apollodorus checking his sources first hand. It seems that Apollodorus reveals his only source (as far as the tragedians are concerned) at the moment he quotes Asclepiades. The unspecific character of the expression πολλοὶ τῶν τραγικῶν points at the possibility of Apollodorus’ use of a mythographical source and certainly Asclepiades could have been a good possibility.30 If this scenario is correct, then the information that we gather from Apollodorus is about a tragic fragment regarding the parenthood of Argos and Io, which Apollodorus is not reproducing having the tragic texts in front of him, but rather, after using an intermediate source, perhaps Asclepiades, whom, we can assume, did have access to the initial texts.

Pseudo-Fragments Playful interaction with fragments, or even the creation of fragments as such is part of the intellectual works of narrators of different genres in the course of different chronological periods, be it classical or Hellenistic poets, romantic or contemporary painters. The adoration of the fragment has grown because of different reasons and with different results according to the era in which it was developed and to whether the fragment was intentionally created or de facto the only available. The Aitia-prologue provides us with one of the most characteristic examples of conscious selectivity, in which the poet proudly celebrates discontinuity and incompleteness: Πολλάκι μοι Τελχῖνες ἐπιτρύζουσιν ἀοιδῆι νήιδες, οἳ Μούσης οὐκ ἐγένοντο φίλοι, εἵνεκεν οὐχ ἓν ἄεισμα διηνεκὲς ἢ βασιλ[η . . . . . . ]ας ἐν πολλαῖς ἤνυσα χιλιάσιν ἢ . . . . . ] . ους ἥρωας, ἔπος δ᾽ ἐπὶ τυτθὸν ἑλ[ίσσω παῖς ἅτε, τῶν δ᾽ ἐτέων ἡ δεκὰς οὐκ ὀλίγη. (Callim. fr. 1, 1–6 Pfeiffer)

|| 30 Even if we read Φερεκύδης μὲν Ἀρέστορος λέγει, Ἀσκληπιάδης δὲ Ἰνάχου, pace Villagra 2017, 60. The fact that such a reading presents Io and Argos Panoptes as siblings does not by definition exclude itself from the tragic tradition. Besides, different tragedies often present conflicting versions of the myth, and with the myth of the Danaids this happens to be even stronger. As characteristically maintained by Garvie 2006, 163–164, “the most remarkable feature of the accounts [of the myth of the Danaids] is their lack of agreement in almost every detail of the story”.

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Often the Telchines mutter against me, against my poetry, Who, ignorant of the Muse, were not born as her friend, Because I did not complete one single continuous song (on the glory of?) kings . . . in many thousands of lines Or on . . . heroes, but turn around words a little in my mind Like a child, although the decades of my years are not few. (Text and Translation by A. Harder)

The first lines of the poem have given rise to long discussions for numerous reasons. What is of interest to us at this point is the fact that the poem starts by projecting the impression of something small and discontinuous (οὐχ ἓν διηνεκὲς ἄεισμα), although it is developed in some thousands of lines.31 In this sense, these first lines deliberately create a false fragmentary impression in a complete composition. One of the most characteristic examples of such a narrative impression is the Lipogrammatic Odyssey by Triphiodorus, as well as the Lipogrammatic Iliad by Nestor of Laranda, who both composed new versions of the two epics upon a word-game according to which, one letter of the alphabet was missing in each of the twenty-four books (alpha from Book 1, beta from Book 2 and so on). In both of these cases, an otherwise complete narrative is intentionally given fragmentary characteristics. The Suda explains both lipogrammata as following: Νέστωρ· Λαρανδεύς, ἐκ Λυκίας, ἐποποιός, πατὴρ Πεισάνδρου τοῦ ποιητοῦ, γεγονὼς ἐπὶ Σευήρου τοῦ βασιλέως· Ἰλιάδα λειπογράμματον ἤτοι ἀστοιχείωτον· ὁμοίως δὲ αὐτῶι ὁ Τρυφιόδωρος ἔγραψεν Ὀδύσσειαν· ἔστι γὰρ ἐν τῆι πρώτηι μὴ εὑρίσκεσθαι ἄλφα καὶ κατὰ ῥαψωιδίαν οὕτως τὸ ἑκάστης ἐκλιμπάνειν στοιχεῖον. [Sud. s.v. Νέστωρ (ν 261)] Nestor, of Laranda, in Lycia, an epic poet, father of the poet Pisandrus, active under the reign of [Septimius] Severus. [He wrote] a lipogrammatic Iliad, that is with one character missing. Triphiodorus wrote an Odyssey in the same fashion. In the first [book], one does not find [the letter] alpha, and along the whole poem, the letter designating each book is missing. (Translation by P. Schubert)

The very experiment of the lipogrammatic Iliad and Odyssey is based on a forced correspondence between the 24 letters of the Greek alphabet and the 24 Books of each of the two Homeric epics. Nestor and Triphiodorus had to rewrite in the same meter all lines of each Book from which the given letter was missing. This is a

|| 31 See the discussion in Harder 2012, 12–13.

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very demanding task, especially with respect to letters that are very common to the Greek language (e.g. alpha, epsilon, iota, kappa, omicron, pi, sigma) and would unavoidably result in the re-composition of many lines of the relevant Books. In a seminal article on this topic,32 James Porter draws attention to the fact that lipograms are difficult games, using as proof the fact that E.G. Turner, the editor of Papyrus Bodmer XXVIII,33 noted that neither he nor two audiences to whom he had presented his material had realized that the very papyrus he was editing was asigmatic, and that this became evident to him only when pointed by a colleague. Lipogramms are not easy to detect when a given text is not familiar to the audience. Conversely, when a text is well-known we would expect that the lipogrammatic new composition would be observed by the audience, since they would easily compare it with the version they are aware of. This, I concur, is exactly the case with the lipogrammatic Iliad and Odyssey of Nestor and Triphiodorus respectively. In fact, it is against the background of the familiarity of any hellenophone audience with Homer, even in the imperial period, that we should interpret Nestor’s and Triphiodorus’ experiment.34 This observation lies at the heart of the function of such lipogrammatic texts as pseudo-fragments. The aim of this demanding game was to create the impression of recasting an archetype not by refashioning its characters, plotline or viewpoint but by remolding its cast through selective fragmentation. The outcome would

|| 32 Porter 2007. 33 A satyr-play on the confrontation of Heracles and Atlas (Turner 1976). 34 The dating of Nestor and Triphiodorus (2nd–3rd cent. AD) is remarkably in tune with an interest in detecting alphabetic anomalies in Homer. Athenaeus (10.458a–e) offers an entire list of relevant cases, which are drawn from the Iliad and the Odyssey (and to a lesser extent from comedy). They pertain to the following phenomena: (1) repetition of verse beginning and ending with the same letter (alpha: Il. 4.92, 5.226 and 453; epsilon: Il. 4.89, 5.886; eta: Il. 5.133 and 370; iota: Il. 6.60 and 206; sigma: Il. 1.90; omega: Il. 16.364); (2) asigmatic verses (Il. 7.364); (3) verses whose first and last syllable, if put together, create a given name (Il. 2.557, 658, 732); (4) verses whose first and last syllable, if put together, create the name of a utensil (Il. 8.202, Od. 17.580, 18.107); (5) verses whose first and last syllable, if put together, create the name of some food (Il. 1.538 and 1.550). Athenaeus classifies this category of alphabetic game under ‘riddles’ (γρίφοι), which in this case are based on an existing text that is, contrary to lipogrammatic experiments, not altered at all. Having said this, we should not fail to notice that the alphabetic literary games on Homer (and comedy) presented by Athenaeus are also of a pseudo-fragmentary nature. This time though their fragmentary function lurks behind their seemingly impeccable poetic façade. Their literary or other aspects become null and void. What interests the reader is a syllabic stitching in visually and aurally detectable slots of the line or the lipogrammatically oriented asigmatic effect.

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have been an Iliad that is a pseudo-fragment of Homer’s Iliad, an Odyssey that is a pseudo-fragment of the Homeric Odyssey, since under their fragmentary façade the two epics would have followed their plotline, character-drawing technique, and Weltanschauung.35 Lipogrammatic experiments are at least as old as Lasus of Hermione who was the first to our knowledge to have toyed with the composition of a poetic text deliberately deprived of a single letter. Lasus’ floruit is dated to the last quarter of the sixth century BC but his lipogrammatic tryouts did not originate ex nihilo. Sacadas of Argos composed a Pythian nomos in five parts representing the fight between Apollo and the serpent at Pytho. This composition became a set-piece, not least because Sacadas was able to “voice” the serpent’s hissing by recourse to the use of sibilants. Sacadas’ experiment was a hit. Vocal sibilance became widely known, especially since his Pythian nomos was replete with musical innovation. The next step to Sacadas’ innovation was undertaken by another poet from the wider area of Argolis. Lasus of Hermione tried to bring the sound of words and music in harmony by eliminating the letter sigma from two compositions of his (the dithyramb Centaurs and a Hymn to Demeter) because he regarded it as “difficult to pronounce” or “harsh-sounding (σκληρόστομον)” “and illsuited to the aulos”.36 The story goes on with the most famous student of Lasus, Pindar who in his second Dithyramb adopted sigmatism not only per se but also so as to place himself within the continuing debate about vocal sibilance and music.37 Lasus’ experiment is inscribed within a wider matrix of beliefs concerning

|| 35 A rather different case are the Homeric centos, though they also function as pseudo-fragments. One famous example is a work by the empress Eudocia Athenais (wife of the emperor Theodosius II, fifth cent. AD) who composed a poem on the life of Christ that was exclusively composed of Homeric lines, which had been reordered, so as to suit the new plotline. This biblical pastiche is also a pseudo-fragment but of a different sort. What is noteworthy is that in the preface of this work, composed in dactylic hexameters by Eudocia herself, we have a straightforward explanation both of the fact that she undertook this task in order to expand what the fourthcentury Christian bishop Patricius had started but also her own apologetic to potential complaints concerning her recasting Homer’s text. We do not know whether Nestor or Triphiodorus had followed an analogous practice. 36 Athen. 11.467a = fr. 87 Wehrli (I owe this reference to Porter 2007, 1 n. 5). In the wake of modern lettrisme and G. Perec’s famous “Histoire du lipogramme”, published by an association the name of which toys with this phenomenon (Oulipo < οὐ λείπω), Porter (2007, 1) has rightly called Lasus’ experiment a “proto-Oulipian gesture”. 37 See Zimmermann 2008, 44–50; LeVen 2014, 81–83.

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musical sound. It may well be the case, as Porter has suggested, that his lipogrammatic practice had the rather odd aim to “enable and unleash sound through the suppression of sound”.38 It is now time we ask an important question: how is selective lipogrammatism linked to pseudo-fragmentation? By suppressing letters, lipogrammatism suppresses sound, thus creating the impression of double-fragmentation, both on the level of the text and on the level of its aural perception. Yet, this is only an impression, the impression of false-fragmentation aiming to enable and unleash in greater force the function and sound of other letters and their sounds, together with which the missing letter forms part of a whole. Many centuries later, in January 1845, Edgar Allan Poe publishes The Raven, a poem about a talking raven’s mysterious visit to a distraught lover. The bird is pictured as sitting on a bust of Pallas and instigates the lover’s distress by a constant repetition of the word “Nevermore”. The Raven is structured upon a rich intertextual scheme, but most importantly, in its 18 stanzas of six lines each, Poe never uses the letter z. The poem has a harmonious flow, but at the same time, a fragmentary feeling, which actually has been compared to the Mayan ruins in Chiapas, Mexico: The passion and sentiment are also original, while the style has a fragmentary character, like the architecture of the ruins of Chiapas, where frescoes, and rude but beautiful workmanship, are scattered about in the wildest profusion. (John Sullivan Dwight, review in the Harbinger, 6 December 1845, 1, 410–411).39

The review reminds us of the cappricci, and the way in which a ruin is inserted in a painting as a visual fragment. The lipogramatic structure underscores the fragmentary façade of a narrative that is really unfragmented. A pseudo-fragment is the celebration of fragmentary stylistics in an unfragmented narrative. Along with Triphiodorus, Nestor, and Poe, Auguste Rodin insists on fragmented torsos,40 and one of his futuristic successors, Umberto Boccioni constructs sculptures of synthetic continuity built upon multi-layered fragmentation.41

|| 38 Porter 2007, 13. 39 Walker 1986, 240. 40 See e.g. August Rodin’s, Torse féminin avec main de squelette sur le ventre (c. 1883, Musée Rodin, Paris). 41 See e.g. Umberto Boccioni, Synthèse du dynamisme humain (1913, Location unknown, destroyed).

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Fragments of Ancient Scholarship Over the course of the history of the transmission of classical literature, ancient scholarship has become a powerful medium for the preservation of classical texts. The works of ancient scholars are very often the source for literary fragments. This category however will not examine literary fragments that have been transmitted by ancient scholarship, but rather fragments of ancient scholarship. As in most cases of fragmentary transmission, ancient scholarship is transmitted by intermediate sources like lexicographical collections, miscellaneous works (such as that of Athenaeus), or the ancient scholia. In the case of ancient scholarship, those sources provide us with the textual choices opted by the grammarians, with or without a simple note on the grammarian’s reading. This would mean that the fragment of the grammarians, is actually their own reading of the classical text, transmitted to us through a intermediate source. In Euripides’ Hecuba, the phantom of Polydorus delivers the prologue and describes how his father Priam secretly sent him away to the court of Polymestor since he was very young to fight. Lines 13–14 read as follows: (ΠΟΛΥΔΩΡΟΥ ΕΙΔΩΛΟΝ) νεώτατος δ᾽ ἦ Πριαμιδῶν, ὃ καί με γῆς ὑπεξέπεμψεν. … (Eur. Hec. 13–14) (PHANTOM OF POLYDORUS) I was the youngest of Priam’s sons, and it was for this reason that he sent me away secretly. …

Schwartz prints the following scholia: νεώτατος δ᾽ ἦν: ἀντὶ τοῦ ἤμην φησίν. Ἀττικῶς δὲ ἦν. καὶ χωρὶς δὲ τοῦ ν ἦ, ἀντὶ τοῦ ἔα. Οὕτω Δίδυμος. ἐν μέντοι τοῖς ἀντιγράφοις ἦν φέρεται καὶ κοινὴ ἀνάγνωσις ἦν. (Schol. Eur. Hec. 13 Schwartz 1887, 13) “I was the youngest”: he says ἦν instead of ἤμην. In Attic ἦν. And also without ν (ἦ), instead of ἔα. Thus Didymus. But ἦν is transmitted in the manuscripts and the common reading is ἦν.

We note the expression οὕτω Δίδυμος. What is the Didymus fragment here? It is his own reading of the manuscript, in our case a single-lettered word: ἦ. In this case of fragmentation, a fragment provides a variant for the source text and is

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itself at the same time, a sample of work from a fragmentary transmitted author. As explained by Franco Montanari, at times the fragment that acts as a source of information on the thought of an ancient philologist is given exclusively by a word of the author studied by the philologist, i.e. by the reading he selected or the conjecture he felt it necessary to introduce in a given passage of his author.42

The Euripidean variant is the Didymus fragment and in this sense, a fragment of secondary literature as such is identical with a varia lectio of a text of primary literature. With analogous examples from Aristarchus, the comments of ancient grammarians constitute a separate category of fragmentation, consisting of fragments with a double identity: examples of ancient scholarship, and simultaneously, variae lectiones of ancient Greek texts. The creation of fragments breaks downs narrative to reinvent cohesion in a new hybrid genre. By abolishing the context of the source text, the new narrative is led to a new compartmentalized wholeness that nonetheless managed to preserve its narrative flow. In a new wholeness, fragments acquire new characteristics and novel narrative roles that do not look backward, towards the source text, but forward, towards the new narrative whole in which they are engulfed.

Bibliography Bowie, E. (1997), “The Theognidea: a step towards a collection of fragments?”, in: G.W. Most (ed.) (1997), Collecting Fragments / Fragmente sammeln, Göttingen, 53–66. Bowie, E. (2012), “An Early Chapter in the History of the Theogonidea”, in: X. Riu/J. Pòrtulas (eds) (2012), Approaches to Archaic Greek Poetry, Messina, 121–148. Bradshaw, M. (2008), “Hedgehog Theory: How to Read a Romantic Fragment Poem”, Literature Compass 5.1, 73–89. Collard, C./Cropp, M.J./Gibert, J. (2004), Euripides: Selected Fragmentary Plays with Introductions, Translations, and Commentaries, vol. 2, Warminster. Csapo, E./Slater, W.J. (1995), The Context of Ancient Drama, Ann Arbor. Dionissotti, A.C. (1997), “On Fragments in classical scholarship”, in: G. Most (ed.) (1997), Collecting Fragments / Fragmente sammeln, Göttingen, 1–33. Dover, K.J. (1993), Aristophanes’ Frogs: Edited with Introduction and Commentary, Oxford. Garvie, A.F. (2006), Aeschylus’ Supplices, Play and Trilogy, rev. ed., Exeter. Griffith, M. (1983), Aeschylus’ Prometheus Bound, Cambridge.

|| 42 Montanari 1997, 275.

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Harder, A. (1985), Euripides’ Kresphontes and Archelaos: Introduction, Text and Commentary, Leiden. Harries, E.W. (1994), The Unfinished Manner: Essays on the Fragment in the Later Eighteenth Century, Charlotesville VA/London. Henderson, J. (2002), Aristophanes’ Frogs, Assemblywomen, Wealth, Cambridge MA. Heyne, Ch.G. (1783), Ad Apollodori Atheniensis Bibliothecam Notae, pars I, Göttingen. Huys, M. (1997), “The Fabulae of Ps.-Hyginus: a source for the reconstruction of Euripides’ lost tragedies?: Part II”, Archiv fur Papyrus Forschung und Verwandte Gebiete 43, 11–30. Janowitz, A. (2003), “The Romantic Fragment”, in: D. Wu (ed.) (2003), A Companion to Romanticism, Malden MA, 442–451. LeVen, P.A. (2014), The Many-Headed Muse: Tradition and Innovation in Late Classical Greek Lyric Poetry, Cambridge. Lloyd-Jones, H. (2003), Sophocles: Fragments, repr. with corrections and additions, Cambridge MA. Montanari, F. (1997), “The Fragments of Hellenistic Scholarship”, in: G. Most (ed.) (1997), Collecting Fragments / Fragmente sammeln, Göttingen, 273–288. Murray, R.D. (1958), The motif of Io in Aeschylus’ Supplices, Princeton. Nisetich, F. (2001), The Poems of Callimachus, Oxford. Page, D.L. (1934), Actors’ Interpolations in Greek Tragedy, Oxford. Perrin, B. (1989), Plutarch’s Lives with an English Translation, Cambridge MA. Porter, J. (2007), “Lasus of Hermione, Pindar and the riddle of s”, CQ (57.1) 1–21. Rauber, D.F. (1969), “The Fragment as Romantic Form”, Modern Language Quarterly 30, 212– 221. Schubert, P. (2007), “From the Epics to the Second Sophistic, from Hebuba to Aethra, and finally from Troy to Athens: Defining the Position of Quintus Smyrnaeus in his Posthomerica”, in: M. Baumbach/S. Bär (eds) (2007), Quintus Smyrnaeus: Transforming Homer in Second Sophistic Epic, Berlin, 339–356. Schwartz, E. (1887–1891), Scholia in Euripidem, Berlin. Scullion, S. (2006), “The Opening of Euripides’ Archelaus”, in: D. Cairns/V. Liapis (eds) (2006), Dionysalexandros: Essays on Aeschylus and his Fellow Tragedians in Honour of Alexander F. Garvie, Swansea, 185–200. Sistakou, E. (2009), “Fragments of an Imaginary Past: Strategies of Mythical Narration in Apollonius’ Argonautica and Callimachus’ Aitia”, RFIC 137, 380–401. Sutton, D.F. (1979), Sophocles’ Inachus, Meisenheim. Thomas, S. (2005), “The Fragment”, in: N. Roe (ed.) (2005), Romanticism, Oxford, 502–520. Thomas, S. (2008), Romanticism and Visuality. Fragments, History, Spectacle, London/New York. Villagra, N. (2017), “Lost in Tradition: Apollodorus and Tragedy-Related Texts”, in: J. Pàmias (ed.) (2017), Apollodoriana: Ancient Myths, New Crossroads, Berlin/Boston, 38–65. Wagner, R. (1926), Mythographi Graeci vol. 1: Apollodori Bibliotheca, Stuttgart/Leipzig. Walker, I. (ed.) (1986), Edgar Allan Poe: The Critical Heritage, London/New York. West, M.L. (1974), Studies in Greek Elegy and Iambus, Berlin. West, M.L. (ed.) (1980), Delectus ex Iambis et Elegis Graecis, Oxford. Wright, M. (2016), “Euripidean Tragedy and Quotation Culture: The Case of Stheneboea F661”, AJPh 137, 601–623. Zimmermann, B. (2008), Dithyrambos: Geschichte Einer Gattung, Berlin.

Matthew Wright

How Long Did the Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy Survive? In a way, it is astonishing that any texts of Greek tragedy have survived at all, considering the length of time that has elapsed and the historical events that have taken place since their first performances. By nature books are fragile things, hard to preserve and all too easy to destroy. We are exceptionally fortunate to possess as many as thirty-two complete tragedies, which have somehow made their way to us through a long and haphazard process of transmission. 1 It might so easily not have happened. On the other hand, it might seem surprising that more tragedies did not survive, considering the enormous number of texts that must once have been in circulation throughout the civilised world. Even despite tragedy’s wide popularity throughout antiquity, and its centrality to education and literary culture over an even longer period, our knowledge of the surviving plays depends on just a handful of medieval manuscripts. What happened to the tragic corpus between antiquity and the Middle Ages is not quite clear. Our evidence suggests that most of the plays that happened to survive did so because they became established, at some point in the second or third century AD, as a standard “selected edition” of tragedy. Such a selection was no doubt convenient for educational use, but we cannot know whether it was deliberately put together for that reason. 2 The selection consisted of twenty-four plays: seven each by Aeschylus and Sophocles, and ten by Euripides. But there is no very obvious explanation why this precise number of works was chosen (why not seven, or ten, apiece?) or why these particular titles were seen as preferable to so many others. Perhaps surprisingly, there is no indication that considerations of quality played any part in the choice. One might have supposed that the plays that were preserved were invariably those that won first prizes in the festivals, or those that were consistently most highly regarded by ancient critics, but this is demonstrably not the case. Of course, the making of qualitative aesthetic judgements must be seen as an inherently controversial business, then as now, but still it is hard to feel convinced that it was the best tragedies that were selected, no matter how

 1 Garland (2003) provides a lively and accessible account of this process; cf. Battezzato 2003. 2 See Pearson 1917, xlvi–xlvii; Zuntz 1965, 254–255; Finglass 2012, 13, reacting to the unprovable suggestion of Wilamowitz (1907) that a single figure, such as a second-century schoolmaster, was responsible for the selection. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-006

  Matthew Wright we might define “best”. We can agree that many of them are works of great artistic merit, but so too, by all accounts, were many of the lost plays. (Was Aeschylus’ Suppliant Women really considered to be better than, say, his Niobe or Myrmidons? Surely not.) Furthermore, it is also important to stress that until the second century AD (or thereabouts) the “selected” plays are not particularly well represented in relation to the “unselected” plays, either in papyrus remains and book citations or in the performance record. 3 In other words, the relative popularity or unpopularity of a play does not seem to have been a significant factor in the selection process. And so one is led to look for other explanations. The comparative absence of racy or outré subject matter among the selected plays may suggest that some sort of bowdlerizing impulse was at work. It is striking that the theme of erotic love, which is encountered very frequently in the plots of lost tragedies (especially those of Euripides), is scarcely represented in the selected works, 4 and that plays featuring homosexuality, incest, rape, bestiality and cannibalism are omitted almost entirely. 5 Positive reasons for inclusion, as opposed to rejection, are harder to discern. One notes that there are two or three groups of titles that cluster around a single myth, such as the exploits of Orestes, Electra and Iphigenia, or the family of Oedipus. It has been suggested that such thematic clustering may be due to the prevalent practice of comparison-and-contrast (synkrisis) in educational contexts. 6 This suggestion is plausible, but, if correct, it is hard to explain why those responsible for the selection did not choose works that were more directly comparable — such as the three Philoctetes plays discussed side-by-side in Dio Chrysostom’s fifty-second Oration, or the three parallel Oedipus tragedies by Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides. (A brief glance through the titles of lost plays will reveal many other more obvious candidates for synkrisis.) 7 However that may be, no one has ever succeeded in identifying any other organizing principles, thematic connections or features of form or content linking together the twenty-four selected tragedies, which are extremely heterogeneous in character. Nor, apparently, do these plays share any special characteristics that would make them particularly suitable for educational use.  3 For comparison of papyrus survival rates over time (selected vs. non-selected plays) see Garland 2003, 53–54; Avezzù 2012, 46–47; Carrara 2009, esp. 138–139, 211–212, 251–252, 383–386, 585–593. Cf. Appendix 2 below. 4 See Wright 2017, 224. Euripides’ penchant for love-stories is noted by ancient critics, e.g. Ar. Frogs 1042–55, Long. De Subl. 15.3, Plut. Erotikos (Mor. 748–771). 5 Cf. Easterling 2006, 12–15 for the view that maximum accessibility was a factor, in the sense that the selected plays of Sophocles provide “something for everyone”. 6 Russell/Winterbottom 1972, 504. 7 A list of shared titles and subjects is provided by Wright 2016a, 203–205.

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Thus the question of who made the selection and why eludes a definite answer. But the emergence of this selected edition seems to have coincided with an increasing neglect of all the other tragedies. This is strongly indicated by the dwindling quantity of citations and papyrus fragments from plays outside the selected edition after the second century AD. It seems certain that the creation of the selected edition was, after the decree of Lycurgus (see below), the most decisive single moment in the transmission history of tragic texts. Nevertheless, a few other plays of Euripides also survived – the so-called “alphabetical tragedies”, the titles of which begin with Ε/Η/Θ/Ι: Helen, Heracles, Children of Heracles (Herakleidai), Electra, Suppliant Women (Hiketides), Iphigenia at Aulis, Iphigenia among the Taurians and Ion. 8 This tells us that – somewhere in the world, at some point in time — people were continuing to read and make copies of non-selected plays. This group of plays looks like part of a “Complete Works” of Euripides arranged alphabetically, but it demonstrates that even an apparently complete collection might be unreliable and full of gaps. It is tantalizing to reflect that other known Euripidean titles beginning with the same letters — Erecththeus, Theseus, Thyestes, Ino, Ixion and the lost Hippolytus — might easily have survived among this group but did not. The gaps are probably due to the haphazard assembly of individual book-rolls, which would have contained one play each. 9 Once a group of plays had been transferred to the new codex format, it seems that their specific selection and ordering would have been fixed more securely, and that their survival would have been less precarious. 10 Scholars typically refer to the survival of the alphabetical tragedies as a “happy accident” or “miracle”. 11 In other words, there was a parallel tradition of textual transmission, entirely independent of the selected edition, which left almost no trace on the historical record until the fourteenth century (the date of the codex Laurentianus, our main source for these plays). How this came about, even if not a miracle, is certainly mysterious. But the survival of the alphabetical plays is extremely significant. It shows us that we do not really know how long, or in what circumstances, any of the tragedies outside the mainstream “selected” tradition survived between antiquity and the fourteenth century; they obviously did

 8 The satyric Cyclops is also preserved in this group. 9 So Zuntz 1965, 277; cf. Snell 1935, who speculates that the nine surviving “alphabetical” plays represent the contents of two separate book-cases, each containing precisely five rolls (including Hecuba, which would not need to be re-copied since it already existed in the selected edition). 10 Cf. Finglass 2012, 13–14 on the transition from bookroll to codex as a factor affecting a play’s survival or loss. 11 E.g. Zuntz 1965, 277–278, Kovacs 2005, 387.

  Matthew Wright not drop out of circulation entirely. 12 All of which means, of course, that the rediscovery of further medieval manuscripts containing lost plays would not be a completely unrealistic fantasy — but let us not get carried away. 13 Even though so much about the preservation or disappearance of texts must remain obscure, it is important to enquire exactly how and when the lost plays became lost. How many people within antiquity still knew these plays? Did they encounter them in the medium of performances or books? When ancient writers quoted or discussed tragedies now lost, did they still have the full texts before them? For how long did texts of these works remain available? Can we pinpoint the last recorded sightings of lost plays? Our evidence is very incomplete, but we can make at least a tentative attempt to answer some of these questions. It is normally assumed that during the tragedians’ lifetimes copies of their plays will have existed in their own personal collections, and that after their deaths the poets’ families will have retained all or most of these texts. No direct evidence for such book collections exists, apart from a testimonium that mentions Euripides as the owner of an unusually well-stocked private library, 14 but it seems a reasonable assumption. Book-ownership was becoming widespread in the fifth century, and the fact that the tragedians’ descendants were able to stage revivals of their work indicates that copies of the scripts must have lain readily to hand. 15 In addition, the huge number of tragic quotations, allusions and parodies in fifth-century comedy, many of them intricate and recherché, strongly suggests (to me, at least) that the comedians also had access to texts of a wide range of tragedies when writing their own plays. 16

 12 Signs of knowledge of the “alphabetic” plays have been detected in a small number of Byzantine texts: see Magnelli 2003. 13 For a touching example of scholarly fantasy see Weitzmann 1959, 26–27, 78–80, who managed to persuade himself, on the basis of illustrations in an illuminated manuscript of Oppian (Venice, Marcian. Cod. Gr. 479), that texts of Euripides’ Daughters of Pelias, Ino and other plays remained in circulation during the eleventh century: see Zuntz 1965, 278–281 for trenchant criticism. 14 Athen. 1.3a (TrGF 5 T49; cf. T50a–b). 15 E.g. Aristias, Euphorion, Iophon, Sophocles II (TrGF 1.9, 1.12, 1.22, 1.62); cf. Sutton 1987 on theatrical families in general. 16 See Lowe 1993; Wright 2012, 141–171.

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Comedians throughout the fourth century continued to draw on tragedy, showing a marked preference for fifth-century drama over works by their contemporaries. 17 This may suggest that these earlier plays and their authors were already starting to acquire the status of “classics” — or, at any rate, that the works of Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides remained well known for many decades after their deaths. Euripides is attested more often than Sophocles or Aeschylus in the fragments of “middle” and “new” comedy, but no firm conclusions can be drawn on this basis because our evidence is so jejune. For the same reason the absence of identifiable allusions to any other fifth-century tragedians cannot prove that their plays had already fallen into desuetude, though it may well be that this was so. All we can say for certain is that comedy during the whole of the fourth century, up to and including the plays of Menander, demonstrates knowledge of lost works by all three major tragedians. 18 It is striking that the titles of numerous comedies from this period mirror the titles of now-lost tragedies — for instance, Diphilus’ Daughters of Danaus, Eubulus’ Europa, Antiphanes’ Athamas, Anaxandrides’ Tereus, Nicochares’ Lemnian Women and literally dozens of others along similar lines. 19 Were some or all of these works parodies of specific tragedies — and, if so, on whose tragedies were they based? We cannot be certain whether these comedies were paratragic or simply mythological in conception, but they strongly suggest the ongoing availability and popularity of fifth-century tragedy, extant and non-extant plays alike. At around the same time scholars were starting to write critical and historical studies of tragedy. As well as Aristotle’s extant Poetics, which discusses many now lost tragedies, we know of many other similar works of secondary literature produced in the fourth and early third centuries — including Aristotle’s Performance Records (Didaskaliai), Victories at the Dionysia and On the Tragedians, Heraclides of Pontus’ On the Three Tragedians and On Euripides’ and Sophocles’ Plots, Chamaeleon’s On Aeschylus, Douris’ On Euripides and Sophocles, Philochorus’ On Euripides and his five-book monograph On Sophocles’ Myths, and Dicaearchus’

 17 See Wright 2013, 619–622; Farmer 2017, 11–113, and (on Menander in particular) Gutzwiller 2000; Cusset 2003. 18 Identifiable allusions to lost works (all refs. are to Kassel-Austin): Anaxilas fr. 19, Diphilus fr. 32 (Aeschylus); Alexis fr. 157, Antiphanes fr. 191, Timocles fr. 6 (Sophocles); Anaxandrides fr. 66, Archippus fr. 47, Diphilus fr. 74, Eubulus fr. 26 and fr. 67, Nicostratus fr. 29, Philemon fr. 73, Timocles fr. 6, Antiphanes fr. 19; Menander, Aspis 407, Carchedonios fr. 7, Epitrepontes 760–768, Heros 84, Samia 324–326, 498–500 (Euripides). 19 For detailed discussion see Nesselrath 1990 and 1993; cf. Casolari 2003.

  Matthew Wright Plot-Summaries of Sophocles and Euripides and Contests at the Dionysia. 20 The titles of all these works indicate that they provided comprehensive, synoptic coverage of the material. Obviously the early scholars had access to all the plays as well as contextual information about their production. These books, like many of the plays they discussed, have disappeared, but they were no doubt known and used by later scholars — some of whom will have had far less (if any) first-hand knowledge of the plays themselves. (This is a particularly important consideration when weighing up the evidential value of citations from lost plays: see below.) People’s knowledge of tragedy during the fourth century and later would have depended, increasingly, on acquaintance with the texts in the form of books, but also, to a variable degree, on a continuing tradition of performance. In 386 BC the Athenians voted to include a performance of “old tragedy” alongside new works at the City Dionysia. 21 This measure does not imply that there had been no revivals of older tragedies before that date, but it is a sign of the ongoing popularity of such plays and the increasing esteem in which certain fifth-century writers were being held. 22 No doubt these reperformances at the Dionysia will have included many plays now lost, but we have almost no record of specific tragedies that were produced under this rule. Similarly, we know of many other theatres and performance contexts throughout Greece — and far beyond — in the fourth century and later, but we have next to no information about the actual plays that were produced there. 23 Many fourth-century vase-paintings from South Italy and Magna Graecia depict scenes related (in some sense) to the subject-matter and characters of tragedy: these images are often treated as evidence for frequent reperformances of fifth-century drama beyond Athens, including many non-extant plays. 24 However, as I have argued elsewhere, the status of such evidence is ambiguous. 25 The problem is not simply that it is open to doubt whether drama (in general) had any direct influence on the world of art. 26 Even if one is inclined to be less sceptical,

 20 TrGF 3, pp. 101–102; TrGF 4 T148–155; TrGF 5 T206–217. 21 IG ii2 2318, 2323, 2323a; cf. Pickard-Cambridge 1988, 99–100, 123–125. 22 On reperformance in antiquity see Lamari 2015. 23 See Csapo/Wilson 2015; Csapo et al. 2014. 24 See Taplin 2007 and (with particular reference to the question of reperformance) Vahtikari 2014 and Nervegna 2014. 25 Wright 2016a, xxii–xxiii. 26 E.g. Small 2003, in a bracingly sceptical discussion, refers to “the parallel worlds” of classical art and text.

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it is hard to demonstrate links between vase-paintings and particular performances, as opposed to widespread familiarity with the texts in book form. 27 But regardless of one’s own point of view on such problems generally, it has to be admitted that there is not a single vase-painting that can definitely be connected with a specific performance of a lost tragedy — and for our current purposes this is an insurmountable problem. At best, the vase-paintings can provide a rough indication of which plays and myths remained well known. Surviving images have been plausibly linked to a wide range of non-extant plays. For instance, in his Pots and Plays Oliver Taplin includes fifth- and fourth-century images that may (with varying degrees of probability) be related to Aeschylus’ Edonians, Europe, Niobe, Prometheus Unbound, Phineus and Phrygians; Sophocles’ Creusa, Tereus and Thyestes at Sicyon; and Euripides’ Aeolus, Alcmene, Andromeda, Antigone, Antiope, Dictys, Melanippe, Meleager, Oeneus, Oenomaus, Stheneboea, Telephus, Hypsipyle, Phoenix, Phrixus I and Chrysippus. But this is a judiciously-chosen sample, rather than a complete list of all available possibilities: there have been many other attempts to match up vases and lost tragedies. 28 Most recently Vesa Vahtikari, in a sensible and scrupulous survey of the evidence, has identified just seven lost plays that were “very probably” reperformed outside Athens in the fourth century: Euripides’ Antiope, Telephus and Stheneboea, Sophocles’ Thyestes in Sicyon, and tragedies about Andromeda, Oenomaus and Niobe (authorship uncertain); this list is supplemented by various other tragedies that were “probably” or “possibly” reperformed. 29 But in none of these cases (alas) is certainty achievable. What the artistic evidence suggests is that, as we might have expected, a wide range of non-extant plays remained well known throughout the fourth century, and indeed that the lost plays are no less well represented than most of those which happened to survive. The distribution of images also seems to suggest, more unexpectedly, that Euripides became the most popular tragedian from a relatively early date. But, however we may choose to interpret this evidence, it can only take us as far as the late fourth century. After that date the picture is much less clear. Appendix 1 provides, in handily accessible format, a record of all definitely attested reperformances of lost plays from the ancient world, along with our evidence for these performances — which consists of not vase-paintings but a mixture of literary and epigraphic sources. In a few cases the identity of the author or play is uncertain, but we can at least be confident that these performances did  27 Cf. Zuntz 1965, 257–259. 28 See esp. Webster 1967; Todisco 2003. 29 Vahtikari 2014, esp. 135, 147–150, 175, 183–189, 191–198, 221–247.

  Matthew Wright happen. This table contains only those productions that we know about — just twenty of them, an insignificantly tiny number. Because it is very far from being a complete or representative list, it is impossible to identify any meaningful patterns or trends. There are more plays here by Euripides than anyone else, but this might just be an accident of survival. A few titles (Cresphontes, Archelaus, Ino and Andromeda) appear more than once, but this does not prove that these were especially popular plays. There are no attested reperformances of plays by tragedians other than Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides, but we cannot be certain that no such productions were staged. All that we can conclude for certain is that a number of the lost plays were still being staged from time to time throughout the Hellenistic world and well into the Roman period. If the lost plays’ performance history is obscure, a little more can be said about the transmission of texts from the fourth century BC onwards. During the 330s or 320s, Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides underwent a process akin to canonization after they were named by a decree of Lycurgus as the three official state tragedians of Athens. Among the most important results of this decree was the collection and preservation of authorized texts of their plays, which were deposited in the state archive. 30 Thus Athenians at this date still had access to many — if not all — of the works attributed to the triad. However, we have no idea how these texts were obtained, or what they looked like, or how authentic they were, or whether it proved possible to acquire a text of every single play. It is also unclear exactly what was the main impetus behind Lycurgus’ Authorized Version. Did it represent an entirely new enterprise? Had the Athenians never before kept archival copies of any of the Dionysia entries or prizewinners? 31 Had there been a previous attempt to produce an authentic text, coinciding with the reintroduction of “old” tragedy at the Dionysia? 32 Was the creation of the Authorized Version primarily a symbolic act, intended to establish the triad and preserve their legacy, or did it represent an attempt to ensure textual accuracy and authenticity at a time when lots of rogue editions were circulating? On the whole one would like to know a good deal more about the Lycurgan text. At any rate, the creation of this state-authorized edition was an act of crucial importance. This decisive act ensured the preservation of the works of the three “classic” tragedians, but it also contributed directly to the loss of all the hundreds

 30 [Plut.], X orat. 841f. See Scodel 2007; Hanink 2014; Wright 2016a, xvii–xviii. 31 A pre-existing archive is assumed by Reynolds/Wilson 1991, 5; Kovacs 2005, 381–382 and others; Battezzato 2003, 9–12 sees Lycurgus’ project as entirely unprecedented. 32 Implied by Quintilian 10.1.66, who says that the Athenians began to permit reperformances after the plays had been revised: see Lamari 2015, 195.

How Long Did the Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy Survive?  

of other tragedies by everyone else. From this time and forever afterwards, all the tragedians apart from the triad were relegated to the status of “minor” poets and became neglected. (Well before the end of the fourth century Heraclides of Pontus was able to publish a book entitled On the Three Tragedians, the title implying that there were only three.) 33 It is unclear just how quickly this process happened, or just how total was the obscurity into which they fell, but the fact that no official texts were produced of their work made it almost inevitable that these “minor” tragedians would — sooner or later — sink from view. And yet the fact that we have even a handful of fragments from the other tragedians suggests that copies of (or extracts from?) some of their plays survived, in some form, long enough for them to be quoted by a few bookish individuals here and there. We are told, by Galen, that in the mid-third century BC, at the request of Ptolemy III Euergetes, the Athenians’ official texts of Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides were sent to the Library at Alexandria: this means that these texts will have formed the basis of all later editions. 34 It seems, however, that some of the plays got lost in transit, or that they had already disappeared before Lycurgus was able to collect them. This is suggested by the fact that no one could ever say exactly how many plays each poet wrote: the figures quoted in our sources differ considerably. 35 Several of the surviving manuscripts contain catalogues, which supposedly list the tragedians’ complete works but are defective: they omit titles of plays which we know existed, and they include titles which are nowhere else attested. We have one definite example of a play that was known about (from didascalic records) but unobtainable by the librarians: Aristophanes of Byzantium, in his hypothesis to Euripides’ Medea of 431 BC, recorded that its accompanying satyr-play The Reapers (Theristai) “is not preserved” (οὐ σώιζεται). Even some of the plays that did reach Alexandria were judged spurious: for instance, Aristophanes is said to have rejected as many as seventeen of the titles attributed to Sophocles. 36 It is obvious that the texts still required a lot of editing. From the third century onwards Alexandrian scholars — including Alexander of Aetolus, Aristophanes of Byzantium and Aristarchus of Samothrace — devoted themselves to improving and emending the texts, and it was at this period that great advances were made in the science of textual criticism. As well as producing newly edited texts, the

 33 TrGF 4 T151. 34 Gal. Commentary on Hippocrates’ Epidemics 3, 2.4 (TrGF 4 T157, 5 T219). Battezzato 2003, 19– 25 treats Galen’s account with scepticism. 35 TrGF 3 T1, T2, T78; TrGF 4 T1–2; TrGF 5 T1, T3 and p. 80. 36 Life of Sophocles 1.18 (TrGF 4 T1.76–7).

  Matthew Wright Alexandrian scholars also compiled lists of all the tragedies known to them and wrote monographs, plot-summaries (hypotheseis) and commentaries (hypomnêmata) on many of the plays. 37 This labour left its mark on all subsequent texts, and it seems likely that many of the hypotheseis and marginalia that are preserved in our medieval manuscripts ultimately derive from the writings of scholars in the Hellenistic period. But did all the plays receive equal amounts of scholarly attention? It has been suggested, plausibly, that one factor affecting a play’s preservation (or its inclusion in the later “selected edition”) would have been the existence of an accompanying commentary, which would have made the play more suitable to be studied and taught in schools. 38 However, we cannot say exactly which plays did or did not have commentaries at any particular period during antiquity, and there are in fact definite signs that some of the lost plays (such as Aeschylus’ Lycurgus and Sophocles’ Troilus and Chryses) did have Alexandrian commentaries. 39 I suspect that many more plays than the “selected” twenty-four titles originally had commentaries which later became lost or obsolete. It seems reasonable to suppose that the texts of many lost works survived into the Roman period, on the basis that several Roman playwrights produced tragedies with the same titles. Works such as Livius Andronicus’ Hermiona, Ino and Tereus, Pacuvius’ Atalanta, Antiopa and Thyestes, Accius’ Andromeda and Chrysippus, Ennius’ Erechtheus, Melanippa and Cresphontes, and many others besides, may well have been influenced or directly inspired by lost works of Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides. 40 But because all these Latin works are also lost it is impossible to do more than speculate about the connections between the Greek and Roman dramas. Even in cases where the Roman tragedy survives in full, such as the complete plays of Seneca, the loss of the supposed Greek model means that any sort of sustained comparison is ruled out. 41 Consequently we cannot be sure exactly which Greek plays remained available in the Roman period and which did not. Numerous authors throughout the Greek, Roman and Byzantine periods wrote about the lost plays and alluded to their plots; they also quoted from them,

 37 See Pfeiffer 1968, esp. 222–223, 274–277. 38 Garland 2003, 44; Kovacs 2005, 387. 39 TrGF 3, p. 234 (Σ Theocritus 10.18); TrGF 4 fr. 624 (Hesychius E1847), fr. 728 (Σ Aristophanes, Frogs 191). 40 See Nervegna 2014, 177–178; cf. Boyle 2006, esp. 27–55, 88–89, 202–209. 41 On the numerous difficulties involved see Zwierlein 2004.

How Long Did the Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy Survive?  

thus preserving the majority of our fragments. Whenever we come across a reference or a verbatim quotation in a later text, we might suppose that the later author had the relevant tragedy in front of him and was relying on direct knowledge. If only we could be sure of this, we would be able to demonstrate that complete texts of nearly all the tragedies survived for many hundreds of years. Unfortunately, we cannot. We simply do not know on what basis our sources were able to cite the plays in question. Were some of them already lost — or obsolescent, or little-known, or difficult to access — at the time of citation? It is normally assumed that writers up to the Hellenistic period, at least, would have been able to consult a more or less complete range of texts. But did later writers such as (e.g.) Strabo, Stobaeus, Pollux, Hesychius or Photius invariably quote from first-hand knowledge, or were they relying on secondary sources, such as earlier commentaries, anthologies or lexicons? This is a crucially important question, which applies equally to all book-fragments, including the fragments of the neglected tragedians as well as the “classic” triad. Unfortunately, like so many questions of this sort, it is impossible to answer definitively. 42 Our approach to the problem will depend on how optimistic or sceptical we are prepared to be. We are free to believe that all our fragments are quoted directly from the complete works. Such a belief would be impossible to disprove, but most people would regard this degree of credulity as somewhat naïve. We might suspect that any fragments which are repeatedly quoted by multiple authors, verbatim and without significant variation or expansion, are unlikely to derive from first-hand knowledge of the text. Again, this would be impossible to disprove, but such an attitude might seem excessively sceptical. Perhaps we might be inclined to trust certain quoting authors more than others. Any writers who possess an unusually wide and detailed general knowledge of literature (such as, say, Plutarch, Cicero or Athenaeus) are probably more reliable sources than average – but we cannot be sure that every single one of their tragic quotations was taken directly from a complete text. Perhaps the relative date of a source is important: we might prefer to believe that the later a source is, the less likely it is that the quotation is first-hand. This principle might seem to be straightforwardly grounded in the law of probability, but it is too simplistic, and it does not take account of specific details or citational contexts. We cannot even be quite certain that an exact contemporary of a tragedian will invariably be quoting from a full

 42 The most detailed discussion of the problem (displaying a high degree of scepticism) remains that of Pearson 1917, i.xlvi–xci; cf. Zuntz 1965, 255–257; Garland 2003, 74–75; Finglass 2012, 14.

  Matthew Wright text (it has been argued, for instance, that Aristophanes often quotes tragedy on the basis of his memory of performances that he attended). 43 Alternatively, we might focus on specific formal features of quotations, trying to judge whether certain types of fragment are inherently more likely to have been excerpted from whole texts. Maybe lexicographic fragments (often consisting of a single word or phrase) and gnomic fragments (which lent themselves to decontextualized excerption, and which are naturally memorable) are more likely to have been passed down at second hand, via the medium of quotation culture. By contrast, maybe certain types of longer fragments, including dialogue portions with a change of speaker (which are very rarely encountered), non-gnomic citations, descriptive testimonia and so on, are more likely to have required direct access to the Urtext. This last line of approach strikes me as being potentially the most profitable. But ultimately, as far as I can see, there is no definitive test that could prove whether or not an author is quoting from first-hand knowledge of a play. If we open any volume of TrGF at random and examine the book-fragments and testimonia of any lost tragedy, together with their citation contexts, we will typically encounter a motley collection of different types of quotation from authors of different dates. The majority of fragments tend to be gnomic or lexicographic — that is, precisely the sort of quotation that can function as autonomous, free-standing utterances, requiring no contextual knowledge of the source text. 44 The remainder of the fragments will be more miscellaneous. If we are lucky we may encounter an extended passage of continuous text, but in such cases we will easily be able to imagine a reason why the verses in question might have been excerpted or preserved, independently of their source, to illustrate a point. In each individual case we can try to come up with criteria or arguments to determine a reasonable degree of probability, but I challenge the reader to identify a single quoted fragment that could not have come down to us via an intermediate source rather than first-hand acquaintance with a text. This is hugely important because it means that — to judge on the basis of book-fragments alone — full texts of the lost plays might have disappeared relatively soon after they were written, leaving behind only a few snippets, indirect recollections and inherited critical opinions.

 43 Mastromarco 2006; cf. Revermann 2006. 44 See Wright 2016b, on the way in which gnomic quotations in particular developed a “life of their own” within quotation culture. Cf. Carrara (2009) for indications that the textual transmission of gnomic anthologies was a parallel process independent of the transmission of complete works.

How Long Did the Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy Survive?  

Nevertheless, book-fragments do not tell the whole story. Papyrus fragments unearthed from the sands of Egypt are more revealing. These are (in most cases) the remains of entire books, and they allow us to be more precise about the texts that were still being read — at least in Egypt, if not elsewhere — at various dates from the third century BC right down to the fifth or sixth century AD. Some of these papyrus books were obviously anthologies of extracts, and there are a few ambiguous examples, but in many cases it is certain that we are looking at the remnants of complete playscripts. As in the case of performance records, we are dealing with such a disproportionately small selection of material that we cannot treat it as representative: it does not provide a solid basis for generalizations about textual transmission or ancient reading habits. However, what papyrus fragments prove is that many lost plays by all three members of the triad remained in circulation for many centuries after their original composition. Appendix 2 lists all currently known papyrus books that preserve parts of identifiable lost tragedies. 45 This list will inevitably — and happily — be rendered obsolescent by the ongoing publication of new fragments. For instance, during the last decade or so we have seen the first editions of important fragments of Sophocles’ Epigoni, Euripides’ Ino and Sophocles’ Tereus, 46 and no doubt papyri as yet unpublished have further riches in store. Here I omit references to papyrus fragments of the surviving tragedies, but those who have compared and contrasted this material have noted several striking features. 47 As already noted, until the second century AD (or thereabouts) there is no sign that the plays that have survived were more widely read than the ones that have not. A few plays are more prevalent than others, but a wide variety of tragedies was still in circulation for many centuries. The extant plays are not especially well represented in the papyri, and some of them are not attested there at all. After the second century AD the twenty-four surviving plays of the “selected edition” come to dominate the pattern overwhelmingly, suggesting that people ended up reading the non-selected plays much less than before. However, we do still have papyrus fragments of numerous non-selected plays dating from the three or four centuries that followed. These include not just lost works (such as Sophocles’ Epigoni and Euripides’ Ino, Cresphontes, Oedipus and Melanippe Bound) but also extant works that

 45 This information is compiled from several sources, including TrGF, Carrara 2009, the Leuven Database of Ancient Books (www.trismegistos.org/ldab), and the Oxford Archive of Performances of Greek and Roman Drama (www.apgrd.ox.ac.uk). I omit reference to papyrus fragments of unidentifiable tragedies: see TrGF 2 (Kannicht-Snell) fr. 627–726 (pp. 175–309). 46 P.Oxy. 4807 (published 2007), 5131 (published 2012) and 5292 (published 2016). 47 See esp. Garland 2003, 50–55; Carrara 2009; Avezzù 2012; Finglass 2012, 33–34.

  Matthew Wright did not make it into the selected edition (such as Euripides’ Helen and the two Iphigenia dramas). 48 In other words, the non-selected tragedies, though comparatively neglected, continued to circulate and did not disappear immediately or totally. More unexpectedly, it will be seen that we also have three possible examples of papyrus books containing the work of other, neglected tragedians (Critias’ Peirithous, Astydamas’ Hector and a play by Chaeremon), though it has to be admitted that all three cases are ambiguous. The authorship of Peirithous was and remains contested (it may well be Euripidean); 49 the attribution of the Hector fragments to Astydamas rests on conjecture; 50 and the papyrus containing the Chaeremon fragment(s) may be part of a gnomic anthology rather than a complete script of one of Chaeremon’s plays. 51 If it could be definitely shown that complete works by these so-called “minor” tragedians were still readily available in book form many years after their deaths, this would be extremely significant: it would mean that the period of their continuous textual transmission was much longer than normally assumed, and it might prompt us to view them as figures of lasting importance rather than ephemeral nonentities. As it is, we cannot be certain that this was so. Thus it may be that only the plays of the “classic” triad had any substantial afterlife beyond the beginning of the Hellenistic period. Ultimately (and somewhat depressingly) there is no way of knowing which plays endured the longest, or how long full texts remained available. As things currently stand, our latest recorded evidence of a book containing a complete lost tragedy is from the fifth or sixth century AD — the date of the codex Claromontanus, which contains substantial portions of Euripides’ Phaethon. 52 Could it be, then, that Phaethon is the lost play that came closest to surviving into the modern world? Certainly it was still being read a whole millennium after its first performance, and not so very long before our earliest medieval manuscripts of the extant plays. But there is no reason to suppose that other lost plays did not survive as long, or even longer. Since we have only the ambiguous evidence of book-fragments from the period between the latest papyri (fifth or sixth century) and the earliest manuscripts (tenth century), we can do no more than imagine the fate of the texts during these centuries.

 48 Carrara 2009, 335, 374–375, 427–435, 479–482. 49 Collard 2007. 50 See Snell 1971, 138–153 and TrGF 1 ad loc. (pp. 201–204); cf. Taplin 2009. 51 See Snell 1971, 166 and TrGF 1, p. 222; cf. Schubert 2013. 52 Paris. gr. 107B, fol. 162–163 (TrGF 5 F772a–774, 779a–781 Kannicht). Cf. Carrara 2009, 574– 575 (who emphasizes that the provenance of the papyrus is unknown).

How Long Did the Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy Survive?  

In conclusion, then, the factors determining a play’s survival or loss remain largely obscure. Apparently a mixture of factors was involved, including deliberate choice as well as a large degree of randomness. The plays that happened to survive were not always the most popular, most successful or most critically acclaimed. Nor indeed are they are a representative sample of Greek tragedy as a whole: they do not even reflect the full range of tragedy by Aeschylus, Sophocles or Euripides. 53 We cannot tell whether it was performances or books that played the greater part in keeping the plays alive. We can never be sure exactly when each play finally disappeared from view: all that we can do is try to identify the last recorded sighting. No very compelling overall patterns or tendencies definitely emerge from the evidence. It is tempting to conclude that Euripides was read more widely than Aeschylus or Sophocles during antiquity, just because his works are attested more often (from the mid-fourth century onwards), but we cannot be entirely confident that this is true. To reach any firm conclusions about theatrical productions, reading habits or the spread of tragedy at any period in antiquity we would need access to a full range of information that we simply do not have. Our paltry remains offer a few sporadic glimpses into a vanished and inaccessible world: they do not in any sense constitute a complete or representative sample of evidence. And yet all these negative conclusions do not amount to an admission of complete hopelessness. Investigating the transmission history of the lost plays is a useful exercise. It makes us think carefully about important questions concerning our knowledge of the past and the preservation of our cultural heritage. It reminds us how tenuous and incomplete our evidence is, and thus forces us to think very carefully about our methodology and approaches as literary historians. It warns us against the sort of inaccurate generalizations that can lead to misleading or distorted accounts of the tragic genre. It demonstrates that the plays that happened to survive came down to us partly by accident, and it suggests that the history of textual transmission could easily have been very different with only tiny alterations at crucial moments in history. Most importantly of all, it reveals that many of the lost tragedies survived for a surprisingly long time. This last fact may even encourage us to view the rediscovery of lost plays as a less remote prospect than we might have thought.

 53 See Wright 2019 for further discussion.

  Matthew Wright

Appendix 1 Tab. 1: Definitely attested performances of lost tragedies during antiquity Date

Place

Author and play

Evidence

c.  BC

Halai Aixonides/Aexone (Attica)

Sophocles, Telepheia

IG ii.  (TrGF  DID B, p. ; cf. TrGF , p. ): tragedies at the Rural Dionysia. It has been suggested that this is a production of the younger Sophocles (Snell, TrGF , p. ).

c. – BC

unknown

[Aeschylus or Sophocles?], Epigoni

Athenaeus .d (alluding to an acclaimed performance by the tragic actor Andronicus)

c. – BC

Collytus

Sophocles, Oenomaus

Demosthenes .; cf. Demochares FGrHist  Fa; see also TrGF  p. 

c. – BC

Athens

Euripides, Cresphontes

as above

c. – BC

Athens

[Euripides?], Thyestes Demosthenes .

c. – BC

Athens

Euripides, Phoenix

– BC

Abdera

Euripides, Andromeda Lucian, How to Write History 

c. – BC

Heraea

Euripides, Archelaus

IG v. . (TrGF DID B , ): inscription found near theatre at Tegea

c. – BC

Dodone

Euripides, Archelaus

as above

– BC

Athens

[Sophocles?], Ixion

Inscription from Athenian agora recording revivals of “old” tragedy: see Merritt () – .

c. – BC

Rome

Euripides, Alcmene

Plautus, Rudens –

 BC

Rome

Sophocles, Syndeipnoi

Cicero, To his Brother Quintus ..

Demosthenes .

How Long Did the Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy Survive?  

Date

Place

Author and play

Evidence

c.  BC– AD

Numidia

[Euripides?], Hypsipyle

Athenaeus .e–f

early first century AD

Alexandria

Euripides, Auge

Philo, Every Good Man is Free 

– AD

Tarsus or Hispalis (?)

Euripides, Andromeda Eunapius of Sardis (FGH IV F) describing a touring actor during Nero’s reign (perhaps performing excerpts or songs)

– AD

Ephesus

Euripides, Ino

Philostratus, Life of Apollonius .

c. – AD

unknown

Euripides, Ino

Plutarch, Moralia a

c. – AD

unknown

Euripides, Cresphontes

Plutarch, Moralia e

c. – AD

Tibur

Sophocles, Tympanistai

CIL . (listed among performances by a pantomime dancer, L. Aurelius Apolaustus)

late second century AD

unknown

Euripides, Tatian, Address to the Alcmeon [in Psophis?] Greeks . (see TrGF , p. )

Appendix 2 Tab. 2: Remains of ancient papyrus books containing parts of lost tragedies Date

Author and play

Evidence

rd century BC

Euripides, Alexandros

P.Stras.W.G. – (TrGF  F, a, d, a-e, k)

rd century BC

Euripides, Antiope

P.Petrie I.- (TrGF  F)

rd century BC

Euripides, Erechtheus

P.Sorb. inv.  (TrGF  F)

rd century BC

Euripides, Phaethon

BKT ,, pp. – (inv. ) (TrGF  F.–): from an anthology of lyric excerpts

rd century BC

Euripides, Hypsipyle

P.Petrie II.(c) (TrGF  F)

  Matthew Wright

Date

Author and play

Evidence

rd century BC

Euripides, Ino

P. Cairo inv.  (TrGF  F): part of a school textbook; also includes Phoenician Women –

rd century BC

Euripides, Antiope

P.Petrie I. () (TrGF  F): probably part of an anthology of maxims

rd century BC

Euripides, Aegeus

P.Berol. inv.  (TrGF  F): from an anthology

rd century BC

Sophocles, Niobe

P.Grenf. II.(a) (P.Lit.Lond. ) (TrGF  F–); P.Hib.  (TrGF  Fa)

rd century BC

Chaeremon (unknown work)

P.Hib. . (TrGF . Fb): initial letters of each line form an acrostic spelling out the author’s name; consecutive gnomai may be taken from an anthology or may have formed a single continuous passage. See Schubert ().

nd century BC

Euripides, Cresphontes

P.Mich. inv.  (TrGF  Fa); P.Köln X. (inv. - recto) (TrGF  F(a), pp. – )

nd century BC

Euripides, Protesilaus

BKT V., pp. – (inv. ) (TrGF  F.–); from an anthology

nd century BC

Euripides, Melanippe Bound

BKT V., pp. – (inv. ) (TrGF  F); from an anthology

before  BC

Aeschylus, Carians or Europa

P.Didot col. iv (TrGF  F)

c.  BC

Euripides, Telephus

P.Mil. I.. (TrGF  F)

late nd century BC

Euripides, Danae

P.Ross.Georg. I. (TrGF  F); from an anthology

nd or st century BC

Aeschylus, Psychagogoi

P.Köln  (TrGF  Fa)

between st century BC and Euripides, Phrixus ( or ) rd century AD

PSI  (TrGF  Fb): date and precise attribution disputed

between st century BC and Aeschylus, Children of Herard century AD cles

“Papyrus du Fayoum”  (Pack ) (TrGF  Fb): date disputed (see TrGF , pp. –)

st or nd century AD

Aeschylus, Myrmidons

PSI  (TrGF  Fc)

st or nd century AD

Euripides, Telephus

P.Oxy.  (TrGF  Fa)

How Long Did the Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy Survive?  

Date

Author and play

Evidence

st or nd century AD

Euripides, Andromeda

P.Oxy.  (TrGF  F–)

st or nd century AD

Euripides, Cresphontes

P.Fay.Coles  (TrGF  F)

st or nd century AD

Sophocles, Prophets or Polyidus (?)

P.Oxy.  fr.  (TrGF  Fa); attribution not beyond doubt

early nd century AD

Sophocles, Tereus

P.Oxy. 

nd century AD

[Critias?], Peirithous

P.Oxy. , fr. – (TrGF . F, F–): authorship disputed in antiquity

nd century AD

Euripides, Cretans

P.Oxy.  (TrGF  Fb–d)

nd century AD

Aeschylus, Niobe

PSI  (TrGF  Fa)

nd century AD

Aeschylus, Glaucus of Potniae PSI  (TrGF  F–a); P.Oxy.  (TrGF  Fb)

nd century AD

Aeschylus, Glaucus the SeaGod

P.Oxy.  (TrGF  Fe); P.Oxy.  (TrGF  Fc–d)

nd century AD

Aeschylus, Myrmidons

P.Oxy.  (TrGF  F–a)

nd century AD

Aeschylus, Xantriai

P.Oxy.  (TrGF  F–b)

nd century AD

Sophocles, Niobe

P.Oxy.  (TrGF  Fa)

nd century AD

Euripides, Antigone [or Antiope?]

P.Oxy.  (TrGF  F)

nd century AD

Euripides, Telephus

BKT V., pp. – (inv. ) (TrGF  Fc)

late nd century AD

Euripides, Alcmeon [in Psophis?]

PSI XIII. (TrGF  F)

nd or rd century AD

Astydamas, Hector (?)

P.Hib. .; P.Amh. .; P.Strasb.W.G. . (TrGF . F**h?, F**i?, F**a?): from different sources; identification and attribution conjectural.

nd or rd century AD

Euripides, Archelaus

P.Oxy.  (TrGF  F)

nd or rd century AD

Euripides, Hypsipyle

P.Oxy.  (TrGF  Fb–b)

nd or rd century AD

Euripides, Theseus (?)

P.Oxy.  (TrGF  Fb; attribution conjectural)

nd or rd century AD

Euripides, Cretans

BKT V., pp. - (inv. ) (TrGF  Fe)

nd or rd century AD

Sophocles, Scyrians

P.Oxy.  (TrGF  F–c)

nd or rd century AD

Sophocles, Ajax the Locrian

P.Oxy.  (TrGF  Fa–g)

rd century AD

Sophocles, Epigoni

P.Oxy. 

rd century AD

Euripides, Ino

P.Oxy. 

  Matthew Wright

Date

Author and play

Evidence

rd century AD

Euripides, Cresphontes

P.Oxy.  (TrGF  Fa)

th century AD

Euripides, Oedipus

P.Oxy.  (TrGF  F)

th or th century AD

Euripides, Melanippe Bound

BKT V., pp. - (inv. ) (TrGF  F)

th century AD

Euripides, Phaethon

Codex Claromontanus (Paris gr. B, fol. -) (TrGF  Fa– )

Bibliography Avezzù, G. (2012), “Text and transmission”, in: A. Markantonatos (ed.), Brill’s Companion to Sophocles, Leiden, 39–57. Battezzato, L. (2003), “I viaggi dei testi”, in: L. Battezzato (ed.), Tradizione testuale e ricezione letteraria antica della tragedia greca, Amsterdam, 7–31. Boyle, A. (2006), Roman Tragedy, London. Carrara, P. (2009), Il testo di Euripide nell’ antichità, Florence. Casolari, F. (2003), Die Mythentravestie in der griechischen Komödie, Munster. Collard, C. (2007), “The Pirithous fragments”, in: C. Collard, Tragedy, Euripides and Euripideans, Exeter, 56–68 [original version published in: J.A. López Férez (ed.) (1995), Da Homero a Libanio, Madrid, 183–193]. Csapo, E./Goette, H.R./Green, J.R./Wilson, P. (eds) (2014), Greek Theatre in the Fourth Century BC, Berlin. Csapo, E./Wilson P. (2015), “Drama outside Athens in the fifth and fourth centuries BC”, in: A.A. Lamari (ed.), Reperformances of Drama in the
Fifth and Fourth Centuries BC. Authors and Contexts (Trends in Classics 7.2), Berlin, 316–395. Cusset, C. (2003), Menandre ou la comédie tragique, Paris. Easterling, P.E. (2006), “Sophocles: the first thousand years”, in: J. Davison/F. Muecke/P. Wilson (eds), Greek Drama III: Essays in Honour of Kevin Lee, BICS Supplement 87, 1–15. Farmer, M. (2017), Greek Tragedy on the Comic Stage, Oxford/New York. Finglass, P.J. (2012), “The textual transmission of Sophocles’ dramas”, in: K. Ormand (ed.), A Companion to Sophocles, Malden/Oxford, 9–24. Garland, R. (2003), Surviving Greek Tragedy, London. Gutzwiller, K. (2000), “The tragic mask of comedy”, ClAnt 19, 102–137. Hanink, J. (2014), Lycurgan Athens and the Making of Athenian Tragedy, Cambridge. Kovacs, D. (2005), “Text and transmission”, in: J. Gregory (ed.), A Companion to Greek Tragedy, Malden/Oxford, 379–393. Lamari, A.A. (ed.) (2015), Reperformances of Drama in the 
Fifth and Fourth Centuries BC: Authors and Contexts, Trends in Classics 7.2, Berlin. Lowe, N. (1993), “Aristophanes’ books”, Annals of Scholarship 10, 63–83. Magnelli, E. (2003), “Un nuovo indizio (e alcune precisazioni) sui drammi ‘alfabetici’ di Euripide a Bisanzio tra XI e XII secolo”, Prometheus 29, 193–212.

How Long Did the Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy Survive?  

Mastronarde, D.J. (2017), “Text and transmission”, in: L. McClure (ed.), A Companion to Euripides, Malden/Oxford, 11–26. Merritt, B.D. (1938), “Greek Inscriptions”, Hesperia 7, 77–160. Nervegna, S. (2013), Menander in Antiquity: The Contexts of Reception, Cambridge. Nesselrath, H.-G. (1990), Die attische mittlere Komödie, Berlin. Nesselrath, H.-G. (1993), “Parody and later Greek comedy”, HSCP 95, 181–195. Pearson, A.C. (ed.) (1917), The Fragments of Sophocles, 3 vols., Cambridge. Pfeiffer, R. (1968), History of Classical Scholarship from the Beginnings to the End of the Hellenistic Age, Oxford. Pickard-Cambridge, A.W. (19883), The Dramatic Festivals of Athens, rev. T.B.L. Webster/ J. Gould/D.M. Lewis, Oxford. Reynolds, L./Wilson, N.G. (19913), Scribes and Scholars, Oxford. Russell, D.A./Winterbottom, M. (1972), Ancient Literary Criticism, Oxford. Schubert, C. (2013), “Ein literarisches Akrostichon aus der ersten Hälfte des vierten Jahrhunderts v. Chr.? Zu Chairemon, TrGF I, 71 F14b”, GFA 16, 389–397. Scodel, R. (2007), “Lycurgus and the state text of tragedy”, in: C. Cooper (ed.), Politics of Orality, Leiden, 129–154. Small, J.P. (2003), The Parallel Worlds of Classical Art and Text, Cambridge. Snell, B. (1935), “Zwei Töpfe mit Euripides-Papyri”, Hermes 70, 119–120. Snell, B. (1971), Szenen aus griechischen Dramen, Berlin. Sutton, D.F. (1987), “The theatrical families of Athens”, AJP 108, 9–26. Taplin, O.P. (2007), Pots and Plays, Los Angeles. Taplin, O.P. (2009), “Hector’s helmet glinting in a fourth-century tragedy”, in: S. Goldhill/ E.M. Hall (eds), Sophocles and the Greek Tragic Tradition, Cambridge, 251–263. Todisco, L. (ed.) (2003), La ceramica figurata a soggetto tragico in Magna Grecia e in Sicilia, Rome. Vahtikari, K. (2014), Tragedy Performances Outside Athens in the Late Fifth and the Fourth Centuries BC, Helsinki. Webster, T.B.L. (19672), Monuments Illustrating Tragedy and Satyr Play, London. Weitzmann, K. (1959), Ancient Book Illumination, Cambridge MA. Wilamowitz-Moellendorf, U. von (1907), Einleitung in die griechische Tragödie, Berlin. Wright, M.E. (2012), The Comedian as Critic: Greek Old Comedy and Poetics, London. Wright, M.E. (2013) “Poets and poetry in later Greek comedy”, CQ 63, 603–622. Wright, M.E. (2016a), The Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy. Volume 1: Neglected Authors, London. Wright, M.E. (2016b), “Euripidean tragedy and quotation culture: the case of Stheneboea F661”, AJP 137, 601–623. Wright, M.E. (2017), “A lover’s discourse: eros in Greek tragedy”, in: R.A. Seaford/J.M. Wilkins/ M.E. Wright (eds), Selfhood and the Soul, Oxford, 219–242. Wright, M.E. (2019), The Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy. Volume 2: Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides, London. Zuntz, G. (1965), An Inquiry into the Transmission of the Plays of Euripides, Cambridge. Zwierlein, O. (2004), Lucubrationes Philologae, Band I: Seneca, Bern.

Francesco Paolo Bianchi

What we Do (Not) Know about Lost Comedies: Fragments and Testimonia  An Aristophanic comedy generally contains about 1.500 verses and altogether the eleven surviving Aristophanic comedies contain about 17.000 verses. If we think of Cratinus and Eupolis, the other authors of the Archaia who formed together with Aristophanes the Alexandrian triad, 1 we will find that their works survive only as a corpus of about 500 fragments and a corresponding number of lines each; 2 therefore, all we have of Cratinus and Eupolis can be compared to just a third of only one aristophanic play. As E. Norden stated in his “römische Literatur” about one hundred years ago, after centuries of tradition what we have is only a huge Trümmerhaufen: “wie die griechische Literatur, so besitzen wir auch die römische nur als einen Trümmerhaufen, der im Vergleich mit ihrem ursprünglichen Bestande etwa so geringfügig ist wie die Ruinen des heutigen Forum Romanum im Vergleich mit demjenigen der Kaiserzeit”; 3 this means that we have to think of any lost comedy as something that “does not exist”, to quote S.D. Olson’s words, “it did exist once upon a time, but it does not exist any longer; that is what «lost» means” and we must realize “that we can never test our hypothesis against their object”. 4 My paper focuses on four case examples of lost comedies, which are attributed to Cratinus and known to us through the fragments belonging to the indirect tradition and through testimonies; fragments and testimonies interact and work jointly towards an overall interpretation, but raise also a set of problems, which have to be examined, in order to prevent us from a simplistic over-interpretation.

 1 The Alexandrinian triad is explicitly attested for the first time in Hor. sat. I, 4 1 Eupolis atque Cratinus Aristophanesque poetae, but no doubt that its origin can be traced back to the Hellenistic age and to the Alexandrian scholars, maybe to Lycophron περὶ κωμῳδίας, see Bianchi 2017, 364–368 ad Cratin. test. 27 K–A. (with previous references). 2 Cratinus, PCG IV (1983), frr. 1–514 K (frr. 505–514 dubia); Eupolis, PCG V (1986), frr. 1–494 (frr. 490–494 dubia). For the transmission and the surviving fragments of Cratinus s. Bianchi 2017, 40–102, for Eupolis s. Olson 2017, 14–16. 3 Norden 1927, 93. 4 The three quotations in Olson 2015, 211. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-007

  Francesco Paolo Bianchi

 The first case is one of the most famous comedies written by Cratinus, the Dionysalexandros; 5 its fame is due mainly to the lucky discovery by Grenfell and Hunt in 1904 of a papyrus, published in editio princeps the same year (P.Oxy. IV, 663). On the basis of palaeography the papyrus can be dated back to the II–III century AD, and contains an ancient fragmentary hypothesis of this play; in some respects we can consider this record as an unicum, since it “belongs to a (sub-literary) genre with clearly defined features and a considerable number of parallels, but up to now it is also the only argumentum to a non Aristophanic comedy of the archaia we can read”. 6 On the other hand, there are only 13 fragments known through the indirect tradition, whose problems and difficulties are common to other similar texts, and in this particular case seem to be even more difficult: we have neither evidence of political reference, nor names of kōmōdoumenoi, nor elements for the chronology; and also the attribution of the fragments to some sections of the comedy is at least very uncertain. The relationship between the hypothesis and the fragments preserved by the indirect tradition is particularly informative. The hypothesis allows us to understand roughly the plot: the text is on two columns, 25 lines the first (19 complete), whose initial section is lost, and 20 the second (18 complete); “the title occurs not where it would be expected […] but at the top of the last column”, 7 and it suggests that the papyrus originally contained an edition of Cratinus’ comedy, opened by the title, written in a large blank space, an ἄγραφον in which thereafter the hypothesis was added; 8 thanks to a comparison with other similar Aristophanic hypotheseis 9 it is possible to say that the lost section contained the summary of prologue, parodos and agon, the three sections which normally precede the parabasis. The first lines that we can entirely read belong to the summary of the parabasis whose

 5 PCG IV, 140–147, testt. i–*ii, frr. 39–51 K–A. 6 Bakola 2010, 193. For P.Oxy. 663 see Bianchi 2016, 211–241 with previous bibliography. 7 Grenfell/Hunt 1904, 69. 8 See especially Caroli 2007, 248–250 and van Rossum-Steenbeek 1998, 38, which suggests also that “it is not unthinkable that this hyp. once formed part of a collection of hypp.”. 9 E.g. Ach. 1, Eq. A1, Nub. A5, Vesp. 2, Pax A3, Av. A2, Lys. A1, Ran. 1, which present linguistic (e.g. description of parabasis), stylistic (simple sentences and terse style), and structural (focus on the action, aesthetic consideration at the end) similarities (see for details Bakola 2010, 193 fn. 28).

What we Do (Not) Know about Lost Comedies: Fragments and Testimonia  

content is hidden behind the mysterious abridgement ΠΥΩΝΠΟΙΗ; 10 it follows a quite linear sketch of the ensuing events: παραφανέντα τὸν |11 ∆ιόνυσον ἐπισκώ(πτουσι) (καὶ) |12 χλευάζου(σιν)· ὁ δ(ὲ) πα- |13 ραγενομένων〈 〉|14 αὐτῷ παρὰ μ(ὲν) ῞Η̣̣ρ̣α̣ [ς] τυραννίδο(ς) |15 ἀκινήτου, πα[ρ]ὰ δ’ Ἀθηνᾶς |16 εὐψυχί(ας) κ(α)τ(ὰ) πόλεμο(ν), τῆς |17 δ᾽ Αφροδί(της) κάλλιστό(ν) τε κ(αὶ) |18 ἐπέραστον αὐτὸν ὑπάρ-|19 χειν,κρίνει ταύτην νικᾶν|20 μ(ε)τ(ὰ) δ(ὲ) ταῦ(τα) πλεύσας εἰς |21 Λακεδαίμο(να) (καὶ) τὴν Ἑλένην |22 ἐξαγαγὼν ἐπανέρχετ(αι) |23 εἰς τὴν Ἴδην. ἀκού(ει) δ(ὲ) με-|24τ’ ὀλίγον τοὺς Ἀχαιοὺς πυρ-|25 πολ]εῖν τὴν χώ(ραν) (καὶ) [ [... col. II, rr. 29–48] τὸν Ἀλέξαν[δ(ρον). τὴν μ(ὲν) οὖν Ἑλένη(ν) |30 εἰς τάλαρον ὡς τ̣α̣[ |31 κρύψας, ἑαυτὸν δ ̓ εἰς κριὸ[ν |32 μ(ε)τ(α)σκευάσας ὑπομένει |33 τὸ μέλλον. παραγενό- |34 μενος δ’ Ἀλέξανδ(ρος) κ(αὶ) φωρά- |35 σας ἑκάτερο(ν) ἄγειν ἐπὶ τὰς |36 ναῦς πρ(οσ)τάττει ὡς παραδώσων |37 τοῖς Ἀχαιοῖ(ς). ὀκνούσης δ(ὲ) τῆς |38 Ἑλένη(ς) ταύτην μ(ὲν) οἰκτείρας |39 ὡς γυναῖχ’ ἕξων ἐπικατέχ(ει), |40 τὸν δ(ὲ) ∆ιόνυ(σον) ὡς παραδοθη- |41 σόμενο(ν) ἀποστέλλει, συν- |42 ακολουθ(οῦσι) δ’ οἱ σάτυ(ροι) παρακαλοῦν- |43 τές τε κ(αὶ) οὐκ ἂν προδώσειν |44 αὐτὸν φάσκοντες. κωμῳ- |45δεῖται δ’ ἐν τῶι δράματι Πε- |46 ρικλῆς μάλα πιθανῶς δι’ |47 ἐμφάσεως ὡς ἐπαγηοχὼς |48 τοῖς Ἀθηναίοις τὸν πόλεμον And after Dionysus appears, they make fun of him and jeer him. After Hera offers him unshakable royal power, Athena offers him courage in war, and Aphrodite offers that he be the best-looking and most sexually attractive man there is, he judges her the winner. After this, he sails to Sparta and takes Helen away, and returns to Ida; shortly thereafter he hears that the Achaeans are laying the country waste and looking for Alexandros. He hides Helen as quickly as he can in a basket, changes his own appearance to make himself look like a ram, and waits for what will happen next. After Alexandros appears and catches them, he orders (his men) to take them both to the ships to turn them over to the Achaeans. But when Helen is reluctant, he pities her and detains her to be his wife; but he sends Dionysus off to be surrendered. The satyrs follow along, encouraging (him) and saying that they will not abandon him. Pericles is made fun of quite persuasively in the play via innuendo for having brought the war on the Athenians. (Translation by S.D. Olson)

Among the most relevant facts we count the judgment of the Goddesses (ll. 13– 16), 11 the information that the scene was on the mount Ida (ll. 20–23), the arrival of the true Alexandros who discovers Dionysos and Helen (ll. 33–41), the identity of the chorus as a chorus of satyrs (l. 42); furthermore, we are told at ll. 44–48 that the comedy has a political dimension and mocks Pericles μάλα πιθανῶς δι᾽ ἐμφάσεως (where emphasis is a terminus technicus for a hidden mock opposed to an open one) 12 for a precise reason, ὡς ἐπαγηοχὼς τοὺς Ἀθηναίους ἐπὶ πόλεμον,  10 See Bianchi 2016, 218–224 for a summary of the different interpretations. 11 This scene is one of the most vexed and was interpreted in many different ways, see Bianchi 2015. 12 “Versteckte Anspielung”, Koerte 1904, 490–491. On the emphasis see Sonnino 2003, Bakola 2010, 198–206 (198 n. 35 for further bibliography).

  Francesco Paolo Bianchi because he had brought the war on the Athenian. Since the expression τὸν πόλεμον at line 48 is commonly interpreted as a reference to the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War, we can infer that the comedy was written in 430 or 429 BC, before Pericles’ death. 13 As for the 13 fragments of indirect tradition, none of them, as already said, can be practically integrated into the dramatic action reported in the hypothesis. The only exception may be fr. 45 K–A ὁ δ ̓ ἠλίθιος ὥσπερ πρόβατον βῆ βῆ λέγων βαδίζει “the fool goes around saying ‘Baa! baa!’ like a sheep”, 14 preserved by lexicographical sources and by Eustatius, since it records the onomatopoeic sound “baa baa” for the sheep noise. 15 It seems to be “a mocking description of the disguised Dionysus’ attempts to avoid capture by Paris”; 16 from Meineke onwards 17 the fragment was attributed to the scene in which a scared Dionysus hides himself thanks to his transformation into a ram, at ll. 31–37 of the hypothesis. Although this assumption is plausible, we have to remark the general nature of the utterance. It is also possible that we are in front of a gnomic saying that had no relationship with the plot, but was placed, perhaps, in the lost agōn, since in fact, both the spirit and the meter of the fragment, the catalectic iambic tetrameter, are usual for the comic agōn. 18 To come to the other fragments, we can just make some suggestions, which are sometimes very different from each other and all of them seem plausible in the same way, as the following three examples show. Fr. 40 K–A στολὴν δὲ δὴ τίν ̓ εἶχε; τοῦτό μοι φράσον. / (B.) θύρσον, κροκωτόν, ποικίλον, καρχήσιον, “(A.) What sort of clothing was he wearing? Tell me this! (B.) He had a thyrsus, a multicoloured himation, and a drinking-cup” 19 could be part of the scene, in which Paris, probably the speaker A, is looking for Dionysus, the individual clearly referred to (as the four words of v. 2 indicate); 20 fr. 41 K–A εὐθὺς γὰρ ᾑμώδεις

 13 For the chronology of the Dionysalexandros, see Bianchi 2016, 207–210. 14 Transl. Olson 2007, 425. 15 Phot. β 130 = Etym. Gen. β 105 Berg. (AB; Etym. Magn. 196, 7) = Sud. β 250; Eust. in Od. 1721,26; Eust. in Il. 768,14. 16 Olson 2007, 91. 17 Meineke FCG II.1, 40, cfr. Bianchi 2016, 274–276. 18 For the catalectic iambic tetrameter in the agon of a comedy, see Perusino 1968, 64–66, 97–121. 19 Transl. Olson 2007, 425. 20 See Olson 2007, 91: “The individual referred to is clearly Dionysus, and Speaker A is probably Paris, who is attempting to discover who assumed his identity in order to judge among the goddesses and then stole Helen from Menelaus”. For the four words of v. 2, all referring to Dionysus, see Bianchi 2016, 248–252.

What we Do (Not) Know about Lost Comedies: Fragments and Testimonia  

ἀκούων τῶν ἐπῶν τοὺς προσθίους ὀδόντας, “The minute you heard her words you began to gnash your front teeth” 21 shows a scared character: it could be Dionysus himself, afraid from the Achaenas or from Paris, while both are looking for him, or it could be another character who is pointing to Dionysus, tremendously excited after hearing the goddesses’ proposals; 22 fr. 48 νακότιλτος ὡσπερεὶ κῳδάριον ἐφαινόμην, “Wool-plucked, I looked like a fleece”, 23 could refer to Dionysus’ unmasking ad described in hyp. col. II rr. 31 s., 34 s. 24 To sum up, the case of Dionysalexandros shows that the hypothesis provides significant information about the plot, the characters and also the political issues of the play; relying just on the fragments of the indirect tradition, we would not be aware of these features at all. This case should remind us that we must be very cautious every time we try to infer general conclusions on the plot from a few fragments; “wie sehr man sich bei allen Rekonstruktionsversuchen selbst von Stücken, von denen zahlreiche und umfangreiche Fragmente erhalten sind, auf dünnem Eis befindet, zeigt in aller Deutlichkeit der Dionysalexandros des Kratinos: ohne das Papyrusfund der Hypothesis des Stücks wäre man kaum auf die vielschichtige, mit ständigen Rollenwechseln überraschende Handlung gekommen”. 25 In this sense, we can remember that, before the discovery of the hypothesis, Meineke doubted that Dionysalexandros could effectively be attributed to the young Cratinus, because of the mythological content and moreover; following an explanation proposed by Schweighaeuser, he believed that the comedy referred to Alexander the Great's campaign “Dionysiacae pompae adsimulatam”. 26 This interpretation is today for us clearly wrong, but at that time there was no evidence against this view.

 21 Transl. Olson 2007, 425. 22 The last one is the hypothesis of Pieters apud K–A PCG IV, 142, compare Olson 2007, 91: “probably a description of Dionysus’ reaction when one of the goddesses attempted to bribe him to judge her the most beautiful and he had trouble containing himself”. For the other interpretations, see Bianchi 2016, 255. 23 Transl. Henderson 2011, 184. 24 Koerte 1904, 494 and n. 1 “für 41 [= 48 K–A] weiss ich keine recht geeignete Stelle vorzuschlagen [...] Sprach vielleicht Dionysos den Vers, nachdem er seine Rolle als Widder aufgegeben hatte?”, see Bianchi 2016, 292–293. 25 Zimmermann 2011, 716. 26 Meineke FCG II.1, 37, cfr. Meineke FCG I, 57, 413. See Bianchi 2016, 199 n. 153.

  Francesco Paolo Bianchi

 The second example is the Nemesis. 27 We have two variants of Nemesis’ myth, which ends with Helen’s birth; in both versions Zeus and Nemesis have intercourse and Nemesis gives birth to an egg. This egg is then handed to Leda, who broods it up to its hatching; 28 in this way it is possible to maintain both traditions about Helen’s birth, on the one hand from Leda, as known from the Homeric poems onwards, and on the other hand from Nemesis. 29 According to the first version, in order to flee Zeus, Nemesis roams the world and hides herself by changing her shape into animal forms (Cypria fr. 10 Bernabè), but Zeus “pursued Nemesis after changing himself too into a goose, and after he united with her she laid an egg from which Helen was born”. 30 In the second variant Zeus, to achieve his goal, transforms into a swan, then lets Aphrodite, transformed into eagle, pursue him; he seeks shelter in Nemesis’ bosom and has intercourse with her in Rhamnous, probably an allusion to Nemesis’ temple in Rhamnous (destroyed by the Persians in 490 BC, refurbished during the 430s and finished about 10/15 years later) and, in general, a “local variant [...] inspired by the presence of Nemesis in Attica”. 31 The fullest account of this second version is in Hyg. Astr. II 8 and, according to Eratosthenes’ Katasterismoi, 32 it was the va-

 27 PCG IV, 179–185, test. i–ii, frr. 114–127 K–A. The comedy was produced all but certainly in 431 BC (better than 429 BC), as can be inferred particularly from fr. 125 K–A ex schol. Ar. Av. 125c which refers a problematic mention of the soothsayer Lampon, see Bianchi 2017, 23–28 (26–28 for the discussion of a dating in 429 BC). 28 According to Apollod. III 10, 7 a shepherd found the egg and brought it to Leda; in Sapph. fr. 166 V. Leda found herself the egg; finally in schol. Lycophr. v. 88 Scheer Nemesis herself gave the egg to Tyndareos who gave it to Leda. 29 See Casolari 2003, 80 n. 62: “Sie ist möglicherweise auf einen Versuch zurückzuführen, die beiden Sagen in der Weise zu vereinigen, daß aus Leda diejenige wird, die das wahrscheinlich von Nemesis stammende Ei findet”, cfr. generally ibid. 80– 83 and on the myth of Helen and her birth the bibliography in Reinhardt 2011, 257 n. 978. 30 Cypria fr. 11 Bernabè ex Philod. Piet. B 7369 Obbink, translation of Henderson 2012, 3. About this version of the myth see in particular Luppe 1974b. 31 Henderson 2012, 3, cfr. ibid. for the the temple in Rhamnous: “the subtext was celebration of Nemesis’ local role in helping the Athenians punish Persian hybris at Marathon, for legend had it that the Persians had brought with them a block of Parian marble for their trophy, and it was from this block that Nemesis’ statue was carved (Paus. 1.33.2–3, 7–8). See moreover Henderson 2012, 9 nn. 17–21, Bianchi 2017, 116 n. 139. 32 Eratost. catast. epit. 25, 30b Oliv. = p. 142 Rob. = Cratin. Nemesis test. ii K–A (PCG IV, 179) Κύκνου (v.l. κύκνοϲ) οὗτοϲ ἐστιν ὁ καλούμενος μέγας, ὃν κύκνῳ εἰκάζουσιν. Λέγεται δὲ τὸν Δία ὁμοιωθέντα τῷ ζῴῳ τούτῳ [...] καταπτῆναι εἰς Ῥαμνοῦντα τῆς Ἀττικῆς κἀκεῖ τὴν Νέμεσιν

What we Do (Not) Know about Lost Comedies: Fragments and Testimonia  

riant chosen by Cratinus; Eratosthenes’ account ends with the phrase ὥς φησι Κράτης ὁ ποιητής, but scholars generally accept Valckenaer’s emendation of Κράτης in Κρατῖνος, 33 since a scholium to Germanicus’ translation of Aratus’ Phenomena narrates the same story but ends with the words “ut ait Cratinus”. 34 The learned tradition has often mixed up the names Crates and Cratinus; 35 furthermore, none of the comedies attributed to Crates is about Nemesis, whereas the indirect tradition records that Cratinus wrote a comedy called Nemesis. At any rate, even if we assume that the evidence refers to Cratinus, nothing is told in this accounts about the title of the comedy where the myth was narrated. Since we know of a comedy Nemesis written by Cratinus, it seems consistent to refer the allusion to this comedy, also because none of the other titles preserved for Cratinus’ plays can be associated with this myth; although we can’t exclude that Nemesis’ story was incidentally quoted in another comedy, in a way that we ignore, some fragments, preserved by the indirect tradition and usually assigned to the comedy Nemesis, support the assumption that the reference is to Cratinus Nemesis, where the poet followed this particular version of the myth: “es besteht wohl kein Zweifel, dass es sich dem Sachverhalt nach nun um die ‘Nemesis’ handeln kann. Das wird zudem aus einigen (noch zu erörternden) Fragmente deutlich”. 36 In fr. 114 K–A ὄρνιθα τοίνυν δεῖ σε γίγνεσθαι μέγαν ‘and so you’ll have to become a big bird’ 37 someone “has to become a big bird”; it could be spoken by Zeus and referred to Aphrodite, who has to become an eagle, 38 or the addressed is Zeus himself, who has to become a swan and “dicit haec sive Venus sive Mercurius sive alius Iovis in explenda libidine minister, iubens eum facere quod opus sit ut Nemesi potiatur”. 39 Perhaps, it should be preferred this last alternative: the fragment was preserved at Athenaios IX 373c for the male form of ὄρνις and therefore is “more likely Zeus becoming the swan, since ‘big bird’ is masculine here, and in the

 φθεῖραι. τὴν δὲ τεκεῖν ῷόν, ἐξ οὗ ἐκκολαφθῆναι καὶ γενέσθαι τὴν Ἑλένην ὥς φησι Κράτης (Κρατῖνος Valckenaer) ὁ ποιητής. 33 Valckenaer 1824, 166. 34 German. p. 89, 19 Breysig “Hic est cygnus, in quem ferunt Iovem se transfigurasse et transvolitasse in terram Atticam Rhamnunta ibique compressisse Nemesim, ut ait Cratinus tragoediarum scriptor, eamque edidisse ovum, unde nata sit Helena”. 35 See Kassel–Austin PCG IV, 121. 36 Luppe 1974a, 50. 37 Transl. Henderson 2012, 8. 38 See Hyg. Astron. 2.8 “Iuppiter... iubet... Venerem aquilae simulatam se sequi, ipse in olorem conversus”, cf. Luppe 1974a, 53, Bakola 2010, 171, 222 and 251. 39 Kock CAF I, 48.

  Francesco Paolo Bianchi catasterism version ‘big bird’ means swan, as does ‘purple-winged bird’ in fr. 121”. 40 In fr. 115 K–A Λήδα, σὸν ἔργον· δεῖ σ ̓ ὅπως εὐσχήμονως / ἀλεκτρυόνος μηδὲν διοίσεις τοὺς τρόπους, / ἐπὶ τῷδ ̓ ἐπῴζουσ ̓, ὡς ἂν ἐκλέψῃς καλὸν / ἡμῖν τι καὶ θαυμαστὸν ἐκ τοῦδ ̓ ὄρνεον ‘Leda, the task is yours; you must be / no less adapt than a cock / in clucking over this, so you can hutch us / an amazing bird from this one’ 41 the speaker exhorts Leda to brood (ἐπῴζουσ᾽(α)) the egg (designated with the pronouns τῶδ᾽(ε), v. 3, and τοῦδ᾽(ε) v. 4) up to its hatching. Hermes is generally identified as the speaker because, according to Hyginus (Astr. II 8) he brought Leda the egg; 42 it is also possible that this fragment gives some suggestions for the setting: we know that Zeus has intercourse with Nemesis in Rhamnous but since Leda has to be in Sparta and there are two other fragments that allow us to situate the setting of part of the play in Sparta, we can assume that “from fr. 115 together with frr. 117 and 119 [...] at some point the action shifted from Attica to Sparta”. 43 Particularly important for the interpretation of the Nemesis is fr. 118 K–A μόλ ̓ ὦ Ζεῦ ξένιε καὶ καραιέ (“come, O Zeus, patron of foreigners and head of state”), 44 which allows us to disclose the political dimension of the drama, since it hints doubtless at Pericles, spotted for his onion-shaped head (see the word καραιέ); 45 the political facet of the play is confirmed also by fr. 125 K–A, which mentions the famous soothsayer Lampo, a friend of Pericles. 46 According to the prevailing view, the Nemesis, like the Dionysalexandros, contained the interaction of myth and city politics: “the assimilation of Zeus to Pericles in fr. 118, the traditional role

 40 Henderson 2012, 4. Fr. 121 K–A ὄρνιθα φοινικόπτερον is preserved in the same section of Athen. IX 373c immediately before fr. 114 K–A and it can be compared with Hor. carm. IV 1 10 purpureis oloribus, see Henderson 2012, 10 fn. 27. 41 Transl. Henderson 2012, 8. 42 See Moessner 1907, 60, Luppe 1974a, 51–52, Bakola 2010, 171, Henderson 2012, 6–7 (who also suggests that Hermes was disguised as Tyndareos); for other less probable interpretations of the speaker of fr. 115 see Bianchi 2017, 117 n. 143. 43 Henderson 2012, 6. Cratin. fr. 117 K–A Σπάρτην λέγω γε † σπαρτίδα † τὴν σπάρτινον, “when I say ‘Sparta-ward’ I mean ‘Sparta’, not a spartine!”; fr. 118 K–A Ψύρα τε τὴν Σπάρτην ἄγεις “you’re treating Sparta like Psyra” (both translations in Henderson 2012, 8). 44 Transl. Henderson 2012, 8. 45 The fragments is quoted at Plut. Vit. Per. III 3 for the comic mocks in comedy to the head of Pericles, cf. Ar. Ach. 530 s. with Olson 2002, 530 s., Telò 2007, 175 s., Bagordo 2013, 128–130 (ad Telecl. fr. 18 K–A, Hēsiodoi) and 220–222 (ad Telecl. fr. 45 K–A, inc. fab.) with further bibliography. 46 For this fragment see above n. 28.

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of Nemesis and Helen as bringers of war in poetry and the new shrine at Rhamnous [...] and the Spartan setting of the play’s Leda action all encourage us to look for the topical resonance in Nemesis”; 47 this is, of course only a possibility, which cannot be proved and actually, also in the case of the Dionysalexandros (see above), in spite of the information delivered by the hypothesis, we do not understand exactly the relationship between myth and politics. Moreover, as Bakola pointed out, “first and foremost, Nemesis travestied a mythic tale [...] the sparseness of the surviving material and the nature of the mythic tale make it difficult to say precisely how political satire was interwoven with the mythical and the dramatic plot-strands of the play [...] we must assume that, as in the case of Dionysalexandros, the narrative stayed firmly in the field of mythological burlesque, and was enhanced by allusions to drama”. 48 Therefore, the case of the Nemesis shows that we can get an overall view of the plot thanks to the accidental preservation of a mythological account, which quotes the name of Cratinus; the plot’s reconstruction seems to be confirmed by some fragments preserved by the indirect tradition, whereas other fragments, incorporating other important information like the political references, imply the coexistence of both myth and politics.

 A third example is the comedy Odyssēs. 49 In some respects, we find here similar features to our first example, the Dionysalexandros. We can read about the Odyssēs in two passages from the Περὶ διαφορᾶς κωμῳδιῶν by Platonios, an unknown grammarian probably of the third or fourth century AD: 50

 47 Henderson 2012, 7. 48 Bakola 2010, 220 and 224 (second and third quotation). 49 PCG IV, 192–200, frr. 143–157 K–A. For the chronology of the play, see below n. 55. 50 Kaibel 1898, p. 48 referring to Περὶ διαφορᾶς κωμῳδιῶν ll. 64–66, p. 6 Koster = 79–81, p. 36 Perusino ὁρῶμεν γοῦν τὰς ὀφρῦς ἐν τοῖς προσώποις τῆς Μενάνδρου κωμῳδίας ὁποίας ἔχει annotates: “da redet einer der Menander von der Bühne her kennt, also gewiss kein Byzantiner”, cf. Perusino 1989, 13: “in epoca prebizantina, quando Menandro veniva ancora rappresentato” (with the referenco to A. Dain, La survie de Ménandre, Maia 15, 1963, 278–309 for the staging of Menander), Storey 2003, 46 (“any time before AD 500”), Sommerstein 2009, 273–274. It is indeed doubtful, cf. Nesselrath 2000, 242 n. 11: “There is, however, the possibility that Platonius has simply taken over this sentence out of an earlier source”.

  Francesco Paolo Bianchi τοιοῦτος οὖν ἐστιν ὁ τῆς μέσης κωμῳδίας τύπος, οἷος ἐστιν ὁ Αἰολοσίκων Ἀριστοφάνους καὶ οἱ Ὀδυσσεῖς Κρατίνου καὶ πλεῖστα τῶν παλαιῶν δραμάτων οὔτε χορικὰ οὔτε παραβάσεις ἔχοντα [...] τοιαῦτα δὲ δράματα καὶ ἐν τῇ παλαιᾷ κωμωδίᾳ ἔστιν εὑρεῖν, ἅπερ τελευταῖα ἐδιδάχθη λοιπὸν τῆς ὀλιγαρχίας κρατυνθείσης. οἱ γοῦν Ὀδυσσεῖς Κρατίνου οὐδενὸς ἐπιτίμησιν ἔχουσι, διασυρμὸν δὲ τῆς Ὀδυσσείας τοῦ Ὀμήρου. (Platon. diff. com. (proleg. de com. I) p. 4 ll. 29–31 / 49–52 Koster = p. 34, ll. 35–38 / 61–65 Perusino) Such, then, is the form of Middle Comedy, of the kind exemplified by the Aiolosikōn of Aristophanes and the Odyssēs of Kratinos and very many of the old plays which have neither choral songs no parabases [...] Middle Comedy abandoned such [political] plots and turned to the mockery of stories told by the poets, since there was no risk of punitive sanctions attached, for example, to making fun of Homer when he said something unskillfully, or of some tragic poet. Such plays are also to be found in Old Comedy, those which were produced last when oligarchy had already taken power. The Odyssēs of Kratinos, at any rate, has no censure of anyone [sc. contemporary], but parody of the Odyssey of Homer. 51 (Translation by A. Sommerstein)

Platonios reports the following statements about the Odyssēs of Cratinus: 1) the comedy had neither choral songs nor parabasis (οὔτε χορικὰ οὔτε παραβάσεις); 2) it was staged in the last phase of the Archaia, after the rise of the oligarchy; 3) it lacked political assault (οὐδενὸς ἐπιτίμησις); 4) it was a parody (διασυρμός) of Homer’s Odyssey. As Sommerstein stated, “of the things that Platonios asserts about Odyssēs, the only one of which we can be sure is that the play parodied Homer’s Odyssey — and that we knew already”. 52 With respect to the first information, the lack of choral songs and of the parabasis, we have indeed no evidence for the parabasis; on the other hand, however, the fragments handed down through the indirect tradition preserve, undoubtedly, lyric sections: the kind of verse used in fr. 151 K–A is the paremiac, in fr. 153 K–A the glyconeus and maybe the paremiac could be used as well in fr. 152 K–A, although this is not sure, since

 51 For these passages of Platonios see Sommerstein 2009 and Zimmermann 2001, 724–725. For a bibliography until 1989 see Perusino 1989, 53–56, for the years later see Quaglia 1998, 32–33, Casolari 2003, 61–62. 52 For the homeric passages hinted to in the Odyssēs see the list of Tanner 1915, 176 n. 5: fr. 135 (= 146 K.–A.): ι 357–359 (ι 196 s., 208–211); fr. 138 (= 143 K.–A.): ε 303–305 (ι 142–145); fr. 139 (= 143 K.–A.): ε 315 (ι 270 s., Hom. h. III [Ap.] 418); fr. 140 (= 144 K.–A.): ε 273–277; fr. 141 (= 145 K.–A.): ι 347–364; fr. 144 (= 151 K.–A.): ι 502–505. See moreover Amado-Rodriguez 1994, Mastromarco 1998, Casolari 2003, 61–77, Ornaghi 2004, 199–217, Bakola 2010, 234–246, Zimmermann 2011, 725, Bianchi 2017, 121–125.

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the verse could be also the second half of an anapestic tetrameter catalectic. 53 As far as chronology (2) there is a clear mistake, since Cratinus died before the twenties of the fifth century; we don’t know when the comedy was staged, but it has been suggested that it happened in the years of Morichides’ decree, 440/439– 437/6 AD. 54 Platonios’ information therefore seems unrealiable and this could be true also for the third item above, the lack of political assault: “[Platonios’] statement that the play ‘has no censure of anyone’ is consistent with the surviving fragments, but the absence of personal satire from these fragments may be a mere accident of preservation; there are [...] other comedies of Kratinos from which we have substantial numbers of quotation fragments and in which none of them includes overt satirical reference to any contemporary individual, and we know that one of these [the Dionysalexandros] was readily interpreted, both by most of those who saw it and by Hellenistic scholars, as a sustained satire on Pericles”. 55 Although the lack of political features is confirmed at present by the fragments, it could just be a chance occurrence; otherwise some interpretations focus on possible political hints in the comedy, 56 and, as last, Zimmermann defined the Odyssēs as “eine unpolitische Spielart der Mythentravestie”, but makes an interesting remark about the use of the verb πειθαρχεῖν (fr. 143, v. 2 K–A): “man könnte allerdings [...] in dem verb πειθαρχεῖν [...], das zum oligarchischen Wortschatz gehört (vgl. z. B. Soph. Ant. 676, Xen. Cyr. 1,2,8), eine politische Anspielung aushören”. 57 As for the analogy between the cases of Dionysalexandros and Odyssēs, a hypothesis dating the II–III century A.D. is, of course, something very different from

 53 For the metre of these three fragments, see Bianchi 2017, 252. As for the absence of χορικά in the Aiolosikōn of Aristophanes, see Orth 2017, 15 and 66–81 (commentary on frr. 8–10 Kassel – Austin, respectively trochaic dimeters, aristophaneans and choriambs). 54 For the chronology of Cratinus and the Odyssēs, see respectively Bianchi 2017, 13–15 and 28–29. 55 Sommerstein 2009, 286. 56 E.g. an identification between Pericles and Polyphem was suggested by Mewaldt 1946, 276– 277 (“zweifellos hatte auch diese erste Travestie, wie sonst be- kanntermaßen bei dem genialdraufgängerischen Kratinos, eine politische Spitze, und gern möchte man wissen, ob mit Polyphemus nicht doch Perikles gemeint war, den Kratinos ständig angegriffen und verspottet hat”) and Dörrie 1968, 22 (“aller Wahrscheinlichkeit nach war darin der Kyklop zu verstehen als eine Schlüsselfigur, hinter der ein verhaßter Politiker (vielleicht Perikles) erkennbar wurde”); Casolari 2000, 77 n. 58 adds to this possibility that the greed (cfr. fr. 150 K–A) is a typical connotation of the tyrant, but also remarks the lacks of any evidence for this interpretation: “Sie findet aber keine Bestätigung in den überlieferten Fragmente”. 57 Zimmermann 2011, 725–726 n. 236. It is also may be possible to see a political allusion in the image of the ship in fr. 143 K–A, traditionally used as an allegory of the political life, see Gentili 2006, 292–316.

  Francesco Paolo Bianchi the utterances of an unknown and unreliable grammarian, and we have to remind this difference every time we relate these two sources to the rest of the evidence; however, the indirect tradition preserves in both cases fragments in which there is no hint of political issues. Nevertheless, we know from the hypothesis that the Dionysalexandros had also a political facet; and in the case of the Odyssēs, none of our fragments is about politics, but we can’t exclude that political themes were in fact explored, but were not preserved by the tradition.

 The last example is the Pytinē, 58 one of the most famous plays written by Cratinus and perhaps his last comedy: it was staged in 423 at the Dionysia, when Cratinus carried off the first prize against the Connos of Amipsias and the Clouds of Aristophanes. 59 A scholium to Aristophanes’ Knights preserves the plot summary; furthermore, the comedy survives in 25 fragments and is one of the best-documented plays of Cratinus. Thanks to the relationships existing between the summary and the fragments, we are able to reconstruct some scenes and to recognise, with a reasonable degree of certainty, that some of the surviving verses belong indeed to these scenes. παροξυνθεὶς ἐκεῖνος, καίτοι τοῦ ἀγωνίζεσθαι ἀποστὰς καὶ συγγράφειν, πάλιν γράφει δρᾶμα, τὴν Πυτίνην, εἰς αὑτόν τε καὶ τὴν μέθην (Μέθην), οἰκονομίᾳ τε κεχρημένον τοιαύτῃ. τὴν Κωμῳδίαν ὁ Κρατῖνος ἐπλάσατο αὑτοῦ εἶναι γυναῖκα καὶ ἀφίστασθαι τοῦ συνοικεσίου τοῦ σὺν αὐτῷ θέλειν, καὶ κακώσεως αὐτῷ δίκην λαγχάνειν, φίλους δὲ παρατυχόντας τοῦ Κρατίνου δεῖσθαι μηδὲν προπετὲς ποιῆσαι καὶ τῆς ἔχθρας ἀνερωτᾶν τὴν αἰτίαν, τὴν δὲ μέμφεσθαι αὐτῷ ὅτι μὴ κωμῳδοίη μηκέτι, σχολάζοι δὲ τῇ μέθῃ (Μέθῃ) (Cratin. Pytinē test. ii K–A [PCG IV, p. 219]= schol. vet. [VEΓ3ΘΜ] Ar. Eq. 400a (I) = Sud. κ 2216) It was in irritation at this, it seems, that even though he had retired from competition and writing, he wrote a play once again, the Wine Flask, about himself and drunkenness (or

 58 PCG IV, 219–232, testt. i–iii, frr. 193–217 K–A. 59 Cratin. PCG IV test. 7c K–A, arg. A 6 (VERs) Ar. Nub. 4 rr. 12–17 Holwerda = arg. V 134 rr. 1–6 Wilson 2007 αἱ πρῶται Νεφέλαι ἐδιδάχθησαν (post ἐν ἄστει V) ἐν ἄστει ἐπὶ ἄρχοντος Ἰσάρχου (424/3 BC), ὅτε Κρατῖνος μὲν ἐνίκα Πυτίνῃ, Ἀμειψίας δὲ Κόννῳ. διόπερ Ἀριστοφάνης ἀπορριφθεὶς (ἀπορριφεὶς E) παραλόγως ᾠήθη δεῖν ἀναδιδάξας (ἀναδιδάξαι V) τὰς Νεφέλας τὰς δευτέρας καταμέμφεσθαι (ἀπομεμφ- V) τὸ θέατρον. ἀτυχῶν δὲ πολὺ μᾶλλον καὶ ἐν τοῖς ἔπειτα οὐκέτι τὴν διασκευὴν εἰσήγαγεν (ἐπήγ- Rs). Cf. Bianchi 2017, 302–303.

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Drunkenness), which employed the following outline: Cratinus pretended that Comedy was his wife but wanted to get divorce from him, and she filed a lawsuit against him for mistreatment. But Cratinus’ friends happened by and begged her not to do anything rash, and they asked the reason for her hostility. She criticized the fact that he no longer wrote comedies but wasted time with drunkenness (or Drunkenness). (Translation by J. Henderson. With the addition of “or Drunkenness”, twice.)

The scholium is about the nexus Κρατίνου κῴδιον and explains that κῴδιον means ‘sheepskin’, which is treated together with the wool. Moreover, the scholiast states that this is an assault to Cratinus, who is described by Aristophanes as a drunkard suffering from enuresis; in fact, a few words later we are told that the κῴδιον is a sort of nappy. 60 Right after this explication, he reveals that Cratinus, who had already retired from the scene, got angry (παροξυνθείς) at the assault and wrote a new play called Pytinē; of course, the statement about Cratinus’ disengagement is incorrect and due to Aristophanes’ depiction of the rival. 61 Then there is the plot summary, which can be summed as it follows: 1) the play was about Cratinus himself and drunkenness (εἰς αὐτόν τε καὶ τὴν μέθην); drunkenness can be understood either as the abstract idea of being drunk or as a personification (Μέθη, Drunkenness), as already suggested by Meineke 62 and Kock (“Comoediam igitur et Ebrietatem fabulae personas esse voluit”); 63  60 Schol. vet. (VEΓ3ΘΜ) Ar. Eq. 400a (I) εἴ σε μὴ μισῶ, γενοίμην ἐν Κρατίνου κῴδιον = Sud. κ 2216 ~ Cratin. PCG IV, test. 14 K–A ~ Pytinē test. ii K–A. Κρατίνου κῴδιον: κῴδιόν ἐστι τὸ ἅμα τοῖς ἐρίοις δέρμα σκευαζόμενον. ὡς ἐνουρητὴν δὲ καὶ μέθυσον διαβάλλει τὸν Κρατῖνον. ὁ δὲ Κρατῖνος καὶ αὐτὸς ἀρχαίας κωμῳδίας ποιητής, πρεσβύτερος Ἀριστοφάνους, τῶν εὐδοκίμων ἄγαν (it follows the summary of the plot, see above. This section of the scholium corresponds with Cratin. test. 14 K–A, the summary of the plot with Pytinē test. ii K–A). The word ἐνουρητής describes normally old men, see Ar. Lys. 402 and 450, and possibly refers to the use of the verb ῥεύσας in the parabasis of the Acharnians of Aristophanes, v. 526, cf. Bianchi 2017, 311 ad Cratin. test. 9 K–A; ἐν Κρατίνου means generally “in Cratinus’ house” (cf. schol. Ar. Eq. 400a εἰς τὴν οἰκίαν τοῦ Κρατίνου, cf. Henderson 2011, 177, Storey 2011, 245), but maybe could be translated as “may I be Cratinus’ bed” (Edmonds 1957, 17), cf. Bianchi 2018, 239 n. 17. 61 This is clear from the fact that in the same year of the Knights (424 BC) Cratinus staged the Satyroi (Cratin. PCG IV, test. 7b K–A) and maybe after the Pytinē he produced the Seriphioi (Bakola 2010, 60 n. 139) and eventually also the Lakōnes (so Mastromarco 2002, 398‐403, cf. Bianchi 2017, 318–319 and n. 432). 62 Meineke FCG I, 48, II.1, 116. 63 Kock CAF I, 68. For the interpretation of Μέθη as a personification, see Luppe 2000, 17, Rosen 2000, 26, Ruffell 2002, 156 and compare the personifications of Πόλεμος, Εἰρήνη, Ὀπώρα e Θεωρία in the Peace of Aristophanes; see Bianchi 2018, 240 and Bakola 2010, 282–285 for the idea that μέθη/Μέθη could coexist and reflect the different points of view of the characters of the drama.

  Francesco Paolo Bianchi 2) the scholiast uses the words οἰκονομία τε κεχρημένον τοιαύτῃ to announce the plot summary. In literary criticism, the noun οἰκονομία points out the “structure”, the “internal arrangement” of a play (“of a literary work, arrangement”, LSJ s.v. 3; “rhet. distribution, disposition, of themes, of material”, DGE s.v.) as it is confirmed by some passages of other authors, in particular, Cicero 64 and Dionysius of Halicarnassus; 65 3) in the section from τὴν Κωμῳδίαν up to λαγχάνειν, the summary informs that Cratinus depicts Comedy as his wife; here, it is told that Comedy wants to leave her husband and charge him with abuse (κακώσεως δίκη). Particularly important is the expression ἀφίστασθαι τοῦ συνοικεσίου and his juridic value: one of the meanings of ἀφίστημι is the loss of a legal condition 66 and συνοικέσιον is cognate with συνοικεῖν “the accepted term for living together in legitimate union”, 67 so that with the expression ἀφίστασθαι τοῦ συνοικεσίου “the scholiast represents the matter as divorce and more particularly as apoleipsis, whereby the wife initiated the process. In this case, unlike when a husband took the initiative, the process entailed formalities including the wife’s appearance before an archon to register her change of status”. 68 The other expression κακώσεως αὐτῷ δίκην λαγχάνειν indicates to take a legal action 69 and as Biles stated “the scholiast’s detail conform to Athenian divorce procedures, and his description is too unified and its implications too extensive to be a product of his imagination”; 70 as Bakola 71 suggests, γραφὴ κακώσεως refers all but certainly to a ἐπικλήρου κάκωσις, 72 while far less certain is the possibility of a hint to the Solonian law τρὶς ἑκάστου μηνὸς ἐντυγχάνειν πάντως τῇ ἐπικλήρῳ τὸν λάβοντα, 73 and hence “it  64 Cic. Att. VI 1 Accepi tuas litteras a. d. V Terminalia Laodiceae; quas legi libentissime plenissimas amoris, humanitatis, offici, diligentiae. iis igitur respondebo, * * * (sic enim postulas), nec οἰκονομίαν meam instituam sed ordinem conservabo tuum. 65 Dion. Hal. Pomp. IV 2 (Ξενοφῶν) οὐ μόνον δὲ τῶν ὑποθέσεων χάριν ἄξιος ἐπαινεῖσθαι [ζηλωτὴς Ἡροδότου γενόμενος], ἀλλὰ καὶ τῆς οἰκονομίας. 66 LSJ s.v. ἀφίστημι Β.1 “ὧν εἷλεν ἀποστάς giving up all claim to what he had won (at law), D. 21, 181; τῶν αὑτῆς Id. 19, 147, cf. 35, 4; ἀφίστασθαι τῶν τοῦ ἀδελφοῦ ib. 44”; GE s.v. “to be deprived, lose”. 67 Harrison 1968, 2. 68 Biles 2011, 159–160. On the apoleipsis see Harrison 1968, 40–44, Cohn‐Haft 1995, 4–7, 11–13. 69 [Aristot.] Ath. Pol. 53, 1 δίκας λαγχάνουσιν, 56, 6 δίκαι λαγχάνονται, see V. LSJ s.v. and Rhodes 1981, 587 s., 2017, 381. 70 Biles 2011, 160. 71 Bakola 2010, 276–277. 72 Α γραφή κακώσις could refer only to parents, orphans, or heiresses, cf. Harrison 1968, 117– 119, Rhodes 1981, 630. 73 Sol. F 51a Ruschenbusch (p. 88) = 434 Martina (p. 217). The source for this law is Plut. Sol. 20, 4.

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seems, that, in the Pytine Comedy was presented as an ἐπίκληρος given in wedlock to Cratinus, who thus come under a legal obligation to consummate the marriage regularly [...] Making Comedy an heiress was a stroke of self‐eulogy on the poet’s part. The point is that she has inherited a rich poetic tradition which only he is entitled to access [...] Comedy thus sought to divorce the poet because of an alleged [...] neglect of his conjugal duties”. 74 We have, indeed, no evidence for the allusion to this law and it can not at all be demonstrated; the only thing we can say with an acceptable degree of plausibility is the presence in the scholium of 4th cent. BC legal terminology and the hint to a legal procedure, whose precise details cannot be detected. 4) in the next section, Cratinus’ friends enter the scene, try to discourage Cratinus’ wife from leaving her husband and ask Comedy about her hatred (ἔχθρα). According to Malcom Heath, 75 the expression φιλοὺς δὲ παρατυχόντας τοῦ Κρατίνου means the beginning of the parodos and consequently the chorus should be composed by Cratinus’ friends; this is certainly possible, however “one wonders what characters would be recognized as friends of Cratinus”; 76 5) Comedy explains to Cratinus’ friends, why she blames her husband (μέμφεσθαι): Cratinus composes no more comedy (μὴ κωμῳδοίη μήκετι). The utterance μὴ κωμῳδοίη μηκέτι, σχολάζοι δὲ τῇ μέθῃ (Μέθῃ) could have a double meaning, depending on taking μ(Μ)έθη as a personification or not: “‘he does not make comedies, but it is only concerned with drinking’ and ‘he does not sleep with me, but is constantly with her’”. 77 Thanks to the scholium, we can then suppose that the Pytinē included: a) a prologue in which Comedy, Cratinus’ wife, complains about the treatment that she suffers from the poet and announces her resolution to leave her husband; b) a parodos in which the chorus, composed by Cratinus’ friends, enters the scene with the aim to persuade Comedy not to leave Cratinus; c) after the parodos, a scene in which Comedy explains to Cratinus’ friends why she is so bitter. We can also ascribe to these scenes some of the fragments preserved by the indirect tradition; just two possible examples:

 74 Bakola 2010, 177. 75 Heath 1990, 150: “I take it that this is the entry of the Chorus”, cf. Bianchi 2018, 243. 76 Biles 2002, 181 n. 140. 77 Bakola 2010, 281.

  Francesco Paolo Bianchi 1) fr. 193 K–A ἀλλ’ † ἐπαναστρέψαι βούλομαι εις † τὸν λόγον. / πρότερον ἐκεῖνος πρὸς ἑτέραν γυναῖκ’ ἔχων / τὸν νοῦν, κακὰς εἴποι πρὸς ἑτέραν· ἀλλ’ / ἅμα μὲν τὸ γῆρας, ἅμα δέ μοι δοκεῖ kl / † οὐδέποτ’ αὐτοῦ πρότερον, “But I want to return to the story. Previously, when he was paying attention to another woman, he behaved badly † to another. † But now that he’s old, he seems to me ... † never of him previously †”; fr. 194 K–A γυνὴ δ’ ἐκείνου πρότερον ἦ, νῦν δ’ οὐκέτι, “previously I was his wife, but now no longer”. 78 In both of them, the speaker should be Comedy: 79 in fr. 193 she says that ἐκεῖνος, so Cratinus, cares for another woman (πρὸς ἐτέραν γυναῖκα), in fr. 194 Comedy remembers that, once upon a time, she was Cratinus’ wife (γυνή, but now no more, νῦν δ᾽ οὐκέτι) and he (designated by ἐκεῖνος again) used to care for her. Fr. 193 is recorded by the scholiast after the summary (see above), 80 and perhaps may have belonged to the scene of Comedy’s complaint, that comes after the parodos. Furthermore, the fragment seems to match the scholium, as the scholiast writes τὴν δὲ μέμφεσθαι αὐτῷ ὅτι μὴ κωμῳδοίη μηκέτι, σχολάζοι δὲ τῇ μέθῃ. Nevertheless, since the scholiast introduces the fragment with a generic statement τὰ ἐπιτήδεια τῶν ἰάμβων, we can’t exclude that frag. 193 could belong to the prologue, in which the blame-motif seems to appear too; 81 2) frr. *195 K–A νῦν δ’ ἢν ἴδῃ Μενδαῖον ἡβῶντ’ ἀρτίως / οἰνίσκον, ἕπεται κἀκολουθεῖ καὶ λέγει, /οἴμ’ ὡς ἁπαλὸς καὶ λευκός. ἆρ’ οἴσει τρία;, “But now, if he spies a barely adolescent little Mendaean wine, he follows it and dogs its tracks and says: ‘Damn! how soft and white it is! Is it strong enough for three?”; 82 and fr. 196 K–A τὸν δ’ ἴσον ἴσῳ φέροντ’· ἐγὼ δ’ ἐκτήκομαι, “... a wine that stands half and half. I am melting!”, 83 can be assigned to the scene after the parodos with a higher degree of certainty. In both of them Comedy blames her husband for spending his time with μέθη (σχολάζοι δὲ τῇ μέθῃ), and the first one is particularly interesting because “the imagery is explicitly sexual (‘Cratinus’ reacts to a fine wine in the way a devoted pederast reacts to a pretty boy)”. 84

 78 Both translations in Olson 2007, 423. 79 This is a likely communis opinio from Runkel 1827, 51 and Meineke FCG I 48 onwards. For fr. 193 K.A., cf. Bianchi 2018, 247–248. 80 For the problems of fr. 193, v. 1, which are sometimes considered not Cratinus’ ipsissima verba, but still words of the scholiast, see Bianchi 2018, 249–250 n. 63. 81 Olson 2007, 81 attributes both fragments to the prologue, while Beta 2009, 245, n. 211–212 considers equivalent the attribution to the prologue or to the scene after the parabasis. 82 Transl. Olson 2007, 423. 83 Transl. Henderson 2001, 205. 84 Olson 2007, 82.

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. Another topic concerns the function of the scene that follows the arrival of Cratinus’ friends, the last of the three scenes that can be reconstructed from the scholium. M. Heath suggested that it could be identified as the agōn; 85 since we are told by the scholiast that Comedy wanted to proceed against Cratinus under a κακώσεως δίκη, the agōn took perhaps the shape of a trial, and Comedy and Cratinus were the contenders. The theme would be certainly suitable for a comic agōn; furthermore, if we think about Aristophanes’ comedies, we notice that the agōn is generally placed after the parodos and before the parabasis and every time the agōn comes after the parabasis, there is a specific dramaturgical reason. 86 This suggestion, however, encounters some difficulties, since none of the fragments that seem to match the trial-motif are composed in iambic tetrameter catalectic or anapestic tetrameter catalectic, which are the usual recitative meters for the agōn; therefore, it has been proposed that the agōn was partly composed in iambic trimeters, in order to parody judicial speeches. This could be the case of fr. 197 K–A τὴν μὲν παρασκευὴν ἴσως γιγνώσκετε, “You are aware, perhaps, of the preparation . . .”. 87 Preserved at Clem. Alex. VI 20, 3, together with other quotations from the orators, as an example of plagiarism, 88 the citation context shows that παρασκευή should be understood in the meaning of “intrigue, cabal” (LSJ s.v. nr. 3, cf. GE s.v. “intrigue, plot, trick”) and that “οrators seem to have been taught to refer to their opponents’ παρασκευή [...] as a way of painting them as desperate and conniving”; hence, it seems then possible that the fragment was

 85 Ηeath 1990, 150: “there followed a debate in which Comedy set out her complaints and Cratinus defended himself”. 86 See Pickard‐Cambridge 19622, 200, Gelzer 1960, in part. 11–37, Dover 1972, 66. In Aristophanes the agon is before the parabasis in Wasps (526–724), Birds (451–638) and Lysistrata (476– 613), after in Knights (756–940), Clouds (950–1104) and Frogs (858–1098); in the Knights there is also a shorter agon before the parabasis (303–460). There is no agon in Acharnians, Peace and Thesmophoriazusae; it is attested, indeed, in Ecclesiazusae (571–709) and Pluto (487–726), which, however, do not have a parabasis and therefore do not allow a comparison. 87 Transl. Olson 2007, 423. 88 Clem. Alex. VI 20, 3 Κρατίνου ἐν Πυτίνῃ εἰπόντος· τὴν μὲν παρασκευὴν ἴσως γινώσκετε, Ἀνδοκίδης ὁ ῥήτωρ λέγει (1, 1)· «τὴν μὲν παρασκευήν, ὦ ἄνδρες δικασταί, καὶ τὴν προθυμίαν τῶν ἐχθρῶν τῶν ἐμῶν σχεδόν τι πάντες εἴσεσθε». Ὁμοίως καὶ Λυσίας ἐν τῷ πρὸς Νικίαν ὑπὲρ καταθήκης (fr. 190 Sauppe) «τὴν μὲν παρασκευὴν καὶ τὴν προθυμίαν τῶν ἀντιδίκων ὁρᾶτε, ὦ ἄνδρες δικασταί,» φησίν, καὶ μετὰ τοῦτον Αἰσχίνης λέγει (3, 19)· «τὴν μὲν παρασκευὴν ὁρᾶτε, ὦ ἄνδρες Ἀθηναῖοι, καὶ τὴν παράταξιν».

  Francesco Paolo Bianchi “the beginning of a speech most likely made by ‘Cratinus’ in response to an attack on him by Comedy, and addressed to his friends”. 89 It makes any problem the fact that the agōn in Cratinus could have been structurally different from Aristophanes, as the case of fr. 6 K–A (Archilochoi) eventually suggest; 90 there is, indeed, no other evidence for such an agon with parodical judicial speeches in the Pytinē than the interpretation of the lines of the scholium and that of fr. 197 K–A. On the other hand, we have two fragments, 208 and 209 K–A, whose content allows attribution to the agōn and both of them are catalectic iambic tetrameters, the metre this section has normally in Aristophanes (along with the catalectic anapaestic tetrameters). 91 This possibility contrasts, however, with the previous one (parody of judicial speeches in iambic trimeter), unless we think that both the themes and both the metrical forms coexisted in a way we can not reconstruct.

. Finally, a group of fragments can't be assigned to the scenes that are reported in the scholium, so it has to belong to other scenes that are not mentioned by the scholiast. Just two examples show the case. The first one is fr. 199 K–A πῶς τις αὐτόν, πῶς τις ἂν† / ἀπὸ τοῦ πότου παύσειε, τοῦ λίαν πότου;/ ἐγᾦδα. συντρίψω γὰρ αὐτοῦ τοὺς χόας, / καὶ τοὺς καδίσκους συγκεραυνώσω σποδῶν, / καὶ τἄλλα πάντ’ ἀγγεῖα τὰ περὶ τὸν πότον, /κοὐδ' ὀξύβαφον οἰνηρὸν ἔτι κεκτήσεται, “how, how could someone put a stop to his drinking, his excessive drinking? I know — I’ll crush his pitchers, and smash his wine-buckets and all the other vessels he uses for drinking to bits; he won’t even own a vinegar-dish that holds wine any longer!”, 92 in which the speaker, surely a male (v. 3 σποδῶν) “wonders how to stop Cratinus’s excessive drinking, and has the idea of smashing all his wine  89 Both quotations from Olson 2007, 83. 90 Cratin. fr. 6 K–A: εἶδες τὴν Θασίαν ἅλμην, οἱ ̓ ἄττα βαΰζει; / ὡς εὖ καὶ ταχέως ἀπετείσατο καὶ παραχρῆμα. / οὐ μέντοι παρὰ κωφὸν ὁ τυφλὸς ἔοικε λαλῆσαι. These three hexameters are likely intepreted as the sphragis of the agon from Pretagostini 1982, 45–47 and in this case it follows that all the agon was in hexameter, cf. Bianchi 2016, 66–67. 91 Cratin. fr. 208 K–A: ληρεῖς ἔχων· γράφ ̓ αὐτόν / ἐν ἐπεισοδίῳ· γελοῖος ἔσται Κλεισθένης κυβεύων / † ἐν τῇ τῇ κάλλους ἀκμῇ; Cratin. fr. 209 K–A: Ὑπέρβολον δ ̓ ἀποσβέσας ἐν τοῖς λύχνοισι γράψον. For the former see Zieliński 1931, 87: “aut poeta lagaena orbatus inutilis ostendebatur ad comoediam scribendam aut lagaena recuperata egregiam scribens fabulam inducebatur”, cf. Gelzer 1960, 182; for the latter see Crusius 1889, 39: “Comoediam audimus in agone nova quaedam poetae inventa corripientem atque veras τοῦ κωμῳδεῖν vias monstrans”. 92 Transl. Olson 2007, 423.

What we Do (Not) Know about Lost Comedies: Fragments and Testimonia  

jars”. 93 The consequences of smashing Cratinus’ wine jars could be showed in fr. 202 K–A ἆρ’ ἀραχνίων μεστὴν ἔχεις τὴν γαστέρα, “do you have a belly full of cobwebs?”, 94 in which someone, perhaps the character Cratinus himself, is complaining about an empty vessel. The second example is fr. 200 K–A ἀτὰρ ἐννοοῦμαι δῆτα τῆς μοχθηρίας / τῆς † ἠλιθιότητος τῆς ἐμῆς, “but I do indeed recognize the depravity of my folly”, 95 in which the speaker regrets his mistakes (μοχθηρίας) and admits (ἐννοοῦμαι) that his faults have to be attributed only to his foolishness (ἡλιθιότητος); “The speaker might be either ‘Cratinus’, who at last sees the error of his ways, or Comedy recognizing that she has treated her husband worse than he deserves”. 96

 In conclusion. The four cases discussed serve as examples of the different issues that can arise from the interaction between testimonies and fragments. The Dionysalexandros shows that testimony can provide us of data that are not attested in the fragments, for example, the political connotation of the drama; on the other hand, although we can rely on a detailed summary, none of the fragments can be assigned with certainty to any section of the dramatic action. The Nemesis attests that it is possible to know the mythical variant which had been chosen by the poet and that some fragments can be related to that particular narrative. The Odyssēs make clear that testimony can be contested thanks to the information provided by the fragments. Consequently, although the testimony asserts the absence of political engagement, and the fragments confirm this absence, we feel legitimate to doubt that the comedy lacked political references, and we are tempted to attribute this lack to an accident of preservation. Finally, the Pytinē confirms that sometimes testimonies and fragments together allow us to reconstruct some scenes, but we have also to consider individual problems that can’t be answered with certainty. This is the case of the agōn and of the fragments that could be hypothetically ascribed to it. More than thirty years ago, M. Heath stated in his work “Aristophanes and his rivals” that “the greatest wisdom in the study of lost plays is the knowledge  93 Heath 1990, 151. 94 Transl. Henderson 2011, 206. 95 Transl. Olson 2007, 424. 96 Olson 2007, 85. For other fragments of the Pytinē which can be assigned to scenes not summarized in the scholium, see Bianchi 2018, 252–257.

  Francesco Paolo Bianchi of when to fall silent”; 97 the four cases examined confirm, I think, one more time the validity of his view. Dealing with fragments certainly requires a skillfully use of the so called ars nesciendi; or, surely better, as Wilamowitz wrote in 1928 “du sollst freilich suchen und darin nicht müde werden, aber dich bescheiden, wo uns das wissen versagt ist, sonst gerätst du ins Schwindeln”. 98

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What we Do (Not) Know about Lost Comedies: Fragments and Testimonia  

Gentili, B. (2006), Poesia e pubblico nella Grecia antica. Da Omero al V secolo. Quarta edizione aggiornata, Milano (19831). Grenfell, B.P./Hunt, A.S. (1904), “Argumentum of Cratinus’ ∆ιονυσαλέξανδρος”, in: P.Oxy. IV, 69–72. Harrison, A.R.W. (1968), The Law of Athens: the Family and Property, vol. I, Oxford 1968. Heath, M. (1990), “Aristophanes and His Rivals”, G&R 37.2, 143–157. Henderson, J. (2011), “Cratinus”, in: J. Rusten (ed.), The Birth of Comedy. Texts, Documents, and Art from Athenian Comic Competitions, 486–20, Baltimore, 173–220 (ch. 5). Henderson, J. (2012), “Pursuing Nemesis: Cratinus and Mythological Comedy”, in: C.W. Marshall/G. Kovacs (eds), No Laughing Matter: Studies in Athenian Comedy, London, 1–12. Kassel, R./Austin, C. (1983–2001), Poetae Comici Graeci, Berolini/Novi Eboraci, I: Comoedia dorica–Mimi–Phlyaces, 2001; II: Agathenor–Aristonymus, 1991; III.2: Aristophanes. Testimonia et fragmenta, 1984; IV: Aristophon–Crobylus, 1983; V: Damoxenus–Magnes, 1986; VI.2: Menander. Testimonia et fragmenta apud scriptores servata, 1998; VII: Menecrates– Xenophon, 1989; VIII: Adespota, 1995. Kaibel, G. (1898), Die Prolegomena περὶ κωμῳδίας, Berlin (Abhandlungen der königlichen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen, Philologisch-historische Klasse, n. F. Bd. 2, Nr. 4). Kock, Th. (1884–1888), Comicorum Atticorum Fragmenta, Lipsiae, I (Antiquae comoediae fragmenta): 1880; II (Novae comoediae fragmenta. Pars I): 1884; III (Novae comoediae fragmenta. Pars II. Comicorum incertae aetatis fragmenta. Fragmenta incertorum poetarum. Indices. Supplementa): 1888. Koerte, A. (1904), “Die Hypothesis zu Kratinos’ Dionysalexandros”, Hermes 39, 481–498. Luppe, W. (1974a), “Die Nemesis des Kratinos. Mythos und politischer Hintergrund”, WZHalle 23, 49–60. Luppe, W. (1974b), “Zeus und Nemesis in den Kyprien. Die Verwandlungssage nach pseudoApollodor und Philodem”, Philologus 118, 193–202. Luppe, W. (2000), “The Rivalry between Aristophanes and Kratinos”, in: D. Harvey/J. Wilkins (eds), The Rivals of Aristophanes. Studies in Athenian Old Comedy, London/Swansea, 15–21. Mastromarco, G. (1998), “La degradazione del mostro. La maschera del Ciclope nella commedia e nel dramma satiresco del quinto secolo a.C.”, in: A.M. Belardinelli/O. Imperio/G. Mastromarco/M. Pellegrino/P. Totaro (eds), Tessere. Frammenti della comedia greca: studi e commenti, Bari, 9–42. Mastromarco, G. (2002), “L’invasione dei Laconi e la morte di Cratino (Ar. Pax 700–703)”, in: L. Torraca (ed.), Scritti in onore di Italo Gallo, Napoli, 395–403. von Mewaldt, J. (1946), “Antike Poliphemgedichte”, AAWW 20, 265–286. Moessner, O. (1907), Die Mythologie in der dorischen und altattischen Komödie, Diss. Erlangen Meineke, A. (1839–1957), Fragmenta comicorum Graecorum. Collegit et disposuit A. M., Berolini, vol. I (Historia critica comicorum Graecorum) 1839; vol. II.1 (Fragmenta poetarum comoediae antiquae) 1839; vol. II.2 (Fragmenta poetarum comoediae antiquae) 1840; vol. III (Fragmenta poetarum comoediae mediae) 1840; vol. IV (Fragmenta poetarum comoediae novae) 1841; vol. V.1–2 (Comicae dictionis index et supplementa), 1857. Nesselrath, H.-G. (2000), “Eupolis and the Periodization of Athenian Comedy”, in: D. Harvey/ J. Wilkins (eds), The Rivals of Aristophanes: Studies in Athenian Old Comedy, London/ Swansea, 233–246.

  Francesco Paolo Bianchi Norden, E. (1927), Die römische Literatur. Anhang: die lateinische Literatur im Übergang von Altertum zum Mittelalter, hrs. von B. Kyzler (=Siebente Auflage. Ergänzter Neudruck der dritten Auflage 1927, Stuttgart/Leipzig 1998). Olson, S.D. (2002), Aristophanes. Acharnians, Oxford. Olson, S.D. (2007), Broken Laughter. Select Fragments of Greek Comedy, Oxford. Olson, S.D. (2015), “On the Fragments of Eupolis’ Taxiarchoi”, in: M. Taufer (ed.), Studi sulla commedia attica, Freiburg/Berlin/Wien, 201–213. Olson, S.D. (2017), Eupolis. Einleitung, Testimonia und Aiges–Demoi, Fragmenta Comica 8.1, Heidelberg. Ornaghi, Μ. (2004), “Omero sulla scena. Spunti per una ricostruzione degli Odissei e degli Archilochi di Cratino”, in: G. Zanetto/D. Canavere/A. Capra/A. Sgobbi (eds), Momenti della ricezione omerica: poesia arcaica e teatro, Milano, 197–228. Orth, Ch. (2017), Aristophanes: Aiolosikon-Babylonioi. Übersetzung und Kommentar, Fragmenta Comica 10.3, Heidelberg. Perusino, F. (1968), Il tetrametro giambico catalettico nella commedia greca, Roma. Perusino, F. (1989), Platonio. La commedia greca. Edizione critica, traduzione e commento, Urbino. Pickard‐Cambridge, A.W. (1962), Dithyramb, Tragedy and Comedy, Oxford (19271). Pretagostini, R. (1982), “Archiloco ‘salsa di Taso’ negli Archilochi di Cratino”, QUCC n.s. 11, 43– 52. Quaglia, R. (1998), “Elementi strutturali nelle commedie di Cratino”, ACME 51.3, 23–71. Reinhardt, U. (2011), Der antike Mythos. Ein systematisches Handbuch, Freiburg. Rhodes, P.J. (1981), A Commentary on the Aristotelian Athenaion Politeia, Oxford (19932 cum add.). Rhodes, P.J. (2017), The Athenian Constitution Written in the School of Aristotle, Liverpool. Rosen, R. (2000), “Cratinus’ Pytine and the Construction of the Comic Self”, in: D. Harvey/ J. Wilkins (eds), The Rivals of Aristophanes. Studies in Athenian Old Comedy, London/ Swansea, 23–39. Ruffell, I. (2002), “A Total Write‐Off. Aristophanes, Cratinus, and the Rhetoric of Comic Competitions”, CQ 52, 138–163. Runkel, M. (1827), Cratini veteris comici Graeci fragmenta, Lipsiae. Sommerstein, A.H. (2009), “Platonios Diff. Com. 29–31 and 46–52 Koster: Aristophanes’ Aiolosikon, Kratinos’ Odyssēs, and Middle Comedy”, in: A. Sommerstein (ed.), Talking about Laughter, and other Studies in Greek Comedy, Oxford, 272–288. van Rossum-Steenbeek, M. (1998), Greek Readers’ Digests? Studies on a Selection of Subliterary Papyri, Leiden/New York/Köln. Sommerstein, A.H. (2005), “A lover of his art: the art-form as wife and mistress in Greek poetic imagery”, in: J. Emma/J. Herrin (eds), Personification in the Greek world: from antiquity to Byzantium Aldershot (Publications of the Center for Hellenic Studies / King’s College London, 7), 161–171. Sonnino, M. (2003), “Insulto scommatico e teoria del comico in un simposio alessandrino del 203 a.C. (Polibio 15.25.31–33)”, in: R. Nicolai (ed.), Rhysmos. Studi di poesia, metrica e musica greca offerti dagli allievi a Luigi Enrico Rossi per i suoi settant’anni, Rome, 283– 302. Storey, I.C. (2003), Eupolis Poet of Old Comedy, Oxford/New York. Telò, M. (2007), Eupolidis Demi, Firenze.

What we Do (Not) Know about Lost Comedies: Fragments and Testimonia  

Valckenaer, L.C. (1824), Euripidis Tragoedia Phoenissae, interpretationem addidit H. Grotii, graeca castigavit e mstis, atque adnotationibus instruxit, scholia subiecit L. C. V., Lipsiae. Zieliński, Th. (1931), Iresione I. Dissertationes ad comoediam et tragoediam spectantes continens, Leopoli. Zimmermann, B. (2011), Die Attische Komödie, in: B. Zimmermann (ed.), Handbuch der Griechischen Literatur der Antike, I: Die Literatur der archaischen und klassischen Zeit, München 2011 (Handbuch der Altertumswissenschaft 7.1), 671–800. Zimmermann, B. (2015), Eine Dichterfehde in Altathen (Aristophanes und Kratinos), in: Ch. Kugelmeier (ed.), Translatio humanitatis: Festschrift zum 60. Geburtstag von Peter Riemerm St. Ingbert, 133–145.

S. Douglas Olson

The Fragments of Aristophanes’ Gerytades: Methodological Considerations The nominal topic of this paper is Aristophanes’ fragmentary Gerytades, and in particular Matthew Farmer’s recent treatment of the play in his well-received OUP book, Tragedy on the Comic Stage. 1 I argue not so much that Farmer’s analysis of what remains of Gerytades is wrong as that it is misguided; the problem has less to do with facts than with methodology, with how we handle such material, how we argue and what we as scholars can be expected to believe. Gerytades is an intriguing comedy, and I will have a fair amount to say about fr. 156 in particular. But my real interests are larger than this and have to do with the pitfalls of fragmentary material; with how modern readings of such material come to be established and perpetuated; and with the ways such readings ought to be evaluated and the extent to which they should be taken seriously. Put another way, my real goal in this paper is to ask a series of hard questions about what we can reasonably say about fragmentary comedies, and by extension fragmentary tragedies as well, and about some of the basic methodological rules we rely on — or ought to rely on — when we think and write about them. The discussion has three main parts: a survey of the fragments of Gerytades and Farmer’s handling of them; a critique of his hypotheses and an attempt to trace their sources; and some conclusions. These are academic rather than personal issues; I assume that readers will be capable of distinguishing the two.

Section I: Farmer on Gerytades Gerytades is usually dated to 408/7 BC, putting it just two years before Frogs, a point to which I will return in various ways later on. Farmer is concerned with the comedy because he sees it reflecting his own larger interests in his book, which

 1 Farmer 2017. Cf. Rothwell 2017: “There are, to my mind, no missteps in Tragedy on the Comic Stage. Farmer is respectful of the evidence, especially of the fragments, yet imaginative in teasing out ideas. Speculation is labeled as such … Many of the issues have been discussed for decades, but Tragedy on the Comic Stage is more than a synthesis; it offers a systematic new perspective on how the two genres interacted”. I thank Matthew Farmer for sharing an advance copy of his book with me, as well as for his friendship over the last few years. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-008

  S. Douglas Olson have to do with how Aristophanic comedy situates itself in relationship to tragedy, on the one hand, and to dithyramb, on the other. Ultimately, on his reading of the fragments of the play, the author shows that his own work belongs in a space beyond such pedestrian boundaries: “Aristophanes positions himself not as one comic poet speaking on behalf of comedy as a whole, but as a poet beyond all generic categorization who can comment on tragedy, dithyramb, and comedy alike. Aristophanes does not elect himself the representative of the trugic choruses; he positions himself in a sublime role beyond genre itself”. 2 35 fragments of Gerytades survive, including a total of 38 lines or partial lines, as well as a number of scattered words and allusions. The question is what one can reasonably do with such material. Like all modern readers of Gerytades, Farmer not unreasonably begins with fr. 156, which is preserved by Athenaeus and is far and away the most substantial bit of evidence we have for the contents of Aristophanes’ play. Athenaeus — drawing on what source we do not know, although there is no positive reason to believe that he had access to a complete copy of the text — tells us: καὶ Ἀριστοφάνης δ’ ἐν Γηρυτάδῃ λεπτοὺς τούσδε καταλέγει, οὓς καὶ πρέσβεις ὑπὸ τῶν ποιητῶν φησινεἰς Ἅιδου πέμπεσθαι πρὸς τοὺς ἐκεῖ ποιητάς (Ath. 12.551a) Aristophanes in Gerytades as well offers the following list of thin men, who he says were sent to Hades as ambassadors to the poets there.

Some of this information could have been deduced from the text of the fragment itself, but not all of it, and in such circumstances we have little choice but to accept what the ancient source tells us, even though we know that Athenaeus sometimes gets such matters wrong. This is the information we have, and we cannot improve on it, even if we know we cannot trust it implicitly. The fragment itself reads: (Α.) καὶ τίς νεκρῶν κευθμῶνα καὶ σκότου πύλας ἔτλη κατελθεῖν; (Β.) ἕνα † δ’ ἀφ’ ἑκάστης τῆς τέχνης εἱλόμεθα κοινῇ γενομένης ἐκκλησίας, οὓς ᾖσμεν ὄντας ᾁδοφοίτας καὶ θαμὰ ἐκεῖσε φιλοχωροῦντας. (Α.) εἰσὶ γάρ τινες ἄνδρες παρ’ ὑμῖν ᾁδοφοῖται; (Β.) νὴ Δία μάλιστά γ’. (Α.) ὥσπερ Θρᾳκοφοῖται; (Β.) πάντ’ ἔχεις. (Α.) καὶ τίνες ἂν εἶεν; (Β.) πρῶτα μὲν Σαννυρίων

 2 Farmer 2017, 212.

5

The Fragments of Aristophanes’ Gerytades: Methodological Considerations  

ἀπὸ τῶν τρυγῳδῶν, ἀπὸ δὲ τῶν τραγικῶν χορῶν Μέλητος, ἀπὸ δὲ τῶν κυκλίων Κινησίας. (Α.) ὡς σφόδρ’ ἐπὶ λεπτῶν ἐλπίδων ὠχεῖσθ’ ἄρα. τούτους γάρ, ἢν πολλῷ ξυνέλθῃ, ξυλλαβὼν ὁ τῆς διαρροίας ποταμὸς οἰχήσεται

10

(Ar. fr. 156 K–A) (A.) And who dared descend to the vault of the dead and the gates of darkness? (B.) There was an assembly, and we chose one man from each art, those we knew were frequenters of Hades and often enjoyed going there. (A.) Because there are frequenters of Hades among you? (B.) By Zeus, absolutely! (A.) Like frequenters of Thrace? (B.) You’ve got it. (A.) And who would they be? (B.) First of all Sannyrion from the trugic 3 choruses; and from the tragic choruses Meletus; and from the cyclic choruses Cinesias. (A.) On slender hopes you are borne indeed! For if it comes in a flood, the Diarrhea River will scoop these men up and carry them off. 4

5

10

(Translation by M. Farmer)

“This conversation”, Farmer notes, “provides the essential details of the play: an assembly of poets was held in Athens, and a representative from each of the three major genres performed at the City Dionysia was chosen to serve on a mission to Hades”. Indeed, Farmer suggests that, given a seeming echo of the opening of Euripides’ Hecuba 5 in 1, “this passage could even represent the opening lines of Gerytades”. 6 He also argues that we can roughly establish the identities of the two speakers: “The first character (A.) is a denizen of the underworld, a gatekeeper or other blocking figure like Aeacus in Frogs. The second (B.) is either one of the chosen poets, who then speaks of himself somewhat oddly in the third person, or, rather more probably, an escort appointed from among the poets’ assembly, perhaps the eponymous Gerytades himself”. 7 The next question is why Sannyrion, Meletus and Cinesias in particular have been chosen as ambassadors,

 3 I.e. “comic”. 4 Translation after Farmer 2017, 198–199; particularly significant departures from Farmer’s interpretation of individual words in vv. 1 and 11. 5 Eur. Hec. 1–2 ἥκω νεκρῶν κευθμῶνα καὶ σκότου πύλας / λιπών. 6 Farmer 2017, 199. 7 Farmer 2017, 199.

  S. Douglas Olson and Farmer’s answer allows him to squeeze a bit more information about the identity of character (B.) out of the text. (B.) describes the poet-ambassadors as haidophoitai, “frequenters of Hades”, which (A.) compares not very helpfully — from our perspective, at least — to Thraikophoitai, “frequenters of Thrace”, but which Hesychius glosses “thin and shriveled and close to death”. 8 Where Hesychius has got this information is an open question, although it is possible that he — that is to say, his source — is referring to this very fragment of Aristophanes and simply guessing on the basis of its overall content. Be that as it may, Farmer maintains: “It seems clear that the three poets are being mocked according to the familiar trope that depicts bad poets as unable to earn their living and therefore, hungry, cold, dying, or even dead”; and the fact “That they are discussed in pejorative terms” — i.e. as bad poets “and therefore, hungry, cold, dying, or even dead” — “by Character B strongly supports the notion that he is a fourth poet who has been selected to escort the ambassadors to Hades, rather than one of the three poets thus described; the three poets themselves may even have been played by mutes, like the three goddesses in Cratinus’ Dionysalexandros”. 9 Not much is known about Sannyrion (the comic ambassador), Meletus (the tragic ambassador), or Cinesias (the dithyrambic ambassador). But Farmer collects most of what little information there is, in an attempt to show that it is consistent with all three men being characterized elsewhere more or less as they seem to be in Gerytades. Sannyrion is known to have staged a Danae and an Io, suggesting an interest in mythological parody and thus presumably in tragedy, but he also wrote a Gelôs (“Laughter”) and is supposed to have made fun at some point of Aristophanes (fr. 5). Perhaps more important, Strattis (fr. 21) called Sannyrion a kanabos or “framework”, seemingly referring to his thinness, and Farmer suggests “perhaps directly as a result of his portrayal in Gerytades, [he] is made fun of elsewhere for being unable to feed himself by his art”. 10 Much less is known about Meletus, but Sannyrion (fr. 2) referred to him as “the corpse from the Lenaion”, which Farmer suggests might be another reference to the inability of bad poets to support themselves. 11 Cinesias, finally, is made fun of again and again in what survives of late 5th-century comedy, including by Plato Comicus (fr. 200) for being a “skeleton”.

 8 Hsch. α 1793 ἁιδοφοῖται· οἱ λεπτοὶ καὶ ἰσχνοὶ καὶ ἐγγὺς θανάτου ὄντες. 9 Farmer 2017, 200. The question of how the Judgement-scene in Dionysalexandros was staged is in fact more complicated than this; see in general Bianchi 2016, 232–234. 10 Farmer 2017, 201. 11 Farmer 2017, 202.

The Fragments of Aristophanes’ Gerytades: Methodological Considerations  

“Three hungry poets”, then, on Farmer’s reading of Gerytades, “led by a fourth person, perhaps Gerytades himself, descend to the underworld” 12 — and the point of their hunger is, on the one hand, that they are unsuccessful poets, and on the other hand, that their inability to feed themselves makes them haidophoitai, men who already have one foot in the grave and are thus a logical choice to serve as ambassadors to the dead. Implicit in all this is the notion that Gerytades was fundamentally an underworld play, and Farmer goes on to fit as many of the remaining fragments as he can into the dramatic framework he has established on the basis of fr. 156. Thus fr. 163 τὴν μάλθαν ἐκ τῶν γραμματείων ἤσθιον (“they were eating the wax off their writing tablets”) describes how ravenous the three poet-ambassadors were, 13 while fr. 159 ἆρ’ ἔνδον ἀνδρῶν κεστρέων ἀποικία; / ὡς μὲν γάρ ἐστε νήστιδες γιγνώσκετε (“Is there a colony of mullet men inside? Because they’re like starvelings, you know”) is “probably the poets again”, “as seems likely”. 14 That a number of fragments refer to a symposium or feast, 15 while others describe food, 16 makes it “likely … that the ambassadors’ meeting with the poets of the underworld took the form of a banquet”; 17 and since other fragments describe a meal off-stage, 18 “This staging would make all the more sense if … the three poet delegates were played by mutes”, 19 confirming part of Farmer’s analysis of fr. 156. As for what was discussed at this great offstage banquet in Gerytades, attended by the poet-ambassadors and their dead  12 Farmer 2017, 204. 13 Farmer 2017, 204: “they literally consume the tools of their trade in their hunger”. 14 Farmer 2017, 204, 205. 15 Gerytades frr. 157 τότε μὲν † σου κατεκοττάβιζον τὸ / νυνὶ δὲ καὶ κατεμοῦσι, τάχα δ’ εὖ οἶδ’ ὅτι / καὶ καταχέσονται (“Then † they poured kottabos on you the † / but now they vomit on you, and perhaps, I think, they’ll even shit on you”); 161 ἐν τοῖσι συνδείπνοις ἐπαινῶν Αἰσχύλον (“praising Aeschylus among his dinner companions”); 167 αὐτοὶ θύομεν (“We ourselves are making sacrifice”). 16 Gerytades frr. 164 ἀκροκώλι’, ἄρτοι, κάραβοι, βολβοί, φακῆ (“trotters, loaves of bread, crayfish, bulbs, pea-soup”; nom.); 165 πτισάνην διδάσκεις αὐτὸν ἕψειν ἢ φακῆν; (“Are you teaching him to cook pea-soup or lentil-soup?”); 172 ψίθυρός τ᾿ ἐκαλοῦ καὶ ψωμοκόλαξ (“You were called a slanderer and a morsel-flatterer”); 173 ἄλλος † δ᾿ εἰσέφερε πλεκτῷ κανισκίῳ / ἄρτων περίλοιπα θρύμματα (“Another man † was bringing in the remaining bits of bread in a woven basket”); 174 ἦν δὲ / τὸ πρᾶγμ’ ἑορτή. περιέφερε † δὲ κύκλῳ λεπαστὴν ἡμῖν / ταχὺ προσφέρων παῖς † ἐνέχει τε † σφόδρα κυανοβενθῆ (“The occasion was a party; a slave was bringing around † a limpet-cup in a circle to us † quickly offering (it) † and was pouring in † very dark blue”); 183 καρπεῖα (“fruit”); 189 σκόμβρος (“mackerel”). 17 Farmer 2017, 204. 18 Frr. 158 (quoted above); 161 (quoted above and in n. 15); 173 (quoted in n. 16); 174 (quoted in n. 16). 19 Farmer 2017, 204.

  S. Douglas Olson underworld counterparts, five of the smaller fragments seem to suggest that the topic was tragic poetry in particular: fr. 161 ἐν τοῖσι συνδείπνοις ἐπαινῶν Αἰσχύλον (“praising Aeschylus among his dinner companions”), which “likely involved … a comparison, implicitly or explicitly”, 20 meaning that the poetry of someone else was criticized as worse than Aeschylus’; fr. 158 (Α.) καὶ πῶς ἐγὼ Σθενέλου φάγοιμ’ ἂν ῥήματα; / (Β.) εἰς ὄξος ἐμβαπτόμενος ἢ ξηροὺς ἅλας (“(A.) How could I consume Sthenelus’ words? (B.) By dipping them into vinegar or a bit of dry salt”), accompanied in the scholion that quotes the lines by a claim that Sthenelus was such a bad poet that he was forced to sell his theatrical equipment, a story “that is certain to derive from comedy and that may well come from this very play”; 21 fr. 162 θεράπευε καὶ χόρταζε τῶν μονῳδιῶν (“Treat her and feed her on your monodies!”), which Farmer compares to the comment about Euripides nourishing tragedy on monodies at Frogs 944, and which he takes to be advice to the poet-ambassadors about how to improve their plays; fr. 160 περιάγειν ἐχρῆν / τὸν μηχανοποιὸν ὡς τάχιστα τὴν κράδην (“The operator should have brought the crane/branch about as rapidly as possible”), referring to the mêchanê and to “what should happen in certain circumstances in an ideal tragedy”; 22 and fr. 178 Ἀγαθώνειον αὔλησιν (“Agathonian piping”), in which “Agathon was singled out for criticism of his effeminate style”. 23 Farmer concludes: “Tragic culture thus extended in Gerytades even into the underworld, with poets living and dead engaged in a debate over specific, technical aspects of tragic poetry. Dionysus discovers a similar world in Frogs” 24 — which is surely not a coincidence. And why does comedy descend to the underworld repeatedly in the first place? Because “If tragedy … is the genre with the established right to advise the city on affairs of state, comedy can claim the same right by journeying directly into the tragic realm of the underworld … Comic poets … send their characters to the underworld to seek advice because the underworld can be presented as tragic.” 25 Gerytades was thus a play that claimed tragic authority for itself but simultaneously insisted that comedy — in particular Aristophanic comedy — was king of all, the genre capable of criticizing every other type of poetry and rising above them. The echoes of Frogs are again unmistakable.

 20 Farmer 2017, 205. 21 Farmer 2017, 205. 22 Farmer 2017, 206. 23 Farmer 2017, 207. 24 Farmer 2017, 207. 25 Farmer 2017, 210.

The Fragments of Aristophanes’ Gerytades: Methodological Considerations  

Section II: Back to the Fragments Farmer’s argument regarding the structure, contents and implications of Gerytades is richer and more complex than the summary offered above, but the main points are as stated: an underworld play, in some ways strikingly reminiscent of Frogs a few years later, with an embassy of incompetent ambassador-poets eventually instructed in their craft by their dead counterparts; and all of this as part of an elaborate effort to situate comedy as the dominant genre at the City Dionysia, and Aristophanes himself as the dominant poet within that genre. I argue in what follows that the evidence does not support these conclusions and, more important, that this reading of the fragments of Gerytades serves to raise larger and methodological questions about what we can and cannot do with the scattered bits and pieces of “lost” Athenian comedies and tragedies (and by extension of other fragmentary texts). I begin with the date of the play, which Usener (seemingly followed by Farmer) puts in 407 BC, while Kuiper and Geissler have it in 408 BC. 26 In fact, these are merely guesses made on the basis of limited and dubious evidence and cannot be used as support for any larger conclusions. Fr. 178 mentions the pipemusic of Agathon, who was active from the mid-410s BC on and went off to Macedon before 405 BC. This does not show, however, that Gerytades itself was staged before 405 BC, as Usener claimed, since surely Agathon’s music could be mentioned even after he himself was not around. Beyond that, Gerytades can be dated only on the basis of references to Sannyrion, Meletus, Cinesias (all in fr. 156), Sthenelus (in fr. 158), the baker Thearion (in fr. 177) and the courtesan Nais (in fr. 179) — for none of whom do we have information more precise than that they would be at home generally in the final decade of the century — combined with absence from the fragments of any mention of Euripides, which (once again despite Usener) shows nothing at all, since we have at most 2–3% of the text of the play. The generally accepted date of Gerytades is thus an example of scholarly “common knowledge” that is in fact merely a modern academic tradition passed on from one publication to the next; we do not know that Aristophanes’ play dates just a few years before his preserved Frogs, even if the supposed connection has come to shape how the fragments of Gerytades are interpreted (as argued below). This observation in turn leads direct to fr. 156.

 26 References and further discussion in Kassel–Austin’s introduction to the play.

  S. Douglas Olson Farmer — again following in a long tradition of scholarship that begins at least with Norwood 27 — describes fr. 156 as preserving “the essential details of [Aristophanes’] play” 28 and in fact suggests that these may be its opening lines. καί in verse 1 makes it very unlikely that this is the opening of the action, since “and who?” patently follows up on some previously made point. The more significant question is why should we assume that fr. 156 is central to making sense of Gerytades. In other words: What reason is there to believe that random philological sorting of the kind we know brought all this fragmentary material to us has fortuitously preserved a set of lines that offer deep and essential insight into the plot of an otherwise vanished comedy? This is an extremely useful assumption, if our goal is to reconstruct as much as we can of the action of the play. But “useful” does not mean “compelling” or even, ultimately, “helpful”. Some character at some point in Gerytades discussed an embassy of poets supposedly sent down to the underworld. That does not mean that this is “what the comedy was about”; perhaps these lines are from an exemplary scene in the second half of the action, for example, and bear only a glancing relationship to the plot as a whole. And if the argument is made that “this is the best we can do, given the evidence we have, so we must forge ahead regardless”, it might be better to concede that there are some things we cannot know, the outline of the plot of Aristophanes’ Gerytades being among them, and that we would do better to concentrate on questions that can be answered more convincingly. So what can be said about fr. 156? In particular, who are (A.) and (B.)?; where is the action set?; and why have these particular poets been sent down to the underworld? As noted earlier, Farmer argues that (A.) is a resident of the underworld, “a gatekeeper or other blocking figure like Aeacus in Frogs”; that (B.) is most likely an escort appointed by the poets’ assembly to accompany Sannyrion, Meletus and Cinesias, and perhaps to be identified with Gerytades himself; that the dialogue in the fragment is spoken in the underworld, and indeed that the play as a whole is seemingly set there; that Sannyrion, Meletus and Cinesias were chosen because of their professional incompetence, meaning their inability to keep themselves fed from their art; and that they were most likely mutes. Once again, however, there is no reason to believe that any of this is true. (A.) uses paratragic language in 1–2 and 11, but nothing he says hints that he plays the part of a blocking figure or gatekeeper. Instead, he simply asks for information about the ambassadors and how they were chosen, and then offers a cynical follow-up

 27 Norwood 1931, 289–292. 28 Farmer 2017, 199.

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remark in 11–13. (A.)’s questions and (B.)’s responses refer to two groups: the assembly that selected the poet-ambassadors, called “we” by (B.) (in 3, 4) and “you” by (A.) (in 6, 11), and the ambassadors themselves, whom (A.) and (B.) both refer to in the third person. (B.) is thus treated as speaking for the assembly of poets, who chose and dispatched the ambassadors. But there is no hint in the passage that he is himself a fourth ambassador, and certainly no positive reason to believe that he is the mysterious Gerytades. Nor does anything in the text suggest that the dialogue takes place in the underworld; all (A.) asks in 1–2 is “who dared to descend” there, which is not the same as asking “who has dared come down (here)”; 29 and the dialogue makes at least as much sense set in our world as in the one below. Whether Sannyrion, Meletus and Cinesias were represented elsewhere in the action by mutes, is impossible to say. But the fact that they are referred to in the third person in fr. 156 offers no ground either for believing or disbelieving the thesis, which is to say that there is no support for it in what little is preserved of the play. Farmer’s reading of fr. 156 thus appears to have been decisively shaped by Frogs, which did take place in the underworld, and which included an Aeacus/doorkeeper figure, as well as an ambassador from the upper world (Dionysus) who was not himself one of the poets whose work was at the center of the action. But all these details come from somewhere other than the text of the fragment. As for why Sannyrion, Meletus and Cinesias were chosen as ambassadors, (B.) claims in 4 “we knew that they were haidophoitai”, a word which, as Farmer notes, is attested only here and in Hesychius. 30 But (B.) does not leave it at that and instead adds by way of clarification (4–5) “and they frequently enjoy spending time there”. This is an odd thing to say — Sannyrion, Meletus and Cinesias were obvious choices to go to Hades as ambassadors because they went there all the time in any case — but it seems to be what (B.) means, because in 7 he adds “just like Thraittophoitai”, i.e. people who habitually travel back and forth to Thrace. One obvious interpretation would seem to be that all three poets were known for writing plays or poems set in the underworld — and Sannyrion, despite being a comic poet, was (as noted in Section I) interested in mythological parody, which makes sense in this connection. But what the text does not say is that these men are qualified for ambassadorships to Hades because “their failure as poets means they are unable to keep themselves well fed … they’re already halfway there”. 31 Nor are such charges registered elsewhere against Sannyrion, Meletus  29 Farmer 2017, 198. 30 Farmer 2017, 199–200. 31 Farmer 2017, 203.

  S. Douglas Olson and Cinesias. There are two jokes about them in fr. 156, the first of which is that they are haidophoitai, while the second is that they are very thin (which is something Strattis also said about Sannyrion, and that Aristophanes and Plato Comicus both said about Cinesias). That these jokes are connected — that is, that being skinny is supposedly characteristic of haidophoitai — is unclear. But whether the jokes are connected or not, nothing in the text of the fragment says that Sannyrion, Meletus and Cinesias are skinny because they are bad poets, nor is this asserted elsewhere. 32 Instead, this is another idea imported from another source and foreign to fr. 156 itself. Why Sannyrion, Meletus and Cinesias are the poets chosen as ambassadors in fr. 156 is thus uncertain. Perhaps they are supposed to be bad poets and starving as a consequence. But there is no positive reason to believe that, just as there is no positive reason to believe that the action of the play is set primarily in the underworld, or that (B.) is Gerytades, who is accompanying the ambassadors on their mission. Nor does guessing about who or what is referred to in other fragments help to build the case, a point that raises another issue. That someone is said to “eat the wax off their writing tablets” in fr. 163 does not mean that this is the poet-ambassadors — the subject of the verb is obscure — and cannot be used to confirm the hypothesis that the ambassadors are desperately hungry. So too in the case of the “colony of mullet men inside” in fr. 159: perhaps this is again the poet-ambassadors, but perhaps it is not, and there is no ground for asserting that this is “probable” or “likely”; this is a circular argument. As for the rest of the action in the play: The existence of a number of references to eating, drinking, banquets and symposia in the fragments of Gerytades does not allow us to reconstruct a banquet scene, or even more adventurously to claim that the existence of a supposed offstage banquet scene confirms the hypothesis — for which there is no other support — that “the three poet delegates were played by mutes”. The fragments in question do not obviously add up to such a scene in any case. But the real difficulty is that every Aristophanic comedy contains numerous references to eating, drinking, banquets and symposia scattered throughout the text; that our sources (Athenaeus in particular) are particularly interested in mining what we now think of as “lost comedies” for references of this sort; and that it is methodologically misguided to take the presence of such material in the fragments of an individual play to imply that that play included a single banquet or symposium scene, from which all the material is borrowed, as opposed to referring at various, more or less random points, to eating and drinking. Perhaps there was a banquet or symposium scene in Gerytades; it is impossible to prove that  32 Despite Farmer 2017, 201, in reference to Sannyrion.

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there was not. But there is also no reason to believe that there was one, for this is merely a guess with nothing behind it. So too as regards poetry. What little survives of Gerytades makes it clear that dramatic poetry, and tragedy in particular, was mentioned a number of times in the play — as it is, once again, in virtually every surviving Aristophanic comedy. In fr. 161, someone (or something masculine) is described as “praising Aeschylus among his fellow-banqueters”, although whether this is one of the characters or a person one of the characters mentions, and whether the action is set in the onstage present or in the past or the future, is impossible to say; in fr. 158 someone considers “eating Sthenelus’ words”, which apparently need salt (metaphorically speaking “wit”?); 33 and in fr. 162 someone say “Feed her on your monodies!”, which might be a reference to tragedy. This last fragment and fr. 160 (referring to the stage-engineer and the “fig-tree”, however, are the only evidence that anyone offered or received advice in Gerytades about how to write tragic poetry, and fr. 160 might easily be placed in many other contexts. Nor does a reference to “Agathonian piping” in fr. 178 show that “Agathon was singled out for criticism of his effeminate style”; the text itself does not say so much, and it does us no good to run aggressively beyond the evidence.

Section III: Methodological observations To sum up in regard to Gerytades, first of all: Despite the modern authorities, we do not know the date of Aristophanes’ play, although we can place it roughly in the final decade of the 5th century BC or so; we certainly do not know whether it belongs before or after Frogs, although the magnetic effect the plot of the latter play has exercised on modern attempts to make sense of what little survives of the former is obvious. We do not know that fr. 156 gives us the basic plot of Gerytades, nor, even if we assume that it does, do we know that any of the action was set in the underworld. The identities of Speakers (A.) and (B.) in fr. 156 remain obscure, except that (B.) seems to speak for poets generally; there is no reason to think that he is Gerytades or that (A.) is an Aeacus-figure. The three poet-ambassadors are preternaturally skinny, but nothing suggests that this is because they are professional failures or that those supposed failures were central to the story. There is no compelling evidence that the comedy included one or more banquet

 33 There is no reason to believe that the story the scholion passes on about Sthenelus being forced to sell his theatrical equipment came from Gerytades, as Farmer 2017, 205 suggests.

  S. Douglas Olson scenes or a debate about how to write good dramatic poetry. And nothing obviously supports the notion that Aristophanes used Gerytades to make an elaborate argument about the relationship between comedy, tragedy and dithyramb, the point of which was that he himself was the super-generic master of the theater. All of this is fabrication, a fragile scholarly house of cards that does not stand up to even moderately skeptical consideration. But this is far from the first attempt at such a reconstruction, and my real interest is in the issues this reading of the fragments of Gerytades raises. There are at least two fundamental problems with working with the fragments of lost comedies — and mutatis mutandis, everything that follows applies to tragedy as well. 34 The first involves the nature of the evidence. Even in the case of late 5th-century plays by Aristophanes and Eupolis, we generally have 2–3% of the original text at most. Nor can we assume that what we have is representative of the play as a whole, since (as already noted above) our sources have distinct interests, mostly involving rare words, cultural realia and historical persons, or nominally fine or profound sentiments; they are not attempting to give us a “fair sample” of the original, and there is no reason to expect that the fragments they pass on to us can be put together to yield a reliable image of it. Perhaps more important, we cannot reconstruct such texts, not only because the task is difficult but because the undertaking is intellectually incoherent. The fragments of a lost play are not like the fragments of a pot that can be put back together when it is broken. A so-called lost text is both unique and gone; it has disappeared from our realm and no longer exists. As a consequence, we can never prove or disprove any hypotheses offered about it. More concretely put, we do not and cannot know what happened in Aristophanes’ Gerytades, because there is no evidence except for the handful of problematic bits and pieces of the text that survive. They are not enough to answer the question, and this is all we have. Likewise, we do not and cannot know who (A.) and (B.) in fr. 156 are, because the only evidence is the fragment itself, and it does not tell us. We can attempt to squeeze as much information as possible out of the texts themselves, and we can guess. But whatever guesses we generate are part of a self-referential and occasionally circular process in which our “reconstructions” of lost plays are actually creative amalgams of a more or less careful reading of the scrappy remainders of the original with

 34 The title often appears to give us some basic generic sense of what went on in a fragmentary tragedy. Beyond that, however, we are inevitably once again in the realm of free speculation, i.e. guesswork that is occasionally repeated often enough to take on the character of nominal scholarly truth.

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opinions taken over from other modern scholars (in this case Norwood’s carelessly inventive reading of fr. 156), “echoes” of other texts we happen to know better (in the case of Gerytades, the dramatic template provided by Aristophanes’ Frogs), and our own contemporary concerns and preoccupations, be they personal or societal (here an argument having to do with poetic genre and authority). 35 This is our first problem. Our second problem, closely connected to it, is that we lack explicit, widely acknowledged rules for handling our evidence. Perhaps there was a banquet-scene in Gerytades, for example, despite the objections I have raised against this on methodological grounds; for who can know? But if Scholar A can make whatever assertions he likes about the contents of a lost play, and Scholar B can make whatever assertions she likes, there is very little basis for a conversation, for anytime B attempts to disagree with A, A can reply “That’s how it looks to me”, at which point further discussion becomes impossible. Put another way, fragment studies are a substantially under-theorized area of academic inquiry, and it is worth asking: What kinds of arguments are we willing to accept in regard to “lost” dramatic texts? What sort of approaches and methodologies are we willing to rule out? And where do we need more discussion? In that spirit, and building on the arguments put forward above, I offer six partial and preliminary suggestions: 1. Reconstructions of the missing portions of lost texts, and thus of those texts as wholes, can be powerful and revealing acts of imagination. But those acts are rooted almost entirely in the modern world and only by reference in the ancient one, and they must be understood as such; as far as we can know, they get us no closer to what the original author wrote. 36 Put another way, reconstructions of

 35 For a more extensive discussion of these points and their implications, see Olson/Balthussen 2017. 36 Those disinclined to believe the point on its face need simply compare e.g. the reconstructions of Eupolis’ Demes by Ian Storey (2003, 111–174) and Mario Telò (2007), both working with the same primary evidence but arriving at strikingly different conclusions. The problem has nothing to do with the “scientific character” of either study or with obvious methodological differences. Instead, the difficulty is that, to the extent the question is posed in a naively positivistic fashion (“What can we know about this lost text?”), it has no chance of producing a useful answer. Both Storey and Telò construct an elaborate house of cards out of a series of arbitrary hypotheses, tentative conclusions and ideas borrowed from other scholars. Neither reconstruction tells us anything “true” about Eupolis’ play — although they potentially tell us a good deal about the times and academic and social environments in which they were produced, the interests of the individual scholars who produced them, the interpretative schools from they come, and the like. This is an intellectual dead end, and the vigor with which its practitioners try to defend it

  S. Douglas Olson lost texts are best interpreted as the products of a process of creative story-telling fundamentally shaped by the interests, assumptions and prejudices of the individuals who produce them. Some reconstructions take more evidence into account or handle the evidence they acknowledge in more consistent ways or in a manner the larger community of scholars may at some point recognize as superior. But none of them tell us anything demonstrably right or wrong about the ancient object of interest, which remains eternally inaccessible. If reconstruction is an activity worth engaging in, it is so only because fragments “are good to think with”; such reconstructions offer us no access to anything “real” or “true”, because they cannot do so. 37 2. Since assertions regarding fragments inevitably involve some degree of guesswork, we ought to ask what sort of guesswork and in particular how many mutually dependent hypotheses we are willing to tolerate in discussions of them. The obvious danger is elaborate “house of cards” arguments, for the perverse nature of such constructions is that every additional “card” added to the house reduces the likelihood that the thesis as a whole is correct rather than increasing it. If a thesis depends on two proposals, for example, each of which has a 50% chance of being correct, the thesis as a whole has only a 25% chance of being right, and every additional such proposal added to the structure lowers the odds even further. “House of cards” arguments tend to be recognizable by their elaborate and ingenious character, with one arbitrary intuition or conjecture succeeding another until the grand conclusion is drawn. They also tend to be marked by phrases such as “if we assume”, on the one hand, and by the use of words such as “clearly”, which elicit the reader’s assent without arguing the point, on the other. Without offering any specific quantitative criteria (since opinions may dif-

 merely illustrates a lack of appreciation for the real dynamics of the process and traditions in which they are involved. 37 Paradoxically, this applies even in cases where a modern interpretation misrepresents or ignores individual items of evidence, because we cannot know whether all the evidence we believe we have is reliable. That a fragment is attributed to Aristophanes, for example, does not mean that it is actually by Aristophanes, and even if it is by Aristophanes, we cannot know that he wrote the words as we have them. In all these cases, we are reduced to arguing probabilities, on the one hand, and to ignoring alternative possibilities, on the other. This means, for example, that a fragment omitted from a reconstruction nominally in error might actually not deserve to be considered, and that a crucial linguistic point of interpretation in another might in fact be an ancient editor’s attempt to correct an ambiguous text or alter a controversial one. We can thus quite properly and appropriately judge that certain reconstructions meet those methodological or technical standards we choose to impose upon them, but we cannot say that they are “right” or “wrong” in the way those terms are generally (and unhelpfully) understood.

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fer on the point), I suggest that any hypothesis regarding a lost text that can reasonably be described as a “house of cards” should be rejected a priori; this is a bad way to argue, except once again to the extent that such arguments contribute to other — contemporary — ends that have nothing specifically to do with ancient texts, even if ancient texts serve as a means of discussing them. 3. Arbitrary guessing at the context of individual fragments, the identities of speakers or the topics to which they refer is misguided, since it makes us no wiser and has no basis in the ancient evidence. Such guesses are a common element in “house of cards” arguments, and particularly flimsy and damaging ones at that; a guess that has a 10% chance of being right in such a structure reduces the possibility that the entire construction is accurate by 90%. 4. In the absence of positive evidence of some sort (for example, use of a rare meter), no attempt should be made to combined scattered fragments into conjectural scenes. This is particularly so when the theme in question is a commonplace or when the words or lines preserved do not fall neatly together in terms of syntax or potential narrative structure. But even when one fragment of dialogue might be taken to respond to another, assuming that it does and then building on that conclusion is merely a specific type of “house of cards” argument, and is thus open to the same objections spelled out above. 5. The length or interest of a fragment is not to be confused with its importance in a lost play. Ancient scholarship was not produced for our benefit and cannot be expected to serve our ends in any direct or obvious fashion. 38 What we have of Athenian comedy in particular appears to be a scatter of material chosen for excerption because it used words or referred to persons, objects, customs or sentiments that interested Hellenistic and Roman-era scholars. Their concern was not to preserve enough information to allow us to understand the plots or larger political or poetic significance of the texts they were consulting, but to satisfy the needs or desires of their original readers, who appear to have been concerned primarily with lexicographic, historical and moral matters. What we have are thus, from our perspective, more or less randomly chosen bits and pieces of the text, some probably central to the action as a whole, others quite peripheral, with no indication of which category is which. When we are lucky, the fragments we have allow us to see brief snippets of dramatic action, and we can use arguments from analogy — another methodologically tricky tool — to try to understand that action on the basis of comparison with other, more substantially preserved texts. Even those conclusions, however, fall into the category of  38 For discussion of this point, taking as an example the quotations of Aristophanes in Athenaeus (our most significant source of fragmentary poetic material of all sorts), see Olson 2015.

  S. Douglas Olson guesswork, and everything beyond them certainly does; that fr. 156 of Gerytades can be made to recall the plot of Frogs does not tell us anything substantial about Gerytades, even if it is tempting to imagine that it might. 6. Citation of an authority, above all else a modern authority, is not an argument. In particular, this means that further hypotheses ought not to be built on the conjectures of others even if those conjectures have ossified into scholarly doctrine; this is merely to assist in the construction of a multi-generational “house of cards”, which looks secure because every individual scholar adds only one or two more hypotheses to the construction. These are mostly negative points, intended to suggest that some — in several cases quite popular — modern approaches to comic fragments in particular are misguided. More positive arguments could be offered about what we can reasonably do with this material and about the possibilities it opens up for careful, responsible, creative philology. This includes work on the lexicographic and historical levels, as well as attempts to make sense of the ancient scholarship that preserves most literary fragments, and of other creative re-uses of what seems already by the Hellenistic and Roman eras to have been regarded as obscure but deeply significant material. But that is a topic for another paper.

Bibliography Bianchi, F.P. (2016), Cratino. Archilochoi — Empipramenoi (frr. 1–68). Introduzione, Traduzione, Commento. Fragmenta Comica 3.2, Heidelberg. Farmer, M.C. (2017), Tragedy on the Comic Stage, Oxford. Norwood, G. (1931), Greek Comedy, London. Olson, S.D. (2015), “Athenaeus’ Aristophanes, and the Problem of Reconstructing Lost Comedies,” in: S. Chronopoulos/C. Orth (eds), A Fragmentary History of Greek Comedy (Studia Comica), Heidelberg, 35–65. Olson, S.D./H. Baltussen (2017), “Epilogue: A Conversation on Fragments”, in: J. Kwapisz (ed.), Fragments, Holes and Wholes: Reconstructing the Ancient World in Theory and Practice (Journal of Juristic Papyrology Supplement), 393–406. Rothwell, K.S. (2017), Review of Farmer 2017, BMCR 2017.08.14 Storey, I. (2003), Eupolis: Poet of Old Comedy, Oxford. Telò, M. (2007), Eupolidis Demi, Biblioteca Nazionale, Serie dei Classici Greci e Latini XIV, Florence.

Oliver Taplin

Fragments of Aeschylus and the Number of Actors The direct and dogmatic sentences of Aristotle’s Poetics 1449a8–23 remain to this day the orthodox account of the early history of tragedy. 1 (I am taking “early tragedy” to mean earlier than 472, the date of our earliest surviving complete play, Persai.) Aristotle’s authority has, however, come increasingly under question, especially the teleological template underlying his alleged gradual development from crude beginnings until it eventually reached its proper nature (τὴν αὑτῆς φύσιν) in the work of Sophocles. 2 This looks suspiciously schematic. While the Poetics has completely dominated accounts of early tragedy, there is another significant body of evidence, and that is the corpus of fragments of Aeschylus, as I shall try to show. According to Aristotle it was a gradual and long-drawn-out process (πολλὰς μεταβολὰς μεταβαλοῦσα…) before tragedy changed from “slight plots and laughable diction” (ἐκ μικρῶν μύθων καὶ λέξεως γελοίας) to achieve its full solemnity (ὀψὲ ἀπεσεμνύνθη). Presumably that development had been completed before the earliest securely dateable tragedy known to us, namely Phrynichus’ play about the sack of Miletus in 492 (plus or minus a year), 3 as reported by Herodotus 6.21.2. And the well-known “Basle Dancers” vase, dated to the 490s, also seems a long way from any slight and ludicrous beginnings. 4 So Aristotle is positing a gradual, multifarious development from long before 500. It is very unlikely that any texts of tragedy survived from before then, since we would surely have heard about them if they had. So we are bound to have doubts about whether he had any secure evidence for this, or whether, rather, he was making conjectures to fit his teleological model. Another questionable assertion — despite its appeal for those who like to imagine tragedy as rooted in primal dionysiac rites — is that tragedy originated (ἀπ’ ἀρχῆς) with improvisations from “the leaders of the dithyramb” (ἀπὸ τῶν ἐξαρχόντων τὸν διθύραμβον). This is suspect because of its symmetry with the  1 This paper is a much-revised version of the lecture I gave at the conference in Thessaloniki in May 2018. It remains, however, in the form of a lecture rather than an academic article (which would display fuller bibliography and more decorous diction). I am most grateful to those who contributed to discussion, especially to Anna Lamari. 2 Cogent arguments in, for example, Scullion, 2002. 3 All dates are BC. 4 Recent description and discussion in Hart 2010, 29. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-009

  Oliver Taplin much more plausible claim that comedy originated from the leaders of the phallic songs. Secondly, it does not account for the actors using stichic spoken metres instead of sung lyric. And, thirdly and most importantly, the dithyramb claim fails to account for the crucial and, so far as we know, unprecedented leap into embodiment and impersonation instead of occasion-bound narrative. This calls for both the actors and the chorus to shed their temporal identities and become people who are other in time and place. This does not look like a gradual development; it is far more likely that “tragedy was a deliberate invention, a brilliant idea”. 5 There is yet another claim in Aristotle’s account which has not been subjected to so much scepticism, but which I shall also query. Illustrating the changes which tragedy went through, he says that “Aeschylus innovated by raising the number of actors from one to two….” (καὶ τό τε τῶν ὑποκριτῶν πλῆθος ἐξ ἑνὸς εἰς δύο πρῶτος Αἰσχύλος ἤγαγε). We can discount the claim that a particular playwright, as opposed to the civic organisation, was able to change the conventional “rules” of the tragic competition. But regardless of that, Aristotle clearly implies that there were one-actor tragedies down into the time of Aeschylus; and that at some stage of his career a second actor became permissible, just as a third actor seems to have become allowable at some time in between his earlier surviving plays and the Oresteia (meaning probably between 463 and 458). Scholars tend to associate these supposed one-actor tragedies with the originary leader of the dithyramb (although Aristotle actually uses the plural), and they take it for granted that Aristotle must have known of some such tragedies. We are bound to ask, however, whether it is inherently plausible that this kind of story-telling could ever have existed with only one actor. Arguably the very nature of the drama calls for interaction and potential conflict between individuals, not just between an individual and a group. The close relation of tragic narrative to epic precedent points the same way. Epic makes much of debates, quarrels, persuasions, insults, advice; and scenes of this kind are surely fundamental to the new genre of tragedy as well. All such scenarios call for two participant actors on stage. It might be countered that some at least of these kinds of scenes can be conducted between a single actor and the chorus; and this does indeed occur throughout fifth-century tragedy, especially in Aeschylus. But this raises a neglected question about what is meant by “the chorus” when in iambic dialogue  5 Scodel 2010, 37. Herington 1985 was an important pioneer of this innovative model. I argue (in Taplin 2018) that the mask was also invented at the same time to enable this new kind of enactment.

Fragments of Aeschylus and the Number of Actors  

as opposed to lyric. It is the convention in the manuscripts and editions to put the same marginal attribution, viz. “XO.”, against both the lyric and iambic contributions, but that does not entail that they were in practice delivered in the same way. It is, indeed, unlikely that they were. While the lyric parts were mainly sung by the whole chorus in unison, it seems implausible (although not unthinkable) that the spoken lines were delivered in unison. Apart from the challenges of audible coordination in speech (harder than in song), problems in the organisation of rehearsals are also likely to have arisen. It would have been far more practicable for a single member to have delivered the spoken lines, namely the chorusleader (who may have been known as the koryphaios). There is an interesting and neglected item of evidence suggesting that the chorus-leader had a role intermediary between chorus and actor. Figure 25 on the Pronomos Vase 6 is holding his satyr mask, which shows he is a member of the chorus, but, unlike all the others who have their ithyphallic satyr-shorts exposed, he wears a rather fancily decorated short chiton. This allies him with the actors above with Dionysus; also like them, and unlike all but one or the other choreutai, he is not allocated a name. I conclude that spoken dialogue between an actor and “the chorus” was actually between the actor and an actor-like representative of the chorus. It is now time to turn to that other significant body of evidence, the corpus of fragments of Aeschylus. Unfortunately there are none that we can date with complete confidence, but it is surely unlikely that all of them come from later than Persai, i.e. from the last 16 years of his more than 40-year career. Two-actor scenes were evidently common practice by the time of Persai: there are three brief exchanges between the Queen and the Messenger, and a protracted and intense dialogue between the Queen and the ghost of her husband Darius (lines 703– 758). It is impossible, of course, to assert on the evidence of the fragments that any particular play definitely used only one actor; but there is a good handful where we can be sure that two individual roles were called for on stage together. The remainder of this brief essay will be devoted to scrutinizing those fragments for traces of the number of actors. I might as well play the best card, or rather set of three cards, first. Aeschylus composed an Achilles- trilogy, which is universally agreed to have been made up of Myrmidones, Nereides and Phryges, and which very probably tracked the same narrative sequence as Iliad (i) books 9 and 16; (ii) 18–19; and (iii) 24. This trilogy appears to have been Aeschylus’ best-known work after the Oresteia; and it may well be that it was this ambitious composition, declaring tragedy’s claim to rival and even surpass epic, that first established him as a major figure.  6 This is the numeration on the pull-out key at the start of Taplin/Wyles 2010.

  Oliver Taplin We cannot date the trilogy with confidence, however. Alan Sommerstein proposes 484, said to be the year of Aeschylus’ first victory; 7 but the Athenian judges seem to have been almost as bad as the Oscar nominators for spotting long-term winners! There is, however, one possibly important pointer to an even earlier date. We know from several passages in Aristophanes’ Frogs that Myrmidones opened with the alienated Achilles silent on stage, his head and face veiled. This departed radically the Iliad where he responds volubly to the embassy in book 9. And it so happens that between about 490 and 470 there is also a whole cluster of Athenian vase-paintings which show various Achaean leaders pleading with a veiled and uncommunicative Achilles. It is tempting to conclude that the painters were inspired to this iconography by Aeschylus’ revolutionary portrayal, in which case the trilogy dates for very early in his career. 8 On the other hand, there is no indication in the pictures of any theatrical connection, and it may well be that Aeschylus followed a new iconography rather than the other way round. 9 But whichever was the case, the Homer-challenging Achilles-trilogy was probably an early work from the 490s or 480s. And it indisputably included extensive and crucial scenes involving two actors. In Myrmidones, as we know from Frogs, Achilles sat there with his head covered, refusing to respond, first to the chorus (see frr. 131–132), and then to other leaders who urged him to re-join the battle. As Aristophanes’ Euripides rightly observes in jest, Aeschylus would make the audience wait in suspense for his silent character to speak (Frogs 919–920). While the chances of the survival of papyri are so often frustrating, in the case of fr. 132b there was an extraordinary stroke of good luck and good scholarship by which an Oxyrynchus fragment in Oxford was joined with one in Florence which had been transcribed before being destroyed by a bomb in 1944. Together they read: [ [ [ [

]τι.α.ωγε.|...[ ]. ἐπῳδὴν |ο|ὐκ ἔχω̣ σο[ ]π̣εσεισαπ|α|σαν̣ ἡνίαν̣ [ ].. δ’, Ἀχιλ̣λ̣εῦ, |π|ρᾶσσ’ ὅπῃ [

Φοῖ]νιξ γεραιέ, τῶν | ἐμῶν φρε[νῶν πολ]λ̣ῶν ἀκούων |δ|υσ̣τ̣ όμων λ[

 7 Sommerstein 2008, 135. The fragments shall be cited from this very useful edition. 8 Most authoritatively Döhle 1983; cf. Taplin 1972, 62–74 (rather overconfident forays from nearly 50 years ago!). 9 As strongly argued by Giuliani 2013, 197–205 (with further bibliography).

Fragments of Aeschylus and the Number of Actors  

πάλ]αι σιωπῶ κο̣ ὐ̣δ|εν̣ [.]σ̣τ̣ .μ[ [ ] ἀντέλεξα. σὲ δε.|[..]α̣ξιωτ̣ [

(Aesch. fr. 123b Radt)

It is beyond reasonable dispute that the first four lines are spoken by Phoenix and the second four by Achilles, and that this preserves the very moment when Achilles at last broke his silence in dialogue response. Later in the play there must surely also have been dialogue between Achilles and Patroclus before he went off to battle. And then in fr. 138 we have Achilles in dialogue with Antilochus who has broken the news of Patroclus’ death. So there was a lot of two-player interaction in Mymidones, which was evidently a long and eventful play 10 — and most definitely a far cry from “slight plots and laughable diction”! Not much can be reconstructed of the second play, Nereides, beyond the bringing of Achilles, new armour by his mother accompanied by the chorus of her sisters; but it can hardly be doubted that there was dialogue between Achilles and Thetis. Similarly in the third play, Phryges (which had the alternative title of Hectoros Lytra) there must surely have been dialogue between Achilles and Priam. Also it so happens that the ancient Life of Aeschylus tells us that Achilles sat silent and veiled in this play as well except for a brief dialogue with Hermes at the very start. 11 Fragment 266, which seems to be spoken by a god (ἡμῶν γε μέντοι νέμεσις ἐσθ’ ὑπερτέρα) may well come from that dialogue. Taken all together, then, the Achilles-trilogy, which was certainly a highly important work within Aeschylus’ oeuvre, and which may well have dated from early in his career, indisputably included several extensive and crucial scenes involving two actors. This is far the most significant evidence, and the other plays may be surveyed relatively cursorily, and in alphabetical order of title. I shall not look at further less secure examples; and, since the question here is specifically about tragedy, I shall not survey the satyr plays, even though some of them indisputably employed two actors, even without counting the role of Silenus in dialogue.

 10 It is generally supposed that, in addition to all the previous incidents, Mymidones also included the scene of Achilles’ lament over the dead body of Patroclus, known from fragments 135–137 to have been explicitly homoerotic. This is based entirely on the allocation of fr. 135 to Mymidones by Athenaeus 602e. I wonder whether that title might have been used to indicate the whole trilogy, in which case the lamentations would find a better place, along with fr. 153, in the second play, Nereides. 11 ἐν δὲ τοῖς Ἕκτορος λύτροις Ἀχιλλεὺς ὁμοίως ἐγκεκαλυμμένος οὐ φθέγγεται πλὴν ἐν ἀρχαῖς ὀλίγα πρὸς Ἑρμῆν ἀμοιβαῖα. See p. 365 of Radt 1985.

  Oliver Taplin Edonoi fr. 61, extrapolated from Aristophanes’ Thesmophoriazousai 134ff., has Lycurgus taunting Dionysus. It is quite possible that Dionysus responded for much of the scene with reserved and enigmatic silence, but it is highly unlikely that he did not speak at all. And even if he did not, we still have two named actors on stage together. Next Niobe: Niobe, sitting in silence on the tomb of her children, is paired closely with Achilles in Frogs 911ff. As in Myrmidones the audience had to wait a long time for the silent figure to speak eventually. Whoever is the speaker of fr. 154a predicts to the chorus that Tantalus will be coming to plead with his daughter; and it is very likely that it was he who, like Phoenix in Myrmidones, managed to break her silence. And surely there was dialogue between them. In Hoplon Krisis fr. 175, Aias insulted Odysseus to his face in the second person. So they are both on stage, and Odysseus, of all people, will not have taken this abuse without riposte. From Prometheus Lyomenos, which so far as I can see shows every sign of being by Aeschylus, 12 we have no fewer than three fragments (195, 196 and 199) in which Prometheus is giving Heracles instructions about his future adventures (as he does to Io in Desmotes). Clearly both are on stage. For Philoctetes we rely on the comparative discussion in Dio Chrysostom 52, which makes it amply clear that the Aeschylean version included extensive scenes between Philoctetes and Odysseus. And in Psychagogoi fr. 275 Teiresias tells Odysseus about his eventual death, presumably directly to his face. Finally, fr. 318, from an unknown play, has someone individual (not the chorus) address a herald (τοσαῦτα, κῆρυξ, ἐξ ἐμοῦ διάρτασον). So there were a good few tragedies of Aeschylus that made use of two actors. Before returning finally to Aristotle’s claim that he increased the number from one to two, we have to ask what kind of definite evidence for early tragedy was available to Aristotle. So far as dramatic texts were concerned there is no reason to think that any from before 500 survived. Indeed very little, so far as we can tell, survived of any tragedies from before 472 apart from those of Aeschylus. It is unlikely that any genuine words of Thespis or Choirilos were preserved; and, to judge from the limited quotations, there was probably only a little of Phrynichus. The most likely explanation for the exceptional survival of so many of Aeschylus’ plays is that an archive was kept by his theatrical dynasty.

 12 Contrary to the standard view, I do not believe that the authorship and authenticity of Prometheus Desmotes and Prometheus Lyomenos stand or fall together. While it is now generally and rightly believed that Desmotes is largely or entirely the work of a follower of Aeschylus, I see nothing among the extensive fragments of Lyomenos that militates against its being entirely the work of Aeschylus himself.

Fragments of Aeschylus and the Number of Actors  

I hope that I have made the case for considering it to be a serious possibility that all the plays of Aeschylus right from the start called for at least two actors, and none could be played with only one. Suppose, then, that this is what Aristotle observed when he scrutinised the plays, why should he claim that Aeschylus invented the second actor? The most plausible answer has to be that he had already on other grounds arrived at the firm teleological belief that tragedy had developed from a choral origin and from the emergence of a single “leader”. To reconcile this theory with Aeschylus’ practice, he concluded that the playwright himself must have introduced the second actor. If this train of argument has been at all along the right lines, then Aristotle’s account of the early history of tragedy collapses with a kind of domino effect. Aeschylus did not innovate the second actor because there had never been singleactor tragedy; this was because the spoken element of tragedy did not develop from the leader of the dithyramb; this was because tragedy did not grow from a purely choral root. In turn this means that its development was not gradual, and that it had never been through a simple or laughable or primitive stage. Contrary to the teleological model it was a fully-fledged art-form from the start. To conclude, some big claims mesh with these small details about the fragments of Aeschylus. The revolutionary invention of theatre brought together speaking actors with choral lyric: it was an exogamous union, not a parthenogenesis from the chorus. And, fundamentally, it surplanted previous forms of narration with enactment, embodiment, total impersonation. The performance-space, masks, costumes and props and a whole complex of further performative resources all came into being together — and a new art-form was born. Obviously, this radical theory has to be pieced together as a great mosaic, and its ramifications extend far beyond my present scope. What I hope to have brought into focus is just one segment of this mosaic: the claim that the fragments of Aeschylus are a revealing source for the early development of tragedy. And that they point towards tragedy as complex, serious, and in every sense dramatic, right from the very beginning.

Bibliography Döhle, B. (1983), “Die ‘Achilleis’ des Aischylos: Eine Theaterinszenierung im Spiegel der Darstellungen der bildenden Kunst”, in: H. Kuch (ed.) (1983), Die griechische Tragödie in ihre gesellschaftlichen Funktion, Berlin, 161–172. Giuliani, L. (2013), Image and Myth, revised translation of Bild und Mythos, Chicago. Hart, M.L. (2010), The Art of Ancient Greek Theater, Getty Museum, Malibu.

  Oliver Taplin Herington, C.J. (1985), Poetry into Drama: Early Tragedy and the Greek Poetic Tradition, California. Radt, S. (1985), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta, vol. 3, Aeschylus, Göttingen. Scodel, R. (2010), An Introduction to Greek Tragedy, Cambridge. Scullion, S. (2002), “‘Nothing to do with Dionysus’: tragedy misconceived as ritual”, CQ 52, 102–137. Sommerstein, A. (2008), Aeschylus III, Fragments, Cambridge MA. Taplin, O. (1972), “Aeschylean Silences and Silences in Aeschylus”, HSCPh 76, 57–97. Taplin, O. (2018), “The Tragic Mask and the Invention of Theatre”, Scienze dell’Antichità 24.3, 1–9. Taplin, O./Wyles, R. (2010), The Pronomos Vase and its Context, Oxford.



Part II: Fragmented Tragedy

Alan H. Sommerstein

Revisiting the Danaid Trilogy In this paper I will be discussing two fragmentary plays, but I will have little to say about actual fragments. For this I apologize. It was under the auspices of Bernhard Zimmermann, in Düsseldorf, back in 1994, that I first presented my ideas about the structure of Aeschylus’ Danaid trilogy – though my basic thesis had already been put forward by Wolfgang Rösler (1993). This thesis – actually a revival of a proposal made first by August von Schlegel (1809/1923; i 75) – was that the surviving play, Suppliants, was not the first, as is usually supposed, but the second part of the trilogy, being preceded, rather than followed, by Egyptians; and that Egyptians was set in Egypt rather than at Argos, and dealt with the dispute between Danaus and his brother Aegyptus which eventually resulted in Danaus and his daughters fleeing to Greece. Rösler and I, following Martin Sicherl (1986) and half a dozen ancient accounts of the Danaid story, held that a crucial determinant of the trilogy’s action had been an oracle given to Danaus whose exact terms are variously reported, 1 but from which it followed that if his daughters married the sons of Aegyptus, one of them would kill him. I reproduce and translate the half-dozen sources in the Appendix. This thesis, to say the least, has not been well received. Every editor of the play (except myself, of course) has rejected it (Sandin 2005, 9–12; Bowen 2013, 7– 10; more hesitantly, Citti/Miralles 2019), as have the majority of others who have discussed the issue such as Garvie (2006, xviii–xx), Kyriakou (2011, 65–76), Papadopoulou (2011, 18–19) and Beriotto (2016, 48–52). A few such as Conacher (1996, 109–111) and Collard (2008, xxxvii) have taken a neutral line, and a handful more (e.g. Turner 2001, 28–29 n. 9; Föllinger 2003, 201–204, 2009, 102–105) have adopted my proposal or a modified version of it; but the preponderance of opinion is unmistakable. 2 With my own edition of Suppliants (Sommerstein 2019)

 1 This variability in itself suggests that the oracle story had a wide currency. One poet or mythographer had it tell Danaus that he would be killed by a son of Aegyptus (a, c, f in Appendix); another said, by his son-in-law (e); while a third imagined Danaus encouraging his daughters to use lethal force, if necessary, against “anyone attempting to rob them of their virginity” (b), as if any man who became the husband, lover, or rapist of one of the Danaids might afterwards become Danaus’ murderer. 2 However, a team led by director Ramin Gray is planning a production of a reconstructed version of the trilogy in which Egyptians is placed first. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-010

  Alan H. Sommerstein appearing, it seems a good time to review this issue and respond to the main specific arguments 3 that have been raised by critics of my view of the trilogy. 4 Rösler and I certainly got one thing badly wrong. Following Sicherl, we relied heavily on six words in a scholion on the words ὧν θέμις εἴργει “from which Right debars them” in Supp. 37. The scholion, in full, reads ὧν τὸ δίκαιον ἡμᾶς εἴργει διὰ τὸ μὴ θανατωθῆναι τὸν πατέρα. The first five words are a straightforward attempt to paraphrase the poetic text. The last six words mean “because of the non– killing of our father”, and we took this to be equivalent to “in order that our father should not be killed”. As Garvie (2006, xviii–xix) in particular has pointed out, these words are at least as likely to mean “because our father is still alive”. In any case the scholion is wrong: the Danaids are not saying that justice forbids them to do anything, they are saying that justice forbids their cousins to take them in marriage (λέκτρων ... ἐπιβῆναι, “to mount our beds”) against their will and that of their father (37–39). There is still, though, one thing that we can infer from it. The scholiast didn’t write μὴ τεθνηκέναι or ἔτι ζῆν; he wrote μὴ θανατωθῆναι, “not being put to death”. And that implies that he, or his source, knew that later in the trilogy Danaus was put to death – which rules out some dénouements that have been popular in the past, such as Pindar’s story (Pyth. 9.112–116) of Danaus putting up his daughters as prizes in a foot-race. The main evidence for placing Suppliants second in the trilogy comes from Danaus’ last speech, in particular its second half, 996–1013, where he displays an almost desperate anxiety that his daughters shall at all costs preserve their virginity and value it “more than life itself” (1013). To be sure, any Greek father would feel some anxiety on this score until his daughters were safely married; but no other father, in any surviving text, makes such a song and dance about it, and Danaus’ tirade is all the more remarkable because his daughters have not given the slightest indication of any tendency to go astray.

 3 As opposed to the argument of general principle, strongly voiced by Doug Olson at the Thessaloniki conference, that we simply do not have adequate evidence on which to found even the most skeletal reconstruction of the trilogy. I made the case for a less negative approach in my 2007 Gaisford lecture (see Sommerstein 2010). 4 In my edition itself – appearing in a series (Cambridge Greek and Latin Classics) which describes itself as “aimed primarily at undergraduate and graduate students” – I discuss the structure of the trilogy from a neutral point of view, presenting the main arguments on each side of the question but not committing myself to either (Sommerstein 2019, 12–20). In the same way Griffith (1982, 31–35), editing Prometheus Bound in the same series, discussed the question of its authenticity in a neutral manner, even though a few years earlier (Griffith 1977) he had done more than anyone to convince scholarly opinion that the play was not Aeschylus’ work.

Revisiting the Danaid Trilogy  

Now Danaus had an option, well known to every father in Aeschylus’ audience, which would have provided considerable protection both against the danger of illicit liaisons, of which he is apparently so afraid, and against the sons of Aegyptus. This was to get his daughters married, as soon as possible, to suitable young men, thereby giving his new sons-in-law an intense personal interest in protecting the Danaids against all other men, and also making it impossible for the Aegyptiads to take their cousins as virgin brides. And most conveniently, a group of such potential bridegrooms is actually on hand, probably equal in number to the Danaids, committed if necessary to defend them and their father with their own lives, and described by Pelasgus as their φίλοι ὀπάονες “friendly escort” (954), in every respect the polar opposite of the Aegyptiads. Danaus could not hope to find better matches for his daughters, to guard them both against their enemies and against their own supposed frailties. Of course he does nothing of the sort. What is more, he says in effect (1006– 1007) that if his daughters succumb to sexual temptation, they and he will suffer precisely what they have endured much toil and a long sea voyage to avoid; 5 in other words, his aim was never just to help them escape marriage to the sons of Aegyptus; there is no risk of that happening now that they have been accepted by the Argives. Putting together what he says and what he does not do, it is as if he is determined that they shall remain permanently virgin. This is normally thought of as a most grievous wrong, and it is rare even in myth. The only two other parents I can think of who do this, Acrisius and Clytaemestra, both do it because they are afraid for their own lives. And the only story we know of that gives Danaus that kind of motive to avoid any marriage for his daughters (not just a marriage to their cousins) is the oracle story, or rather one particular version of it, according to which Danaus was told that he would be killed by his son-in-law (Lactantius on Stat. Theb. 2.222 = e in Appendix) or by the bedfellow of his daughter (implied by schol. Il. 4.171 = b which says he had told his daughters to strike back at anyone attempting to take away their virginity). Yet in Suppliants itself there is no reference, direct or indirect, to any such oracle; nor can we assume that Aeschylus took knowledge of it for granted as a regular part of the myth, for we know that in one recent version of the story (that of Pindar) Danaus not only survived but himself arranged new marriages for his daughters. Has Aeschylus, then, deliberately left his audience mystified on this important issue, to be enlightened only much later in the trilogy? This was Sicherl’s view, and Hose (2006) finds it acceptable, citing several occasions in epic and tragedy when an oracle is  5 μὴ πάθωμεν ὧν πολὺς πόνος, πολὺς δὲ πόντος οὕνεκ’ ἠρόθη δορί, “let us not suffer that on account of which much toil and much sea has been ploughed [n.b. zeugma] by our craft”.

  Alan H. Sommerstein mentioned for the first time only after it has been fulfilled; but in none of these cases is the audience left mystified for a long period about the explanation of actions or attitudes crucial to the plot. If that possibility is ruled out, then the audience must have been informed about the oracle in a preceding play, which can only have been Egyptians. Only Danaus himself would know of the oracle, and he would not be able to mention it in public, so he would have had to do so in a prologue. The hypothesis may be supported by some allusions in Supp. to earlier events which become decidedly cryptic if we suppose that no play preceded Supp. The Danaids say to their father (741–742) that the Aegyptiads are “insatiate of battle” (μάχης ... ἄπληστον) and add “I speak to one who knows” (λέγω πρὸς εἰδότα). This implies that Danaus has waged war against them in Egypt ─ and this is the only reference in Suppliants to this war. Why was it not mentioned at the start of the play? Because ─ it may be argued ─ the audience already knew about the war from the preceding play, and further reference to it at that stage was unnecessary. Again, two passages imply that under Egyptian law the sons of Aegyptus have the right to claim possession of their cousins regardless of the latter’s own wishes or of their father’s ─ but this emerges in a strangely indirect way. First Pelasgus asks whether such a law exists (387–391) and receives an evasive answer; later the Egyptian herald speaks of the Danaids as items of lost property (916–920), and asks (932–933) “who shall I say took away from me this group of cousin women?” as if, again, they belonged to him by right. Such a right was utterly alien to Greek society and requires far clearer explanation than it ever receives in this play; again, such explanation could have featured in Egyptians. There is also another consideration. If Egyptians was the second play, coming between Suppliants and Danaids, what was its content? We can fill in with fair confidence the events that it could have covered – the fabula, to use a convenient narratological term: a battle (which must have gone badly for the Argives, probably with the death of King Pelasgus), the assumption of power in Argos by Danaus (whether by election or by coup d’état), negotiations for a peace treaty including the acceptance of the Aegyptiad–Danaid marriages, the hatching of the murder plot by Danaus and his daughters, and the actual celebration of the multiple wedding. In view of the title, the chorus would have been formed not by the Danaids, as in the other two plays, but by their enemies, most likely the sons of Aegyptus themselves (who did not appear in Suppliants, and could not have appeared in Danaids). Now if Egyptians included the plotting of the murders, that would have to take place in the absence of the Aegyptiads and therefore, almost certainly, before the entrance of the chorus; the imaginary location of the action would have

Revisiting the Danaid Trilogy  

to be Argos (where Danaus’ family are living), and the main part of the play would have to be devoted to the negotiations leading up to the marriages. This could be seen as parallel to the negotiations and debate in Suppliants leading to the Argive decision to grant asylum; but there is a big difference. The Argives were being asked to make a decision that was likely to involve them in a dangerous war, and they have to be virtually forced into it by threats of a sacrilegious suicide and of the wrath of Zeus Hikesios. In Egyptians, as we are at present imagining it, the Aegyptiads would have been offered precisely what they had been demanding all along, and there would really have been nothing needing to be negotiated about. I very much doubt whether there is enough meat in this action, so to speak, to make a drama, even an Aeschylean one. That, essentially, is the case for the Schlegel sequence. I will now try to address the most important arguments against it. 6 The strongest of these, to my mind, derive from two features of the elaborate choral parodos with which Suppliants begins. The extensive self-presentation of the Danaids, their thoughts and their feelings, all but guarantees that we are meeting them for the first time. The parodos also has much to say about Io and Epaphus (40–67), a story to which the chorus will return in two later passages (291–324, 538–589), altogether covering the subject at such length and in so much detail that it is hard to suppose that anything substantial could have been said about it in a preceding play. Yet these considerations do not in themselves prove that there was no play preceding Suppliants. What they do, I think, prove is that if there was such a play, the Danaids did not appear in it, and very little was said about them (except as the potential objects of a marriage transaction between their father and their uncle) or about Io and Epaphus. This may seem surprising, but is quite possible. In Agamemnon, for example, there is no mention of any daughter of Agamemnon except the dead Iphigeneia, though in the first half of the next play Electra will be a major focus of interest (and Iphigeneia will be faded out almost completely); and the butchery of the children of Thyestes, which in the middle part of the

 6 One much adduced argument was disposed of long ago. It is often pointed out (e.g. Conacher 1996, 109–110; Sandin 2005, 11; Kyriakou 2011, 68 calls it “virtually damning for the case of Sicherl and the rest”) that nothing is said in the surviving play about any oracle given to Danaus; I had already explained this by the assumption that Danaus had not divulged the oracle even to his daughters, instead bringing them up to be fanatically devoted to the preservation of their virginity (Sommerstein 1994, 119–122, 128).

  Alan H. Sommerstein Oresteia – from the Cassandra scene to the end of Choephoroi – is repeatedly referenced 7 as the ἀρχὴ κακῶν for the Atreid family, is completely absent from the first thousand lines of the opening play. Again, Athena, who will dominate Eumenides, is not mentioned at all in Agamemnon or Choephoroi, not even in connection with the capture of Troy for which according to tradition (and indeed according to Eum. 457–458) she was largely responsible. Another argument that has won wide approval is the one briefly stated half a century ago by Alex Garvie (1969, 126): “At the end of the Supplices we are still in the early stages of the action. It is impossible to see how the situation could be resolved in a single following play”. More recent critics (Sandin 2005, 9–10; Kyriakou 2011, 73) have expressed the same idea rather differently: the Schlegel sequence would require an altogether excessive proportion of the plot of the trilogy to be crammed into the third play, whether directly as part of the action or by way of retrospective report. It would certainly be excessive by comparison with the Oresteia; in that trilogy the situation at the beginning of each play after the first is essentially identical to that at the end of the preceding play except that Orestes has changed his location. There is, however, another possible comparandum: the Theban trilogy. 8 We have seen what happens, in fabula terms, between the end of Suppliants and the beginning of Danaids. What happened between the end of Oedipus and the beginning of Seven against Thebes? At an absolute minimum, the arrival of Polyneices at Argos; his marriage to Adrastus’ daughter; the persuasion of Adrastus by his two sons-in-law to attack Thebes; the mustering and march of the Seven; and a siege of significant duration (cf. Sept. 22–23). In Seven Aeschylus seems for the most part to have assumed that his audience knew about these things (cf. Garvie 1969, 185) and indeed about some less essential ones such as how Amphiaraus was forced to join the expedition, an episode alluded to in Seven only in the vaguest of terms (βίαι φρενῶν 612). But it would have been equally possible to inform the audience more directly, say in a prologue, about the events that had not been dramatized.  7 Ag. 1094–1096, 1215–1222; Cho. 1065–1076, cf. 578 on the Erinys drinking her “third draught” of blood. Once and once only (Ag. 1186–1193) the crimes and sufferings of the Atreid house are traced one step further back, to the adultery of Atreus’ wife with Thyestes. 8 A further suggestive case is furnished by the trilogy based on the Odyssey. The first play, Psychagogoi, set at an entrance to the underworld, corresponded to book 11 of the Homeric poem; the second, Penelope, set within Odysseus’ palace in Ithaca town, must have corresponded to all or part of books 17–23, leaving the events of nine books (in the order of the fabula, books 12, 5– 8 and 13–16) to be treated by retrospect or not at all. We have, however, no evidence as to how Aeschylus did in fact present these events (if he did), except that it was not through direct stage action.

Revisiting the Danaid Trilogy  

This indeed is what I think happened at the beginning of Danaids. The shorter of the two book fragments (fr. 43), though partly corrupt, seems to refer to the ceremonial “waking” of the bridal couples as something that has not yet taken place; the chorus of Danaids, therefore, are not yet on stage, and the fragment must come from a prologue, perhaps spoken by Danaus, perhaps by a servant; It would only take about half a dozen lines in that prologue to narrate briefly what had happened since we last saw the Danaids and their father. Sandin (2005, 10) objects that if this was done the audience would “feel cheated” because “one expects the conflict between the Aegyptiads and the Danaids to appear on-stage”. It is not clear to me that this would be so. We have already had a confrontation, not indeed with the Aegyptiads, but with their brutal henchmen, which has come as close to actual violence as the genre allows; there can be no further meeting between the cousins until the war is over, and any meeting at that stage would necessarily be, on the surface, friendly, since the Danaids must conceal their true intentions. Again we may compare what happened, or did not happen, in other Aeschylean trilogies. The beginnings of the quarrel between Eteocles and Polyneices may or may not have formed part of Oedipus; but certainly after that their conflict never “appears on-stage” until both are dead. Something similar seems to have happened in Penelope: fr. 187 9 indicates that the action of that play was set in Penelope’s private chamber, so that the conflict in the great hall between Odysseus and Penelope's suitors does not “appear on-stage” at all, and the suitors are never seen until they are dead; their gross hybris towards the supposed beggar has to be narrated rather than enacted, and it was apparently narrated not in Penelope but in the following play, Ostologoi (see frr. 179 and 180). In the Iliadic trilogy, likewise, the second most important person in the fabula, Hector, never appeared on stage except as a corpse. Evidently what “one expects” today – “one” being a spectator of contemporary drama in one or another medium – is not necessarily what audiences expected in Aeschylus’ day. Likewise it cannot always be the case, as Kyriakou (2011, 73) claims, that Aeschylus “would need to dramatize [and not merely present through narrative] events that were crucial in his own treatment of the myth”. At any rate, those who reject the Schlegel sequence, and reject the oracle story, must explain why Danaus is made to speak as he does in 996–1013: why he is made so desperately anxious that his daughters shall preserve their virginity,

 9 ἐγὼ γένος μέν εἰμι Κρὴς ἀρχέστατον ‘I am a Cretan of most kingly lineage’. In the false tales he tells while unrecognized on Ithaca, Odysseus always makes himself out to be a Cretan, but it is only in his meeting with Penelope in her private quarters that he claims to be a member of the Cretan royal house (Od. 19.178–184).

  Alan H. Sommerstein and so terribly apprehensive that they may not (despite everything they have said); why he says in 1006–1007 that in the latter event, the family will suffer precisely what it left Egypt to avoid; and why he is not made to adopt the simple solution (and the only one consistent with his recognized duty as a father) of offering them in marriage. And in the last twenty-five years I have still not heard or read any such explanation. 10

Appendix: Sources for the Oracle Story (a) Σ Il. 1.42: Δαναὸς τoὺς τοῦ Αἰγύπτου παῖδας, πλὴν ἑνὸς ἢ δυοῖν, διὰ τῶν θυγατέρων ἀνεῖλε δεδοικώς, καθότι καὶ ἐκ χρησμοῦ ἠκηκόει ὅτι φονευθήσεται ὑφ’ ἑνὸς αὐτῶν. Danaus, through the agency of his daughters, destroyed all but one or two of the sons of Aegyptus, in accordance with what he had heard from an oracle that he would be murdered by one of them.

(b) Σ Il. 4.171: παραγενομένων δὲ τῶν Αἰγυπτίων ἐπὶ τὸν τῶν Δαναοῦ θυγατέρων γάμον, αἱ Δαναΐδες κατὰ τὰς τοῦ πατρὸς ὑποθήκας ἐδολοφόνησαν αὐτούς· ἐκεῖνος γὰρ αὐταῖς συνεβούλευσε τοὺς τὴν παρθενίαν ἀφαιρουμένους ἀμύνασθαι. When the Egyptians came to marry the daughters of Danaus, the Danaids treacherously killed them, according to their father’s advice; for he had advised them to resist anyone attempting to rob them of their virginity.

(c) Σ [Aesch.] Prom. 453: φοβηθεὶς ὁ Δαναὸς μήπως ἀναιρεθήσεται ὑπὸ τῶν υἱῶν Αἰγύπτου (ἦν γὰρ χρησμὸς αὐτῷ δοθεὶς πάλαι περὶ τούτου) ναῦν κατεσκεύασε τὴν κληθεῖσαν πεντηκόντορον ὡς ἀπὸ τοῦ ἀριθμοῦ ὧν ἐγέννησε θυγατέρων.

 10 This paper, which I was to have presented at the Thessaloniki conference, was very kindly presented for me by Patrick Finglass when I was obliged to withdraw from the conference for health reasons. I am most grateful to him, and also to Bernhard and the two Annas for their further cooperation in making, and supplying to me, video recordings of the discussion, and not least to those who took part in that discussion – Poulheria Kyriakou, Doug Olson, Oliver Taplin and an unidentified postgraduate student – whose criticisms have contributed very materially to the improvement of the paper.

Revisiting the Danaid Trilogy  

Danaus, afraid that he might be done away with by the sons of Aegyptus (for he had long ago been) given an oracle about this), prepared a ship, what is called a fifty-oarer (penteconter) from the number of daughters he had begotten.

(d) Σ Eur. Or. 872: οὗτος ἀπῆλθεν εἰς τὸ μαντεῖον, χρησόμενος εἰ ἄρα καλῶς ἔγημαν αἱ θυγατέρες. ὁ δὲ θεὸς ἔχρησεν αὐτὸν ἐκ τούτου κινδυνεύσειν. ὁ δὲ ἔπεισε τὰς θυγατέρας ἀνελεῖν τοὺς υἱοὺς Αἰγύπτου. He went off to the oracular sanctuary to inquire whether his daughters had made good marriages, and the god responded that their marriages would bring him into personal danger. He then persuaded his daughters to make away with the sons of Aegyptus.

(e) Lactantius on Stat. Theb. 2.222: Danaus responso comperit quod generi sui manibus interiret; Argos profectus est et primum dicitur navem fecisse ... Danaus learned from an oracular response that he would perish at the hands of his son-inlaw; he set out for Argos, and is said to have been the first to build a ship …

(f) Lactantius on Stat. Theb. 6.290–291: Danaus deprehendit oraculo se ab uno Aegypti fratris filio occidendum; itaque simulavit se fratris filiis natas in matrimonii consortium traditurum armavitque occulte filias... Danaus came to know by means of an oracle that he was destined to be killed by one of the sons of his brother Aegyptus; he therefore fraudulently gave his own daughters into the bond of marriage with his nephews, and secretly gave them weapons ...

Bibliography Beriotto, M.P. (2016), Le Danaidi: storia di un mito nella letteratura greca, Alessandria. Bowen, A.J. (2013), Aeschylus: Suppliant Women, Oxford. Citti, V./†Miralles, C. (2019), Eschilo: Supplici, Rome. Collard, C. (2008), Aeschylus: Persians and other plays, Oxford. Conacher, D.J. (1996), Aeschylus: the earlier plays and related studies, Toronto. Föllinger, S. (2003), Genosdependenzen: Studien zur Arbeit am Mythos bei Aischylos, Göttingen. Föllinger, S. (2009), Aischylos, Meister der griechischen Tragödie, Munich. Garvie, A.F. (1969), Aeschylus’ Supplices: play and trilogy, Cambridge. Garvie, A.F. (20062), Aeschylus’ Supplices: play and trilogy, London. Griffith, M. (1977), The authenticity of Prometheus Bound, Cambridge.

  Alan H. Sommerstein Griffith, M. (1982), Aeschylus: Prometheus Bound, Cambridge. Hose, M. (2006), “Vaticinium post eventum and the position of the Supplices in the Danaid Trilogy”, in: D.L. Cairns/V. Liapis (eds), Dionysalexandros: Essays on Aeschylus and his fellow tragedians in honour of Alexander F. Garvie, Swansea, 91–102. Kyriakou, P. (2011), The past in Aeschylus and Sophocles, Berlin. Papadopoulou, Th. (2011), Aeschylus: Suppliants, Companions to Greek and Roman Tragedy, London. Rösler, W. (1993), “Der Schluß der ‘Hiketiden’ und die Danaiden–Trilogie des Aischylos”, RhM 136, 1–22. Sandin, P. (2005), Aeschylus’ Supplices: introduction and commentary on vv.1–523, corrected ed., Lund. Schlegel, A.W. von (1809/1923), Vorlesungen über dramatische Kunst und Literatur, ed. G.V. Amoretti, Bonn/Leipzig. Sicherl, M. (1986), “Die Tragik der Danaiden”, MusHelv 43, 81–110. Sommerstein, A.H. (1994), “The beginning and the end of Aeschylus’ Danaid trilogy”, in: B. Zimmermann (ed.), Griechisch-römische Komödie und Tragödie, Stuttgart, 111–134 (reprinted with addenda in: A.H. Sommerstein, The Tangled Ways of Zeus, Oxford, 2010, 89– 117). Sommerstein, A.H. (2010), “Sherlockismus and the study of fragmentary tragedies”, in: A.H. Sommerstein, The Tangled Ways of Zeus, Oxford, 61–81. Sommerstein, A.H. (2019), Aeschylus: Suppliants, Cambridge. Turner, C. (2001), “Perverted supplication and other inversions in Aeschylus’ Danaid trilogy”, CJ 97, 27–50.

Patrick J. Finglass

Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta Volume II: Old Texts, New Opportunities Tragicorum Graecorum fragmenta is one of the great monuments of modern scholarship on ancient Greek drama. Published between 1971 and 2004, its five volumes (the last in two parts) contain the fragments of Greek tragedy (and satyrplay) from classical Greece down to the Roman period. Its editors, Bruno Snell, Richard Kannicht, and the late Stefan Radt, are rightly considered giants in our field; other scholars can hope to equal their achievement in these volumes, but no-one is likely to surpass it. Three of the volumes are dedicated to one of the “big three” tragedians, Aeschylus (volume three, edited by Radt in 1985), Sophocles (volume four, also edited by Radt, first in 1977, then updated in 1999), and Euripides (volume five, in two separate parts, edited by Kannicht in 2004). Each of these books contains not just the fragments and testimonia to each play, but also the testimonia to each author — extremely useful collections of text on the life and artistic production of these playwrights, which anyone interested in these authors must consult whether or not they are concerned with the fragments themselves. Another, the first, contains fragments by other named authors, together with the testimonia to tragedy as a genre, including the vital inscriptional evidence which sheds such light on tragedy in antiquity. That leaves the second: of the five volumes, I would venture, by some distance the least studied. The contents of the second volume have had the misfortune to be preserved not just as fragments, but as anonymous fragments, shorn not just of immediate context but even of the names of their author, and in such a way that it is not now possible to determine who wrote the text in question. (That last qualification is vital — many fragments, especially those preserved on papyrus, do not have a name attached to them, but through study of their style and vocabulary, or through the overlap with a quotation fragment which has an authorial ascription, scholars can assign them to their author with certainty or with a high degree of confidence). In some cases, it is not even possible to

 I am most grateful to Drs Anna Lamari and Anna Novokhatko for the kind invitation to a wonderful conference; and to audiences in Frankfurt and Dublin who heard versions of this paper. For the issues treated in this chapter see also Finglass forthcoming, a companion piece which takes a different perspective on the subject and examines different passages. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-011

  Patrick J. Finglass determine which century the text in question came from. No wonder, one might think, such texts are neglected. This neglect is particularly manifest in the absence of translations and commentaries on these texts — a point all the more apparent because recent years have been good, in publication terms, for most tragic fragments. As well as, indeed stimulated by, Tragicorum Graecorum fragmenta, there have been Loeb volumes for the fragments of Aeschylus (by Alan Sommerstein, 2008), Sophocles (by Hugh Lloyd-Jones, 1996, revised 2003), and Euripides (by Christopher Collard and Martin Cropp, 2008, in two volumes). Aris and Phillip commentaries on groups of fragmentary plays have also come out, for both Sophocles (Sommerstein, Fitzpatrick, and Talboy 2006, Sommerstein and Talboy 2012) and Euripides (Collard/Cropp/Lee 1995; Collard/Cropp/Gibert 2004), offering exemplary commentaries on a range of dramas. These have recently been added to by a volume containing commentaries on some minor tragedians, Cropp 2019; more are promised. And there have been detailed commentaries on some individual fragmentary dramas: Sophocles’ Tereus (Milo 2008), Euripides’ Phaethon (Diggle 1970), Hypsipyle (Cockle 1987), Telephus (Preiser 2000), Philoctetes (Müller 2000), Cretans (Cozzoli 2001), Alexandros (Karamanou 2017), Melanippe Wise, and Melanippe Captured (Domouzi 2020), to name just a few. The fragments of the other named tragedians, which make up volume one of Tragicorum Graecorum fragmenta, have received much less attention, but Matthew Wright’s monograph The Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy. Volume I: Neglected Authors (2016) does much to bring them to the attention of a wider audience. These fragments at least belong to writers with a name — they may be “neglected”, in Wright’s terminology, but at least they are “authors”. 1 By contrast, the anonymous fragments in Tragicorum Graecorum fragmenta volume II are neglected in a more profound way, never having received a systematic analysis of any kind. True, some individual texts have received attention. The third-century papyrus P. Köln 245, which appears as fr. 672a at the back of TrGF vol. V part 2 (pp. 1142–1144) and contains dialogue from a play about Odysseus in Troy, has been the subject of a monograph (Parca 1991). And the Gyges fragment, P.Oxy. 2382 from the second or third century, now fr. 664 in TrGF volume II, has received quite a bit of attention since its publication in 1949, but the date of the work that it contains remains stubbornly unclear — whether it came before or after Herodotus’ account of the Lydian king Gyges is still a  1 See also Zouganeli 2017 and Sims 2018, doctoral theses which contain commentaries on some of these authors. Wright 2019, the second of two volumes in his study, is devoted to the fragments of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides.

Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta Volume II: Old Texts, New Opportunities  

mystery. 2 These texts, however, are the exceptions rather than the rule; and even they have not been integrated into discussions of tragedy more generally. Most of the texts are completely unknown even to specialists in Greek tragedy. Some tragic texts are even more unlucky than the ones found in Tragicorum Graecorum fragmenta volume II. These are the anonymous tragic fragments published after that volume appeared in 1981, or which (in a few cases) had been published before that date, but were only subsequently recognised as coming from tragedy or satyr-play. Those which had appeared by 2004 were then included in the Addenda to Tragicorum Graecorum fragmenta volume II, which can be found in Tragicorum Graecorum fragmenta volume V part 2, at the very end of the book, after even the index (pp. 1117–1158, “Addenda et corrigenda in vol. 2”). There is a good deal of material here, but who ever looks at it? Anonymous texts which do not even make it into the volume devoted to those anonymous texts — it hardly seems very accessible or approachable. Moreover, any papyrus that came out after 2004 does not appear even there, or indeed in any volume of Tragicorum Graecorum fragmenta: for instance, P.Oxy. 5184, a tragic papyrus that cannot be assigned to any author (which was published by W.B. Henry in 2014). We could really do with a new edition, which gathers all this material together and preferably furnishes it with a translation and commentary too — because most of this material has never received even that rather basic level of scrutiny, and if it is to reach a wider audience such assistance will be vital. Such a book would become out of date over time in its turn, as is the fate of most classical editions: but in terms of present need, the current arrangement is clearly unsatisfactory. One might be forgiven for thinking that, as far as Greek tragedy was concerned, the editor’s task was done — rather, the to-do list sometimes seems greater than ever. As a result the title of this chapter is somewhat misleading, because the texts of anonymous tragedy are scattered about beyond even that little-consulted volume. Yet what they have in common is that they are largely unknown, and many must have secrets to reveal. No secrets are revealed in this chapter, in which I look at three different anonymous tragic fragments (one a quotation, one written on a potsherd, one from a papyrus), and briefly discuss certain points that makes them, to my mind, worth studying. But I hope that just by pointing to the neglect of these fascinating texts I may persuade other scholars, perhaps especially doctoral students, to take some of them seriously and apply to them the investigation that they deserve.  2 For recent discussion and bibliography of those earlier pieces see Kotlińska-Toma 2015, 178– 185, Hornblower 2019, 103–106.

  Patrick J. Finglass

 Tr. Adesp. fr. 110 TrGF ἀλλ’ οὐδὲ Αἴας σιωπᾷ, μέλλων δὲ ἑαυτὸν ἀποσφάττειν κέκραγεν οὐκ ἦν ἄρ’ οὐδὲν πῆμ’ ἐλευθέρου δάκνον ψυχὴν ὁμοίως ἀνδρὸς ὡς ἀτιμία. οὑγὼ πέπονθα καί με †συμφοροῦσα† βαθεῖα κηλὶς ἐκ βυθῶν ἀναστρέφει λύσσης πικροῖς κέντροισιν ἠρεθισμένον. (Tr. Adesp. fr. 110 TrGF) But not even Ajax is silent, but when he is about to slaughter himself he cries out “So after all there is no suffering that bites the soul of a free man like dishonour does. That is what I have suffered and ... me the deep stain from the depths turns me upside down, as I am incited by the bitter goads of madness”.

This passage comes from the Stromateis of Clement of Alexandria (c. 150–215), in which the bishop discusses how sinful action is the result of deliberate abandonment to one’s passions and cites tragic characters who explicitly so abandon themselves. Beginning by citing a speech delivered by Oedipus’ father Laius, a passage which other evidence indicates comes from Euripides’ Chrysippus, he goes on to cite a speech delivered by Medea from Euripides’ homonymous play. Finally, he gives us the citation from Ajax above. But Clement’s introduction does not explicitly tell us the drama, or the author, from which the quotation comes, and unlike the previous two quotations which he gives us, we have no other evidence which could shed light on the matter; as a result, the actual source of this tragic quotation eludes us. Perhaps it comes from Aeschylus’ Thracian Women, in which Ajax’s suicide did not take place on stage as in Sophocles but was related by a Messenger. But Aeschylus’ was not the only such play available, and any assumption that the fragment was by him would be unsafe. Theodectas, one of the great tragic playwrights of the fourth century, wrote an Ajax, for example, and there will have been other such plays too which today leave no trace. 3 We will never know whether this play came from the fifth century, the fourth, or even later; no linguistic features impose a later date, but this might simply be because the quotation is so short. The quotation is therefore correctly included among the anonymous fragments of tragedy. Yet Clement does at least tell us that this comes from Ajax’s suicide speech. Just that bit of context makes this fragment so much more useful and encourages

 3 For tragic treatments of the Ajax myth see Finglass 2011, 33–36.

Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta Volume II: Old Texts, New Opportunities  

a comparison with another speech from an Ajax just before he kills himself – from Sophocles’ Ajax. (That speech contains some anonymous fragments of its own – interpolated passages, probably from actors wishing to make it even more of a bravura performance piece. I omit them from the text below and would refer readers interested in why I believe these passages not to be by Sophocles to my 2011 commentary). ΑΙ. ὁ μὲν σφαγεὺς ἕστηκεν ᾗ τομώτατος γένοιτ’ ἄν, εἴ τῳ καὶ λογίζεσθαι σχολή, δῶρον μὲν ἀνδρὸς Ἕκτορος ξένων ἐμοὶ μάλιστα μισηθέντος, ἐχθίστου θ’ ὁρᾶν. πέπηγε δ’ ἐν γῇ πολεμίᾳ τῇ Τρῳάδι, σιδηροβρῶτι θηγάνῃ νεηκονής· ἔπηξα δ’ αὐτὸν εὖ περιστείλας ἐγώ, εὐνούστατον τῷδ’ ἀνδρὶ διὰ τάχους θανεῖν. οὕτω μὲν εὐσκευοῦμεν· ἐκ δὲ τῶνδέ μοι σὺ πρῶτος, ὦ Ζεῦ, καὶ γὰρ εἰκός, ἄρκεσον. αἰτήσομαι δέ σ’ οὐ μακρὸν γέρας λαβεῖν. πέμψον τιν’ ἡμῖν ἄγγελον, κακὴν φάτιν Τεύκρῳ φέροντα, πρῶτος ὥς με βαστάσῃ πεπτῶτα τῷδε περὶ νεορράντῳ ξίφει, καὶ μὴ πρὸς ἐχθρῶν του κατοπτευθεὶς πάρος ῥιφθῶ κυσὶν πρόβλητος οἰωνοῖς θ’ ἕλωρ. τοσαῦτά σ’, ὦ Ζεῦ, προστρέπω· καλῶ δ’ ἅμα πομπαῖον Ἑρμῆν χθόνιον εὖ με κοιμίσαι, ξὺν ἀσφαδᾴστῳ καὶ ταχεῖ πηδήματι πλευρὰν διαρρήξαντα τῷδε φασγάνῳ. καλῶ δ’ ἀρωγοὺς τὰς ἀεί τε παρθένους ἀεί θ’ ὁρώσας πάντα τἀν βροτοῖς πάθη, σεμνὰς Ἐρινῦς τανύποδας, μαθεῖν ἐμὲ πρὸς τῶν Ἀτρειδῶν ὡς διόλλυμαι τάλας. ἴτ’, ὦ ταχεῖαι ποίνιμοί τ’ Ἐρινύες, γεύεσθε, μὴ φείδεσθε πανδήμου στρατοῦ. σὺ δ’, ὦ τὸν αἰπὺν οὐρανὸν διφρηλατῶν Ἥλιε, πατρῴαν τὴν ἐμὴν ὅταν χθόνα ἴδῃς, ἐπισχὼν χρυσόνωτον ἡνίαν ἄγγειλον ἄτας τὰς ἐμὰς μόρον τ’ ἐμὸν γέροντι πατρὶ τῇ τε δυστήνῳ τροφῷ. ἦ που τάλαινα, τήνδ’ ὅταν κλύῃ φάτιν, ἥσει μέγαν κωκυτὸν ἐν πάσῃ πόλῃ. ἀλλ’ οὐδὲν ἔργον ταῦτα θρηνεῖσθαι μάτην· ἀλλ’ ἀρκτέον τὸ πρᾶγμα σὺν τάχει τινί. ὦ φέγγος, ὦ γῆς ἱερὸν οἰκείας πέδον Σαλαμῖνος, ὦ πατρῷον ἑστίας βάθρον, κλειναί τ’ Ἀθῆναι, καὶ τὸ σύντροφον γένος,

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853 859 860

  Patrick J. Finglass κρῆναί τε ποταμοί θ’ οἵδε, καὶ τὰ Τρωικὰ πεδία προσαυδῶ, χαίρετ’, ὦ τροφῆς ἐμοί· τοῦθ’ ὗμιν Αἴας τοὔπος ὕστατον θροεῖ, τὰ δ’ ἄλλ’ ἐν Ἅιδου τοῖς κάτω μυθήσομαι.

865

(Soph. Aj. 815–865) AJ. The slaughterman stands where it will be sharpest — if a man has leisure to make calculations — the gift of Hector, the man most hateful of foreigners to me, and most detestable to see. It stands fixed in the hostile land of the Troad, newly sharpened on an iron-gnawing whetstone. I planted it, securing it well all round, so that it should prove most kind to this man in providing a speedy death. Thus I am well prepared. After this you, o Zeus, as is fitting, be the first to help me. I shall ask to obtain no great favour from you. Send a messenger for me, bearing the grim tidings to Teucer, so that he may be the first to raise me as I lie fallen on this freshly-dripping sword, and I shall not be noticed beforehand by some enemy and thrown out as prey to dogs and birds. Such is my supplication of you, o Zeus. At the same time I call on Hermes of the earth below, escort of souls, to lull me fast to sleep, as with a swift and spasmless leap I break through my ribs with this sword. And I call as my helpers the perpetual virgins, the perpetual overseers of all the sufferings of men, the dread, far-striding Erinyes, to learn how I am destroyed by the Atridae in my wretchedness. Come, o swift and punishing Erinyes: taste the entire army, do not spare them. And you, who drive your chariot through the lofty heaven, the Sun, when you catch sight of my ancestral land, check your golden rein and announce my ruin and my death to my aged father and the wretched woman who nursed me. Wretched woman, I suppose that when she hears this message, she will raise a great lamentation in the whole city. But there is no point in vainly lamenting thus: no, the deed must be begun with speed. O light, o holy ground of my native land of Salamis, o ancestral foundation of my hearth, and famous Athens, and your race kindred to mine, and springs and rivers here, and the Trojan plains I address: farewell, you who have nourished me. This is the last word that Ajax pronounces to you; the rest I shall speak to those below in Hades.

This imposing speech is on quite another scale than the little anonymous fragment. Yet for all its length, what is relevant here is not what it contains but rather what it does not. In the words of Karl Reinhardt, the suicide speech of Sophocles’ Ajax offers “no lament, reproach, world-weariness, aversion, no hint of melancholy”. 4 Sophocles’ Ajax utters plenty of laments and reproaches earlier in the play; but in his final speech he is focused on making due preparations for the task in hand and a series of requests to the gods, before he finally says farewell to both his homeland and the land of Troy and kills himself. Ajax’s passionate hatred for the army which dishonoured him is still there – but there is no explicit reflecting on that dishonour in its own right. Earlier in the drama he had told Athena that he  4 Reinhardt 1947, 36 = 1979, 28.

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had so turned his hand against Agamemnon and Menelaus, “that never again shall they refuse honour to Ajax” (ὥστ’ οὔποτ’ Αἴανθ’ οἵδ’ ἀτιμάσουσ’ ἔτι, 98); later he notes how he is perishing dishonoured by the Argives (ἄτιμος Ἀργείοισιν ὧδ’ ἀπόλλυμαι, 440). But any such reflection at this later point in the play, or any reference to the Judgment of the Arms or any other slight which he has received from the army, or any mention of his recent humiliation at the hands of Athena, who diverted his vengeful purpose away from the sleeping army towards animals, would only detract from the grandeur of Ajax’s final moments, making more difficult the transition to the remaining part of the play in which the rehabilitation of that warrior will be such a prominent theme. The plays diverge in other ways. The anonymous fragment uses the language of realisation: the particle ἄρ’ in the first line implies that Ajax in that play has only just understood (or is presenting himself as having only just understood) the point about dishonour that goes on to make. But this idea of learning is absent from Sophocles’ speech, where Ajax knows just as much as he wants to, and acts and gives instructions to heavenly powers accordingly. A statement of realisation would make him appear less confident and in control — the time for realisation was earlier, whereas now he is acting on the basis of a settled view of his place in the world. So too the reference in the fragment to Ajax as a “free man” and as such particularly bitten by dishonour presupposes a very different figure from the warrior described by Sophocles. The concern that Sophocles’ Ajax shows for his status has nothing to do with his membership of any group, let alone one as capacious as that of all free men, but rather with his belief in his own unique, surpassing excellence: the fragment suggests someone with a more moderate picture of his position in the world. A further potential difference lies in the reference to madness in the fragment (line 5); although the precise referent is unclear, a strong possibility is that it denotes the attack of madness that Ajax experiences during his attempt on the army. That episode, which so dominates the first part of Sophocles’ play, is not mentioned at all by that playwright’s Ajax before he kills himself: such a humiliating episode is not something that would suit the grander tone of that suicide speech. Comparison with the anonymous fragment brings out particular characteristics of the speech in Sophocles. A tiny quotation, with almost no context, turns out to be illuminating for the literary and dramatic critic, and meaning can be elicited from the juxtaposition. For while we do not know when this fragment was written or who wrote it, the one thing that we can be certain about is that someone wrote it as part of a dramatic treatment of Ajax’s suicide. Almost nothing of that treatment has survived: but the little that has, while telling us almost nothing about that vanished play, at least invites us to ponder some of

  Patrick J. Finglass the choices that Sophocles made in his account of the myth, and to observe some of the points that he was so careful to avoid. The bishop deserves our thanks for preserving it.

 Tr. Adesp. fr. 701a TrGF The second text is one of the fragments tucked away at the back of Tragicorum Graecorum fragmenta volume V part 2 (p. 1148). This text was written on an ostrakon, dated on the basis of its script to the first or second century BC, and discovered at Mons Claudianus, a Roman quarry in the eastern desert of Egypt administered by the Roman army. It consists of twelve tragic trimeters. They were published by Cuvigny and Wagner in 1986, and the following year Eric Handley made a vital contribution to their interpretation; yet apart from their republication in Kannicht’s edition, and a reference to them by Wolfgang Luppe 1991, no-one appears to have referred to them since. They read as follows (my translation takes many phrases from Handley’s article; I am unaware of a continuous translation of the piece in any language): σίγησο]ν, ὦ παῖ, καὶ τὸ γενναῖον φρόνει· θανεῖ]ν γὰρ αὐτῇ ἐκπάλαι πεπρωμένον, θέλει]ς κομίσσαι θάνατον ὡς πατροκτό[νος· νῦν γὰρ σὲ κλῄζω· εἰ δ’ ἔβης πρὸς Ἀΐ[δ]α̣ν πρὸς καιρόν, ὀλιγον ἦ[ν] με κηδεύειν, τέκνον· ἐν ταῖς γὰρ ἀρχαῖς νέκυσι πληροῦνται τάφοι{ς} στεφάνοις, μύροισιν, οἰκετῶν κηδεύμασι· ὅσῳ γάρ ἐστι νεαρὰ τὰ κακὰ, συμφλέγει· ὅταν δ’ ἀποστῇ, ἐν ὀλίγῳ χρόν τὸ πῦρ εὐμετάθετον τίθησιν εἰς ἄλλον τρόπον τὸν νοῦν τὸν ἐσθλὸν καὶ μα[ραί]ν̣ ει τ̣ ὴ̣ν̣ φλ̣[όγα. μὴ γὰρ σε[ ]ειν θέλω (Tr. Adesp. fr. 701a TrGF) Be silent, child, and ponder what is noble! For it being long fated for her to die, you wish to bring death back as if you were the killer of your father. For now I ?appeal to you? ? call you? If you had gone to Hades at the due time, it would have been right for me to grieve little for you, my child. For at the first, funerals for the dead are full of garlands, myrrh, and the

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mourning of household members; the more recent the sad event is, the more it conflagrates. 5 When the event is distant, in a short time the fire makes the mind that is good easily transferable to another mode, and diminishes the flame ... For not ... I wish ...

Handley seems to have rightly identified this as from a speech delivered by Pheres to his son Admetus; they have come into conflict, as in Euripides’ Alcestis, because the aged Pheres is unwilling to give up his own life to preserve that of his son, leaving Admetus’ young wife Alcestis to undertake the sacrifice herself. Yet this text seems to have been passed over in discussions of the Alcestis myth, whether in studies of Euripides’ Alcestis; or of the Alcestis rehearsal papyrus (P.Oxy. 4546), which contains a section of stichomythia but only offers the lines spoken by one character, omitting the ones spoken by the other, and thus apparently used by an actor to learn his part; or of the Barcelona Alcestis, a mythological poem of at least 124 Latin hexameters published not long before our ostrakon. This reflects in part the status of the ostrakon as a new text, which for more than two decades was not available in any edition and would be familiar only to readers who happened to have looked at either of the two relevant volumes of the Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik. But even after it was published in an edition, it had the bad fortune to appear in an appendix to a book on a quite different topic. When we add that the text is anonymous, that there is no prospect of ever discovering the name of that author, and that the Greek in the short piece is difficult to understand, it is perhaps not hard to see why the scholarly world appears to have passed it by. While many questions about this piece remain unanswered, there is nevertheless much of interest here. First, the fragment is quite possibly an extract from a larger play, not as a self-contained unit. For while we can infer the myth from the speech, it requires more thought to unravel than we would expect if it were intended as a self-contained speech, as if it were some rhetorical exercise depicting Pheres addressing his son. 6 If this is true, it is a testimony to another Alcestis play, or at least to an episode from that myth turned into dramatic verse, which has left no other trace: an addition to the reception history of this myth. Second, certain linguistic usages mean that this play is post-classical (e.g. ἐκπάλαι and εὐμετάθετον are found no earlier than Imperial Greek, and the instances of hiatus — if not signs of textual corruption, a possibility raised by Handley — also  5 Or, emending to ὅτῳ with Handley, “the sad event burns like the pyre inside the person for whom it is recent”. 6 Similarly, Luppe 1991, 90 argues that lines 1–3 are taken from some wider context and are not simply an amateur’s metrical composition. Luppe seems not to know Handley’s piece, however, since he does not discuss the possibility that the text comes from a version of an Alcestis myth.

  Patrick J. Finglass imply a post-classical text); so if this is from a play of some kind, it is testimony to the continuing productivity of tragic drama as a genre during the Roman period. Third, just as the Ajax fragment came to life when set alongside a comparable passage from a play that survived complete, so too this fragment permits a productive comparison with another drama on the same subject which has survived in full. In particular, the tone that we find here is quite different from anything in Euripides’ play. There Pheres begins: ἥκω κακοῖσι σοῖσι συγκάμνων, τέκνον· ἐσθλῆς γάρ, οὐδεὶς ἀντερεῖ, καὶ σώφρονος γυναικὸς ἡμάρτηκας. ἀλλὰ ταῦτα μὲν φέρειν ἀνάγκη καίπερ ὄντα δύσφορα. δέχου δὲ κόσμον τόνδε καὶ κατὰ χθονὸς ἴτω. τὸ ταύτης σῶμα τιμᾶσθαι χρεών, ἥτις γε τῆς σῆς προύθανε ψυχῆς, τέκνον, καί μ᾿ οὐκ ἄπαιδ᾿ ἔθηκεν οὐδ᾿ εἴασε σοῦ στερέντα γήρᾳ πενθίμῳ καταφθίνειν, πάσαις δ᾿ ἔθηκεν εὐκλεέστερον βίον γυναιξίν, ἔργον τλᾶσα γενναῖον τόδε.

615

620

625

(Eur. Alc. 615–625) I come to share in your trouble, my son. For you have lost, as no one will deny, a noble and virtuous wife. Yet you must bear these things though they are hard to bear. Now take this finery, and let it be buried with her. We must show honour to her corpse seeing that she died to save your life, my son, and did not leave me childless or let me waste away in a stricken old age bereft of you. She has given the lives of all women a fairer repute by daring to do this noble deed. (Translation by D. Kovacs, slightly adapted)

After Admetus angrily rejects his consolation, however, Pheres’ tone changes. In the words of Andreas Markantonatos, “Pheres, fuming with indignation, tears away all Admetus’ protective screens and leaves him with his self-respect in tatters”; 7 the same scholar refers additionally to his “unashamed cynicism, brazen self-centredness, and lack of moral fibre”. 8 Neither this new emotional register, not his original one, however, matches what we find on the ostrakon. There we encounter a Pheres who actively consoles his son in a more direct way than we find in Euripides. The speech is not the opening to their encounter, if the

 7 Markantonatos 2013, 113. 8 Markantonatos 2013, 19.

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supplemented word “be silent” is correct — Pheres is taking control of the exchange, but not in the angry and contemptuous way that he does in Euripides. He still address him “my child”; he urges him to consider what is noble; he seems to appeal to the consoling power of time. It implies a different kind of relationship between the two men compared to anything in the classical tragedy. The process of the thought is still difficult, though it is not clear whether this is the result of textual corruption (i.e. the writer of the ostrakon, for whatever reason, has slightly garbled some earlier, better version of this text) or because the text was always like this (which implies a carelessly written text, perhaps never intended for performance at all). While much here is still uncertain, the contents and the provenance of this tragic text are so strikingly unusual that it should scarcely be ignored by anyone concerned with the Alcestis myth.

 Tr. Adesp. fr. 665 TrGF The last of my examples is a piece of anonymous tragedy that has seen an unusual level of engagement compared to many of these texts, but which could still do with being better known. Here it is, with a translation from Denys Page’s Loeb edition:

ο̣ ὐ̣κ̣ ἀντερῶ̣ σοι· τ[ήνδε τὴ]ν ψ[υ]χὴν ἅπαξ σοί, φιλτάτη τεκοῦσα, παρ[ε]θέμην μολ̣[ών· αἰτῶ· παρ’ αὑτῆι τὸ ξίφος φύλασ̣[σ]έ μοι·

μάλιστα· λέξον “ἐμμενῶ μητρὸς κρίσει”·

ἦ̣ μ̣ὴ̣ν φανεὶς πονηρὸς οὐδὲ ζῆν θέλω· ἀλλ’, Ἑτεόκλες, πίστευσον, οὐ φανήσομαι· σὲ δ’ ἐξελέγξω πάντοτ’ ἠδικηκότα.

Ἐτεοκλέης {δι}δοὺς σκῆπτρα συγγόνωι φ[έρει]ν δειλὸς παρὰ βροτοῖς, εἰπέ μοι, νομίζεται;

σὺ γὰρ οὐκ ἂν ἐδίδους μὴ στρατοὺς ἄγοντί μο̣ [ι·

τὸ μὴ θέλειν σόν ἐστι, τὸ δὲ δοῦναι τύχης·

ἐμοὶ προσάπτεις ὧν σὺ δρᾶις τὰς αἰτίας· σὺ φέρειν γὰρ ἡμᾶς πολεμίου ἠ[ν]άγκασας· εἰ γὰρ ἐμέρ[ι]ζες τὸ διάδημ’ ἄτερ μάχης,

5

10

  Patrick J. Finglass τίς ἦν {ἂν} ἀνάγκη τ̣ ο̣ ῦ̣ φέρειν στράτευμ’ ἐμέ;

κοινῆι πέφυκεν· ὥ[στ]ε μὴ κέλευέ μοι·

ἄλλοις τύραννος τ̣ υ̣γ̣χάνεις, οὐ συγγόνωι·

π̣α̣λ̣ε ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣ στ ̣ ̣ ̣ρουν γενήσομαι.

τὸ πρᾶιον ἡμῶν, μ[ῆ]τερ, οὐκ ἐνετράπη· ὅθεν ἐξ ἀνάγκης ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣ λοιπὸν φράσω· γ̣α̣ί̣ ας γὰρ αὐτὸς ἀκλε̣ ῶ̣ς μ’ ἀπήλασεν Ἄ[ργ]ο̣ υ̣ς̣ τ̣ ε γῆ μοι συμμάχους παρέσχετο καὶ πλείον’ αὐτ̣ ὸ̣ ς̣ στρατὸν ἔχων ἐλήλυ[θα σ̣υ̣ν̣ αν[ τ̣ οιγ̣ὰρ[ προσφ̣ε̣ρ̣[ ὃ παρεθέμην σοι, [μῆτερ

οὐδ’ εἰ Κύκλωπος εἶχον [ ψυχὴν ἄθελκτον ̣ ̣ [ τί γὰρ τυραννεῖς, τί λι[ ἡλίκον ἐφ’ ὑμῖν̣ π[

.... I shall be....

Mother, he took no heed of my gentle spirit, so I must speak henceforth [in anger]. It was he who drove me without honour from the land and the land of Argos provided me with comrades in arms, and I have come myself with a greater army ... therefore ... which I entrusted to you ...

Not even if I had the implacable soul of Cyclops.... For why are you monarch, why ...

Despite the name of brother, [you are] not ... this utterance ... different

Though I am his brother, I must ... (Translation by D. Page)

Here we have what is clearly a scene from a drama, which must be from after the fifth century on the basis of its language, and which corresponds to a scene from Euripides’ Phoenissae of 408. But this is no unthinking adaptation of Euripides’ play. In the words of Edith Hall, “the author of the derivative version has made efforts to make the relationship between Jocasta and her sons more intense and perhaps more believable”. 9 Polynices here hands over his sword to his mother — “a spectacular innovation”, according to Page, who goes on to note: “A new and striking element: Jocasta bids Polynices swear that after the ensuing debate he will abide by her verdict”. 10 In Euripides Polynices swears oaths to Jocasta to guarantee the truth of what he is saying, but there is nothing here or elsewhere in tragedy to match the oath that Polynices swears in this fragment. Hall points to the “maternal authority” (p. 280) that these shifts create, and the (p. 280) “snappy, vituperative

 9 Hall 2007, 280. 10 Page 1942, 174.

  Patrick J. Finglass stichomythia, a more informal way to open their debate scene than the symbouleutic orations with which the equivalent dialogue commences in the Euripidean Phoenician Women”. 11 Can we date this text? Denys Page called it “part of an original Greek Tragedy written in (or not much later than) the 4th century B.C.”, noting that there are no linguistic borrowings from Phoenissae, “not even a linguistic coincidence worthy of the name” ... “it is not a schoolmaster’s or schoolboy’s exercise; it is a piece of an ancient Tragedy, based on one of Eur’ most popular plays, but going beyond its model in content, and avoiding imitation of it in style”. 12 There may be an implication here, though, that a later poet would have leant on Euripides much more, when in fact independence of phraseology is perfectly possible in a poet from centuries after Euripides’ day. According to Hall, the piece “deploys new vocabulary in order to enliven the language, for example the term merizein to diadema, ‘to share the tiara’ ..., in the sense of ‘to split up the Theban kingdom’. The author could have been a contemporary of Xenophon, who refers to the Persian king’s tiara as to diadema in his Cyropaedia (e.g. 8.3.13), a work usually dated to c. 380 BC”. 13 For Vayos Liapis on the other hand, “the above fragment has all the trappings of a school exercise, a rather maladroit remaniement-cumcondensation of the agōn between the sons of Oedipus in Eur. Phoen. 446–637 ... This anonymous piece is likely to be a rhetorical exercise in ēthopoiia, or impersonation, whereby the apprentice orator stages a forensic dispute between the warring sons of Oedipus”. 14 Advocating a later date for the piece on linguistic grounds, Liapis cites a discussion by Raffaella Cribiore which refers to it as “an ēthopoiia centered on Polyneikes ... The student — or, less likely, the teacher — who engaged in this exercise and ended it abruptly, leaving a large unwritten space, introduced the bold innovation of Polyneikes handing his sword to his mother. This mini-agōn, with its concentration of so much into so little and its numerous errors due to phonetic spelling, was not a felicitous attempt to vie with Euripides”. 15 Liapis makes a strong linguistic case that the text is post-classical and probably from the imperial period, indeed perhaps contemporary with the third 11 Cf. Stesichorus fr. 97 F., which also shows the Theban queen mediates between Eteocles and Polynices (cf. Swift 2015, 132–143). My edition makes no reference to Tr. Adesp. fr. 665 TrGF, despite the possibilities for productive comparison. 12 Page 1942, 173; 178–179. 13 Hall 2007, 280–281. Cf. the discussion in Page 1942, 177, which concludes “there are stranger things in our scanty fragments of 4th-century Tragedy”. 14 Liapis 2014, 360, 363. 15 Cribiore 2001a, 230. For papyri in the context of education more generally see Cribiore 2009.

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century papyrus on which it is written. Yet that should not lead us to condemn the piece. A significant achievement in recent scholarship is the understanding that tragedy remained a significant and productive genre long after the deaths of Sophocles and Euripides towards the end of the fifth century BC: that in the fourth century, in the Hellenistic period, and under the Roman empire, Greek tragedy remained an important genre that continued to see significant new works. 16 In this light a whole scene written by an anonymous hand centuries after the composition of the classic play which it reworks is of considerable interest: for it offers a glimpse of a period of the genre that is now almost completely lost. Debate on this substantial fragment up until now has been based on a polarity between “early/good”and “late/bad”, with the quality of the piece a function of its date; but such a schematic approach is itself well out of date. Even if this is a school exercise rather than an extract from a longer drama, that hardly rules out the possibility of creative engagement with the works of the past. This text has lost its author and its context, and is probably a late example of a genre that would not have much longer to run — but it is none the worse for that, demonstrating as it does the continuing vitality of the genre, which centuries after Euripides was still striving after mythological innovation even in a work destined perhaps for page rather than for stage. Here too, then, is one more way that appreciation of anonymous fragments can give us a better appreciation of Greek tragedy as a whole.

Bibliography Cockle, W.E.H. (1987), Euripides. Hypsipyle. Text and Annotation based on a Re-examination of the Papyri, Testi e Commenti 7, Rome. Cropp, M.J. (2019), Minor Greek Tragedians, Volume 1: The Fifth Century. Fragments from the Tragedies with Selected Testimonia, Oxford. Collard, C./Cropp, M.J. (2008), Euripides. Fragments, 2 vols, Loeb Classical Library 504, 506, Cambridge, MA/London. Collard, C./Cropp, M.J./Lee, K.H. (1995), Euripides. Selected Fragmentary Plays, Volume Ι: Telephus, Cretans, Stheneboea, Bellerophon, Cresphontes, Erectheus, Phaethon, Wise Melanippe, Captive Melanippe, Warminster.

 16 For fourth-century tragedy see Csapo et al. 2014; for Hellenistic tragedy see Kotlińska-Toma 2015 with Coo 2017 (a detailed review); for the longue durée of tragedy from c. 400 BC to AD 400 see Liapis/Petridis 2019.

  Patrick J. Finglass Collard, C./Cropp, M.J./Gibert, J. (2004), Euripides. Selected Fragmentary Plays, Volume ΙΙ: Alexandros (together with Palamedes and Sisyphus), Oedipus, Andromeda, Antiope, Hypsipyle, Archelaus, Warminster. Coo, L. (2017), Review of Kotlińska-Toma 2015, Gnomon 89, 167–170. Cozzoli, A.-T. (2001), Euripide. Cretesi, Test e Commenti 15, Pisa/Rome. Cribiore, R. (2001a), Gymnastics of the Mind. Greek Education in Hellenistic and Roman Egypt, Princeton. Cribiore, R. (2001b), “The grammarian’s choice: the popularity of Euripides’ Phoenissae in Hellenistic and Roman education”, in: Y.L. Too (ed.), Education in Greek and Roman Antiquity, Leiden/Boston/Cologne, 241–259. Cribiore, R. (2009), “Education in the papyri”, in: R.S. Bagnall (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Papyrology, Oxford/New York, 320–337. Csapo, E./Goette, H.R./Green, J.R./Wilson, P. (eds) (2014), Greek Theatre in the Fourth Century B.C., Berlin/Boston. Cuvigny, H./Wagner, G. (1986) “Ostraca grecs du Mons Claudianus”, ZPE 62, 63–73. Davies, M./Finglass, P.J. (2014), Stesichorus. The Poems, Cambridge Classical Texts and Commentaries 54, Cambridge. Diggle, J. (1970), Euripides. Phaethon, Cambridge Classical Texts and Commentaries 12, Cambridge. Domouzi, A. (2020), Euripides: Melanippe Wise and Melanippe Captured, Texte und Kommentare 63, Berlin/Boston. Finglass, P.J. (2011), Sophocles. Ajax, Cambridge Classical Texts and Commentaries 48, Cambridge. Finglass, P.J. (2014a), “Thebais?”, in: M. Davies/P.J. Finglass, Stesichorus. The Poems, Cambridge Classical Texts and Commentaries 54, Cambridge, 356–392. Finglass, P.J. (forthcoming), “Editing anonymous ancient Greek tragedy”. Hall, E. (2007), “Greek tragedy 430–380 BC”, in: R. Osborne (ed.), Debating the Athenian Cultural Revolution. Art, Literature, Philosophy, and Politics 430–380 BC, Cambridge, 264– 287. Handley, E.W. (1987), “O.Mons Claudianus 13 (ZPE 62, 1986, 71ff.)”, ZPE 68, 11–13. Henry, W.B. (2014), “5184. Tragedy”, The Oxyrhynchus Papyri 79, 6–9. Hornblower, S. (2019), “Hellenistic tragedy and satyr-drama; Lycophron’s Alexandra”, in: V. Liapis/A.K. Petrides (eds), Greek Tragedy after the Fifth Century. A Survey from ca. 400 BC to ca. AD 400, Cambridge, 90–124. Karamanou, I. (2017), Euripides. Alexandros, Text und Kommentare 57, Berlin/Boston. Kotlińska-Toma, A. (2015), Hellenistic Tragedy. Texts, Translations and a Critical Survey, London/New Delhi/New York/Sydney. Kovacs, D. (1994), Euripides. Cyclops. Alcestis. Medea, Loeb Classical Library 12, Cambridge, MA/London. Kyriakou, P./Rengakos, A. (eds) (2016), Wisdom and Folly in Euripides, Trends in Classics supplement 31, Berlin/Boston. Liapis, V. (2014), “The fragments of Euripides’ Oedipus: a reconsideration”, TAPA 144, 307– 370. Lloyd-Jones, H. (2003), Sophocles. Fragments, Loeb Classical Library 483, Cambridge, MA/ London. [Corrected version of 1996 impression] Luppe, W. (1991), “Literarische Texte”, APF 37, 77–91.

Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta Volume II: Old Texts, New Opportunities  

Markantonatos, A. (2013), Euripides’ Alcestis. Narrative, Myth, and Religion, Untersuchungen zur antiken Literatur und Geschichte 112, Berlin/Boston. Milo, D. (2008), Il Tereo di Sofocle, Bibliotheca Antiqua 2, Naples. Müller, C.W. (2000), Euripides. Philoktet, Texte und Kommentare 21, Berlin/New York. Page, D.L. (1942), Select Papyri. III. Literary Papyri. Poetry, London/Cambridge, MA. [Revised impression of 1941 printing] Parca, M.G. (1991), Ptocheia or Odysseus in Disguise at Troy (P. Köln VI 245), American Studies in Papyrology 31, Atlanta. Preiser, C. (2000), Euripides. Telephos, Spudasmata 78, Hildesheim/Zürich/New York. Reinhardt, K. (1947), Sophokles, Dritte Auflage, Frankfurt am Main. Reinhardt, K. (1979), Sophocles, translated by H. and D. Harvey, Oxford. Sims, T. (2018), A Commentary on the Fragments of Fourth-century Tragedy, Diss. Nottingham. Sommerstein, A.H. (2008) Aeschylus. Fragments, Loeb Classical Library 505, Cambridge, MA/ London. Sommerstein, A.H./Talboy, T.H. (2012), Sophocles. Selected Fragmentary Plays, Volume II: The Epigoni, Oenomaus, Palamedes, The Arrival of Nauplius, Nauplius and the Beacon, The Shepherds, Triptolemus, Oxford. Sommerstein, A.H./Fitzpatrick, D./Talboy, T. (2006), Sophocles. Selected Fragmentary Plays, Volume I: Hermione, Polyxene, The Diners, Tereus, Troilus, Phaedra, Oxford. Swift, L. (2015), “Stesichorus on stage”, in: P.J. Finglass/A. Kelly (eds), Stesichorus in Context, Cambridge, 125–144. Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta. Vol. 1 Didascaliae Tragicae, Catalogi Tragicorum et Tragoediarum, Testimonia et Fragmenta Tragicorum Minorum, ed. B. Snell, 2nd ed. rev. R. Kannicht. Göttingen 19711, 19862. Vol. 2 Fragmenta Adespota, ed. R. Kannicht and B. Snell. 1981. Vol. 3 Aeschylus, ed. S.L. Radt. 1985. Vol. 4 Sophocles, ed. S.L. Radt. 19771, 19992. Vol. 5 Euripides, 2 parts, ed. R. Kannicht. 2004. Wright, M. (2016), The Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy, Volume 1: Neglected Authors, London/New York. Wright, M. (2019), The Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy, Volume 2: Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides, London/New York. Zouganeli, A. (2017), Les fragments des poètes tragiques grecs du quatrième siècle avant notre ère: édition, traduction et commentaire, Diss. Paris.

Kyriakos Tsantsanoglou

παῖς μάργος

The passage I intend to treat comes from P.Oxy. 2256 fr. 9 (a) and (b), a most important Aeschylus papyrus that consists of at least 89 fragments. 1 The text is reproduced from the edition of Stefan Radt in TrGF III (Aeschylus), inc. fab. F 281a and 281b. E. Lobel, the first editor, The Oxyrhynchus Papyri 20, London 1952, 36 ff., ascribed the two fragments to a satyr-play, a view, however, that did not meet general acceptance. So, the usual reference to the play where the fragments belonged was “Dike play” or “Dike-Drama” from the character speaking. I do not plan to discuss here the nature of the play, but, preliminarily to a comprehensive account of my views, I shall confidently contend that it is a satyr-play and, in particular, the satyr-play of Aeschylus’ Argonautic trilogy (TrGF III, TRI B XII). My aim here is confined to identifying the παῖς μάργος who is mentioned in line 31 and described thereafter till the end of the column (and the fragment) in line 41:

30

35

40

]ν[ ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣]ο ἐπισπέ ̣ ̣ ̣[ ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣] ̣ ̣[ ̣] πό]λ̣ις τ̣ ι ς οὔτε δῆμος οὔτ᾽ ἔτη̣ς ἀνὴρ τ̣ οιάνδε μοῖραν π[αρ]ὰ̣ θεῶν καρπουμένη[ τ̣ έ̣ κμαρ δὲ λέξ̣ω τῶ̣ι ̣ τόδ᾽ εὐδερ̣κὲ[ς] φερε[ ̣ ̣] ̣[ ἔθρε[ψ ̣ ] παῖδα μάργον ὃν τί̣κ̣τ̣ε̣ι [ Ἥρα μιγε̣ ῖσα Ζηνὶ θυμοιδ[ δ]ύ̣σα̣ρ̣κτ[ο]ν, αἰδὼς δ᾽ οὐκ ἐνῆ[ν] φ̣ρ̣[ον]ήματι· ] ̣υκτα τῶν ὁδοιπόρων βέλη ] ̣δως ἀγκύλαισιν ἀρταμων· ] ῀ ̣ν ἔχ̣[αι]ρ̣ε κἀγέλα κακὸν ]ν ῎̣ζοι φόνος· ]μ̣ουμένη ] ι̣ πρ[ ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣]γον χέρα ]οῦν ἐνδίκως κ̣ικλήσκεται ]νιν ἔνδικ̣[ ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣ ̣] ̣ος·

στάζ̣[οι·

Before proceeding to a detailed examination of the text, it would be useful to note the attempts made for identifying the παῖς μάργος. He is mentioned by the goddess Dike to an unidentified addressee, but clearly the chorus-leader, as evidence of her power. He is a son of Zeus and Hera, whose rearing they entrusted to Dike.

 1 Or 90 fragments, if P. Gen. inv. 98 (Funghi/Martinelli 1996–1997 [1998], 7–17) comes from the same hand. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-012

  Kyriakos Tsantsanoglou He was a violent, irritable, disobedient, and shameless boy. He used to take delight in shooting and hacking the passers-by. The description ends with the etymology of his name, which, however, did not survive. The only legitimate male offspring of Zeus and Hera was Ares. Hephaistos was a son of Hera alone, and was certainly quite improbable to have displayed such a violent behaviour. Lobel thought of Ares, but did not find the arrows that are mentioned at line 34 as the most likely description of the god’s arms. Also the behaviour of the παῖς μάργος did not remind him anything of Ares’ activity. He suspected that a highway robber was in question, someone like Sinis, and he attempted several supplements and emendations of the text with this identification in mind, although he explicitly states that Sinis could not have been the character spoken of, since his parents were not Zeus and Hera but, in most versions of the myth, Poseidon and Sylea. D.S. Robertson 2 insisted on Ares reminding the god’s trial before the court of Areopagus for murdering Halirrhothios. H. Lloyd-Jones 3 objected that “in the usual version of this story, Ares was not an aggressor, but was defending the virtue of his daughter Alcippe”. And, certainly, the killing was not made during the god’s boyhood, as the papyrus text clearly suggests. Yet, Lloyd-Jones considers Ares as surely the subject of lines 31 ff. But he associates the story with Cycnus, son of Ares, who persecuted visitors to Delphi and was killed by Heracles. He reminds that, according to Aristophanes, Ran. 963, a Cycnus appeared in an Aeschylean play. 4 But, even if we set aside the question whether the Cycnus referred to by Aristophanes was the son of Ares or the king of Kolonai in the southern Troad, 5 the παῖς μάργος is specifically defined in the text as son, not grandson, of Zeus. F. C. Görschen 6 returned to Sinis, connecting the story with Aeschylus’ satyr-play Theoroi or Isthmiastai, both the identification of the boy and the ascription to the play being impossible. An entirely different approach to the question of identifying the παῖς μάργος, no doubt the most thorough one, was made by Ph. J. Kakridis. 7 His candidate was Heracles, who, though in conventional genealogies was considered a son of Zeus and Alkmene, in some versions of the myth was referred to as son of Hera. A Theban hymn is quoted by Ptolemaeus Chennus, 3.14, p. 24 Chatzis, describing the hero as Διὸς καὶ Ἥρας υἱός. On several Etruscan mirrors Hera is represented as  2 Robertson 1953. 3 Lloyd-Jones 1957, 577. 4 First proposed by F. G. Welcker; see references at TrGF III p. 230, under **ΚΥΚΝΟΣ?. 5 Tenedians are mentioned in fr. 451o.53, which Lobel associated with Tenes, son of Cycnus and king of Tenedos, and Mette ascribed to an unattested Aeschylean play Ten(n)es. 6 Görschen 1955, 139ff. 7 Kakridis 1962.

παῖς μάργος  

suckling the baby hero, in one of them in particular an inscription in Etruscan identifies him as “Heracles, son of Juno”. Heracles is also referred to by Diodorus Siculus, 4.39.2, as Hera’s adopted son. Finally, in a poetic inscription of the second century CE found at Rome (Kaibel, Epigr. Gr. 831), the hero is mentioned as adopted son of Dike. As for the boy’s bloodthirsty feelings, Ph. Kakridis reminds of the story of the mutilation of the heralds of Erginos, as well as of some other appearances of Heracles as a primitive and savage person. 8 He therefore supplemented exempli gratia the etymologizing lines 40–41 of the papyrus as follows: [Ἡρακλέης] οὖν ἐνδίκως κικλήσκεται [Ἥρας γὰρ ἔσχεν ἶ]νιν ἔνδικ[ον κλ]έος.

The legend about Hera suckling Heracles, illustrated on a mid-4th century Apulian vase BM F107, must go back to the Theban tradition mentioned by Pausanias, 9.25.2, that Zeus deceived his wife so as to suckle the newborn baby: δείκνυται δέ τι χωρίον ἔνθα Ἥραν Θηβαῖοί φασιν Ἡρακλεῖ παιδὶ ἔτι ἐπισχεῖν γάλα κατὰ δή τινα ἀπάτην ἐκ Διός. It is also narrated by Diodorus Siculus: Ἀλκμήνη δὲ τεκοῦσα καὶ φοβηθεῖσα τὴν τῆς Ἥρας ζηλοτυπίαν, ἐξέθηκε τὸ βρέφος εἰς τὸν τόπον ὃς νῦν ἀπ᾽ ἐκείνου καλεῖται πεδίον Ἡράκλειον. καθ᾽ ὃν δὴ χρόνον Ἀθηνᾶ μετὰ τῆς Ἥρας προσιοῦσα, καὶ θαυμάσασα τοῦ παιδίου τὴν φύσιν, συνέπεισε τὴν Ἥραν ὑποσχεῖν τὴν θηλήν. τοῦ δὲ παιδὸς ὑπὲρ τὴν ἡλικίαν βιαιότερον ἐπισπασαμένου τὴν θηλήν, ἡ μὲν Ἥρα διαλγήσασα τὸ βρέφος ἔρριψεν, Ἀθηνᾶ δὲ κομίσασα αὐτὸ πρὸς τὴν μητέρα τρέφειν παρεκελεύσατο. (Diod. Sic. 4.9.6)

The same author relates another legend about Hera’s supposed bearing of Heracles: προσθετέον δ᾽ ἡμῖν τοῖς εἰρημένοις ὅτι μετὰ τὴν ἀποθέωσιν αὐτοῦ Ζεὺς Ἥραν μὲν ἔπεισεν υἱοποιήσασθαι τὸν Ἡρακλέα καὶ τὸ λοιπὸν εἰς τὸν ἅπαντα χρόνον μητρὸς εὔνοιαν παρέχεσθαι, τὴν δὲ τέκνωσιν γενέσθαι φασὶ τοιαύτην · τὴν Ἥραν ἀναβᾶσαν ἐπὶ κλίνην καὶ τὸν Ἡρακλέα προσλαβομένην πρὸς τὸ σῶμα διὰ τῶν ἐνδυμάτων ἀφεῖναι πρὸς τὴν γῆν, μιμουμένην τὴν ἀληθινὴν γένεσιν· ὅπερ μέχρι τοῦ νῦν ποιεῖν τοὺς βαρβάρους ὅταν θετὸν υἱὸν ποιεῖσθαι βούλωνται. (Diod. Sic. 4.39.2)

 8 None of these appearances is, however, placed in the hero’s childhood. One might possibly mention the killing of Linos, Heracles’s teacher of music, by the child hero either with a large stone or the lyre or the plectrum; Apollod. 2.4.9, Ael., VH 3.32, al. The killing is represented on fifth century Attic vases, e.g. the red-figure cup by Duris in Munich (2646).

  Kyriakos Tsantsanoglou The description seems to imply a newborn child, but it is actually a newborn soul after the hero has met his death and has been deified, and after Hera eventually receded from her earlier wrath. I do not know whether or not the habit is barbaric, as Diodorus claims, or how old the legend is. Had it not been for the exceptional case of Heracles, it might remind of the favourable treatment of the initiated in afterlife: e.g., Pind. fr. 137 ὄλβιος ὅστις ἰδὼν κεῖν᾽ [sc. τὰ ἐν Ἐλευσῖνι μυστήρια] εἶσ᾽ ὑπὸ χθόν᾽· οἶδε μὲν βίου τελευτάν, οἶδεν δὲ διόσδοτον ἀρχάν; Pelinna gold lamellae D2 Tzif. νῦν ἔθανες καὶ νῦν ἐγένου. It is true that Ptolemaeus Chennus, Περὶ παραδόξου ἱστορίας or Περὶ καινῆς ἱστορίας, Phot. Bibl. cod. 190, 148a.38 Bekker; 3.14, p. 24 Chatzis, poses the question τίνος ἐστὶν ὁ ὕμνος ὁ ᾀδόμενος ἐν Θηβαίοις εἰς Ἡρακλέα, ἐν ᾧ λέγει Διὸς καὶ Ἥρας υἱός; Photius’ abridgement does not give the answer, but the Patriarch’s criticism about the author’s reliability (which, combined with the book’s particular contents set out in the Bibliotheca, led to his modern description as “fantasist”) is remarkable: 146b.5 ἔχει δὲ πολλὰ καὶ τερατώδη καὶ κακόπλαστα, καὶ τὸ ἀλογώτερον, ὅτι καὶ ἐνίων μυθαρίων αἰτίας, δι᾽ ἃς ὑπέστησαν, ἀποδιδόναι πειρᾶται. ὁ μέντοι τούτων συναγωγεὺς ὑπόκενός τέ ἐστι (“hollow, flabby”) καὶ πρὸς ἀλαζονείαν ἐπτοημένος (“with a passion toward charlatanry, imposture”), καὶ οὐδ᾽ ἀστεῖος τὴν λέξιν. Be that as it may, the Theban hymn with the specific invocation must have existed. The paradox awaited must lie in the author’s omitted answer. It is, however, expected that given the tradition of the hero’s deification and his concurrent solemnized adoption by Hera, he might well be invoked as son of Zeus and Hera. Still, this has nothing to do with the hero’s earthly boyhood. Finally, as mentioned above, in a second century CE poetic inscription found in Rome, Heracles appears as given by Zeus to Dike as adopted son: 7 τῶ σὲ καὶ υἷα Δίκηι Κρονίδης θετὸν ἐγγυάλιξε, | εὖτε μιν ὑβρισταὶ φῶτες ἄτιμον ἄγον. The difference between nurse of the παῖς μάργος and adoptive mother of the hero is negligible. There is, however, a serious difference between the mythological reports of the inscription and the papyrus. In the latter, Zeus and Hera entrust the rearing of their baby or child son to Dike as a nurse in order to make him docile. In the inscription, however, it is the grown up hero that Zeus offers to Dike as her adopted son, when insolent mortals would not honour her, i.e., when they would not respect moral law. Heracles has already carried out his labours and so has exhibited his devotion to justice. Actually, he is to serve as Dike’s companion and assistant, killing wild beasts, but also (5 f.) ὑπε[ρ]φιάλους ἀδίκους τε ἄνδρας, thus enforcing justice on men. 9  9 Kaibel mentions the fragmentary epic verse which mentions Heracles as “the most righteous slayer” (δικαιοτάτου δὲ φονῆος). It was attributed to the sixth century BC epic poet Peisandros

παῖς μάργος  

D.F. Sutton, 10 developing Kakridis’s findings, but rejecting the ascription to the Aitnaiai, goes on to propose that the Dike fragment came from the Kerykes, an Aeschylean satyr-play, in which Heracles must have had a major part. The play had already been associated by B.A. Van Groningen 11 with the story of the harsh punishment of the heralds of king Erginos by Heracles. A. Wessels 12 considers Sutton’s proposal “bloße Spekulation”. Now, however, I believe that the basic evidence is changed altogether. Fr. 9 (b) of the same papyrus (fr. 281 b Radt), which Lobel thought to come “apparently from the bottom of the column immediately following that partly preserved in fr. 9 (a)”, i.e., to belong to the right of 9 (a), if placed on the left part of the bottom of the preserved column (fig. 2), restores considerably lines 36–41 and yields satisfactory sense. The punishment inflicted upon the boy by Dike is now clear, and, what is more, the etymology is revealed. First, I reproduce the text of fr. 281 b from Radt’s edition: 281 b

5

]. .[ ]εαcε ̣[ ]ω̣ τόδ᾽ ἐχθ ̣[ ̣] ̣[ ]ερρύθμιξα κα[ ]παισα· παι ̣ ̣[ ]ητο παίεσθαί ̣[

And then, I present the two fragments joined together. Bars indicate the meeting point of the two papyrus fragments.

40

̣ ̣ ̣ ̣ ] ̣ ̣|[ ̣ ̣ ̣ ]῀̣ν ἔχ[αι]ρε κἀγέλα κακὸν . . .]ε̣ αcε ̣|[ ]ν ̣ζοι φόνος· ·στάζ̣[οι· . . .]ω̣ τόδ᾽ ἐχθ ̣[.] ̣|[. . . . . . . . .]μ̣ουμένη . .]ερρύθμιξα κα|ὶ πρ[. . . . .]γον χέρα ]παισα· παι ̣ ̣|οῦν ἐνδίκως κικλήσκεται, ]η τὸ παίεσθαί | νιν ἔνδικ̣[. . . . .] ̣ος·

 of Kamiros who was credited with an Ἡράκλεια (fr. 10 Kinkel). It is now believed to come from the late (third century CE) epic poet Peisandros of Laranda (Keydell 1935, 309 and n. 4 = Kl. Schr. p. 361; M. Davies publishes it as “Pisandri Camirensis fragmentum spurium” and Alb. Bernabé as “Pisander” fr. 10). 10 Sutton 1974 includes the play in the list; id. 1983. 11 Van Groningen 1930. 12 Krumeich/Pechstein/Seidensticker 1999, 98–106, esp. 105–106.

  Kyriakos Tsantsanoglou

Fig. 2: P.Oxy. 2256 fr. 9 a and 9 b = Aesch. fr. 281 a + 281 b, lines 31–41.

Finally, I give the reconstructed text of lines 27–41, i.e., the verses where Dike relates the παῖς μάργος incident as evidence of her power.

30

35

(Δι.) οὐκ ἄν τις οὖ]ν [ἀρνοῖτ]ο ἐπισπέσ̣θ̣ α̣[ι Δίκ]η̣ι ̣, πό]λις τις οὔτε δῆμος οὔτ᾽ ἔτης ἀνήρ, τ̣ οιάνδε μοῖραν π[αρ]ὰ̣ θεῶν καρπουμένη[ι. τ̣ έκμαρ δὲ λέξ̣ω σ̣ọι̣ τόδ᾽ εὐδερκέ[ς.] Χο. φέρε. Δι. ἔθρε[ψα] παῖδα μάργον, ὃν τίκ̣τεν̣ [ποτὲ] Ἥρα μιγε̣ ῖσα Ζηνί, θυμοιδ[ῆ, κακόν,] δ]ύ̣σα̣ρ̣κτ[ο]ν, αἰδὼς δ᾽ οὐκ ἐνῆ[ν] φ̣ρ̣[ον]ήματι. ἀμῶν φο]ρ̣υκτὰ τῶν ὁδοιπόρων μέλη ἠρτᾶτ᾽ ἀκ]η̣δῶς ἀγκύλαισιν ἀρτάμων. τὸ θέ]͜α̣μ̣[α ὁρ]ῶ̣ν ἔχ[αι]ρε κἀγέλα κακὸν κἀλ]έ̣ ας ἔα̣[σκε σάρκας, ὧ]ν ὄζοι φόνος. ·στάζ̣[οι· κἀγ]ὼ τόδ᾽ ἐχθα̣[ί]ρ̣[ουσα καὶ θυ]μ̣ουμένη εὖ] ἐρρύθμιξα καὶ πρ[οσήγα]γον χέρα

παῖς μάργος  

40

κἄ]παισα· παῖς δ᾽ οὖν ἐνδίκως κικλήσκεται, ὁτι]ὴ τὸ παίεσθαί νιν ἔνδικ̣[ον τέ]λ̣ος.

27 usque ad ἀρνοῖτο suppl. Fraenkel | Δίκηι Vysoký 30 c̣ọι̣ post correctionem e cω dub. Ts., τῶι (‘the ω is anomalously made and the presumed ι has lost its top and might perhaps be read υ’) Lobel | antilaben coniecit Ts. 32 κακόν Ts. 34 ἀμῶν Ts. | φο]ρ̣υκτὰ Lobel | βέλη pap., μέλη Lobel 35 ἠρτᾶτ᾽ ἀκ]η̣δῶc Ts. | ἀρτάμων gen. pl.; initio -ω̂ ν (participium) scriptum erat, postea accentus circumflexi angulati sinistra pars deleta est, ut accentus gravis confectus sit, i.e. -ὼν barytonon 36–41 fr. 281b coniunxit et omnia coniecit Ts. “Then nobody would refuse to obey Dike, neither city nor commoner or gentleman, seeing that she enjoys such a lot by the gods. And I shall relate to you this clearly seen proof. — Go on! — I nurtured a ferocious boy, whom Hera bore once after mating with Zeus, irascible, malicious, disobedient, with no shame in his mind. Hacking off blood-stained the limbs of the passers-by, he hung them recklessly on butchers’ hooks. Watching the spectacle, he rejoiced and laughed at their misfortune and used to leave out in the sun the flesh-pieces, whose gore stank (or ‘dripped down’). And I, detesting this and being angry, brought him to order and stretched out my hand and smacked him (κἄπαισα); and so he is justly called child (παῖς), since being smacked (τὸ παίεσθαι) is his just destination”.

Thus, we have an amusing etymology of the general category to which the boy belongs, but his name is still missing. Identifying the παῖς μάργος can perhaps be useful for spotting the mythical area of fr. 281ab. Lloyd-Jones, 577, is no doubt right that it is uncertain whether the narration about the boy relates or not to the main theme of the play, and so an investigation from this starting-point might misdirect us to alien destinations. However, no matter if the παῖς μάργος in the satyr-play was a diverting detail or not, the appearance of Dike must have had a mythological and dramatic explanation. Narrations of incidents parallel with the main theme of the play are found in drama, but, as far as I know, only in choral parts. Here, since the παῖς incident is presented as evidence of Dike’s power, it is very likely that it sheds light on her role. The story may have been made up by Aeschylus for playing with the παίειν – παῖς pun, but it was concocted about a familiar god, known to the audience, since he was a son of Zeus and Hera. His involvement in the satyr-play story, most likely indirect, must be made not with the characteristics of his boyhood, but those he acquired after his disciplining by Dike. On the other hand, the new characteristics cannot be entirely irrelevant to the god’s innate temperament. Otherwise, the detailed description of his boyhood acts would be pointless. It must be left to the viewer to determine whether the god’s old characteristics survive in the new ones, only cloaked under metaphors so as to appear pleasing and attractive. Literarily, since Aeschylus has invented a story about a son of Zeus and Hera, yet he plans to conceal the god’s name, he must have given a clue to the viewers

  Kyriakos Tsantsanoglou for making the recognition on their own. The clue is found in the opening of Dike’s story: ἔθρεψα παῖδα μάργον. The “mad, rampant, furious, violent boy” appears elsewhere too in Greek literature. Already in Alcman, PMG 58, Ἀφροδίτα μὲν οὐκ ἔστι, μάργος δ᾽ Ἔρως οἷα παίσδει ἄκρ᾽ ἐπ᾽ ἄνθη καβαίνων, ἃ μή μοι θίγηις, τῶ κυπαιρίσκω. (Alcm. fr. 58 PMG)

he appears, thanks to Bentley’s certain supplement, qualifying Ἔρως, in a charming erotic song of young girls. In later poetry, μάργος occurs as a typical epithet of Ἔρως: Αp. Rhod. 3.120 μάργος Ἔρως λαιῆς ὑποΐσχανε χειρὸς ἀγοστόν, Nonnus, Dion. 10.337 ἵστατο μάργος Ἔρως, 33.180 καὶ μάργος Ἔρως ἀνεπάλλετο κόλπου μητρὸς ἑῆς, 48.277 μάργος Ἔρως ἐρέθιζεν. Was, however, Eros a son of Zeus and Hera? The parentage of Eros was one of the most complicated questions in antiquity. As W. S. Barrett puts it on Eur. Hipp. 534, referring to Page, Sappho and Alc., 269–272, “Eros, being the mere personification of an emotion, had no myth, no cult [ ], and no traditional parentage [ ], and the poets on occasion provide him with parents more or less as the fancy takes them”. Leaving aside the god’s cosmogonic hypostasis, the most familiar version connects him with Aphrodite, whether with no father name, or Aphrodite and Ares (Simon. PMG 575, Nonnus Dion. 5.93) or Aphrodite and Ouranos (possibly Hes. Theog. 201, Sapph. 198 b) or Aphrodite and Hephaestus (alii, ap. Serv. in Aen. i.664 al.) or Aphrodite and Hermes (Cic. Nat. 3.59) or Aphrodite and Zeus (Verg. Cir. 134) or Artemis and Hermes (Cic. Nat. 3.60) or Gaia and Ouranos (Sapph. 198 a) or Iris and Zephyrus (Alc. 327) or Eileithyia (Olen ap. Paus. 9.27.1) or Zeus (Eur. Hipp. 534) or Penia and Poros (Pl. Symp. 178), and possibly even more parentages. Cf. Pl. Symp. 178 b γονῆς γὰρ Ἔρωτος οὔτ᾽ εἰσὶν οὔτε λέγονται; Theocr. id. 13.1–2 τὸν Ἔρωτα ... ᾧτινι τοῦτο θεῶν ποκα τέκνον ἔγεντο, where the Scholiast notes: ἀμφιβάλλει τίνος υἱὸν εἴπῃ τὸν Ἔρωτα. Ἡσίοδος μὲν γὰρ Χάους καὶ Γῆς, Σιμωνίδης Ἄρεος καὶ Ἀφροδίτης, Ακουσίλαος Νυκτὸς καὶ Αἰθέρος, Αλκαῖος Ἴριδος καὶ Ζεφύρου, Σαπφὼ Γῆς καὶ Οὐρανοῦ καὶ ἄλλοι ἄλλως. Cf. AG 5.177.5 (Meleager) πατρὸς δ᾽ οὐκέτ᾽ ἔχω φράζειν τίνος, Antagoras (Powell, C.A., Epigr. 1) ὅ τοι γένος ἀμφίσβητον. Zeus is mentioned in Verg. Cir. 134 as father of Eros by Aphrodite, being therefore both pater atque avus idem Iuppiter, but not by Hera. Hipp. 534, Ἔρως ὁ Διὸς παῖς, was considered as the only mention of Zeus as father of Eros (apart from Virgil Ciris) and an innovation of Euripides. Now, it appears that Aeschylus had preceded, but whether the paternity of Zeus was his innovation or not, I cannot say. Though, I believe that the story about Dike as

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Eros’ nurse, the account of the boy’s horrible doings, and, naturally, of his punishment are all Aeschylus’ invention. Moreover, the dreadful arrows, with which the μάργος παῖς committed his criminal acts, continued being his main attribute after Dike disciplined him (Eros Archer), inflicting, however, a different sort of injuries to his targets. For summing up what we know till now, it is necessary to refer also to the previous verses of the fragment, not given above. Dike was sent by Zeus on a special mission to a certain place and people (12 ἐς γῆν τήνδ᾽), and not vaguely to the earth and the humans. What else can that mission be if not to restore justice in a case in which it had been violated? But the violation does not seem to have been committed by a single hero or a genos, but by a whole people. Whether Dike is speaking of her prerogatives or her duties or of her reception into the specific place she has been sent to, her references to the citizens are unspecified expressions and general plurals. On the other hand, combining this impression with Dike’s statement that she is sent to those toward whom Zeus is well-disposed (11 πέμπει δέ μ᾽ αὐτὸς οἷσιν εὐμεν[ὴς κυρεῖ), we may reasonably surmise that Dike is not coming for punishing the people, but perhaps for offering them a chance to redeem. The Satyr-chorus, not only are unable to identify Dike but also do not seem to be friendly to her or to law and justice, the principles that she stands for, as can be inferred from her threats — to which the etymology of παῖς from παίεσθαι must be implicitly included, since the Satyrs are usually designated as παῖδες. However, these threats are expressly addressed to the στρατός of the country. The word cannot be given the vague sense “people, population”, as some times in Aeschylus, mainly in the Eumenides, because such a meaning would lead to the conclusion that the people of this country consisted of Satyrs. Yet, in the satyrplays known to us, Satyrs have always a status auxiliary to humans or to gods, whether as slaves or hired hands or assistants or followers. An army consisting of Satyrs, serving the local people, would fit their usual role. But which human society might need an army of Satyrs? Now, if we combine the arrival of Dike with the story about her foster son, μάργος Ἔρως, can we conjecture that he may be involved in the communal violation that dictated her coming? However, love affairs are normally individual cases. A collective love affair that ended up in violation of justice requiring Dike’s intervention is a rather rare situation. Be that as it may, these observations, surmises, and queries converge to one conclusion: the legend about the Lemnian women. It is a case of collective crime, in which Dike is closely involved. In the first stasimon of Choephoroi, Aeschylus illustrates the enormity of Clytaemnestra’s crime with three mythical cases of female passion. The third and worst of all

  Kyriakos Tsantsanoglou (631 πρεσβεύεται λόγωι) is the crime of the Lemnian women, who murdered every man on the island, their fathers and husbands, a crime which is synonymous to horror (631–638). The next strophic pair (639–651) is devoted to Dike, the goddess who, when violated, inflicts heavy penalties on the violators, a statement that is forthwith connected with the revenge of Orestes being plotted at the time. An expression parallel to the proverbial Λήμνιον κακόν or Λήμνια κακά (Aesch. Cho. 631, Hdt. 6.138.20–24) was Λημνία δίκη, which Photius (λ 269) and Suda (λ 448) interpret by ἡ κακίστη. Further, it is a case where μάργος Ἔρως is involved, both in the beginning of the story and in its final solution. Yet, in spite of the seriousness of the crime, Zeus may be well-disposed toward the women, because the previous behaviour of the men had also been condemnable: they had sexually abandoned them in favour of Thracian slave women. If then Dike’s arrival aimed at offering the women a chance for gaining their redemption, that chance appears in the attempt of the Argonauts to disembark at Lemnos, which must be the theme of the satyr-play of the Argonautic trilogy. Finally, in a society consisting exclusively of women, whom the poet wishes to reserve for a different role, it is reasonable to find an army of bestial creatures. The myth is akin to the one of the Danaids, who also killed their husbands, though for a different reason. They were punished to fill the Danaids’ jar in the underworld, one of the proverbial punishments in Hades together with those of Sisyphus, Tantalus, and Ixion. No punishment is mentioned for the Lemnian women. If the Dike-play comes from this mythical area, the crime must have already been committed. In the myth, the chance given to the women had to do with the sojourn of the Argonauts in Lemnos, which was their first stop after their departure from Iolkos. Now, Aeschylus is credited with producing a tetralogy about the Lemnian women, interwoven with the Argonauts myth in its early stages. The plays attributed to the tetralogy, with varying order according to different scholars, are alphabetically Ἀργώ, Κάβειροι, Λήμνιαι, Ὑψιπύλη. 13 Unfortunately, the evidence provided solely by book fragments is scanty. It is plain, however, that the story centers on the Lemnian incident of the Argonautic legend.

 13 TrGF 3, TRI B XII (Argonautae), p. 118.

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Commentary 27. “Apparently a scriptio plena” (Lobel). It seems that the middle optative verb was written in full for averting the inconvenient rhythm caused by the caesura media. οὐκ ἄν τις οὖ]ν [ἀρνοῖτ]ο Fraenkel, accepted by Lloyd-Jones, Mette, and Werner; 14 Radt mentions the supplement only in the app. crit. For the end of the verse Fraenkel proposed ἐπισπέσθα[ι πόλ]ει, “to follow, to obey a city”, having in mind the new city, Aetna, in whose praise he believed Dike was speaking. Vysoký improved Fraenkel’s proposal keeping the verb but changing the object to the obvious Δίκ]ηι. 28. οὔτε δῆμος οὔτ᾽ ἔτης ἀνήρ was already known (377 N.2) from a discussion in the Homeric Scholia (Il. 6.239c; 2.173.47 Erbse) on the aspiration of έτης. Alexion supported an aspirated initial, whereas Ptolemaeus of Askalon an unaspirated one. Herodian (2.55.18 Lenz; cf. Eust. Il. 641.57), who sides with the latter, adduces the Aeschylean fragment together with a Euripidean one (1014 N.2; see below) as a proof of the lack of a rough breathing. It is remarkable that in our papyrus we read οὔτ᾽ ἕ⟦ν⟧τηc. Cf. St. Radt, Pindars zweiter und sechster Paian, Diss. Amsterdam 1958, 198 f. A generic notion, apparently (οὔ) τις vel sim., is here particularized. Of the three terms, ἔτης, though obsolete in classical Attic, seems to be clear: “private man”, i.e. a citizen who does not hold an office. Its meaning becomes clearer when seen together with the terms from which it is usually distinguished. At Aesch. Supp. 247 ff. (πότερον ὡς ἔτην λέγω | ἢ τηρὸν ἱερόρραβδον (text insecure) ἢ πόλεως ἀγόν;) the distinction is between private man, priest, and city leader; at Eur. fr. 1014 N.2 (πόλεως μὲν ἀρχῶι, φωτὶ δ᾽ οὐκ ἔτηι πρέπων) between city leader and private man; at SIG3 141.11 f. (ἄρχων ἢ ἔτας) between leader and private man; at Thuc. 5.79.4 (ταῖς πολίεσσι ... τὼς δὲ ἔτας) between cities and private men; at SIG3 9.8 f. (αἴτε ϝέτας αἴτε τελεστὰ αἴτε δᾶμος) between private man, magistrate, and community (translated so in, e.g., Meiggs-Lewis, A Selection of Greek Historical Inscriptions, 32.) The last two witnesses, both from dialectal treaties, mention the three terms of our verse. It is only in our verse, however, that a distinction is also made between city and community. Lloyd-Jones, Mette, and Werner translate respectively “no city or people”, “kein Staat, kein Demos”, “nicht Bürgerschaft noch Gau”. But what would the factual difference between πόλις and δῆμος be, if both, as usually, stood for the citizen-body? The problem had been solved already since our verse was known as fr. 377 N.2 A. Nauck, Mélanges

 14 Werner 1988.

  Kyriakos Tsantsanoglou gréco-romaines 4 (1880), 682 f., and Th. Bergk, Hermes 18 (1883), 515 n. 1, had shown that δῆμος was used here, not of the community, as usually, but of a single person, in the sense “commoner”. See LSJ s.v. II.1 (“rarely of a single person”); Il. 12.213 οὐδὲ ἔοικεν δῆμον ἐόντα παρὲξ ἀγορευέμεν. This was the meaning of the term in the treaty of SIG3 9: not “community” but “commoner”. The question is then what the difference between δῆμος and ἔτης would be. Bergk, loc. cit., gave a plausible answer: “ἔται, qui proprie sunt gentiles, deinde nobiles dicebantur, qui principem olim inter cives locum obtinebant, quique alias ἀστοί vel πολῖται appellantur”. Our verse should then be translated: “neither city nor commoner or gentleman”. As shown by the analogues in the treaties, it appears as if Aeschylus is employing here an official formula. Does this use of the language of administration lend solemnity to the speech of Dike or does it add to its comical effect? 29. καρπουμένη[ι: If the construction adopted in line 27 is right, the dative, proposed by Fraenkel, is necessary. Lloyd-Jones inexplicably prints καρπουμένη[ς, leaving line 27 unsupplemented. 30. τω̣ι̣ : Lobel and Radt. Actually, what is read τ is the top curve of c. The second letter is a narrow ω (as narrow as 35 αρταμων) marked on both bottom sides with dots. ι is not written supra lineam but inserted later as a slim vertical in the narrow space between the marked ω and the initial τ of the next word. Τhe scribe wrote cω, possibly attracted by -ξω, which he later corrected to c.ω.I. The dots indicate that the correct cοι was written between two dots in the missing · margin. The same holds for εὺδὲ ρκε[c]. Cf. Ag. 315 τέκμαρ τοιοῦτον σύμβολόν τέ σοι λέγω, Eum. 447 τεκμήριον δὲ τῶνδέ σοι λέξω μέγα, 662 τεκμήριον δὲ τοῦδέ σοι δείξω λόγου. εὐδερκὲς (τέκμαρ) does not mean here “acute cernens” (Italie) or “seeing brightly, bright-eyed” (LSJ), nor is it “dub. sens.” (LSJ Suppl.). It is passive (“clearly seen”) and synonymous to Eum. 244 ἐκφανὲς (τέκμαρ) or Cho. 667 ἐμφανὲς (τέκμαρ). φέρεις or -ρειν Lobel in connection with the reading τῶι. If the three dots following ε in Radt’s edition (φερε[ ̣ ̣] ̣[ ) represent letters, it must be pointed out that Greek has no ending syllables of the type -ρε+3 letters. The tiny trace read ] · [ must be one of the dots that should flank the corrected cοι in the margin. The word, which had already annoyed Fraenkel (“was man eigentlich erwartet ist πρέπει”), must be the exclamatory imperative φέρε, “come on”, i.e., φέρε λέξον, spoken, however, by the Chorus-leader in antilabe. This is the third antilabe to be found in Aeschylus besides PV 980, and fr. 78a (Theoroi).4; cf. Sept. 217. The Theoroi antilabe is the only fully developed one. The other two are cases of elementary divisions of verses between speakers (only one step beyond the extra

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metrum employment of interjections) and have nothing to do with the complex device exploited by other dramatists. Merely, one of the speakers cries out a disyllable interjection either in the opening of the verse or in its close. 31. “ἔθρεψε more probable than ἔθρεψα” (Lobel, followed by Lloyd-Jones). Others (Mette, Ph. J. Kakridis, Radt in app.) prefer the first person. ἔθρεψε is palaeographically impossible, since the upper part of ε ought to be visible. Moreover, the information that she reared an unruly boy whom Hera bore to Zeus would be absurd if “she” was also Hera. What Dike says is that she served as a nurse to a son of Zeus and Hera. Görschen’s ποτέ is very appropriate for describing the indefinite time of the divine myth. But the use of the historical present τίκτει with ποτέ is anomalous. Read τίκ̣τεν̣ . The top tip of an upright which survived is not necessarily an ι. The scribe often writes ν with the oblique starting a little lower than the top (e.g., 32 ζηΝι), its head here being visible in an enhanced image. 31–32. [ποτ᾽ οὐχ] | Ἥρα μιγεῖσα Ζηνὶ θυμοιδ[ὴς πόσει (Merkelbach) may relieve Zeus of this unpleasant fatherhood, but does not offer the name of the supposed father, as one would expect in such a case. Furthermore, οὐχ Ἥρα μιγεῖσα for Ἥρα οὐ μιγεῖσα is bad Greek. 32. θυμοιδ[ὲς βρέφος (Görschen) or τέκνον (Mette), θυμοίδ[η θεόν (LloydJones) are all possible. I would propose alternatively one further characterization after θυμοιδῆ, e.g. κακόν, in the sense “base, evil”. But there are many more possibilities. For the meaning of θυμοιδής see Lloyd-Jones, 578 f. I am uncertain whether the adjective is paroxytone or oxytone; dictionaries accentuate πεοίδης, ἰσχιοίδης, γαστρ(ο)οίδης, but, in prepositional compounds, διοιδής, ἐνοιδής, προσῳδής. The scribe, who elsewhere marks the ambiguous accents, did not accentuate here on the first two syllables. If he has done so on the missing last one, he must have written θυμοιδῆ. παῖς ... θυμοιδής, “irascible son”, may be playing with θυμηδής, “glad-hearted, dear”; the latter can be joined with παῖς: Epigr. Anat. 13:72,16 (Sebastopolis) παῖδας θυμηδέας, οὓς [τέκεν αὕτη]. 34. ἄ]φυκτα is unanimously adopted, though the reading is not so certain. Lobel describes the traces of the first letter as “apparently the ends of the overhang and central stroke of ε but the damaged right-hand loop of ρ or φ cannot be ruled out”. “]Ε̣ pot. qu. ]Φ̣, ]Ρ̣” (Radt). Still, Ι believe that ρ not only cannot be ruled out, but is much likelier than ε, especially because the two upper strokes of ε are usually more distanced between themselves than the tiny arcs that make up the loop of ρ. If ρ, φο]ρ̣υκτά, “defiled (with blood)” proposed by Lobel is the only fitting word; cf. Od. 20.348 αἱμοφόρυκτα (κρέα). This reading supports Lobel’s suspicion that βέλη should be emended to μέλη, though his supposition of Sinis, the highway bandit killed by Theseus, is unnecessary. Then the verse may open

  Kyriakos Tsantsanoglou with a participle denoting “hacking off, cutting off”. It is difficult to estimate accurately the size needed for a left margin justification, but ἀμῶν seems fitting. 35. Both lines 33 and 35 end with punctuation marks; then, 34–35 must constitute a separate period. If this period starts with a participle as we presumed, the verb must be found at the opening of 35. ἀνα]ι ̣δῶς, is difficult to read, as noticed by Lobel, since the only visible relic of the supposed ]ι ̣ is part of a horizontal at the middle of the line. It might be an η with its right-hand upright abraded (the left-hand one should have been lost in the break). Radt disagrees: “]Ị legi posse pace Lobel haud negaverim”. No doubt, ἀναιδῶς is clearly associated with 33 αἰδὼς δ᾽ οὐκ ἐνῆ[ν] φ̣ρ̣[ον]ήματι, but it would be curious to characterize as shameless the second part of the boy’s atrocious act but leave the first undesignated. Speaking of corpses or their limbs, ἀκηδῶς, “without care, without burying”, is most fitting. An accent is clearly visible above the omega of ἀρταμων, whose shape is, however, unusual. It seems like an upright descending with a slight bent to left but hardly similar to a grave. Radt questions: “an accentus circumflexus erat, qui in ceteris quidem huius fragmenti locis rotundus, in aliis autem eiusdem papyri fragmentis (cf. fr. 451r9. 451s32b2. 53,10) angulatus est?”. It is true that both the size and the cant of the stroke match the right-hand leg of an angular circumflex rather than the grave. Actually, the corrector wiped off the left-hand leg, in order to produce a grave accent, leaving, however, visible relics of the deleted left-hand leg. Clearly, the original reading was the participle of ἀρταμέω (ἀρταμῶν). But, after the correction, the barytone -ὼν denoted an unaccented ending, and so ἀρτάμων, gen. pl. of ἄρταμος, “butcher”. If so, ἀγκύλαισιν, a much debated word (“bow, missiles, thonged javelins”), becomes clear: “on butchers’ hooks”. Then, the verb in the opening of the verse becomes also clear: “he hung, he used to hang”, possibly the middle ἠρτᾶτ(ο). The whole distich could run ἀμῶν φο]ρ̣υκτὰ τῶν ὁδοιπόρων μέλη | ἠρτᾶτ᾽ ἀκ]ηδῶς ἀγκύλαισιν ἀρτάμων, “after hacking off blood-defiled the limbs of the passers-by | he used to hang them ruthlessly on butchers’ hooks”. Aeschylus shows a predilection for words of the butchers’ vocabulary even in high drama: Pers. 463 κρεοκοποῦσι δυστήνων μέλη; Ag. 1277 ἐπίξηνον μένει; PV 1023 αἰετὸς λάβρως | διαρταμήσει σώματος μέγα ῥάκος; fr. 193.11 R. (from Prometheus Lyomenos in Cicero’s translation) aduncis lacerans unguibus | Iovis satelles pastu dilaniat (= (δι)αρταμεῖ) fero. 36. At the top of fr. 9 (b) = 281 b R. the bottom tip of a thin descending oblique followed after a short distance by the low end of a thicker ascending oblique. Though there are more possibilities, Α̣Ṃ seems very likely.

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]ῶ̣ν: “] ̣̑, ω possible but not verifiable” (Lobel), perhaps represents a further participle: ὁρ]ῶ̣ν? I propose τὸ θέ]͜α̣μ̣[α ὁρ]ῶ̣ν, which fits exactly the size, the traces, and the sense. ἔχαιρε κἀγέλα: Cf. Soph. Aj. 961 f. οἱ δ᾽ οὖν γελώντων κἀπιχαιρόντων κακοῖς τοῖς τοῦδε; El. 1300 χαίρειν πάρεστι καὶ γελᾶν ἐλευθέρως. Whereas ἔχαιρε is absolute, “he rejoiced”, ἐγέλα takes the accusative, “he derided the ill”. κακόν may imply both the evil committed by the boy and the disaster suffered by the victims, which actually amount to the same thing. 37. κἀλ]έ̣ ας, “and lying in the sun”, acc. pl. of ἀλεής. The rare adjective derived from ἀλέα, “warmth, heat”, occurs in Soph. Phil. 859 describing ὕπνος and is interpreted in the Scholia: ἀλεὴς ὕπνος ἐσθλός· ὁ ὕπνος ὁ ὑπὸ τὴν ἀλέαν τοῦ ἡλίου. Alternatively, μελ]έ̣ ας, possibly suggesting μελεϊστί, though less matching ἔα̣[σκε. Following the initial ε, Lobel notes “the foot of a stroke rising from the line with a slight slope to right”, yet it is not one stroke but a narrow angle, certainly an A. The epic imperfect ἔασκε, “used to leave”, is self-evident. σάρκας seems inevitable, since what we need here is a masculine or feminine noun in acc. pl. scanning – ⏑, therefore necessarily a third-declension one-syllabled noun, and denoting something which after being hung on a hook either stinks or discharges blood. Lobel read ὄζοι. Görschen’s ἄζοι (Radt “ὄ̣ ζ vel ἄ̣ζ”) is impossible from a sense point of view, since ἄζω is transitive, and I cannot see what the gore or the corpse or the killing might parch. Cf. Ag. 1309 f., which involves both blood dripping and flesh stinking: — φόνον δόμοι πνέουσιν αἱματοσταγῆ. — καὶ πῶς; τόδ᾽ ὄζει θυμάτων ἐφεστίων. For the whole image cf. Pers. 463 παίουσι κρεοκοποῦσι δυστήνων μέλη. 38. “Detesting this and being angry”. τόδε cannot be connected to θυμουμένη; θυμοῦμαι is normally constructed with dative or περί τινος, ἔς τινα, πρός τινα. Absolutely, like here, at Ag. 1069, Eum. 801. 39. μετ]ερρύθμιξα (Mette) is too long. Of the three possible compounds: ἀνερρ-, διερρ-, and ἐπερρύθμιξα, I would have a slight preference for the last one because it seems to fit exactly with the left-hand margin. However, it is the simple ῥυθμίζειν that occurs in the sense “bring to order, correct, chasten, punish”: [Aesch.] PV 241 νηλεῶς ὧδ᾽ ἐρρύθμισμαι, IC I xvi.5.35 (Lato, second cent. BC) ἐρευνίοντες καὶ ῥυθμίττοντες used of criminal correction. Cf. Antiph. com. 33.4 εὔρυθμος βακτηρία, “corrective cane”. Then, εὖ ἐρρύθμιξα? In spite of the Cretan legal occurrence, it seems like a colloquial usage rather than a formal metaphor. Cf. Modern Greek colloquialisms κανονίζω, διορθώνω, συγυρίζω, σιάζω “set to order, adjust, tidy up”, but also “rebuke, punish”.

  Kyriakos Tsantsanoglou Lobel considered the Doric form as a sign of satyr-play comparing the Doricisms found in the Diktyoulkoi: μικκός, φίντων, ὀβρίχοισι, θῶσθαι. Fraenkel (Kleine Beiträge 1, 252 n.1; cf. on Ag. 785) objected comparing Aesch. Supp. 39 σφετεριξάμενοι and, possibly, Ag. 785 σεβίξω and Cho. 954 f. ἐπωρθίαξεν. Perhaps a distinction should be made between Doric vocabulary and Doric or quasiDoric morphology. The first may be used to lend a provincial, possibly rustic, colouring to the text, as is the case in the Diktyoulkoi, the latter merely metri gratia, as with the tragic occurrences. πρ[οσήγα]γον χέρα Fraenkel: “I laid my hand (on him), I seized (him)”. Cf. Ar. Lys. 893 = Men. Sam. 582 μὴ πρόσαγε τὴν χεῖρά μοι; elsewhere ἐπιβάλλειν or προσφέρειν χεῖρά τινι. Dike was actually shown on the Kypselos chest seizing Adikia with one hand and striking her with a stick (Paus. 5.18.12), and so also on a 6th century BC Attic amphora in Vienna. 40–41. I was not able to find elsewhere the jocular etymology of παῖς from παίω, “smack, hit”, which may have also been prompted by the colloquial shortened Attic imperative παῖ for παῖε: Xen. Cyn. 6.18 παισάτω πᾶς (παῖς codd.), παῖ δή, παῖ δή. παίειν has not survived in Modern Greek, only παιδεύω in the sense “pester”. It is from the latter that a similar folk etymology occurs in a Cretan tag: τὴν παίδαν ἔχουν τὰ παιδιά, γιαῦτος παιδιὰ τὰ λέσι, literally “pestering is the property of children, that is why they are called children”. But the real purpose of the joke is to consecrate caning by attributing its use to a supreme deity and to affirm its fated relevance on child-raising by means of name-magic. Another Modern Greek proverb declares that τὸ ξύλο βγῆκε ἀπ᾽ τὸν παράδεισο; it is used in the sense of “spare the rod and spoil the child”, but literally it means “the rod (= the wood of the tree of knowledge) came from Eden”. 41. ὁτι]ή: cf. 9 above, there too at the opening of the line. No other causal conjunction, which is necessary at this place, fits the relics, the space and the metre. Besides this line, the play with the name of Δίκη appears repeatedly in the fragment: 6 δίκηι, 17 ἔνδικον, 40 ἐνδίκως. A spot level with the top of letters, but at such a distance from ο that renders ]λ certain. For τέλος in the sense “destination, duty, obligation”, cf. Ag. 908, 1202, Cho. 760, Eum. 743.

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Bibliography Funghi, M.S./Martinelli, M.C. (1996–1997) [1998], “P. Gen. inv. 98: Eschilo?”, Analecta Papyrologica 8–9, 7–17. Kakridis, Ph.J. (1962), “Der παῖς μάργος im Dike-Fragment des Aischylos”, Eranos 60, 111–121. Keydell, R. (1935), “Die Dichter mit Namen Peisandros”, Hermes 70, 301–311. Krumeich, R./Pechstein, N./Seidensticker, B. (eds) (1999), Das griechische Satyrspiel, Darmstadt. Lloyd-Jones, H. (1957), Aeschylus (ed. Herbert Weir Smyth, Loeb Classical Library) Appendix, London. Robertson, D.S. (1953), “Dike and Ares”, CR n.s. 3, 79–80 Sutton, D.F. (1974), “A Handlist of Satyr Plays”, HSCPh 78, 107–143 Sutton, D.F. (1983), “A Possible Subject for Aeschylus’ ‘Dike Play’”, ΖPE 51, 19–24. Van Groningen, Β.Α. (1930), “Ad Aeschyli Κήρυκας”, Mnemosyne n.s. 58, 134. Werner, O. (19884), Aischylos. Tragödien und Fragmente (Sammlung Tusculum), München/ Zürich.

Nikos Manousakis

Aeschylus’ Actaeon: A Playboy on the Greek Tragic Stage? As reported by Hesiod (Th. 975–977), among the children of Kadmos and Harmonia, a daughter of Aphrodite, is Autonoe, who, according to the same author (Cat. frr. 215, 216, 217 MW3), in turn marries Aristaeus – a son of the nymph Cyrene and Apollo. In the first seventy lines of Pyth. 9 (474 BC) 1 Pindar narrates in iridescent detail the story of Apollo’s fascination with the wild maiden Cyrene (παρθένον ἀγροτέραν), whom he witnesses fearlessly fighting a lion all by herself in Pelion (λέοντί ποτ᾽… | ὀβρίμῳ μούναν παλαίοισαν | ἄτερ ἐγχέων). The god summons Chiron from his cave to show him the marvelous girl, and asks him if it is right to lay his “famous hand upon her and indeed to reap the honey-sweet flower from the bed of love”. 2 The centaur advises the god of prophecy to proceed with what he already knows will eventually happen, and Apollo swiftly seizes Cyrene in his golden chariot and takes her to Libya. 3 There the god will make the wild girl ruler of a city (ἀρχέπολιν Pyth. 9.54) bearing her name, and she will give birth to a son, Aristaeus. The baby will be looked after by the Horai and Gaia, who will provide him with nectar and ambrosia, making him immortal (Pyth. 9.60–64). He will be regarded as a Zeus and a holy Apollo – Ἀγρεὺς (huntsman) and Νόμιος (pastor) (Pyth. 9.65). 4 From this quite extraordinary bloodline, containing a formidable woman who ἀκόντεσσίν τε χαλκέοις | φασγάνῳ τε μαρναμένα κεράϊζεν ἀγρίους | θῆρας (Pyth. 9.20–22), 5 εὐρυφαρέτραν… ἑκάεργον Apollo (Pyth. 9.26, 28), 6 Aristaeus, an  1 On Pyth. 9 see the studies of Farnell 1961, 201–213; Fränkel 1975, 441–450; Carey 1981, 65–103; Stephen 1996, 117–142. 2 The translation is by Race 1997. Translations form Greek and Latin are my own, unless otherwise stated. 3 According to Pherecydes Hist. fr. 9a line 7–8 and others, see FGrHist 316 fr. 3, Cyrene was actually carried to Africa by swans. 4 Cf. Apollon. Arg. 2.506–507. According to the anonymous commentator of Pyth. 9 sch. 6a, ἀπὸ δὲ Ἠοίας Ἡσιόδου τὴν ἱστορίαν ἔλαβεν ὁ Πίνδαρος. For Aristaeus see also the accounts of Diod. Sicul. Bibl. Hist. 4.81.2; Paus. 8.2.4, 10.17.3–4, 10.30.5; Virg., Georg. 4.315–558. 5 Callimachus (Hymn 2. 90ff.) relocates Cyrene’s lion-wrestling from Thessaly to the newly founded Libyan city that will bear her name. Hence, when killing the African beast, Phoebus’ wild bride becomes a civilizing hero(ine) of the stature of Heracles, or, as a matter of fact, Kadmos. This version is probably adapted by Callimachus from the local historian Acesander, see Williams 1978, 79. 6 Apart from a bow-wielding god, Apollo has also been a shepherd when serving Admetus in Thessaly. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-013

  Nikos Manousakis agrarian deity, and Kadmos, the slayer of Ares’ dragon and the god’s son in law, Ἀκταίων ἀνέτελλε. 7 Actaeon, the son of Aristaeus and Autonoe, is a huntsman torn to pieces by his hounds. These are the only two facts on which all ancient sources concerning the mythical figure under discussion are rather unanimous. 8 Actaeon’s deplorable fate was a result of his personal interaction with a female: either Kadmos’ daughter Semele or the virgin goddess Artemis. In the case of the latter, Actaeon was punished by the goddess because he boasted he was a better hunter than her, because he thought he could be united with her, or because he saw her bathing naked. Among the few tragedies listed under Phrynichus’ name in the Suda Lexicon there is an Actaeon — which may very well have been the oldest stage adaptation of the huntsman’s myth. Apart from its title, we have no other evidence as regards Phrynichus’ composition. The first Actaeon-drama about which we can draw substantive conclusions is Aeschylus’ Toxotides (Archeresses). To begin with, the title of the drama seems to be quite informative. As Sommerstein aptly notes, “since women archers were not a feature either of ancient Greek society or (except in the case of Amazons) of the ancient Greek imagination, the Chorus is likely to have consisted of nymphs accompanying Artemis”. 9 What has not yet been addressed is a direct consequence of this judgment. If Artemis’ attendants populated the Chorus of a play in which Actaeon was the protagonist, as the extant fragments make rather clear, 10 then, at least at the outset of this

 7 Nonnos Dion. 5.287. 8 The suggestion by Forbes Irving 1990, 80 that the essence of Actaeon’s “story is a hunting nightmare in which the hunter identifies with his victim”, is ingenious. 9 Sommerstein 2008, 244. In fact, the bow seems to be the symbol par excellence of the Amazons in the Aeschylean imagination, see Supp. 287–289 καὶ τὰς ἀνάνδρους κρεοβότους {δ’} Ἀμαζόνας, | εἰ τοξοτευχεῖς ἦστε, κάρτ’ ἂν ἤικασα | ὑμᾶς (“and if you were equipped with bows, I would have surely thought that you were the menless, flesh-eating Amazons”); Eum. 625–628 οὐ γάρ τι ταὐτὸν ἄνδρα γενναῖον θανεῖν | … καὶ ταῦτα πρὸς γυναικός, οὔ τι θουρίοις | τόξοις ἑκηβόλοισιν, ὥστ’ Ἀμαζόνος (“for a noble man to die… at the hands of a woman — and not by the far-shooting furious bow of an Amazon”). See also Johansen and Whittle 1980, 321 for further references by Greek authors of the bow as a weapon characteristic of the Amazons. The existing evidence indicates that Aeschylus must have been more fascinated with these female warriors than both Sophocles and Euripides. In six secure Aeschylean plays we find three expressive references to these manly women, see the two references in this n. and also Eum. 685ff. Sophocles never mentions the Amazons in his extant plays and fragments, whereas in eighteen secure Euripidean dramas we find four formulaic references to Hippolytus through his Amazon mother in the homonymous play (10, 307, 351, 581), and two (one lyric and one brief iambic) mentions, rather similar between them, to Heracles’ Amazon labour in Her. (408–418) and Ion (1143–1145). 10 See fr. 241 Radt.

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play, the goddess — who is the physical “instigator” of the huntsman’s killing according to almost all (literary and artistic) accounts from antiquity — must have been favorable towards him. In fact, this very aspect of Actaeon’s mythical persona is attested in two later authors, Callimachus and Nonnos, and, in all likelihood, it was also the one Aeschylus employed in his Tox. Callimachus (Hymn 5.110) describes Actaeon as being μεγάλας σύνδρομος Ἀρτέμιδος, while in Nonnos (Dion. 5.290) he is Ἀρτέμιδος θεράπων ὀρεσίδρομος. 11 An alternative plot for Tox. would have been too problematic, since we would have to account for a tragedy which was most probably the opening drama of the trilogy it was part of, as we will see below, and in which the Chorus was all along not just unfavorable but rather hostile towards the main character. This kind of plotline can be regarded as characteristic of Greek comedy to some extent (see Aristophanes’ Achar. and Birds), yet the only parallel in extant tragedy is Aeschylus’ Eum. 12 Still, this play is the culmination of a broad composition, and its plot is tied to a long series of preceding stage events. When the ghost of Clytemestra bids the Furies to wake up and pursue Orestes, the audience, evidently, needs no explanation of her motives. However, this could hardly have been the case for Tox., and the various structural difficulties that would emerge if we were to conjecture an a priori turbulent divine Chorus for the lost drama render this plotline dramatically unthinkable. Thus, it seems that we are in a position to indicate that at the opening of Aeschylus’ Tox., no matter whether Artemis was actually one of the dramatis personae or not, 13 Actaeon was portrayed as her protégé: a fortunate regular companion of the hunting goddess. 14 This line of thought leads us straight to two other mythic hunting companions of Artemis, Orion and Hippolytus. Orion’s legend “probably had its beginnings in the Mycenaean Age; and he was apparently a popular hero in the Dark and early Archaic Ages. He was early identified with the constellation that we call Orion. Though fifth-century Hellenes knew the constellation by this name, the

 11 For the use of Actaeon’s example by Callimachus see indicatively Bulloch 1985, 218ff., and also Stephens 2015, 236ff. For Actaeon in the work of Nonnos see Heath 1992, 135ff.; Paschalis 2014, 109ff. 12 The Chorus in Eur. Bacch. is, of course, hostile to Pentheus from the very beginning. Yet, in that play the Chorus is an “extension” of Dionysus, one of the protagonists. On the other hand, in Eum. the deities of the Chorus are absolutely essential to the plot. Most likely, this would have also been the case in Tox. 13 Sommerstein 2013, 87 maintains that Artemis “will certainly have been a character” in the drama. Yet, the existing evidence provides scant basis for such a definitive claim. 14 Possibly the unattributed iambic Aeschylean fr. 342 Radt, δέσποινα νύμφη, δυσχίμων ὀρῶν ἄναξ (“lady nymph, queen of the fearful mountains”), derives from Tox. and refers to Artemis.

  Nikos Manousakis hero Orion had by then faded into the background, eclipsed by Heracles, Theseus, Perseus, and other heroes”. 15 In Od. 5.118–124, the most informative Homeric reference to the myth of Orion, Calypso reproaches the gods for being σχέτλιοι and ζηλήμονες, begrudging goddesses who openly sleep with mortals. That is why the gods turned against Dawn when she seized Orion to be her lover, until the chaste Artemis brought upon him an easy death with her arrows in Ortygia. ἀγανοῖς βελέεσσιν ἐποιχομένη κατέπεφνεν is a Homeric formula that could be signifying nothing more than Orion’s sudden death. Yet, there is a possibility that the poet employed it to specifically indicate the hero’s painless slaying by Artemis, who could have been in favor of him. The Homeric formula under discussion appears in Il. 24.759, and in various passages in the Od, referring to the state of sudden, painless death sent by Apollo, Artemis, or both. 16 In the Il. the formula has a clear highlighting effect, since it implicitly identifies a “mild” slaying act by Apollo with how the god protected and cared for Hector’s corpse (νῦν δέ μοι ἑρσήεις καὶ πρόσφατος ἐν μεγάροισι | κεῖσαι, τῶι ἴκελος ὅν τ’ ἀργυρότοξος Ἀπόλλων | οἷς ἀγανοῖσι βέλεσσιν ἐποιχόμενος κατέπεφνεν, “but now dewy and fresh you lie in my halls, like someone whom Apollo of the silver bow has just assailed with his gentle arrows and killed him”). 17 In the aforementioned speech by Calypso in Od. the use of the formula is, technically, somewhat eccentric. In all other epic examples, it is employed with Apollo being the subject if the dying person is a man, and Artemis if it is a woman. Orion is in fact the only mortal male who “suffers” a swift, painless death, hit by the arrows of Leto’s daughter. 18 This, over and above the mythical convention, could be an allusion to their intimate prehistory. Ps-Apollodorus (Bibl. 1.4.5) tells us that Orion, ὡς μὲν ἔνιοι λέγουσιν, ἀνῃρέθη δισκεύειν Ἄρτεμιν προκαλούμενος, ὡς δέ τινες, βιαζόμενος Ὦπιν μίαν τῶν ἐξ Ὑπερβορέων παραγενομένων παρθένων ὑπ᾽ Ἀρτέμιδος ἐτοξεύθη. In the latter version of the myth, the object of Orion’s sexual assault, the hyperborean nymph accompanying the goddess, is in some accounts Artemis herself, also known as Ὦπις. Aratus (Phaen. 634–646) is more descriptive, recounting that, as προτέρων λόγος has it, Orion, Artemis’ co-hunter, assaulted the goddess grabbing her by her robe (ἑλκῆσαι πέπλοιο). 19 Some authors narrate that the goddess favored the  15 Fontenrose 1981, 5. 16 Apart from Od. 5.123–124, see also Od. 3.279–280; 11.172–173; 11.198–199; 15.410–411. 17 See Richardson 1993, 357. Macleod 1982, 153 notes that the formula could have been invented to be used in this Iliadic passage, and then was “reproduced more or less appropriately” in the Od. 18 Cf. — most notably — Il. 21.483–484. See Heubeck, West and Hainsworth 1988, 267. 19 Kidd 1997, 396 aptly indicates that this version of the myth is reflected in Hom. sch. (AD) Σ 486: συγκυνηγῶν δὲ οὗτος (sc. Orion) Ἀρτέμιδι, ἐπεχείρησεν αὐτὴν βιάσασθαι.

Aeschylus’ Actaeon: A Playboy on the Greek Tragic Stage?  

hunter until he committed his sexual lapse, while others say that this intimate relationship lasted until Orion’s death, which was caused by some deity other than Artemis. 20 As a matter of fact, according to Hesiod (Cat. Gyn. fr. 148(a) MW3) Orion περὶ τὰς θήρας διῆγε κυνηγετῶν τῆς Ἀρτέμιδος παρούσης καὶ τῆς Λητοῦς, and he was killed by a huge scorpion sent by Γῆ, in order to punish him for boasting that he could destroy πᾶν θηρίον… τῶν ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς γιγνομένων. And it was at the request of Leto and Artemis that Zeus ἐν τοῖς ἄστροις αὐτὸν ἔθηκεν. This version ties Orion’s killing to his proud and boastful temper, which is also what leads Artemis to slay him according to Ps-Apollodorus’ account, when he dares to challenge her in a discus contest. A notably different, and as a matter of fact unique version of the myth is provided by Istros the Callimachean (FGrH 334 fr. 64), 21 who tells us that Artemis was in love with Orion on the point of marrying him (“Oriona a Diana esse dilectum, et paene factum ut ei nupsisse existimaretur”). However, her brother Apollo, who was against this union, challenged Artemis to carry out an archering enterprise, and thus tricked her into killing Orion. The deceived goddess, after mourning for her beloved, placed him among the stars. Hippolytus, the son of an Amazon, is another of Artemis’ hunting protégés. His tragic story, best known from the extant homonymous Euripidean tragedy, seems to have been established at Athens by the sixth century BC, 22 and according to Pausanias, writing in the first century BC, it was still known even to ὅστις βαρβάρων γλῶσσαν ἔμαθεν Ἑλλήνων. This young man, just like Orion and Actaeon at some stage of their myth, was enjoying Artemis’ friendship 23 until another deity, Aphrodite in this case, plotted against him and caused his death. All three male co-hunters of Artemis, Hippolytus, Orion, and Actaeon, are killed by ferocious animals. Yet, Hippolytus is different from the other two in that he is, traditionally, chaste in character, and prefers to spend time riding his horses rather than chasing after the pleasures of Aphrodite. Hence, the relationship between Hippolytus and Artemis, is, and remains, sexless in principle. In Euripides’ play the young man’s chaste conduct, his refusal to adequately honor the goddess of physical love, that is his rigid σωφροσύνη and inherent aversion to sexual intercourse, 24 should have been quite unconventional for ancient spectators. As Barrett puts it, Hippolytus’ claim that  20 See Fontenrose 1981, 13ff. in detail. 21 See Jackson 2000, 83–87. 22 See Barrett 1964, 9. 23 Eur. Hipp. 19: μείζω βροτείας προσπεσὼν ὁμιλίας (“he has come into a companionship greater than mortal”). 24 Eur. Hipp. 13: ἀναίνεται δὲ λέκτρα κοὐ ψαύει γάμων (“he renounces love making and will have nothing to do with marriage”). For Hippolytus’ and Phaedra’s σωφροσύνη (“prudence/ moderation”) see concisely Halleran 1995, 45–46.

  Nikos Manousakis “one must have complete and innate σωφροσύνη… to cull a garland [from the virgin meadow that Reverence tends, while] others are κακοί, and must keep away… is quite astonishing by ordinary Greek standards”. This hero’s “requirement of moral purity is alien to the ordinary Greek cult until Hellenistic times [, and] his insistence that the purity must be innate would be extraordinary even then. This intense and intolerant young man has built into his cult of the virgin Artemis a strange and exclusive puritanism of his own; the Athenian audience, while they feel the beauty of his ideals…, will at the same time feel their narrowness, and will find it excessive and unnatural”. 25 Since, evidently, this Hippolytus could not have been held mythically or dramatically responsible for an assault against the virgin Artemis, as Orion and Actaeon have been, another female “victim” eventually presents itself: his father’s wife, Phaedra. However, the virgin actually “violated” in this tale is male. It is Hippolytus himself — and his “violators”, Aphrodite and Phaedra, are both female. With all the above in mind regarding Artemis’ mythical male co-hunters, I will now examine the extant evidence for Tox., in an attempt to show that there is no need for Aeschylus’ Actaeon to be “a puritanical misogynist like Hippolytus… [who] eventually… succumbs and offends against Semele or Artemis”, as has been suggested. 26 I will argue that there is no actual evidence supporting that Actaeon was depicted in Tox. as a man who kept away from women, or, even more so, loathed them. On the contrary, he was most probably portrayed by Aeschylus as an overconfident sensual young man, an Orion-like seducer, who, however, directed his passionate pursuit towards mortal women. 27 As mentioned earlier, Actaeon’s downfall is closely tied to his personal interaction with either Semele or Artemis. Yet, the earliest sources on the Actaeon-myth, Hesiod, Stesichorus, and Acusilaus are all unanimous in that it was his relationship with Semele that caused his death. The version according to which the Boeotian hunter meets his end for challenging Artemis’ hunting skills is found in late Euripides (Bacch. 337–

 25 See Barrett 1964, 172. Cf. Lawrence 2013, 225–227. 26 Forbes Irving 1990, 87. Another mythical hunter fiercely avoiding women and marriage is Melanion. The young man is mentioned by Aristophanes in Lys. 785ff., and we know that Antiphanes, one of the most important poets of Middle comedy, composed a play entitled Melanion (see fr. 147 PCG). Yet, Aristophanes in this case is distorting the mythical tradition concerning Melanion. In Xen. Cyneg. 1.2.7 and Ps-Apoll. Bibl. 3.9.2 we in fact read that Melanion’s major achievement was to win the hand of the huntress maiden Atalanta in a race against her, and — save Aristophanes — there is no source indicating that he was avoiding women. See Sommerstein 1990, 197–198. 27 See Sommerstein 2013, 87.

Aeschylus’ Actaeon: A Playboy on the Greek Tragic Stage?  

341), while the version in which he dies because he, willingly or unwillingly, offended Artemis in a much more intimate way, most widely known from Ovid’s account in Met. 3.131–259, 28 is unattested until Callimachus (Hymn 5.107–118), and it occurs again in the work of much later authors. 29 Hesiod (Cat. Gyn. fr. 217 MW) reports that Actaeon, τῶν Σεμέ]λης ἐφιέμενος γάμων, was transformed into a deer by the will of Artemis and was torn apart by his own hounds. ἐφιέμενος γάμων is rather unclear. It could mean that Actaeon was eager (determined) to lawfully make Semele his wife, or that he laid hands on her with unlawful sexual intentions. 30 A mutilated mention of Kadmos in this Hesiodic fragment (πρὸς τοῦ μητροπάτορο[ς: “from his mother’s father”) makes it possible that in this account Actaeon’s death was caused, on a first level, by a curse from his grandfather. In another (possibly) Hesiodic fragment (*39 H) we read that the dogs of the hunter were instigated by Zeus (Διὸς ἐννεσίηισι) to set off and kill their master. 31 Acusilaus (FGrHist 2 fr. 33) narrates that Actaeon ἐν τῶι Κιθαιρῶνι κατεβρώθη ὑπὸ τῶν ἰδίων κυνῶν. καὶ τοῦτον ἐτελεύτησε τὸν τρόπον… μηνίσαντος τοῦ Διὸς ὅτι ἐμνηστεύσατο Σεμέλην. Stesichorus (fr. 285 Finglass), on the other hand, brings Artemis to the fore, indicating that ἐλάφου περιβαλεῖν δέρμα Ἀκταίωνι τὴν θεόν, παρασκευάζουσάν οἱ τὸν ἐκ τῶν κυνῶν θάνατον, ἵνα δὴ μὴ γυναῖκα Σεμέλην  28 It is interesting that by highlighting Actaeon’s unintentional act of seeing Artemis naked, Ovid (Met. 3.141–142) seems to be pointing in the direction of tragic guilt: at bene si quaeras, fortune crimen illo, non scelus invenies; quod enim scelus error habebat? (“if you would seek out carefully, you would find that the blame of this mistake lies with fortune, not with any crime. For what crime was there in wandering?”). Note here the crimen-scelus-error wordplay. See further Barchiesi and Rosati 2007, 150–151. Cf. Apuleius’ view, Met. 2.4, on Actaeon’s story: “Actaeon curioso obtutu in deam sursum proiectus” (“Actaeon casting his curious gaze on the goddess”). 29 Luc. Dial. Deor. 16.2; Ps.-Apoll. Bibl. 3.4.4; Hyg. Fab. 180, 181; and Nonnos Dion. 5.287–551 all mention Artemis’ bath and Actaeon’s intrusion upon it. Diod. Sicul. Bibl. Hist. 4.81.3–5 reports that according to some sources Actaeon was punished because he indented to either marry or rape Artemis, see further below. 30 For the latter sense of γάμος see Eur. Hel. 190 Ναΐς… Πανὸς ἀναβοᾶι γάμους (“the Naiad nymph… screaming at the rape of Pan”) — with the comment of Allan 2008 on this verse. 31 This fragment, consisting of twelve hexameter lines, has been assigned to various authors, among them the choral lyric poets Alkman and Stesichoros – an improbable hypothesis, if anything for metrical reasons. See Hirschberger 2004, 491. A further possible Hesiodic fragment (= P.Oxy. 2509 = 103 H) associates Semele with Actaeon through the dogs of the latter, which, as Athena(?) tells Chiron, will be given to Semele’s son Dionysus. Casanova 1969, discussing Actaeon’s myth in the Cat. Gyn, ascribes this fragment to Hesiod. Janko 1984 convincingly supports Casanova’s suggestion, and adds further evidence. On this fragment see further Hunter 2005, 257–259, and the detailed comments of Hirschberger 2004, 393–397. West 1985, 88, though without elaborating, denies the Hesiodic origin of both fragments discussed here.

  Nikos Manousakis λάβοι. 32 This account indicates more clearly that Actaeon and Semele were set to be husband and wife. Dodds suggests that although the early sources make Actaeon compete with Zeus for Semele, “when Semele became Actaeon’s aunt this was no longer suitable, and he transferred his attention to Artemis…, or was turned into a punished boaster”, as is the case in Euripides’ Bacch. 33 Still, this reshaping of the myth need not have taken place before Euripides, who, as far as we can know, of course, is the earliest author in whose work it is attested. For the ancient Greek mythological aristocracy an endogamous marriage between aunt and nephew is by no means inconceivable, 34 and exactly due to this endogamy Actaeon could have been an apposite husband for Semele. In all likelihood, in the oldest version of the myth, Semele was set to marry Actaeon, for “it looks as though they were betrothed”. 35 Yet, Zeus, who wanted the girl for himself, turned against Kadmos’ grandson, and eliminated him. As for Artemis’ conventionally prominent role in Acateon’s death, as Davies and Finglass aptly point out, “it is natural for Zeus to destroy a hunter through the agency of the divine huntress, his daughter”. 36 Actaeon could have also been, and most probably was, a boastful hunter in Aeschylus’ treatment of the myth (see fr. 241 Radt). Yet, the extant fragments of Tox. indicate that his main hamartia in this play is more interpersonal in nature — as we have seen to be the case in all early sources of Actaeon’s story.  32 In Stesichorus’ version Artemis casts the skin of a deer around Actaeon: ἐλάφου περιβαλεῖν δέρμα. This phrase can be a figurative description of Actaeon’s metamorphosis, but it can also mean that the lyric poet either had the goddess actually throwing a deer skin on Actaeon to set his metamorphosis in motion, or that Atremis threw a deer skin on Actaeon only to confuse his hounds, which then attacked and killed him. See in detail Davies and Finglass 2014, 572–574. Cf. Forbes Irving 1990, 198–199 and 200. Also Fontenrose 1981, 34–35 indicates that in the version of the myth Statius and Arnobius had in mind, Actaeon put on a deer skin himself in order to spy on the bathing Artemis. Yet, his hounds mistook him for an actual deer, possibly because the goddess caused them to, and killed him. There could also have been a variation of the myth according to which Actaeon was punished because he killed a sacred deer of Artemis, see Forbes Irving 1990, 200–201. On these versions see also the bibliography provided by Lacy 1990, 37 n. 61, 40 n. 84 and n. 86. Séchan 1926, 137 ingeniously suggests that the killing of a sacred deer may have been a painter’s way of depicting Actaeon’s boast about his hunting skills, exploited by Euripides in Bacch. 33 Dodds 1960, 113–114. 34 Bremmer 1983, 175 n. 13 and 181 n. 43. Cf. Kossatz-Deissmann 1978, 144 and n. 838. A maternal aunt would often be only a few years older, and might even be younger, than her nephew. 35 See Lacy 1990, 28 n. 16. 36 See Davies and Finglass 2014, 572. Kossatz-Deissmann 1978, 144 suggests that Artemis finds her place in the Actaeon-story narrated in Tox. through a “cult nexus” between herself and Dionysus. More specifically, she argues that Artemis acts as an avenger of Dionysus. Yet, this theory is not supported by any actual evidence.

Aeschylus’ Actaeon: A Playboy on the Greek Tragic Stage?  

In Aeschylus’ drama Actaeon seems to be guilty of sexually offending Semele or Artemis, and if the latter is the case his crime should not have been caused by some innocent error, as for instance in Callimachus 37 or Ovid. 38 Nevertheless, a direct sexual offence against Artemis, apart from rendering Actaeon “too much of a monster of iniquity to be the central figure of a tragedy”, 39 is attested for the first time — and rather ambiguously — in a much later source, Diodorus Siculus. 40 According to Diodorus (Bibl. Hist. 4.81.3–5), Actaeon used to offer Artemis the prime prey of his hunt, 41 and, presuming upon this fact, while perhaps also boasting about his hunting spoils, he intended to achieve a (voluntary or forced?) union with the virgin goddess (προηιρεῖτο τὸν γάμον κατεργάσασθαι τῆς Ἀρτέμιδος) at her own temple. It is unclear if in Diodorus’ account Actaeon considered proposing marriage to Artemis, as he considers doing in Nonnos’ version (Dion. 5.512–519), 42 or if

 37 Hymn 5.113–114: ὁππόκα κ᾽ οὐκ ἐθέλων περ ἴδηι χαρίεντα λοετρά | δαίμονος. 38 See n. 28 above. 39 Sommerstein 2013, 87 argues that “Artemis could quite possibly lure him to his doom by disguising herself as a seduceable mortal (rather as Aphrodite does, for a different purpose, in Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite 81–142), giving Actaeon the opportunity to show how good a “judge of fillies” …he is — and, doubtless, to come to a disastrously wrong judgment”. Yet, such a hypothesis seems untenable, since it implies a kind of sensual stage interaction between Actaeon and (the transformed) Artemis that would be rather inappropriate for Greek tragedy. If we may presume that the reaction of the audience to the advances of the mortal Phaedra towards Hippolytus was sufficient to make Euripides rewrite his play on this myth, see Barrett 1964, 11–12, what would have been the reaction of the audience to a tragedy of Aeschylus showing one of the three virgin goddesses (see e.g. Hom. Hymn Aphr. 7–33), even though transformed, sexually provoking a mortal womanizer? Further, even in the aforementioned epic hymn the goddess of love disguises herself as a mortal woman to seduce Anchises, in a sense, against her will — only because Zeus, in an act of retribution, γλυκὺν ἵμερον ἔμβαλε θυμῷ | ἀνδρὶ καταθνητῷ μιχθήμεναι (Hom. Hymn Aphr. 45–46). On this see Olson 2012, 28ff. and 160ff. See also Faulkner 2008, 10ff. 40 Cf. Hyg. Fab. 180 “Actaeon… Dianam lavantem speculatus est et eam violare voluit”. 41 See the bibliography provided by Lacy 1990, 35 n. 51 for hanging offerings to the gods. 42 Nonnos’ Actaeon, with Cyrene’s wedding to Apollo in mind, supposed that he could draw Artemis, Apollo’s’ sister, into his family through marriage (Ἄρτεμιν ὠισάμην ἐμφύλιον εἰς γάμον ἕλκειν). He thought that if Dawn could fall for Orion, Selene for Endymion, and Demeter for Iasion, then Artemis could fall for him (ὠισάμην ὅτι τοῖος ἔην νόος ἰοχεαίρης). After Actaeon’s disappearance, Nonnos’ Dionysus tells his aunt Autonoe that the truth about her son is in fact very different from what she thought (Dion. 44.283ff.): Artemis married Actaeon, and the whole metamorphosis story is nothing but herdsmen’s lies. And if she follows him to the mountains, the god falsely reassures Autonoe, she will meet her boy again — along with his divine wife. Cf. the version of Istros the Callimachean mentioned earlier.

  Nikos Manousakis he attempted to rape her. Yet, Lacy seems to be right in maintaining that in Diodorus the aspiring hunter’s “goal was [also] marriage, and therefore a ceremonially sanctioned union”. 43 Actaeon’s specific transgressions in Euripides and Callimachus are reflective paradeigmata for Pentheus and Teiresias respectively. The former challenges Dionysus’ divinity, the latter sees Athena naked, and Actaeon does something functionally similar in each of the two accounts. This makes it quite plausible that Euripides and Callimachus actually invented the hunter’s “new” form of offence. It has been argued in detail that the Euripidean and the Callimachean versions belong to a more elaborate, pre-existing state of Actaeon’s myth, focusing on the bath of Artemis. 44 Still, this argument, learned and ingenious as it may be, remains unconvincing, because there is no actual literary evidence to support it. 45 Since, in all likelihood, Actaeon’s hamartia in Tox. is tied to some form of lustful desire, as it will become clear, and he is not simply a boasting hunter, if Aeschylus was not the first to portray him as a wooer of Artemis, possibly a willing trespasser at her virginal bath, his interaction with Semele should have been the kernel of the drama. Whereas there is no Aeschylean sign pointing to Artemis, a particular iconographic piece of evidence suggests that the solution does lie with Semele. Although there are quite a few extant depictions of Actaeon’s fate from classical to late antiquity, and some of them have been associated with Aeschylus, 46 a specific artefact, a red-figure bell krater dating from about 440 BC, attributed to the Lykaon Painter, representing the hounds attacking Actaeon in the presence of

 43 See Lacy 1990, 35ff. 44 See Lacy 1990, 29ff. 45 See Heath 1992, 21–22 n. 21. 46 See LIMC s.v. Aktaion for the art representations of Actaeon in general, and also KossatzDeissmann 1978, 142–165 for those associated specifically with Tox. This scholar, using the evidence from art, persuasively indicates that Aeschylus adopted the Semele version for his lost play. However, as noted earlier, the specific plotline she proposes, with Dionysus in the center of the “divine action,” cannot be supported by the literary evidence. Trendall and Webster 1971, 62 argue that even though the Lykaon krater makes it clear that Zeus was central to the plot of Tox., Actaeon’s hamartia in the drama was not wooing Semele, but seeing Artemis naked. Their suggestion is based on the rather untenable view that Aeschylus’ Actaeon was in fact a chaste hunter. Todisco 2003, 791 provides a quite useful listing of the possible Tox. images grouped according to their place of origin: Attic, Apulian, Campanian etc. For the Actaeon-myth in Campanian vase painting see in detail Leach 1981. It is interesting that the vast majority of illustrations of the myth draw on the dramatic moment of Actaeon’s death (see Jacobsthal 1929; Kilinski II 2013, 201ff.), and show either the hunter alone, while being viciously attacked by his hounds, or the same scene with Artemis present, rousing the dogs.

Aeschylus’ Actaeon: A Playboy on the Greek Tragic Stage?  

Zeus, Lyssa and Artemis, 47 is the only illustration that could be tied to Aeschylus and Tox. on an actual basis. The reason is rather simple. It seems that Aeschylus’ son Euaion was the protagonist of a reperformance of the play depicted in the Lykaon Painter krater. In a dozen red-figure vases dating between about 475 and 450/430 BC, painted, apart from the Polygnotan Lykaon Painter, by the Phiale, the Achilles, and the Euaion Painters, 48 we find the name Euaion, almost always accompanied by the epithet καλός. In four cases the beautiful Euaion is clearly specified as the son of Aeschylus (ΕΥΑΙΟΝ ΚΑΛΟΣ ΑΙΣΧΥΛΟ). 49 In addition to the Lykaon krater under discussion here, which can be associated with some Actaeon-drama, in all likelihood Aeschylus’ Tox., two or three of the remaining Euaion-vases can also be associated with stage plays. More specifically, a Sicilian red-figure calyx krater, having an “Euaion of Aeschylus is beautiful” inscription and showing Perseus next to the bound Andromeda, seems to be tied to Sophocles’ Andromeda. Also, an Etrurian hydria, showing the mythic singer Thamyras seated and holding his lyre points to Sophocles’ Thamyras, whereas an Attic Lekythos, showing a young man holding down his sword could be associated (although this is less likely) with the matricide in the Oresteia. 50 Furthermore, three Euaion-vases can possibly be tied to satyrdrama. 51 All in all, the rarity of the youth’s name, the specific period of time from which the vases date, and, mainly, the association of some Euaion-vases with theatre productions indicate that all evidence should be attached to Aeschylus’ son: a τραγικός according to Suda Lexicon (actor and possibly playwright), quite popular

 47 ARV2 1045, no. 7. For full reference see Matheson 1995, 432. For the full publication record of the krater see the Beazley Archive Pottery Database online, BAPD RF 213562, http://www. beazley.ox.ac.uk/pottery/default.htm (last access 26/02/2018). The Lykaon artist seems to have painted a “near-replica” of the scene in a calyx krater of which only a fragment survives (ARV2 1046, n. 11, BAPD RF 213566), see Robertson 1992, 212. 48 See Robertson 1992, 207. 49 See the list in Shapiro 1987, 108–109. 50 See Trendall and Webster 1971, 63–65 and 69–70 for the Euaion-vases tied to Sophocles’ Andromeda and Thamyras. See also Séchan 1926, 193–198; Webster 1967, 147 and 152. See also the remarks of Gibert in Collard, Cropp and Gibert 2004, 139–140. Thamyras seems to have been one of the poet’s early plays, and a rather unique theatrical event for which Sophocles himself was on stage: κιθάραν ἀναλαβὼν ἐν μόνῳ τῷ Θαμύριδί ποτε ἐκιθάρισεν, ὅθεν καὶ ἐν τῇ ποικίλῃ στοᾷ μετὰ κιθάρας αὐτὸν γεγράφθαι (TrGF IV Radt2 Test. A 1. 24–25). In this production Euaion seems to have performed the role of the nymph Agriope, Thamyras’ mother. For further bibliography on Euaion as Agriope see Wilson 2009, 61 n. 63. See also Kovacs 2013, 496–497. 51 For the full publication record of these vases see the Beazley Archive Pottery Database online (n. 47), BAPD RF 30688, 209713, 214343 (last access 26/08/2018).

  Nikos Manousakis for his looks, 52 “starring” (perhaps in first performances and) in reperformances of his father’s dramas, “directed” by his brother Euphorion, 53 by himself, or possibly by some other theatre craftsman in Aeschylus’ family, 54 and in (at least two of) Sophocles’ plays. The Lykaon krater synthesis (Figure 1 below), with Zeus, Lyssa, and Artemis surrounding Actaeon who is growing horns, and also getting pointy ears and a snout (the glimpse in the hunter’s face while in the processes of dehumanization is an exquisite indication of the painter’s artistry), is quite unique in ancient Greek art. 55 It is hence plausibly associated with a stage transformation of the Actaeon 52 For Aeschylus’ Euaion see also Webster 1972, 47–48; Krumeich 2002. 53 In Euphorion’s lemma in the Suda Lexicon we read that τοῖς Αἰσχύλου τοῦ πατρός, οἷς μήπω ἦν ἐπιδειξάμενος, τετράκις ἐνίκησεν. If we are to put faith in this information, Euphorion must have directed at least four unperformed tetralogies composed by his father. The number of works left behind by Aeschylus (twelve tragedies and four satyr plays) seems rather extreme, yet it is not impossible. Further, Euphorion seems to have been a successful theatre practitioner himself, since, according to Aristophanes’ of Byzantium Hypothesis to Med., in 431 BC he was awarded first prize with Sophocles and Euripides in the second and third place respectively. Aeschylus’ anonymous biographer informs us that the poet οὐκ ὀλίγας δὲ μετὰ τελευτὴν νίκας ἀπηνέγκατο, since Ἀθηναῖοι τοσοῦτον ἠγάπησαν Αἰσχύλον ὡς ψηφίσασθαι μετὰ θάνατον αὐτοῦ τὸν βουλόμενον διδάσκειν τὰ Αἰσχύλου χορὸν λαμβάνειν (l. 48–52). This honorary decree as regards Aeschylus’ work is also attested in various other sources, see TrGF III Radt Test. Gm. Sommerstein 2010a, 13 suggests that the gap between the thirteen victories mentioned in the Vita for Aeschylus and the twenty-eight in the Suda Lexicon should be filled with those achieved posthumously. Cf. Vahtikari 2014, 85. However, Biles 2006/7 casts serious doubt on the existence of the decree under discussion. In any case, even if the actual official order is a confection, as it seems to be, this does not write off the indissoluble respect Aeschylus’ work enjoyed in the fifth century BC, inside and outside Athens, proved by the reperformances of his plays after his death, and also during his lifetime. See in detail Hanink and Uhlig 2016. See also Lamari 2015. On reperforming old drama in the fourth century BC, and the rather low popularity of Aeschylus’ plays, see Nervegna 2014. 54 Aeschylus has been the biological forefather of a series of theater practitioners. Both his sons Euphorion and Euaion, his nephew from his sister, and son of a certain Philopeithes, Philocles, were τραγικοί. Philocles’ sons, Morsimus and Melanthius were all τραγικοί. Morsimus’ son, Astydamas I, and his sons, Philocles II and Astydamas II, were of the same craft as well. Astydamas III and Aeschylus III could have been members of the same family — the grandsons of Astydamas II (?). This “biblical” sequence makes it clear that Aeschylus’ bloodline was still present in theatre practice at some point in the middle of the fourth (or even third) century BC — more than a hundred years after Aeschylus’ death. See Ferrin Sutton 1987, 12–13. Cf. Griffith 2013, 117. Vahtikari 2014, 234 assumes that Tox. was one of Aeschylus’ plays that was probably restaged in Magna Graecia. 55 A fragment of an Agrigentine relief vessel, dated in the first half of the fourth century BC, represents on the left side Artemis next to Actaeon, who is being attacked by his hounds, a seated man in the middle, and on the right side a woman with a long drapery (LIMC s.v. Aktaion n. 34). Breitenstein 1945, 142 identifies the female figure as Lyssa. Yet, as the scholar himself indicates,

Aeschylus’ Actaeon: A Playboy on the Greek Tragic Stage?  

myth, and Euaion’s involvement in the scene makes it most probable that it is, to some degree, tied to Aeschylus’ Tox. Another, though much less conclusive, indication for this hypothesis could be that there are four dogs discernible in the scene, three attacking Actaeon and one emerging from Lyssa’s head — and we do know (see fr. 245 Radt) that in Tox. Actaeon’s hounds were indeed four: Κόραξ, Ἅρπυια, Χάρων, and Λυκόττας. 56 However, even if this synthesis is in fact inspired by the work of Aeschylus, as it seems to be, there is still a further obstacle to overcome in the attempt to employ it as evidence for the plotline of Tox. In vase painting, “scenes from tragic drama were depicted as if the characters were in the mythological story that the drama was portraying”. 57 What then can we conclusively infer about the play itself from the Lykaon synthesis “interpreting” Tox.? Very few things actually — but still some quite crucial points. Firstly, Zeus’ presence in the scene speaks to the use of the Stesichorean Semele version by Aeschylus, 58 in which Actaeon is killed in order not to take Semele as his wife, or of a similar version in which Actaeon dies for making advances at Semele. Lyssa

 this figure “lacks every explanatory attribute” of the goddess of vengeance. For Lyssa in artefacts presenting Actaeon’s killing see further Schlam 1984, 94. Kossatz-Deissmann 1978, 160 more convincingly identifies the woman as Semele. It is possible that a female figure on the right of a similar scene, but without Zeus present, in a Lucanian vase (LIMC s.v. Aktaion n. 45; Todisco 2003, 400 L 45) can also be identified as Semele. The woman is touching the top of her dress on her right shoulder. This gesture can in fact be indicative of the horror with which she is presented, but it can also point to her feminine status, see Llewellyn-Jones 2005, 89–90 with further bibliography. An Apulian amphora (LIMC s.v. Aktaion n. 88; Todisco 2003, 469 Ap. 183) dating from the middle of the fourth century BC, presents Actaeon being attacked by his hounds, surrounded by Artemis, Lyssa, Aphrodite and Eros. Artemis and Aphrodite are both seated. On the right (next to Aphrodite and Eros), an unidentified standing woman, who could by all means be Semele, is pointing at the scene. The presence of Aphrodite and her son could be indicative of the sexual nature of Actaeon’s crime. 56 For the catalogue of Actaeon’s dogs in Greek and Roman literature see Nikolopoulos 2014, 163. It is interesting that various representations of Actaeon being attacked by four hounds, among them the Lykaon krater under discussion here (see LIMC s.v. Aktaion n. 15, 27, 30, 45, 81), have also something else in common: Artemis is always present, and always armed. Even more interesting is that in four of the five cases she holds a bow, and only once (LIMC s.v. Aktaion n. 45) she is presented holding two spears – and while the four bow-vases are dated between 490 and 440 BC, the spears-vase is dated to about 330 BC. We are, of course, in no position to say if the bow-vases were influenced by a specific Actaeon-tragedy (a reperformance of Tox.?) but such a scenario is possible. 57 Dickin 2009, 57. 58 It is generally accepted that, in composing his stage version, Aeschylus was variously influenced by Stesichorus’ Oresteia. See most recently Swift 2015, 127ff. (with the older bibliography in n. 11).

  Nikos Manousakis and Artemis seem to simply be Zeus’ accessories in eliminating the hunter. In Séchan’s words “chez Eschyle… c’était Zeus, irrité des prétentions rivales d’Actéon, qui était la cause première du drame; Artemis et Lyssa n’étaient que les ministres de sa vengeance et n’agissaient, pas plus l’une que l’autre, pour leur compte personnel”. 59

Fig. 3: Red-figure bell krater attributed to the Lykaon Painter, portraying Zeus, Lyssa, Actaeon (Euaion), and Artemis/00.346 © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston MA.

A second “deduction” we can make about Tox. from the Lykaon Painter synthesis, directly tied to the first, concerns the presence of Lyssa. In this representation of Actaeon’s death, unlike all other similar illustrations, Artemis alone, holding her “torche vengeresse” 60 (did the incident in Aeschylus’ version take place at night?) in her right hand, a bow in her left, and carrying a quiver, seems to be insufficient in instigating rage (rabies) into the hunter’s hounds. The goddess stands on the left of Actaeon, watching Lyssa in flesh and blood carrying out this gory mission. Lyssa is on the hero’s right, moving towards him while directing  59 Séchan 1926, 135. 60 Séchan 1926, 133.

Aeschylus’ Actaeon: A Playboy on the Greek Tragic Stage?  

the dogs. Zeus is standing just behind Lyssa, holding a pole in his right hand and his thunderbolt in his left. Further, there is evidence, though inconclusive, that these characters, Zeus and Lyssa, are associated through the inscriptions stating their names. 61 Yet, it seems quite improbable that Lyssa was a stage character in Tox., as she must have been in Aeschylus’ Xantriai (Wool-Carders). In the latter drama the personification of rage appears on stage ἐπιθειάζουσα ταῖς Βάκχαις. 62 Lyssa seems to have functioned in Xantr. as Clytemestra’s ghost functions in Eum., instigating the women of the Chorus to rush after their victim — most likely Pentheus. Still, Pentheus’ dismemberment did not, evidently, take place on stage, before the audience, and the same applies to the tearing of Actaeon to shreds by his hounds instigated by λύσσα. 63 Hence, we can infer from the Lykaon synthesis that, most likely, Lyssa was only graphically mentioned in Tox. — probably in the messenger speech describing Actaeon’s death, from which fr. 244 Radt derives. 64 Furthermore, if we can associate Lyssa, as a name for both rage and rabies, with Tox., then Mette seems to be right in supporting that the unattributed Aeschylean fr. 372 Radt, ἀφρὸς | βορᾶς βροτείας ἐρρύη κατὰ στόμα, plausibly derives from the aforementioned messenger speech. 65

 61 Right above the head of each character we read ΔΙΟΣ, ΛΥΣΣΑ, ΕΥΑΙΩΝ-ΑΚΤΑΙΩΝ, and ΑΡΤΕΜΙΣ respectively. Mercanti 1914, 130, based on the use of genitive for Zeus’ name, suggests that ΔΙΟΣ ΛΥΣΣΑ should be read together as “Zeus’ rage”: rage instigated by Zeus. Nevertheless, as Caskey and Beazley 1954, Plate LXII note, “the old practice of writing the names of persons in the genitive had not died out, and there are several examples of it in the Group of Polygnotos, to which the Lykaon Painter belongs”. On the other hand, the use of only Zeus’ name in the genitive in the Lykaon krater under discussion still renders Mercanti’s argument possible. 62 See fr. 169 Radt. For Xantr. see concisely Sommerstein 2008, 170–172; Sommerstein 2013, 89– 90. 63 Lyssa, daughter of Night and Ouranos, is a stage character in Euripides’ Her. In this play, Iris incites a reluctant Lyssa, to instigate Heracles to kill his children. “Lyssa will interact directly with Heracles, but we do not see this. At 1003–1006 the messenger reports that Athena, seen by the observers, interacted physically with Heracles, hurled a rock at him and threw him to the ground to stop his murdering frenzy; but, again, we do not see this. Lyssa has been one of the characters in Aeschylus’ Xantriai… It is not impossible the Euripides’ deployment of Lyssa in Heracles may have been inspired by the deployment of the Aeschylean Lyssa, but, if so, the modality of interaction is different, since there was every reason to think that in Aeschylus’ Xantriai it happened in the direct interaction mode on stage”, see Sourvinou-Inwood 2003, 470. 64 Unless Sommerstein 2013, 90 is right in suggesting that Lyssa in Xantr. acts upon the bacchants from a distance. If this hypothesis holds, one would say that the same could be applied to Lyssa instigating the dogs of Actaeon — evidently in the presence of the Chorus of hunting nymphs. 65 See Mette 1963, 135. Another possibility for the attribution of this fragment is Glaucus of Potniae. Glaucus was a son of Sisyphus, devoured by his own mares. For Aeschylus’ drama on this myth see Sommerstein 2008, 32–33. A foaming mouth is an actual symptom of rabies in both

  Nikos Manousakis The Lykaon synthesis and Occam’s razor suggest that Aeschylus adopted the Semele version in Tox. 66 Yet, how exactly did he structure his plot? To answer this question, I will translate and discuss four fragments of the drama (241, 242, 243, 246 Radt) that, I maintain, are directly related scenically. οὔπω τις Ἀκταίων᾽ ἄθηρος ἡμέρα κενόν, πόνου πλουτοῦντ᾽, ἔπεμψεν ἐς δόμους (Aesch. fr. 241 Radt) there has never been yet a day to send Actaeon home empty-handed — much strained and with no prey αἰδοῖ μὲν ἁγναῖς παρθένοις γαμηλίων λέκτρων ταπεινή βλεμμάτων ῥέπει βολή 67 (Aesch. fr. 242 Radt) bashful virgins, pure of the wedding bed, always drop their glance low νέας γυναικὸς οὔ με μὴ λάθηι φλέγων ὀφθαλμός, ἥ τις ἀνδρὸς ἦι γεγευμένη· ἔχω δὲ τούτων θυμὸν ἱππογνώμονα (Aesch. fr. 243 Radt) the burning eyes of a young woman who has tasted a man, never, ever, escape my notice. I am quite an expert at spotting mares of this breed πεζοφόροις ζώμασιν (Aesch. fr. 246 Radt) (wearing) girded frocks that reach low to the feet

 dogs and horses. Yet, there is not the slightest evidence that λύσσα was mentioned in Aeschylus’ Glaucus, whereas for Tox., as inconclusive as it may be, there is an indication. 66 Cf. Renner 1987, 283 for a further Hesiodic fragment from the Cat. Gyn. about Actaeon and his wife (?). 67 For the conjectures on the text adopted here see TrGF III Radt 347.

Aeschylus’ Actaeon: A Playboy on the Greek Tragic Stage?  

These fragments can all be regarded as pieces of the same scene — a scene which seems to have been placed early in the play. The setting of Tox. is the city of Thebes, and, more specifically, Kadmos’ royal halls. As Sommerstein suggests, fr. 241 Radt might be a part of the prologue, in which Actaeon “looks forward to a successful day of hunting”, 68 or, more conveniently for the structure of the plot, Actaeon could be speaking these lines just after returning from hunting, in an opening mutatis mutandis similar to that of Euripides’ Hipp. In this prologue Actaeon could be priding himself about his performance in the “sport” either in the presence of the Chorus, or in an unanswered monologue, 69 (addressed to a group of servants?), spoken before the entrance of the hunting nymphs, who had also spent the day with Actaeon and Artemis in the woods, and might have fallen back for some reason. Most likely, the following fragments, 242, 243, 246 Radt, are remnants of the same speech. The subject of the speech is women: virgin and deflowered — and, judging by the tenor of the lines, the speaker is evidently male. The language of the first two fragments (242, 243 Radt) abounds in sexual tension, and the third one (246 Radt) could also be tied to the very same context. There seems to be nothing puritanical in these lines, and whoever the speaker is, there is no basis for describing him as prudish. 70 The speaker seems to be a quite selfconfident womanizer, a real playboy. In frr. 242 and 243 Radt, in all likelihood directly tied to each other, the unknown character speaks, on the one hand about shy, unmarried, virgin girls, who, evidently in the presence of men, drop their eyes (and keep them) low, and, on the other hand about girls who have already “tasted” a man, girls who know the pleasures of intercourse — and this fact is discernible in their ardent eyes. According to Aristotle (Rhet. 2.6.18) Greek proverb had it ἐν ὀφθαλμοῖς εἶναι αἰδῶ, and Euripides in Cresphontes (457 Kannicht) has a similar maxim: αἰδὼς ἐν ὀφθαλμοῖσι γίγνεται. Aeschylus himself in Semele (fr. 168 Radt), 71 when having Hera speak about the infallible, well-minded, just-married brides, lying in the wedding bed for the first time, mentions close together (in a mutilated context) women’s eyes and their commended sense of shame: κόρας ν]εολέκτρους ἀρτιγάμ̣[ους | … [ὄ]μ̣μασιν ε[ὔ]φρονες | … [ὑ]περ ὄμματός ἐστ̣[ι | αἰδὼς γὰρ καθαρὰ καὶ ν[υ]μφο̣κ̣όμ̣ος μέ[γ’] ἀρ̣ί̣[στα. 72 αἰδὼς in Greek literature is thought as having its  68 Sommerstein 2008, 247. 69 Cf. the prologue in Aesch. Sev., Ag., Cho. and Eum. 70 See n. 26 above. The sexually “dehydrated” language of Euripides’ Hippolytus when referring to women points to a directly opposite state of mind from that of the speaker of the Aeschylean fragments under discussion. 71 See n. 98 below. 72 [ὄ]μ̣μασιν is proposed by Diggle 1998, 23. Contra Sommerstein 2010b, 204.

  Nikos Manousakis seat in the eyes, 73 and Plutarch (Mor. 528e) quotes the fourth-century BC historian Timaeus (fr. 122) saying that τὸν ἀναίσχυντον οὐ... κόρας ἐν τοῖς ὄμμασιν ἔχειν ἀλλὰ πόρνας. 74 The downcast eyes’ αἰδὼς is a trait that accompanies the maiden in the wedding bed. Even Aphrodite, the goddess of love and lust in person, makes this gesture of maidenhood shyness. In the Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite (155–156) she follows Anchises to their love-bed κατ᾽ ὄμματα καλὰ βαλοῦσα. 75 Also, Pindar, in Pyth. 9 (9ff.) discussed earlier, has Aphrodite welcoming the newlywed couple, Apollo and Cyrene, as in normal circumstances the grooms’ family would, overlaying their sweet bed with beloved αἰδῶ. 76 The speaker of frr. 242 and 243 Radt most likely explains to his interlocutor(s) how one can tell between a maiden and a young girl (married or unmarried?) who overtly, through marriage, or secretly has known the taste of men — and the sexual overtone in the use of γεύω is quite prominent. Save for this fragment, Aeschylus employs the verb γεύω only for extraordinary “edibles”. In Ag. 1222 Cassandra speaks of Thyestes, the father who tasted the flesh of his own children, whereas in fr. 29 Radt from Glaucus the Sea-God, most probably a satyr drama, 77 Glaucus speaks about how he came to taste the grass that gives mortals everlasting life. 78 In Tox. the speaker’s method of telling women apart lies in the eyes —  73 See Richardson 1974, 227 for references in archaic, classical, and Hellenistic Greek authors. See Hom. Il. 9.372–373 with the comments of Griffin 1995, and also Eur. IA 944, about the eyes and shamelessness. 74 In Ps.-Plutarch’s Lives 839c we read that “after watching Sophocles the tragedian lustfully ogling a boy, [Isocrates] said: It’s not just our hands that we should keep to ourselves, Sophocles, but our eyes as well”. The translation is by R. Waterfield, see Roisman, Worthington and Waterfield 2015. In various other versions of the story the comment concerning Sophocles’ conduct is attributed to Pericles, see id. 166. For historical analysis of the semantic range of the word αἰδώς in Greek literature see the thorough studies of Schultz 1910; Effra 1937; Cairns 1993. See also Ferrari 2002. 75 For lovers casting down their eyes in later Greek and Latin poetry see the references by Faulkner 2008, 225. 76 As Carey 1981, 69 notes, “this picture of the young couple, embarrassed in each other’s presence, shunning public gaze and making love in deserted Libya, is the most delightful in Pindar”. In Ath. 13.16.11 we read that Aristotle (fr. 43) “well claimed that the only part of their boyfriend’s bodies that lovers pay attention to is the eyes, which is where the sense of decency [(τὴν αἰδῶ)] resides”. The translation is by Olson 2010. 77 See Sommerstein 2008, 24–25 with some further bibliography. 78 In Sophocles and Euripides γεύω literally means to taste something, and it is used mainly for wine, for the flesh of animals sacrificed for oracular purposes, and also for horse fodder (see Soph. Ant. 1005, Eur. Ion 1203, Cycl. 149, 150, 155, 559, IA 423). It is used figuratively by both poets to describe the “tasting” of toils and sorrows by men (see Soph. Trach. 1101, Eur. Alc. 1069, Hec. 375, Her. 1353). Only in Aj. 844 we find a rather daring use of the verb, with Ajax, in his last

Aeschylus’ Actaeon: A Playboy on the Greek Tragic Stage?  

that never lie. The sense that emerges when we combine frr. 242 and 243 Radt is that while maidens have the natural tendency, not just to look down, 79 but to look away by looking down — just like the μεταστραφθεῖσα goddess in the Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite (156) — 80 when being in the field of vision of a man that could potentially be their future husband (or their lover), women who have tasted sex are unable to hide their willingness to taste it again, because their glittering eyes, 81 (keeping direct eye contact), give away their yearning for the well-known pleasure. Xenophon (Mem. 2.1.21–22) quotes from memory a work by the sophist Prodicus (fr. 2) on Heracles’ meeting with Virtue and Vice: the former is described as τὰ δὲ ὄμματα αἰδοῖ, while the latter as τὰ δὲ ὄμματα ἔχειν ἀναπεπταμένα. The difference between the shy glance of maidens and the wide-open gaze of sexually “initiated” girls is one of the topics addressed by the unknown Aeschylean speaker. Yet, telling virgins and non virgins apart by the look in their eyes is not an easy task. To be able to always take note of the glittering eyes of willing girls, and to never miss a possible prey, one’s senses should be heightened — he should be properly trained in this “sport”. And our unknown speaker seems to be exactly this kind of man. The phrase the speaker uses to declare his expertise in spotting “initiated” women, ἔχω δὲ τούτων θυμὸν ἱππογνώμονα, is pregnant with bold sexual symbolism. Aristotle (Hist. an. 6.21, 572a 10) notes that “in eagerness for sexual intercourse, of all female animals the mare comes first… Mares become horse-mad [(ἱππομανοῦσιν)], and the term derived from this one animal [(τὸ ὄνομα αὐτῶν)] is applied by way of abuse to women who are inordinate in their sexual desires

 speech, calling the Furies to come and feed on the entire Greek army, see Finglass 2011, 385. From what we can tell, Aeschylus’ use of ἀνδρὸς… γεγευμένη is bold and original. 79 More specifically, to direct low the rays, the “arrows” of their glance. Cf. Ag. 742–743 where Helen, when first arriving in Troy, is described as μαλθακὸν ὀμμάτων βέλος, | δηξίθυμον ἔρωτος ἄνθος (“a soft arrow coming from the eyes, a heart-biting flower of love”). 80 See Faulkner 2008, 224–225. 81 The burning eyes possibly reoccur in the work of Aeschylus in (the dubious) fr. 451c 8–9, but this time most probably as regards rage: κε]ῖ̣ [ν̣ ]ος εἶ̣ π̣ε̣ δ̣ὴ φλ̣έγων | ὀργὴ]ν̣ π̣ε̣δόθεν ὀμμάτων̣ , see further TrGF III Radt 460. For the “flaming eyes of love” see Soph. fr. 474 Radt2 from Oenomaus, where Hippodameia speaks about Pelops’ look of love: τοίαν Πέλοψ ἴυγγα θηρατηρίαν | ἔρωτος, ἀστραπήν τιν’ ὀμμάτων, ἔχει· | ἧι θάλπεται μὲν αὐτός, ἐξοπτᾷ δ’ ἐμέ, | ἴσον μετρῶν ὀφθαλμόν, ὥστε τέκτονος | παρὰ στάθμην ἰόντος ὀρθοῦται κανών (“so strong is the the captivating charm that Pelops has — the lightning in his eyes. It warms him, but turns me to ashes. And he has a way of looking at me directly in the eyes — like some craftsman measuring well, and drawing an unmistakably straight line”). For this play see Sommerstein and Talboy 2012, 75–109. For the “eyes of love” in Greek tragedy, see further Wright 2017, 230–232.

  Nikos Manousakis [(ἐπὶ τῶν ἀκολάστων περὶ τὸ ἀφροδισιάζεσθαι)]”. 82 Aristotle further tells us (Gen. An. 4.5, 773b 25ff.) that only women, and among animals the female horse, which is by nature prone to sexual intercourse (φύσει ἀφροδισιαστικὸν), admit copulation even when already pregnant. Hence, in Greek thinking the word ἵππος seems to have been an idiom for lustful women. 83 Anacreon (PMG 417) likens a girl who looks at him λοξὸν ὅμμασι to a Thracian filly, and assures her that if he puts the bridle on her, he will use the reins to wheel her round the turnpost of the racecourse — for now she has no skilled horseman to ride her: δεξιὸν γὰρ ἱπποπείρην | οὐκ ἔχεις ἐπεμβάτην. 84 Heraclitus, the grammarian who quotes the poem in his Homeric Problems, notes that Anacreon composed it ἑταιρικὸν φρόνημα καὶ σοβαρᾶς γυναικὸς ὑπερηφανίαν ὀνειδίζων, τὸν ἐν αὐτῇ σκιρτῶντα νοῦν ὡς ἵππον ἠλληγόρησεν. It seems then that the girl Anacreon addresses is meretriciously avoiding him, while she would most likely want to let him “ride” her as much as he wants to lead her to the “finish line”. 85 Hutchinson aptly associates Anacreon’s ἱπποπείρην with Aeschylus’ ἱππογνώμονα. Both these compounds, in their specific context, invoke the concept of a man highly experienced with women. 86 In Aristophanes’ Lys. 677–678 we listen to the Chorus of old men say that ἱππικώτατον γάρ ἐστι χρῆμα κἄποχον γυνή, | κοὐκ ἂν ἀπολίσθοι τρέχοντος. And the par excellence “equestrian” women, they add, are the Amazons, fighting men from the back of their horses. Sommerstein is right to indicate that horsemanship “in connection with women automatically suggested the “equestrian” coital position”. 87 Moreover, Aristophanes in his second Thesmophoriazusae (fr. 344 PCG), even more explicitly, refers to the opposite position — with the man on the top: ἀναβῆναι τὴν γυναῖκα βούλομαι. Various other references from comedy indicate that the connection between riding a horse and sexual intercourse was a cliché  82 The translation is by Peck 1970. Cf. Virg. Georg. 3.266–283, indicating that it was Venus herself who inspired the sexual frenzy of mares, see Erren 2003, 675ff. See also Hor. Odes 1.25.14 and Ov. Ars 2.487–488. 83 See Pind. fr. 107 Bowra (= 122 S–M) in which a group of a hundred prostitutes is referred to as φορβάδων κορᾶν ἀγέλαν ἑκατόγγυι- | ον. On this fragment see further Currie 2011, 289–293. The comic poet Eubulus (fr. 82 PCG) calls prostitutes πώλους Κύπριδος — cf. Hesych. Lex. s.v. πῶλος. Also, in Ath. 13.45.39 we find a hetaira called Ἵππη. 84 The lyric image of a mare-girl is much older than Anacreon, see Alcm. 1.45–59 PMG with the notes by Calame 1983, 311ff. 85 On this poem see most recently Leo 2015, 163–175. 86 Hutchinson 2001, 284. The first to indicate this parallel was Wilamowitz-Möllendorff 1913, 119. 87 Sommerstein 1990, 192. This association even takes the form of a political pun, see Aristoph. Lys. 619 (with the note of Sommerstein 1990, 186) and 772–773, and also Wasps 500–502 (with the note of Biles and Olson 2015, 243–244 for further references).

Aeschylus’ Actaeon: A Playboy on the Greek Tragic Stage?  

in Greek thinking. 88 Old comedy is, of course, the genre of sexual wordplay by default, and lyric poetry can be quite playful in this direction. The question that has to be addressed here is how can we account for such a clearly playful sexual concept in an Aeschylean tragedy. Before I attack this question I should first comment on the last fragment from Tox. which, I argue, could also belong in the same scene as the others. In short, this last fragment seems to concern women’s fashion as a sign of their αἰδώς. In one of the sources for fr. 246 Radt, Pollux Onomasticon 7.51.5–52.1, we read the following: τὸ δὲ ζῶμα ἔστι μὲν ἐπιτήδειον ἐνδῦναι, πέζας δὲ ἔχει, ὡς Αἰσχύλος δηλοῖ, πεζοφόρα τὰ ζώματα ἀποκαλῶν. ὅτι δ’ ἐνδῦναι ἦν ἐπιτήδεια, τεκμήραιτ’ ἄν τις καὶ τῷ ἐν τῇ Μενάνδρου Ῥαπιζομένῃ: οὐχ ὁρᾶτε τὴν τροφόν ζῶμ’ ἐνδεδυμένην; ὡς ἐπὶ τὸ πολὺ γὰρ γραῶν τὸ φόρημα ἦν. (Poll. Onom. 7.51.5–52.1) The ζῶμα is convenient (comfortable) clothing, and it has a hemline low to the feet, as Aeschylus indicates, calling πεζοφόρα the ζώματα. One can also ascertain the fact that they are convenient from (the reference in) Menander’s Rhapizomene don’t you see the nurse wearing a (bordered) girded frock? since it is old women mostly wearing a dress like that.

Photius in his Lexicon s.v. ζῶμα (Ζ 71 Theodoridis), makes it clear that the word can mean a kind of θώραξ — a piece of battle clothing — 89 but also that Menander’s reference is about a certain type of girded garment. Hence, Aeschylus’ πεζοφόρα ζώματα are women’s girded frocks that reach low to the feet. These long robes are quite comfortable, and that is why old women, like the nurse in Menander’s Rhapizomene, 90 who at their age evidently care very little about their looks, wear them all the time. There is one example in Greek literature where ζῶμα is used as a synonym for ζώνη, signifying the maiden girdle — which girls would

 88 See Henderson 1991, 164–165 in detail. 89 From a Scholion by Aristonicus in Il. 4 (187a1–2: τοῦ ζώματος μνησθεὶς παραλέλοιπε τὸν θώρακα ὥστε ἀπὸ μέρους τὸ ὅλον δεδηλῶσθαι), we can infer that ζῶμα is a girt or piece of clothing worn under the armor, that could be used as a hypernym for the breastplate. See further Kirk 1985, 350. The ζῶμα φαεινόν in Od. 14.482 could suggest that the piece of clothing under discussion was actually made of some kind of metallic material. ζῶμα in other contexts can also mean loincloth/waist-cloth (worn next to the body), see e.g. Il. 23.683; Alcaeus fr. 203, 357 L–P. See further Bennett 1997, 70 n. 15 and 116 n. 8. 90 Fr. 327 PCG.

  Nikos Manousakis wear from the age of puberty and remove when they were to get married. 91 In an Alcaean poem about the union of Thetis and Peleus (fr. 42 L–P), the poet describes how the bridegroom deflowered his pure, virgin bride by loosening her ζῶμα. 92 Even though there is no actual evidence to support such a hypothesis, the early use of this word for the maiden girdle makes it possible for Aeschylus to have also used ζῶμα, signifying a seemly long robe, in an allusive phrase invoking the loss of virginity. 93 In any case, it is plausible that in Tox. πεζοφόροις ζώμασιν was spoken in the very same scene as the other three fragments considered here, and, if so, it could be pointing to a further criterion, save the shy/passionate look, by which one can tell virgins and sexually “initiated” girls apart: that is how (provocatively) they dress. Herodotus (1.8.3) tells us that at Candaules’s suggestion to see his wife with no clothes on Gyges replies that the woman who takes off her clothes loses the respect that she is owed. 94 From this point of view we may infer that in the Greek mind how a woman covers her body is crucial with regard to how respected she wants to be. The association between αἰδώς and how provocatively a woman chooses to dress is clear in the tale of Heracles’ meeting with Virtue and Vice mentioned earlier (Xen. Mem. 2.1.21–22/ Prodicus fr. 2). There, Virtue is described κεκοσμημένην τὸ… σῶμα καθαρότητι, wearing a (purely) white raiment, while Vice has on a négligé, an ἐσθῆτα… ἐξ ἧς ἂν μάλιστα ὥρα διαλάμποι.

 91 See Garland 1990, 219ff. The “loosening” of a woman’s girdle is also associated with childbirth, see further Hitch 2015, 524–525. In tragedy ζώνη is primarily associated with the womb, see Aesh. Cho. 992, Eum. 607–608, Eur. Hec. 762, I.T. 204–207. For the various concepts related to the female ζώνη in Greek literature, among them both virginity and seduction, see in detail Bennett 1997, 125–160. This scholar, id. 145, suggests an interesting association between ζώνη and ζῶμα in view of Hera as a warrior-seductress in the epos (see Il. 14–15). 92 For this poem see concisely Page 1955, 278–281. 93 Electra, the tragic maiden par excellence, ever “married” to the memory of her father’s wretched fate, in Sophocles’ homonymous drama gives her sister Chrysothemis her οὐ χλιδαῖς ἠσκημένον ζῶμα (l. 452), her unadorned girdle, asking her to offer it to Agamemnon’s tomb, see Finglass 2007, 228–229. Save the Tox. fragment, this is the only other occurrence of ζῶμα (meaning girdle in this context) in extant tragedy. The compound συ/ξυζωμάτων (also meaning girdles), clearly used as a synonym of ζώνη, occurs (plausibly for metrical reasons in the main) in Aesch. Supp. 462, where Danaus’ daughters threaten to hang themselves from the statues of the gods in order to protect their maiden status. In comedy ζῶμα occurs in an Aristophanian fragment (332 PCG (l.7)), most likely meaning “undergarment” in that context. 94 See Ferrari 2002, 79.

Aeschylus’ Actaeon: A Playboy on the Greek Tragic Stage?  

As has been suggested as early as Mette, the speaker of the fragments presented above seems to be Actaeon. 95 Yet, Mette maintained that there is a mocking undertone against the Chorus in the hunter’s words in frr. 242 and 243 Radt. This is a rather untenable hypothesis. A hero shamelessly accusing a friendly divine group of companions of a virgin goddess as being unchaste could not easily fit in Greek tragedy. Mette’s view most probably derives from the misinterpretation of an ancient source. More specifically, Antigonus Carystius in Hist. Mir. 115.1–2, with Aristotle’s work in mind, notes: τῶν δὲ θηλέων ζῴων ῥοπικώτερόν φησιν εἶναι πρὸς τὴν συνουσίαν ἵππον, καὶ ἱππομανεῖν ἰσχυρῶς, ὅθεν καὶ πρὸς τὴν βλασφημίαν ἀπὸ τούτου μεταφέρεσθαι καὶ τὰς πρὸς τὰ ἀφροδίσια κεκινημένας ὀνειδίζεσθαι. φαίνεται δὲ καὶ Αἰσχύλος ἱστορικῶς τὸ τοιοῦτον οὕτως πως εἰρηκέναι πρὸς τὰς παρθένους ἐν ταῖς Τοξότισιν. Antigonus then quotes frr. 242 and 243 Radt. Mette must have taken πρὸς τὰς παρθένους to indicate that the lines were expressed in accusation of the virginal nymphs populating the Chorus. However, what Antigonus seems to actually mean is that one of Aeschylus’ characters, in all likelihood Actaeon, addressed these lines to the virgin nymphs of the Chorus without any hostility, simply in discussing with them the nature of mortal females. If Actaeon addresses these sexually charged lines to the huntresses of the Chorus, who were probably portrayed more like Amazons, 96 with whom a man could have had a “brash” conversation about the sexual conduct of common women, rather than like ethereal virgin nymphs of the woods, what is the specific subject of this conversation? It seems highly unlikely for these lines to be a general comment made by Actaeon as regards female nature. Three fragments of a lost Aeschylean drama deriving from quite different sources are plausibly closely interconnected pieces of the same scene — in all likelihood of the same speech. Even if one accepts that Aeschylus did compose lines (especially iambic) that were not inseparably interwoven in the plotline of his plays, it would be rather unconvincing to suggest that these fragments are not crucially relevant to the plot of Tox. Who is then the specific woman whose conduct triggered Actaeon’s words? Most probably, she is none other than Semele. Or else, if Actaeon was in fact referring to some specific girl other than her, we would have to persuasively explain how this aspect of the plot could serve the dramatic economy of Tox. If the suggested hypothesis is correct, it becomes clear that the Aeschylean version of the Actaeon-story could have been innovative in that the poet did not choose to portray Actaeon and Semele as set to be lawfully married, as seems to  95 Mette 1963, 135 — cf. Séchan 1926, 135. See also Sommerstein 2008, 247; Sommerstein 2013, 87. 96 See n. 9 above.

  Nikos Manousakis have been the case in earlier accounts. If Actaeon and Semele were set to be married in Tox., this means that Actaeon would have been portrayed as a shameless, un-tragic figure, vilifying his bride to be by suggesting that she is not a virgin, but a lustful woman. 97 In Tox. Kadmos’ daughter has probably already been “involved” with Zeus, and, most likely, she is already pregnant with Dionysus. Gossip surrounding her name would have been flaring up in Thebes, 98 and this could very well have been the topic of discussion between Actaeon and the Chorus. The hunter could have suggested that his experience with girls allows him to see through Semele: she is nothing more than a vain, lustful woman, entertaining a rumor that Zeus himself “fell” for her. Actaeon, plausibly overconfident about his looks and amorous skills, could have claimed that he can prove Semele’s lustfulness and deception — the latent meaning being that he could pursue her amorously and seduce her. Since she has known the pleasures of intercourse, by lying with some mortal man of course, she would be a rather eager prey. Alternatively, without challenging Semele’s claims that the father of gods is her lover, Acateon could have declared that he is able to seduce Semele and share almighty Zeus’ bed. The Chorus should have reproached the hunter for his arrogance, possibly reminding him that the will of Zeus is unintelligible to mortals, and those irreverent to the gods are severely punished. Following this conversation, the archeresses could have sung about the misfortunes of Semele and the joys of being a

 97 That is the case, of course, if Actaeon is indeed vilifying a particular woman for sexual lust. Nevertheless, it is not an impossible scenario that he is outlining his ability to distinguish between immodest and chaste women, to then state that he is particularly pleased that his brideto-be, Semele, fits into the latter category. Another possibility is that Actaeon has heard rumors of his future wife’s experience (i.e. with Zeus), and he is complaining of the sexual license of women. 98 On the lustful nature of women in the Greek mind see, in detail, Carson 1990. Cf. Eur. Bacch. 26–31 ἐπεί μ’ ἀδελφαὶ μητρός, ἃς ἥκιστ’ ἐχρῆν, | Διόνυσον οὐκ ἔφασκον ἐκφῦναι Διός, | Σεμέλην δὲ νυμφευθεῖσαν ἐκ θνητοῦ τινος | ἐς Ζῆν’ ἀναφέρειν τὴν ἁμαρτίαν λέχους, | Κάδμου σοφίσμαθ’, ὧν νιν οὕνεκα κτανεῖν | Ζῆν’ ἐξεκαυχῶνθ’, ὅτι γάμους ἐψεύσατο (“because the sisters of my mother, even thought they were the last who should have done so, said that Dionysus was no offspring of Zeus, but that Semele, “bedded” by some mortal man, ascribed her sexual misdeeds to Zeus — a clever invention of Kadmos. That is why, they proclaimed, Zeus killed her, for falsely claiming that he was her bedfellow”). νυμφευθεῖσαν in this context is a euphemism for “seduced”. See Dodds 1960, 67. Cf. the very mutilated lyric papyrus fr. 168.8–9 Radt (= P.Oxy. XVIII 2164 fr. 1) from Aesch. Sem.: φιλο[ῦ].σιν … φθονερ[ | δόξα τ’ ἀεικής (“they like to… envious… and the shameful repute”). It is quite clear that the fragment belongs to Sem., as Sommerstein 2008, 224–233; Sommerstein 2010b, 202–204; Sommerstein 2013, 83 convincingly indicates — and not to Xantr., as has been suggested in the past. For further bibliography on this subject see also Hadjicosti 2006a, 121 n. 1.

Aeschylus’ Actaeon: A Playboy on the Greek Tragic Stage?  

virgin. In the next scene Actaeon would go on to make advances at Semele, either on or off stage, and, evidently, she would have vehemently rejected him. As mentioned earlier, in Hesiod’s account of the myth Kadmos possibly cursed Actaeon for his offence, and this could have triggered his divine punishment on the mortal level. Even though it is rather certain that in Tox., as in almost all versions of the myth, the chaste Artemis takes on the killing of the insolent hunter, most likely assisted by Lyssa (in her off stage act of savagery), the instigator of Actaeon’s doom must have explicitly been Zeus — the offended bedfellow of Semele, and the father of her unborn child. There is no way of knowing if Kadmos was a character in Aeschylus’ Tox. and, if he was, what was his view about his daughter’s “involvement” with Zeus. Yet, there is evidence 99 that in Aeschylus’ Semele, a drama in all likelihood following Tox. in a thematically connected trilogy, 100 the fatal union between Semele and Zeus, in all his divine glory, takes place in Kadmos’ house, who most probably knows about the affair, and is honored by this “conjunction” — as is the case with Euripides’ Bacch. Hence, it is

 99 See n. 98 above for the storyline in Eur. Bacch., where Kadmos, for his own reasons, defends Semele and her divine offspring, and cf. the choral fr. 168.11–15 Radt from Aesch. Sem.: [Σ]εμέλας δ᾽ ε[υ- | χ̣όμεθ̣’ εἶναι διὰ πᾶν εὐθύπορον λά[χος όλβου | τὰ γὰρ ἄλλα τάδ’[ | Κάδμῳ Σεμέ̣[λα | … παντοκρα[τ | Ζ̣ηνί, γάμων δ[ (“we pray that Semele’s blissful destiny may be unswerving throughout, and everything else … for Kadmos [and] Semele… almighty Zeus, married”). See also fr. 168a.8–9 Radt from the same play: εὔκλει̣ [ά]ν θ’[ | Κάδμου̣ τ̣ ’ ἀ.[ (“and the glory of Kadmos”). 100 Sommerstein 2013 rightly, I believe, maintains that Tox. was the first play of a thematically connected Aeschylean trilogy concerning the offspring of Kadmos. Tox. was followed by Sem., and the third tragedy of the composition was Xantr., putting on stage the punishment of another impious grandson of Kadmos, Pentheus, by Semele’s son Dionysus. An extensive papyrus fragment (fr. 168 Radt) from Sem. (see n. 98 above) indicates that Hera, disguised as a priestess, appeared on stage in this play. See in detail Hadjicosti 2006b. Her plan, which turned out successfully, was to make Semele doubt the identity of her lover and ask him to present himself to her in full divine glory. Actaeon is most likely mentioned in Sem. (fr. 221 Radt Ζεύς ὃς κατέκτα τοῦτον) in a prologue spoken by Hera, in which the goddess informs the audience that “Zeus, who killed Actaeon because he was a suitor of Semele, has now made her pregnant himself”, see Sommerstein 2013, 88. Hadjicosti 2006a, based on the use of τοῦτον instead of κεῖνον in the fragment, argues that Actaeon’s dead body was seen on stage in Sem. Sommerstein 2013, 87 suggests that it was not the hunter’s dead body, but his tomb which was seen and is referred to in the line under discussion. However, neither of these hypotheses is necessary. Aeschylus’ Hera might be referring to the dead Actaeon using τοῦτον without actually “pointing” to any tangible “object”, as e.g. in Per. 188 where the Queen uses τούτω for the two outstanding girls she sees in her dream, or in Sev. 505 where Eteocles uses τοῦτον to refer to the, evidently not present on stage, Argive warrior Hippomedon, who stands at the fourth gate of Thebes. For τοῦτον cf. Soph. Ant. 203 (for the off stage dead body of Polynices); OT 799, 947; Phil. 442, 444.

  Nikos Manousakis tempting to conjecture, paraphrasing Lacy, 101 that Actaeon’s offence to Semele could have in some way endangered certain “dynastic plans on the part of Kadmos”, who would more than welcome a son of Zeus in his family. If Kadmos was indeed a dramatis persona in Tox., Actaeon’s offence could have led him to curse his grandson also in this drama — and even banish him from Thebes à la manière de Theseus and Hippolytus in Euripides’ Hipp. Actaeon, in an unreconstructable context, is then found in the woods (hunting?), along with his dogs, and possibly along with some male companions. Artemis who has so favored Actaeon by making him her co-hunter, would have turned against him, 102 most probably answering Kadmos’ curse. She would have “visited” the young man in the woods, and transformed him into a deer to be torn apart by his hounds, that were instigated by the Zeus-sent Lyssa. The news of his violent death is brought to the stage characters, Actaeon’s kin, and the Chorus of former co-hunters, by some messenger who could have simply witnessed the events, or took part in them. This messenger could have been either mortal, for instance one of Actaeon’s companions, or divine, plausibly an avenging Artemis, who, à la manière de Dionysus in the exodos of Bacch., speaks about mortal sin and the merciless rage of the gods. Yet, there is also another possibility. Pollux’s mention of a certain horned Actaeon-mask (Onom. 4.141.5) in his περὶ τραγικῶν προσώπων section presumes the appearance of a partly metamorphosed hunter on stage. We are of course in no position to indicate if the mask was tied to Phrynichus’, Iophon’s, or Aeschylus’ Actaeon-play, or perhaps to a drama by a completely different poet. However, it is not improbable that this mask was tied to some mythic “tradition”, which became a stage “tradition”. But if the metamorphosis, evidently, did not take place on stage, how and why did a horned Actaeon face the audience? The answer to this question seems to lie in two later accounts. Pausanias (9.38.5) tells us that the Orchomenians had the following story about Actaeon: “A ghost, they say, carrying a rock was ravaging the land. When they inquired at Delphi, the god bade them discover the remains of Actaeon and bury them in the earth. He also bade them make a bronze likeness of the ghost and fasten it to a rock with iron”. 103 Nonnos (5.412ff.), on the other hand, recounts that the ghost of a transformed Actaeon appeared to Aristaeus in sleep, informing him of his deplorable fate and asking him to bury his changed form and provide the necessary honors. The Actaeon-mask might be an indica-

 101 Lacy 1990, 28. 102 Cf. Apollo’s change of attitude in Aesch. fr. 350 Radt. 103 The translation is by Jones 1935.

Aeschylus’ Actaeon: A Playboy on the Greek Tragic Stage?  

tion that the ghost of Actaeon was also a stage character in fifth-century, and possibly Aeschylean, or later tragedy; a ghost functioning as a messenger of his undisclosed death — much like Polydorus in Euripides’ Hec. 104 The pathetic value of such a character, announcing his vicious killing, indicating Zeus as the architect of his catastrophe, and asking his family for a proper burial of his remains is quite apparent, and the only extant line evidently deriving from the messenger speech in Tox. makes this possible. Fr. 244 Radt κύνες διημάθυνον ἄνδρα δεσπότην (“the dogs utterly ravaged their (own) master”), could have been spoken by someone who witnessed the events, but also by the ghost of the victim himself. In the latter case Actaeon’s reference to the hounds he once mastered, and to the disastrous reversal of this relationship, would have been quite emphatic. 105 After Actaeon’s death had been made known, the play would have ended with a long dirge about the young hunter who had gone astray, sung by the Chorus, while the members of his family were setting off towards the woods to collect what was left of him. 106

 104 For the phantom of Polydorus in Hec. see concisely Gregory 1999, 39ff., and also Lane 2007. For ghosts in extant and lost Greek tragedy see in detail Bardel 1999 and 2005. 105 Cf. Eur. Bacch. 337–339 ὁρᾶις τὸν Ἀκταίωνος ἄθλιον μόρον, | ὃν ὠμόσιτοι σκύλακες ἃς ἐθρέψατο | διεσπάσαντο (“you know about the wretched death of Actaeon, who was torn apart by the flesh-devouring dogs he had raised”). Judging from his other plays, it is quite likely that Aeschylus presented Actaeon’s transformed dead body on stage in the exodos of Tox. The dead bodies of Oedipus’ sons are brought on stage for the exodos in Sev., the dead bodies of Agamemnon and Cassandra are shown on stage in Ag., the dead bodies of Clytemestra and Aegisthus are brought on stage in Cho., Patroclus’ dead body is seen on stage in the exodos of Myrmidons, Hector’s dead body must have been in plain sight in Phrygians or The Ransoming of Hector, and the same applies to the dead body of Sarpedon in Carians or Europa, and to that of Memnon in the Weighing of Souls. There are also other lost Aeschylean plays in which dead bodies could have been brought on stage. If this pattern holds for Tox., and the Actaeon-mask Pollux refers to was in fact used in this drama, it could have been worn by the actor portraying Actaeon as a (half-)transformed dead body. 106 Hesiod in the Cat. Gyn. fr. 217 MW3 (= P.Oxy. 2489) mentions Actaeon’s family along with Hermes, in relation to the tending of the dead hunter’s remains: τε]θνηότα πορσανέουσαι. See West 1985, 88. See further Hirschberger 2004, 391–393. A volute-krater, attributed to the Painter of the woolly satyrs, dating from 450–440 BC (see LIMC s.v. Aktaion n. 16), presents a young man wearing a chlamys, typical attire of huntsmen and messengers, over his elbows. He has just dropped his club, a weapon used by huntsmen, and hat, and he is announcing Actaeon’s death to a standing man and a seated woman, most likely Aristaeus and Autonoe. This young messenger, who also wears a pair of boots, could be Hermes, but he could also very well be a mortal companion of Actaeon. The representation is fairly securely associated with some Actaeondrama — yet, there is no way of ascertaining if this drama is Tox. or another composition. The actual tending of Actaeon’s dead body is represented on a black-figured pyxis dating form 470 BC (see LIMC s.v. Aktaion n. 121), on this see Séchan 1926, 138 and Forbes Irving 1990, 198.

  Nikos Manousakis In this paper, I discussed in detail the extant evidence concerning Aeschylus’ Tox. — more in an attempt to shed some new light on the various questions it poses, rather than in order to provide definitive answers. Even though only a few lines survive from this drama, the thematic affinity of the fragments, the evidence from myth, art, and literature, and also the evidence indicating that it was part of a thematically connected trilogy, allowed me to draw some plausible conclusions about the plot and structure of this Actaeon-play. Certainly, there is much speculation involved in this venture. Yet, the speculation is always firmly based upon the most trustworthy evidence available: the extant fragments of the play. In a nutshell, I propose here that Tox. is based on the oldest version of the Actaeonmyth, the Semele version. However, in the Aeschylean drama, unlike what is the case in earlier accounts, Actaeon and Semele are related but not set to be married. Actaeon is a hunting protégé of the virgin Artemis, who, as is the case with Orion, favors him until he commits a sexual lapse. Too confident about his charm and knowledge of women, he ends up offending a mortal girl who has shared the bed of Zeus, and he pays the price. The moral of Tox. could be summarized in a fragment (428 Kannicht) from Euripides’ lost Hipp.: οἱ γὰρ Κύπριν φεύγοντες ἀνθρώπων ἄγαν | νοσοῦσ᾽ ὁμοίως τοῖς ἄγαν θηρωμένοις: “those who are running away from sexual pleasures are just as mad as those who hunt after them exceedingly”. 107 In Tox. Actaeon is an anti-Hipploytus, obsessed with hunting animal and human prey in exactly the same way Hippolytus, the other hunter, is obsessed with chastity and moral purity. “The link of sex to hunting — an obvious and ubiquitous one, given that both involve pursuit, capture and penetration with a “weapon” — exploits not only the ambiguity of eros, the way it sits on the cusp of culture and nature, but also the violence and death… in the erotic imagery derived from war and its weapons… [H]unting as erotic metaphor locates sex in the no-man’s-land where culture and nature uneasily fraternize and more often try to destroy one another”. 108 It is not hard to imagine how a poet as lavish as Aeschylus would have ingeniously exploited the nuanced link between courtship  107 Cf. Ath. 12.3.5 τὸ οὖν ἡδονὰς διώκειν προπετῶς λύπας ἐστὶ θηρεύειν (“going after pleasures without any moderation is the same as hunting for sorrows”). 108 Thorton 1997, 40–41. For the pursuit of animals as a sexual metaphor in Greek literature, whether it concerns men “hunting” women, men “hunting” boys, or women “hunting” men (Achilles in Eur. IA 959–960 boasts: μυρίαι κόραι | θηρῶσι λέκτρον τοὐμόν: “countless maidens are after my (wedding) bed”), see concisely (with plenty of references to the sources) Cohen 2010, 150–151. For the erotic metaphor of hunting in Greek tragedy, see further Wright 2017, 223. See also Dunn 1980, 104–307 in more detail (about this metaphor in Greek and Latin poetry). On hunting and pederastic courtship see briefly Dover 1989, 87–89, and thoroughly Barringer 2001, 70–124.

Aeschylus’ Actaeon: A Playboy on the Greek Tragic Stage?  

and hunting in Actaeon’s case. The rather unnatural “preoccupation” of this mythical hunter with the pleasures of the flesh, leading him to offend Zeus’ bedfellow — an act evoking Orion’s offence against Artemis herself — and Hippolytus’ unnatural avoidance of this aspect of life, are actually two sides of the same coin, as the aforementioned fragment makes clear. From these two interconnected extremes, which bring all three co-hunters of Artemis to meet their tragic end, Euripides in his extant Hipp. masterfully dramatizes the price one pays for the extreme abstinence from sexual pleasures. On the contrary, Aeschylus in Tox. seems to be dramatizing the price of sexual hedonism 109 — and, alas, this kind of fascinating Aeschylean poetry is in the main (most likely) forever lost to us.

Bibliography Allan, W. (2008), Euripides: Helen, Cambridge. Barchiesi, A./Rosati, G. (2007), Ovidio Metamorfosi, vol. II, Milan. Bardel, R. (1999), Casting Shadows on the Greek Stage: The Stage Ghost in Greek Tragedy, PhD diss., University of Oxford. Bardel, R. (2005), “Spectral Traces: Ghosts in Tragic Fragments”, in: F. McHardy/J. Robson/ D. Harvey (eds), Lost Dramas of Classical Athens: Greek Tragic Fragments, Exeter, 83–112. Barrett, W.S. (1964), Euripides: Hippolytos, Oxford. Barringer, J.M. (2001), The Hunt in Ancient Greece, Baltimore. Bennett, M.J. (1997), Belted Heroes and Bound Women: The Myth of the Homeric Warrior-King, Lanham MD/Oxford. Biles, Z.P. (2006/7), “Aeschylus’ Afterlife: Reperformance by Decree in 5th C. Athens?”, ICS 31/2, 206–242. Biles, Z.P./Olson, S.D. (2015), Aristophanes: Wasps, Oxford. Breitenstein, N. (1945), “Analecta Acragantina”, ActaA 16, 113–153. Bremmer, J. (1983), “The Importance of the Maternal Uncle and Grandfather in Archaic and Classical Greece and Early Byzantium”, ZPE 50, 173–186.

 109 It seems not implausible that Euripides in both his Hippolytus-plays exploited specific ideas present in Tox. fr. 428 Kannicht from the lost Hipp., quoted above, might be evidence that in this play Euripides focused on the punishment not of one, but of both interconnected tragic hamartiae: Phaedra’s unrestrained lustfulness (see e.g. frr. 430 and 434 Kannicht, most probably spoken by Phaedra, see Barrett 1964, 18, also id. 30–1 concisely for the characterization of the queen in the lost play), and Hippolytus’ strict avoidance of lust. If this suggestion is sound — and the sharp contrast between the “corrected” (see the Hypothesis to the extant play 29–30), silent, virtuous Phaedra of the extant Hipp., and the daring, audacious Phaedra of the lost play points in this direction — then Actaeon’s characterization in Tox. might have had something in common with that of Phaedra in the lost Hipp., or, to be accurate, the other way around. For further bibliography on Euripides’ first Hipp. see Collard/Cropp 2008, 466.

  Nikos Manousakis Bulloch, A.W. (1985), Callimachus: The Fifth Hymn, Cambridge. Cairns, D.L. (1993), Aidos: The Psychology and Ethics of Honour and Shame in Ancient Greek Literature, Oxford. Calame, C. (1983), Alcman, Rome. Carey, C. (1981), A Commentary on Five Odes of Pindar: Pythian 2, Pythian 9, Nemean 1, Nemean 7, Isthmian 8, New York. Casanova, A. (1969), “Il Mito di Atteone nel Catalogo Esiodeo”, RIFC 97, 31–46. Caskey, L.D./Beazley, J.D. (1954), Attic Vase Paintings in the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, London. Cohen, A. (2010), Art in the Era of Alexander the Great: Paradigms of Manhood and their Cultural Traditions, Cambridge. Collard, C./Cropp, M.J./Gibert, J. (2004), Euripides: Selected Fragmentary Plays, vol. II, Oxford. Collard, C./Cropp, M. (2008), Euripides: Fragments (Aegeus-Meleager), Cambridge MA. Currie, B. (2011), “Epinician Choregia: Funding a Pindaric Chorus”, in: L. Athanassaki/E. Bowie (eds), Archaic and Classical Choral Song: Performance, Politics and Dissemination, Berlin, 269–310. Davies, M./Finglass, P.J. (2014), Stesichorus: The Poems, Cambridge. Dickin, M. (2009), A Vehicle for Performance: Acting the Messenger in Greek Tragedy, Plymouth. Diggle, J. (1998), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta Selecta, Oxford. Dodds, E.R. (1960), Euripides: Bacchae, Oxford. Dover, K.J. (1989), Greek Homosexuality, Cambridge MA. Dunn, H.D. (1980), The Hunt as an Image of Love and War in Classical Literature, PhD diss., Berkeley. Effra, A.E. (1937), “Αἰδώς und verwandte Begriffe in ihrer Entwicklung von Homer bis Demokrit”, Philologus Suppl. 30n.2. Erren, M. (2003), P. Vergilius Maro: Georgica – Kommentar, Heidelberg. Farnell, L.R. (1961), Critical Commentary to the Works of Pindar, Amsterdam. Faulkner, A. (2008), The Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite, Oxford. Ferrari, G. (2002), Figures of Speech: Men and Maidens in Ancient Greece, Chicago. Finglass, P. (2007), Sophocles: Electra, Cambridge. Finglass, P. (2011), Sophocles: Ajax, Cambridge. Fontenrose, J. (1981), Orion: The myth of the Hunter and the Huntress, Berkley. Forbes Irving, P.M.C. (1990), Metamorphosis in Greek Myths, Oxford. Fränkel, H. (1975), Early Greek Poetry and Philosophy: A History of Greek Epic, Lyric, and Prose of the Middle of the Fifth Century, Oxford. Garland, R. (1990), The Greek Way of Life: From Conception to Old Age, London. Gregory, J. (1999), Euripides: Hecuba, Atlanta GA. Griffin, J. (1995), Homer: Iliad Book Nine, Oxford. Griffith, M. (2013), Aristophanes’ Frogs, Oxford. Hadjicosti, I.L. (2006a), “Semele and the death of Actaeon: Aeschylus fr. 221 Radt”, ACl 49, 121–127. Hadjicosti, I.L. (2006b), “Hera Transformed on Stage: Aeschylus Fr. 168 Radt”, Kernos 19, 291– 301. Halleran, M.R. (1995), Euripides: Hippolytus, Warminster.

Aeschylus’ Actaeon: A Playboy on the Greek Tragic Stage?  

Hanink, J./Uhlig, A.S. (2016), “Aeschylus and His Afterlife in the Classical Period: ‘My Poetry Did Not Die with Me’”, in: S.E. Constantinidis (ed.), The Reception of Aeschylus’ Plays Through Shifting Models and Frontiers, Leiden, 51–79. Heath, J. (1992), Actaeon, the Unmannerly Intruder: The Myth and its Meaning in Classical Literature, New York. Henderson, J. (1991), The Maculate Muse: Obscene Language in Attic Comedy, New York. Heubeck, A./West, S./Hainsworth, J.B. (1988), A Commentary on Homer’s Odyssey – Volume I: Introduction and books I–VIII, Oxford. Hirschberger, M. (2004), Gynaikōn Katalogos und Megalai Ēhoiai: Ein Kommentar zu den Fragmenten zweier hesiodeischer Epen, München. Hitch, S. (2015), “From Birth to Death: Life-Change Rituals”, in: E. Eidinow/J. Kindt (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Greek Religion, Oxford, 521–536. Hunter, R. (2005), The Hesiodic Catalogue of Women: Constructions and Reconstructions, Cambridge. Hutchinson, G.O. (2001), Greek Lyric Poetry: A Commentary on Selected Larger Pieces, Oxford. Jackson, S. (2000), Istrus the Callimachean, Amsterdam. Jacobsthal, P. (1929), Aktaions Tod, Merburg. Janko, R. (1984), “P.Oxy. 2509: Hesiod’s Catalogue on the Death of Actaeon”, Phoenix 38, 299– 307. Johansen, F.H./Whittle, E.D. (1980), Aeschylus: The Suppliants, vol. II, Copenhagen. Jones, W.H.S. (1935), Pausanias: Description of Greece, Cambridge MA. Kidd, D. (1997), Aratus: Phaenomena, Cambridge. Kilinski II, K. (2013), Greek Myth and Western Art: The Presence of the Past, Cambridge. Kirk, G.S. (1985), The Iliad: A Commentary-Volume I: Books 1–4, Cambridge. Kossatz-Deissmann, A. (1978), Dramen des Aischylos auf westgriechischen Vasen, Mainz am Rhein. Kovacs, G.A. (2013), “Stringed Instruments in Fifth-Century Drama”, in: G.W.M. Harrison/V. Liapis (eds), Performance in Greek and Roman Theatre, Leiden, 477–499. Krumeich, R. (2002), “Euaion ist Schön: zur Rühmung eines zeitgenössischen Schauspielers auf attischen Symposiengefäßen”, in: S. Moraw/E. Nölle (eds), Die Geburt des Theaters in der griechischen Antike, Mainz am Rhein, 141–145. Lacy, L.R. (1990), “Aktaion and a Lost Bath of Artemis”, JHS 110, 26–42. Lamari, A.A. (2015), “Aeschylus and the and the Beginning of Tragic Reperformances”, in: A.A. Lamari (ed.), Reperformances of Drama in the
Fifth and Fourth Centuries BC. Authors and Contexts, Trends in Classics 7.2, Berlin, 189–206. Lane, N. (2007), “Staging Polydorus’ Ghost in the Prologue of Euripides’ Hecuba”, CQ 57, 290– 294. Lawrence, S. (2013), Moral Awareness in Greek Tragedy, Oxford. Leach, E.W. (1981), “Metamorphoses of the Actaeon Myth in Campanian Painting”, MDAI(R) 88, 307–327. Leo, G.M. (2015), Anacreonte: I Framenti Erotici, Rome. Llewellyn-Jones, L. (2005), “Body Language and Female Role Player in Greek Tragedy and Japanese Kabuki Theatre”, in: D. Cairns (ed.), Body Language in Greek and Roman Worlds, Swansea, 73–105. Macleod, C.W. (1982), Homer: Iliad – Book XXIV, Cambridge. Matheson, S.B. (1995), Polygnotos and Vase Painting in Classical Athens, Madison WI. Mercanti, E. (1914), “Rappresentanze del Mito di Atteone”, Neapolis 2, 123–134.

  Nikos Manousakis Mette, H.J. (1963), Der verlorene Aischylos, Berlin. Nervegna, S. (2014), “Performing Classics: The Tragic Canon in Fourth Century and Beyond”, in: E. Csapo/H.R. Goette/J.R. Green/P. Wilson (eds), Greek Theatre in the Fourth Century BC, Berlin, 157–187. Nikolopoulos, T. (2014), Ὀβιδίου Μεταμορφώσεων Βιβλίο Τρίτο, Athens. Olson, S.D. (2010), Athenaeus: The Learned Banqueters, vol. VI, Cambridge MA. Olson, S.D. (2012), The Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite and Related Texts, Berlin. Page, D.L. (1955), Sappho and Alcaeus: An Introduction to the Study of Ancient Lesbian Poetry, Oxford. Paschalis, M. (2014), “Ovidian Metamorhosis and Nonnian poikilon eidos”, in: K. Spanoudakis (ed.), Nonnus of Panopolis in Context: Poetry and Cultural Milieu in Late Antiquity with a Section of Nonnus and the Modern World, Berlin, 97–138. Peck, A.L. (1970), Aristotle: Historia Animalium, vol. II, Cambridge MA. Race, W.H. (1997), Pindar: Olympian Odes, Pythian Odes, Cambridge MA. Radt, S. (1985), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta: Aeschylus, vol. 3, Göttingen. Radt, S. (1999), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta: Sophocles, vol. 4, Göttingen. Renner, T. (1987), “A Papyrus Dictionary of Metamorphoses”, HSCP 82, 277–293. Richardson, N.J. (1974), The Homeric Hymn to Demeter, Oxford. Richardson, N.J. (1993), The Iliad: A Commentary - Volume VI: Books 21–24, Cambridge. Robertson, M. (1992), The Art of Vase-Painting in Classical Athens, Cambridge. Roisman, J./Worthington, I./Waterfield, R. (2015), Lives of Ten Orators: Texts from Pseudo-Plutarch, Photius, and the Suda, Oxford. Shapiro, A. (1987), “Kalos-Inscriptions with Patronymic”, ZPE 68, 173–186. Schultz, R. (1910), Aidos, PhD diss., University of Rostock. Séchan, L. (1926), Études sur la Tragédie Grecque dans ses Rapports avec la Céramique, Paris. Sommerstein, A.H. (1990), The Comedies of Aristophanes: Lysistrata, Warminster. Sommerstein, A.H. (2008), Aeschylus: Fragments, Cambridge MA. Sommerstein, A.H. (2010a), Aeschylean Tragedy, London. Sommerstein, A.H. (2010b), “Notes on Aeschylean Fragments”, Prometheus 36, 193–212. Sommerstein, A.H. (2013), “Aeschylus’ Semele and its Companion Plays”, in: G. Bastianini/ A. Casanova (eds), I Papiri di Eschilo e di Sofocle, Florence, 81–94. Sommerstein, A.H./Talboy, T.H. (2012), Sophocles: Selected Fragmentary Plays, vol. II, Oxford. Sourvinou-Inwood, C. (2003), Tragedy and Athenian Religion, Oxford. Stephen, I. (1996), Pindar: Selected Odes -Olympian One, Pythian Nine, Nemeans Two & Three, Isthmian One-, Warminster. Stephens, S.A. (2015), Callimachus: The Hymns, Oxford. Sutton, F.D. (1987), “The Theatrical Families of Athens”, AJPh 108, 9–26. Swift, L. (2015), “Stesichorus on Stage”, in: P.J. Finglass/A. Kelly (eds), Stesichorus in Context, Cambridge, 125–144. Thorton, B.S. (1997), Eros: The Myth of Ancient Greek Sexuality, Boulder CO. Todisco, L. (2003), La Ceramica Figurata a Soggetto Tragico in Magna Grecia e in Sicilia, Rome. Trendall, A.D./Webster, T.B.L. (1971), Illustrations of Greek Drama, Edinburgh. Vahtikari, V. (2014), Tragedy Performances Outside Athens in the Late Fifth and Fourth Centuries BC, Helsinki. Webster, T.B.L. (1967), Monuments Illustrating Tragedy and Satyr Play, London. Webster, T.B.L. (1972), Potter and Patron in Classical Athens, London. West, M.L. (1985), The Hesiodic Catalogue of Women, Oxford.

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Wilamowitz-Möllendorff, U. von (1913), Sappho und Simonides: Untersuchungen über Griechische Lyrik, Berlin. Williams, F. (1978), Callimachus: Hymn to Apollo, Oxford. Wilson, P. (2009), “Thamyris the Thracian: The Archetypal Wandering Poet?”, in: R. Hunter/ I. Rutherford (eds), Wandering Poets in Ancient Greek Culture: Travel, Locality and PanHellenism, Cambridge, 46–79. Wright, M. (2017), “A Lover’s Discourse: Erōs in Greek Tragedy”, in: R. Seaford/J. Wilkins/ M. Wright (eds), Selfhood and the Soul: Essays on Ancient Thought and Literature in Honour of Christopher Gill, Cambridge, 219–242.

Martin J. Cropp

Euripides or Critias, or Neither? Reflections on an Unresolved Question Fragmentation — the survival of a text only in later quotations, paraphrases and other references — inevitably poses questions about the value of the information that has reached us, which may be removed from the original by many hundreds of years and can be inaccurate, misleading, inconsistent, or in some cases simply irrelevant. 1 None of these questions is more fundamental than the question of authorship. How confident can we be that the ascriptions of text and content to a particular author or work that we find in our testimonia are correct, and how far can we go in supplementing or rejecting these ascriptions, or in resolving their uncertainties and disagreements? Editors of fragmentary texts constantly confront these questions, and their responses can have far-reaching consequences. The ascriptions adopted by editors, even if accompanied by suitable caveats, carry a certain authority and risk being taken for granted at least by less cautious readers. The point is well illustrated by the case of the tragedies Rhadamanthys, Tennes and Pirithous and the satyr-play Sisyphus, which in antiquity were generally ascribed to Euripides. In 1875 the youthful Wilamowitz declared that they were in fact a tetralogy composed by a younger contemporary of Euripides, the oligarch Critias, who is named once in our testimonia as possibly the author of Pirithous, and once as the author of a speech by the character Sisyphus which others ascribed to Euripides. This opinion has never gone unquestioned: Wilamowitz himself, returning to the subject fifty-two years later, was moved to cry, “Will the truth now prevail?” 2 Recent sceptics notably include Christopher Collard and Nikolaus Pechstein, who focus respectively on Pirithous and Sisyphus

 1 This is a revised version of the paper which I gave at the 12th Trends in Classics International Conference, Fragmented Parts, Coherent Entities: Reconsidering Fragmentation in Ancient Greek Drama, Thessaloniki, 24–27 May, 2018. Warmest thanks to the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki for its hospitality and to the members of the organizing committee, especially Anna Lamari and Anna Novokhatko, for their work in presenting such a congenial and productive conference. This discussion complements my edition of the fragments and testimonia of Tennes, Rhadamanthys, Pirithous (Cropp 2019, 180–234), which includes texts, English translations and commentary. 2 Wilamowitz 1927, 292. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-014

  Martin J. Cropp but also address the wider issues. 3 Wilamowitz’s ascriptions however have generated the kind of authority that I have just mentioned. They were adopted by Hermann Diels in his edition of the Presocratics (first published in 1903), by Bruno Snell in his edition of the minor tragedians (first published in 1971), and by recent editors including Richard Kannicht in his magisterial edition of the Euripides fragments. 4 Diels and Snell both began by citing a statement in a brief biography of Euripides found in some Byzantine manuscripts which declares the three tragedies spurious. I have summarized all the relevant testimonia in an Appendix to this paper, using the ascriptions and fragment-numbers of TrGF there as throughout. Briefly, the evidence of title lists, hypothesis collections and nearly all ancient quotations shows that the tragedies Tennes, Rhadamanthys, Pirithous and a satyr-play Sisyphus were normally included in the Euripidean corpus, while the combined evidence of two versions of the Byzantine Life shows that these three tragedies and an unnamed satyr-play were considered spurious (νοθεύεται, Life A) or disputed (ἀντιλεγόμενα, Life B). Critias is named as alternative author of fr. 2 (from Pirithous) and fr. 19 (the much-discussed atheist speech, which I shall refer to as the Sisyphus-fragment). Nothing connects him with Tennes or Rhadamanthys except an assumption that the four inauthentic or disputed plays were produced together at the City Dionysia. Nothing connects him with a Sisyphus except the possibilities (a) that the Sisyphus-fragment is correctly ascribed to him by Sextus Empiricus and (b) that this fragment came from a satyr-play named Sisyphus. This evidence (except for the papyri and the fuller version of Pirithous fr. 1 which were published later) 5 led Wilamowitz to assert that Critias had indeed produced a tetralogy at the City Dionysia comprising the three tragedies and a satyrplay named Sisyphus. 6 This production, he supposed, was later forgotten, or the

 3 Collard 2007 (1995) with bibliography pp. 64–68 (cf. Collard/Cropp 2008, 630–635); Pechstein 1998, 185–191. Earlier e.g. Kuiper 1907, 354–365 (cf. 1888, 362–365); Schmid 1940, 180; Hoffmann 1951, 142f.; Lesky 1972, 525f.; Dihle 1977, 28–30 (followed by Scodel 1980, 124f.); Sutton 1981, 35; 1987, 7–10. 4 Kannicht below, note 36. See also Diggle 1998, 172; Jouan/Van Looy 1998, XV. 5 P.Oxy. 2078 was published in 1927, but Wilamowitz does not seem to have addressed it before his death in 1931. The commentary of Ioannes Logothetes, which includes a fuller version of fr. 1 than that known from Gregory of Corinth, was published by Rabe in 1908 and discussed by Wilamowitz only in 1927 (see also Kuiper 1908a). 6 Wilamowitz (1875, 166) originally dated this production in the period 411–406 to suit his assumption that Pirithous was parodied in Aristophanes’ Frogs at the Lenaea of 405 (on which see further below, pp. 246–247). Later he preferred a date before 411 (Wilamowitz 1920, I.118 n. 1; 1921, 71).

Euripides or Critias, or Neither? Reflections on an Unresolved Question  

memory of it suppressed, but texts of the plays survived and in due course reached the Alexandrian Library under the name of Euripides. Scholars there became aware of the didascalic record of Critias’s production and restored the plays to him, with some uncertainty about Sisyphus since Euripides was known to have produced a Sisyphus with the Trojan trilogy of 415; but in fact the text of Euripides’ Sisyphus was totally lost, the two brief quotations ascribed to it (Euripides frr. 673–674) were from a different satyr-play of Euripides, perhaps Syleus, and the Sisyphus that reached Alexandria (and in his opinion was the source of fr. 19) was Critias’s Sisyphus. (An alternative to this last step is to assign all the extant Sisyphus material to Critias, as Kannicht now recommends: see below, p. 242 with n. 36.) The most distinctive feature of this narrative was the supposition that the four plays had constituted a tetralogy, 7 i.e. that they had been produced together at the City Dionysia and were so recorded in the Athenian Didascaliae. Earlier editors had often accepted Sextus’s attribution of the Sisyphus-fragment to Critias while retaining the ancient ascriptions of frr. 673–674 to Euripides’ Sisyphus. 8 The three tragedies had usually been ascribed to Euripides, but with reservations for Pirithous in view of Athenaeus’s comment on fr. 2, and for all three after Elmsley’s publication of version A of the Life which named them as spurious. 9 Wilamowitz reasserted the unEuripidean character of the Sisyphus-fragment 10 and multiplied arguments against Euripides’ authorship of the Pirithous fragments on grounds of content and style. 11 He also made a couple of points about the language of the Rhadamanthys fragments, but these are inconsequential 12 and in reality the ascriptions of Rhadamanthys and Tennes to Critias depend entirely on the tetralogy theory.  7 “Tetralogy” here means simply a set of four plays, not necessarily a thematically connected set. 8 e.g. Valckenaer 1767, 208f.; Bach 1827, 72ff.; Matthiae 1829, 323; Wagner 1844, 344 and 1848, 102ff.; Nauck 1856, 598ff. (and in his 1889 edition, where Wilamowitz’s theory of 1875 is simply noted); cf. Welcker 1842, 1007ff. 9 The version in ms. Ambrosianus L 39 was published by Elmsley 1821, 193–195 (five other texts are now known, cf. Kannicht in TrGF 5, p. 45). Bach (1827, 77–86) and Kayser (1845, 235f., 242– 251) argued at length in favour of ascribing Pirithous to Critias: see also e.g. Matthiae 1829, 302; Wagner 1844, 307f., 336, 353; Nauck 1856, 431, 445, 456, 597. Welcker discussed Pirithous in his Euripides volume (1839, 589–592) but otherwise ascribed it to Critias (1839, 438, 876; 1842, 1007– 1009). 10 Wilamowitz 1875, 166. 11 I comment on these below, pp. 245–246. 12 Wilamowitz claimed that the word πρόσχωρος (fr. 16.1) was “frequent” in Aeschylus and Sophocles but “constantly avoided” by Euripides. In fact it is found once in Aeschylus and three

  Martin J. Cropp The language and content of the fragments have been extensively and inconclusively debated, 13 but the question of how they and the relevant testimonia were transmitted and can be understood has not been examined so thoroughly, although Wilamowitz’s narrative has provoked some cogent objections. 14 The narrative is seductively simple and decisive, but closer consideration reveals some improbable features. First, we have to accept that a production by Critias at Athens’ leading dramatic festival was generally forgotten in the decades that followed. Wilamowitz suggested that the memory of the production was “obliterated partly by chance, partly by ill feeling [towards the author]”, 15 but it seems a little unlikely that the production was simply forgotten when Critias was such a well-known, if widely detested, figure; 16 and if we suppose that the record of his production was actively suppressed after the restoration of the democracy, we then have to ask how it survived and became known to later scholars. Secondly, we have to accept that, even as the memory of the production was lost or suppressed, texts of the plays themselves continued to circulate. This would be surprising in itself, but the narrative asserts, thirdly, that these texts, or at least the copies that reached Alexandria, came to be identified as texts of Euripides. It is true, as Wilamowitz pointed out, that plays by a lesser tragedian were more likely to be ascribed to a more famous one than vice versa, and that booksellers were motivated to make such changes in order to increase their sales, 17 but it is not so likely that this happened to an entire tetralogy, or that exactly the same thing happened to each of four plays individually if (ex hypothesi) they were no longer recognized as a tetralogy. And again these arguments seem to underestimate the interest that texts of Critias would have retained in their own right.  times in Sophocles, while the verb προσχωρεῖν is found once in Sophocles and once in Euripides. He also objected to the word πάτωρ in fr. 17.4, but this was a mistaken conjecture of Dindorf. 13 The debate on style is inevitably inconclusive: see especially Davies 1989, 26–28; Pechstein 1998, 293–295; Cipolla 2003, 254f. See also note 40 on Rhadamanthys and p. 242 with notes 52– 54 on Pirithous. 14 See especially Hoffmann 1951, 139–145; Gauly et al. 1991, 108f.; Pechstein 1998, 188–190; Collard 2007, 59–64 (cf. Collard/Cropp 2008, 630–635). Kuiper’s methodological arguments (1907, 356–365) were largely refuted by Wilamowitz 1907 (1994), 211–214; cf. Alvoni 2011, 121–124. 15 partim casu partim invidia…oblitterata (Wilamowitz 1875, 166). 16 But not so detested as to discourage Plato from giving him leading roles in three of his dialogues (Charmides, Timaeus, Critias). 17 Wilamowitz 1907 (1994), 216; 1920, 118 n. 1. On these and other motives for falsification see Speyer 1971, 131–149. On forgeries directed towards the Alexandrian and Pergamene library collections, Montana 2015, 90 with n. 124.

Euripides or Critias, or Neither? Reflections on an Unresolved Question  

Lastly, we have to accept that Alexandrian scholars learned that Critias had produced a tetralogy comprising the relevant plays and restored to him the texts with these titles that bore Euripides’ name, but nevertheless retained them in the Euripidean corpus. Wilamowitz stated that they restored them to Critias unequivocally except for a slight hesitation over Sisyphus, 18 but that is inaccurate. The summaries of the Life of Euripides show that the plays were included in the Euripidean corpus but noted as spurious or doubtful. Evidence that Critias might have been named as their likely author if they were not by Euripides is very slight: a lexicographer’s comment on Pirithous from three centuries later, and a doxographer’s attribution of the Sisyphus-fragment to Critias. The question of Sisyphus is especially problematic since (a) the Sisyphus-fragment may not have been part of the text which reached Alexandria as Euripides’ Sisyphus (see below, pp. 248– 250); (b) it seems unlikely that the satyr-play from Euripides’ well-known production of 415 would have disappeared during the fourth century while the satyr-play from a long-forgotten production by Critias survived; and (c) a didascalic record of a Sisyphus produced by Critias would not have proved that the play transmitted as Euripides’ Sisyphus was not the Sisyphus produced by Euripides in 415. 19 The fact that the Euripidean corpus established at Alexandria included some plays that were judged spurious or doubtful merits some attention. The phenomenon is not unusual in itself: according to the Byzantine Life of Sophocles, Aristophanes of Byzantium identified seventeen (or perhaps just seven) “spurious” plays within the Sophoclean corpus. 20 There are comparable records for Aeschylus (a genuine and a spurious Aitnaiai) 21 and for comic poets, 22 not to mention historians and orators for whom there were no records comparable with the dramatic Didascaliae and the scope and motives for confusion and misrepresentation were greater. 23 The brief statements about inauthenticity in our remnants of the Life of Euripides are no doubt distilled from a much fuller statement in their ultimate Hellenistic source, and here a comparison with the Life of Aristophanes is illuminating. According to its fullest transmitted version, the comic poet “wrote  18 Wilamowitz 1875, 166: Alexandrinos tandem grammaticos tragoedias quidem uno ore ei restituisse, in satyrica paullo haesisse... 19 Cf. Pechstein 1998, 188. 20 Sophocles T 1.76f. TrGF (Bergk conjectured ζʹ (7) for mss. ιζʹ (17) in order to reconcile the totals of 130 and 123 plays given respectively by the Life and the Suda). 21 Aeschylus T 78 TrGF (the ancient catalogue of titles transmitted in some Byzantine mss.). 22 See the entries for Old Comedy in general and for Epicharmus, Magnes and Aristophanes in the anonymous treatise On Comedy, Prolegomena de comoedia III Koster (1975, 7–10). 23 See e.g. Dion. Hal. On Deinarchus §§1, 9–13; Dover 1968, 22–27, 148–161; Canfora 1990, 45– 50, 102–104. Also Socratic dialogues, Diog.Laert. 2.121–125, 3.60–62, 64.

  Martin J. Cropp 44 plays, of which 4 are disputed (ἀντιλέγεται) as not being his: these are Poiêsis, Nauagos, Nêsoi, Niobos, which some have said were by Archippus”. 24 Briefer summaries make the same distinction without naming the disputed plays or mentioning Archippus, 25 or do not make it at all. 26 But in a Byzantine treatise On Comedy we read simply “plays numbering 44, of which 4 are spurious (νόθα)”. 27 The brief statements in the extant versions of the Life of Euripides must reflect a similar process of simplification. What they indicate is only that the original Life noted the plays as spurious or doubtful, not that they were known decisively to be spurious as the statement about the tragedies in version A quoted by Diels and Snell (τούτων νοθεύεται τρία) seems to suggest. Critias might possibly have been named as an alternative author, but the rarity of evidence linking him with any of these plays suggests otherwise. 28 The disputed plays probably entered the Euripidean corpus via Callimachus’s Pinakes, 29 which necessarily assigned works to authors. Callimachus sometimes commented on questions of authenticity, 30 and he may or may not have done so in these cases. Either way the plays will have been either questioned or (more likely) rejected by Aristophanes of Byzantium, as for the Sophoclean corpus, probably in his comments On the Pinakes of Callimachus 31 as well as in his Hypotheses to the plays of the tragic poets. The Hypotheses seem to have ordered the plays alphabetically (as the Pinakes presumably did), rather than in

 24 Proleg. de com. XXVIII.66f. Koster (= Aristophanes T 1.59ff. PCG): ἔγραψε δὲ δράματα μδʹ, ὧν ἀντιλέγεται δʹ ὡς οὐκ ὄντα αὐτοῦ· ἔστι δὲ ταῦτα Ποίησις, Ναυαγός (i.e. Διόνυσος ναυαγός), Νῆσοι, Νίοβος (i.e. Δράματα ἢ Νίοβος), ἅ τινες ἔφασαν εἶναι τοῦ Ἀρχίππου. 25 See Proleg. de com. XXIXa.47ff. (ἀντιλεγόμενα/ἀμφιβαλλόμενα), XXXIIa.6ff. (ἀμφιβάλλονται ὡς νόθα), XXXIIb.5f. (ὀβελίζονται). 26 Proleg. de com. XXX (= Aristophanes T 2 PCG) says simply “44 dramas” and in its longer version lists 42 titles including all the disputed ones. 27 Proleg. de com. III (n. 22 above), 41. 28 The attributions to Archippus of plays in the Aristophanic corpus may have been due to the comic poets’ practice of producing their plays under each other’s names, a practice not generally shared by tragedians so far as we know: cf. Halliwell 1989. Collaborations within families (as possibly between Sophocles and Iophon, Ar. Frogs 79f., and in posthumous productions) are exceptional cases. On Euripides’ supposed collaborators see below, p. 241 with n. 35. 29 Πίνακες τῶν ἐν πάσῃ παιδείᾳ διαλαμψάντων καὶ ὧν συνέγραψαν ἐν βιβλίοις κʹ καὶ ρʹ (Tables of those distinguished in every form of learning, and of their writings, in 120 books, frr. 429–453 Pfeiffer). 30 See Callimachus frr. 437, 442, 449 Pfeiffer with his comments following fr. 453, and Pfeiffer 1968, 128, 287f.; Montana 2015, 107–109. 31 Πρὸς τοὺς Καλλιμάχου Πίνακας, frr. 368–369 Slater; cf. Pfeiffer 1968, 133, 193. On the scope and purpose of this work, Slater 1976.

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chronological order of productions (as in Aristotle’s Didascaliae and in Callimachus’s special Pinax of dramatic productions which used Aristotle’s work). 32 They also seem to have separated satyr-plays from tragedies, and since this separation is found in version B of the Life of Euripides (and implicitly in version A’s omission of the satyr-play) it seems likely that the original Life reflected Aristophanes’ opinions on the matter of authenticity. Were those opinions justified? The question cannot be answered with any confidence when we have so little of the relevant texts. Besides the work of Aristotle and Callimachus, Aristophanes was presumably aware of the Lycurgan texts of the canonical tragedians, even if the tradition that Ptolemy III appropriated the originals for the Alexandrian Library is unreliable. 33 It seems likely that the three tragedies and one unnamed satyr-play were initially suspected because they were not attributed to Euripides in the Didascaliae as edited by Aristotle and (therefore) not amongst the Lycurgan texts. If so, considerations of content or style might then have swayed opinions in either direction. Andromache was accepted as Euripidean despite not appearing in the Didascaliae, while Rhesus was retained in the corpus (with some uncertainty) mainly because a Rhesus of Euripides did appear in them. 34 On the other hand, Euripides’ reputation for plagiarism and presenting others’ work as his own, though comic in origin, was sometimes taken seriously and could have led to mistaken denials of a play’s authenticity. 35  32 Πίναξ καὶ ἀναγραφὴ τῶν κατὰ χρόνους καὶ ἀπ’ ἀρχῆς γενομένων διδασκάλων (Table and register of dramatic poets, in chronological order from the beginning, frr. 454–456 Pfeiffer); cf. Pfeiffer 1968, 129, 131f.; Caroli 2006, 8f.; Montanari 2009, 400f.; Meccariello 2014, 77–79. On Aristotle’s influence on Peripatetic and Alexandrian research on tragedy in general, Montanari 2009, 390– 394. 33 Galen, In Hippocr. Epidem. III comm. 2.4, p. 79.23ff. Wenkenbach (CMG 5.10.2.1) = Sophocles T 157 TrGF; cf. Montanari 2009, 413. Galen’s anecdote is severely questioned by Bagnall 2002, Johnstone 2014. 34 Schol. Eur. Andr. 445 (= Callimachus fr. 451 Pfeiffer): εἰλικρινῶς δὲ τοὺς τοῦ δράματος χρόνους οὐκ ἔστι λαβεῖν· οὐ δεδίδακται γὰρ Ἀθήνησιν. ὁ δὲ Καλλίμαχος ἐπιγραφῆναί φησι τῇ τραγῳδίᾳ Δημοκράτην (“It is not possible to find the timing of the play exactly, for it was not produced at Athens. Callimachus says the tragedy bears the name of Democrates”). Hypoth. II Eur. Rhes.: τοῦτο τὸ δρᾶμα ἔνιοι νόθον ὑπενόησαν, Εὐριπίδου δὲ μὴ εἶναι· τὸν γὰρ Σοφόκλειον μᾶλλον ὑποφαίνειν χαρακτῆρα. ἐν μέντοι ταῖς Διδασκαλίαις ὡς γνήσιον ἀναγέγραπται… (“Some people have suspected this play of being spurious and not by Euripides, for it shows rather the stamp of Sophocles; but it is listed as genuine in the Didascaliae”). It is notable that Rhesus is not amongst the tragedies named as spurious in the Life. 35 For Euripides’ “collaborators” (chiefly Socrates and Cephisophon) see TrGF Euripides T 51– 54. Athenaeus (7.276a, 10.453c–e) records the strange allegation that Euripides’ Medea was modelled on Callias’s Alphabetic Tragedy. Dicaearchus’s assertion that Euripides “reworked” Neophron’s Medea (Hypoth. 1 Eur. Med., 25f.) was probably a mistaken inference from comedy,

  Martin J. Cropp If Aristophanes judged our four plays spurious, his judgments must be taken seriously but they are not necessarily decisive and would have remained subject to the same kind of uncertainty amongst scholars that we see in the Rhesus hypothesis and the Life of Aristophanes. Some such account will explain well enough how these plays came to be included in the Euripidean corpus while being regarded as spurious or doubtful, but it is less easy to see why this happened if, as Wilamowitz assumed, a didascalic record of a production by Critias comprising the very same titles had come to light. In that case the extant texts of the three tragedies could have been assigned to Critias rather than Euripides, or at least we might expect to see him named more often in our testimonia than we actually do. The difficulty is avoided to some extent in a reformulation of Wilamowitz’s theory by Richard Kannicht, which differs significantly from the original. Kannicht suggests that the didascalic record of the production of these four plays was itself ambivalent (inter Critiam et Euripidem fluctuasse), and that the Alexandrians chose to assign them to Euripides (rather than to Critias as Wilamowitz supposed). 36 This accounts better for the fact that the plays were subsequently associated primarily with Euripides, but such an ambivalence in the didascalic record itself needs to be explained (Kannicht says it happened incerta de causa), and the near-disappearance of Critias’s name from the later record remains a problem. It also leaves open the possibility (as Wilamowitz’s theory did not) that the ascriptions to Euripides were correct and doubts about the plays’ authenticity not justified. On this account, too, the corpus of 92 certainly or possibly Euripidean titles known to the Alexandrians 37 would have included two satyr-plays named Sisyphus (the Sisyphus of 415 and the Sisyphus of the disputed tetralogy), but there is no hint of this duplication  prompting the later belief that the play was entirely Neophron’s work (Diog. Laert. 2.134, Suda ν 218: cf. Librán Moreno 2011). See in general Halliwell 1989, 517 (A2), 520; Schorn 2004, 227–233 (Socrates); Lefkowitz 2012, 89f.; Colomo 2011, 112–116; Bagordo 2013, 198f. on Teleclides fr. 41 PCG. 36 TrGF 5.659: “ipse persuasus sum tetralogiam Pirithoum Rhadamanthum Tennem Sisyphum satyricum Critiae fuisse, in didascaliis incerta de causa inter Critiam et Euripidem fluctuasse, ab Alexandrinis corpori Euripideo insertam esse, ubi Sisyphus tandem similiter atque Rhesus locum fabulae Euripideae quae οὐκ ἐσῴζετο occupaverit”. Cf. Kannicht 1996, 24 (“…die Zweifel über den Autor von Peirithous, Rhadamanthys und Tennes dürften ihren Ursprung wohl am ehesten in einer Unklarheit der betreffenden Didaskalie gehabt haben (hier kommen wir über die Vermutung nicht hinaus)”) and 27 (“Wir haben…offenbar anzunehmen, dass in Wahrheit eine vollständige Tetralogie zwischen Euripides und Kritias strittig war”). Kannicht takes the logical step (considered also by Snell) of ascribing what are now Eur. frr. 673–674, as well as the Sisyphusfragment, to Critias’s Sisyphus: cf. Kannicht 1996, 27. 37 See the Life of Euripides quoted in the Appendix below, pp. 251–252.

Euripides or Critias, or Neither? Reflections on an Unresolved Question  

in our testimonia (unless we infer it from the divergent ascriptions of the Sisyphus-fragment). 38 The uncertainties of the tetralogy theory in either of these forms suggest to me that, despite appearances, its basic premiss may be mistaken — that the plays were not after all produced together at the City Dionysia, and that there was therefore no didascalic record. This would account at least as well for the fact that the ascription of these plays to Euripides came to be denied and Critias only mentioned ambivalently in connection with Pirithous and the Sisyphus-fragment. And since tetralogies were staged only at the City Dionysia, it would follow that the plays were not a tetralogy and were produced in other contexts, at various times, and not necessarily all by the same poet. 39 In the remainder of this paper I shall discuss very briefly where this hypothesis might lead us and how we might assess the evidence for each of the plays (such as it is) if we consider them individually. For Tennes and Rhadamanthys we know only that the plays were noted as spurious or doubtful, probably by Aristophanes of Byzantium and possibly earlier in the Pinakes of Callimachus, and possibly for the reasons discussed above (absence from the Didascaliae compounded by considerations of content and/or style). The text-fragments of Rhadamanthys (frr. 16–18) are not noticeably unEuripidean 40 but that does not get us very far. There is however one feature that might tell against its authenticity: the play’s subject-matter is strikingly obscure. According to the hypothesis-fragment (fr. 15), it culminated in the deaths of Zeus’s sons Castor and Polydeuces (the Dioscuri) and an appearance ex machina of the goddess Artemis telling Helen to establish a cult for her brothers and announcing the deification of Rhadamanthys’s daughters. 41 This story had no  38 Cf. Wilamowitz 1875, 166. Wilamowitz did not offer a list of all the 92 titles. Kannicht does so, but his 92 titles include only one Sisyphus (Kannicht 1996, 23f., cf. TrGF 5.1.80). He counts 21 tetralogies produced at the City Dionysia, one posthumous trilogy (IA, Alcmeon at Corinth, Bacchae) with no satyr-play, two tragedies not produced at Athens (Andromache, Archelaus), and the three disputed tragedies without the disputed satyr-play: thus 84+3+2+3 = 92. The numbers can of course be massaged in various ways: for example, we do not know that Archelaus was never produced at Athens as Kannicht assumes. 39 Cf. Pechstein 1998, 189. 40 See above, n. 12 on Wilamowitz’s objections to the language of the Rhadamanthys fragments. The idea that the priamel fr. 17 is a declaration of Critias’s oligarchic principles is mistaken: see Cropp 2019, 230f., 232 with note 65. 41 PSI XII.1286, col. ii.1–8: ... Πο]λυδεύκους, ἀνηιρέθη μονομαχήσας. [Ῥ]αδαμάνθυος δ’ ἐπὶ μὲν τῆι νίκηι [χ]α̣ί̣[ρ]οντος, ἐπὶ δὲ ταῖς θυγατράσιν ἀ[λγ]οῦντος Ἄρτεμις ἐπιφανεῖσα π̣ρ[οσέ̣]ταξε τὴν μὲν Ἑλένην ἀ[μφοτέροις] το̣ῖς ἀδελφοῖς τοῖς τεθνη̣[κόσιν] τιμὰς καταστήσασθαι, τ̣[ὰς θυγα]τέρας δ’ αὐτοῦ θεὰς ἔφησε γεν̣[ήσεσθαι: “... Polydeuces (having died?) he (i.e. Castor) was killed in

  Martin J. Cropp known impact on the mythical or literary traditions. No other source connects Rhadamanthys with the deaths of the Dioscuri (they were more commonly said to have died in combat with their cousins Idas and Lynceus after abducting the latter’s destined brides, the daughters of Leucippus). 42 No other source mentions that Rhadamanthys had daughters, let alone daughters who were deified. We might guess that the story was connected with a local cult similar to the betterknown cult of the Leucippides, 43 but in any case the plot seems unlikely for a tragedy composed for production at Athens in the late fifth century. A fourth-century composition falsely ascribed to Euripides is at least a plausible alternative. The same might be said of Tennes. Its single surviving verse is of even less help (fr. 21, “Alas, there is no righteousness in the present generation!”), but the papyrus hypothesis-ending (fr. 20) is readily associated with the mythology of the island of Tenedos and its eponymous hero Tennes, which appears with variations in later sources. 44 The young Tennes, son of Cycnus (ruler of the mainland territory opposite Tenedos) but sired by Apollo (the dominant god of both mainland and island), 45 rejects the advances of his stepmother, who then complains to her husband that he has assaulted her. Cycnus believes her and throws Tennes and his sister (who has defended her brother) into the sea in a chest which floats across the narrow strait to the island. They are rescued, and Tennes in due course becomes the island’s ruler, naming it Tenedos, establishing a polis and laws, and honoured with a cult after his death. Cycnus later learns the truth and kills his wife and her accomplice. In some accounts he attempts a reconciliation which Tennes rejects, cutting the mooring-ropes of his father’s boat with a double-axe (pelekus) when he tries to land on the island. Both are later killed by Achilles as the Achaeans arrive to lay siege to Troy. 46 The hypothesis-ending shows that the tragedy concerned Tennes’ expulsion and survival, Cycnus’s regrets, and a speech of Apollo commanding Cycnus to

 single combat. And as Rhadamanthys was rejoicing at the victory, but grieving for his daughters, Artemis appeared and instructed Helen to establish rites honouring (both?) her dead brothers, and declared that his daughters would become goddesses”. 42 See for example Gantz 1993, 323–328; Fowler 2013, 420–424. 43 For the Leucippides and their cult and associated myths see Larson 1995, 64–69; Calame 2001, 185–191; Fowler 2013, 422. 44 Conon, Nar. 28; Diod. Sic. 5.83; Apollod. Epit. 3.24; Plut. Mor. 297d–e; Paus. 10.14.2–4; Schol. D Il. 1.38; Tzetzes on Lycoph. Alex. 232 (the story is cryptically sketched in Alex. 232–242). 45 e.g. Il. 1.37f. 46 Il. 11.624–627 recalls Achilles’ sacking of Tenedos, and the Cypria probably included the fighting there and Tennes’ death at Achilles’ hands (cf. Apoll. Epit. 3.25). Aeschylus may have produced a Tennes about these events (cf. Radt in TrGF 3.343 and 479–480).

Euripides or Critias, or Neither? Reflections on an Unresolved Question  

punish his wife and name the island Tenedos. 47 The god probably foretold Tennes’ future and heroization, and the naming of the island by Cycnus suggests that in this account the two were reconciled (the axe-episode cannot have been included since the play’s action was set on the mainland and ended with the revelation of Cycnus’s error). 48 The play thus incorporated some well-worn mythical and dramatic motifs (a divinely begotten youth, a “Potiphar’s Wife” situation, the youth expelled from his homeland to become the founding hero of a new polis) with others that were specific to Tenedos and aetiologically related to its history and cults: for example, Tennes and his sister seem to have originated in a pair of pre-Greek deities who appear as a double-headed male-female figure on Tenedian coinage, as does the double-axe, a Bronze Age symbol of authority. The story as a whole seems designed to define the island’s close but autonomous relationship with the nearby mainland communities, while incidentally eliding the role of the Aeolian Greeks who in a competing account had settled the whole area, including Tenedos, after the Trojan War. 49 A tragedy incorporating this story would have been primarily of local interest. It might have had an Athenian angle since Athens had a strategic interest in Tenedos and the island was usually aligned with Athens between the 470s and the 330s. 50 A production by an Athenian poet is therefore not out of the question, but this could also have been a local fourth-century production claiming Euripides’ authority — a common motive for politically coloured forgeries of this kind. 51 The third disputed tragedy, Pirithous, is much better attested than the other two and certainly widely associated with Euripides. Wilamowitz argued that some features of the vocabulary, style and content of the fragments are unEuripidean, but his arguments are not compelling. The parodos and the papyrus fragments (the latter not known to Wilamowitz) contain a number of rare or unique poetic words, but these are rare because of their contexts — the mystic chorus’s cosmological hymn and the exotic crimes and punishments of Pirithous and his

 47 P.Oxy. 27.2455 fr. 14 col. xiii (= fr. 20): five very incomplete lines, variously restored, then: ... τὸ̣ν Τ[έ]ννην ἤκουσεν̣ ἐ̣πὶ̣ τ̣ὴ̣ν̣ ἀ̣ντιπέρα νῆσον σεσῶσθαι· προει̣πό[ν]τος δ’ Ἀπόλλωνος τὴν μὲν νῆσο̣ν Τ̣ένεδ̣ον π̣ροσηγόρευσεν, [τ]ὴν δὲ ψευσα[μέν]ην̣ γ̣υ̣ν̣αῖκα ἀπέ̣κτεινεν: “... he heard that Tennes had safely reached the island opposite. At Apollo’s command he named the island Tenedos and killed the wife who had deceived him”. 48 A reconciliation is implied in Tzetzes’ scholia on Lycoph. Alex. 232, where Cycnus is said to have joined his children on the island and to have been killed with them by Achilles. 49 See further Cropp 2019, 213f. 50 Rutishauser 2001. 51 Cf. Speyer 1971, 131–133, 142–145.

  Martin J. Cropp father Ixion. 52 Such words are just as likely to have been used by Euripides as by any other contemporary poet, if not more so. Wilamowitz’s complaints about the style of the dialogue between Aeacus and Heracles (fr. 1) were somewhat exaggerated, and his assumption that Euripides was not capable of some careless composition (while Critias was) is questionable. 53 As for content, the claims that Euripides could not have voiced the “Anaxagorean” cosmology of fr. 4 or the “Socratic” doctrine of fr. 10 are now generally recognized as unsound. 54 Wilamowitz’s assertion of a relationship between Pirithous and Aristophanes’ Frogs is also unpersuasive. In Pirithous Heracles enters the Underworld and is confronted by Aeacus. In Frogs Dionysus posing as Heracles enters the Underworld and on reaching Hades’ palace is confronted by a doorkeeper who is identified in most manuscripts as Aeacus but is not named in the text and is quite unlike the Aeacus of mythical tradition. 55 Wilamowitz inferred that the editors who gave the doorkeeper this name must have had in mind the Aeacus of Pirithous, who must therefore have behaved like Aristophanes’ doorkeeper, obstructing and brawling with Heracles. Pirithous must therefore have been produced not

 52 parodos: fr. 2 πλημοχόας, εὐφήμως; fr. 3 ἀκάμας, περίφοιτᾷ, ὠκυπλάνοις, Ἀτλάντειον, τηροῦσι; fr. 4 αὐτοφυῆ, αἰολόχρως, ἐνδελεχῶς, ἀμφιχορεύει, ῥύμβος, ἄκριτος. Some other lexical points (fr. 1.2 ἐγκονεῖν, fr. 11.1 τρόπος “disposition”, fr. 11.3 ῥήτωρ “politician”) were rebutted by Kuiper (1908a, 338; 1908b; 1907, 377f.). Papyrus fragments: fr. 4a.13 ἀπρούπτως, fr. 4a.15 ὀνειρατώδης, fr. 5.15 οἰστρήλατος, fr. 5.16 ἄπυστος, fr. 5.18 διασπαράσσω, fr. 6 ἀχάλκευτος. fr. 4a.17f. πέπταται…ἀχλὺς (a mist spread over the eyes) and fr. 5.11 μίσγοιτο (of sexual intercourse) are Homeric reminiscences. In general see Kuiper 1907, 371–373; Pechstein 1998, 190 n. 13; Alvoni 2011, 126f.; Cropp 2019, 221–231 (commentary on these fragments). 53 Wilamowitz 1907 (1994), 215; 1927, 229 (“tragische aufgeputzte Trivialität”); cf. Cropp 2019, 223. Repeated verses such as Pirithous fr. 1.9 = Wise Melanippe F 481.1 are found elsewhere in Euripides (cf. Harsh 1937). Wilamowitz’s assumption that this dialogue opened the play and thus contravened Euripides’ practice (1907 [1994], 214) was mistaken: cf. Sutton 1987, 33f.; Collard/ Cropp 2008, 637f.; Cropp 2019, 221. 54 See respectively Wilamowitz 1875, 162 with 1907b, 215f.; 1875, 165. That fr. 4 is inconsistent with other cosmological statements of Euripides is immaterial since this is not a matter of the poet’s personal beliefs (cf. Kuiper 1907, 381–385 amongst others). fr. 10 is not a Socratic statement (“Only the virtuous man can be happy”); it says only that fortune favours people with good sense (…ὡς τοῖσιν εὖ φρονοῦσι συμμαχεῖ τύχη). Wilamowitz also asserted arbitrarily that the constellation Ursa Minor (fr. 3.3) would have been known to Critias but not to his older contemporary Euripides (1907, 216). 55 Traditionally Aeacus’s piety in life led to his becoming one of the judges of the dead in the Underworld: ps.-Apollodorus 3.12.6, cf. Pl. Ap. 41a, Grg. 523–524, Isoc. 9.13–15, LIMC “Aiakos” nos 1–3 (S. Italian vases, later 4th C.). His role as gatekeeper of Hades is first attested explicitly in the works of Lucian (Dial. mort. 6.1, 11.2, 13.3 etc.) nearly six hundred years after Frogs.

Euripides or Critias, or Neither? Reflections on an Unresolved Question  

long before Frogs, 56 and Aristophanes could not have modelled this scene on a play of Euripides because Euripides was to be his target later in Frogs. 57 This reasoning is obviously circular: there is no evidence that the Aeacus of Pirithous behaved like Aristophanes’ doorkeeper, nor is this at all likely; and the assumption that the catabasis of Dionysus–Heracles in Frogs was modelled on that of Heracles in Pirithous is unneeded since the pattern of Heracles’ catabasis was much older. 58 Some scholars persuaded by Wilamowitz’s argument have been tempted to use the plot of Frogs as a template for the reconstruction of Pirithous, 59 but that is unjustified. Our uncertainty about Pirithous rests essentially on the doubt recorded in the Life and the suggestion of (probably) the lexicographer Pamphilus that it might have been Critias’s work. 60 The suggestion may have been an educated guess made because Euripides’ authorship was doubted and (say) something in the text was reminiscent of Critias’s thought or style. 61 At any rate, only this slender thread connects the play with the name of Critias. As for the doubts about Euripides’ authorship, these are difficult to assess. The play so far as we know it — an Athenian myth imaginatively reworked with the rescue of Pirithous, a broadly Anaxagorean doctrine in the cosmological fragments, and a generally accomplished tragic style — is very likely from the late fifth century and seems quite possibly Euripidean. If there was no didascalic record, denials of its authenticity may have been justified by evidence unknown to us, or they may have been due to misjudgment or misinformation of the kind I have mentioned earlier. That leaves open the possibility that this was a work of Euripides which was not produced at one of the major Athenian festivals. Both Sophocles and Euripides seem to have produced tragedies at other venues in Attica, at least occasionally. 62 These will often have been plays already produced in the City, but that need not  56 Wilamowitz 1875, 171f., cf. Alvoni 2008, 40–42. On this dating see above, n. 6. 57 Wilamowitz 1907, 214: “Es ist…unmöglich, dass er diese Figuren von Euripides nimmt, den er angreifen will. Nicht das mindeste Bedenken hat das, wenn das Drama von Kritias gegeben war, was dann ja kurz vorher geschehen war”. 58 See especially Lloyd-Jones 1967. 59 Wilamowitz 1875, 172; Sutton 1987, 67–70; Dobrov 2001, 133–156. Sutton and Dobrov both attribute Pirithous to Euripides. Dobrov interprets Frogs as a comic “contrafact” of Pirithous and includes Euripides frr. 868, 910, 912, 913, 964 and TrGF adesp. fr. 658 in the latter. 60 See Appendix, pp. 248–249 under Pirithous. 61 Cf. Hypoth. 2 Eur. Rhes. quoted in n. 34 above, and Slater 1976, 234 with n. 2 on Alexandrian scholars’ reliance on intuition in the absence of documentary information. 62 Sophocles at Eleusis, IG I3 970 = TrGF DID B 3; Sophocles at Halai Aixonides, IG II2 3091 = TrGF DID B 5; Euripides at Anagyrous, IG I3 969 = TrGF DID B 2 (Euripides T 62). Details and discussion: Csapo 2010, 89–95; Csapo/Wilson 2015, 319–328; Lamari 2017, 35–45.

  Martin J. Cropp always have been so, especially at major centres such as Peiraieus or Eleusis. 63 Eleusis, the site of Heracles’ descent to the underworld and capture of Cerberus after his initiation into the Lesser Mysteries, 64 would have been an appropriate setting for Pirithous with its new and improved version of that story. As I noted earlier, the satyr-play Sisyphus presents special complications because of the uncertain status of the Sisyphus-fragment (Critias fr. 19 in TrGF) which is attributed to Critias by Sextus (quoting the whole text) but to Euripides by ps.-Plutarch/Aetius (quoting parts of it). 65 One of the few things that can be said confidently about this speech is that it presents a sophistic argument, characteristic of the late fifth century, about the origin of the belief that all human wrongdoing is perceived and subject to punishment by gods who exist unseen in the heavens. It does not necessarily come from a play named Sisyphus, 66 nor from the play otherwise attested as Euripides’ Sisyphus, nor from a play that was ever publicly performed. It does however seem to have been associated with Critias at least as early as the end of the fourth century when, according to the first-century Epicurean philosopher Philodemus, Epicurus “reproached for their complete madness those who eliminate the divine from existing things”, including Prodicus, Diagoras, Critias and others. 67 Philodemus’s list seems to have been a prototype of the catalogues of alleged atheists found in later sources (including Sextus and ps.-Plutarch citing the Sisyphus-fragment) and probably codified by Cleitomachus of Carthage in the late second century BC. 68 Dihle argued that Epicurus need not have had the Sisyphus-fragment in mind and could have cited Critias as

 63 A dubious anecdote of Aelian has Socrates visiting Peiraieus to see new tragedies of Euripides (Aelian, VH 2.13 = Eur. T 47a TrGF). 64 See Eur. HF 610–613 with Bond 1981, 218f. and refs. there. 65 see Appendix, p. 250 and above, p. 236. 66 This is an inference based on the assumptions (a) that the play was named after its principal character and (b) that its principal character was Sisyphus. Pechstein (1998, 117, 191, 289ff.) finds a possible alternative in one of Euripides’ two plays named Autolycus. 67 Philodemus, On Piety 1, lines 519–530 Obbink 1996 (523–530 = Epicurus, Περὶ φύσεως fr. 27(2) Arrighetti): καὶ πᾶσαν μ[ανίαν Ἐ]πίκουρος ἐμ̣[έμψα]το τοῖς τὸ [θεῖον ἐ]κ τῶν ὄντων [ἀναι]ροῦσιν, ὡς κἀ[ν τῶι] δωδεκάτω[ι Προ]δίκωι καὶ Δια[γόραι] καὶ Κριτίαι κἄ[λλοις] μ̣έμφ̣[εται] φὰ̣ς π̣α[ρα]κόπτε̣ι̣ν καὶ μ̣[αίνεσ]θαι, καὶ βακχεύουσιν αὐτοὺς [εἰ]κά[ζει…: “Epicurus reproached for their complete madness those who eliminate the divine from existing things, as in Book 12 he reproaches Prodicus, Diagoras and Critias among others, saying that they rave like lunatics, and he likens them to Bacchant revellers…” (tr. Obbink, slightly adapted). 68 See especially Winiarczyk 1976, also e.g. Obbink 1989, 217f.; 1996, 351; Sedley 2013, 329f.; Whitmarsh 2015, 208f. Sedley suggests that Theophrastus was Epicurus’s source.

Euripides or Critias, or Neither? Reflections on an Unresolved Question  

an atheist simply because of his lawless political record, 69 but this is now implausible: the text of Philodemus’s statement, as read by Obbink, 70 makes it clear that Epicurus was attacking specific doctrines which denied the existence of gods or seemed to imply such a denial. 71 He might conceivably have had in mind some other text of Critias, 72 but (as Dihle himself noted) nothing relevant is otherwise associated with him; and since the Sisyphus-fragment was cited later as the evidence for Critias’s atheism, it is reasonable to infer that it was Epicurus’s evidence as well. Critias’s association with the Sisyphus-fragment, then, looks considerably stronger than that of Euripides, whose atheist credentials are slight and who is linked with the speech only much later by ps.-Plutarch/Aetius and derivatives. He may have been mistakenly identified with the speech simply because he was the best-known author of a Sisyphus. 73 All this, however, leaves the origin of the Sisyphus-fragment undetermined. Possibly it was already quoted in isolation in Epicurus’s time as an example of Critias’s atheism; 74 if so, a complete play-text, if there ever was one, might no longer have existed — and if it did, it cannot have been a text no longer ascribed to Critias and bearing the name of Euripides instead, as Wilamowitz’s theory requires. Either way, there is no need to connect the Sisyphus-fragment or its source with Euripides’ Sisyphus as represented by frr. 673–674 and the related testimonia. Nor is it quite certain that the author must therefore have been Critias, although it is not easy to account for the attribution if it had no real basis. 75

 69 Dihle 1977, 31f., followed by Yunis 1988, 45f. Against this, Winiarczyk 1987, 37, 42; Davies 1989, 25; Cipolla 2003, 267f. Both sides are sceptically reviewed by Pechstein 1998, 295–302. 70 See Philodemus lines 519–523 (note 67 above) with Obbink 1989, 216f. and 1996, 349f. Dihle and Yunis were of course not aware of this reading. 71 On this point see amongst others Obbink 1996, 352–355; Sedley 2013, 329–332. 72 One might well wonder whether his only evidence was a speech delivered by a mythical criminal who was eternally punished in Hades, but these aspects could have been overlooked once the speech was detached from its context. 73 For sources for Euripides’ supposed atheism see Winiarczyk 1984, 171f. Two lines of the Sisyphus-fragment (vv. 33–34) are ascribed to Euripides in Chrysippus fr. 1009 von Arnim, but the source of this fragment (actually ps.-Plutarch/Aetius again, Mor. 879f.) names only “the Stoics” and its attribution to Chrysippus in particular is unjustified (cf. Dihle 1977, 37 n. 14). 74 Sedley 2013, 335–337 argues that the speech, or a larger text containing it, will have been circulated privately and anonymously from the start because of the risks that open atheistic statements faced in late fifth-century Athens. The detachment of the speech from its author and dramatic context is however resisted by Whitmarsh 2014, 113–115 with n. 34. 75 Sedley 2013, 337 suggests that the attribution “may have originated from a feeling that the author of such a seditious passage must be a playwright of appropriate date who was also a person of suitable moral badness”.

  Martin J. Cropp To sum up: there are no certainties here, only some reasons for doubting that the Alexandrians’ doubts about these plays were based on documentary evidence of their production as a single tetralogy, which must then be assigned either to Euripides or to Critias. If there was no such evidence, there are no grounds for attributing Rhadamanthys or Tennes to Critias, and only marginal grounds for attributing Pirithous to him. The grounds for attributing these plays to Euripides are stronger insofar as their texts apparently reached Alexandria under his name, but fact that his authorship was then denied, at least by some scholars, for reasons that we cannot assess must leave matters in doubt (my own sense is that Pirithous has a better chance of being by Euripides than the other two). Sisyphus is a different matter because it may not have been the disputed satyr-play mentioned in the Life of Euripides and may not have been the source of the Sisyphus-fragment; so it may well be that Critias was responsible for the Sisyphus-fragment and Euripides for the Sisyphus known in Alexandria. All in all, the best editorial policy is perhaps that of Nauck and those before him (p. 237 above) who ascribed the Sisyphus-fragment to Critias while printing the fragments of Sisyphus and the three tragedies under Euripides’ name, with suitable warnings about the status of the tragedies.

Appendix: The Testimonia Euripides Pirithous – ten book-fragments, Critias frr. 1–4, 6, 10–14, cited variously by Satyrus (c. 200 BC), Plutarch, Athenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Stobaeus and others; 76 – a narrative hypothesis quoted in two Byzantine rhetorical commentaries (see Critias fr. 1); and probably: – an inscribed list of Euripidean play-titles (IG II2 2363, c. 100 BC = Euripides T 7a); 77  76 Stobaeus cites fr. 10 and fr. 12 from “Euripides’ Pirithous”, fr. 11 simply from “Pirithous”. 77 Generally known as the Piraeus Catalogue. The titles in lines 43–46 were probably Pl[eisthenes], [Pa]lamedes, P[eliades] or P[olyidos], Peleus, P[eirithoos], [Pro]tesilaos: cf. Pechstein 1998, 34–36.

Euripides or Critias, or Neither? Reflections on an Unresolved Question  

–

parts of a complete papyrus text (P.Oxy. 2078 + 3531, 2nd C. AD = Critias frr. 4a, 5, 7–9). 78

Rhadamanthys – all three book-fragments, cited by Strabo (1st C. BC = Critias fr. 16), the “Antiatticist” Lexicon (fr. 18) and Stobaeus (fr. 17); – end of a narrative hypothesis from a Euripidean collection (PSI 1286, 2nd C. AD = Critias fr. 15). Tennes – the only book-fragment, Critias fr. 21, cited by Stobaeus; – a list of Euripidean play-titles (P.Oxy. 2456, 2nd C. AD = Euripides T 8); – end of a narrative hypothesis from a Euripidean collection (P.Oxy. 2455 fr. 14, 2nd C. AD = Critias fr. 20). Sisyphus – both book-fragments explicitly ascribed to the play (Euripides, Sisyphus frr. 673–674); – the didascalic record for 415 BC (cited by Aelian, VH 2.8 = Euripides, Sisyphus test. ii); – the lists of play-titles cited above for Pirithous and Tennes; – part of a narrative hypothesis, as for Tennes (P.Oxy. 2455 fr. 7 = Euripides, Sisyphus test. *iii). 79

Not Euripides –

Two abridgements of an ancient Life of Euripides found in Byzantine manuscripts (TrGF Euripides T 1.IA.28–29, 1.IB.57–58): 80 IA: “His plays totalled 92, of which 78 are preserved. Three of these are spurious (νοθεύεται): Tennes, Rhadamanthys, Pirithous”; 81

 78 The papyrus presumably circulated as a text of Euripides: cf. Collard 2007, 61. 79 The Sisyphus hypothesis may be represented in fr. 5 rather than fr. 7: see Kannicht ad loc. 80 On the Hellenistic source of the Byzantine summaries see Schorn 2004, 27–31. 81 τὰ πάντα δ’ ἦν αὐτοῦ δράματα ϙβʹ, σῴζεται δὲ οηʹ. τούτων νοθεύεται τρία, Τέννης Ῥαδάμανθυς Πειρίθους.

  Martin J. Cropp IB: “His plays totalled 92, and 67 plays of his are preserved, plus 3 that are disputed (ἀντιλεγόμενα); and 8 satyr-plays, and of these also 1 is disputed”. 82

and probably: – the Roman scholar M. Terentius Varro (1st C. BC) stated that Euripides “wrote 75 tragedies”, i.e. probably 78 [plays] minus 3 [tragedies], cf. IA above; 83 – the Marmor Albanum, an inscription accompanying a seated statue of Euripides (2nd C. AD? = TrGF Euripides T 6), has an unfinished alphabetic list of his play-titles which may have been meant to include all the authentic titles without the four disputed ones. 84 – the biographical entry for Euripides in the Suda (10th C.) credits him with 22 productions in all, i.e. probably 88 plays (= 92–4). 85

Critias or Euripides Pirithous – Athenaeus 11, 496a (late 2nd C. AD) quotes an explanation of the term πλημοχόη (a type of small ceramic jug) by the lexicographer Pamphilus (1st c. AD) and adds: “The author of Pirithous mentions them, whether this is Critias the tyrant or Euripides, as follows…” (Critias fr. 2 is then quoted). 86 The quotation

 82 τὰ πάντα δ’ ἦν αὐτοῦ δράματα ϙβʹ, σῴζεται δὲ αὐτοῦ δράματα ξζʹ καὶ γʹ πρὸς τούτοις τὰ ἀντιλεγόμενα, σατυρικὰ δὲ ηʹ, ἀντιλέγεται δὲ καὶ τούτων τὸ αʹ (i.e. “one of the eight”, not “the one that accompanied the three tragedies”: cf. Kannicht 1996, 27 n. 12; Cropp 2019, 219). 83 Varro fr. 298 Funaioli, from Aul. Gel. 17.4.3: “Euripiden quoque M. Varro ait, cum quinque et septuaginta tragoedias scripserit, in quinque solis vicisse”. 84 Musée du Louvre, Ma 343 (colour photo https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Seated_ Euripides_Louvre_Ma343.jpg accessed 9 Feb. 2020). The list was in two columns of which the first is only partially preserved (its last eight titles are lost) and the second was never completed (it stops at ΟΡΕΣΤΗΣ, so that titles beginning with the letters Π through Χ are missing). Titles which Euripides used twice (Hippolytus etc.) are listed once each. Pechstein assumes that the second column would have contained the same number of titles as the first column, i.e. 34, and so would not have allowed for the four disputed plays, but the assumption of symmetry is not altogether reliable; there was room in the second column for at least 40 titles, and even if symmetry was required the total might have been an odd number. Some asymmetry is in fact visible, as the eleven extant titles in col. 2 (ΚΡΗΤΕΣ–ΟΡΕΣΤΗΣ) occupy the same height as the first ten titles in col. 1 (ΑΛΚΗΣΤΙΣ–ΑΥΓΗ). 85 Suda ε 3695 (= TrGF Euripides T 3) at end: ἐπεδείξατο δὲ ὅλους ἐνιαύτους κβʹ (so mss. AV). See note 38 above for Kannicht’s interpretation of the numbers in the biographical sources. 86 μνημονεύει αὐτῶν καὶ ὁ τὸν Πειρίθουν γράψας, εἴτε Κριτίας ἐστὶν ὁ τύραννος ἢ Εὐριπίδης, λέγων οὕτως ....

Euripides or Critias, or Neither? Reflections on an Unresolved Question  

presumably comes from Pamphilus, the comment on disputed authorship from either Pamphilus or Athenaeus. Sisyphus(?) – Sextus Empiricus (adv. math. 9.54, late 2nd C. AD?) quotes the famous atheist speech Critias fr. 19 in full and attributes it to Critias, whereas the pseudoPlutarchan Placita Philosophorum (an epitome of a doxographic work usually ascribed to Aetius) quotes parts of it as from Euripides and names Sisyphus as the speaker. 87 Neither names the play or says whether it was a tragedy or a satyr-play.

Critias –

Four gnomic fragments from unidentified plays (so possibly from one or more of the plays in question here) are ascribed by Stobaeus simply to Critias (Critias frr. 22–25).

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 87 [Plut.] Mor. 880E. On the shadowy figure of Aetius see most recently Mansfeld 2016, esp. 164– 168.

  Martin J. Cropp Canfora, L. (1990), The Vanished Library, transl. M. Ryle (orig. Italian, 1986), Berkeley. Caroli, M. (2006), “La numerazione dei drammi greci nella tradizione manoscritta antica e medievale”, Segno e testo 4, 3–49. Cipolla, P. (2003), Poeti minori del dramma satiresco, Amsterdam. Collard, C. (2007), “The Pirithous Fragments”, in: C. Collard (ed.), Tragedy, Euripides and Euripideans: Selected Papers, Bristol (orig. 1995), 56–68. Collard, C./Cropp, M. (2008), Euripides: Fragments. Oedipus–Chrysippus etc, Cambridge MA. Colomo, D. (2011), “5093. Rhetorical Epideixeis”, in: D. Colomo/J. Chapa (eds), The Oxyrhynchus Papyri, vol. 76, London, 84–171. Cropp, M.J. (2019), Minor Greek Tragedians. Fragments from the Tragedies with Selected Testimonia. I. The Fifth Century, Liverpool. Csapo, E. (2010), Actors and Icons of the Ancient Theater, Chichester. Csapo, E./Wilson, P. (2015), “Drama outside Athens in the fifth and fourth centuries BC”, in: A.A. Lamari (ed.), Reperformances of Drama in the Fifth and Fourth Centuries BC: Authors and Contexts, Berlin (Trends in Classics 7), 316–395. Davies, M. (1989), “Sisyphus and the invention of religion”, BICS 36, 16–32. Diggle, J. (1998), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta Selecta, Oxford. Dihle, A. (1977), “Das Satyrspiel ‘Sisyphos’”, Hermes 105, 28–42. Dobrov, G. (2001), Figures of Play. Greek Drama and Metafictional Poetics, Oxford/New York. Dover, K.J. (1968), Lysias and the Corpus Lysiacum, Berkeley. Elmsley, P. (1821), Euripidis Bacchae, Oxford. Finglass, P.J. (2015), “Ancient Reperformances of Sophocles”, in: A.A. Lamari (ed.), Reperformances of Drama in the Fifth and Fourth Centuries BC: Authors and Contexts, Berlin (Trends in Classics 7), 207–223. Fowler, R.L. (2013), Early Greek Mythography, II. Commentary, Oxford. Gantz, T.N. (1993), Early Greek Myth, Baltimore/London. Gauly, B. et al. (1991), Musa Tragica: die griechische Tragödie von Thespis bis Ezechiel, Göttingen. Halliwell, F.S. (1989), “Authorial collaboration in the Athenian comic theatre”, GRBS 30, 515– 528. Harsh, P.W. (1937), “Repetition of lines in Euripides”, Hermes 72, 435–449. Hoffmann, H. (1951), Chronologie der attischen Tragödie, PhD diss., Hamburg. Johnstone, S. (2014), “A New History of Libraries and Books in the Hellenistic Period”, CA 33, 347–393. Jouan, F./Van Looy, H. (1998), Euripide, Tome VIII.1. Fragments 1re partie, Paris. Kannicht, R. (1996), “Zum Corpus Euripideum”, in: C. Mueller-Goldingen/K. Sier (eds), ΛΗΝΑΙΚΑ: Festschrift für Carl Werner Müller, Munich, 21–31. Kayser, W.C. (1845), Historia Critica Tragicorum Graecorum, Göttingen. Koster, W. (1975), Scholia in Aristophanem I.1a. Prolegomena de Comoedia etc, Groningen. Kuiper, K. (1888), Wijsbegeerte en Godsdienst in het Drama van Euripides, Haarlem. Kuiper, K. (1907), “De Pirithoo fabula Euripidea”, Mnemosyne 35, 354–385. Kuiper, K. (1908a), “De Euripideae fabulae Pirithoi fragmento nuper reperto”, Mnemosyne 36, 335–341. Kuiper, K. (1908b), “De vocabuli τρόπος vi atque usu per saecula VI et V”, Mnemosyne 36, 419– 434. Lamari, A.A. (ed.) (2015), Reperformances of Drama in the
 Fifth and Fourth Centuries BC: Authors and Contexts, Trends in Classics 7.2, Berlin.

Euripides or Critias, or Neither? Reflections on an Unresolved Question  

Lamari, A.A. (2017), Reperforming Greek Tragedy. Theater, Politics and Cultural Mobility in the Fifth and Fourth Centuries BC, Berlin. Larson, J. (1995), Greek Heroine Cults, Madison WI. Lefkowitz, M. (20122), The Lives of the Greek Poets, Baltimore. Lesky, A. (19723), Die tragische Dichtung der Hellenen, Göttingen. Librán Moreno, M. (2011), “Neofrón 15 T 1–3 Sn.-K. y la Medea de Eurípides”, Lexis 29, 113–129. Lloyd-Jones, Η. (1967), “Heracles at Eleusis”, Maia n.s. 19, 206–229. Mansfeld, J. (2016), “Theodoret of Cyrrhus’s Therapy of Greek Diseases as a source for the Aëtian Placita”, The Studia Philonica Annual 28, 151–168. Matthiae, A. (1829), Euripidis Tragoediae et Fragmenta, vol. 9, Leipzig. Meccariello, C. (2014), Le Hypotheseis Narrative dei Drammi Euripidei. Testo, contesto, fortuna, Rome. Montana, F. (2015), “Hellenistic Scholarship”, in: F. Montanari/St. Matthaios/A. Rengakos (eds), Brill’s Companion to Ancient Greek Scholarship, 2 vols, Leiden, 60–183. Montanari, F. (2009), “L’esegesi antico di Eschilo da Aristotele a Didimo”, in: J. Jouanna/ F. Montanari (eds), Eschyle à l’aube du théâtre occidental, Vandoeuvres, 379–433. Nauck, A. (1856), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta (Second edition: 1889), Leipzig. Obbink, D. (1989), “The atheism of Epicurus”, GRBS 30, 187–223. Obbink, D. (1996), Philodemus on Piety, Part 1, Oxford. Pechstein, N. (1998), Euripides Satyrographos: ein Kommentar zu den euripideischen Satyrspielfragmenten, Stuttgart/Leipzig. Pfeiffer, R. (1968), History of Classical Scholarship: from the beginnings to the end of the Hellenistic age, Oxford. Rabe, H. (1908), “Aus Rhetoren-Handschriften”, RhM 63, 127–151. Rutishauser, B. (2001), “Island strategies: the case of Tenedos”, REA 103, 197–204. Schmid, W. (1940), Geschichte der griechischen Literatur, Ι.3.1, Munich. Schorn, S. (2004), Satyros auf Kallatis. Sammlung der Fragmente mit Kommentar, Basel. Scodel, R. (1980), The Trojan Trilogy of Euripides, Göttingen. Sedley, D. (2013), “The Atheist Underground”, in: V. Harte/M. Lane (eds), Politeia in Greek and Roman Philosophy, Cambridge, 329–348. Slater, W.J. (1976), “Aristophanes of Byzantium on the Pinakes of Callimachus”, Phoenix 30, 234–241. Speyer, W. (1971), Die literarische Fälschung im heidnischen und christlichen Altertum, Munich. Sutton, D.F. (1981), “Critias and atheism”, CQ 31, 33–38. Sutton, D.F. (1987), Two Lost Plays of Euripides, New York/Bern etc. TrGF (1971–2004), B. Snell/R. Kann nicht/S. Radt, Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta, Five volumes in six, Göttingen. Valckenaer, L.C. (1767), Diatribe in Euripidis perditorum dramatum reliquias, Leiden. Wagner, F.W. (1844, 1848), Poetarum Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta, vol. 2: Euripides (1844), vol. 3: Minores, Adespota (1848), Breslau. Welcker, F.G. (1839, 1842), Die griechischen Tragödien mit rücksicht auf den epischen Cyclus, vols 1–2 (1839), 3 (1842), Bonn. Whitmarsh, T. (2015), Battling the Gods: Atheism in the Ancient World, New York/London. Wilamowitz-Moellenfdorff, U. von (1875), Analecta Euripidea, Berlin. Wilamowitz-Moellenfdorff, U. von (1907), “Response to Kuiper 1907”, in: J.M. Bremer/W. Calder Mnemosyne 47 (1997), 211–216; cf. Alvoni (2011), 120–130. Wilamowitz-Moellenfdorff, U. von (1920), Platon, 2 vols, Berlin.

  Martin J. Cropp Wilamowitz-Moellenfdorff, U. von (1921), “Melanippe”, Sitzungsberichte de Preussichen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 63–80 (= KS I, 440–460). Wilamowitz-Moellenfdorff, U. von (1927), “Lesefrüchte 223”, Hermes 62, 291f. (= KS IV, 446f.). Wilamowitz-Moellenfdorff, U. von (1929), “Lesefrüchte 254”, Hermes 64, 463f. (= KS IV, 481f.). Winiarczyk, M. (1976), “Der erste Atheistenkatalog des Kleitomachos”, Philologus 120, 32–46. Winiarczyk, M. (1984), “Wer galt im Altertum als Atheist?”, Philologus 128, 157–183. Winiarczyk, M. (1987), “Nochmals das Satyrspiel ‘Sisyphos’”, WS 100, 35–45. Yunis, H. (1988), “The Debate on Undetected Crime and an Undetected Fragment from Euripides’ Sisyphus”, ZPE 75, 39–46.

Ioanna Karamanou

Fragmented Intergeneric Discourses: Epinician Echoes in Euripides’ Alexandros This survey sets out to explore Euripides’ intergeneric interplay with epinician poetry in the Alexandros, which was staged in 415 BC alongside the Palamedes, the Trojan Women and the satyr play Sisyphus. Research on this drama, which is one of the best preserved fragmentary tragedies, has benefited enormously from papyrus finds providing a large number of fragments from the play (P.Stras. 2342–2344) and a major part of its narrative hypothesis (P.Oxy. 3650, col. i). The available fragmentary material could thus offer scope for a considerable range of interpretative possibilities, not least because the Alexandros may be perceived both as a self-contained play and as part of a production which has been widely and plausibly considered to bear the features of a “connected” trilogy. 1 The Alexandros treats the recognition of the long-lost royal son Alexandros / Paris with his natal family and his return to the Trojan palace. According to the hypothesis (P.Oxy. 3650, col. i), when Alexandros was born, Hecabe had him exposed due to an ill-omened dream alluding to the disaster that the newborn child would bring to Troy. The child was raised by a herdsman, who named him Paris. Hecabe still grieving over his exposure persuaded Priam to establish athletic games in his memory. When twenty years had passed, the boy excelled among his fellow herdsmen, who accused him of arrogance before Priam as a judge. After defending himself, Alexandros was granted permission to participate in his own funeral games. Having been crowned winner, he infuriated his brother Deiphobus and his companions, who realizing that they had been defeated by a herdsman demanded that Hecabe should kill him. When Alexandros re-appeared onstage, Cassandra recognized him at a state of prophetic frenzy foretelling of the future disaster. Hecabe was prevented from killing him. His foster-father arrived and because of the danger was compelled to tell the truth. Alexandros thus returned to the Trojan palace. This play features an athletic contest as a pivotal element of its dramatic plot. I shall point out that Euripides chooses to employ epinician vocabulary, imagery

 1 The unity of the trilogy of 415 BC has plausibly been supported by Scodel 1980, esp. 64–121. See also Menegazzi 1951, 190–191; Pertusi 1952, 251–273; Webster 1966, 208–213; Barlow 1986, 27–30; Ritoók 1993, 109–125; Hose 1995, 33–57; Kovacs 1997, 162–176; Falcetto 2002, 21–37; Collard Cropp/Gibert 2004, 47–48; Sansone 2009, 193–203; Torrance 2013, 238–245; Karamanou 2016, 355–367 and 2017, 31–37 (with further bibliography on this matter). https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-015

  Ioanna Karamanou and ideology to describe this competition and I shall seek to investigate the dramatic meaning of the use of epinician elements and their ramifications for the development of the plot. We may start with fr. 61d K. (fr. 15 Kar.). 2 The paragraphoi in ll. 5–9 and 14– 15 of the papyrus text point to a stichomythic dialogue consisting of questions and answers with regard to the outcome of the athletic games, which is suggestive of a messenger scene.

(ΧΟ.) vel (ΕΚ.) (ΑΓΓΕΛΟC) (ΧΟ.) vel (ΕΚ.) (ΑΓΓ.) (ΧΟ.) vel (ΕΚ.) (ΑΓΓ.)

(ΧΟ.) vel (ΕΚ.) (ΑΓΓ.) (ΧΟ.) vel (ΕΚ.)

10–12 ll.] τε.[ 10–12 ll.]ο̣ υδ[ ..]o..[± 7 ll.]νcυ̣[ τ̣ ύχηι δ[ίδω]μ̣ι πά[ντα –x – ᴗ – κρείccω πεφυκὼc [ – ᴗ – x – ᴗ – ἦ καὶ cτέφουcιν αὐτὸ[ν –x – ᴗ – καί φαcιν εἶν̣ α̣ί̣ γ’ ἄ̣ξιον [ x – ᴗ – ὁ δ’ ὧδε μορφῆι διαφερ[ –x – ᴗ ἅ̣πα̣νθ’, ὅc’ ἄ̣νδρα χρη[ ᴗ – x – ᴗ – ± 10 ll.]γαν βουκ[ολ 2–3 ll.]δ.[ ․ ]δ̣[ ἀγῶνα ποῦ κ[ρίνουcι; – x – ᴗ – Πρία̣μοc τίθη̣c̣ιν [ – ᴗ – x – ᴗ – εἰc̣ τόνδε νικη.[ – ᴗ – x – ᴗ – κ̣α̣[ὶ] πρ̣ο̣ [. . .]αιδ[

5

; ;

10 ; ;

15

(Eur. fr. 61d K.) (traces of three lines) (Chorus-leader or Hecabe) (Messenger) (Cho.) / (Hec.) (Mess.) (Cho.) / (Hec.) (Mess.) (traces of one line) (Cho.) / (Hec.) (Mess.) (Cho.) /(Hec.) (traces of one line)

[I assign everything] to fortune[ Being better by nature[ Are they really crowning him[ ? And they deem him worthy[ Is he/ Being so exceptional in appearance[ ? Everything that a man must[ ]herdsman[ Where [do they judge] the contest [ Priam is setting [ To this man […] victory [awards ?

?

 2 The text and translation of the fragments of the Alexandros follow Karamanou 2017, henceforth abbreviated as Kar.

Fragmented Intergeneric Discourses: Epinician Echoes in Euripides’ Alexandros  

This messenger scene comprises a succinct report of offstage events, which is usually embedded in an introductory dialogue between the messenger and his interlocutor. These brief announcements are followed by detailed messengerspeeches. The likeliest addressee of the messenger speech seems to be Hecabe, who would naturally be very eager to hear news from the games held in memory of her lost child. She also needs to be informed of the outcome of the contest, in order to participate in the next scene, which involves a formal debate between her two sons, Hector and Deiphobus, concerning their defeat by the unknown herdsman. Nonetheless, there is no clear evidence as to whether the messenger was involved in a dialogue with Hecabe right from the outset, that is, in the present fragment, or briefly reported the events in a dialogue with the chorus-leader, who then presumably summoned Hecabe out of the palace to listen to the messenger’s rhēsis. 3 According to the hypothesis, Alexandros won in running, pentathlon and possibly in a fighting event (P.Oxy. 3650, col. i, 21–22). The closest extant dramatic parallel to this report of the athletic contest would be the false messengerspeech describing Orestes’ participation in the athletic games in Soph. El. 680– 763. 4 As we shall see, the use of epinician vocabulary in the messenger’s report echoes the victor’s proclamation by the herald in epinician poetry. 5 Line 4 of the present fragment preserves the addressee’s reaction to the herdsman’s victory at the athletic competition. The speaker, that is, Hecabe or the chorus-leader, attributes this outcome to fortune, which suggests the unexpectedness of Alexandros’

 3 For the former possibility, see the similar opening dialogues between messengers and dramatic characters in Med. 1121–1230, Heracl. 784–866, Andr. 1070–1165, El. 761–858, Hel. 1512– 1618, Phoen. 1066–1263 (and Mastronarde 1994, 446), Or. 852–956, Bacch. 660–774; for the latter possibility, see Hipp. 1153–1254, IT 1284–1419 (this was proposed by Schadewaldt ap. Snell 1937, 37 and was accepted by Jouan/van Looy 1998–2003, I 51, Kannicht 2004, I 192, Collard/ Cropp/Gibert 2004, 78–79 and by Di Giuseppe 2012, 115–116). Scodel (1980, 31) favoured Hecabe’s onstage presence before the messenger’s arrival, on the basis of Ennius Alexander fr. 19 Jocelyn / 15 Manuwald possibly presenting the Queen to be awaiting a report about the athletic contest. This would entail that she was the messenger’s interlocutor in the dialogue of the present fragment. Though one might argue that Ennius may have not necessarily followed Euripides’ arrangement of the episode so closely, it is worth noting in support of this suggestion that there is a series of Euripidean parallels involving characters anxiously awaiting news, which are to be reported by the arriving messenger (Med. 1116–1117, Andr. 1047–1069, El. 751–760, Or. 844– 851), as in the Ennian fragment. 4 See also Di Giuseppe 2012, 115. 5 See e.g. Pind. Ol. 13.100, Pyth. 1.32–133; Kampakoglou 2018, 202, n. 79.

  Ioanna Karamanou victory, 6 as well as a possible doubt about his abilities. This statement seems to be refuted in the next line by the messenger, who asserts Alexandros’ superiority over his rivals. In more specific terms, the messenger stresses Alexandros’ supremacy in the athletic contest by employing κρείccων in the sense of “better”, “superior”. 7 This epithet recurs in the ensuing agon between Hector and Deiphobus (fr. 62b.33 K.) with regard to Alexandros’ superiority and worth. At the same time, the epithet κρείccων also denoting “better in point of rank” (LSJ9) from an aristocratic viewpoint in conjunction with πεφυκώc might create an ironic ambiguity, 8 by alluding to Alexandros’ inherent excellences due to his high birth. The well informed audience would be able to perceive both levels of interpretation. The twofold meaning of this line could be suggestive of the tension between the aristocratic values commending the innate excellences of the noble and the civic values of late-fifth century defining nobility on the basis of worth and usefulness. The latter are praised in the choral ode of fr. 61b K. The association of athletic victory with the winner’s physis evidently derives from epinician poetry, which upholds the aristocratic system of values, as it emerges from several Pindaric passages, such as Ol. 9.100 (τὸ δὲ φυᾷ κράτιστον ἅπαν), Ol. 2.86 (σοφὸς ὁ πολλὰ εἰδὼς φυᾷ), Nem. 3.40. 9 Likewise, in the arbitration scene in Menander’s Epitrepontes (322–329) the victory in an athletic competition is regarded as likely to reveal the noble nature of the exposed child. In l. 6 of the same fragment there is a reference to Alexandros’ crowning, which recurs in fr. 62d, col. ii, 6 K., as will be discussed below. Naturally enough, the victor’s crowning is a key epinician element (Pind. Ol. 1.100, 2.74, 3.18, 4.11, Pyth. 1.37, 8.57, Nem. 2.22, Isthm. 1.21, Bacchyl. 1.158, 2.10, 4.16). Euripides appropriates the idea of the victory wreath as an indicator of excellence deployed to describe athletic, military or civic virtue. 10 In the present case, as possibly in  6 See Collard/Cropp/Gibert 2004, 79. Fortune is given dramatic prominence in the Alexandros as a mechanism of the plot through its identification with divine will (fr. 62 K.) and its underlying association with time (fr. 42 K.). For this idea, see De Romilly 1968, 119–131; Dunn 2007, 88–92 and 1996, 143–151; Hose 2008, 157–169; Giannopoulou 1999–2000; Matthiessen 1964, 180–185. 7 See similarly Eur. fr. inc. 972.2 K. σφάλλουσιν ἡμᾶς κρείσσονες πεφυκότες and the parallel syntax in the same position of the trimeter in Med. 301 κρείσσων νομισθείς. Cf. also Heracl. 25, Andr. 765, El. 227, Archelaus frr. 244.1 and 261.2 K. 8 As observed by Scodel 1980, 89. 9 Cf. Donlan 1978, 95–101; Kurke 1991, 85–107; Carey 1995, 88–90; Nicholson 2005; Silk 2012, 349; 354–361; Morgan 2008, 31–35; Podlecki 1984, 237–243. 10 See Supp. 315 (and Collard 1975, II 191), El. 163, 614 (cf. Denniston 1939, 126–127), 887, HF 335 (and Bond 1981, 153), 1334, IT 12, Phoen. 858, Or. 924, Erechtheus fr. 360.34 K. (cf. Collard/Cropp/Lee 1995, ad loc.), Antiope fr. 219.1 K., Autolycus fr. 282.18–24 K., fr. inc. 853.4 K., fr. inc. 1052.5 K., Soph. Aj. 465, Phil. 841. Cf. also Thuc. 2.46.1, Lycurg. Leocr. 12.51 and within comic

Fragmented Intergeneric Discourses: Epinician Echoes in Euripides’ Alexandros  

Hyps. fr. 757.935 K., the verb στέφω (“to crown”) is literally used with regard to the crowning of the winner in a funeral athletic contest. However, as we shall see below, the imagery of the crown is ironically brought into play later on, in order to delineate Alexandros’ shift from glorious winner to helpless victim. Alexandros’ outstanding beauty, which is stressed in l. 8, recurs within the context of this trilogy, that is, in the agon of the Trojan Women (987 κάλλος ἐκπρεπέστατος) and is widely reported in ancient sources. Similarly, in Soph. El. 685 Orestes’ radiant appearance as he enters the athletic contest arouses the audience’s admiration. 11 According to the aristocratic system of values, physical beauty was related to aretē (“virtue”) as a mark of the high-born. The notion of physis comprises the element of appearance, which is, as expected, a feature of athletes (Autolycus fr. 282.10 K. λαμπροὶ δ’ ἐν ἥβῃ καὶ πόλεως ἀγάλματα, Ar. Eq. 556–557). 12 The emphasis on appearance is a topos in epinician poetry. 13 Fr. 54 K. (fr. 17 Κar.) was evidently delivered after Alexandros’ athletic victory, to judge from the use of the idiom ἦν ἄρα in the first line; this is a colloquialism denoting that a fact or truth has only just been recognized, which, in this case, would verify Alexandros’ worth despite his seemingly humble status. 14 κακόν τι παίδευμ’ ἦν ἄρ’ εἰς εὐανδρίαν ὁ πλοῦτος ἀνθρώποισιν αἵ τ’ ἄγαν τρυφαί· πενία δὲ δύστηνον μέν, ἀλλ’ ὅμως τρέφει μοχθεῖν τ’ ἀμείνω τέκνα καὶ δραστήρια. (Eur. fr. 54 K.) Wealth and too much luxury are, after all, a bad instruction in manly virtue. Poverty is miserable, but, for all that, it breeds children who are better at toiling and effective.

 contexts in Ar. Eq. 1250–1254 (where standard epinician vocabulary, such as στέφανος, νικητήριον, καλλίνικος, is employed). See Blech 1982, 109–180; Zeitlin 1970, 655–660; Foley 1985, 177– 188 (with further bibliography); Swift 2010, 121–172. 11 See Finglass 2007, ad loc. 12 See Holwerda 1955, 62–65. Cf. also Kampakoglou 2018, 207. 13 Pind. Isthm. 7.22 σθένει τ’ ἔκπαγλος ἰδεῖν τε μορ-/φάεις, ἄγει τ’ ἀρετὰν οὐκ αἴσχιον φυᾶς, Οlymp. 9.94, Νem. 3.20, Νem. 11.13–16, Οlymp. 8.19f., 14.5–7. See Donlan 1978, 106–107; Nisetich 1978, 140–142; Race 1990, 187–192; Robertson 2003, esp. 70–72; Potter 2012, 89–93; Di Giuseppe 2012, 118. 14 On this idiom, see Denniston 19542, 36–37; Stevens 1976, 62–63. For the placement of this fragment, see Kovacs 1984, 53; Huys 1995, 353; Collard/Cropp/Gibert 2004, 80; Di Giuseppe 2012, 122.

  Ioanna Karamanou This gnomic fragment could belong to the messenger-speech as a generalizing evaluation of the themes reported therein. This type of moralizing coda, which occurs widely in Euripidean messenger-speeches, emerges from the dramatic circumstances and also forms a marker of the messenger’s focalization. 15 The key notion of this fragment is euandria (“manliness”), which is closely associated with the concept of andreia. It is an aristocratic ideal conveying traditional excellences, such as virtue in war, courage and physical strength, which were regarded as features of the noble class in archaic Greek thought. Naturally enough, athletics form a locus for the demonstration of manly virtue until Late Antiquity. 16 The traditional features of euandria are occasionally commended in Euripidean drama, as in HF 475 and Archelaus fr. 237 K. 17 Nonetheless, from midfifth century onwards, euandria also develops into a moral feature of the good citizen, comprising the quiet values of prudence and justice which the citizen displays through his civic conduct and not by birth alone. This notion gradually becomes a feature of Athenian political self-representation, to quote the opening words of Gorgias’ Encomium of Helen (D–K82 B11.11) asserting that euandria (“manly excellence”) is the adornment of a city (κόσμος πόλει μὲν εὐανδρία, Χen. Mem. 3.3.12f.). Accordingly, in Euripides’ Electra (367–385) Orestes is challenging the aristocratic claim to excellence by attributing moral qualities to manly virtue (euandria) in the light of the farmer’s integrity. In a similar manner, the farmer mentioned in the messenger’s report of the trial in Or. 917–922 is described as ἀνδρεῖος ἀνήρ, as he leads a prudent and blameless life. 18 In the present fragment wealth is considered to inhibit the development of manly virtue. This view clashes with the aristocratic ideal, according to which athletic participation was restricted to the upper class of the wealthy and the noble. These lines are thus suggestive of the contradiction between the traditional sense of euandria and the lowly status of the character displaying this manly virtue. At the same time, the audience would be in a position to perceive the irony

 15 Cf. similarly Med. 1224–1230, Heracl. 863–866, Supp. 726–730, Hel. 1617–1618, Bacch. 1150– 1152 and the Phrygian’s monody in Or. 1500–1502. See de Jong 1991, 74–76, 191–192; Bassi 1899, 68–70; Erdmann 1964, 82–86; Rutherford 2012, 202–203. 16 See, for instance, Dio Chrys. Or. 29.8–10, Luc. Anach. 25, 36. Cf. Crowther 1985, 285–291; Reid 2011, 58–80; König 2005, 30–35, 132–157; Kyle 19932, 36–37, 40. 17 Cf. also Di Giuseppe (2012, 125, n. 160) citing Supp. 913–915 (on which, see Storey 2008, 66– 68 and Morwood 2007, 214) and fr. inc. 1052.5–7 K. 18 See Donlan 1999, 150–152; Adkins 1960, 176–177; Gregory 1991, 124.

Fragmented Intergeneric Discourses: Epinician Echoes in Euripides’ Alexandros  

concerning the ambiguity arising from Alexandros’ high birth despite his seemingly humble status. 19 Fr. 62a K. (fr. 18a, col. i Kar.) preserves remnants of the beginning of an interesting agon formally signposted as an ἅμιλλα λόγων between Hector and his brother Deiphobus before their mother Hecabe as a judge. 20 (ΧΟ.)

(ΔΗΙΦΟΒΟC) (ΕΚΤΩΡ) (ΔΗ.) (EKT.) (ΔΗ.) (EKT.)

].ο̣[ καὶ μὴν ὁρῶ τόν]δ̣’ Ἕκτορ’ ἐξ ἀγωνίω[ν cτείχοντα μό]χθων cύγγονόν τε, παῖδε cώ, Δηίφοβον,] ε̣ ἰc δ’ ἅμιλλαν ἥκουcιν λόγων. αἰνῶ μὲν οὐ]δέν’, ὅcτιc ἐcτὶ δυcχερήc, αὖθιc δὲ τοῖ]c̣ κακοῖcι μαλθάccει φρέναc̣. ἐγὼ δέ γ’, ὅc]τιc cμίκρ’ ἔχων ἐγκλήματα μεγάλα νο]μίζει καὶ cυνέcτηκεν †φόβω[ι. πῶc γάρ, κα]cίγνηθ’ Ἕκτορ, οὐκ ἀλγεῖc φρέ̣ να̣[c δούλου παρ’] ἀ̣νδρὸc ἆθλ’ ἀπεcτερημέν[οc; μάτην ἀθυ]μ̣εῖc, Δηίφοβε· τί γάρ με δεῖ x – ᴗ –; οὐ] καιρὸc ὠδίνειν φ[ρέν]αc. x – ᴗ – x ]. ῥ̣α̣ιδίωc φέρειc τάδε· x – ᴗ – x Φρ]υξὶν ἐμφανὴc ἔcηι. ]c̣ νέον φῦcαι με̣ [ βο]ύ̣λεται δ’ οὐ cωφρ[ ]νεζευχθοι[ κ]αθεcτηκεν̣ [ ]εγω γὰρ ουχω̣[ ].πρόcθεν λ[ ]πηδ.[

5

10

15

20

(Eur. fr. 62a K.) (Chorus-leader)

(Deiphobus) (Hector)

And now I see] Hector [here coming] from the athletic toils and his brother, Deiphobus,] your two sons, and they have got involved in a contest of words. I approve of] no one who is tough, but then] softens his disposition towards the base. And I of no one] who having insignificant complaints regards them as [major] and is agitated with †fear.

 19 On the quiet virtues which andreia encompasses, see Pl. La. 196c 10–201b 5, Resp. 429a 8– 430b 9, Phdr. 68c 5–69c 3, Symp. 219d, Cra. 413d 7–414a 3, Grg. 507b 4–507c 7, Arist. Eth. Nic. 1115a 4–1117b 22, Pol. 1260a 19–24, VV 1250b 3–6. Cf. Bassi 2003, 37–56; Balot 2014, 7–10, 251– 261; Schmid 1992, 59–176; Rabieh 2006, esp. 68–94, 161–170. 20 For the substantiation of this scene as an agon, see Karamanou 2011.

  Ioanna Karamanou (Deiphobus) (Hector) (Deiphobus) (Hector) (Deiphobus)

And how], my brother Hector, are you not feeling pain in your spirit, when you have been deprived of prizes [by a slave]? You vainly distress yourself], Deiphobus. Why do I need [ This is not] the time to afflict my spirit. ] you are bearing these things softly ] you will be conspicuous to the Phrygians ] to be young by nature [ ] does not want to [show moderation. ] to be yoked [ ] is established [ ] for I do not/ shall not ]before[

The objective of this formal debate, which takes place after Alexandros’ athletic triumph, is Hector’s disagreement with his brother’s intention to have the unknown herdsman eliminated. Deiphobus resents the encroachment on his royal status by the socially inferior herdsman who deprived him of the prize at the games, which the prince regards as his legitimate privilege and rightful possession. His ethical stance follows the archaic requirements of a shame culture, according to which a man pursues the expressed ideal norm of society concerning the acknowledgement of one’s honour, whilst internalizing the anticipated judgements of others on himself. 21 Athletic victory, in particular, is a specific indicator of status and prowess involving a community’s recognition of an individual’s standing within that community. From this ideological viewpoint, the main concern of the participants is to demonstrate their superiority, in order to live up to a socially imposed code of excellence, according to which failure incurs public shame. 22 Deiphobus’ emotion could be best described as phthonos (“envy”, “grudge”), which involves the resentment one feels against people who rise above themselves, violating the status rules of a highly class conscious society. 23 The emotion of phthonos is also

 21 The term “shame culture” was coined by Dodds 1951, 28–63. See also Hammer 2007, 155–158; Redfield 19942, 113–116; Adkins 1960, 154–158, 185–189. 22 See Durand 1999, 76–111, 165–185; Hawhee 2004, 15–43; Miller 19912, 105–113; van Wees 2011, 2–6. 23 Arist. Rh. 1387b22–1388a24, Eth. Eud. 1233b19f., Eth. Nic. 1108b3–5; see Ben-Ze’ev 2003, 106– 112; Konstan 2003, 13–14 and 2006, 125–128.

Fragmented Intergeneric Discourses: Epinician Echoes in Euripides’ Alexandros  

related to timē (“honour”), as expressed in Deiphobus’ possible criticism of Hector for being conspicuous to the Trojans as inferior to a slave in l. 14. 24 Accordingly, as I have argued in an earlier publication, 25 in l. 8 φθόνω[ι could be preferable to φόβωι; the latter cannot be justified by its context, since the notion of fear does not emerge at all from Deiphobus’ words or Hector’s reaction to his brother’s attitude. Instead, the dominant ideas of this introductory dialogue are Deiphobus’ indignation at the herdsman’s victory and his grief for the loss of the prize by a socially inferior, which are basic attributes of phthonos. It is thus possible that φθόνω[ι could be the lectio difficilior substituted by the much commoner and palaeographically similar φόβω[ι. The emotion of phthonos is commonly felt by the defeated (see Phoen. 545 φθόνον ἔχει νικώμενον) and is closely related to athletic prowess being directed against the glory achieved by victory. The notion of phthonos is incorporated into the rhetoric of praise for the victor in epinician poetry. In Pindar fame is won not only in the praise of the successful competition of the athlete but also in the deprecation of the phthonos of others. 26 Euripides revisits and refigures this epinician emotion by incorporating it into tragic ideology. Deiphobus’ feeling of phthonos due to his defeat by the herdsman is inherently associated with honour and rests upon an ideal self-image which is challenged and an awareness of the standards under which he is liable to be criticized. His envy is brought into contrast with Hector’s sōphrosynē (fr. 62a.7–8, 11–12, 16 K.) and sense of justice towards the herdsman’s well-earned victory (fr. 62b.10–13 K.). 27 Hector’s moderation and justice are civic virtues and attributes of a quiet moral behaviour commended in democratic Athens. Hence, the Euripidean agon between Hector and Deiphobus seems to showcase the continuing existence of the competitive ideology of ancient athletics alongside civic excellences in late fifth-century Athens. 28 As Laura Swift aptly pointed out, despite the anxiety expressed towards aristocratic values, the Athenian polis seems to have aimed at assimilating elite culture rather

 24 On the association of envy with honour, see Arist. Rh. 1387b28–1388a7. Cf. Walcot 1978, 11, 18–20, 38–39; Bulman 1992, 27–28; Marquez 2005, 44–45. 25 Karamanou 2011, 44–45. 26 See esp. Parth. fr. 94a.8f. Sn.-M. παντὶ δ’ ἐπὶ φθόνος ἀνδρὶ κεῖται/ ἀρετᾶς, Ol. 1.47–51, 6.74– 76, 8.55, Pyth. 1.81–86, 2.88–92, 3.71, 7.19–20, 11.29–30, Nem. 4.39–41, 8.21–23, Isthm. 1.41–45, 2.43, 5.22–25; cf. also Bacchyl. 3.63–71, 5.187–189. See Goldhill 1991, 138–139, 147, 158–159; Mackie 2003, 16–19; Most 1985, 109–110 and 2003, 127–128, 133–141; Kirkwood 1984, 171–173, 177–179; Kurke 1991, 178–182, 195–218; Boeke 2007, ch. 3. 27 Karamanou 2011, 44–45. 28 On the coexistence of competitive and co-operative excellences towards the end of the fifth century, see e.g. Cairns 1993, 265–342; Adkins 1960, 156–168.

  Ioanna Karamanou than eliminating it. 29 This practice may additionally emerge from the trend of epinician poetry to honour not only the laudandus, but also his achievements as beneficial to the community as a whole. From this viewpoint, the epinikion would not be restricted to elite recipients, but it could assume a collective character appealing to a wider audience. 30 Euripides’ refiguration and incorporation of epinician ideology into this agon could thus serve to showcase its dialogue with the values of the democratic polis. Fr. 62d, col. ii K. (fr. 18b, col. ii Kar.) comprises a stichomythic conversation between Deiphobus and Hecabe involving their plotting against Alexandros. (margo) (ΕΚΑΒΗ)

κεῖ̣̣ ν̣ο̣ ν̣ μέν, ὄνθ’ ὅc ἐcτι, θαυμάζειν Φρύγαc, Πριάμου δὲ νικ….γ̣εραίρεcθαι δόμουc. (ΔΗΙΦΟΒΟC) πῶc οὖν .[3–4 ll.].ε̣ ι̣ τ̣ α‫ׅ‬ ̣ ῦ̣τ̣ ά̣ γ̣' ὥcτ' ἔχειν καλῶc; (ΕΚ.) ………….ι̣δε‫ׅ‬ χειρὶ δεῖ θανεῖν. (ΔΗ.) οὐ μὴν ἄτ̣ρ̣ω̣τόc γ’ εἶcιν εἰc ῞Αιδου δόμουc. (ΕΚ.) ποῦ νῦν [ἂ]ν̣ ε̣ἴη καλλίνικ’ ἔχων cτέφη; (ΔΗ.) πᾶν ἄcτ̣υ̣ πληροῖ Τρωικὸν γαυρούμενοc. (ΕΚ.) [±7 ll. δ]εῦρ’, εἰc βόλον γὰρ ἂν πέcοι. ‫ ׅ‬γ’ ὅτ[ι κρ]ατεῖ τῶν cῶν τέκνων. (ΔΗ.) [± 8 ll.]ι̣δηιc x — ᴗ — x — ᴗ ἁ]μ̣μάτων ἔcω x — ᴗ — x — ᴗ ]ε̣ι̣ν cε βούλομαι x — ᴗ — x ἐc]τὶ δοῦλοc, ἀλλ’ ὅμωc ]..λ̣[.].δ’ ἐμοῖc ]… φόνον ]ω̣ν ἅπαξ ]αύcεται ] ]α̣ ]. ] ]

5

10

15

20

(Eur. fr. 62d, col. ii K.) (upper margin) (Hecabe

that the Trojans admire him, being who he is, while Priam’s house is not honoured [with victory]. (Deiphobus) So, how […], so that things go well?

 29 Swift 2010, 43–55. 30 See Crotty 1982, ch. 2; Kurke 1991, esp. 223–227; Swift 2010, 111–114.

Fragmented Intergeneric Discourses: Epinician Echoes in Euripides’ Alexandros  

(Hec.) (Deiph.) (Hec.) (Deiph.) (Hec.) (Deiph.)

…………he has to die by … hand. He will certainly not go uninjured to the house of Hades. Now, where could he be, bearing the victory wreath? He is filling the whole city of Troy with his pride. ] here, for he can fall into the net. ] that he prevails over your children. ] within the knotted cords ] I want you to [ ] he is a slave, but still ] my [ ] assassination ] once …he] will [cease / regret] (Traces of five lines)

At this point Hecabe has been persuaded by Deiphobus that the herdsman enjoying the glory of victory constitutes a threat to the royal rights of her own sons. In more specific terms, ll. 1–2 involve an eloquent contrast between the herdsman’s victory and the fame of which Priam’s oikos has been deprived. Fame and honour are standard indicators of status and prowess within epinician contexts commending aristocratic values. In more specific terms, in l. 2 the term γ̣εραίρεcθαι (“to be honoured”) is commonly used in epinician poetry to denote the particular honour conferred upon the athletic victor. 31 The tragic irony is palpable, since Hecabe is unaware that Alexandros is only seemingly lowbοrn and that the prize actually remains within the royal family, as the athletic victor is her long-lost son. In l. 6 there is a further reference to the wreath of victory (καλλίνικα cτέφη). In this case, the imagery of the crown is ironically deployed, as it precedes the attack against the glorious winner in the next column of this fragment. Likewise, in the Trojan Women, the third tragedy of this production, the same imagery is ironically brought into play, with the purpose of underscoring the ambiguity between real and apparent victory (Tro. 353, 784, 937, 1223). 32 This ambiguity, which is conveyed through the crown imagery, seems to provide a further conceptual link between the first and the third tragedy of the “Trojan trilogy”. In a similar manner, in Hec. 660 the wreath imagery is subverted, in that the title-heroine is presented as the undisputed victor of a contest for misfortune. 33

 31 See Pind. Ol. 3.2, Nem. 11.5, Isthm. 2.17 εὐάρματον ἄνδρα γεραίρων,᾿Ακραγαντίνων φάος, 8.62, Bacchyl. 2.13 γεραίρουσ’ ἐπινικίοις, 4.3, 6.14. 32 See Scodel 1980, 118–119; Croally 1994, 131–133, Biehl 1989, 351. 33 See Gregory 1999, 127.

  Ioanna Karamanou The subversive nuances of this passage are further enhanced through the use of the term καλλίνικος, which is a Pindaric epithet par excellence (Pyth. 1.32, 11.46, Nem. 3.19, Isthm. 1.12, 5.54) and also occurs in the next column of this fragment (col. iii, 11) describing the victory ode and anticipating the murder attempt against Alexandros. Likewise, in Phoen. 1374 καλλίνικος is ironically employed during the fratricide. It conveys a similarly ironic sense in Medea’s plotting scene (Med. 765) and in the messenger-speech reporting Pentheus’ shift from glorious king to victim (Bacch. 1147, 1161). 34 This epithet, which is regularly attached to Heracles, bears sinister nuances within the context of his horrific deeds in the homonymous play (HF 959–962, 1046), 35 as Alexandros Kampakoglou most recently pointed out in his survey of the Euripidean treatments of athletic victory from the viewpoint of tragic reversal. 36 Accordingly, ll. 7–8 involve a clear opposition between Alexandros’ exultation over his victory and his imminent defeat by falling into the ambush set by Hecabe and Deiphobus. At the same time, a contrast is drawn in spatial terms between the public realm of male action, where Alexandros is boasting for his triumph, and the private sphere of the oikos controlled by the female (that is, the would-be murderess Hecabe), where he is to meet his death. The third column of this fragment (fr. 62d, col. iii K./ fr. 18b, col. iii Kar.) preserves the part of the text subsequent to the plotting scene of the previous column and comprises the beginning of at least seven choral lines (ll. 2–8) signposted with coronides in ll. 2 and 6 and an ensuing dialogue (ll. 9–21) indicated with paragraphoi in ll. 9, 12, 14 and 21. (margo)

coronis

coronis

δούλου̣ ῥ̣[ μεταβολ[ὰ νικων̣ τ̣ [ cιν παραε̣ θ̣ [ οἶκον εξ.[ δέcποινα̣ [ πὶ δεσποτ̣ [ φύλλοιc ν̣ [ ποῦ μ̣οι π̣[

5

 34 See Buxton 1982, 165–166; Segal 19972, 135–136; Stinton 1990, 291. 35 See Swift 2010, 146–147. 36 He also stressed the sinister overtones of Alexandros’ victory by reviving the occasionally held historicizing association between Alexandros and Alcibiades, who was crowned Olympic victor in the year before the staging of the Euripidean play (Kampakoglou 2018, 202–218).

Fragmented Intergeneric Discourses: Epinician Echoes in Euripides’ Alexandros  

῾Εκάβη φρα̣[ τὴν καλλ̣[ίνικον πρέcβυc πε̣ [ ῾Εκάβην δὲ̣ β[ oρ[.] φε̣ ρ̣[ εκ̣..[ δι..[ δο..[ cτ[ πρ[ αρ [ απ̣.[

10

15

20

(Eur. fr. 62d, col. iii K.) (upper margin)

coronis

coronis

of a slave [ A shift [ win[ner … house [ My lady [ to the master(s) [ with leaves[ Where[ Hecabe [tell me the victory [ode The aged man [ but Hecabe [ (Remains of eight lines)

The first speaker in the dialogue is evidently an arriving character who seems to be looking for Hecabe (l. 10). This character is likely to be Alexandros, whose arrival has been expected by Deiphobus and Hecabe (col. ii, 8), while his appearance at this point of the plot is reported in the hypothesis (P.Oxy. 3650, col. i, 25– 26). 37 Additionally, the reference to the leaves (probably the leaves of victory) in l. 8 and the kallinikos song in l. 11 reinforce the possibility of the crowned victor’s onstage appearance. Moreover, the arrival of the intended victim in search of someone is congruent with Euripidean staging practice, to judge from the parallel intrigue scenes in HF 701–706, 712 and Antiope fr. 223.19–23 K. 38 In such cases the  37 See Collard/Cropp/Gibert 2004, 84–85; Collard/Cropp 2008, I 36; Di Giuseppe 2012, 151. 38 Cf. also Collard/Cropp/Gibert 2004, 85; Bond 1981, 248.

  Ioanna Karamanou would-be victim encounters a character, who manages to lure him inside the stage-building, with the purpose of his falling into the ambush. In the present situation this role is likely to have been undertaken by Hecabe, as suggested in col. ii, 8. Accordingly, the remnants of ll. 14–21 might belong to a dialogue between Alexandros and Hecabe (as indicated by the paragraphoi in ll. 14 and 21), during which she may have trapped him into entering in the palace, where Deiphobus is presumably awaiting. 39 The remnants of the choral lines (ll. 2–8) seem to comment on the imminent reversal of Alexandros’ good fortune, esp. in l. 2. In this fragment too the consistent use of epinician vocabulary is remarkable. In l. 8 there is a probable reference to the leaves of victory crowning the winner (φύλλοιc), which echoes the φυλλοβολία of triumphant athletes, that is, the scattering of leaves upon the victor, as attested, for instance, in Pind. Pyth. 9.123–124 and Bacchyl. 11.17–21. This imagery is also employed in Euripides’ Autolycus fr. 282.24 K., with the purpose of subverting athletic ideology in favour of civic virtues. 40 In the present line it also has a potentially subversive function, as the winner is about to fall into the ambush set by his opponents. Likewise, this term bears a sinister nuance in Hipp. 806–807 pointing to Theseus’ misfortune despite his earlier victory and in Hec. 574 describing the scattering of leaves upon Polyxena’s corpse, as if she had won an athletic victory (according to schol. vet. Hec. 573 Schwartz). 41 In l. 11 we encounter again the term kallinikos; this time it probably refers to “the song of victory”, whose epinician character was conveyed through singing and dancing (Pind. Ol. 9.1–4, Pyth. 5.106f., Nem. 4.16 and schol. vet. Pind. Ol. 9.1, Nem. 3.1 Drachmann). 42 It was originally performed by people welcoming or escorting Olympic victors. The reference to the victory ode evidently corresponds to this particular dramatic situation, as Alexandros is reported above to have been celebrating his victory all over Troy (col. ii, 7). The victory ode is employed to celebrate the triumph over one’s enemies in El. 865 43 and Erechtheus fr. 370.6 K. Conversely, in HF 680–681 and Med. 45 it conveys sinister overtones anticipating the impending disaster. 44 In the present case, it similarly bears ironic resonances, as  39 See Collard/Cropp/Gibert 2004, 85. 40 See Mangidis 2003, 30–33; O’ Sullivan/Collard 2013, 391, n. 13. 41 See Collard/Cropp/Gibert 2004, 85; Gregory 1999, 114–115. 42 Cf. Jouan/Van Looy 1998–2003, I 73, n. 65; Collard/Cropp/Gibert 2004, 85. On the kallinikos song, see also Ar. Ach. 1227–1234, Av. 1764 (and Dunbar 1995, 769–770); cf. Agócs 2012, 213–216; Papadopoulou 2005, 79, 147–151; Lawler 1948, 254–258. 43 See Cropp 20132, 204; Sonnino 2010, 335–336. 44 On the Heracles, see Swift 2010, esp. 132–133; Kampakoglou 2018, 192–193. On the Medea, see Mastronarde 2002, ad loc.

Fragmented Intergeneric Discourses: Epinician Echoes in Euripides’ Alexandros  

this scene paves the way for a catastrophic event, which will only be averted in the nick of time. Overall, the investigation of Euripides’ engagement with epinician imagery and vocabulary in the Alexandros demonstrates a dialogue between the competitive ideology of ancient athletics and late fifth-century civic and moral values. This juxtaposition also occurs within an agonistic context aiming to underscore this conceptual polarity. At the same time, epinician elements are brought into play to imbue the dramatic situation with subversive, ironic and sinister nuances, serving the twists and turns of the tragic plot. Euripides’ dialogue with and refiguration of epinician poetry could bring forward the dialectic, as well as the tension between the traditional criteria of excellence and the quiet moral virtues of democratic Athens.

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Fragmented Intergeneric Discourses: Epinician Echoes in Euripides’ Alexandros  

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  Ioanna Karamanou O’Sullivan, P./Collard, C. (2013), Euripides: Cyclops and Major Fragments of Greek Satyric Drama, Oxford. Papadopoulou, Th. (2005), Heracles and Euripidean Tragedy, Cambridge. Pertusi, A. (1952), “Il significato della trilogia troiana di Euripide”, Dioniso 15, 251–273. Podlecki, A.J. (1984), The Early Greek Poets and Their Times, Vancouver. Potter, D. (2012), The Victor’s Crown: A History of Ancient Sport from Homer to Byzantium, Oxford. Rabieh, L.R. (2006), Plato and the Virtue of Courage, Baltimore. Race, W.H. (1990), Style and Rhetoric in Pindar’s Odes, Atlanta. Redfield, J.M. (19942), Nature and Culture in the Iliad, North Carolina. Reid, H. (2011), Athletics and Philosophy in the Ancient World: Contests of Virtue, London/New York. Ritoók, Z. (1993), “Zur Trojanischen Trilogie des Euripides“, Gymnasium 100, 109–125. Robertson, G.I.C. (2003), “The Andreia of Xenocles: Kouros, Kallos and Kleos”, in: R.M. Rosen/ I. Sluiter (eds), Andreia: Studies in Manliness and Courage in Classical Antiquity, Leiden, 59–76. Rosen, R.M./Sluiter, I. (eds) (2003), Andreia: Studies in Manliness and Courage in Classical Antiquity, Leiden. Rosen, R.M./Sluiter, I. (eds) (2008), Kakos: Badness and Anti-value in Classical Antiquity, Leiden. Rutherford, R.B. (2012), Greek Tragic Style: Form, Language and Interpretation, Cambridge. Sansone, D. (2009), “Euripides’ New Song: The First Stasimon of Trojan Women”, in: J.R.C. Cousland/J.R. Hume (eds), The Play of Texts and Fragments: Essays in Honour of Martin Cropp, Leiden, 193–203. Schmid, W.T. (1992), On Manly Courage: A Study of Plato’s Laches, Carbondale. Scodel, R. (1980), The Trojan Trilogy of Euripides, Göttingen. Segal, C.P. (19972), Dionysiac Poetics and Euripides’ Bacchae, Princeton. Silk, M.S. (2012), “Reading Pindar”, in: P. Agocs/C. Carey/R. Rawles (eds), Reading the Victory Ode, Cambridge, 347–364. Snell, B. (1937), Euripides Alexandros und andere Strassburger Papyri mit Fragmenten Griechischer Dichter (Hermes Einzelschr.5), Berlin. Stevens, P.T. (1976), Colloquial Expressions in Euripides, Wiesbaden. Stinton, T.C.W. (1990), Collected Papers on Greek Tragedy, Oxford. Storey, I.C. (2008), Euripides: Suppliant Women, London/New York. Swift, L. (2010), The Hidden Chorus: Echoes of Genre in Tragic Lyric, Oxford. Torrance, I. (2013), Metapoetry in Euripides, Oxford. Van Wees, H. (2011), “Rivalry in History: An Introduction”, in: N. Fisher/H. van Wees (eds), Competition in the Ancient World, Swansea, 1–36. Walcot, P. (1978), Envy and the Greeks, Warminster. Webster, T.B.L. (1966), “Euripides’ Trojan Trilogy”, in: M. Kelly (ed.), For Service to Classical Studies: Essays in Honour of F. Letters, Melbourne/Canberra/Sydney, 207–213. Zeitlin, F. (1970), “The Argive Festival of Hera and Euripides’ Electra”, TAPhA 101, 645–669.

Massimo Giuseppetti

Wink or Twitch? Euripides’ Autolycus (fr. 282) and the Ideologies of Fragmentation In his essay entitled The Thinking of Thoughts Gilbert Ryle begins his discussion of the concept of “thick description” with a theoretical situation: 1 Two boys fairly swiftly contract the eyelids of their right eyes. In the first boy this is only an involuntary twitch; but the other is winking conspiratorially to an accomplice. At the lowest or the thinnest level of description the two contractions of the eyelids may be exactly alike. From a cinematograph-film of the two faces there might be no telling which contraction, if either, was a wink, or which, if either, was a mere twitch. Yet there remains the immense but unphotographable difference between a twitch and a wink. For to wink is to try to signal to someone in particular, without the cognisance of others, a definite message according to an already understood code. It has very complex success-versus-failure conditions. The wink is a failure if its intended recipient does not see it; or sees it but does not know or forgets the code; or misconstrues it; or disobeys or disbelieves it; or if anyone else spots it. A mere twitch, on the other hand, is neither a failure nor a success; it has no intended recipient; it is not meant to be unwitnessed by anybody; it carries no message. It may be a symptom but it is not a signal.

In some cases, fragments of ancient Greek drama present us with similar interpretive challenges. Fragmentation, in fact, may be considered an essential characteristic of drama. Its fictitious characters act in fictitious situations, and without the guidance provided by a narrator their interactions are often temporary and rapidly evolving. Their words, whether short gnomic utterances or long memorable speeches, reflect and depend upon their circumstances, which thus play a fundamental part in channeling semantic interactions. The interconnection of word and context is thus essential for the interpretation of dramatic texts, as is the cognizance of the storyline. But when all is left is a fragment — a papyrus scrap or a quotation in a later work — how can we make sense of it? The loss of the original context and, in the case of quotations, the possibly distorting effects resulting from recontextualisation only compound the interpretive uncertainties faced by the modern reader. Decontextualised fragments from ancient drama can be potentially very misleading, both in themselves and with respect to the play of

 1 Ryle 2009, 494–495. Ryle’s essay was originally published in 1968; see Geertz 1973, 6–8. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-016

  Massimo Giuseppetti which they are a part. 2 Here we may easily run the risk of taking a twitch for a wink, in Ryle’s terms, especially if we take into account the generic osmosis that characterises dramatic forms, comedy and satyr play often being, on many levels, secondary genres with respect to tragedy, in the sense that they use and presuppose tragedy for their effects. 3 My interest here is twofold. First, I aim at exploring at some length the possible responses, both ancient and modern, to a text’s fragmentary conditions. As we shall see, modern readers often follow interpretive procedures that to some extent overlap with the strategies adopted by ancient readers. Reading is always an inherently ideological act, but reading fragments implies a remarkable number of unspoken assumptions. How can we go beyond the inconspicuous but effective limitations imposed by such assumptions? My second interest provides an answer. However innovative Greek dramas may be, they tend to follow, in a somewhat reassuring fashion, generic stereotypes and structural patterns. The overall conventional nature of dramatic works maps well onto G. Ryle’s notion of “code”. If brought judiciously into play, this “code” may prove to be a valuable countermeasure to accidents of preservation and interpretive assumptions. The case study I shall consider in this paper is Euripides fr. 282, an expansive, artfully structured attack against athletes which originally was part of his satyr play Autolycus. This text has long featured in discussions of Euripides’ views on social conventions. Its interpretation, however, remains rather problematic. This difficulty is due to the fact that very little is known about the dramatic context of the fragment. As a result, commentators have for the most part based their readings of fr. 282 on larger scholarly narratives. The invective against the athletes has thus been associated with certain episodes of Euripides’ life or has been treated as a rhetorical piece, a particular instance of a broader conflict between physical and intellectual occupations. The dramatic character of this text, however, cannot be ignored without distorting its nature, and the cautious investigation of its possible function within the play is an essential requirement for any

 2 Dover 2000 offers a brilliant illustration of this problem. See also Lamari, this volume. 3 Paratragedy, as is well known, is a pervasive theme in comic plots; Demetrius, on the other hand, equates satyric drama with “a tragedy of humour” or “at play” (τραγῳδίαν παίζουσαν, Eloc. 169). As the bibliography on the intersections of dramatic genres is massive, I will limit myself here to a few recent collections: Medda, Mirto, and Pattoni 2006; Bakola, Prauscello, and Telò 2013; more specifically on satyr play see Lämmle 2013; Di Marco 2013; Shaw 2014; Griffith 2015.

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reliable interpretation. 4 In part this exploration will be tentative, of course, but, as I hope the following pages will show, it will provide some valuable insights into the nature of this particular episode in the framework of ancient anti-athletic discourse.

 Athenaeus’ voracious athletes In Athenaeus’ Learned Banqueters the theme of gluttony (ἀδηφαγία and πολυφαγία) is explored at length, especially in book 10. The first mythical example Athenaeus discusses is, unsurprisingly, Heracles (411b–412b), but he mentions also a number of gluttons who made history — Cambles, king of Lydia, and Mithridates, king of Pontus, for instance; as he writes, “entire ethnic groups”, like the Thessalians or the Boeotians, “were also mocked for being gluttons” (ἔθνη δὲ ὅλα εἰς πολυφαγίαν ἐκωμῳδεῖτο, 10.417b). 5 In this context athletes provide a fundamental link between myth and history. Heracles is indeed in several respects the mythical projection of the ideal athlete, in particular the “heavy athlete” (Schwerathlet) competing in boxing and wrestling. This category of sportsmen became known for its unique lifestyle and especially for its (demanding) dietary requirements. Athenaeus reviews a few outstanding cases of eating feats performed by such athletes: Theagenes of Thasos and Milo of Croton (412d–f), for instance, were both able to eat a bull all by themselves. He then observes that “[i]t comes as no surprise (οὐδὲν παράδοξον) that these men were gluttons; because all athletes in the course of their training are taught to eat a large amount of food” (413c). It is in this context that Athenaeus quotes a long excerpt from Euripides’ Autolycus I (fr. 282) in which athletes are portrayed as the worst evil Greece has ever suffered. This fragment is centered upon a stark contrast between athletes and actual men of worth. If the former are of no avail to either themselves or their city, only the latter deserve proper recognition for their service to public interest. But before having a closer look at Euripides’ fragment, it is perhaps best to dwell a bit longer on the context of its quotation in book 10 of the Learned Banqueters. Here there is in fact an important point to make regarding Athenaeus’ rhetorical concerns. His survey of the literary portrayal of athletic lifestyle is not always  4 See the general remarks on the fragmentation of dramatic texts in Dover 1974, 14–17. A case similar to Euripides fr. 282 is the speech on the (all too human) creation of the gods in the Sisyphus attributed to Critias (88 B 25 D–K = TrGF I 43 fr. 19) or Euripides (see Pechstein 1998, 289– 343). I hope to deal with this text elsewhere. 5 Here and elsewhere I use D.S. Olson’s translation of Athenaeus.

  Massimo Giuseppetti as penetrating or dispassionate as it appears to be at first glance. At times he (intentionally?) does not get the satirical tone of the texts he discusses, as is the case with the sepulchral epigram for Timocreon of Rhodes. 6 In other cases, our evidence suggests that his representation of things may be rather skewed. Let us consider the two athletes mentioned earlier, Theagenes of Thasos and Milo of Croton. Athenaeus is very scrupoulous about his sources about them, namely, Posidippus’ Epigrams (120 AB = HE 3126–9) and Theodorus of Hierapolis (FHG IV 513 fr. 1). In this regard he is clearly concerned with the display of his vast learning. Interestingly, however, when other writers like Pausanias refer to either Theagenes or Milo, they never mention their assumed prodigious appetites. 7 Conversely, Athenaeus’ sources for gluttonous athletes “do not include Eratosthenes’ Olympic Victors, which suggests it is likelier to have been concerned with more serious matters, such as those Pausanias discusses in connection with the Olympic victors he cites”. 8 Athenaeus has a marked penchant for piquant details and humorous narratives, and historical accuracy is not his most pressing preoccupation; besides, he is well aware that his literary selection casts an amusing light onto the world of sport, as his conspicuous debt to comedy suggests. 9 There is, however, something quite peculiar about the way Athenaeus frames Euripides’ fragment from the Autolycus, for in this case the learned narrator indulges in a glimpse of literary history. 10 He observes that the Athenian playwright has borrowed (εἴληφεν) his views on the athletes from the elegies of Xenophanes of Colophon; 11 he goes on to quote one of these elegies (fr. B 2 W.² = 152 Strobel– Wörrle), and concludes by adding that “Xenophanes also offers many other contentious comments about his own wisdom, attacking the idea of athletics as useless and worthless” (πολλὰ δὲ καὶ ἄλλα ὁ Ξενοφάνης κατὰ τὴν ἑαυτοῦ σοφίαν ἐπαγωνίζεται, διαβάλλων ὡς ἄχρηστον καὶ ἀλυσιτελὲς τὸ τῆς ἀθλήσεως εἶδος, 414c). That Euripides’ fragment is intertextually connected with Xenophanes’ elegy is beyond doubt. What needs stressing in this context, though, is the almost

 6 “Simonides”, Epigr. 37 Page (also preserved in AP 7.348 = FGE 831–832), with Page 1981, 252– 253; see also Martelli 2008. 7 Arafat 2000, 194. See, on Theagenes, Paus. 6.6.5, 6.11.2–9, 6.15.3; on Milo, Paus. 6.14.5–8 and Diod. Sic. 12.9.5–6. 8 Arafat 2000, 195. On Eratosthenes’ Olympic Victors see BNJ 241 frr. 4–8. 9 On the portrayal of heavy athletes and their voracity, especially in middle and new comedy, see Bruzzese 2004; for a broader picture of the comic discourse on food see Wilkins 2000. 10 For a brilliant study of ancient “quotation culture” see Wright 2016 on Euripides fr. 661 (from Stheneboea). 11 Athen. 10.413f–14c.

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imperceptible process of semantic simplification that fr. 282 undergoes in this page of the Learned Banqueters. Leaving aside for a moment the issues associated with first-person statements in archaic poetry, there is nothing intrinsically problematic in the claim that Xenophanes is confrontational about his own sophia — if anything, the use of a verb like ἐπαγωνίζομαι, with its obvious athletic overtones, wittily emphasises that the archaic poet and athletes are contenders in the same arena. 12 Less innocuous, nonetheless, are the interpretive implications of the link between the two texts, for the reader is invited to think that the two poets formulate similar ideas in similar fashion. Euripides’ fragment comes in fact from a dramatic piece, that is, a literary work in which different characters act and talk in situations that are just as crucial for the construction of meaning as the dramatic script itself. This is particularly relevant for satyr play (an important detail omitted by Athenaeus), as in this genre the gods and heroes of the epic tradition are cast in the strange world of satyrs. One may think that here, halfway between civilization and the wild, sport would be anything but a familiar activity (a mistaken assumption, as we shall see). What is the point, at any rate, of upbraiding the social prestige enjoyed by athletes? However one might answer this question, there is no doubting that fr. 282 cannot be simply read as Euripides’ own take on the matter — this is a speech that a particular character addresses to his/her interlocutor(s) in a certain situation. We will look at this problem in greater detail later. For the moment, it is important to note that Athenaeus’ cultured practice of linking texts and tracing imitations is not always neutral or without consequences in terms of scholarly standards. In this case, it expunges crucial aspects of how meaning is constructed in and through the texts he discusses. In that it equates “content” with “meaning”, it is ultimately a well-defined ideology of reading and interpretation. 13 As we shall see, to some extent this ideology still has a place in modern approaches to fragmentary texts and to our fragment in particular. If our goal is to get a better understanding of fr. 282 qua dramatic text, the first step we need to take is to investigate the play it originally belonged to: the Autolycus.

 12 Larmour 1999, 41–42. 13 This is not to say, of course, that Athenaeus was aware of the larger context of fr. 282 or that he has intentionally omitted crucial details about the text. In all probability he had had access to the excerpt from Autolycus only through other sources.

  Massimo Giuseppetti

 Hypotheses about Euripides’ Autolycus Euripides’ diatribe against athletes (fr. 282) comes from the play Autolycus. 14 This was a satyr play, as clearly indicated by Tzetzes and Pollux. 15 In Homer, Autolycus is Odysseus’ grandfather. Odysseys indeed owes him his name, for his grandfather had been cause of anger (ὀδυσσάμενος) to many (Od. 19.407–408). 16 He surpassed all men in thievery and in oaths (ὃς ἀνθρώπους ἐκέκαστο | κλεπτοσύνῃ θ’ ὅρκῳ τε, Od. 19.394–395), either because he was very dear to Hermes, or because the god was in fact his father, as in the Hesiodic Catalogue (frr. 64 and 67 M–W). A devious character bearing all the hallmarks of the trickster, Autolycus is at home in the world of the satyr play. 17 Athenaeus states that fr. 282 comes from Euripides’ “first Autolycus” (Εὐριπίδης ἐν τῷ πρώτῳ Αὐτολύκῳ λέγει κτλ., Ath. 10.413c = T iiia). The implication that there was a second play bearing the same title was long doubted. 18 A second-century AD writing exercise, however, has provided independent corroboration. 19 Little survives of the two plays. Apart from the long fragment preserved in Athenaeus’ Learned Banqueters (fr. 282), we know of just three other short fragments (none of which distinguishes between the two plays). In one fragment

 14 For the Greek text of the fragments and testimonia of Euripides’ Autolycus I follow R. Kannicht’s edition (TrGF 5, no. 15/16); the English translations are by C. Collard/M. Cropp (2008). 15 Tzetz. Chil. 8.452–453 (= T iv); Poll. Onom. 10.111 and 10.178 (= frr. 283–284); see also Diom. Ars gramm. 3.10.9 (= T ii). 16 On the naming of Odysseus in this passage and the interpretation of ὀδυσσάμενος in this context see Rutherford 1992, 185–186. 17 In the early tradition Autolycus possessed magical skills: he could take new appearances, for instance, and make himself or the things he stole invisible (see e.g. Pherecyd. BNJ 3 fr. 120; Hes. Cat. frr. 67a–b M–W; Ov. Met. 11.301–317). On the mythography about Autolycus in general see Pechstein 1998, 88–99; Mangidis 2003, 71–107. 18 Nauck, for instance, believed πρώτῳ to be a corruption of σατυρικῷ. See e.g. Schmid 1936; Steffen 1971, 213–214; Kannicht 2005, 1.342. 19 τὸ δρᾶμα̣ Ε̣ὐ̣[ρ]ι̣π̣(ίδου) | Αὐτόλυκος α̣[´], PVindob G 19766v (= T iiib), ll. 6–7 (new reading by Bastianini and Luppe 1989); see Kannicht 2005, I 342. A different interpretation in Mangidis 2003, 110–118, who argues that these sources refer to different performances of one play (more in general on the issue of dramatic, and especially tragic, reperformance see Lamari 2017, with bibliography). On the obscure reference to τὸ ᾱ in the Life of Euripides (= T A Ib.5) see Sutton 1974a, 51–52 and 1974b, 140–141, who argues (not very convincingly) that it should be understood as a reference to “the plays of the group beginning with A”, i.e. the two Autolycus plays (cf. Schmid 1936; Steffen 1971, 213). For another pair of Euripidean plays with identical namecharacters see Phrixus I and II, TrGF 76/77 T iia (P.Oxy. 2455 + 3652, third century AD).

Wink or Twitch?  

somebody defends “our father” (possibly Silenus) against a group who call him “ugly little man” (ἄωρον ἀνδρίον, fr. 282a). Another one is about donkeys carrying charcoal-baskets and bringing wood from a mountain (fr. 283), whereas the last one refers to “reins for horses” (fr. 284). For the narrative content of the play(s) the only source that explicitly refers to “Euripides’ satyr play Autolycus” is Tzetzes. In his portrayal Autolycus is an extremely talented thief who would steal one thing and return another of inferior value so that his thefts would go unnoticed. He would steal a very good horse and give back an ass, and “when he stole a marriageable young girl, he gave back again either a silenus or a satyr, some decrepit little old man, snub-nosed, toothless and bald, all snotty, one of the uglies — and her father thought of him as his daughter”. 20 A different version is found in Hyginus (without any explicit mention of Euripides). 21 Here Autolycus manages at first to steal some cattle from Sisyphus but ends up being outsmarted. Suspecting the theft, Sisyphus has marked the hooves of his cattle and eventually takes back all that Autolycus had stolen from him. The episodes told by Tzetzes and Hyginus clearly differ considerably from each other. Indeed there is hardly anything in their narratives that could point to a single play. 22 As a result, R. Kannicht has argued that Tzetzes and Hyginus preserve the two “versions” of the satyr play staged by Euripides. 23 Admittedly, the meagre evidence available allows for different hypotheses, none of which seems to be much more persuasive than the others. 24 In any case, there is no compelling reason to suspect that fr. 282 might have come from a dramatic genre other than a satyr play, i.e. a tragedy, as some have suggested. 25 Unfortunately, neither Tzetzes nor (a fortiori) Hyginus apparently provide any clear clue

 20 Tzetz. Chil. 8.435–453 (= T iv), with Masciadri 1987 and Pechstein 1998, 46–55. 21 Hyg. Fab. 201 (= T *va). 22 Pace Mangidis 2003, 110–118. 23 Kannicht 1991 and 2005, I 344. See also Van Looy 1998, 332–335. 24 See e.g. Sutton 1974a, 53 (fr. 282 belongs to Autolycus I; [Apd.] 2.4.9, where Autolycus teaches the young Heracles how to wrestle, may be relevant for its plot) and Sutton 1980, 59–60, 148– 150; Pechstein 1998, 39–40, 113–117 (see also Pechstein and Krumeich 1999a, 403), argues that all fragments come from Autolycus I, which is a satyr play, whereas Autolycus II is a prosatyric tragedy like the Alcestis. Autolycus is also the title of a comedy by Eupolis; the first version was presented about 420 BC (Ath. 5.216c–d; frr. 48–75 K–A) and its name character was an historical figure, an Athenian boy athlete. We do not know if it is related with Euripides’ satyr play; see Mangidis 2003, 134–141. 25 Angiò 1992 argues (unconvincingly) that the tragic allure of fr. 282 indicates that Autolycus I (which contained the fragment) was a tragedy. As a matter of fact, fr. 282 exhibits linguistic features more characteristic of satyr play than tragedy (see γνάθος, 5 and 17; νηδύς, 5; φοιτάω, 11;

  Massimo Giuseppetti as to the dramatic context of fr. 282. 26 Thus, the question remains how an invective against athletes can fit into a play centered on as devious a character as Autolycus. This query can only be resolved by reconstructing a plausible dramatic context for fr. 282, and in order to do this we need first to scrutinise the rhetorical structure and the arguments put forward in the fragment. As we shall see, the unconventional world inhabited by satyrs offers a highly relevant backdrop for the contentious subject of our fragment, and it may help us unlock, at least in part, its semantic potential.

 Sophoi against Athletes κακῶν γὰρ ὄντων μυρίων καθ᾿ Ἑλλάδα οὐδὲν κάκιόν ἐστιν ἀθλητῶν γένους. οἳ πρῶτον οἰκεῖν οὔτε μανθάνουσιν εὖ οὔτ᾿ ἂν δύναιντο· πῶς γὰρ ὅστις ἔστ᾿ ἀνήρ γνάθου τε δοῦλος νηδύος θ᾿ ἡσσημένος κτήσαιτ’ ἂν ὄλβον εἰς ὑπερβολὴν πατρός; οὐδ’ αὖ πένεσθαι κἀξυπηρετεῖν τύχαις οἷοί τ’· ἔθη γὰρ οὐκ ἐθισθέντες καλά σκληρῶς μεταλλάσσουσιν εἰς τἀμήχανον. λαμπροὶ δ’ ἐν ἥβῃ καὶ πόλεως ἀγάλματα φοιτῶσ’· ὅταν δὲ προσπέσῃ γῆρας πικρόν, τρίβωνες ἐκβαλόντες οἴχονται κρόκας. ἐμεμψάμην δὲ καὶ τὸν Ἑλλήνων νόμον, οἳ τῶνδ᾿ ἕκατι σύλλογον ποιούμενοι τιμῶσ’ ἀχρείους ἡδονὰς δαιτὸς χάριν. τίς γὰρ παλαίσας εὖ, τίς ὠκύπους ἀνήρ ἢ δίσκον ἄρας ἢ γνάθον παίσας καλῶς πόλει πατρῴᾳ στέφανον ἤρκεσεν λαβών; πότερα μαχοῦνται πολεμίοισιν ἐν χεροῖν δίσκους ἔχοντες ἢ δι’ ἀσπίδων χερί θείνοντες ἐκβαλοῦσι πολεμίους πάτρας; οὐδεὶς σιδήρου ταῦτα μωραίνει πέλας †στάς. ἄνδρας χρὴ σοφούς τε κἀγαθούς φύλλοις στέφεσθαι, χὤστις ἡγεῖται πόλει κάλλιστα σώφρων καὶ δίκαιος ὢν ἀνήρ,

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 τρίβων, 12; Pechstein 1998, 39–40, 59–60, 64). Furthermore, as Collard and Cropp 2008, 280 remark, “[t]he length and rhetorical tone of fr. 282 are also not impossible for a satyr play (cf. the Cyclops’ speech defending his voracity, Cyc. 315–346)” See also Soph. fr. 149 (Lovers of Achilles). 26 Cf. the aporetic remarks of Sutton 1974b, 141; Sutton 1975, 206; Seaford 1991, 87; García Soler 2010, 153.

Wink or Twitch?  

ὅστις τε μύθοις ἔργ’ ἀπαλλάσσει κακά μάχας τ’ ἀφαιρῶν καὶ στάσεις· τοιαῦτα γάρ πόλει τε πάσῃ πᾶσί θ’ Ἕλλησιν καλά. (Eur. fr. 282 K.) Of countless bad things existing throughout Greece none is worse than athletes as a breed. First, they neither learn well how to manage a household, nor would they be able to learn — for how could a man who is a slave to eating and dominated by his belly acquire wealth to exceed his father’s? Moreover they cannot manage poverty or cope with misfortunes: because they have not learned good habits, a change towards difficulties is hard on them. They are splendid in their prime and go proudly about as ornaments to a city; but when old age in its harshness falls upon them, they fade away like cloaks that have lost their threads. I blame too the Greeks’ custom of gathering because of these men to value useless pleasures for the sake of a feast. Why — what man who has wrestled well, what man fleet of foot or that has thrown a discus or boxed a jaw well, has defended his ancestral city by winning a wreath? Are they going to fight enemies with a discus in their hands, or drive enemies from a fatherland by punching through shields with a fist? No one is this stupid †when standing† near a sword! Wreathing with leaves should be for men who are wise and brave, and for the man who leads a city best through being prudent and just, and whose words deliver it from evil acts by removing feuds and factions: such are the things good for every city and all Greeks. (Translation by C. Collard/M. Cropp)

The beginning of this long vituperation introduces the breed of athletes as the worst of the innumerable evils that Greece suffers (κακῶν ... μυρίων ... οὐδὲν κάκιόν ἐστιν ἀθλητῶν, 1–2). Its conclusion, on the other hand, praises those who are “wise and brave” (ἄνδρας ... σοφούς τε κἀγαθούς, 23), excellent leaders in their city (24–25), prudent and just (25). They should be crowned with wreaths, not athletes, for their actions are the “the things good for every city and all Greeks” (πόλει τε πάσῃ πᾶσί θ’ Ἕλλησιν καλά, 28). In this way, the last word of this text (καλά, 28) is the exact opposite of its very first word (κακῶν, 1). This establishes an ethical dimension that frames and informs the fragment as a whole. The rhetoric of the text operates on both the individual and the social level. The first part (1–12) analyses the faults that the athletic lifestyle involves, especially in terms of personal economic prosperity; the second part (13–23) criticises the social value commonly attached to athletic excellence and insists on its irrelevance to the well-being of the city; the third and final part of the diatribe (23–28) commends the true heroes that every city should celebrate — the wise and brave men whose words ward off feuds and factions. There is no doubting that this carefully structured text appropriates and varies the themes of the anti-athletic tradition, “striking in both its ubiquity and

  Massimo Giuseppetti its longevity”. 27 The arguments that commonly feature in such a polemical discourse are that (a) athletes are barely beneficial to their families and cities, 28 both in peace and in war, (b) and that other occupations provide much more valuable contributions to private and public well-being; the conclusion to be drawn (c) is that rewarding athletes with public honours is an ill-advised practice, for other categories are more deserving of civic recognition. The rhetorical effect of Euripides fr. 282 lies, on one hand, in the novel forms of criticism that it levels against athletes, some of which appear to reflect contemporary medical knowledge; 29 on the other hand, it hinges on the distinctive appropriation of traditional motifs. Let us now get a closer look at the intertextual grain of the fragment. Tyrtaeus fr. 12 W.² provides a first significant intertext for Euripides’ antiathletic invective. 30 In his elegy the poet contrasts “furious valour” (θούριδος ἀλκῆς, 9) with a number of qualities, including “prowess in running or in wrestling” (1–4 W.²). In his view, excellence (ἀρετή) is the best human prize (ἄεθλον) for a young man (13–14) — a claim that could be read also as a subtle criticism of more mundane honours. Here too the city’s survival, particularly in wartime, is

 27 Stewart 2017, 273. See also Marcovich 1978; Kyle 1987, 124–154; Müller 1995, esp. 88–108, 145–161; Pechstein 1998, 70–76; Papakonstantinou 2014. For a selection of relevant texts (besides those discussed below) see Ar. Eq. 535, Nub. 417; Eupolis fr. 129 K–A; [Hipp.] Alim. 34; Plat. Ap. 36d6–9, Resp. 404a5, 410b5, Leg. 832e1, 795e7; Xen. Mem. 3.12.1, Symp. 2.17; Isocr. 4.1–2, 15.250, Epist. 8.5; Timocles fr. 8 K–A; Dio Chrys. 9.10–13; Diog. L. 1.55–56, 6.27; Diod. 9.2.5; Plut. Phil. 3.2–5, Ages. 20.1; Gal. Adhort. 9–14. 28 The notion that athletes do not “learn well how to manage a household” (πρῶτον οἰκεῖν οὔτε μανθάνουσιν εὖ, 3), for instance, recalls a passage in Euripides’ Electra in which Orestes contrasts well-born men who “rule well both states and homes” (οἱ γὰρ τοιοῦτοι τὰς πόλεις οἰκοῦσιν εὖ | καὶ δώμαθ’, 386–387) with the “bodies empty of minds that are ornaments for the marketplace” (αἱ δὲ σάρκες αἱ κεναὶ φρενῶν | ἀγάλματ’ ἀγορᾶς εἰσιν, 387–388 — cf. πόλεως ἀγάλματα in fr. 282.10). As Cropp 1988, 125 remarks, “[t]his section is the most open to doubts”; Diggle brackets 386–390 in his edition of the Electra. Possibly they are an echo of fr. 282; see Pechstein 1998, 79–82 (against the hypothesis of interpolation). On the varia lectio πρῶτον οἰκεῖν at fr. 282.3 (Galen. Protr. 10 cod. A, now also P.Oxy. 3699; πρῶτα μὲν ζῆν Athenaeus) see Musso 1988. 29 As Pritchard 2012, 12–13 remarks, two negative features appear here for the first time: the athletes’ diet prevents them from acquiring more wealth than their fathers (3–6) and their habits makes it all but impossible for them to adapt if their circumstances decline (7–9). Papakonstantinou 2014, 325 notes how Hippocratic works dated to the classical period call attention to the excesses of athletic diets (e.g. Diet. sal. 7) in conjunction with over-specialization in training (Hipp. Aphor. 1.3; cf. Xen. Symp. 2.17; Aristot. Gen. anim. 768b29–33). 30 I quote from D. E. Gerber’s translation. On Tyrtaeus fr. 12 W.² in general see Schwinge 1997; Luginbill 2002; Sánchez-Mañas 2013; more specifically on the Euripidean parallels see Pechstein 1998, 73–74; Mangidis 2003, 49–54.

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the criterion by which human qualities are to be judged; against such a background, only valour provides the “common benefit” (ξυνὸν δ᾿ ἐσθλόν) for the city and all the people (15–16). As a result, whereas old age turns Euripides’ athletes into “cloaks that have lost their threads” (fr. 282.11–12), Tyrtaeus’ fighter (or, rather, victor: νικήσας, 36) “stands out among the townsmen” (ἀστοῖσι μεταπρέπει, 39), 31 honoured by all, young and old alike (37). But to the extent that it focuses on (the sociopolitical dimension of) “furious valour”, Tyrtaeus’ elegy appears to be at a substantial remove from Euripides’ fragment. By contrast, Xenophanes fr. 2 W.² — which, as we saw, Athenaeus considers as the “source” of fr. 282 — proves to be a closer intertext. 32 ἀλλ’ εἰ μὲν ταχυτῆτι ποδῶν νίκην τις ἄροιτο ἢ πενταθλεύων, ἔνθα Διὸς τέμενος πὰρ Πίσαο ῥοῆις ἐν Ὀλυμπίηι, εἴτε παλαίων ἢ καὶ πυκτοσύνην ἀλγινόεσσαν ἔχων εἴτε τὸ δεινὸν ἄεθλον ὃ παγκράτιον καλέουσιν, ἀστοῖσίν κ’ εἴη κυδρότερος προσορᾶν, καί κε προεδρίην φανερὴν ἐν ἀγῶσιν ἄροιτο, καί κεν σῖτ’ εἴη δημοσίων κτεάνων ἐκ πόλεως, καὶ δῶρον ὅ οἱ κειμήλιον εἴη — εἴτε καὶ ἵπποισιν· ταῦτά κε πάντα λάχοι, οὐκ ἐὼν ἄξιος ὥσπερ ἐγώ· ῥώμης γὰρ ἀμείνων ἀνδρῶν ἠδ’ ἵππων ἡμετέρη σοφίη. ἀλλ’ εἰκῆι μάλα τοῦτο νομίζεται, οὐδὲ δίκαιον προκρίνειν ῥώμην τῆς ἀγαθῆς σοφίης· οὔτε γὰρ εἰ πύκτης ἀγαθὸς λαοῖσι μετείη οὔτ’ εἰ πενταθλεῖν οὔτε παλαισμοσύνην, οὐδὲ μὲν εἰ ταχυτῆτι ποδῶν, τόπερ ἐστὶ πρότιμον, ῥώμης ὅσσ’ ἀνδρῶν ἔργ’ ἐν ἀγῶνι πέλει, τούνεκεν ἂν δὴ μᾶλλον ἐν εὐνομίηι πόλις εἴη· σμικρὸν δ’ ἄν τι πόλει χάρμα γένοιτ’ ἐπὶ τῶι, εἴ τις ἀεθλεύων νικῶι Πίσαο παρ’ ὄχθας· οὐ γὰρ πιαίνει ταῦτα μυχοὺς πόλεως.

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(Xenoph. fr. 2 W.2) But if someone were to gain a victory by the swiftness of his feet or in the pentathlon, where there is the precinct of Zeus by Pisa’s stream in Olympia, or in wrestling or engaging in painful boxing or in that terrible contest which they call the pankration, he would have  31 On the motif of visibility/conspicuousness see below. 32 See, among others, Bowra 1938 = 1953, 15–37; Marcovich 1978; Giannini 1982; Lucas de Dios 1991; Harris 2009; on the echoes in fr. 282 see Pechstein 1998, 70–73; Mangidis 2003, 41–49; Egli 2003, 125–128; Harris 2009, 163–166.

  Massimo Giuseppetti greater renown (than others) in the eyes of his townsmen, he would gain a conspicuous front seat at the games, he would have food from the public store granted by the city, and a gift which would be a treasure for him — or if (he were to gain a victory) even with his horses, he would obtain all these things, although he is not as deserving as I. For my expertise is better than the strength of men or horses. But this custom is quite irrational and it is not right to give strength precedence over good expertise. For neither if there were a good boxer among the people nor one good at the pentathlon or in wrestling or again in the swiftness of his feet, the most honoured of the deeds of human strength in the contest, would there for that reason be better law and order in the city. Little would be the city’s joy, if one were to win while contending by the banks of Pisa; for this does not fatten the city’s treasury. (Translation by D.E. Gerber)

In this well-known elegy Xenophanes’ polemical target is not athletics per se or the sportsmen’s lifestyle. Rather, as in Euripides fr. 282, his criticism concerns primarily the public honours Olympic winners are showered with in their home cities, namely, glory (6), front seats (προεδρίην φανερήν, 7), food at public expense (8–9), and “a gift which would be a treasure” (9). Euripides fr. 282 includes some intriguing counterparts to the rewards listed by Xenophanes. Firstly, the splendor surrounding victors: if the archaic text emphasises their “visibility” (ἀστοῖσίν κ’ εἴη κυδρότερος προσορᾶν, 6), Euripides underscores that athletes, “splendid in their prime”, are “ornaments to a city” (λαμπροὶ δ’ ἐν ἥβῃ καὶ πόλεως ἀγάλματα | φοιτῶσ’, fr. 282.10–11) — the language employed clearly evokes the practice of dedicating statues to celebrate athletic victories. Secondly, Xenophanes stresses that victors may count on “food from the public store granted by the city” (καί κεν σῖτ’ εἴη δημοσίων κτεάνων | ἐκ πόλεως, 8–9), which corresponds (though in less straightforward fashion) to the meal (δαιτὸς χάριν) associated to the gathering of people (σύλλογον ποιούμενοι) in Euripides (fr. 282.14–15). 33 On a different level, both texts claim that the city’s material prosperity and political

 33 The interpretation of these lines is controversial. Some commentators think that the passage points to meals offered by the victors to the populace (Pechstein 1998, 65–66; see also Harris 2009, 164–165); others (e.g. O’Sullivan and Collard 2013, 389 n. 11) interpret it as a reference to athletes receiving meals at public expense (σίτησις; for the practice see e.g. Plat. Ap. 37a; Timocles fr. 8.16–19 K–A). Marcovich 1977, 54 (= 1991, 126), followed by Lämmle 2013, 398 n. 200 and Stewart 2017, 288, favours this interpretation but suggests the emendation τιμῶσ’ ἀχρείους [ἡδονὰς] δαιτὸς χάριν (15): “they honour these useless men after granting them the favour of free food”); he also understands σύλλογον ποιούμενοι as a reference to the assembly. This last suggestion is rather uncertain; a festival could be meant, and we know that civic honours were proclaimed during festivals (on such a custom see e.g. Wilson 2009). Moreover, the transmitted text makes sense as it is, for δαιτὸς χάριν (15) may simply refer to the public banquet(s) held on occasion of the celebrations. Cf. Mangidis 2003, 32.

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stability is of the utmost importance (Eur. fr. 282.18, 282.27–28; Xenoph. fr. 2.19, 2.22–23 W.²), even though Xenophanes does not mention war in this connection. If in this respect fr. 282 exhibits distinctively Tyrtaean overtones, it also displays harsher tones in deprecating the futility of athletic expertise in boxing or in discus-throwing in phalanx-based battles (fr. 282.16–23). But what is perhaps most striking about Xenophanes and Euripides is that both associate their critiques of social conventions (τὸν Ἑλλήνων νόμον, Eur. fr. 282.13; τοῦτο νομίζεται, Xenoph. fr. 2.13 W.²) about athletic prestige with the contention that “wisdom” is well worthy of larger appreciation: the former claims that his sophie is “better than the strength (ῥώμης) of men or horses” (11–12, cf. 14 and 19), the latter asks, more obliquely, that the “men who are wise and brave” (ἄνδρας χρὴ σοφούς τε κἀγαθούς, fr. 282.23) get more public recognition for their merits. The Autolycus fragment, then, does more than instantiate an especially sophisticated episode in the broader framework of the anti-athletic discourse. Euripides overtly appropriates the authority of the earlier poetic tradition while including new motifs and reshaping the argumentative strategy adopted by his predecessors. In doing so, he flags this speech as a new chapter in that discourse. No doubt this text was designed to strike its audience as a memorable piece, highly effective in terms of rhetorical strategy and vividness of imagery. There is one tricky aspect, however, that we need to address. Xenophanes fr. 2 W.² is clearly the expression of a broader professional strategy. With this elegy he aims at “advertising” his wisdom against the background of the emergence of the citystate in the seventh and sixth centuries. That age is characterised by a growing need for a new kind of intellectual leadership, and to secure his position in that arena Xenophanes has to contend with a fierce competition. 34 On several levels, his poem reflects very closely his concerns; it is, first and foremost, an articulation of Xenophanes’ own views on social criticism and personal ambitions. What about Euripides fr. 282? Is there any warrant for the assumption that the same communication structure is at work in the Autolycus fragment just as it is in Xenophanes? Before we consider how scholarship has dealt with this crucial problem, it is perhaps worth getting back for a moment to G. Ryle and his distinction between a wink and a twitch.

 34 See e.g. Lloyd 1979, 246–257; Martin 1993; Harris 2009; Stewart 2017.

  Massimo Giuseppetti

 What You See Is What You Get? As Ryle observes, the two boys both swiftly contract the lids of their right eyes, but what for one is merely an involuntary twitch, for the other is an intentional wink meant for an accomplice. Unlike the twitch, what characterizes the wink, he notes, is its deliberate nature; among other things, a wink is addressed to someone in particular, conveys a message, and presupposes an understood code. 35 In both cases the phenomenon is the same; the undetectable 36 differences are at the levels of (a) the intentions of the boys and (b) the awareness (and use) of a code of communication shared with somebody else. Now, this simple example may help us focus on the interpretive strategies we put in place when we deal with a textual fragment such as Euripides fr. 282. If we apply Ryle’s distinction to the level of literary interpretation and more specifically to the analysis of Euripides fr. 282, we can distinguish between two scenarios. The first scenario assumes that the speaker’s voice articulates Euripides’ own “thoughts”. In Ryle’s terms, this approach simply posits that what we see — a twitch — is all there is to see, i.e. a swift contraction of the eyelids. There is no need, here, to look for any “understood code”: we have immediate access to Euripides’ mind, so to speak. As a result, one may feel quite confident that fr. 282 encapsulates Euripides’ perspective on athletic lifestyle, or at any rate a rather faithful and straightforward reflection of a real situation. Let us consider a few approaches along these lines. The idea that fr. 282 articulates authorial views is, in a word, how Athenaeus, and a few other post-classical writers after him, read our fragment. After all, fr. 282 has survived precisely because ancient readers thought of it as a genuine piece of Euripidean ideas, both authoritative and unusual in its harshness. 37 Yet, surprisingly, also a significant number of modern commentators have followed this same style of analysis. According to Guggisberg, for instance, fr. 282 is noth-

 35 “The signaller himself, while acknowledging that he had not had an involuntary twitch but (1) had deliberately winked, (2) to someone in particular, (3) in order to impart a particular message, (4) according to an understood code, (5) without the cognisance of the rest of the company, will rightly deny that he had thereby done or tried to do five separately do-able things” (Ryle 2009, 495). 36 See Geertz 1973, 6–7. 37 See e.g. Diog. L. 1.56; Plut. De gen. Socr. 12 (Mor. 581f). On the echo in Eur. El. 386–90 see above, n. 28.

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ing but a conscious digression in which, in the manner of a comic parabasis, Euripides virtually speaks on his own behalf. 38 Others, more prone to biographical curiosities, recall in this connection two episodes in Euripides’ career. Aulus Gellius and the poet’s Life say that, when he was a boy, an oracular response predicted that he would be victor in the competitions. 39 His father then trained him as a wrestler, and a successful one, for his son won prizes at several contests. As is clear from the similar story Herodotus tells of Tisamenus (9.33), this narrative is undoubtedly a late fabrication. Denniston, nonetheless, believes that fr. 282 can be explained as Euripides’ “violent reaction” against his early training. 40 The other relevant athletic event in Euripides’ life is Alcibiades’ Olympic victories in the chariot races (in all likelihood in 416), which the poet celebrated in a wellknown epinician song. 41 From this piece of information scholars have drawn a number of assumptions. First, if in 416 Euripides is willing to praise Alcibiades’ victories, this can only mean that at the time he still has no reservations about athletic competitions per se. By reading fr. 282 as an assertion of authorial ideas, scholars can then consider it as the product of a later stage in the playwright’s career. 42 A different take on fr. 282, on the other hand, is provided by the “ritual” explanation. Athletics is a motif quite popular in satyr play. 43 Some scholars believe that the reason behind this is that athletic competitions of men or boys dressed as satyrs were included in the program of the festivals (Dionysia and Anthesteria) hosting dramatic performances. 44 There is no evidence to support such a claim, though, 45 and even if there were, the practical configuration of the festivals could not account for how athletics is specifically explored in each play. More to point, it is hard to see how the alleged ritual competitions could explain Euripides’ invective against athletes.

 38 Guggisberg 1947, 123–134 (thus also Iannucci 1998, 35–36). See also e.g. Kambitsis 1972, 62– 63; Lesher 1992, 56–57; Pechstein 1998, 71–73 (but cf. 76–77); Mangidis 2003, 65, 199. 39 Gell. 15.20 and Vita Eur. 2 (respectively TT 2 and 1.IA). 40 Denniston 1939, 97 (cf. Kyle 1987, 130–131). See Orac. Delph. 418 P–W = Q 159 Fontenrose (= Eur. T 34) and Wilamowitz 1889, 19–20. 41 Plut. Alc. 11 = PMG 755 (= Eur. T 91a); Thuc. 6.16.2. On the epinician song see Bowra 1960 = 1970, 134–148. 42 See Angiò 1992, 91–93, with reference to Di Benedetto 1971, 305. Cf. Denniston 1939, 97 on ἀγάλματ’ ἀγορᾶς at Eur. El. 388. 43 See below. 44 Seaford 1988, 40; 1991, 88–89. 45 Voelke 2001, 269; see also Larmour 1999, 174–177 and Pritchard 2012, 4–5.

  Massimo Giuseppetti More interestingly, fr. 282 often surfaces in the ongoing debate over the extent to which sport was an exclusively elite occupation in late archaic and early classical Greece. 46 Generally speaking, sport historians see in our text a reflection of mainstream views in classical Athens. 47 Yet the sociological analysis of these views is far from undisputed, and this has affected the interpretation of Euripides’ fragment in a variety of ways. For scholars arguing that athletics remained throughout the classical age an essentially aristocratic occupation, for example, fr. 282 instantiates a polemical attack against an older, aristocratic model of education. 48 For partial corroboration of this thesis some turn to Aristophanic comedy, which on several occasions voices the complaint that youth is more interested in rhetoric than in physical training, and that Euripidean drama is to blame for this corruption of the ἀρχαία παιδεία. 49 N. Pechstein has in fact suggested that Aristophanes may be responding to the extended fragment from Autolycus. 50 Somewhat surprisingly, others have argued for the opposite thesis, namely, that fr. 282 expresses outrage at the growing professionalization of sport and at the alleged “degeneration” brought about by the increasing numbers of lower-class athletes competing in the games. 51 Whichever side one takes in this scholarly dispute, the fact nonetheless remains that our fragment has virtually nothing to say about the existing wealth or social status of the athletes. 52 Possibly, this kind of approach best exemplifies the flaws of this first interpretive scenario. In most cases scholars exploit fr. 282 to extract, in almost positivistic fashion, Euripides’ take on contemporary developments in the social perception of sport. Yet, at the same time, modern reconstructions of that perception rely, in part, on how texts such as fr. 282 are understood. 53 The inherent risk, then, is that of circular reasoning: which explains quite well how the same text can be counted as “evidence” by opposing scholarly factions.

 46 See Angeli Bernardini 1980, 89–92; Kyle 1987, 128–131; Larmour 1999, 41–44; Visa-Ondarçuhu 1999, 239–243; Voelke 2001, 262–268; García Romero 2009; García Soler 2010; Pritchard 2012 and 2013, 139–163; Lämmle 2013, 353–354, 398; Papakonstantinou 2014; Stewart 2017. 47 E.g. Larmour 1999, 114. 48 Seaford 1991, 87–89; Iannucci 1998; Pritchard 2013, 153 (cf. Stewart 2017, 288–289). 49 See Aristoph. Nub. 1052–1055, Ran. 1069–1071, 1083–1088. 50 See Pechstein 1998, 83–85; Pechstein and Krumeich 1999a, 411. 51 See e.g. Angeli Bernardini 1980, 91–92. On the contrasting views of Euripides as “sports lover” or “hater” in previous scholarship see Pechstein 1998, 76–77. 52 Cf. Stewart 2017, 274. 53 As Pechstein 1998, 77 acutely remarks, extracting a positive view on sport per se from fr. 282 is a questionable interpretive procedure.

Wink or Twitch?  

 Satyrs, Athletes, and Sophoi in Autolycus It is now time to move on to the second interpretive scenario. What is distinctive about how Ryle conceptualises the wink is, as we saw earlier, its deliberate nature, the essential implication being that a wink presupposes an “understood code”. In the framework of literary interpretation, we have every reason to believe that an “understood code” is in fact at play. The critical aspect ignored by Athenaeus and by many of his modern counterparts is that it is a serious misconception to equate Xenophanes’ elegy with Euripides’ Autolycus fragment, for the latter is part of a dramatic script. Fr. 282 is clearly a speech delivered by a character in a certain situation. As a result, it reflects in the first place that situation along with the speaker’s moral qualities and his/her response to his/her immediate circumstances. Not only are we aware that an “understood code” is at play; to a significant degree we are familiar with that “code” as it corresponds to the set of generic conventions and expectations underlying ancient Greek drama. In a word, we have the cognitive tools to realise that the boy is winking, and we are (partially) aware of his covert communication system. If it is essential to unravel the possible “codes” underlying fr. 282, the first step in this direction is taking into account that Autolycus is a satyric drama. Quite interestingly, athletics is a very common theme in satyr plays, so common, in fact, that it requires some form of explanation. 54 Satyrs are imaginary creatures characterised by a half human, half animal nature. Qua Dionysus’ attendants, they enjoy the full range of hedonistic entertainment offered by the god: constantly drunk, they spend their time chasing nymphs and all other sorts of pleasures. Satyric plots, however, have them involved in heroic struggles in which they invariably end up defeated or out of place. The irreconcilability between their weak, flawed nature and the situations in which they happen to find themselves is one of the main sources of the genre’s humour. It is in this connection that athletics becomes a significant motif in satyr play. Athletics requires a kind of physical and ethical equipment (endurance, patience, determination) that satyrs are clearly lacking; if they ever attempt to change their ways and become sportsmen (as happens in Aeschylus’ Sacred Ambassadors or Isthmian Competitors), 55 they are inevitably bound to fail and go back to their carefree existence under Dionysus. As D. Pritchard has remarked, “[s]ince satyrs were the antithesis of courage

 54 See e.g. Pratinas’ Wrestlers, Aeschylus’ Sacred Ambassadors or Isthmian Competitors, and Achaeus’ Games; Sutton 1975; Voelke 2001, 261–272; Pritchard 2012. 55 See Aesch. frr. 78a–c and, more specifically, frr. 78a.11–12, 78a.18–22, and 78c.43–48.

  Massimo Giuseppetti and habituated only to the ‘ponoi’ of dancing, drinking, and fornicating, they were the most unlikely of athletes. Thus the poets of satyric drama saw choruses witnessing sporting contests or, better still, trying unsuccessfully to be sportsmen as ideal scenarios for bringing to the fore the true colours of the satyrs and hence entertaining theatre-goers”. 56 Thus when satyr play portrays athletic activities it is, for the most part, to bring out the incongruous nature of the satyrs or to contrast it with more heroic attitudes. We are here beginning to penetrate the “understood code” of fr. 282. The way athletics is generally handled in satyr plays strongly suggests that in Autolycus Euripides does not exploit this motif for its own sake or as a subject of personal reflections. Rather, the anti-athletic invective is first of all a variation on a generic stereotype. As such, it may well evoke other instances in which sport and sportsmen appear in satyr plays. From this point of view, the exceptionally negative light it casts on athletes is in part unsurprising in a genre whose main characters are, in many respects, far from ideal athletes. Moreover, as we saw earlier, the attack appropriates and innovates the traditional anti-athletic repertoire championed by Xenophanes and Tyrtaeus. If Euripides has turned a familiar topic into a piece of literary sophistication, it is crucial to stress that this is not a mere display of rhetorical cleverness on the poet’s part. The speech’s main purpose is to convey in a particularly elaborate, and thus persuasive, fashion a message that at the same time defines the speaker’s characterization and serves his/her agenda. The question, then, concerns the identity of such speaker and the nature of his/her agenda. Only a few scholars have discussed these issues at some length. Developing a suggestion of N. Pechstein, D. Pritchard has recently argued that the speaker is Autolycus himself. 57 Pechstein believes that Autolycus attacks the athletes because he himself had been criticised for neglecting athletics and relying instead on his rhetorical skills. Pritchard, on the other hand, thinks that fr. 282, rather than reflecting popular views, is mainly designed to characterise him as a villain: “The sheer number of complaints that Autolycus makes about athletes alone would have shocked the vast majority of theatre-goers. The Athenian dēmos simply abhorred public criticism of athletics or those who practised it. Autolycus’

 56 Pritchard 2012, 10. 57 Pechstein 1998, 84–85 (where he also notes that the speaker of fr. 282 is characterised as a “sophistic” figure); Pechstein and Krumeich 1999a, 411; Pritchard 2012, 13–16 (~ 2013, 152–156). In the context of a reconstruction of the play, Mangidis 2003, 190–200 has argued that the speaker of fr. 282 is Silenus, angered at his master Autolycus, who has recently turned to athletics.

Wink or Twitch?  

sustained attack appears, therefore, to have done more than prove his training in anti-logical argumentation: it helped to guarantee the audience’s poor judgement of his character”. 58 Both suggestions are in themselves valuable, but perhaps it is possible to go one step further. Tzetzes portrays Autolycus in Euripides’ satyr play as a master of rhetorical deception: he persuades his victims that he is returning to them what he has stolen. The detail that seems most relevant to the plot of Euripides’ play is about a “marriageable girl”: he convinces her father that he has his daughter back when in fact he has received a silenus or a satyr. 59 Perhaps the play is all about this erotic adventure; at the very least, it must have extended over a large portion of it. In either case, it is easy to imagine that before abducting the girl Autolycus airs his erotic plans, we do not know whether in a monologue or in an exchange with other characters. Be that as it may, there is one possibility that deserves further exploration. Fr. 282, as we have seen, includes criticism but also praise. It demolishes the social prestige enjoyed by athletes (1–23) and celebrates the “men who are wise and brave” (ἄνδρας ... σοφούς τε κἀγαθούς, 23). Pritchard may be right in supposing that “[c]ertainly very few would have accepted what Autolycus said of athletes”. 60 This, nevertheless, leaves two questions unanswered: (1) why does Autolycus choose this particular subject, and (2) why does he conclude his tirade with a positive note of praise, after all irrelevant to his negative characterization? Everything indicates that Autolycus’ speech, in all its parts, fully depends on the character’s dramatic situation; in other words, both his criticism and his praise are motivated by his circumstances in this part of the play. Let us consider his criticism first. His invective, one may suspect, is aimed at athletes because they are dangerous competitors in erotic pursuits. This idea can be found, albeit from a different point of view, in another satyr play, possibly by Sophocles. Here the chorus is talking with the father (Oeneus or [Sch]oeneus?) of the girl they want to marry (Soph. fr. **1030 = P.Oxy. 1083+2354). The satyrs introduce themselves as “sons of nymphs and ministers of Bacchus and neighbours of the god” (2–3); after that, they list their virtues, beginning with all sorts of athletic special-

 58 Pritchard 2012, 15. As another example of this type of characterization Pritchard cites Eur. El. 386–390 (see above, n. 28). On the function played by the athletic theme in the Electra as a whole (cf. 524–529, 614, 781–782, 824–825, 859–865, 880–885, 1174) see Arnott 1981 (but contrast Arnott 1981, 188–190 and Cropp 1988, 159). 59 Tzetz. Chil. 8.435–453 (= T iv) with Masciadri 1987, 3–4 (“die Beschreibung des Tzetzes hier ... auf echtes Material zurückgeht”); see also above, n. 20. 60 Pritchard 2012, 15.

  Massimo Giuseppetti ties: “fighting with the spear, contests of wrestling, riding, running, boxing, biting, twisting people’s balls” (9–11). 61 Athletic “talents”, then, can also be associated with (at least potentially) erotic situations in satyr play. Turning back to Euripides, we can hypothesise that, in dramatic terms, Autolycus’ invective may have been caused by an urge to discredit his possible competition, perhaps after someone had objected to his erotic plans. This situation furnishes also a suitable context for the last portion of fr. 282. Autolycus concludes his speech on a note of praise for the sophoi kai agathoi (23). As we saw above, the close association between the criticism of athletics and the tribute to sophie can be traced back to Xenophanes fr. 2 W.² Why is Autolycus adopting the same rhetorical strategy? 62 By following the conventions of the earlier debate on the relative value of different skills he may be pursuing a similar goal, namely, the promotion of a particular skill or occupation. 63 He characterises the sophoi kai agathoi (23) as competent speakers (μύθοις, 26) who benefit the city by removing fights and quarrels (27–28), a detail that points again to a different passage in Xenophanes (cf. οὔ τι μάχας διέπειν ... ἢ στάσιας σφεδανάς, fr. 1.21–23 W.²) but also to the Hesiodic portrayal of the king cherished by the Muses in the Theogony. 64 In this way he may be praising poets, intellectuals, or politicians, as commentators suggest. 65 But perhaps his purpose is first and foremost self-promotion. Since Homer Autolycus excels in the art of swearing deceptive oaths in

 61 See Pechstein and Krumeich 1999b. 62 Euripides appears to be particularly fond of this kind of stark contrasts. Contrast the debate between Zethus and Amphion about practical and intellectual life in Antiope (frr. 183–189, 193– 202, and perhaps also 191, 219–220), which in part draws on the contrast between brawn and brains (see e.g. Soph. Aj. 1250–1252). Fr. 201 in particular is very close to the first lines of fr. 282. See Mangidis 2003, 23–25. 63 On this rhetorical strategy see Stewart 2017, 160–166; more in general on the adversarial quality of much philosophical and scientific debate in ancient Greece see Lloyd 1990. 64 “All the populace look to him as he decides disputes with straight judgments; and speaking publicly without erring, he quickly ends even a great quarrel (μέγα νεῖκος) by his skill. For this is why kings are prudent (ἐχέφρονες), because when the populace is going astray in the assembly they easily manage to turn the deeds around, effecting persuasion with mild words (μαλακοῖσι παραιφάμενοι ἐπέεσσιν); and as he goes up to the gathering (ἀγῶνα) they seek his favor like a god with soothing reverence, and he is conspicuous among the assembled people” (Hes. Theog. 86–92, trans. G.W. Most). 65 See Di Benedetto 1971, 305; Giannini 1982, 67; Angiò 1992, 90; Iannucci 1998, 44; Pechstein 1998, 70; Larmour 1999, 42; Egli 2003, 127; Harris 2009, 166; Stewart 2017, 276. Some commentators see in this phrase Euripides’ own claim of superiority. The nexus σοφὸς καὶ ἀγαθός, often contrasted with καλὸς καὶ ἀγαθός, is in fact quite common, especially in Plato: see e.g. Euth.

Wink or Twitch?  

order to cover his thefts — what J. Redfield has in fact categorised as “the art of Autolycus”. 66 There is a good amount of humour and irony in the fact that a lying thief expresses admiration for the noble men whose words bring about civic concord. 67 Why would he do that? Perhaps because one of the implications of his speech is that he is one of those noble men: the trickster portrays himself as a public benefactor as he reviles one of the most popular categories of men (and does so with words that echo the authority of the archaic tradition). If the dramatic context of this statement is one of erotic competition, then Autolycus’ claim may imply a further note of self-interest: he maintains, in the manipulative fashion that is to be expected of him, that he is well above all other contenders. For all intents and purposes fr. 282 is a passionate expression of concern and an outstanding speech designed to impress the theatre’s audience. Its tone is so much serious, in fact, that some have doubted that the fragment may actually come from a satyr play. 68 After all, though, a wink is virtually indistinguishable from a twitch. The tone of moral rigour is essential to both Autolycus’ characterization and to the humorous effect of his speech. As a concluding remark, it is worth underscoring to which extent the interpretive scenario we have followed so far has helped us unearth the semantic potential inherent in our fragment. Well aware of the many ramifications of the long-standing Greek discourse on athletics, Euripides here evokes them only to have them delivered by a manipulative crook. In the case of fr. 282, fragmentation has proved to be almost as deceitful as Autolycus.

Bibliography Angeli Bernardini, P. (1980), “Esaltazione e critica dell’atletismo nella poesia greca dal VII al V sec. a. C. Storia di un’ideologia”, Stadion 6, 81–111. Angiò, F. (1992), “Euripide, Autolico, fr. 282 N.²”, Dioniso 62, 83–94. Arafat, K. (2000), “The Recalcitrant Mass: Athenaeus and Pausanias”, in: D.C. Braund/J. Wilkins (eds), Athenaeus and his World: Reading Greek Culture in the Roman Empire, Exeter, 191–202.

 282e5; see also Pind. Ol. 9.28; Aesch. Sept. 595; Soph. Phil. 118; Pechstein 1998, 68–69; cf. Giannini 1982, 67. For σοφὸς καὶ καλός (which “deserves recognition in its own right as a previously neglected idiom”: Panegyres 2019, 1021) see e.g. Hipp. Ma. 281a1. 66 Redfield 2003, 258. 67 We have thus no reason to suppose, as Sutton 1980, 148 does, that fr. 282 was followed at some point by a second speech defending athletes. 68 Angiò 1992, 87. See above, n. 25.

  Massimo Giuseppetti Arnott, W.G. (1981), “Double Vision: A Reading of Euripides’ Electra”, G&R 28, 179–192. Bakola, E./Prauscello, L./Telò, M. (eds) (2013), Greek Comedy and the Discourse of Genres, Cambridge. Bastianini, G./Luppe, W. (1989), “Una hypothesis euripidea in un esercizio scolastico (P. Vindob. G 19766 verso, Pack2 1989): l’Αὐτόλυκος πρῶτος”, Analecta Papyrologica 1, 31–36. Bowra, C.M. (1938), “Xenophanes and the Olympic Games”, AJPh 59, 257–279 (repr. in Bowra 1953, 15–37). Bowra, C.M. (1953), Problems in Greek Poetry, Oxford. Bowra, C.M. (1960), “Euripides’ Epinician for Alcibiades”, Historia 9, 68–79 (repr. in Bowra 1970, 134–148). Bowra, C.M. (1970), On Greek Margins, Oxford. Bruzzese, L. (2004), “Lo Schwerathlet, Eracle e il parassita nella commedia greca”, Nikephoros 17, 139–170. Collard, C./Cropp, M. (2008), Euripides: Fragments. 1: Aegeus–Meleager, Cambridge (MA)/ London. Cropp, M.J. (1988), Euripides: Electra, Oxford. Denniston, J.D. (1939), Euripides: Electra,Oxford. Di Benedetto, V. (1971), Euripide. Teatro e società, Turin. Di Marco, M. (2013), Satyriká. Studi sul dramma satiresco, Lecce. Dover, K.J. (1974), Greek Popular Morality in the Time of Plato and Aristotle, Oxford. Dover, K.J. (2000), “Frogments”, in: D. Harvey/J. Wilkins (eds), The Rivals of Aristophanes: Studies in Athenian Old Comedy, Swansea, xvii–xix. Egli, F. (2003), Euripides im Kontext zeitgenössischer intellektueller Strömungen: Analyse der Funktion philosophischer Themen in den Tragödien und Fragmenten, München. García Romero, F. (2009), “Alabanza y crítica del deporte en la literatura griega”, Materiales para la historia del deporte 7, 9–22. García Soler, M.J. (2010), “Euripides’ Critique of Athletics in Autolykus, fr. 282 N²”, Nikephoros 23, 139–153. Geertz, C. (1973), The Interpretation of Cultures: Selected Essays, New York. Giannini, P. (1982), “Senofane fr. 2 Gentili-Prato e la funzione dell’intellettuale nella Grecia arcaica”, QUCC 39, 57–69. Griffith, M. (2015), Greek Satyr Play: Five Studies, Berkeley. Guggisberg, P. (1947), Das Satyrspiel, Zürich. Iannucci, A. (1998), “Euripide (satiresco) e gli «sportivi»: note di lettura a Eur. fr. 282 N.²”, Quaderni del Dipartimento di Filologia, Linguistica e Tradizione Classica di Torino 11, 31– 48. Kambitsis, J. (1972), L’Antiope d’Euripide, Athènes. Kannicht, R. (1991), “De Euripidis Autolyco vel Autolycis”, Dioniso 61, 91–99. Kannicht, R. (2005), Euripides: Fragmenta (TrGF V), 2 vols, Göttingen. Kyle, D.G. (1987), Athletics in Ancient Athens, Leiden. Lamari, A.A. (2017), Reperforming Greek Tragedy: Theater, Politics, and Cultural Mobility in the Fifth and Fourth Centuries BC, Berlin/Boston. Lämmle, R. (2013), Poetik des Satyrspiels, Heidelberg. Larmour, D.H.J. (1999), Stage and Stadium: Drama and Athletics in Ancient Greece, Hildesheim. Lesher, J.H. (1992), Xenophanes of Colophon: Fragments, Toronto.

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Lloyd, G.E.R. (1979), Magic, Reason, and Experience: Studies in the Origin and Development of Greek Science, Cambridge. Lloyd, G.E.R. (1990), Demystifying Mentalities, Cambridge. Lucas de Dios, J.M. (1991), “Jenófanes 2: la inteligencia contra el deporte”, in: J.A. López Férez (ed.), Estudios actuales sobre textos griegos, Madrid, 57–73. Luginbill, R.D. (2002), “Tyrtaeus 12 West: Come Join the Spartan Army”, CQ 52, 405–414. Mangidis, I. (2003), Euripides’ Satyrspiel Autolykos, Bern/Frankfurt am Main. Marcovich, M. (1977), “Euripides’ Attack on the Athletes”, Živa Antika 27, 51–54 (repr. in 1991, 123–126). Marcovich, M. (1978), “Xenophanes on Drinking Parties and Olympic Games”, ICS 3, 1–26 (repr. in 1991, 60–84). Marcovich, M. (1991), Studies in Greek Poetry, Atlanta. Martelli, M.F.A. (2008), “Gli epigrammi AP 7.348 (= 37 FGE) e AP 13.30: la presunta attribuzione a Simonide”, Acme 61, 261–272. Martin, R.P. (1993), “The Seven Sages as Performers of Wisdom”, in: C. Dougherty/L. Kurke (eds), Cultural Poetics in Archaic Greece: Cult, Performance, Politics, Cambridge, 108–128. Masciadri, V. (1987), “Autolykos und der Silen. Eine übersehene Szene des Euripides bei Tzetzes”, MH 44, 1–7. Medda, E./Mirto, M.S./Pattoni, M.P. (eds) (2006), Κωμῳδοτραγῳδία: intersezioni del tragico e del comico nel teatro del V secolo a.C, Pisa. Müller, S. (1995), Das Volk der Athleten. Untersuchungen zur Ideologie und Kritik des Sports in der griechisch-römischen Antike, Trier. Musso, O. (1988), “Il fr. 282 N2 dell’Autolico euripideo e il P. Oxy. 3699”, SIFC 6, 205–207. O’Sullivan, P./Collard, C. (2013), Euripides’ Cyclops and Major Fragments of Greek Satyric Drama, Oxford. Page, D.L. (1981), Further Greek Epigrams: Epigrams before A.D. 50 from the Greek Anthology and Other Sources, Cambridge. Panegyres, K. (2019), “Καλὸς καὶ σοφός”, Mnemosyne 72, 1020–1028. Papakonstantinou, Z. (2014), “Ancient Critics of Greek Sport”, in: P. Christesen/D.G. Kyle (eds), A Companion to Sport and Spectacle in Greek and Roman Antiquity, Chichester, 320–331. Pechstein, N. (1998), Euripides Satyrographos. Ein Kommentar zu den Euripideischen Satyrspielfragmenten, Stuttgart. Pechstein, N./Krumeich, R. (1999a), “Autolykos”, in: R. Krumeich/N. Pechstein/B. Seidensticker (eds), Das griechische Satyrspiel, Darmstadt, 403–412. Pechstein, N./Krumeich, R. (1999b), “Oineus-Satyrspiel”, in: R. Krumeich/N. Pechstein/B. Seidensticker (eds), Das griechische Satyrspiel, Darmstadt, 368–374. Pritchard, D.M. (2012), “Athletics in Satyric Drama”, G&R 59, 1–16. Pritchard, D.M. (2013), Sport, Democracy and War in Classical Athens, Cambridge. Redfield, J.M. (2003), The Locrian Maidens: Love and Death in Greek Italy, Princeton (NJ). Rutherford, R.B. (1992), Homer: Odyssey. Books XIX and XX, Cambridge. Ryle, G. (2009), “The Thinking of Thoughts: What is Le Penseur Doing?”, in: id., Collected Essays 1929–1968, London/New York, 494–510. Sánchez-Mañas, C. (2013), “Excellence: Tyrtaeus’ Own View. A Literary Analysis of Fragment 9”, Erga-Logoi 1, 107–122. Schmid, W. (1936), “Zwei Auflagen von Euripides’ Αὐτόλυκος”, Philologische Wochenschrift 56, 766–768.

  Massimo Giuseppetti Schwinge, E.-R. (1997), “Tyrtaios über seine Dichtung (Fr. 9 G.-P. = 12 W.)”, Hermes 125, 387– 395. Seaford, R. (1988), Euripides: Cyclops, Oxford. Seaford, R. (1991), “Il dramma satiresco di Euripide”, Dioniso 61, 75–89. Shaw, C.A. (2014), Satyric Play: The Evolution of Greek Comedy and Satyr Drama, Oxford. Steffen, V. (1971), “The Satyr-Dramas of Euripides”, Eos 59, 203–226. Stewart, E. (2017), “‘There’s Nothing Worse than Athletes’: Criticism of Athletics and Professionalism in the Archaic and Classical Periods”, Nikephoros 27, 273–294. Strobel, B./Wöhrle, G. (2018), Xenophanes von Kolophon, Berlin/Boston. Sutton, D.F. (1974a), “The Evidence for a Ninth Euripidean Satyr Play”, Eos 62, 49–53. Sutton, D.F. (1974b), “A Handlist of Satyr Plays”, HSCPh 78, 107–143. Sutton, D.F. (1975), “Athletics in the Greek Satyr Play”, Rivista di Studi Classici 23, 203–209. Sutton, D.F. (1980), The Greek Satyr Play, Meisenheim am Glan. Van Looy, H. (1998), “Autolykos”, in: F. Jouan/H. Van Looy, Euripide. VIII: Fragments. 1: AigeusAutolykos, Paris, 330–340. Visa-Ondarçuhu, V. (1999), L’image de l’athlète d’Homère à la fin du Ve siècle av. J.-C, Paris. Voelke, P. (2001), Un théâtre de la marge: aspects figuratifs et configurationnels du drame satyrique dans l’Athènes classique, Bari. Wilamowitz - Moellendorff, U. von (1889), Einleitung in die griechische Tragödie, Berlin. Wilkins, J. (2000), The Boastful Chef: The Discourse of Food in Ancient Greek Comedy, Oxford. Wilson, P.J. (2009), “Tragic Honours and Democracy: Neglected Evidence for the Politics of the Athenian Dionysia”, CQ 59, 8–29. Wright, M. (2016), “Euripidean Tragedy and Quotation Culture: The Case of Stheneboea F661”, AJPh 137, 601–623.

Efstathia Papadodima

Barbarism and Fragmentation in FifthCentury Tragedy: Barbarians in the Fragments and “Fragmented” Barbarians In this paper I explore the theme of barbarism and the image of barbarians in fifth-century tragedy in relation to the issue or the notion of “fragmentation.” I use the term “fragmentation” both in a technical sense, to refer to the fragments of lost plays and their interplay with extant tragedies, and in a more abstract sense, to refer to the idea or concept of “fragmentation”, as opposed to the idea of a coherent entity or the idea of unity and wholeness (inspired by the conference’s title: “Fragmented Parts, Coherent Entities”). Given that the material associated with tragic barbarians is vast and diverse, I will attempt to make a few all-embracing points rather than pay truly close attention to any particular figure or text, much less inquire into all possible parallels or contrasts between the extant and fragmentary plays I will go through (or into all possible connections among a wider range of plays to which the particular extant and fragmentary plays I will mention might point). The fragments I will refer to have been, and are still being, seriously studied or reconsidered in their own right. I will limit myself to some observations concerning barbarism and the image of barbarians. Part 1 lays out a few remarks about the way in which barbarism is treated in extant and/or vs fragmentary tragedy, in an attempt to pinpoint whether the tragic fragments might make any substantial contribution to our understanding of the theme. Part 2 makes some observations about the inherently “fragmented” status/quality of tragic barbarians as a whole, regardless of whether these barbarian characters are found in extant or fragmentary tragedy. My point is that the treatment of barbarians in tragedy as a whole is marked by a certain degree of rather controversial “fragmentation”, which inevitably also affects the barbarians’ Greek counterparts — or primarily affects their Greek counterparts. The “fragmented” barbarians of fifth-century tragedy are largely supposed to highlight constituent fragments of the Self and probably establish a (sense of) unity, in the Greek world and in Greek self-perception, which more often than not proves frail.

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-017

  Efstathia Papadodima

 Barbarians in the Fragments (and/or vs Extant Tragedy): Some Basic Points Greek tragic theatre is a rich source for the study of ethnicity, 1 as primarily explored in terms of the Greek-barbarian opposition (although the genre’s interest in ethnicity and ethnicity’s very scope are not confined to that opposition). Many fifth-century tragedies feature foreign themes or characters of diverse statuses — “Easterners-Northerners”, historical-mythical, male-female — or offer more theoretical insights into the theme of ethnic or cultural differentiation. Thus, based on both extant and fragmentary tragic production, we might form a “typology” of barbarism as a literary theme, and there are several ways to go about it, e.g. by mapping out barbarism’s major uses and effects (ideological and otherwise), by isolating types of ethnic groups or barbarian individuals, by plot-types, by categories of ethnic stereotypes or by comparing the tragedians’ outlook and take on the topic. Even though the theme of ethnic identities in drama is intricate and multilayered, 2 we could readily detect two very basic, related but not necessarily interdependent, aspects of barbarism and of the Greek-barbarian interaction, which underlie both extant and fragmentary tragedy: the first aspect refers to the two groups’ (mutual) hostility or “antagonism”, while the second aspect refers to the explicit or implicit interest in the two groups’ distinct essence or relative value. Indeed, most tragic contexts which bring Greeks and barbarians into contact present or presuppose some form of confrontation or clash between the two peoples, whether physical or mental. At the same time, tragic barbarians (especially of extant tragedy) are standardly represented in a dangerous, grave or disadvantegeous position, or as the defeated ones, in quite pragmatic terms — whether they are male monarchs (Xerxes, Darius, Polymestor, Theoclymenus, Thoas, Rhesus) or female slaves of war and suppliants (the Trojans, the Danaïds, the Phoenicians). What about the tragic fragments? It is self-evident that the fragments provide us with (some) additional material about barbarian peoples, places, and stories,

 1 I here use the term “ethnicity” quite loosely. For detailed discussions about proposed definitions and extensions of terms such as “ethnic identity”, “cultural identity” etc. in the ancient world see Hall 1997, 47; 2002, 198–220. Contrast Harrison 2002, 4, n. 19. See also McInerney 2001, 51–73. 2 Bibliography on the topic is rich and diverse. See notably Bacon 1961; Hall 1989; Saïd 2002, 62–100; Papadodima 2013, upon which I draw several thoughts and remarks.

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which might occasionally enrich and deepen our understanding of particular extant plays. The other way round, extant dramas may shed some light on fragmentary ones. Beyond the tragic genre, Aristophanic comedy (and its versatile relationship with tragedy) is interesting in this latter respect. We might simply mention the poet’s “utilization” of two popular foreign (or quasi-foreign) figures featuring in fragmentary tragedies, who, as usually in Aristophanes, primarily come to highlight Greek/Athenian problems and animosities or divisions. These characters are Tereus (in Birds) 3 and Telephus (in Acharnians and Women at the Thesmophoria). 4 A more challenging question is whether the fragments do, or could, make any substantial, qualitative rather than quantitative, difference or contribution to our understanding of a theme which is by definition controversial and context-dependent. I would argue upfront that the contribution of the fragments is quite limited in this respect, not only because the lack of context/material makes  3 The Tereus bird claims that he has taught the other birds how to communicate (ἐδίδαξα τὴν φωνήν), since up to this point the birds have only been speaking in a barbarian, that is, unintelligible fashion (βαρβάρους ὄντας πρὸ τοῦ [199–200]). The presumed unintelligibility of barbarian tongue is commonly expressed through the swallow/bird-metaphor in tragedy (e.g. Aesch. Ag. 1050–1051, Soph. Ant. 1001–1002). Ironically enough, it is a notoriously savage Thracian, as portrayed in Sophocles’ Tereus, and one who actually cuts off a person’s tongue, who undertakes to teach the birds how to speak. The treatment of the figure of Tereus in Birds additionally highlights the very relationship and tension between fragmentary tragic plays that concern the eponymous hero, namely the plays by Sophocles and Philocles (the tetralogy Pandionis, of which we know virtually nothing). The Tereus bird in Aristophanes mocks another bird’s costume by saying: “he is the son of Philocles’ hoopoe, but I am his grandfather” (279–283), thus pointing to an intergenerational conflict and antagonism. See Wright 2016, 99–100. 4 As represented in Euripides’ lost Telephus (438 BC), Telephus was a Mysian king, Greek by birth (the son of Heracles and Auge), who employed various tactics and arguments in order to gain the Acheaen army’s assistance. The tragic hero’s ambivalent “ethnic” status, of which he himself appears fully conscious (14), as well as his proving his “Hellenicity” to the Greeks, are an integral part of the story and of his eventual rescue (healing), rather than a more abstract matter of debated identities or (self-)identification. Two of the most characteristic and popular tragic episodes associated with Telephus (his persuasion/deception and enforcement attempts) are parodied in Aristophanes, namely the hero’s disguise as a beggar and his seizing baby Orestes and holding him as “hostage” at sword-point. Accordingly, Dicaeopolis in Acharnians tries to make the Acharnians pay attention to him and support his goal (to put an end to the war — a purely intra-Hellenic affair) by being dressed like “Mysian Telephus” (in effect a miserable beggar), after borrowing the play’s “rags” by Euipides himself, and threatening to use his knife against a charcoal basket. Dicaeopolis resorts to this course of action after having rejected Euripides’ other possible disguise-suggestions, which allude to some of the poet’s fragmentary plays (like Bellerophon). The Inlaw in Women at the Thesmophoria attempts to escape the women by grabbing and threating to kill one of the women’s baby, in reality a wine skin.

  Efstathia Papadodima broader conclusions risky or impossible (unless we are inclined to rest heavily on speculations), but also because barbarians per barbarians are presented as more “fragmented” than their Greek counterparts, even in extant tragedy. I define “fragmented” here in a much looser sense, as opposed to “coherent”, “whole” or “consistent”. Three of the most evident ways in which extant and fragmentary tragedy may complement, but also complicate, one another when it comes to barbarism and the Greek-barbarian relationship are the following. (1) First, in “intra-barbarian” terms, the dialogue between extant and fragmentary tragedy may offer a more developed image of recurrent individual characters of foreign origin, who hold an important place in the tragic corpus (like Hecuba or Cassandra [Euripides’ Hecuba, Alexandros, Trojan Women]); of specific types of barbarians of a more “sketchy” nature (like the greedy and savage Thracians Tereus [Sophocles’ Tereus] and Polymestor [Euripides’ Hecuba]); 5 and of the mythical stories/cycles and plot-types associated with barbarians (like the escape-plots of Euripides’ Helen, IΤ, and Andromeda, with their “exotic” barbarian captors on the fringes of the familiar or “civilized” world — Egypt, the land of the Taurians, Ethiopia). (2) Second, the dialogue between extant and fragmentary tragedy offers insights into the broader, conceptual Greek-barbarian relationship and presumed differentiation, in so far as certain (often “extreme”) types of barbarians of extant tragedy find their most representative Greek “counterparts” in the tragic fragments. (3) Third, with respect to the Trojans, a group which holds an important place in the tragic universe, the fragments might somewhat twist their predominant image/representation in extant tragedy, although the evidence is not substantial. I will briefly go through a few examples or particulars of these three points.

. Extant Barbarians and their Fragmented Counterparts Hecuba is a good example of the way in which the dialogue between extant and fragmentary tragedy may offer insights into issues of characterization, first, because she is a leading character in the most extensive fragmentary play with a Trojan subject and characters (Euripides’ Alexandros). Second, Alexandros represents a crucial episode of the queen’s life prior to and independently of her interaction with the Achaeans (and of the Trojan War). As such, the drama does not

 5 Such Thracians stereotypes are common in tragedy (see e.g. Hall 1989, 102–110) and classical literature. For the idea of Thracian greed see Tereus fr. 587; cf. Thuc. 2.97. For the Thracians’ proneness to excessive violence see also Thuc. 7.29.4–5, 7.30.3.

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reflect any sort of “ethnic tension” or clash, whereas the two extant plays involving Hecuba make heavy use of that tension or open animosity (Euripides’ Hecuba and, secondarily, Trojan Women). 6 All in all, through the combination of extant and fragmentary material, we may follow Hecuba’ course (as a mother) in both an intra-ethnic and an inter-ethnic environment. At the same time, the Hecubas of extant drama and of Alexandros share an important, constitutive feature, which boils down to the queen’s double status as the (quintessential) bereaved/ grieving and violent/vengeful mother, a status that seems to surpass or prove irrelevant to ethnic boundaries. In all three plays Hecuba is primarily defined by her relationship with her children, who are either dead/about to die or removed from their home environment, the family in all cases being fragmented and broken, forcibly or intentionally. In the two extant dramas, which take place on devastated or alien and “liminal” lands after Troy’s sack, Hecuba is faced with multiple blows and outrages by various agents; these blows generate immense grief as well as mood for vengeance. In Hecuba in particular, which thematizes the Greek-barbarian polarity far more extensively, these blows come from different “foreigners” — the queen’s Achaean conquerors/masters and her Thracian supposed allies, who themselves engage in confrontation. Among other channels, Hecuba struggles to defend her most crucial and defining interests, that is, her children’s life or honour, by rhetorically exploiting the Greek-barbarian opposition while confronting her masters (Odysseus) or while trying to persuade them to execute justice (Agamemnon). First, in order to avert Polyxena’s sacrifice by the Achaean army, she appeals to a law which she herself presents as distinctively Greek, that of isonomia, and which she tries to use to her own advantage (291–292), whilst “returning” Odysseus’ accusations about Trojans/barbarians being ungrateful towards their friends (328–331, 254–257). Second, in order to debunk Polymestor’s attempted justification of his unholy killing of his guest, Polydorus, in front of Agamemnon who is called to judge the case (i.e. that Polymestor’s motive for the murder was his wish to protect the Achaeans), she asserts that Greeks and barbarians have never, and could never, be friends (1119–1201). This somewhat contradicts her earlier invocations of the friendship that is expected to bind her with both Odysseus, on account of the help she once offered him, and Agamemnon, on account of the latter’s sexual relationship with Cassandra (824–825).

 6 Alexandros and Trojan Women, along with Palamedes, belong to the same trilogy, composed after Hecuba.

  Efstathia Papadodima In fact, rather than having a clear-cut polarity between Achaean victors, Trojan victims, and their Thracian allies, all three peoples involved manipulate the Greek-barbarian division (and the pertinent master-slave contrast) in quite selfserving and partial ways. 7 In the end, when any attempt on the queen’s part to get Agamemnon to punish the Thracian proves futile, Hecuba turns from a grieving mother to a brutal murderess, blinding Polymestor and murdering his sons. 8 In Trojan Women, Hecuba is once again the grieving mother who, after suffering great, successive losses, struggles to secure Helen’s killing, in the play’s famous agon (with Menelaus as judge). Among other, quite sober and calculated, arguments, the queen utilizes Troy’s popular image as an opulent tyranny 9 as a means for proving that Helen was beyond doubt guilty, a more than willing participant in her “abduction” (994–995, 1022–1028; cf. also Helen’s portrayal in Euripides’ Orestes). Hecuba’s image as a bereaved mother who turns vengeful (in order to protect or honour her children) may be complemented by Euripides’ Alexandros, set at the prosperous kingdom of Troy in somewhat happier, though not completely untroubled, times. The drama utilizes the exposed-child motif (referring to the exposure of Paris/Alexandros in the light of an oracle) and culminates in the familial recognition. 10 Since the play dramatizes a wholly intra-Trojan affair, the polarity that comes to the foreground and drives the action is that of social class and status. Hecuba mourns over her (supposed) dead baby (Paris), until the unidentified Trojan prince shows up as an unknown stranger of low standing and manages to beat Hecuba’s (other) royal sons in the games intended to commemorate his own supposed death, hence threatening their authority and privileges. In the context of that supposed polarity (low-born/high-born), a wrathful Hecuba appears inclined to kill, or at least to be implicated in a killing, in order to protect her acknowledged sons’ interests. A powerful queen/mother, Hecuba is now the intended and plotting murderess not of her enemy’s children (or of those who harmed her children), by way of avenging an irreversible outrage against her kin, but of her own — innocent — child, although unbeknownst to her (also reminding  7 Notably when Agamemnon treats guest-killing as a barbarian (Thracian) trademark (1247– 1249) and when Polymestor appeals to his friendly disposition towards the Achaeans in order to justify his crime. 8 Her “transformation” is of course much more complex. See suggestively the seminal study by Mossman 1990. 9 See e.g. Tro. 474, 748, 927–928, 1107–1109, 1168–1170 with Burnett 1977, 308–312; Eur. El. 315– 318, 998–1003; Or. 1110–1114, 1426–1436. See also Miller 1997, 153–187, 193–198. 10 See now the edition of Karamanou 2017, with comprehensive information about the play’s themes and characters.

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one of Creusa in Euripides’ Ion). Hence, despite her quite pragmatic differences with the after-war Hecubas and irrespective of the ethnicity-factor, the Hecuba of Alexandros in some way complements her extant counterparts in terms of her capacity for violent vengeance (especially fr. 62d K) — also alluding to her image in the Iliad. 11

. Extant Barbarians and their Fragmented Greek Counterparts Certain types of barbarians of extant tragedy find representative Greek “counterparts” in lost plays. Even though the limited extent of the fragments, as well as the frustrating uncertainty surrounding many of their particular aspects, do not allow for a detailed or even consistent and reliable portrayal of these Greek individuals and their actions, we can still trace elements that provide us with food for thought about issues of identity (referring not only to ethnicity but also to gender and social status). In the context of the Trojan saga, we might mention the grieving, bereft wife Andromache (in Euripides’ Trojan Women) in conjunction with Laodamia of Euripides’ lost Protesilaus, of which only few fragments survive. More suggestive is the class of “problematic” or downright destructive and murderous barbarian mothers who hold leading roles in extant plays and whose Greek counterparts happen to appear only in the fragments. Euripides’ Medea is certainly the most representative example, all the more since the title character is a woman who knowingly and intentionally kills her children, while her crime is thematized in Greek-barbarian terms (and the women of the Chorus even feel compelled to search for [Greek] exempla, which is not untypical in itself). Medea’s core identity is of course anyway exceptional in several respects (a sorceress of divine descent). Among the fragmentary tragedies, the elephant in the room here is Tereus, one of the more popular and widely studied lost tragedies of Sophocles, in which the theme of foreignness must have played some meaningful part 12 — and there is at least one anti-barbarian aphorism concerning greed as a distinct feature of the barbarian genos (fr. 587). Although a full reconstruction of the plot remains

 11 Though not in relation to child-murder. See e.g. 24.212–213 (about her wish to devour Achilles’ liver). 12 The date of composition is unknown, but certainly before 414 BC, when Aristophanes’ Birds was produced. See futher Coo 2013, 352–353, n. 8 and the next note.

  Efstathia Papadodima highly speculative or rather impossible, 13 this revenge and metamorphosis drama treats a chain of savage crimes committed by the Thracian king Tereus (against his sister-in-law, Philomela, driven by lust) and his wife, the Athenian princess Procne (against Itys, her own child, driven by revenge). Like the Colchian Medea, the Athenian Procne kills her son as a means of avenging her husband’s lethal betrayal of their marriage. Both women, who have been relocated to foreign lands (Corinth and Thrace) in the frame/for the sake of their marriage, seem to have the same motive for their crime, and their various similarities have been noted already in antiquity. Yet, there are a number of differences that may be inferred or deduced with some certainty and that might affect/have affected the plays’ treatment of the Greek-barbarian relationship. For one thing, both Tereus’ and Procne’s violent actions are much more ferocious than Jason’s and Medea’s. Tereus’ crime, his raping and mutilating Philomela, is by definition far graver and more “spectacular” than Jason’s abandoning of Medea in favour of a royal bride — which would also match the stereotypes concerning Thracian savagery. On the other hand, Procne’s revenge itself is much more gruesome than the barbarian Medea’s, since Procne not only killed her son but also served him as a meal to his father, like another Atreus. In Tereus fr. 589, a man [Tereus?] is characterized as foolish/mad [ἄνους], while the women who violently avenged him are characterized as even more foolish, acting in an even madder way. In terms of dramatic structure, Procne seems to find out the horrible truth about her sister’s plight in the course of the play, whereas Jason’s betrayal of Medea is already widely known from the very beginning. As a result, the Euripidean play focuses on Medea’s working her way towards her revenge. This might influence the way in which the theme of barbarism is/would have been treated, to the extent that, in Euripides, it necessarily brings into focus Jason’s (the original aggressor’s) attempts to refute his wife’s persistent, fervent accusations and justify himself, ever since his first appearance of stage. And it is, perhaps, no wonder that Jason’s attempts at self-justification (before the revenge), as well as his protests at the outrage he is suffering (after the revenge), revolve around Medea’s barbarian origin.

 13 See Finglass 2016, 61–85 for a stellar history of past reconstruction/dating attempts (with all its extensions about possible influences/deliberate innovations etc.). I here follow Finglass’ plausible conclusions about the plot’s reconstruction.

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Medea herself frequently draws attention to her status as a foreigner and an outsider, 14 mostly as a means of emphasizing her complete lack of support and the dire (in fact the direst possible, in her eyes) position in which Jason has put her. That aspect, her self-conscious and “self-proclaimed” foreignness, directs her reflections, no less when she elaborates on the woes and detrimental effects of marriage early in the play, and while she is already set on avenging her husband (214–266). 15 This becomes even clearer later on, when Medea hints at the inferior position of barbarian women in Greek society as one of Jason’s motives for leaving her, or as the ultimate motive (591–592). Bitter sentiments about marriage are also found in Tereus, but in this context they seem to be more abstract and all-embracing rather than ethnically determined. Procne is the character who, in all probability, laments the pitiful plight and low standing of women (ὡς οὐδέν ἐσμεν), forced as they (generically) are to leave their natal home and go into marriage, to strangers/foreigners or barbarians (fr. 538). It has been convincingly argued that the heroine’s speech most probably comes early in the play (early in the first episode; see n. 13), before the revelation of Philomela’s horrible affliction. That clue would place Procne’s sentiments on a more abstract/universal level, on the one hand, whilst maximizing the dramatic effect of the revelation of Philomela’s fate, on the other. Procne laments her married life and her “removal” from her father’s palace even before getting to be informed of her husband’s atrocious acts against her family (and herself). At the same time, as has been pointed out, Procne’s ties to her paternal oikos are (and have always been) much different from Medea’s in the first place. By marrying the foreigner Tereus and settling in a foreign land, Procne honoured her father’s, king Pandion’s, wish, while later on she longed to be reunited with her sister. Medea, on the other hand, massively violated ties of familial piety in order to marry a foreigner — fleeing her father’s kingdom in secret and killing her brother in the process. This might have crucially influenced Procne’s reception by an Athenian audience, that is, Procne’s crime might have been viewed as (more) justifiable, in so far as Tereus’ atrocious act not only insulted and scorned his wife but also constituted a profound, broader outrage against her fraternal oikos. 16

 14 Both she and the Chorus of Greek women stress the heroine’s seclusion, also through mentions of charged landmarks that separate Asia and Greece (the Clashing Rocks and Bosporus [2, 210–211, 1262–1264]). 15 See Milo 2008, 35–39. 16 See Sommerstein, Fitzpatrick and Talboy 2006, 153–157 (about the issue of the audience’s sympahty for Procne).

  Efstathia Papadodima Be that as it may, it is still telling (or even more telling) that Euripides’ Medea is one of the most undermining plays with respect to its anti-barbarian sentiments and aphorisms, which, not coincidentally, are expressed solely by Jason — himself an outsider (exile) in the city of Corinth (554). Medea has indeed been well received by Corinthian society (10–15). After her husband’s betrayal, she manages to exact the sympathy of the Chorus of local women, who roughly view her husband as a violator of both divine and human law (see especially the first stasimon [“shame has left Greece” / “oaths have no power anymore”]). Jason’s ethnic-related arguments when confronting his wife come across as weak and ineffective or are openly refuted, no less on the basis of the morally charged disparity between (polished) words and (despicable) deeds, of which Jason is found guilty (not only in the eyes of Medea [e.g. 579–585] but also in the eyes of the broader Greek community, the Chorus and Aegeus [576–578, 720–724]). First, Jason claims that he has repaid Medea in full for her past services to him, since he offered her the chance of living in a superior civilization, where what guides people’s lives are lawfulness, justice, and renown for those worthy of it (534–544). Certainly though, in the light of both Jason’s and Medea’s conduct (while in Greece), as well as Medea’s recently damaged reputation (a direct corollary of Jason’s betrayal), this conviction cannot really stand or even convince those around him. After the murder of the children, Jason treats Medea’s past services to him, the very same services for which he had allegedly been grateful, as crimes and evil deeds of a barbarian woman (1329–1335). More strongly, he exclaims that no Greek woman would ever dare to commit child-murder (1339– 1340). Meanwhile, however, some fifty lines earlier, a horrified Chorus had struggled to find a Greek parallel for Medea’s impending monstrosity, concluding that the sole known precedent of a mother (deliberately) killing her offspring is Ino (1282–1292). Although, as the women themselves point out, Ino killed her children after having being driven mad by Hera (like a second Heracles of the eponymous Euripidean drama) 17 and afterwards killed herself by leaping into the sea, the parallel still goes some way into undermining Jason’s sweeping anti-barbarian attack. The reference to Ino as the sole available example of a woman killing her children, i.e. the suppression of other such mothers (including, possibly,

 17 Ino’s story was dramatized in Euripides’ lost Ino, of which we do not know much, but there is evidence that allows us to assume that child-murder was a dominant theme (which also involved more children-victims than the two sons of Medea). A basic difference, though, is that child-murder in Ino, as in the relevant reference in Medea, was largely unintentional. See Finglass 2016, 303.

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Procne), has been variously explained or interpreted by modern critics 18 — and indeed there is no way (or, I would say, reason) to reach a definite conclusion. This is precisely an indication of the intriguing, extensive dialogue not necessarily between extant and fragmentary plays but among different bits and pieces of mythical stories, which might be (and are, as we know) flexibly and quite freely selected and deployed in the tragic universe.

. The Trojans When it comes to a popular tragic group, the Trojans, the fragments seem to offer indications of some possible qualitative difference, no less in terms of the particular characters they employ. The Trojans’ ethnic and cultural status is on the whole treated as rather ambivalent and fluid in fifth-century theatre, 19 something which might also be reflected in the very field of naming and terminology. 20 The tragic Trojans — commonly spoken of in opposition to their epic counterparts 21 — have been viewed as displaced Persians, who, however, may well exhibit sympathetic and noble qualities (and even prove to be more sympathetic or nobler than their Greek conquerors); 22 as culturally (if not necessarily ethnographically) similar to the Greeks/Athenians; 23 or as something in-between. Certainly though, the “sample” of the Trojans of extant tragedy is very specific, as is their relationship with the Achaeans with whom they share the stage; the Trojans of extant tragedy are almost exclusively represented by female victims/slaves of war, the members of the royal house whose prosperous life has

 18 See e.g. Newton 1985, 496–502, who concludes that the parallel is meant to suggest that “there in not one woman from the past who ever went to such extremes, not even Ino”. Although this does not sound necessarily implausible, it is still highly speculative and one among many options, given the tragedians’ free use of different story-lines. 19 The Euripidean Hecuba, after all, boasts that no woman, Greek, Trojan or barbarian, has given birth to sons like hers (Tro. 475–478; cf. Phoen. 1509–1513). 20 This refers to the (possibly ideological) conflation of Troy/Trojans and Phrygia/Phrygians (or Asia/Asians). See e.g. Hall 1989, 26–32, 39, 68–74, 102, 127 and Croally 1994, 104–105. 21 Whose ethnicity is largely ignored, according to widespread consensus. Tragedy at all events exhibits a higher degree of ethnographic interest or awareness, even in connection to the (extant) Trojans. 22 See e.g. Hall 1989, 26–32, 68–74, 102, 127; Croally 1994, 104–105. 23 Mattison 2009.

  Efstathia Papadodima been ravaged in the most brutal way possible, and it is no wonder that what critics most often emphasize are those women’s dignified qualities and suffering or endurance. 24 Most male Trojan characters (including royal Trojans, but also “rustic” Trojans), on the other hand, may be found in fragmentary fifth-century tragedy, 25 especially of Sophocles. Even though, as it happens, the poet’s extant production does not include any Trojan characters, 26 Sophocles seemed to be especially interested in Trojan stories and subjects (titles include Alexandros, Andromache, Hermione, Laocoon, Polyxena, Priamos, Shepherds, Sinon, Troilus). 27 Despite the scanty material, there are indications that the Trojans of several Sophoclean fragments bear features which come closer to being classified as “oriental” or Persian, at least in fifth-century Athenian imagination. Rather than having vague, generic references to Troy’s wealthy tyranny (see n. 9), which is the most common, potentially distinct, “Trojan”/“non-Greek” feature in extant drama, and which most often serves to accentuate the kingdom’s and its members’ grave reversal of fortune, the Trojans of the Sophoclean fragments are represented as speaking a foreign language (frr. 517, 518, 519, 520, 521 Shepherds; fr. 56 Captives; fr. 183 Helen’s Marriage); they allegedly employ eunuchs in the royal court (fr. 620 Troilus; cf. Eur. Or. 1528 with n. 24) and bear shields equipped with bells (fr. 775 inc); 28 and we may also hear about the βαρβάρους εὐοσμίας of the Trojan temples (fr. 341 Laocoon). Even though we cannot reach any conclusions about how individual male Trojans were portrayed and/or interacted with the Greeks, their very presence, as well as the more “orientalizing” details mentioned above, at least alert us to the fact that extant tragedy provides us with only one, quite specific aspect of their image.

 24 Euripides’ Orestes involves an unnamed Phrygian slave (in Helen’s “court”). The Phrygian is thus the only Trojan of extant tragedy who used to be a slave even before Troy’s fall and who, therefore, has no role in the epic tradition. This seems to influence his portrayal decisively. See below, p. 313. 25 The only extant drama that brings Trojan warriors/royals on stage is the Euripides-attributed Rhesus, in all probability a fourth-century tragedy, which involves Trojans and Thracians (and represents an intra-barbarian crisis). Other fourth-century fragmentary plays with Trojan characters include Astydamas’ Hector, on which see the discussion of Liapis 2018, 32–35. 26 Except for Tecmessa in Ajax, who is not strictly Trojan. At all events, Tecmessa’s barbarism is not given any attention. What primarily defines her status, rhetoric, and very fate is her identity as a war-slave bound to be deprived of her master/protector. 27 See notably Bacon 1961, 101–104 and Mattison 2009, 64–65. 28 Cf. the similar descriptions of shields in Aesch. Sept. 386–387; Phoen. 132–141; and [Eur.] Rh. 306–308, 383–385.

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So far, I have outlined a quite sketchy interplay between extant and fragmentary plays when it comes to the representation of barbarians and pertinent themes. In Part 2, I proceed with some thoughts about the “fragmented/fragmentary texture” of barbarians in tragedy as a whole.

 “Fragmented” Tragic Barbarians As shown above, the dialogue between extant and fragmentary tragedy may offer some interesting, though limited, insights with respect to barbarism and barbarians. On the other hand, I would argue that tragic barbarians as a whole, that is, whether of complete or of fragmentary works, are more prone to be viewed as “fragmented”, or as more “fragmented”, than their Greek counterparts — both on account of how they are perceived and on account of the roles they actually play — on three interconnected counts (the third one being the more context-specific). I define “fragmented” as the rough opposite of “unified”, “whole” or “coherent”. The barbarians’ “fragmented” status is interesting to the extent that is shows how the Greeks’ possible attempt to make sense of themselves, and of the world, by constructing and putting forth a coherent (self-)entity/identity through “fragments” and morsels of the barbarian Other turns out to be not really effective or reliable. (1) First, barbarians as peoples constitute one of the two parts of the perceived division of known humanity (“a conceptual polarity of which all other distinctions in culture or psychology are corollaries”, in E. Hall’s words [1989, 3–4]). The Greeks are of course the other part, but it is also the part that “generates” this division and attempts to exploit it to various effects. And then again, in various classical sources this perception and conceptual division per se are, not that rarely, undermined or put into question — not only in theoretical discourse (notably the so-called Sophists and some medical writings), but also in drama itself. This is brought about in at least three ways, so that there is often an interplay or tension between fragmentation/division and unity/cohesion. The more obvious and blunt way through which this perception is challenged consists in the employment of universalizing statements that hint at the unity of humankind or point out the conventionality or the inherent insufficiency of the Greek-barbarian distinction itself. In Euripides’ Alexandros, for instance — and even though it does not directly relate to ethnic origin — the Chorus claim that high-born and humble are one generation (fr. 61b), while in several other passages humankind as a whole is distinguished in terms of its distinct capacities

  Efstathia Papadodima and achievements (notably PV 447–468, 476–506 and Sophocles’ Antigone 332– 375). Somewhat more subtly, rather too many tragic figures are of mixed descent, and their (perceived) mixed or ambivalent characteristics (Greek-foreign) are selectively and fragmentarily deployed or brought into focus. To mention some examples, the Danaïds in Aeschylus’ Suppliants project and exploit their alleged kinship with the Argives, in whose land they desperately seek refuge, whilst being depicted as non-Greeks with respect to their language, physical appearance (234–237, 277–290; cf. Eur. Phaethon fr. 771 and Archelaus fr. 228 about the darkskinned Ethiopians), and political mindset (370–375) — against the anachronistically democratic Argos. 29 The Phoneician women in the eponymous Euripidean play claim to be of the same blood and stock as the Thebans (214–219, 239–249), even though they simultaneously define themselves as outsiders and foreigners (280, 293–296, 301, 679–680, 819, 1301–1302). More strikingly, Agamemnon is said to be, or is actually accused of being, of barbarian/Asian descent, in moments of conflict and uproar amidst the Achaean army — about seemingly irrelevant issues, but still in plays in which Agamemnon himself speaks disparagingly of barbarians (Soph. Aj. 1291–1292 [where the general insults and in fact attempts to bully the semi-barbarian Teucer into silence, on account of the latter’s lineage]; Euripides’ Iphigenia in Aulis 952–954 [where Agamemnon depicts all barbarians as slaves, destined to be subject to the Greeks]). On the other hand, the dubious or foggy ethnic status of figures like Theseus, Heracles, and Oedipus is standardly ignored (cf. Plato’s Menex. 245c–e). Third, the division of the universe into Greeks and barbarians is blurred through the treatment of barbarism as an inner, more abstract, emotional or moral disposition, that actually unites humanity, although in rather negative and unsettling ways — thus, it is a disposition that may define any character, regardless of ethnic background or descent (e.g. Eur. Hel. 501–502; Eur. Hec. 1129 ἐκβαλὼν δὲ καρδίας τὸ βάρβαρον). That aspect may (and does indeed) produce considerably different effects, depending on the context/ speaker/ dramatic situation, while barbarians themselves occasionally employ barbarism in this way (famously Eur. Tro. 764 ὦ βάρβαρ᾽ ἐξευρόντες Ἕλληνες κακά; Eur. IT 1173–1174; cf. Men. Shield 200–209). (2) A second, more pragmatic, count on which barbarians may be understood to be more “fragmented” is that, as dramatic characters, they are quite simply more likely to play less central roles — occasionally appearing as having sketchy or “contrived” characteristics and as being intended to give a new meaning, twist  29 See further Mitchell 2006, 205–223.

Barbarism and Fragmentation in Fifth-Century Tragedy  

or extension to a traditional myth rather than revealing anything specific or realistic about their own identity. The unidentified Phrygian (eunuch) slave of Euripides’ Orestes, who assumes the role of messenger, is perhaps the most evident example. Often considered to be caricatured or comical, the slave repeatedly projects and overstresses his barbarian, “Eastern”, features (referring to language, 30 gestures, attire; e.g. 1370–1371, 1374, 1384–1385, 1395–1397, 1507), thus offering a panorama of the widespread “racist” slurs of the period, which often merge slave and Easterner. 31 What is more, the Phrygian makes a point about the fact that he is clearly and essentially different from (that is, inferior to) not only the “masculine” Greek heroes whom he is forced to confront (Orestes and Pylades; 1349– 1352) but also his own noble compatriots, the Trojan valiant heroes alluded to in the play (notably Hector; 1478–1482). 32 Hence, the Phrygian is (admittedly and consciously) not meant to represent any of the “seminal/representative” groups of tragic barbarians, like the Trojans. (3) Even in plays that do not involve foreigners, barbarians are regularly spoken of and defined through recurring aphorisms or maxims intended to present them as a uniform, unified genos with standard characteristics (especially in the field of politics and ethics — despotic and slavish, cowardly, lawless, luxurious and self-indulgent, unsophisticated). By extension, the Greeks are supposed to form a uniform, unified genos with the opposite, or at least substantially different, features. These maxims, however, by their very nature and texture, may be manipulated in widely different ways and confer much different meanings, depending on the context into which they are incorporated (which is not very surprising). The aspect that mostly interests us here is that these recurring bits and pieces, these “morsels” of barbarism, often end up highlighting some degree of fragmentation of the Greeks, both in terms of their self-perception and in terms of their inter-relationships. We might mention only two examples out of many, which show how these anti-barbarian aphorisms may expressively highlight (contradictory) “fragments” or morsels of the Self, even in contexts that do not involve barbarian characters or actual encounters between Greeks and barbarians. The first, and more indirect, example is Agamemnon’s stated refusal to be treated like a barbarian (or a woman or a god) in the much-discussed tapestry scene of Aeschylus’ Agamemnon. Upon his long-awaited return to Argos as the

 30 See further Porter 1994. 31 See also Long 1986, 132. 32 For the play’s “subheroic” world as whole see suggestively Saïd 2002, 83.

  Efstathia Papadodima triumphant king/conqueror, Agamemnon is quick to reject Clytemnestra’s exhortations to enter the palace by treading upon the fine garments that she has strewed for him. Agamemnon is, after all, unlike his defeated rival, Priam, as both he and his wife portray, or imagine, the Trojan king (918–925). Whether this is a covert reference to Priam’s barbarian, “Eastern” identity or it more generically defines the latter’s status as a (i.e. another) great king, Agamemnon supposedly consolidates and affirms his own core identity, rooted in timeless and stable, “coherent” convictions and values, through his contrast to that abstract, “fleeting” Other. Yet, in the tapestry scene, what Agamemnon very soon does is act like the imaginary Priam. 33 What is more, the play as a whole problematizes the Achaeans’ decisions and way of carrying themselves in relation to the war (Agamemnon’s decision to sacrifice his daughter [218–247, especially 221–225] combined with his very choice to pursue a large-scale military enterprise for the sake of an ἀλλότρια woman [427– 474, 799–804]; the victors’ speculated sacrilege after their victory [338–347; cf. 527–528]), or even implicitly aligns Achaeans and Trojans in their questionable or transgressive conduct (e.g. 763–781). In the end, as nets had bound Troy (357– 361), so Agamemnon will be brought down by the nets woven at home (1115–1117, 1516–1517, 1382–1383). This is not simply to say that Achaeans and Trojans are presumed to be, or are presented as being, at fault about major affairs and aspects of their contact/confrontation. Rather, it suggests that there may be no quintessential, or more essential and constitutive, identity-factors that distinguish Achaeans and Trojans, despite the Greek world’s possible attempt(s) to define itself on that basis. The second example, which points to the reality of intra-Hellenic differentiation and fragmentation highlighted through a passing anti-barbarian aphorism, is Demophon’s denunciation of the herald’s conduct in Euripides’ Children of Heracles (one of the so-called “Athenocentric” plays). Expelled by their homeland and pursued by the Argive Eurystheus, Heracles’ noble offspring find refuge at Marathon, where the Athenian king Demophon (“the voice of the people”) appears inclined to offer them protection. 34 Upon showing up, the Argive herald  33 Comparably, Agamemnon’s heated rhetoric about the quintessential slavishness of barbarians in Eur. IA, famously taken up by Iphigenia herself — an aphorism supposed to reduce barbarians to a stereotypical, one-sided “shadow/morsel” of an entity — leads to some interesting “splits” in his own image. In the same play, Agamemnon himself is repeatedly depicted as/compared to a “slave” by his fellow-Greeks (450, 511, 514, 1012, 1271–1273; cf. his own words about his envying the position of his own slave [16–19]), while he is mocked on account of his Lydian origin (from the unimportant Sypilus, a barbarian πόλισμα [952–954]). 34 See, more broadly, Tzanetou 2012.

Barbarism and Fragmentation in Fifth-Century Tragedy  

threatens to forcefully seize the suppliants from the altar. Demophon, in response, characterizes the herald as one who acts like a barbarian, even though his clothing and garments make it obvious that he is Greek (130–131) 35 — and although respect for suppliants is presented as a universal imperative or standard in classical literature, a rule supposed to unite humankind. 36 Demophon’s remark highlights a disparity between appearance, external features or markers, and conduct or moral quality, or rather projects the Greekbarbarian contrast onto that disparity. It seems that Athens’ image is “constructed” through the city’s expressed opposition to the barbarian world, on the one hand, but also to the city of Argos (represented by the insolent herald and the “tyrannical” Eurystheus, as primarily construed by the herald). 37 Demophon’s remark thus ultimately highlights the Greek world’s fragmentation and divisions or tensions, here concerning city-states of a different political mindset or values. Beyond Argos itself, Athens is presented as the city that is willing to offer what other Greek cities had refused, that is, just treatment (305–306). Athenian life is allegedly governed and distinguished by three fundamental principles or ideals, namely equality and collective decision-making (423–424), freedom or autonomy (62, 113, 198, 244–245, 286–287, 423–424, 957), and justice (e.g. 329–332, 901–909). Likewise, in Euripides’ Suppliants, Theseus (following Aethra) defends Athens’ democratic ideals, and actually the “laws of Hellas”, which seem to be equated with the “laws of mortals”, against the Theban herald (433–455), even though “barbarism” does not enter the scene.

 Brief Conclusion I have, somewhat boldly, attempted to approach “fragmentation” and “fragments” in two ways. More obviously, by co-examining a few extant and/vs fragmentary plays or contexts which might offer insights into the Greek-barbarian (actual or conceptual) interaction (Part 1). Much more loosely, by showing that the inherently “fragmented” status and image of tragic barbarians as a whole (as I take it to be) says something about the Greeks’ possible (and often seemingly  35 In his determination to drag the suppliants by force the herald apparently resembles the truly barbarian herald in Aeschylus’ Suppliants, whose conduct is condemned by both the city of Argos and his own compatriots (the Danaïds), and whose barbarism is (partly) utilized precisely as a means of stressing the need for respecting universal conventions. 36 Cf. Hdt. 1.137.2; Xen. Mem. 4.4.19–20; Eur. IT 1173–1174. 37 See Yoon 2012, 113.

  Efstathia Papadodima conscious) search for some unity and coherence in self-definition — both on an individual and on an intra-state level (Part 2). Judging from fifth-century tragic production (and as the poets themselves seemed to realize), the “fragmented” Other might come some way, but does not quite manage to create a unified, coherent Self.

Bibliography Bacon, H. (1961), Barbarians in Greek Tragedy, New Haven. Burnett, A.P. (1977), “Trojan Women and the Ganymede Ode”, YCS 25, 291–316. Coo, L. (2013), “A Tale of Two Sisters: Studies in Sophocles’ Tereus”, TAPA 143, 349–384. Croally, N. (1994), Euripidean Polemic. The Trojan Women and the Function of Tragedy, Cambridge. Finglass, P.J. (2016), “A New Fragment of Sophocles’ Tereus”, ZPE 200, 61–85. Finglass, P.J. (2016), “Mistaken Identity in Euripides’ Ino”, in: P. Kyriakou/A. Rengakos (eds) (2016), Wisdom and Folly in Euripides, Berlin/Boston, 299–315. Fitzpatrick, D. (2001), “Sophocles’ Tereus”, CQ 51, 90–101. Hall, E. (1989), Inventing the Barbarian: Greek Self-Definition through Tragedy, Oxford. Hall, J. (1997), Ethnic Identity in Greek Antiquity, Cambridge. Hall, J. (2002), Hellenicity. Between Ethnicity and Culture, Chicago/London. Harrison, T. (ed.) (2002), Greeks and Barbarians, Edinburgh. Karamanou, I. (ed.) (2017), Euripides: Alexandros, Berlin/Boston. Liapis, V./Petrides, A. (eds) (2018), Greek Tragedy After the Fifth Century, Cambridge. Long, T. (1986), Barbarians in Greek Comedy, Carbondale. March, J. (2003), “Sophocles’ Tereus and Euripides’ Medea”, in: A. Sommerstein (ed.) (2003), Shards from Kolonos. Studies in Sophoclean Fragments (le Rane Collana di Studi e Testi 34), Bari, 139–161. Mattison, K. (2009), Recasting Troy in Fifth-Century Attic Tragedy, PhD diss., University of Toronto. McInerney, J. (2001), “Ethnos and Ethnicity in Early Greece”, in: I. Malkin (ed.) (2001), Ancient Perceptions of Greek Ethnicity, Center for Hellenic Studies Colloquia, 5, Cambridge MA, 51–73. Miller, M. (1997), Athens and Persia in the Fifth Century BC: A Study in Cultural Receptivity, Cambridge. Milo, D. (2008), Il Tereo di Sofocle (Bibliotheca Antiqua 2), Naples. Mitchell, L. (2006), “Greeks and Barbarians in Aeschylus’ Suppliants”, G&R 53, 205–223. Mossman, J. (1995), Wild Justice. A Study of Euripides’ Hecuba, Oxford. Newton, R.M. (1985), “Ino in Euripides’ Medea”, AJP 106, 496–502. Papadodima, E. (2013), Foreignness Negotiated. Conceptual and Ethical Aspects of the GreekBarbarian Distinction in Fifth-Century Literature, Hildesheim. Porter, J.R. (1994), Studies in Euripides’ Orestes, Leiden/Boston. Saïd, S. (2002), “Greeks and Barbarians in Euripides’ Tragedies. The End of Differences?”, in: T. Harrison (ed.) (2002), Greeks and Barbarians, Edinburgh, 62–100.

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Sommerstein, A.H./Fitzpatrick, D./Talboy, T. (2006), Sophocles. Selected Fragmentary Plays. Volume I. Hermione, Polyxene, The Diners, Tereus, Troilus, Phaedra, Oxford. Tzanetou, A. (2012), City of Suppliants. Tragedy and the Athenian Empire, Austin. Wright, M. (2016), The Lost Plays of Greek Tradedy, vol. I, London. Yoon, F. (2012), The Use of Anonymous Characters in Greek Tragedy, Leiden/Boston.



Part III: Fragmented Comedy

Michele Napolitano

Epicharmus, Odysseus Automolos: Some Marginal Remarks on frr. 97 and 98 K–A Given the impressive number of problems posed by the two extraordinary papyrus fragments of the Odysseus Automolos of Epicharmus that I am going to deal with (frr. 97 and 98 K–A) and the considerable amount of literature that has accumulated over the years on the subject, I will limit myself to addressing, step by step, some specific details. There are three questions I would like to focus on, among them: a) In which epic hypotext should the model reused by Epicharmus for his comedy be identified? b) Who does Odysseus converse with in the verses corresponding, today, to fr. 97 K–A? c) How should the title transmitted by the ancient sources for the comedy be understood, and, in particular, what sense should we attribute to the adjective automolos? A short concluding section will be devoted to some more general remarks regarding the meaning and function of paraepic in Epicharmus. To begin, just a few words regarding what survives of the comedy: five short fragments preserved by later writers, among which only fr. 99 K–A is taken briefly into consideration in this paper, and two fragments which survive in a direct tradition, 97 and 98 K–A, which we owe to two distinct papyri, both traceable back to the second century AD. The first one, the Vienna papyrus 2321, from the collection of the Archduke Rainer, published in 1889 by Theodor Gomperz, comes from a commented edition of Epicharmus and preserves fr. 97.7–17 K–A as well as seven lines of commentary, in the upper margin (CGFP 83 = PCG I, 60–61). The second one is P.Oxy. 2429, published by Lobel in 1959 in The Oxyrhynchus Papyri XXV (CGFP 84 = PCG I, 62–67). This second papyrus preserves what survives of an ancient hypomnema on Epicharmus proceeding perhaps by continuous lemmata. The Oxyrhynchus papyrus, which coincides partially with the text transmitted by the Vienna papyrus (fr. 97.7–10 K–A), aside from adding portions of text belonging to the context immediately preceding the verses preserved by the

 This work is part of the research project DISIECTA MEMBRA (II), funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (ref. FFI2017–83315–C2–1–P). https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-018

  Michele Napolitano Vienna papyrus, confirms the brilliant attribution of the text to the Odysseus Automolos of Epicharmus as proposed by Gomperz in 1889 (line 68 of fr. 98 K–A preserves, though partially, fr. 99.3–4 K–A, attributed by the source, Athenaeus, to the Odysseus Automolos). Moreover, the Oxyrhynchus papyrus makes clear that the scene partially preserved in the two papyri belongs not to a monologue, as had been suggested by Gomperz, but to a dialogue between Odysseus and an anonymous interlocutor, on whose identity scholars are divided. To this we must now add a small papyrus fragment edited by Jean Lenaerts in 2012 (PBerol. 21355 = BKT X 10) coming from the same roll to which the Rainer papyrus belonged and containing remnants of the same comedy (the beginning of twelve trochaic tetrameters accompanied by scanty commentary notes in the lower margin of the papyrus). The dialogical setting has led the editor to put forth the hypothesis that the lines could belong to the same scene transmitted by the Vienna papyrus. 1 Although the very poor state of preservation of the text does not allow any progress in the overall reconstruction of the comedy, at least one detail, in the Berlin papyrus, may prove valuable. Let’s start from the problem of the epic material reworked by Epicharmus. Until 1959, that is until the publication, by Edgar Lobel, of the remains of the ancient commentary on the comedy contained in P.Oxy. 2429, now fr. 98 K–A, the epic model of Epicharmus’ comedy had almost exclusively been recognized in the episode of Odysseus’ mission to Troy disguised as a beggar. In Aristotle’s Poetics this is given the title Ptocheia, alluding to the rags worn by Odysseus for his disguise. 2 The episode has no place in the Iliad, but in the Odyssey it is the focus of the story told by Helen, at Sparta, to her husband Menelaus and his guests, Telemachus and Pisistratus:

 1 Lenaerts 2012, 52. 2 Gomperz 1889, 3 (= Gomperz 1912, 147–149), immediately followed by Blass 1889, 257: “Gegenstand dieses Stückes war die bereits in der Odyssee (δ 242 ff.) erzählte Geschichte, wie Odysseus sich als Bettler verkleidet in Troja einschleicht und Kundschaft von dort zurückbringt”. But the identification of the epic model of Epicharmus’ comedy in the Ptocheia had already been proposed before the publication of the Vienna papyrus (Hermann 1802, 170; Grysar 1828, 288–289; Welcker 1844, 296; Schmidt 1888, 379) and has found supporters even after the publication of the Oxyrhynchus papyrus. This despite the idea, advanced by Lobel 1959, 41–42, that the epic hypotext of the comedy should have been recognized not in the odyssean Ptocheia but in the iliadic Doloneia (for a good overview see Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén 1996, 76–78). See for example Olivieri 1930, 31; Page 1950, 195; Stanford 1950, 168; Phillips 1959, 60, and, after the publication of P.Oxy. 2429, Berk 1964, 150; Casolari 2003, 47–48; Olson 2007, 47–48; Jouanno 2012, 251; Lenaerts 2012, 56; Favi 2017, 18 and passim. As for Willi’s approach to the problem see Willi 2008, 184–185; Willi 2012, 69 (and cf. infra).

Epicharmus, Odysseus Automolos: Some Marginal Remarks on frr. 97 and 98 K–A  

αὐτόν μιν πληγῇσιν ἀεικελίῃσι δαμάσσας, σπεῖρα κάκ᾽ ἀμφ᾽ ὤμοισι βαλών, οἰκῆϊ ἐοικώς, ἀνδρῶν δυσμενέων κατέδυ πόλιν εὐρυάγυιαν. ἄλλῳ δ᾽ αὐτὸν φωτὶ κατακρύπτων ἤϊσκε Δέκτῃ, ὃς οὐδὲν τοῖος ἔην ἐπὶ νηυσὶν Ἀχαιῶν· τῷ ἴκελος κατέδυ Τρώων πόλιν, οἱ δ᾽ ἀβάκησαν πάντες· ἐγὼ δέ μιν οἴη ἀνέγνων τοῖον ἐόντα καί μιν ἀνειρώτευν· ὁ δὲ κερδοσύνῃ ἀλέεινεν. ἀλλ᾽ ὅτε δή μιν ἐγὼ λόεον καὶ χρῖον ἐλαίῳ, ἀμφὶ δὲ εἵματα ἕσσα καὶ ὤμοσα καρτερὸν ὅρκον, μὴ μὲν πρὶν Ὀδυσῆα μετὰ Τρώεσσ᾽ ἀναφῆναι, πρίν γε τὸν ἐς νῆάς τε θοὰς κλισίας τ᾽ ἀφικέσθαι, καὶ τότε δή μοι πάντα νόον κατέλεξεν Ἀχαιῶν. πολλοὺς δὲ Τρώων κτείνας ταναήκεϊ χαλκῷ ἦλθε μετ᾽ Ἀργείους, κατὰ δὲ φρόνιν ἤγαγε πολλήν. 3 (Od. 4.244–258)

The fact that the Ptocheia is to be considered among the models of the Odysseus Automolos is suggested by a series of clues: a) Although the sixth verse of fr. 97 K–A, οὐ γὰρ ἔμπα[λίν] χ᾽ἀνύσαιμ᾽οὕτως ἀλοιῆσθαι κακόν, admits two different translations, depending on whether we punctuate before or after οὕτως, 4 the distinction drawn by the ancient commentator between true beatings and simulated beatings at fr. 98.41–42 K–A in relation to fr. 97.6 K–A (κατ᾽ ἀλή]θειαν καὶ μὴ προσποιήτως ἀλοι–/ῆσθαι, “to be beaten for real and not just for show”) only makes sense if we believe that the beatings that  3 Od. 4.244–258. For Helen in the Odyssey see Clader 1976, 24–40; as for the Ptocheia, one of the most recent treatments is De Sanctis 2017, 214–224 (however, for the epic traditions concerning the spying mission of Odysseus to Troy, as well as their survival in later literature, especially in tragedy, see also Fantuzzi 1996). As far as we know, the story was narrated at length in the Little Iliad (Ilias Parva arg. 1, 15–17 Bernabé [= Procl. Chrest. 206 Severyns] Ὀδυσσεύς τε αἰκισάμενος ἑαυτὸν κατάσκοπος εἰς Ἴλιον παραγίνεται, καὶ ἀναγνωρισθεὶς ὑφ᾽ Ἑλένης περὶ τῆς ἁλώσεως τῆς πόλεως συντίθεται κτείνας τέ τινας τῶν Τρώων ἐπὶ τὰς ναῦς ἀφικνεῖται; fr. 6 Bernabé; fr. 7 Bernabé [= schol. Lycoph. Alex. 780, 246, 25–29 Scheer] ὁ Ὀδυσσεὺς βουλόμενος κατάσκοπος εἰσελθεῖν εἰς τὴν Ἴλιον καὶ φοβούμενος μὴ νοηθεὶς ἀποθάνῃ ἔπεισε Θόαντα πληγῶσαι αὐτὸν πληγαῖς βιαίαις πρὸς τὸ γενέσθαι ἀγνώριστον). On the significant role played by Odysseus in the surviving fragments of the Little Iliad see Kelly 2015, 324. 4 “If the stop is put after οὕτως, the sense will be, ‘I’m not inclined just to go back to the camp. For to get a thrashing is unpleasant’. If after ἀνύσαιμι, it will be, ‘I’m not inclined to go back to camp. For a thrashing is unpleasant and no mistake’” (Lobel 1959, 41, ad 15 seqq.; Webster in Pickard-Cambridge 1962, 256, punctuating after οὕτως, translated as follows: “I could not go back thus. It is bad to be thrashed”). Cf. P.Oxy. 2429 fr. I (a) ii + I (b) 16 = fr. 98, 37 K–A περ]ὶ τὴν διαστολὴν ἀμφιβολία εἶναι.

  Michele Napolitano Odysseus either inflicted on himself (Od. 4.244; Ilias Parva arg. 1, 15 Bernabé), or received from others (Thoas, for example, as in the version of Ilias Parva fr. 7 Bernabé), 5 to make his disguise more effective, actually played some role in the comedy. 6 Fake beatings, evidently, when compared to the real beatings that Odysseus was destined to take from the Achaeans had he decided to return to the camp without carrying out the mission entrusted to him; b) The fact that at fr. 97.14 K–A Odysseus complains about not being able to penetrate Troy (μολὼν ἐς ἄστυ) clarifies the content of the assignment received from the Achaean leaders before leaving the camp – an assignment, completely unrelated with the nocturnal exploration of the Trojan camp that is the topic of the iliadic Doloneia, which implies, instead, the entrance into the city, the penetration of the Trojan walls. The Berlin papyrus published by Lenaerts in 2012 and coming, as mentioned above, from the same roll as the Vienna papyrus, though badly preserved, nevertheless offers a valuable piece of information: the sequence εἰσιόντα [...] ἐς Τροία[ν (ll. 1–2). Whoever was speaking, whatever the lost context of which the verse was originally part, the sequence seems to confirm that Odysseus’ mission foresaw the entrance into the city; c) In 1962, Webster suggested the possibility that the sequence σπειρα at fr. 98.9 K–A might have to do with the σπεῖρα, the “rags” worn by Odysseus for his disguise as a beggar, evoked by Helen at Od. 4.245: “σπεῖρα is the word used of Odysseus’ rags in the Ptocheia (δ 245) but it may be a rope here and have some connection with the basket”, 7 that is to say with the mysterious φορμον of l. 16, in which the name of the playwright Phormos/Phormis or, in fact, the basket (φορμός) evoked by Webster could be hidden. Nevertheless, I think that, at least in this particular case, Webster showed himself far too cautious: given the relative rarity of the lemma, it is difficult to consider as pure coincidence the identity of the sequence σπειρα preserved in the papyrus with the word used by Helen to describe the rags used by Odysseus for his disguise. But there is more to it than that. If we consider the line as a whole, that is the sequence σπειρα, then the five unreadable, or missing, letters after σπειρα, and the sequence φω at the end of the line (σπειρα . [. . .] . φω), an integration comes to my mind (an integration  5 Precisely on the basis of Ilias Parva fr. 7 Bernabé the anonymous interlocutor of Odysseus in the fragment of Epicharmus has been identified with Thoas by Casolari 2003, 43 n. 6 (see also Konstantakos 2015, 67). 6 See for example Kerkhof 2001, 126: “Es ist also unabhängig von der Richtigkeit dieser Interpunktion vorauszusetzen, daß der Sprecher bei früherer Gelegenheit sich selbst geschlagen hat, wohl, wie man dem Titel nach vermuten darf, um sein Überlaufen zu beglaubigen”. See also Favi 2017, 20. 7 Webster 1962, 86.

Epicharmus, Odysseus Automolos: Some Marginal Remarks on frr. 97 and 98 K–A  

which, to my knowledge, has never been proposed before) that might at least be considered plausible: μοισι]

σπεῖρα κ̣[άκ᾽ ἀ]μ̣φ᾽ ὤ-/

That is the beginning of v. 245 of the fourth book of the Odyssey. 8 An integration which, if my hypothesis is correct, would not only remove any residual doubt as to whether the Ptocheia was among the epic sources Epicharmus drew from for his comedy, but would also suggest that the epic model had been reproduced with some fidelity to detail and had included, besides the beatings, Odysseus’ disguise as a beggar. 9  8 In this regard, it is worth underlining the fact that the ancient commentator quotes several times verses from Homer in the course of his commentary: cf. fr. 98 K–A, 83 (Il. 10.511); 126 (Od. 18.74); 129 (Od. 19.446). 9 As already mentioned above, in 1959, in a commentary note on his edition of the Oxyrhynchus papyrus, Lobel suggested that the anonymous interlocutor of Odysseus could be Diomedes and that Epicharmus might have had the Doloneia at hand rather than the Ptocheia. In this regard, Lobel stressed the points of contact between the speech given by Nestor at Il. 10.204 ff. and fr. 97, 11–16 K–A (a combination that has found considerable success in subsequent studies: see, just to mention a few examples, Webster in Pickard-Cambridge 1962, 255–256; Salomone 1981, 63; Albini 1986, 16–17, and Cassio 2002, 76): “The language recalls Il. X 205–12 (κλέος θεῖον : ὑπουράνιον κλέος, ]ν μολὼν ἐς ἄστυ : μετὰ Τρῶας μεγαθύμους ἐλθεῖν, πάντα δ᾽ εὖ σαφα[|]γεῖλαι τὰ τηνεῖ καὐτὸς ἀσκηθὴς μ[ : ταῦτά κε πάντα πύθοιτο καὶ ἂψ εἰς ἡμέας ἔλθοι ἀσκηθής), from Nestor’s speech proposing to send spies into the Trojan camp” (Lobel 1959, 42). Now, when it comes to archaic epics, I confess that I always tend to be wary of proposals aiming at identifying precise intertextual relationships on the basis of lexical similarities, given the formulaic, highly standardized nature of the epic verbal texture. For example: in the use of the adjective ἀσκηθής at fr. 97.16 K–A is it really necessary to see, as Lobel wanted, a precise echo of Il. 10.212, when the adjective ἀσκηθής occurs three times in the Odyssey in a formulaic verse (Od. 5.144 ὥς κε μάλ᾽ ἀσκηθὴς ἣν πατρίδα γαῖαν ἵκηται; 168 ὥς κε μάλ᾽ ἀσκηθὴς σὴν πατρίδα γαῖαν ἵκηαι and in slight variation 9.79 καί νύ κεν ἀσκηθὴς ἱκόμην ἐς πατρίδα γαῖαν, where Odysseus speaks) which serves to signify, in relation to Odysseus, the idea of returning safe and sound to the homeland? Even if here it is a matter of returning unharmed not to Ithaca but to the Achaean camp, I would not rule out the possibility that the epic memory of Epicharmus, reusing ἀσκηθής, ran not to the Nestor of the Doloneia but to the verse with which, in the Odyssey, the wish for a lucky return is expressed precisely in relation to Odysseus. Moreover, not all the points of contact highlighted by Lobel are convincing in the same way (Favi 2017, 23–25, makes very good observations on this point): for example, μολὼν ἐς ἄστυ (fr. 97.14 K–A) means something very different from μετὰ Τρῶας μεγαθύμους / ἐλθεῖν (Il. 10.205 ff.), which indicates not the entrance into the city, but the nocturnal open-air mission to the Trojan camp that is the focus of the enterprise of Odysseus and Diomedes. That being said, I do not want to deny too bluntly the possibility that Lobel’s proposal could be correct. It can be assumed that Epicharmus, while keeping in mind as the main source

  Michele Napolitano According to Andreas Willi, whose recent attempt at reconstruction I will try to summarize in brief, the title of the comedy, Odysseus Automolos, must be interpreted by imagining that Odysseus was presented by Epicharmus as a true deserter: “Wer den Titel Ὀδυσσεὺς αὐτόμολος unvoreingenommen liest, wird nämlich niemals auf den Gedanken kommen, Odysseus habe sich hier nur als Überläufer ausgegeben. Unter einem Ὀδυσσεὺς αὐτόμολος wird man sich viel eher einen Odysseus vorstellen, der tatsächlich übergelaufen ist. Sobald wir dies zugestehen, können wir auf einmal alle Puzzleteilchen problemlos ineinanderfügen”. 10 Odysseus, gone over to the enemy, would have been relegated by the Trojans to the role of swineherd, as it seems possible to infer from fr. 99 K–A, if the persona loquens was Odysseus: δέλφακά τε τῶν γειτόνων τοῖς Ἐλευσινίοις φυλάσσων δαιμονίως ἀπώλεσα, οὐχ ἑκών· καὶ ταῦτα δή με συμβολατεύειν μ᾽ ἔφα τοῖς Ἀχαιοῖσιν προδιδόμειν τ᾽ ὤμνυέ με τὸν δέλφακα. 11 (Epicharm. fr. 99 K–A)

The beatings of which Odysseus complains at fr. 97.4–6 K–A should be seen, according to Willi, as the punishment inflicted on him by his unknown interlocutor, evidently a Trojan, for the loss of the δέλφαξ. Odysseus, afraid of the reaction of the Achaeans on his return to the camp, declares his intention to prepare a speech to be held in their presence in order to convince them that he had successfully carried out the mission. But since his unknown antagonist continues to mock him (fr. 97.9–10 K–A), all that remains to the poor, discouraged Odysseus is to take  of the comedy the story told in the so-called Ptocheia, could have contaminated it with other epic sources, among which it is perfectly natural to think that the Doloneia may have played some role. Something similar, in short, to what we see happening in Apollodorus (Epit. 5.13 Ὀδυσσεὺς δὲ μετὰ Διομήδους παραγενόμενος νύκτωρ εἰς τὴν πόλιν Διομήδην μὲν αὐτοῦ μένειν εἴα, αὐτὸς δὲ ἑαυτὸν αἰκισάμενος καὶ πενιχρὰν στολὴν ἐνδυσάμενος ἀγνώστως εἰς τὴν πόλιν εἰσέρχεται ὡς ἐπαίτης. γνωρισθεὶς δὲ ὑπὸ Ἑλένης δι᾽ ἐκείνης τὸ παλλάδιον ἐκκλέψας καὶ πολλοὺς κτείνας τῶν φυλασσόντων ἐπὶ τὰς ναῦς μετὰ Διομήδους κομίζει), where the two stories appear overlapping and reduced to a single event, and Odysseus leaves for Troy not alone but in the company of Diomedes. If this were the case, it would not be implausible to recognize precisely Diomedes as the unknown interlocutor of Odysseus. 10 Willi 2008, 184f.; see also Willi 2012, 69. We owe the fragment to Athenaeus (9.374 D–E): for Athenaeus as source of Epicharmus see, most recently, Tosetti 2019. 11 “Tending one of the neighbours’ pigs for the Eleusinia I lost it by bad luck, against my will; and so he now said I was making a deal with the Achaeans and he claimed I was selling the pig” (translation by Willi 2012, 70).

Epicharmus, Odysseus Automolos: Some Marginal Remarks on frr. 97 and 98 K–A  

note of the failure of the enterprise and complain of it in the impressive monologue contained at fr. 97.11–17 K–A. Among the main problems posed by this reconstruction, I would isolate the interpretation of the very difficult vv. 9–10 of fr. 97 K–A ] ἐμὶν δοκεῖτε πάγχυ καὶ κατὰ τρόπον / καὶ ἐοικότως ἐπεύξασθ᾽, αἴ τις ἐνθυμεῖν γ[α λῆι. In Willi’s opinion, the prayer Odysseus’ interlocutor ironically refers to in the verses in question should be put in relation to the event evoked in fr. 99 K–A: faced with the looming danger (the Achaeans are coming!), Odysseus would have prayed for his salvation, but his Trojan antagonist would have misunderstood the meaning of his prayer, imagining that it aimed, instead, at obtaining a favourable way out of the difficult situation caused by the involuntary loss of the δέλφαξ: “The speaker in the Athenaeus fragment may still be Odysseus who, upon deserting to Troy, appears to have been given the despicable job of a swineherd. After innocently losing one animal Odysseus fails to appease his Trojan employer who develops a conspiracy theory and suspects a deal between his new servant and the latter’s Greek compatriots — hence the beating” (Willi 2012, 70). A scenario which seems to me far too speculative, starting from the overall interpretation of fr. 99 K–A, which, even if we consider it pronounced by Odysseus, could very well describe a contingent situation instead of the stable, servile condition of a swineherd. That is, Odysseus could have been entrusted by the “neighbours” (γείτονες) evoked at v. 1 with the custody of a δέλφαξ, proving then incapable of keeping his word because of unexpected, unfortunate divine intervention (2: δαιμονίως): a situation apparently similar to that complained of, perhaps by Heracles, in fr. 66 K–A (Ἡρακλῆς ὁ πὰρ Φόλωι) ἀλλὰ μὰν ἐγὼν ἀνάγκαι πάντα ταῦτα ποιέω· / οἴομαι δ᾽ οὐδεὶς ἑκὼν πονηρὸς οὐδ᾽ ἄταν ἔχων (“But I of necessity do all these things. I think no one of his own free will suffers misery or disaster” [transl. Pickard-Cambridge 1962, 264]), 12 which, I repeat, does not lead us to the assumption that Odysseus was framed in a servile role. As for vv. 9–10 of fr. 97 K–A, I wonder if it would not be more reasonable to interpret them independently from every possible relationship with fr. 99 K–A and to refer them to a prayer addressed by Odysseus on the eve of the enterprise. Archaic epics preserve a great number of examples of propitiatory prayers addressed to the gods in the imminence of war, the most fitting of these, relating to the situation staged by Epicharmus, being undoubtedly the prayers offered by

 12 “Eracle esprime anche l’umanità dolente di chi si vorrebbe sottrarre alle proprie faticose responsabilità, pur sapendo che non è possibile, quando in un momento di sincerità, confessa (probabilmente a Folo): ‘ma io compio tutte queste imprese per necessità’ e prosegue: οἴομαι δ᾽ οὐδεὶς ἑκὼν πονηρὸς οὐδ᾽ ἄταν ἔχων” (Salomone 1981, 60). See also Copani 2009, 73–74.

  Michele Napolitano Odysseus and Diomedes to Athena, in the heart of the night, just before moving towards the Trojan camp (Il. 10.277–295). Without necessarily thinking of a relationship of direct dependence between the two texts, a good, although less obvious, further parallel is offered by the long and articulated prayer to Athena by Odysseus, about to move to Troy, at vv. 6–22 of the anonymous poetic text preserved in PKöln VI 245, a sequence of iambic trimeters that probably opened a late Hellenistic or early Roman stage version of the epic Ptocheia. 13 Just a couple of words about the second person plural δοκεῖτε at fr. 97.9 K–A, which remains highly problematic (“The greatest crux of the fragment”: Konstantakos 2015, 70 n. 78). My impression is that it would be worth reconsidering the possibility that the sequence should be read as it was by Gomperz and Blass, namely δοκεῖ τε (the first to print δοκεῖτε was, as far as I know, Kaibel in his edition of the Vienna fragment [Kaibel 1899, 108], followed by all subsequent scholars, the only exception known to me being Stanford 1950, 167). If this is right, then πάγχυ should be linked to the adverb swallowed up by the lacuna at the beginning of the verse (μέτριόν γ᾽ Barigazzi 1955, 126; μετρίως Webster in PCG I, 61 ad loc.), and the enclitic τε to the immediately following καὶ (τε ... καὶ): which seems to me perfectly plausible, while the absence of a second person singular personal pronoun in the accusative as subject of the infinitive clause dependent on the impersonal δοκεῖ might be a not insurmountable obstacle. A good clue in favor of an impersonal δοκεῖ is to be seen, however, in the annotation of the ancient commentator at fr. 98.52–54 K–A, τ]οῦθ᾽ ὁ ἕτερος τῶν ὑποκριτῶν / ]ηι εἰσόδωι εὐξαμένου τινὰ / ] . ἐοικότως ὡς ἐμὶν δοκεῖ, 14 where in the singular εὐξαμένου it is difficult to see anyone other than Odysseus. If this were the case, at fr. 97.9–10 K–A Odysseus’ interlocutor would be caught in the act of mocking him, in a

 13 Edition and commentary of the text in Parca 1991. 14 The δοκεῖ-/τε] printed by Lobel in the editio princeps of the papyrus (Lobel 1959, 37) is in no way necessary (pace Gentili 1961, 337, where “scolio Viennese” is of course wrong for “scolio ossirinchita”), dependent, as it is, on the δοκεῖτε of the Vienna papyrus, which can however, as I have just said, be interpreted as Gomperz and Blass did, namely as δοκεῖ τε. Luppe 1975, 197 suggested the possibility of reading δοκεῖ at the end of l. 54 of the Oxyrhynchus commentary. But in the context of an overall interpretation that nevertheless assumed the correctness of the δοκεῖτε preferred since Kaibel by the editors of the text of the fragment (“Es ist […] zu erwägen, ob nicht an dieser Stelle lediglich die Konstruktion paraphrasiert wird, z. B.: - - - καὶ κατὰ τρόπον κα]ὶ ἐοικότως, ὡς ἐμὶν δοκεῖ, | [σὺ καὶ οἱ μετὰ σοῦ ἐπεύχεσθε. Denn die Anrede im Plural wird wohl ohnehin im Sinne von ‘du und deinesgleichen’ zu verstehen sein”). As far as I can see, there are no substantial obstacles to reading δοκεῖ τε everywhere, namely in the Vienna papyrus as well as in ll. 51 and 54 of the Oxyrhynchus papyrus, where a choice should be made between the two options (either in both cases δοκεῖτε or, as it seems preferable to me, in both cases δοκεῖ τε).

Epicharmus, Odysseus Automolos: Some Marginal Remarks on frr. 97 and 98 K–A  

clearly sarcastic tone, 15 for the bad turn of events: “the prayers you have addressed so properly to the gods have gone really well!”. If we accept the reconstruction offered exempli gratia by Luppe 1975, 196, for fr. 98.52–53 K–A: τ]οῦθ᾽ ὁ ἕτερος τῶν ὑποκριτῶν / λέγει μεμνημένος (vel ἀκούσας τοῦ) ᾽Οδυσσέως ἐν τ]ῆι εἰσόδωι εὐξαμένου τινὰ, then the prayer addressed by Odysseus “at the moment of his first entry on stage” (ἐν τ]ῆι εἰσόδωι) should be placed in the initial section of the comedy, since it is impossible to imagine that Odysseus made his first appearance on stage too late in a piece that saw him in the role of protagonist. This prayer would have been addressed to the gods just before the beginning of the mission, and would therefore have been in all respects similar to those raised by Odysseus and Diomedes in the tenth book of the Iliad or to that documented in the Cologne papyrus. A situation that, if rightly reconstructed, would render much more plausible the idea that Odysseus’ unknown interlocutor was a Greek rather than a Trojan (how could a Trojan refer to a prayer formulated by Odysseus while he was still marching for Troy?). But it is clear that, beyond any problem of detail, the reconstruction proposed by Willi can only work when a series of assumptions are accepted that are far from certain. If one is ready to assume, in particular: a) that the verb ἀνιάω (fr. 97.4 K–A) should be considered equivalent to “verprügeln”, “hurt”, and that the attitude of the anonymous character who converses with Odysseus should be read in a key of open, declared hostility; 16 b) that the unknown speaker should therefore be imagined as an antagonist, an enemy, and should consequently be identified as a Trojan; and above all, c) that the desertion of Odysseus cannot be interpreted as a simulation, that is, that Odysseus was presented by Epicharmus not as a fake but as an authentic deserter and therefore as a traitor. As for the first point, ἀνιάω/ἀνιάζω relate much more to the sphere of moral, or spiritual, torment (“grief”, “distress”: LSJ9 s. vv.) than to that of physical evil: consequently, I cannot see how one should prefer a translation equivalent to “Why do you beat me?” to a rendering that could sound, for example, “Why do you torment me?” or similar. But if the parenthetical clause τί, ὠιζύρ᾽, ἀνιῆις; of v. 4 is to be rendered with “Why do you torment me, you miserable man?”, then it would become difficult, if not impossible, to subscribe to Willi’s idea that the

 15 “Gewiß ist diese Zwischenbemerkung höhnisch gemeint” (Luppe 1975, 197). 16 Willi’s translations of τί, ὠιζύρ᾽, ἀνιῆις; (fr. 97.4 K–A) sounds as follows: “warum tust du mir bloss so weh, du elender Kerl!” (Willi 2008, 178); “why are you hurting me, you idiot!?” (Willi 2012, 64); see also Willi 2008, 183: “Odysseus wird im Augenblick von einer anderen Person B, vielleicht einem Troianer, verprügelt”.

  Michele Napolitano sequence οὕτως ἀλοιῆσθαι κακόν of v. 6 should refer to the beatings that Odysseus had just received from his interlocutor: 17 the beatings that Odysseus says he is afraid of at v. 6 will rather be those that await him upon his arrival to the Achaean camp, to which he confesses, unsurprisingly, that he has no desire to return to (οὐ γὰρ ἔμπα[λιν] χ᾽ ἀνύσαιμ᾽). Regarding the second point, as I have already said, and even with all the caution of the case, it seems that the exchange between Odysseus and his interlocutor is characterized much more by irony and sarcasm than by a tone of open, even violent hostility. Why, for example, should one believe that the words at the end of fr. 97.5 K–A be pronounced by a “Widersacher”, 18 when it is, at the most, a laughing joke? Unfortunately, we know too little about the first six verses of fragment 97 K–A, but it is certainly not impossible (as it was suggested by Olson) 19 that some of what remains of the first three verses can be attributed not to Odysseus but to his interlocutor. For example, in πλ[άνον] at v. 1, glossed over by the anonymous commentator with πλάνην, φλυαρίαν, that is “error”, “nonsense” (fr. 98.28 K–A), and in the sequence ῥᾶιστά κα τοῦτ᾽ ἐργασαίμαν ἢ ὅτι of v. 3, “I would have been able to do this, or whatever else, without any effort”, one could see the remains of a series of rebukes: “you are not capable: what you did was nonsense, you have not been able to complete a mission that I would have been able to accomplish without any difficulty”. Perhaps it is precisely this treatment that Odysseus complains about in the parenthetical clause of v. 4: τί, ὠιζύρ᾽, ἀνιῆις, maybe with a hint of impatience (“you don’t know what you’re saying, you poor fool!”). 20 But his interlocutor mercilessly goes on mocking him despite  17 “So verprügelt zu werden ist schrecklich!” (Willi 2008, 182); see also Willi 2012, 67: “οὕτως ἀλοιῆσθαι κακόν ‘to be beaten like this is bad’ in line 6 is explained by the Oxyrhynchus commentary with κατ᾽ ἀλήθειαν καὶ μὴ προσποιήτως, ‘for real and not just for show’ […]. According to Kerkhof, Odysseus would be thinking of a future beating that might happen if the Greeks discovered that he did not go to Troy. However, οὕτως ‘in this way’ more naturally refers to a present beating. […] speaker B is in fact hurting Odysseus at the moment: note the present ἀνιῆις in line 4”. 18 Willi 2008, 181: “Nur ein Widersacher kann Odysseus als bezeichnen”; see also Willi 2012, 67: “A companion (such as Diomedes) would not call Odysseus πονηρός, but an adversary could well do it”. 19 “The tone is hostile (someone — presumably Odysseus — is accused of or warned against offering a misleading account of things (1) and behaving haughtily (2); cf. 4–5, 9–10), and the lines are better assigned to Odysseus’ interlocutor than to Odysseus himself” (Olson 2007, 48, ad 1–2). 20 The vocative (ὠιζύρ᾽) “is clearly more complicated than Engl. ‘you wretch!’ (LSJ on Av. 1641), but seems always to imply a superior knowledge or understanding in the speaker” (Dunbar 1995, 729, ad 1641). The same state of disappointed, annoyed impatience could perhaps help to explain the unexpected δεξιωτέροις of v. 8, a substitution παρὰ προσδοκίαν for “perfect fools” (Lobel

Epicharmus, Odysseus Automolos: Some Marginal Remarks on frr. 97 and 98 K–A  

the appearance of the Achaeans: “I am the most unhappy man on earth!”, exclaims Odysseus, to which his interlocutor replies: “Oh yes, you’re a poor man indeed!” (fr. 97.4–5 K–A ἀλλ᾽ ὁρέω […] / ὡς ἔω πονηρατος. (B.) ἁλιδίως πονηρὸς ), a joke which takes advantage of the semantic ambivalence of πονηρός. 21 If this is true, the ironic, sarcastic tone of the words addressed to Odysseus would once more suggest the possibility of identifying his interlocutor as a Greek rather than a Trojan. Would it not be possible, for example, to identify him as a Greek who arrived on stage at a certain moment in the course of the play in search of news and, put in front of Odysseus’s negligence, could not refrain from putting him in the pillory? Or shouldn’t we rather think, on the model of the Doloneia, of a fellow traveller (Diomedes?), who, after leaving Odysseus to his work in the first part of the comedy, and realizing, in the end, that the mission had not been fulfilled, denounced his cowardice with open and implacable sarcasm? As for the meaning of the title of the comedy, and in particular of the adjective αὐτόμολος, the problem has been dealt with at length, with remarkable insight and accuracy, in the paper that Federico Favi recently dedicated to the comedy. 22 Favi believes, as I do, that the desertion staged by Epicharmus was not a real desertion, a betrayal, but a simulated one. To the dense discussion of Favi I can perhaps add only a detail of lexical order regarding αὐτόμολος, αὐτομολέω, which recur several times to designate, precisely, acts of simulated desertion, as for example in the story of the mission of Zopirus wonderfully narrated by Herodotus in the third book of his Histories (Hdt. 3.154 ff.) or in the beautiful passage of Pausanias (4.28.7) about the capture of Elis by the Messenians. There is no reason, therefore, to join Willi’s assumption that “any unprejudiced reader should […] conclude from the title as it stands that Odysseus really deserted”. That said, it is certainly possible, as many have thought, that at a certain point during the comedy the simulated desertion turned into open agreement with the enemy and that Odysseus’ failure consisted precisely in not being able to resist the temptation to pass to the side of the Trojans. However, given that we can say next to nothing about the course of events staged by Epicharmus, it cannot be excluded that Odysseus’s plan failed for other reasons. Could it be, for example, that Helen

 1959, 41, ad 24 seqq.; the aprosdoketon was noted by the ancient Oxyrhynchus commentator [fr. 98.49–50 K–A]). 21 The ancient commentator noted this very accurately: see fr. 98.34–35 K–A: ὁ μ(ὲν) [τὸν ἐπί]πονον σημαίνει ὁ δ(ὲ) τὸν κακοήθη ἐγδέ- / χεται καὶ ε[……]. λέγει “ἁλιδίως πονηρός”, οἷον αὐτάρκως. For ἁλιδίως see Cassio 1991, 51–52. 22 Favi 2017; see also Telò 2016.

  Michele Napolitano played a role in distracting Odysseus from his task, in a witty comic reversal of the narrative framework configured by the epic versions of the Ptocheia? The fact remains that, if it is believed that Odysseus’ interlocutor is a Greek and not a Trojan; that the scene with the beatings imagined by Willi did not take place; that the desertion of Odysseus was only simulated; that Odysseus was not relegated, in the course of the comedy, to the humble duties of a swineherd, then Willi’s idea that Epicharmus, parodying archaic epics, aimed at configuring a new cultural identity, a critical and alternative, if not tout court subversive discourse compared to the world of values represented by Homer, would lose much of its appeal. 23 It seems to me, on the contrary, that the possibility should be taken into account that, considering also the absence, in Sicily, of an autochthonous tragic production, 24 Epicharmus’ comedy has sought and found in the epic heritage that prestige, distinction, authority, and widespread degree of recognition which it needed to escape from the sphere of farce and disengagement to which it would have been condemned if Epicharmus had drawn his plots exclusively from motifs and characters taken from the popular repertoire of daily life, and not also from the noble material made available by archaic epics. The strategy developed by Epicharmus, then, does not differ substantially from that pursued earlier, in the same geographical context, by Stesichorus. The differences lie all in the results, which configured themselves differently: one in the direction of comic, bathetic degradation and the other towards forms of noble reproduction of the epic models, by virtue of the very different features, traits and functions of the two literary genres, that is comedy and citharody, practised by Epicharmus, on the one hand, and Stesichorus, on the other. But when Stesichorus, in the attempt to present himself as an autonomous lyric poet, in alternative to the voices of the traditional singers and rhapsodes, was faced with the problem of choosing contents on which to build his compositions, the only possible choice which

 23 The idea, to put it more clearly, is that in the Odysseus Automolos should be detected an operation of degradation of the epic traditional patrimony so pervasive and deep as to constitute an “Angriff auf das Epos” (Willi 2008, 176 ff.), a “fact of literary iconoclasm directed against Homer as the cultural authority kat’exochen” (Willi 2012, 72). See also Bosher 2014, 87, and Revermann 2013, 108–110, who presents, however, a much more nuanced view of the problem (cf. infra). 24 A point rightly emphasised in Revermann 2013, 109: “It is crucial to note in this context […] that there is no evidence for the existence of Sicilian tragedy as a rival genre to Sicilian comedy. […] In the absence of another full-blown dramatic rival to comedy, this form of ‘writing-back’ […] becomes much less an act of generic self-assertion, as Aristophanic paratragedy arguably is, rather than a means of carving out and establishing cultural identity in an environment which may justifiably be called ‘postcolonial’”.

Epicharmus, Odysseus Automolos: Some Marginal Remarks on frr. 97 and 98 K–A  

would have some hope of success was in fact the epic legacy. 25 Homer, therefore, as a deeply identitary fact, assumed and reinterpreted according to the laws of the comic genre, but in the form of adhesion, not of refusal. 26 This seems confirmed to me by the fact that to the pathetic monologue with which fr. 97 K–A ends the vernacular dimension pointed out by Willi in relation to the previous, dialogical section of the fragment appears almost completely extraneous. I confess that in these verses I really can’t see any trace of that “ironic Nuance” that Willi instead sees in them. 27 The paraepic Odysseus that complains about not having fulfilled the mission entrusted to him does so without any shadow of irony, and speaking a language that, although adapted to the trochaic tetrameter and the comic context that forms its background, is in all respects epic. He does so, in short, as an epic hero: but an epic hero who has been touched by the unfortunate fate of treading the boards, almost in spite of himself, not in a tragedy but in a comedy.

Bibliography Albini, U. (1986), Le commedie di Epicarmo, in Studi in onore di Adelmo Barigazzi, I, Roma, 13– 21. Barigazzi, A. (1955), “Epicarmo e la figura di Ulisse hesykhos”, RhM 98, 121–135. Blass, F. (1889), “Das neue Wiener Fragment des Epicharmos”, NJPh 59, 257–262. Bosher, K. (2014), “Epicharmus and Early Sicilian Comedy”, in: M. Revermann (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Greek Comedy, Cambridge, 79–94. Burkert, W. (1987), “The Making of Homer in the Sixth Century B.C.: Rhapsodes versus Stesichoros”, in: Papers on the Amasis Painter and his World, Malibu, California, 43–62.

 25 See Burkert 1987. “Epicharmus’ sources may have been the Cyclic Epic in some form, but there are also themes taken from Dorian and Sicilian folklore, which he could access directly, or else through poets like Stesichorus of Himera […] and Ibycus of Rhegium […]. With these two authors Epicharmus shares not only the bond with Sicily or the Greek West, but also the mixture of common epic themes with Dorian and Sicilian (or at least with a western setting) ones, and it would not be surprising if they had an influence on him” (Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén 2012, 77). 26 To put it with Revermann: “The very act of ‘writing-back’ is, of course, an implicit acknowledgement of the target’s cultural value, and there is no reason at all to believe that Homer and epic poetry were held in lesser esteem in Sicily than anywhere else in the Greek world. On the contrary: recitals of the rhapsode Cynaethus from Chios are attested for Syracuse for the late sixth century, and it has long been plausibly suggested that the Greek colonies and, indeed, the very process of colonization were vital for the dissemination of epic poetry in general and the canonization of the Homeric poems in particular as panhellenic classics” (Revermann 2013, 109). 27 Willi 2008, 190.

  Michele Napolitano Casolari, F. (2003), Die Mythentravestie in der griechischen Komödie, Münster (Orbis antiquus 37). Cassio, A.C. (1991), “ΟΑΔΙΣΤΗ e ΟΑΛΙΔΙΟΣ (SEG 24, 548; IG XII 9, 249 B 290)”, ZPE 87, 47–52. Cassio, A.C. (2002), “The Language of Doric Comedy”, in: A. Willi (ed.), The Language of Greek Comedy, Oxford, 51–83. Clader, L.L. (1976), Helen. The Evolution from Divine to Heroic in Greek Epic Tradition, Mnemosyne Suppl. 42, Leiden. Comicorum Graecorum fragmenta in papyris reperta (CGFP). Ed. C. Austin, Berolini/Novi Eboraci 1973. De Sanctis, D. (2017), Il canto e la tela. Le voci di Elena in Omero, Biblioteca di studi antichi 98, Pisa/Roma. Copani, F. (2009), “La figura di Odisseo da Omero ai drammaturghi del quinto secolo a. C.”, Stratagemmi 10, 57–82. Dunbar, N. (1995), Aristophanes. Birds, Oxford. Fantuzzi, M. (1996), “Odisseo mendicante a Troia e a Itaca: su [Eur.] Rh. 498–507; 710–719 e Hom. Od. 4, 244–258”, MD 36, 175–185. Favi, F. (2017), “Lo Odysseus automolos di Epicarmo”, ZPE 201, 17–31. Gentili, B. (1961), rev. of The Oxyrhynchus Papyri XXV, London 1959, Gnomon 33, 331–343. Gomperz, Th. (1889), Ein griechisches Komödienbruchstück in dorischer Mundart, «Mittheilungen aus der Sammlung der Papyrus Erzherzog Rainer» V 1, 1–10 (= Id., Hellenika. Eine Auswahl philologischer und philosophiegeschichtlicher kleiner Schriften, I, Leipzig 1912, 145–162). Grysar, K.J. (1828), De Doriensium comoedia quaestiones, I, Coloniae ad Rhenum. Hermann, G. (1802), Aristotelis de arte poetica liber cum commentariis, Lipsiae. Jouanno, C. (2012), “Images comiques d’Ulysse, d’Épicharme à Plaute”, LEC 80, 247–282. Kaibel, G. (1899), Comicorum Graecorum fragmenta, I 1: Doriensium comoedia, Mimi, Phlyaces, Berolini. Kelly, A. (2015), “Ilias parva”, in: M. Fantuzzi/C. Tsagalis (eds), The Greek Epic Cycle and Its Ancient Reception. A Companion, Cambridge, 318–343. Kerkhof, R. (2001), Dorische Posse, Epicharm und Attische Komödie, München/Leipzig (Beiträge zur Altertumskunde 147). Konstantakos, I.M. (2015), “On the Early History of the Braggart Soldier. Part One: Archilochus and Epicharmus”, Logeion 5, 41–84. Lenaerts, J. (2012), “Epicharme, Odysseus automolos”, in: F. Reiter (ed.), Literarische Texte der Berliner Papyrussammlung. Zur Wiedereröffnung des Neuen Museums, Berliner Klassiker Texte Bd. 10, Berlin/Boston, 51–59. Lobel, E. (1959), “2429. Commentary on Epicharmus, Ὀδυσσεὺϲ αὐτόμολοϲ and Another Play?”, The Oxyrhynchus Papyri XXV, London, 35–44. Lorenz, A.O.F. (1864), Leben und Schriften des Koers Epicharmos nebst einer Fragmentsammlung, Berlin. Luppe, W. (1975), rev. of Austin, Comicorum Graecorum fragmenta in papyris reperta, Berolini/ Novi Eboraci 1973, GGA 227, 179–206. Olivieri, A. (1930), Frammenti della commedia greca e del mimo nella Sicilia e nella Magna Grecia, Napoli. Olson, S.D. (2007), Broken Laughter. Select Fragments of Greek Comedy, Oxford. Page, D.L. (1950), Select Papyri. III: Literary Papyri. Poetry, London/Cambridge, Mass.

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Parca, M.G. (1991), Ptocheia or Odysseus in Disguise at Troy (P. Köln VI 245), Atlanta (American Studies in Papyrology 31). Phillips, E.D. (1959), “The Comic Odysseus”, G&R 6.1, 58–67. Pickard-Cambridge, A.W. (1962), Dithyramb, Tragedy and Comedy, Oxford (2. ed. rev. by T.B.L. Webster). Poetae Comici Graeci (PCG). Eds R. Kassel et C. Austin, Vol. I: Comoedia Dorica, Mimi, Phlyaces, Berolini/Novi Eboraci 2001. Revermann, M. (2013), “Paraepic Comedy: Point(s) and Practices”, in: E. Bakola/L. Prauscello/ M. Telò (eds), Greek Comedy and the Discourse of Genres, Cambridge, 101–128. Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén, L. (1996), Epicarmo de Siracusa. Testimonios y fragmentos, Oviedo. Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén, L. (2012), “On Epicharmus’ Literary and Philosophical Background”, in: K. Bosher (ed.), Theater Outside Athens. Drama in Greek Sicily and South Italy, Cambridge, 76–96. Salomone, S. (1981), “L’altra faccia di Epicarmo”, Sandalion 4, 59–69. Schmidt, J.O. (1888), “Ulixes Comicus”, JKlPh 16. Supplbd., Leipzig, 375–402. Stanford, W.B. (1950), “On the Odysseus automolos of Epicharmus”, CPh 45.3, 167–169. Telò, M. (2016), “Mad Man: Epicharmus, Odysseus and the Poetics of Desertion”, MD 76, 105– 122. Tosetti, S. (2019), I frammenti di Epicarmo in Ateneo, Frammenti sulla scena (online) 0, 124– 147. Webster, T.B.L. (1962), “Some Notes on the New Epicharmus”, in: Serta Philologica Aenipontana, Innsbruck, 85–91. Welcker, F.G. (1844), “Epicharmos”, in: F.G. Welcker, Kleine Schriften zur Griechischen Litteraturgeschichte, Bonn, 271–356. Willi, A. (2008), Sikelismos. Sprache, Literatur und Gesellschaft im griechischen Sizilien (8.-5. Jh. v. Chr.), Bibliotheca Helvetica Romana 29, Basel. Willi, A. (2012), “Challenging Authority. Epicharmus Between Epic and Rhetoric”, in: K. Bosher (ed.), Theater Outside Athens. Drama in Greek Sicily and South Italy, Cambridge, 56–75.

Anna Novokhatko

δηλαδὴ τρίπους: On Epicharmus fr. 147 K–A The fragment under consideration comes from an unknown comedy of the Sicilian playwright Epicharmus (before 460 BC), fr. 147 K–A: A. τί δὲ τόδ’ ἐστί; B. δηλαδὴ τρίπους. A. τί μὰν ἔχει πόδας τέτορας; οὔκ ἐστιν τρίπους, ἀλλ’ οἶμαι τετράπους. B. ἔστιν ὄνυμ’ αὐτῶι τρίπους, τέτοράς γα μὰν ἔχει πόδας. A. εἰ δίπους τοίνυν ποκ’ ἦς αἴνίγματ’ Οἰ νοεῖς 4: εἰ δίπους Grotefend: οἰδίπους CE αἴνίγματ’ Οἰδίπου νοεῖς Grotefend: αἴνιγμά τοι νοεῖς CE (Epicharm. fr. 147 K–A) (А) What is this here? (B) a tripod, plainly. (А) But why does it have four feet? It is not a tripod, but seems like a tetrapod to me. (B) It bears the name tripod, but it has really got four feet. (А) Well, if it once had two feet, you can think of the riddle of Oe 1

As we can see, the main protagonist of this fragment is a tripod, and a particularly unusual tripod, with four legs. This paper is dedicated to this obscure object likely brought onto the stage. What was a tripod during Epicharmus’ time? In which context might speakers A and B be discussing this issue? First of all, the co-occurrence of intensifying particles and collocations, such as τί δὲ τόδ’ ἐστί, τί μὰν ἔχει, δηλαδή, γα μὰν (Attic γε μήν), τοίνυν, the opposition of the deictic elements in the 1st pers. sing. and 2nd pers. sing. forms οἶμαι (“I think”) versus νοεῖς (“you think”) marks linguistically an intensive dialogue, built around the object τρίπους probably brought on stage. 2 Now. What can this τρίπους be? This object has been unanimously considered to be a table, both in Ancient and modern scholarship. Why? Because of its cover-text. The only cover-text of this fragment is Athenaeus’ Deipnosophists, book 2 (epitome), which frames the background for transmitting information about it. Epicharmus’ fragment is quoted as one of six examples of τρίπους used, it is assumed, for a three-footed table:  I am grateful to Margaret C. Miller for her very helpful comments.  1 All translations are my own. 2 On the discourse markers in this fragment, see Novokhatko 2017, 228–231. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-019

  Anna Novokhatko εἰπόντος τινὸς κυνικοῦ τρίποδα τὴν τράπεζαν δυσχεραίνει ὁ παρὰ τῷ σοφιστῇ Οὐλπιανὸς καὶ λέγει… πόθεν γὰρ τούτῳ ὁ τρίπους; εἰ μὴ τὴν Διογένους βακτηρίαν σὺν καὶ τὼ πόδε ἀριθμῶν οὗτος τρίποδα προσηγόρευσε, πάντων τραπέζας καλούντων τὰς παραθέσεις ταύτας. (Ath. 2.49a–d) When a Cynic calls a table “tripod”, then Ulpian, the guest of the sophist, is displeased and says:... “Where does he get here the ‘tripod’ from? Unless he counts Diogenes’ stick together with his two feet and calls it ‘tripod’, whilst all the others call these devices here ‘tables’”.

Athenaeus quotes six passages from earlier source(s) starting the section with an episode of puristic Atticistic discussions. 3 Some Cynic calls the table τρίπους (εἰπόντος τινὸς κυνικοῦ τρίποδα τὴν τράπεζαν), and one of the main characters in Athenaeus’ work, the severe Atticist grammarian Ulpian of Tyre, can’t stand it (δυσχεραίνει ὁ παρὰ τῷ σοφιστῇ Οὐλπιανὸς καὶ λέγει): “where does he get the word τρίπους from?” Ulpian, who is interested in attestations of words and wordforms 4 with his nickname Κειτούκειτος (“does-it-occur-or-does-it-not”), is thus stating that the correct word for “table” in Greek is τράπεζα and is basically asking whether the word τρίπους is ever attested for a table. Athenaeus continues apparently with a reply to Ulpian’s task (this could also be Ulpian’s own reply, again as often in Athenaeus, 5 in epitome some text must be cut off). Hesiod in his Marriage of Ceyx — says Athenaeus — calls tables “tripods” or says (as a quotation) τρίποδας τὰς τραπέζας (Hes. fr. 266b M–W) ὅτι Ἡσίοδος ἐν Κήυκος γάμῳ —κἂν γὰρ γραμματικῶν παῖδες ἀποξενῶσι τοῦ ποιητοῦ τὰ ἔπη ταῦτα, ἀλλ’ ἐμοὶ δοκεῖ ἀρχαῖα εἶναι — τρίποδας τὰς τραπέζας φησί. (Ath. 2.49b) Hesiod in the “Marriage of Ceyx” — even if some grammarians deny the verses belonged to the poet, I do find them old — calls tables “tripods”.

This is a problematic reference. There is only one papyrus fragment associated with Athenaeus’ passage:

 3 Hsd. fr. 266b M–W, Xen. An. 7.3.21–22, Antiph. fr. 280 PCG, Eub. fr. 119.4–5 PCG, Epicharm. fr. 147 PCG, Ar. fr. 545 PCG. 4 On Ulpian’s interest in attested word-forms, see Ath. 10.422e–423a; 13.590a. 5 Athenaeus’ Ulpian often answers the question which he had posed himself, such as in Ath. 2.58c καὶ ζητούντων πάντων, αὐτός, ἔφη, ἐγὼ ἐρῶ (“and whilst all of them were searching, he said, I will tell you myself”); Ath. 3.100c ἀλλὰ μήν, ἔφη ὁ Οὐλπιανός, καὶ τὸν περὶ τῆς μήτρας λόγον ἀποδώσω (“well, said Ulpian, I will give you the account of the womb”).

δηλαδὴ τρίπους: On Epicharmus fr. 147 K–A  

] [ ]..[ ].πονεοντες[ ]ο̣υγαρατερτε[ ]σ̣ωσα ]πέζας ]καθ̣ έδρας⟧ ] εχοναισας ]ω̣ν… P. Oxy. 2495 fr. 37 Lobel, early 2nd c. AD

]ο̣υ̣κ̣.[ ]..[ ].πον εοντες[ ]ο̣ὐ γὰρ ἄτερ τε[ for not without ]σ̣ωσα τρα]πέζας τρίποδάς τε]καθ̣ έδρας⟧ ]δ̣’ ἔχον αἴσας they had helpings ]ω̣ν… fr. 266a M–W vv. 1–7

Ιn the papyrus the (mistaken) word καθ̣ έδρας was deleted and the word τρα]πέζας written above by another hand. 6 Athenaeus’ contemporary Pollux also writes that the name τρίπους occurs in Hesiod for a table. ἦσαν δέ τινες πρῶται τράπεζαι καὶ δεύτεραι καὶ τρίται. καὶ τρίποδες μὲν ἐφ’ ὧν ἔκειντο· καὶ ἔστι τοὔνομα παρ’ Ἡσιόδῳ (Poll. Onom. 6.83) There were some first meal-courses and second and third. And there were tripods on which they were served; this designation is attested in Hesiod as well

Thus τρίποδάς τε] is the conjecture based on the evidence of Athenaeus and Pollux. I personally do not see in this fragment anything referring to τρίπους. However, even if τρίποδάς τε τραπέζας is a correct reading, τρίπους could be either an adjective here conjoined to the noun τράπεζα, or this could be a part of a catalogue where τρίπους and τράπεζα are listed among other objects. We cannot then be sure whether the text is genuine and the scribe just made a mistake, or, alternatively, whether it was corrected on the basis of some source such as Athenaeus or his predecessor. Perhaps both Athenaeus and Pollux quote the same source on τρίποδες-tables, but it is at least not sure whether they mean this particular papyrus fragment from the Marriage of Ceyx ascribed to Hesiod. The next example quoted by Athenaeus is from Xenophon’s Anabasis (ca. 370 BC) where a symposium scene is described (Xen. An. 7.3.21–22): “then τρίποδες were brought in for everybody; they were around twenty, full with portions of meat (ἔπειτα δὲ τρίποδες εἰσηνέχθησαν πᾶσιν· οὗτοι δ’ ὅσον εἴκοσι κρεῶν μεστοὶ νενεμημένων)”, and Xenophon continues: “αἱ τράπεζαι were constantly distributed among the guests (μάλιστα δ’ αἱ τράπεζαι κατὰ τοὺς ξένους αἰεὶ ἐτίθεντο)”.  6 Lobel 1962, 64–65. See Lobel 1962, 65: “If, as must appear likely, it is to this place that Athenaeus and Pollux refer, τρίποδάς… τραπέζας may be supplied”. See also Merkelbach/West, 1965, 310–311.

  Anna Novokhatko This is indeed a clear example showing a certain shift in the use of τρίπους-τράπεζα: either three-legged tables were brought in and they are called trapezai, or four-legged tables were brought in, and they are called tripodes. The first option is more probable, as surviving monuments reveal. 7 A certain type of a small light three-legged table used at symposia was called in both ways. 8 Further on, Athenaeus lists four comic fragments, one after the other, without any remarks (probably taken from some earlier source where the evidence on the table called τρίπους was gathered): Antiphanes (4th c. BC): ἐπεὶ δ’ ὁ τρίπους ἤρθη κατὰ χειρῶν τ’ εἴχομεν (Antiph. incert. fr. 280) when the tripod was removed and water was poured over the hands

In all probability, a symposium scene is described and τρίπους means here the same small light three-legged table as in Xenophon. 9 Then Eubulus (4th c. BC) is quoted: (B.) τρίποδες οὗτοι πέντε σοι (A.) καὶ πέντε (Β.) πεντηκοστολόγος γενήσομαι (Eub. fr. 119.4–5) (B.) these five tripods are for you (A.) and five (B.) I am going to become an (import-export 2%) tax-collector

Here however nothing tells us that the objects must be tables. They can be tripods used for various reasons such as for cooking in everyday usage or votive offerings for ritual use in a sanctuary (typically, only their characteristic bases have been found). As we do not know where the dialogue takes place, we have two options: either to follow Athenaeus (or his source who might have gathered [rightly or wrongly!] information on three-footed tables) or to keep other alternatives open and to be aware that for example an option of a bronze cauldron tripod or a pot-

 7 See Richter 1966, 63–72 and figs 342–379. 8 On such a use in symposiastic context, cf. Reisch 1905, 1675. Richter 1966, 66–69; Andrianou 2009, 50–63. 9 Cf. Ath. 9.408b–409a, with further parallels.

δηλαδὴ τρίπους: On Epicharmus fr. 147 K–A  

stand tripod is possible, and these tripods are referred to much more often in the Greek texts in general and in drama in particular. 10 Afterwards the Epicharmus’ fr. 147 K–A is quoted, and then the fragment from Aristophanes’ late comedy Telemēsses: Α. τράπεζαν ἡμῖν φερε τρεῖς πόδας ἔχουσαν, τέτταρας δὲ μὴ ’χέτω. Β. καὶ πόθεν ἐγὼ τρίπουν τράπεζαν λήψομαι; (Ar. fr. 545 K–A) (А) Bring us out a table with three feet, it must not have four. (B) And where shall I get a three-footed table?

The joke is based around the incongruence of the name τράπεζα (originally τετράπεζα, four-footed) 11 for three-legged tables. As in 2nd c. AD Ulpian’s case (see above), Aristophanes’ fragment reflects contemporary linguistic discussions on the cohesion of objects and their names. This is all we have in Athenaeus. It is noteworthy, that both Antiphanes and Xenophon use the noun τρίπους (and not the adjective “three-legged”) for a certain kind of table. The noun appears in Plato’s dialogues twice for votive tripod. 12 The noun is not attested before and might appear in the language around the second quarter of the 4th c. BC (being developed from the adjective τρίπους τράπεζα as is clear from Aristophanes’ fragment). Now, if we read Epicharmus’ fragment fr. 147 K–A in the way that Athenaeus imposes, we should accept that the noun τρίπους is being used for “table” one hundred years earlier than otherwise attested. If the table is four-legged, then the question should be posed why the speaker B calls it τρίπους and insists that its name is τρίπους. We have no examples either from literary texts or from archaeological monuments suggesting a four-legged table was ever called a τρίπους. On

 10 On τρίπους as a three-legged cauldron or stand for a vessel, see e. g. Il. 18.344, 23.702; Od. 8.434; Hes. Op. 657; Pind. Isthm. 1.19; Soph. Aj. 1405; Eur. Ion 91; Supp. 1202; Thuc. 1.132; Ar. Eq. 1016; Eccl. 744; Plut. 9. On symposion iconography and the use of a tripod stand in a symposiastic context, cf. Lissarrague 1990, 28 and fig. 14. 11 Orion Etym. T149: Τράπεζα. κατὰ ἀποβολὴν, τουτέστι, τετράπεζα, τέσσαρας πόδας ἔχουσα. αἱ γὰρ τῶν παλαιῶν τράπεζαι τετράγωνοι ἦσαν (“Trapeza: by dropping (of a syllable), that is to say tetrapeza, four-footed. For the tables of the ancients were rectangular”). Cf. further Procl. In Cra. 85.49–50; Etym. Magn. 763.38. 12 Pl. Grg. 472a6 and Pl. Leg. 719c3.

  Anna Novokhatko the contrary, as has been mentioned above, all evidence shows that a three-legged table was called both τρίπους and τράπεζα. Is B cheating A who is, let us suppose, a foreigner who does not understand the difference, or a Strepsiadeslike student of a Socrates-like teacher, and the lesson being taught is one of correspondence between objects and names? Transferring Aristophanes and the Athenian context in which he worked onto Epicharmus’ Syracuse, one might assume that Epicharmus was also engaged in mocking early linguistic studies carried out by the Sicilian rhetoricians: those who know names, know things, and there is no other way to understand the essence of things but through names. 13 Further, this fragment bears noteworthy literary allusions. Τρίπους is involved here in a riddle (thus αἴνιγμα in v. 4), a technique often exploited by comedy. Here Epicharmus with an explicit allusion to the famous riddle of the Sphinx deliberately interweaves the tripod-tetrapod-object into the mythological context. The word τετράπους in v. 2 corresponds to the word τετράπουν found on the fragments of the Attic black-figured hydria from Basel (520–510 BC) revealing the Sphinx standing on a column above a group of Thebans with the written words τετράπουν οὗ καὶ τρ[ and ἐπειδὰν γῆρας belonging in all probability to the riddle. 14 The sphinx addresses Oedipus, her (last) words (i.e. a culmination!) [κ]αι τρί[πον] emerging from her mouth, as seen on the Vatican red-figured tondo 16.541 (Vulci, about 470 BC). 15 The famous riddle of the Sphinx (walking on two, four and three legs) seems to be alluded to on stage as well: Epicharmus himself wrote a comedy with the title Sphinx (frr. 125 and 126 K–A) and Aeschylus wrote the satyr-drama Sphinx (467 BC). Further the chorus in Aeschylus’ Agamemnon (458 BC) alludes to the riddle about an old person using a crutch and contains the adjective τρίπους: “this extreme age, its leaves already withering, it goes its three-footed paths (τό θ’ ὑπέργηρων φυλλάδος ἤδη κατακαρφομένης τρίποδας μὲν ὁδοὺς στείχει, Aesch. Ag. 79–81)”. 16 Thus it is clear that by Epicharmus’ time the riddle of the Sphinx circulated in the textual form as it has come down to us, and Epicharmus’ fragment could thus be understood as a sophisticated literary and mythological wordplay. 17  13 Novokhatko 2015, 79–80. 14 Basel, Collection Cahn 855, BAPD 43112. See Moret 1984, 40, cat. 36, pl. 23; Kreuzer 1992, 86– 88. This is now the oldest surviving visual reference to the riddle of Sphinx. See Katz 2006 with further bibliography. 15 Moret 1984, 49–50, cat. 87, pl. 50–51/1. 16 The riddle is perhaps taken from a tragedy quoted by Asclep. Trag. 12 FGrH 7, see Lloyd-Jones 1978, 60–61. 17 Some of the surviving text of Euripides’ lost tragedy Oedipus (fr. 540a TrGF, produced after 415 BC) reveals a link to the riddle with the key-word “tripod”: “it has intelligence and it is something (four-footed and two)-footed and three-footed (ξύνεσιν δ’ ἔχ̣ο̣[ν/ τέτραπον ἠδὲ δί]πουν τι

δηλαδὴ τρίπους: On Epicharmus fr. 147 K–A  

Let us now revisit the object on stage in Epicharmus’ fragment. If this was a table, then the prevalent type of tables evidenced in Archaic and classical monumental and vase tradition were three-legged rectangular tables being small and light and used for food (as a red-figured kylix 490–480 BC attributed to Douris in British Museum (1892, 0518.1, London E50, BAPD 205273) with a symposiast: on his left is a three-legged table, underneath which is suspended a food basket with red tassels below). As has been noted: “The table most frequently pictured in the 5th c. was small and rectangular, with two legs at the corners of one end, and a single leg at the other end”. 18 Three legs were mainly used for reasons of greater stability, especially on a clay floor. Such a table is referred to in all probability by the 4th c. BC Xenophon and Antiphanes, shown above. If we do not take into account the problematic fragment from Hesiod’s papyrus, we have some earlier written evidence for a symposiastic three-legged table, but without any link to the term τρίπους. Thus, Cratinus mentions such tables in an uncertain comedy (before 422 BC): γαυριῶσαι δ’ ἀναμένουσιν ὧδ’ ἐπηγλαϊσμέναι μείρακες φαιδραὶ τράπεζαι τρισκελεῖς σφενδάμνιναι (Cratin. incert. fr. 334 K–A) they are waiting luxuriant, so dressed out young girls, beaming, three-legged tables τράπεζαι τρισκελεῖς, of maple wood

The Attic Stelae from the Eleusinion also contained inscriptions with lists of furniture items confiscated from Alcibiades’ house after he was accused of profaning the Eleusinian mysteries in 415/414 BC. 19 The evidence is the following: only one of the tables in the Attic Stelai is itemized as τετ[ρ]ά[π]ους (II, 242–243), which probably means that the other (at least) eleven declared as τράπεζαι had only three legs (and were rectangular small-size tables which fit easily under a coach). 20 The form is unclear, perhaps rectangular, as the round table was not introduced in archaeological sources before the 4th c. BC. 21 The rectangular table with three legs is a norm, but occasionally four legs are represented.  τρίπο̣[υν)”. On further literary allusions and the Sphinx riddle here, see Novokhatko 2015, 80– 81 with further parallels and bibliography. On obscene allusions of the riddle around the τρίπους, see Katz 2006 in detail. 18 Pritchett & Pippin 1956, 241–242. See also Richter 1966, 66. 19 Pritchett 1953 and Pritchett & Pippin 1956. 20 Pritchett 1953, 253; Pritchett & Pippin 1956, 212, 242. 21 Pritchett & Pippin 1956, 242.

  Anna Novokhatko So much for three- and four-footed tables. I would like now to make the assumption that Athenaeus is wrong here, and Epicharmus’ fragment (as perhaps Eubulus’ fragment quoted by him as well) does not belong to the list of tables called tripods. What if for some mistaken reason (for example, because of its clear similarity with the wordplay in Aristophanes’ fr. 545 K–A) the fragment was quoted in Athenaeus’ source along with other τράπεζαι-τρίποδες and what we have here is a joke on tripod and tetrapod without a table-context? I summarize here our knowledge on all sorts of τρίποδες until the mid 5th c. BC and try to read this fragment in a new context. Firstly, Epicharmus speaks about tripods elsewhere. In his comedy Thearoi (fr. 68 K–A) tripods are listed among sacred objects and these are clearly opposed to the tables: κιθάραι, τρίποδες, ἅρματα, τράπεζαι χάλκιαι, χειρόνιβα, λοιβάσια, λέβητες χάλκιοι, κρατῆρες, ὀδελοί· τοῖς γα μὰν ὑπωδέλοις †καιλωτε† βαλλίζοντες †σιοσσον χρῆμα εἴη† (Epicharm. fr. 68 K–A) lyres, tripods, chariots, bronze tables, hand-washing-basins, libation vessels, bronze cauldrons, mixing-bowls, spits; on the mortgaged really †…† dancing† …† a deal could be†

Opposed to the four-legged tripod from Epicharmus’ fr. 147 K–A, Athenaeus reveals more on the context of the comedy Thearoi elsewhere: Ἐπίχαρμος, ὦ θαυμασιώτατε, ἐν τοῖς Θεαροῖς μέμνηται τοῦ βαλλιμοῦ… ἐν οὖν τῷ δράματι οἱ θεωροὶ καθορῶντες τὰ ἐν Πυθοῖ ἀναθήματα καὶ περὶ ἑκάστου λέγοντές φασι καὶ τάδε (Athen. 8.362b) Epicharmus, my dear, in the “Thearoi” mentions the word ballismos (“dancing”)… in this play the envoys examine the dedications at Pytho (Delphi) and iteming them each separately say the following

This “and iteming them each separately” (καὶ περὶ ἑκάστου λέγοντές) points perfectly well to the discussion of the dedicated tripod, and the dialogue in fr. 147 K– A might come from this context. As we do not have any proof, this is just an assumption. The fr. 147 K–A could belong to the comedy Theoroi or could belong to any other comedy of Epicharmus where sacral tripods might have been significant (three Heracles-comedies, Epinikos [or Epinikios], Heorta and the like). What is however not at all an assumption, but a matter of fact, is that τρίπους in its main meaning as a three-legged cauldron or three-legged stand as a support for a vessel or a human being appears in most literary and epigraphical texts and

δηλαδὴ τρίπους: On Epicharmus fr. 147 K–A  

on visual monuments. 22 Sacral tripod is “the symbol par excellence of authoritative discourse and, hence, of political power and territorial domination”. 23 It assumes a significant role in ritual and mythology, “it can be set up as a trophy, as a prize for a victor and no matter what its purpose it always commands respect”. 24 We have no particular reason to believe Athenaeus here that tripod in the fragment is a kind of a table, and thus if we imagine this (much more popular in Epicharmus’ time than a table called τρίπους!) object on stage to be something else and then read again the dialogue around it, then we have to explain why this tripod has four legs. First of all, as in the case of the first option, if τρίπους were here a table, this three-legged object could be placed on stage with a person/object hidden behind it (thus making an effect of the “fourth leg”). The whole composition would have looked strange (let us say for example that Philocleon was trying to escape the house hiding himself beneath the donkey that was invisible to Bdelycleon who was dragging the donkey but visible to the audience and to Xanthias in Ar. Vesp. 179–186), 25 allowing the speaker A to ask τί δὲ τόδ’ ἐστί; Speaker B who knows what is happening tries to disguise the whole episode with a linguistic play on the correspondence of names and objects whilst both speakers play with mythological allusions. The second option is the much-discussed phenomenon of votive bronze or stone tripod cauldrons at Greek sanctuaries, for which there is ample evidence in the form of their bases. 26 Such a standard tripod is perhaps here on stage but an extra element is inserted between the three legs of the metal vessel (or its imitation in stone) to support specifically the bowl of the tripod vessel. This is best known in the instance of stone perirrhanteria (utensils for sprinkling the purification water at sacrifices), and the surviving bases of metal tripods dedicated in sanctuaries that typically have a circular centre cutting between the three angular cuttings for the

 22 On the analysis of more than 600 objects from Minoan, Mycenaean and Archaic Greece where tripods are represented, see Sakowski 1997. 23 Papalexandrou 2005, 4. 24 Suhr 1971, 216. 25 See Biles/Olson 2015, 143–145 on the possible placement of characters on stage in the scene. 26 In particular Pierre Amandry made a number of useful studies with clear photographs and line drawings of the top surfaces of votive tripods at a number of sites. On some the cutting for the central support is evident. Cf. Amandry and Ducat 1973, fig. 7, 10, and further the depictions of such tripods on vases, where the support column is depicted as well, see figs. 21, 22, 23, 25; Amandry/Spyropoulos 1974, figs. 1, 2, 4, 5, 12, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 20. 21, 22, 24, 26, 28, 37, 38, 40, 44, 45, 47, 49 (the 3rd cent. BC tripods); Amandry 1976, figs 3–4, 10; Amandry 1977.

  Anna Novokhatko leg. 27 A column was used to support the basin, which is necessary for monumental tripods rather than cooking tripods. The earliest surviving tripods from Olympia have only three bronze legs; presumably the decision to add a central support developed as a result of the experience of wear and tear on such large bronze vessels. Typically, of course, bronze tripods do not survive as their material was reused; but their stands do, with four cuttings, three for three legs and a central one for a support. The most famous example of this is the Plataean votive tripod, the so-called Serpent-column dedicated at Delphi: a giant (golden?) tripod, supported by a bronze serpentine column. 28 This bronze column was the central support of the bowl, not the base / stand on which the whole tripod stood (as used to be thought before excavation). This tripod cauldron was meant to symbolically assert the territorial and political unassailability of the Greek world. The earliest attestation for this tripod is Herodotus: Συμφορήσαντες δὲ τὰ χρήματα καὶ δεκάτην ἐξελόντες τῷ ἐν Δελφοῖσι θεῷ, ἀπ’ ἧς ὁ τρίπους ὁ χρύσεος ἀνετέθη ὁ ἐπὶ τοῦ τρικαρήνου ὄφιος τοῦ χαλκέου ἐπεστεὼς ἄγχιστα τοῦ βωμοῦ… (Herod. 9.81) Having brought all the stuff together, (the Greeks) set apart one tenth for the god of Delphi, whereof the golden tripod was dedicated set upon the bronze three-headed serpent column, nearest to the altar...

The Plataean votive tripod at Delphi was unusual owing to scale and medium, but its serpent column support was merely an unusual elaboration of a standard votive concept. As this tripod specifically would not have been at the top of the mind of a 5th century BC theatre-goer, similar tripods, perhaps closer to Epicharmus’ world, were golden tripods each surmounted by a Nike, dedicated by the tyrants of Syracuse Gelon and Hieron to the sanctuary of Apollo at Delphi, an offering of thanks for the victory at Himera in 480 BC. The bases, where tripods should have been placed, are still in situ near the entrance to the temple. They did not bear tripods, however, but in all probability bronze columns which carried a golden statue and a tripod. But we do not have to look for any particular tripod as any standard tripod had an extra element inserted between the three legs of the metal vessel (see Figs 1, 2 and 3). As Pierre Amandry noted:  27 Amandry 1987, 98 illustrates a 4th cent. BC example (his base H, see the description on p. 97 in detail), that is clearest in his drawing; see also his figures 24 and 30. I am very grateful to Margaret C. Miller for these references. 28 Papalexandrou 2005, 9–10 with bibliography.

δηλαδὴ τρίπους: On Epicharmus fr. 147 K–A  

La présence d’un support entre les pieds du trépied est quasiment constante: il soutenait la partie la plus fragile, la cuve, dont la paroi relativement mince devait résister au poids de l’eau qui l’emplissait dès l’automne et ne s’en retirait qu’en été par évaporation. Ce support est le plus souvent une simple colonnette, mais il peut prendre des formes plus élaborées et originales, comme en témoignent des textes et des monuments. 29

Fig. 4: J.-P. Braun, P. Amandry 1973: The base of the victory tripod of the dithyramb poet Cedeides (5th cent. BC) / 7296 © École française d’Athènes.

 29 Amandry 1987, 83.

  Anna Novokhatko

Fig. 5: The base of the victory tripod of the dithyramb poet Cedeides (5th cent. BC) / EM 10330, N. 3028/2002 © Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Sports / Epigraphic Museum.

δηλαδὴ τρίπους: On Epicharmus fr. 147 K–A  

Fig. 6: The base of the victory tripod of the dithyramb poet Cedeides (5th cent. BC) / ΕΜ 10330, N. 3028/2002 © Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Sports / Epigraphic Museum.

Another type of tripod with a “fourth leg” is a common stone tripod, such as the limestone Oxford tripod from Corinth (probably from a temple of the Metroon, dated between late archaic period and the middle 5th c. BC). 30 It is a basin resting on a stand (central column) adorned with three female figures standing on three

 30 Gardner 1896, 279. Schwendemann 1921, 137. Types of support are discussed as well in Schwendemann 1921, 137–139.

  Anna Novokhatko lions. Further, a god-statue could stand under such a tripod supporting it. 31 Translations of central supports of stone tripod basins are attested. My main point here is obvious: it is not difficult to find the “fourth leg” for Epicharmus’ tripod (τί μὰν ἔχει πόδας τέτορας) as it was very common to see a tripod with a “fourth leg” in public places in Greece and thus this construction offered material to ridicule for a comic playwright. Thus the “fourth leg” in Epicharmus’ tripod could be this support as seen on the stone bases of dedicated tripods from sanctuaries in Greece. There was ample material then available for a joke incorporating both studies of the philosophy of language and the objectname correspondence and literary and mythological allusions, and certainly this material was not poorer than a game around table feet. To conclude. Mythological and literary allusions to the riddle of the Sphinx are evident in this fragment. So too traces of purist linguistic discussions on the cohesion of names and objects. They provide information on the context in which Epicharmus worked, and the horizon of expectations of his audience. The nature of the object on stage, however, as we have seen, can be disputed. Interpreting this object could potentially contribute to the contextualisation of the scene. If we simply follow Athenaeus and view the tripod as a table for food, this could be a symposiastic context. Alternatively, an examination of what a tripod might have meant for Epicharmus’ audience, looking at literary texts and archaeological evidence such as four cuttings of the stone tripod bases which really make it absolutely clear that a τρίπους could indeed have “four legs” (τί μὰν ἔχει πόδας τέτορας), sheds light on another context: a ritual sacral space, Delphi, Heraion, Mithraion and suchlike. And here new horizons for the interpretation of this fragment are opened up.

 31 Cf. a 2nd cent. AD traveller’s account on the Odos Tripodon leading from the Prytaneum to the Theater of Dionysos in Athens in Paus. 1.20.1 ἔστι δὲ ὁδὸς ἀπὸ τοῦ πρυτανίου καλουμένη Τρίποδες· ἀφ’ οὗ καλοῦσι τὸ χωρίον, ναοὶ ὅσον ἐς τοῦτο μεγάλοι, καί σφισιν ἐφεστήκασι τρίποδες χαλκοῖ μέν, μνήμης δὲ ἄξια μάλιστα περιέχοντες εἰργασμένα· (“There is a road leading from the prytaneum called Tripods; this place takes its name from the temples large enough, and within them bronze tripods stand upon, but containing works of art very much worthy of remembering”). See Dickenson 2015, 738.

δηλαδὴ τρίπους: On Epicharmus fr. 147 K–A  

Bibliography Aandry, P./Ducat, J. (1973), “Trépieds déliens”, BCH Suppl. I, 17–64. Amandry, P./Spyropoulos, T. (1974), “Monuments chorégiques d’Orchomène de Béotie”, BCH 98, 171–246. Amandry, P. (1976), “Trépieds d’Athènes: I. Dionysies”, BCH 100, 15–93. Amandry, P. (1977), “Trépieds d’Athènes: II. Targélies”, BCH 101, 165–202. Amandry, P. (1987), “Trépieds de Delphes et du Péloponnèse”, in: BCH 111, 1, 79–131. Andrianou, D. (2009), The furniture and furnishings of ancient Greek houses and tombs, Cambridge/New York. BAPD = Beazley Archive Pottery Database (https://www.beazley.ox.ac.uk/pottery/) Biles, Z./Olson, D. (2015), Aristophanes, Wasps; ed. with intr. and comm., Oxford. Dickenson, C.P. (2015), “Pausanias and the ‘Archaic Agora’ at Athens”, Hesperia 84. 4, 723– 770. Gardner, P. (1896), “A Stone Tripod at Oxford, and the Mantinean Basis”, JHS 16, 275–284. Katz, J. (2006), “The Riddle of the sp(h)ij-: The Greek Sphinx and her Indic and Indo-European Background”, in: G.-J. Pinault/D. Petit (eds), La langue poétique indo-européenne, Actes du Colloque de travail de la Société des Études Indo-Européennes (Indogermanische Gesellschaft / Society for Indo-European Studies), Paris, 22–24 Octobre 2003, Louvain, 157– 194. Kreuzer, B. (1992), Frühe Zeichner 1500–500 vor Chr.: ägyptische, griechische und etruskische Vasenfragmente der Sammlung H. A. Cahn, Basel; eine Ausstellung des Freundeskreises der Archäologischen Sammlung der Universität Freiburg i. Br., 4.12.1992 – 4.4.1993, Universitätsbibliothek Freiburg, ed. by V.M. Strocka, Waldkirch. Lissarrague, F. (1990), The Aesthetics of the Greek Banquet. Images of wine and ritual (Orig. Un Flot d’Images: une esthétique du banquet grec, Paris 1987), transl. by A. Szegedy– Maszak, Princeton. Lobel, E. (1962), The Oxyrhynchus Papyri, Part XXVIII. Ed. with notes. London. Lloyd-Jones, H. (1978), “Ten notes on Aeschylus, Agamemnon”, in: R.D. Dawe/J. Diggle/P.E. Easterling (eds), Dionysiaca: Nine Studies in Greek Poetry by former pupils presented to Sir Denys Page on his 70th Birthday, Cambridge, 45–61. Merkelbach, R./West, M.L. (1965), “The Wedding of Ceyx”, RhM 108, 300–317. Moret, J.-M. (1984), Œdipe, la Sphinx et les Thébains: essai de mythologie iconographique, 2 vols, Geneva. Novokhatko, A. (2015), “Epicharmus’ comedy and early Sicilian scholarship”, SCI 34, 69–84. Novokhatko, A. (2017), “Discourse markers in a comic fragmentary dialogue”, in: F. Logozzo/ P. Poccetti (eds), Ancient Greek Linguistics: New Approaches, Insights, Perspectives, Berlin/New York, 227–242. Papalexandrou, N. (2005), The visual poetics of power: warriors, youths, and tripods in Early Greece, Lanham e.a. PCG = Poetae Comici Graeci, ed. by R. Kassel and A. Colin, Berlin, 1983 –. Pritchett, W.K. (1953), “The Attic Stelai I”, Hesperia 22.4, 225–299. Pritchett, W.K./Pippin, A. (1956), “The Attic Stelai II”, Hesperia 25.3, 178–328. Richter, G.M.A. (1966), The furniture of the Greeks, Etruscans and Romans, London. Reisch, E. (1905), “Dreifuss”, RE V. 2, 1669–1696.

  Anna Novokhatko Sakowski, A. (1997), Darstellungen von Dreifußkesseln in der griechischen Kunst bis zum Beginn der Klassichen Zeit, Frankfurt am Main e. a. Schwendemann, K. (1921), “Der Dreifuss. Ein Formen- und Religionsgeschichtlicher Versuch. Mit einer Beilage”, Jahrbuch des DAI 36, 98–185. Suhr, E.G. (1971), “The Tripod”, Foklore 82.3, 216–232.

Serena Perrone

Crates and the Polis: Reframing the Case In this paper I will make what may seem, at first appearances, to be an entirely trivial and obvious point; namely that Crates’ comedy had much to do with the polis. But then, such an obvious point has not always been taken for granted in the case of Crates. Traditionally, Crates has been described as the champion of light comedy — removed from the political fray and non-aggressive — as opposed to the politically engaged canonical poets of Old Comedy. The fifth-century Crates has instead been considered the forerunner of the following century’s comedy. 1 This understanding of Crates is rooted in the interpretation of ancient testimonia pertaining to him. In the parabasis of the Knights, Aristophanes recalls his former colleague Crates, along with Magnes and Cratinus (vv. 537–540 = Crates test. 6 K–A), and mocks him as a misunderstood poet of the old guard, whose comedy was “sober”, “urbane”, and “cheap” (on this last point cf. also Ar. fr. 347). Although, admittedly, comic mockery by a rival is probably not the most reliable source of information. 2 According to the later Prolegomena de Comoedia (III p. 7 Koster = test. 2), Pherecrates emulated Crates, perhaps not only by being, like Crates, an actor before becoming a playwright, but also by avoiding satirising real individuals. 3 Tell-

 The research here presented was part of my work on Crates within the project Kommentierung der Fragmente der griechischen Komödie (KomFrag), directed by Bernhard Zimmermann, and has benefitted in many ways from dialogue with colleagues in the project (cf. now Perrone 2019). I wish also to thank Franco Montanari, Fausto Montana and Lara Pagani, who read an early draft of this paper and provided — as always — valued comments. I am also grateful to Ralph Rosen and Anton Bierl for the discussion following my paper at the conference in Thessaloniki.  1 Selectively Hasper 1877, Norwood 1931, Bonanno 1972. 2 Praising or attacking colleagues are of course highly rhetorical acts and cannot be taken at face value. It has been argued that the description, and even the very choice, to use Crates in the Knights was functional to the mockery of the actual target, Cratinus, who was one of Aristophanes’ direct rivals in that agon. Cf. Biles 2002, Ruffell 2002, Hartwig 2012. 3 Φερεκράτης Ἀθηναῖος … γενόμενος {ὁ} δὲ ὑποκριτὴς ἐζήλωσε Κράτητα, καὶ αὖ τοῦ (αὖ τοῦ EAld : αὑτοῦ N2 : αὐτὸς τοῦ Kaibel, Van Leeuwen et Bonanno) μὲν λοιδορεῖν ἀπέστη, πράγματα δὲ εἰσηγούμενος καινὰ ηὐδοκίμει γενόμενος εὑρετικὸς μύθων. According to Koster, αὖ means “in vicem; ut iam Crates”, but Heath 1989, 351, n. 29 observes “unfortunately this suggestion is itself based on the standard misinterpretation of Aristotle’s allusion to Crates” (see infra). https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-020

  Serena Perrone ingly, in the approximately sixty surviving fragments of Crates (a scant fifty complete verses), there exist no personal attacks bar one. This single exception, in fr. 37, concerns Megabyzos, as we shall see. If it is not a spiteful accident of transmission, it would appear to be a confirmation that Crates refrained from the verbal abuse of onomastì komodein. That said, the traditional verdict on Crates has been rooted, above all else, in a much-debated passage in Aristotle’s Poetics: τὸ δὲ μύθους ποιεῖν [Ἐπίχαρμος καὶ Φόρμις] τὸ μὲν ἐξ ἀρχῆς ἐκ Σικελίας ἦλθε, τῶν δὲ Ἀθήνησιν Κράτης πρῶτος ἦρξεν ἀφέμενος τῆς ἰαμβικῆς ἰδέας καθόλου ποιεῖν λόγους καὶ μύθους. (Arist. Poet. 1449b7–9 = test. 5)

Here Aristotle claims that the construction of comedic plots originated in Sicily and that Crates was the first Athenian poet to abandon the “iambic idea” of comedy and produce logoi kai muthoi, that is, “dialogues and plots”, katholou “with a general scope” (in Willi’s translation) / “with an overall structure” (in Halliwell’s translation). This passage poses a whole set of intricate problems including nothing less than the origin of comedy, as well as the direct influence of Sicilian models. The correct interpretation has long been subject to heated debate. Aristotle sets Crates as protos in Athens, a key figure in Aristotle’s teleological view of the genre history. But it is unclear whether Aristotle is referring here to form or to content, or to both. The phrase ἀφέμενος τῆς ἰαμβικῆς ἰδέας may indeed confirm Crates’ refrain from personal mockery, and his departure from a certain kind of comedy towards the development of “universal” plot. Καθόλου is the same term used by Aristotle when explaining elsewhere the difference between poetry — which relates more of the universal — and history, which relates to the particular: “katholou means the kinds of things which it suits a certain kind of person to say or do, in terms of probability or necessity, while ‘particular’ means, say, what Alcibiades did or experienced” (Arist. Poet. 1451b7, trans. Halliwell 1995). We may reapply Aristotle’s words and say that Crates’ comedy relates the kinds of events and discourse that occur by probability and necessity, rather than events that actually occurred. As Heath 1989 points out, “to compose a plot ‘universally’ is to compose it […] as a whole, with beginning, middle and end standing in a necessary or probable delimited series of casually consequent events”. He continues “the innovation attributed to Crates was the abandonment of casually unstructured plots, not the abandonment of individual abuse”. 4 More recently, Willi 2015 has drawn attention to the word λόγους, interpreting it as “dialogues”  4 Heath 1989, 348 and 351.

Crates and the Polis: Reframing the Case  

and thus maintains that Crates, along the lines of Sicilian comedy, was the first to produce dramatic and dialogic plot-driven comedy in Athens, just as Aeschylus was supposedly the first to develop dialogues in tragedy. Thereafter, Crates’ innovation was about form, and not only influenced but ultimately shaped the very structure of the whole genre. Yet what developed from questionable interpretations of this remark in Aristotle’s Poetics was the idea that Crates was the fons of a strand in Greek comedy, one different in content and style from mainstream topically engaged and aggressive Old Comedy. In contrast, Crates has been seen as a politically unengaged author, who paved the way for the comedy of manners, a precursor in historical evolution to disengaged New Comedy. 5 It has even been suggested that Crates was the head of a “school” of an alternative kind of comedy (Norwood 1931 includes Phrynichus, Pherecrates and even Plato in the alleged “school of Crates”). 6 More recently, Sidwell 2000 speaks of a “plot-based tradition” and maintains that “we should call Middle Comedy ‘Sicilian Comedy’ and see Krates as its first Athenian exponent”. This established vision of Crates, questionably grounded in ancient testimonies, has occasionally taken on a radical form, a strictly schematic approach, that has led to the drastic exclusion of any reference to contemporary reality. This view was forcefully advocated in the one and only modern monograph concerning Crates, Maria Grazia Bonanno’s 1972 “Studi su Cratete comico”. Bonanno categorically denied any possible political allusion in Crates’ works, and rejected any hypothesis of historical reference therein as improbable and gratuitous, maintaining that any topical political subject should be excluded from Crates’ work, that his social ideals found expression only in utopian fantasies, and that his verses were intended for nothing else other than good yet shallow comic effect. 7 Even if we believe Crates’ comedy represented a significantly different strand — which in my view is not so obvious from the little we know — we need not absolutize this view and reject any possible connection with actual events; it is not necessary to assume that every single one of his verses is general in quality,  5 Cf. Henderson 2013, Csapo 2000 on the influence of conformity to “canon” on the actual survival of a given work. 6 Norwood 1931, 145ff. 7 “Argomenti così “impegnati” dovevano essere coerentemente estranei al nostro poeta, i cui più intimi vagheggiamenti sociali trovano posto solo nell’utopia, intesa secondo la più genuina, ma anche più superficiale sensibilità comica” (Bonanno 1972, 53). In keeping with this line see e.g. Imperio 2004, 215 speaking of Crates as the “massimo esponente del filone “disimpegnato” dell’archaia” or Storey 2011, 200 “a sort of Old Comedy different from the politically and topically charged farces of Aristophanes and Eupolis”.

  Serena Perrone or to exclude any serious argument or any allusion to the reality of living in Athens. The sharp polarisation of political comedy against disengaged comedy is the product of a given period of literary criticism, which has now come to an end. Such a clear-cut antithesis is untenable today. While the “threadbare subject” of ancient comedy and politics continues to be a matter of much contention, 8 we now have a much more nuanced vision of the comic genre and its synchronic variety. Furthermore, the current communis opinio suggests that every comedy was — at least on a basic level — political, in as much it was related to the polis, and the polis was its audience. Comedies were financed and performed in the public sphere and competed for public approval. 9 Nonetheless, Crates has been understood as a kind of exception, operating away from mainstream “political” comedy, even if we were to take “political” in its broader sense of “concerning the polis”, let alone in its strict sense. It is clear that in the case of Crates too we have to smooth over the sharp edges of inherited schematisations, both at a general level and in the specific analysis of single fragments. Indeed, some titles and fragments may be read in an entirely different light, possibly revealing references to actual events. Not without reason, Olson 2010 has suggested that “the earliest evidence for explicitly political comedy is perhaps to be found in the work of Crates”. 10 Dobrov 2010 also cites the political potential of titles such as Samians and Orators. We will return to this matter. The traditional vision that has long informed the interpretation of single titles and fragments of Crates has sometimes re-emerged even in recent literature, fuelling circular reasoning in which the exclusion of political contents is both the premise and the conclusion, sometimes in the form of a certain kind of over-scepticism or reluctance when it comes to possible dating. Needless to say, trying to identify specific historical events in a fragment is a risky business. 11 Interpretation of fragments calls for caution and the danger of overinterpretation is high. Often, we can only construct hypothesis by hypothesis. It is like building on the sand. Nonetheless, each fragment is derived from a whole and that whole had a historical context, of which author and spectators were aware. Therefore, we must interrogate fragments on these aspects, even if we may never derive definite answers.  8 The definition of the subject as a “threadbare” is already present in Gomme 1938. Cf. Olson 2010. 9 See e.g. Winkler/Zeitlin 1990; Sommerstein et al. 1993, Dobrov 1998. 10 Olson 2010, 60; Dobrov 2010. 11 For arguments against overinterpretation and attempts to reconstruct plots from scattered fragments see K. Dover’s Frogments (in the foreword to Harvey/Willis 2000, xvii–xix) and Olson’s experiment with Athenaeus’ Aristophanes (Olson 2015 and 2016).

Crates and the Polis: Reframing the Case  

The first obstacle is setting the historical background of Crates’ activities. He probably began in the 450s. Eusebius’ Chronicles sets his akmè in the year 451/450. 12 Otherwise we only have data that places Crates in relation to Cratinus. Crates began as an actor, perhaps for his future rival (test. 3 Sch. Ar. Eq.). 13 He himself then became a playwright and earned his first victory at the Dionysia, at least two years after Cratinus, thus probably in 451/450 or slightly earlier. 14 How long his career lasted is more uncertain. Since Aristophanes in the Knights speaks of him in the past tense (test. 6), we may assume that by 424 he was no longer active (maybe even dead), perhaps recently. 15 Given the limited number of known plays (eleven attested, but the Suda notes seven, only mentioning the titles of six) and the fact that he apparently never won at the Lenaea, 16 it has been supposed that his career was already over by the early 430s. However a date of at least the early 420s is preferable since we learn from Athenaeus that Crates’ Beasts were produced after Cratinus’ Plutoi, whose possible date may range from 436 to 428 but is probably post 429. 17 In other words, the range is the decades between 450 and 430, the time of Pentecontetia, the rising of the Athenian empire, prior to the Peloponnesian War.

 12 Euseb. Chron. p. 112,15 Helm (test. 7a): Crates comicus et Telesilla ac Bacchylides lyricus clari habentur. Cf. Syncellus p. 297, 5–7 Mosshammer (test. 7c). According to Demetrius Lacon, On Poetry B col. 38 p. 112 Romeo (test. 8), Crates was a contemporary of Aeschylus (who died in 456). This note is generally considered inaccurate or unreliable (“certamente falsa” Bonanno 1972, 27), but a short chronological overlap between the two authors cannot be ruled out. 13 Cratinus’ first victory is dated to 453/452, but he had probably been active since about 460, see Bianchi 2017, 13. The order in which the two comedians are cited in some sources seems to confirm their relative chronology (cf. e.g. Crates test. 2 and 6). 14 IG II2 2325e.50–52 (Victors List = Crat. test. 9 e Cratin. test. 5). Eusebius placed the floruit of Cratinus in 454/53 or 453/452 (= Cratin. test. 4). For Cratinus’ chronology see Bianchi 2017, 13– 15. 15 Cf. Geißler 1925, 18 n. 2, who notes that Aristophanes in the Knights speaks of him always in the past tense. 16 Rusten et al. 2011, 137, read this information in light of the alleged apolitical nature of Crates’ comedy with a circular argument: “Note also that Crates never won a victory at the Lenaea, which might support the theory of Russo 1994 that the Lenaea was a more political venue”. One has to consider that perhaps for half his career there were no Lenaean competitions to be won. We have no firm date for the formal institution of comedic contests at the Lenaea. The official establishment is traditionally dated to 442/40 (Capps 1907, 186–187), but the exact date is disputed. 444/41 is a reasonable estimate according to Rusten 2006, while Luppe 2007 opts for 443/39. Cf. Bagordo 2014 on Xenophilos test. 2, who is the first name on the winners list IG II2 2325e. Cf. Millis/Olson 2012, 178ff. 17 The possible date range is 436–428, but a date post 429 seems more likely. For a synthesis of the problem see Bianchi 2017, 30ff.

  Serena Perrone For not a single one of Crates’ plays have we any information about dating, or at which festival they were staged, or where they were ranked in the agon. Hypotheses can only be based on possible references and allusions to contemporary events. And in the case of Crates we cannot even rely on the komodoumenoi for assistance. Some possible dates for single comedies have been suggested (for the most part by the wishful Edmonds), but these have been deemed “improbable” or “gratuitous” by Bonanno. 18 However, in a few cases at least, I think the historical references should not be so hastily dismissed. The first case is the play entitled Samioi (Samians) (frr. 31–35). Possible connections with the revolt of Samos (441) — a severe breakdown within the Delian League that threatened Athenian hegemony – and the subsequent war led by Pericles in 440/439 are clear and have been noted before, only to be excluded as Crates has not been considered “political”. Geißler and, more recently, Storey are notable examples. 19 Storey’s 2011 Loeb edition of comic fragments is indicative of the approach I seek to challenge: Is there any connection between a play called “Samians” by a poet of the 430s and the critical revolt of Samos (440/439) from the Athenian archē? But since Crates seems to have been an apolitical and nontopical comic poet, we might ask what other aspects of Samians might have been useful for comedy (pp. 225–227).

It is possible to debate whether Crates’ Samians should be dated to before, during or after (and by how much) the revolt, which would involve examining the slippery issue of the Morychides’ decree (enacted during the Samian war, between 440 and 439, but then abolished between 437 and 436). 20 In my view it is unlikely that, in the decades when Crates was active, a comedy so entitled had nothing to say, openly or otherwise, concerning the political relationship between Athens and a key ally within the Delian League, during a historical juncture when Athens was establishing its empire. Equally, how likely is it that the mention of the personal name Megabyzos in fr. 37 from Tolmai 21 has nothing to do with Megabyzos, the Persian satrap who

 18 Bonanno 1972, 29, n. 1. 19 Geißler 1925, 18 n. 2. Cf. Edmonds 1957, 152–170. 20 Ammendola 2001, 91–93, Cuniberti 2012, 22–25. The content of the decree and what exactly was subject to limitation is unknown. Sch. Ar. Ach. 67 (τὸ ψήφισμα τὸ περὶ τοῦ μὴ κωμῳδεῖν γραφὲν ἐπὶ Μορυχίδου). 21 Cited by Ath. 6.247f: ποιμαίνει δ’ ἐπισίτιον· | ῥιγῶν δ’ ἐν Μεγαβύζου (μεταβύξου A), | † δέξετ’ ἐπὶ μισθῶι σῖτος.

Crates and the Polis: Reframing the Case  

defeated the Athenians in the disastrous expedition to Egypt (460–454)? 22 The connection has been proposed by Edmonds and more recently by Sofia, 23 who even argues that the Egyptian expedition was the central argument of Tolmai on the basis that the title is translatable as Daring Deeds, and so can be dated to 454 BC. That is perhaps too much, 24 yet we cannot exclude the possibility that the proper name in fr. 37 is an allusion to such events: even had a few years passed, such a bitter defeat would probably be still resonant in the minds of the theatre audience. I am not persuaded by the argument that the name Megabyzos in this fragment is merely a generic name for a rich man (as it may have been some six centuries later, cf. Luc. Tim. 22, Hsch. μ 446) providing an “overtone of grandeur”, as Kassel-Austin and Storey would have it. 25 I think it more likely that name rang another bell for the theatre audience. Both the Egypt expedition and the Samos revolt were crucial events for Athens during Crates’ life; both were turning points in Pericles’ foreign and military policy, events that no doubt stuck firmly in the minds of the theatre audience. By mere mention of Samians and Megabyzos, Crates could not easily have avoided the connection with these events in the public’s memory. We have made reference to another noteworthy title, 26 Rhetores, a play which Athenaeus attributed to Crates (Ath. 9.369c). Even if Rhetores is often translated as Orators, Politicians may also be fitting. 27 “Rhetor” was a term that was used technically to denote any citizen who had made a speech before the people in the Assembly, which often, effectively, correlated with “political leader”. So much

 22 On Megabyzos and the Athenian expedition to Egypt see Thuc. 1.104, 109–110, Ctes. fr. 14.37– 39, Diod. Sic. 11.77.5. 23 Sofia 2012 and 2016. 24 Nesselrath 2017 is sceptical: “Are we really to believe that Crates wrote a comedy in which he made fun of a disastrous Athenian defeat (he might have remembered what happened to his fellow dramatist Phrynichus when he put the destruction of Miletus by the Persians on stage: see Herodotus 6.21.2)? Moreover, the events that Crates is supposed to have alluded to according to Edmonds and Sofia took place around 460 BC, but Crates very likely only started producing comedies around 450: why should he have wanted to start his dramatic career by reminding his fellow Athenians of their bitter defeat in Egypt ten years ago?”. After all, if one were to trust Aristophanes, Crates had to face the public rage more than once (Eq. 537 οἵας δὲ Κράτης ὀργὰς ὑμῶν ἠνέσχετο καὶ στυφελιγμούς). 25 Storey 2011, 229. 26 Olson 2010, 61. 27 So Storey 2011, 225 who, however, regards the title given by Athenaeus’ manuscripts as a garbled form of either Geitones or Heroes.

  Serena Perrone for our supposedly “apolitical” poet then! Many scholars have therefore questioned that this title befits Crates, regarding it as an error. 28 Circular reasoning may deem it an error, but of course it may not be. So many uncertainties make any hypothesis little more than tentative. Another case in point is fr. 26 from the Etymologica, which has received little attention to date. It is a one-word fragment, whose textual transmission is problematic. Indeed the very existence of the play from where it supposedly originates is questionable. Furthermore, no modern edition reliably examines the ancient source. A lovable concoction of troubles. In the entry concerning an Ionic epithet of Zeus, 29 an example from Crates is cited in the context of a controversy about the possible derivation from words that end in –ων, specifically as proof of the existence of a term pogonia from pogon (“beard”). Crates used it in the compound λιποπωγωνία. Our sources do not mention anything concerning its meaning. πωγωνιήτης: πώγων (om. AB) πώγωνος πωγωνίτης (καὶ πλεονασμῶι τοῦ η πωγωνιήτης Et. Sym. V). λέγει σοί τις· “δός μοι ἀπὸ τῶν εἰς ων ληγόντων· οὐκ ἔχεις.” γεγονέν πωγωνία. Κράτης (σωκρ- Et. Sym. C) γοῦν ἐν Μετοίκοις (μετρικοῖς AB) λιποπωγωνία (λιπ- Sylburg: λειπ- Et. Magn.: λέγει· τὸ πωγ- AB, πωγ- Et. Sym.) ἔφη. δύναται οὖν, ὥσπερ οἰκία οἰκιάτης, οὕτω πωγωνία πωγωνιάτης καὶ πωγωνιήτης (γενέσθαι add. Et. Sym.). (Etym. Gen. AB ≃ Etym. Magn. p. 698, 8 ≃ Etym. Sym. CV) pogonietes (bearded, epithet of Zeus): pogon pogonos pogonites (and with pleonasm of eta pogonietes). Someone may say you: “Tell me (a derivate) from words that end with ōn; you are not able to”. There is pogonia. Crates at any rate in Metoikoi used lipopogonia. Thus like oikia oikiates, so too are pogonia pogoniates and pogonietes possible.

λιποπωγωνία is a hapax legomenon composed from λείπω + πώγων and translated by Storey as “lack of a beard”. 30 As for –pogon, compounds related to the beard are quite numerous. In comedy we have τραγοπώγων “with a goat’s beard” (Cratin. fr. 108), δασυπώγων “thick-bearded” (Ar. Thesm. 33) and τιλλοπώγων “one who plucks out his beard”

 28 The Marcianus lectio ἐν Ῥήτορσιν was emendated to ἐν Ἥρωσιν by Volkmann 1861, 40 (followed by Kock 1880, I 138), and to ἐν Γείτοσιν Bonanno 1972, 123. Cf. Storey 2011, 225 “the easiest solution is to regard this title as a garbled form of either Neighbours (Retorsin ~ Geitosin) or Hērōes (Retorsin ~ Erosin)”. 29 Cf. Sud. s.v. 30 Storey 2011, 223.

Crates and the Polis: Reframing the Case  

(Com. Adesp. fr. *671). 31 Similar in meaning to λιποπωγωνία is σπανοπώγων, “having a scanty beard”, from Ion of Chios’ Sunekdemetikos, a work of uncertain nature, possibly related to the embassy to Sparta (fr. 113 Leurini = FGrH 392 F8). 32 The beard in classical Greek culture was a symbol of virility, while having a beard was the norm for adult males in fifth-century Athens. The fashion of shaving began only later, at the end of the fourth century, with Alexander the Great, as is known from literary (Ath. 13.565a) and iconographic sources. The noun λιποπωγωνία could be understood therefore as having an element of mocking to it, scoffing at a beardless character charged with being unmanly and effeminate. There are many comic examples including the clean-shaven Agathon, who wears a beardless mask in Ar. Thesm. 191ff., or Agyrrius, mocked by Praxagora in Aristoph. Eccl. 102. 33 But this interpretation linking the lack of bear with lack of manliness is not the only one possible. There is probably some layer of significance in operation. 34 Pogon is not only the common noun for beard, but it is also a toponym. It is the place name identified with the port of Troezen (Hdt. 8.42 ἐς γὰρ Πώγωνα τὸν Τροιζηνίων λιμένα προείρητο συλλέγεσθαι; cf. Strab. 8.6.14.). A saying also existed that played on this double meaning. The Suda and the paroemiographic tradition report that: Εἰς Τροιζῆνα δεῖ βαδίζειν: ἐπὶ τῶν κακογενείων καὶ σπανοπωγώνων 35 εἴρηται. Πώγων γάρ ἐστι λιμὴν εἰς Τροιζῆνα (Sud. ει 324) “You must go to Troezen”. This was said in reference to those who had a poor or scanty beard. Pogon is in fact the port of Troezen. 36

 31 See also Alex. fr. 266, Timocl. fr. 5. Several examples are listed in Pollux’ Onomasticon (Poll. Onom. 2.88). 32 The source of the fragment is Poll. Onom. 2.88: παρὰ δ’ Ἴωνι τῶι τραγικῶι ἐν τῶι ἐπιγραφομένωι Συνεκδημητικῶι καὶ «σπανοπώγων» τις ὀνομάζεται. For the possible connection with an embassy to Sparta see Leurini 2000, 73. According to von Blumenthal 1939, 54, Sunekdemetikos was a comedy: cf. sch. RV Ar. Pax 835 = FGrH 392 T2, but see Katsaros 2009 ad l. and Federico 2015, 32. 33 Cf. Arnott 1996, 743–744. 34 Unnoticed, as far as I can tell, except for the reference to Zen. II 28 in the apparatum by Kassel/Austin (p. 99). 35 Note σπᾰνοπώγων as in the fragment of Ion. 36 Suda π 2150 s.v. Πώγων, πώγωνος: Τροιζήνιος λιμὴν οὕτω καλούμενος· ὅθεν καὶ παροιμία ἐπὶ τῶν κακογενείων· ἐς Τροιζῆνα δὲ βαδίζειν (“Pogon pogonos: port of Troezen, so called; from here

  Serena Perrone Many fragments from Crates are dependent on the paroemiographic tradition. These include for example fr. 6 (a pig through roses), fr. 33 (on the aging horse), and fr. 38 (a donkey among the bees). The correspondence between the Troezen proverb and Crates’ usage of the word is not perfect, but a link seems very likely to me: pogon is not only beard but may recall also the name of the port of Troezen, the city in the Argolid. This double meaning was clear enough to produce a proverbial expression. The question is now, what could possible allusion to this port mean for Crates and his audience? During what has been termed the First Peloponnesian War, Athens acquired Troezen, perhaps in 456. But, some ten years later, in the winter of 446/445, the Thirty Years’ Peace was signed between Athens and Sparta. According to the requirements of the peace treaty, Athens was forced to cede its possessions in the Peloponnese, including Megara, Achaea and, critically for us, Troezen. The loss of this important port on the Argolid Peninsula would have had a considerable impact on Athenian military and commercial power. Therefore λιποπωγωνία, the lack of pogon, may not only mockingly refer to the condition of being devoid of beard, but also to the condition of having lost the port of Pogon, a fitting allusion to recent political affairs, with direct consequences on Athenian trade and business. This neologism may have been coined on the model of other compounds in lipo-, especially compounds relating to military dishonour, such as λιποστρατία or λιποταξία. Compounds with lipo- as the first member are quite productive in later Greek, often with a privative sense (connected with its intransitive sense “to lack, to be without”). 37 However, in most ancient compounds the transitive meaning of λείπω, “to abandon”, seems prevalent. 38 Its main semantic fields are 1. “desertion”: λιπόναυς “he who abandons his ship” Aesch. Ag. 212; λιποστρατία Hdt. 5.27.2 and in comedy (γραφὴ) λιποταξίου “(indictment for) desertion” Ar. fr. 846 (cf. Dem. 21.166 λιποταξία), Plato Com. fr. 7 and Antiph. 127.9; 2. “fainting”: λιποθυμ- in Hippocrates and λιποψυχ- in e.g. Soph. fr. 496 and in Xenarch. Com. fr. 7.12.

 also the proverb refering to one who has a poor beard: to go to Troezen”). See also Zen. II 28 and Eust. 1, p. 442.12. The proverb held for some considerable time, see Erasmus’s Adagia 1299 “naviges Troezenem”, in reference to the use of a false beard. 37 See Beekes 2010, 844, Chantraine 1968. 38 λιπόγαμος “who abandons one’s consort” and λιποπάτωρ “having left one’s father” Eur. Or. 1305, in reference to Helen, cf. Stesich. 46 λιπεσάνωρ.

Crates and the Polis: Reframing the Case  

If lipopogonia was a play on words, a post quem dating of the pun could be placed at 446 BC, the start of the Thirty Years’ Peace. There is always a risk in speculation, but perhaps there is no harm with a little more. According to the Etymologica, the title of the play from where this fragment originates is Metoikoi, “Metics” (μετρικοῖς in the Etym. Gen. is probably a case of scribal trivialization). This is the only occurrence of such a title for Crates. Metoikoi is not listed among the six plays mentioned by the Suda (test. 1). Consequently, some scholars have questioned its attribution to Crates. We know of plays entitled Metoikoi by Plato and Pherecrates. Meineke 1826, Schmidt 1946 and Bonanno 1972 — though rather more cautiously — considered whether fr. 26 could have originated from Pherecrates’ Metics rather than Crates’ Metics, grounding their reasoning in the potential confusion between the names Crates and Pherecrates (cf. e.g. Crates frr. 14, 20). However, even the attribution of a play entitled Metics to Pherecrates is far from certain: its single mention by the grammarian Apollonius Dyscolus (de pron. p. 113, 77 Sch. = GG II 1.1) has been considered a possible error, since he cited the Metics by Plato shortly prior to mentioning Pherecrates’ Metics. 39 The existence of Plato’s Metics is not doubtful, thankfully. Four fragments (frr. 80–83) from various sources (Photius, Pollux, Apollonius Dyscolus) exist. Additionally, it is mentioned among the titles list for Plato in Suda π 1708. Meineke and Kaibel suggested that there was only one play with this title that existed, and that it was written by Plato. They therefore attributed all the fragments cited under the play’s title to Plato. 40 Errors in the tradition are certainly possible, however it is equally possible that different poets wrote works with the same title. 41 Neither the fact that there is only one source for the play’s title, nor its absence from the Suda’s list are sufficient reasons for excluding the title from the ranks of Crates’ comedies. Once again the footing for supposition and speculation is unsure, but we may still interrogate further. What does the title of the Metics actually imply? Metics were a particularly large group of people in fifth-century Athens. They were immigrants, foreigners who had taken up residence in the city. They were free men but without political rights, obliged to register an Athenian citizen to act as prostates, and to pay specific taxes. 42 Athens became increasingly attractive to

 39 Kassel-Austin PCG VII p. 161; Quaglia 2001, 12. 40 Meineke 1839, 64; Kaibel apud PCG VII p. 466. 41 Plato and Crates also shared the title Heortài (Feasts). 42 For a definition of the status of a metic see Whitehead 1977, 6–10, Kamen 2013, 43ff. and Sosin 2016. The date of the creation of the metoikia is disputed; the first literary reference seems

  Serena Perrone immigrants, particularly after the Persian Wars and the establishment of its wealthy empire. Despite metics’ lower status and the existence of the stereotype that saw them only as interested in money and hateful of their own countries, 43 metics were integrated into the economic, social and religious life of the city, and played a fundamental role in the exercise of Athens’ economic and commercial power. In Aristophanes’ Acharnians (vv. 507–508) a metaphor links metics and Athenian citizens together in opposition to the xenoi present at the Dionysia: the Athenian population — astoi and metics — who participated at the Lenaea, are likened to grain that has been hulled and separated from the chaff, which is the foreigners; citizens are the flour, metics the bran. 44 Aristophanes seemingly shows a favourable attitude toward metics in other passages as well (Pax 297, Eq. 347, Lys. 580). That is not surprising, given that metics formed a substantial part of the audience in the theatre. Moreover, metics could participate at the Lenaian festival not only as spectators but also by performing as members of the chorus or acting as choregoi. 45 But while the Lenaea was seemingly inclusive, that was not the case for the City Dionysia. At the City Dionysia, metics were excluded from participating in choruses and classed as mere foreigners along with all other nonAthenian participants. 46 Cf. Sch. Ar. Plut. 953c–d Chantry, 47 Plut. Phoc. 30.6. 48 It appears that a procedures of complaint were in place and regulated by law, should a metic have participated in a chorus. This is indicated by Pseudo-Andocides’ Against Alcibiades, which refers to an episode involving Alcibiades, 49 as

 to be that in Aeschylus’ Supplices, see Tosi 2010. Wijma 2014 argues for its emergence already in the 470s on the basis of iconographic representations. 43 Lape 2010, 49ff. 44 Taillardat 19652, 392. The stress on the intimacy of the festival should be read as a response to Cleon’s accusation that Aristophanes smeared the city in front of a global audience at the Dionysia with his Babylonians in 426, see Wijma 2014, 70. 45 Cf. Lys. 12.20. Wilson 2000, 28–31. 46 For a recent synthesis see Wijma 2014, 65–85. 47 (953c) ἔπειτ’ ἐκεῖ κορυφαῖος] οὐκ ἐξῆν ξένον χορεύειν ἐν τῷ ἀστικῷ χορῷ· παρὰ τοῦτο πέπαιχεν· ἐν δὲ τῷ Ληναίῳ (“βαλανείῳ” Chantry) ἐξῆν. VEΘNBarbAld (953d) ἐπεὶ καὶ μέτοικοι ἐχορήγουν. VEΘNBarbAld. C 48 νόμου γὰρ ὄντος Ἀθήνησι τότε μὴ χορεύειν ξένον ἢ χιλίας ἀποτίνειν τὸν χορηγόν. Plutarch, while discussing Demades’ ostentatious display of wealth, states there was a law in Athens at the end of the fourth century which stipulated that no foreigner could be part of a chorus. If the law was broken the choregus would have to pay a fine of 1,000 drachmas. However, Demades presented a chorus of 100 members entirely made up of foreigners and brought 1,000 drachma fine for each of them to the theatre. 49 [And.] 4.20 (Taurea VS Alcibiades) Κελεύοντος γὰρ τοῦ νόμου τῶν χορευτῶν ἐξάγειν ὃν ἄν τις βούληται ξένον ἀγωνιζόμενον, οὐκ ἐξὸν ἐπιχειρήσαντα κωλύειν.

Crates and the Polis: Reframing the Case  

well as by Demosthenes’ Against Midia (Dem. 21.56–60). The date of the law that excluded foreigners from choruses is contested. According to Wilson 2000, this law may have been in place since the 440s. Others are of the opinion, based on Demosthenes’ speech, that the law came into force only in the fourth century (Dem. 21.147). At any rate, it is possible that an exclusion of xenoi from the choruses of the City Dionysia already existed de facto if not yet de jure by the second half of the fifth century. We are not able to date with any certainty the development of metic participation in civic festivals, but it likely coincided with political and fiscal developments in the status of metics at Athens, beginning with Pericles’ citizenship law (451/450). Pericles’ law demanded two Athenian parents for citizen status, thereby raising the requirement for citizenship and representing the loss of any prospect for status change for metics. The turn of the second half of fifth century seems to have been a period of social tension at Athens, a period of regulating various components within the polis. The debate may have concerned the inclusion and role of metics in civic and religious activities such as performance in dramatic choruses, such as at the Lenaea, which seems only to have undergone official regulation in the 440s. 50 We do not know when any of the three putative comedies entitled Metoikoi were performed, nor at what festival. Crates’ Metics was probably the earliest, if it existed. It is generally believed that the plural in the title refers to the members of the chorus. If so, a chorus of Metics would have been particularly significant in the social and political climate following the enactment of Pericles’ citizenship law (451/450). If we suppose a performance at a Lenaian festival — perhaps even one of the first that awarded official prize in the late 440s — the chorus would have comprised citizens and/or metics playing the role of metics. If we suppose a performance at a Dionysian festival, where real metics would not have been allowed to have been chorus members, it would have created a meaningful metatheatrical short-circuit between the real identities and the dramatic identities of the chorus members. In short, if Crates ever wrote a comedy entitled Metics, it could perfectly easily be dated to the forties (post 446), as suggested by the possible allusion to the Thirty Years’ Peace in fr. 26. Without indulging further in speculation, in conclusion, the question must be posed: are we really still to believe that Crates must have been an ‘apolitical’ comic poet?

 50 Cf. supra n. 16.

  Serena Perrone The longstanding questionable preconception has for too long informed study on this comic poet: there is a clear need for a reappraisal of Crates’ fragments free of bias and circular logic. I have tried to show there are indeed cases in which it is possible to imagine references to actual situations and that the titles indicate potential engagement with contemporary civic issues. Admittedly, we know very little, almost nothing, and possible historical hints in Crates’ fragments are often unverifiable. But an inability to nuance the precise links and place them exactly within their context does not mean that it can be said that no links or references exist at all. The case against Crates is far from secure.

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Andreas Bagordo

On Some Short (and Dubious) Fragments of Aristophanes I will submit four cases of very short fragments to your attention (one or two words; the second fragment has two, but they do not necessarily belong to the same context) 1 — fragments which I consider representative of the difficulties an editor or commentator has to face, even if the fragments in question appear at first glance so inconsistent and — so to say — innocuous: in addition to this apparent simplicity and innocuousness, one has to consider the authority of such a masterful and, shall I say, intimidating edition as Kassel–Austin, which we all rely on. So, before we change a syllable or a comma of that text we need some courage, of course, but what we mostly need is a good parallel. We also need to delve into the tradition, to divine the intention of our testimonies, to examine the context in which they cite a fragment.

 A Comical Julienne (Ar. fr. 938 [dub.] K–A) ἐπεὶ δὲ καὶ ὄρνεις ἐπῆσαν ταῖς κολοκύνταις καὶ ἄλλοις κνιστοῖς λαχάνοις (οὕτως δ’ εἴρηκεν Ἀριστοφάνης [Ἀντιφάνης? Valckenaer, Dindorf] ἐν Δηλίᾳ [Δαιδάλῳ? Valckenaer] τὰ σύγκοπτα λάχανα κνιστὰ ἢ στέμφυλα) (Ath. 9.373a) And because chickens were sitting on the pumpkins and other chopped up vegetables (thus Aristophanes [Antiphanes?] called the cut up vegetables knista [“chopped up”, nt. pl.] or stemphyla [“pressed”, nt. pl.] in the Dēlia [in Daidalos?]) ὅτι τὰ συγκοπτὰ λάχανα κνιστὰ (η supra ι CE) Ἀριστοφάνης (Ἀντιφάνης? Valckenaer, Dindorf) φησίν (Ath. 2.56d [CE]) because Aristophanes called the cut up vegetables knista (“chopped up”, nt. pl.)

In the category of ὄρνεις “chickens” (the whole section of Athenaeus is dedicated to poultry) the two termini related to λάχανα are attributed to Aristophanes; Eustathius (Eust. in Il. p. 872,9 ὅτι δὲ καὶ λάχανα κνηστὰ ἐκαλοῦντο τὰ συγκοπτὰ ἐκ  1 For further discussion upon these fragments see Bagordo 2018. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-021

  Andreas Bagordo τοῦ κνῶ κνήσω) depends on the epitomized Athenaeus version; for their part Hesychius and Photius are connected with one another (Hsch. κ 3138 κνιστὰ λάχανα· συγκεκομμένα; Phot. κ 824 κνιστὰ [gac z, κνηστὰ gpc z]· λάχανα συγκοπτά [R. Porson: κνιστὰ λάχανα· συγκοπτά]: in Photius g and z punctuate before λάχανα (in my opinion correctly, pace Porson, who inserts λάχανα in the lemma; Theodoridis prints κνηστά — 2 but the correctness of the lectio κνιστά has been shown by Degani long ago — 3 and retains Porson’s punctuation); in Pollux (Poll. Onom. 6.62 τὰ δὲ συγκεκομμένα λάχανα κνιστὰ ἐκάλουν, ὡς τὰ ἄγρια κιχόρια, καὶ ἰσχνὰ λάχανα τὰ λεπτά) the terminology remains identical; what is interesting for our purpose: τὰ δὲ συγκεκομμένα λάχανα is subject, κνιστὰ is predicate. Because Athenaeus, Pollux und Photius’ manuscripts clearly read κνιστά as lemma and λάχανα συγκοπτά or συγκεκομμένα as interpretamentum, it would be more economical to read κνιστά as lemma and λάχανα συγκεκομμένα as interpretamentum also in Hesychius (instead of correcting Photius against the manuscript evidence and in light of the Hesychius-Gloss) and to consider κνιστά, as well as στέμφυλα, as a substantive adjective, which remains comprehensible even without λάχανα (pace Kock I 592 who wrote: “quisquis eorum verborum auctor est, certe etiam λάχανα ad ea pertinent”), exactly like our julienne, understandable without vegetables (it. tagliata does not need di carne, mod. gr. σουβλάκι “skewer” does not need κρέατος, and so on).

 An Ambiguous Jaw (Ar. fr. 941 [dub.] K–A) ἄμφηκες· ἤτοι ἀμφοτέρωθεν ἠκονημένον, ὥσπερ καὶ Ἀριστοφάνης εἶπεν ἀμφήκη γνάθον amphēkes (“double-edged”, nt.): i.e. whetted on both sides, as Aristophanes also said amphēkēs gnathos (“double-edged jaw”, acc.) (Schol. Soph. Aj. 286 ap. Purgold 1802, 76)

 2 Theodoridis 1998, ad l. 3 Degani 1963, 290–291 [= 2004, II 841–842]; κνίζειν (for which see Biles/Olson 2015, ad Ar. Vesp. 1285–1286 ἡνίκα Κλέων μ’ ὑπετάραττεν ἐπικείμενος / καί με κακίσας ἔκνισε: “The vb. (lit. “scratch, scrape”) is used metaphorically of irritating a person or causing him grief”) has occasionally been confused with κνηστά (from κνᾶν “scrape, rasp”; see Ath. 3.111d (κνηστὸς ἄρτος ποιὸς παρὰ Ἴωσι, Ἀρτεμίδωρος ὁ Ἐφέσιός φησιν ἐν Ἰωνικοῖς ὑπομνήμασι); for this reading see 2.51b (ἅπερ [i.e. συκάμινα] οἱ ἐπιχώριοι ἐπὶ βραχὺ κνίσαντες σιδηρίῳ ἐῶσιν ἐπὶ τοῦ φυτοῦ; see also 9.376c), Sud. κ 1874 (κνίζων· λυπῶν, ἢ τέμνων), κ 1878 (κνίσματα· σπαράγματα) and Etym. Magn. p. 522.25 (κνίζω, ὃ σημαίνει τὸ λεπτύνω).

On Some Short (and Dubious) Fragments of Aristophanes  

In his comment on the adjective ἀμφήκης in Sophocles’ Ajax (Soph. Aj. 286–7 ἄμφηκες λαβὼν / ἐμαίετ’ ἔγχος ἐξόδους ἕρπειν κενάς) the scholiast refers back to the one in Sud. α 1694 (ἄμφηκες· ἀμφοτέρωθεν ἠκονημένον [= Phot. α 1297 = Synag. α 414)]. ἀπὸ τῆς ἀμφήκης εὐθείας. οἷος ἐμοὶ τρέφεται παῖς ἀμφήκει γλώττῃ λάμπων. Ἀριστοφάνης Νεφέλαι), an identical formulation that arouses the suspicion that the word in this case too concerns a reference to a passage from Clouds (Ar. Nub. 1158–1160 οἷος ἐμοὶ τρέφεται / τοῖσδ’ ἐνὶ δώμασι παῖς / ἀμφήκει γλώττῃ λάμπων). 4 The pointed use of γνάθος (also from Aristophanes) could, however, relativize the very doubt raised about it. The Aristophanic ἀμφήκης γνάθος seems to be the parodic variant of various high-poetic junctures, which begin with similar formulas such as φάσγανον ἄμφηκες (Hom. Κ 256; cf. Bacchyl. 11.87–88 φάσγανον ἄμ-/φακες), ξίφος ἄμφηκες (Hom. Φ 118 = π 80 = φ 341); in tragedy it is represented by Aesch. Ag. 1149 (ἀμφήκει δορί), [Aesch.] PV 692 (ἀμφήκει κέντρῳ), 1044 (ἀμφήκης βόστρυχος), Soph. El. 485 (ἀμφήκης γένυς, said of an axe, but very interesting for our γνάθος), Eur. El. 688 (ἀμφήκει ξίφει). The use of γνάθος (lit. jaw, metaph. snout) is comparable to the use in Ar. Nub. 1107–1110 (δίδασκε καὶ κόλαζε καὶ μέμνησ’ ὅπως / εὖ μοι στομώσεις αὐτόν, ἐπὶ μὲν θάτερα / οἷον δικιδίοις, τὴν δ’ ἑτέραν αὐτοῦ γνάθον / στόμωσον οἵαν εἰς τὰ μείζω πράγματα), which also suggests a possible context for the fragment: Strepsiades requests that Socrates instruct his son in both the trivial and the more important court proceedings, wherein this double goal is symbolized through the one and the other γνάθος, which both must be whetted and sharpened accordingly (the verb στομοῦν — a metaphor borrowed from metallurgy — 5 corresponds to ἀκονεῖν in the quotation: ἠκονημένον said the scholiast and the Suda; the following passages make another case for the independence of the Aristophanic fragment: [Aesch.] PV 64–65 (ἀδαμαντίνου νῦν σφηνὸς αὐθάδη γνάθον / στέρνων διαμπὰξ πασσάλευ’ ἐρρωμένως), where γνάθος functions as a metaphor for the wedge for Prometheus’ torture, Eur. Cycl. 395 (†Αἰτναῖά τε σφαγεῖα πελέκεων γνάθοις†), where the γνάθοι pertain to a double axe, and – more closely related to the Aristophanic imagery — Eur. fr. 530.5–6 Kn. (πελέκεως δὲ δίστομον / γένυν

 4 See for example Lorenzoni 2017, 451: “riferimento molto probabile a Nu. 1160, come induce a credere Suda α 1694 A.”; for further Aristophanic passages in these scholia see Sternbach 1886, 247. 5 See Blümner 1886, IV 343–344; on the metaphorical usage in comedy cf. Taillardat 19652, 287– 288.

  Andreas Bagordo ἔπαλλ’ Ἀγκαῖος), where γένυς, referring to a πέλεκυς, presents a perfect counterpart to γνάθος, while δίστομος reflects the double edge of ἀμφήκης (irrespective of whether it is δί-στομος or δίσ-τομος). 6 Consequently, it is clear that the juncture from metallurgical jargon with an arguably tragic tinge could have served to characterize sophistic or Euripidean subtlety (in expression or in method of argumentation) and therefore should be considered not so much as a reformulation of ἀμφήκει γλώττῃ of Clouds as another instance of the metaphor of the tongue sharpened on both sides, which can be as sharp and cutting to operate as an axe.

 The Importance of Being ... Aristophanes (Ar. fr. 900 K–A) τετραχίζειν (τετραρχ- gpc, altera litt. ρ supra lin. addita, z)· οἷον (τὸ Hsch.) ἐπὶ τετάρτῳ μέρει ποιεῖν τι (τι π. Et. gen.). οὕτως Ἀριστοφάνης (οὕτ. Ἀρ. om. Hsch.) (Phot. τ 196 = Etym. Gen. B s.v. τετραχίζειν [hinc Etym. Magn. p. 754,34 = Etym. Sym. cod. V fol. 181r = Zonar. p. 1725] = Hsch. τ 639) tetrachizein (“to work for quarter-pay”): that is, to do something for a quarter (of the pay). Thus Aristophanes

The reading τετραρχίζειν (gpc) is a clear trivialization, especially considering the influence of the gloss directly above it (Phot. τ 195 τετραρχία). The verb, attested in literature only here, is a derivative of the adverb τέτραχα (since Plat. Grg. 464c τέτραχα ἑαυτὴν διανείμασα; or also τετραχά) or τετραχῇ (since Xen. Hell. 5.2.7 διῳκίσθη δ’ ἡ Μαντίνεια τετραχῇ) “in four parts” (see also τετραχθά, only Homeric: Hom. II.3.363 τριχθά τε καὶ τετραχθὰ διατρυφὲν ἔκπεσε χειρός, Od. 9.71 τριχθά τε καὶ τετραχθὰ διέσχισεν ἲς ἀνέμοιο; the later instances are Homeric quotations or lexicographical entries); a passage has been unfortunately ignored in Kassel–Austin: Poll. Onom. 7.152 (ἐπίμορτος δὲ γῆ παρὰ Σόλωνι ἡ ἐπὶ μέρει γεωργουμένη, καὶ μορτὴ τὸ μέρος τὸ ἀπὸ τῶν γεωργῶν· τὸ δ’ ἐπὶ τετάρτῳ μέρει νέμεσθαι τετραχίζειν): it suggests that here it could concretely deal with agricultural wage work – as in Solon’s ἐπίμορτος γῆ (Sol. fr. 67 Ruschenb.) or the farmers’ μορτή; in particular, the context of the verb in the Solonian reform program at

 6 Cf. Coughanowr 1984.

On Some Short (and Dubious) Fragments of Aristophanes  

any rate makes it very dubious to attribute the fragment to Aristophanes (as historians, not so interested in the comic Aristophanes indeed, have recently shown, it is almost certain that τετραχίζειν can ultimately be traced back through the transmission of Aristophanes of Byzantium directly to Solon’s axones; 7 the quotation’s unspecific ποιεῖν τι could indeed theoretically indicate a metaphorical usage for any activity, what could speak for the comic poet. Yet the Solonian background in Pollux as well as Aristophanes of Byzantium’s treatment of the Solonian axones makes an important argument for the grammarian (see Ar. Byz. fr. 252. 253 and especially fr. 410 Slater Ἀριστοφάνης δὲ ὁμοίας αὐτὰς εἶναι τοῖς ἄξοσι, πλὴν ὅτι οἱ μὲν ἄξονες νόμους, αἱ δὲ κύρβεις θυσίας ἔχουσιν): 8 an Aristophanis Byzantii fragmentum novum thus is by far more likely than even a Dubium of the comic poet.

 Paederasts or Cunnilingui: Who Is More Harmful to People? (Ar. fr. 969 [dub.] K–A) ὁ δὲ κωμικός, φασί, βροτολοιγὸν (vel βροτολοιχὸν Lobeck) ἰδίως που (‘an ἰδιοτρόπως?’ Taillardat) ἔφη τὸν καὶ αἰσχρολοιχὸν λεγόμενον κατὰ ἀναλογίαν τοῦ ματιολοιχοῦ (ματτυο-?) διὰ τὸ τοὺς τοιούτους παραιτίους γίνεσθαι τοῦ μὴ κύειν τὰς γυναῖκας καὶ οὕτως ἐπ’ ὀλέθρῳ βροτῶν εἶναι (Eust. in Il. p. 518,42) And the comic poet, they say (cf. Suet. Π. βλασφ. 70 p. 53 Taill.), mentioned brotoloigos (“ruining mortals” / brotoloichos “people-licking”, acc.) somewhere in a certain sense (idiotropōs [?] “peculiar”), which is also called aischroloichos (“cunnilingus”, acc.) in analogy to the matioloichos (“someone who licks a mation [?]”; “someone who licks the mattyē [a dish]”), because such people fail to reproduce and thereby are detrimental to humanity.

In one of the meanings of the Homeric epithet βροτολοιγός Eustathius gives an explanation that largely goes back to Suetonius (Suet. Π. βλασφ. 70 p. 53 Taill.). An emendation of βροτολοιχός by Lobeck was rejected by Taillardat, the editor of Suetonius. 9 The compound βροτολοιγός “ruining mortals” is in the poetic tradition almost exclusively found as an epithet of Ares (from βροτός “mortal” and a  7 Cf. Càssola 1993 and Faraguna 2012, 178. 8 Cf. Slater 1986, ad l. 9 Lobeck 1820, 573: “Credo equidem, Comicum βροτολοιχόν (fellatorem), ut intelligi voluisse, ita scripsisse”; Taillardat 1967, 130.

  Andreas Bagordo λοιγός — the corresponding verb is not attested in Greek —, which is only corradical with the Nomen agentis λοιγός “destroyer”; Dettori recently tries to explain it with another root as people-striking; in this case λοιγός would not be a Nomen agentis, but a retrograde form derived from the compound). 10 βροτολοιγός is found e.g. in (Hom. Il. 5.31, 455, 518, 846, 909; 8.349; 11.295; 12.298, 802; 20.46; 21.421; Od. 8.115; see also [Hes.] Sc. 333. 425, Tyrt. fr. 19.4 W.2, Aesch. Supp. 665; later also for Eris — Timon. SH fr. 795,1). Based on the use of the epithet for Eros in a paederastic context, as in Anth. Pal. XII 37 (Dioscor. = HE 1512) (πυγὴν Σωσάρχοιο διέπλασεν Ἀμφιπολίτεω / μυελίνην παίζων ὁ βροτολοιγὸς Ἔρως, / Ζῆνα θέλων ἐρεθίξαι, ὁθούνεκα τῶν Γανυμήδους / μηρῶν οἱ τούτου πουλὺ μελιχρότεροι, from the 3rd century BC), according to which no life could originate from a paederastic relationship, or even thereby destroy humanity, as in Luc. Amor. 35 (μηδέ τις ἔρωτας ἀρρένων ἀπαιτείτω παρὰ τοῦ παλαιοῦ χρόνου· γυναιξὶν γὰρ ὁμιλεῖν ἀναγκαῖον ἦν, ἵνα μὴ τελείως ἄσπερμον ἡμῶν φθαρῇ τὸ γένος) where the idea is explicitly formulated that humankind would be without seed and doomed through homoerotic relationships alone. Accordingly to this, Taillardat tries to read the explanation of the commentator simply as a reference to the seed- and life-destroying effect of paederastic sex and thus tries to equate the comic βροτολοιγός to a paederast; 11 in so doing, however, he has to concede that the βροτολοιγὸς Ἔρως in Anth. Pal. V 180,1–2 (Meleag. = HE 4038) (τί ξένον, εἰ βροτολοιγὸς Ἔρως τὰ πυρίπνοα τόξα / βάλλει καὶ λαμυροῖς ὄμμασι πικρὰ γελᾷ;) does not connote paederasty. Although this interpretation sounds suggestive, upon closer inspection it shows more disadvantages than advantages. First, it seems that, behind the elaborate ὁ βροτολοιγὸς Ἔρως of Dioskorides (likely imitating Meleager), there hides nothing more than the pointed (metrically and phonetically successful) variation of the Homeric formula βροτολοιγὸς Ἄρης, that is, a juncture, clearly coined ad hoc, that requires no poetic tradition or reference other than the Homeric formula; secondly, the ‘paederastic’ meaning does not appear to be compatible with the commentator’s explanation: that is, neither with αἰσχρολοιχός, which elsewhere appears only in Phot. λ 96 (λαπτώμενος· ἀπὸ τοῦ λάπτειν εἴρηται. ὁ αἰσχρολοιχός) and unambiguously refers to cunnilinctus — thus also referring to the otherwise questionable fellatio (also thus in LSJ s.v.) —, nor with Eustathius’s remark (which Suetonius complements) that the word formation βροτολοιγός was used analogously to

 10 Dettori 2014. 11 Taillardat 1967, 130: “En définitive, on a appelé le pédéraste ὁ βροτολοιγός parce qu’on l’identifiait comiquement avec l’Érôs pédérastique lui-même”.

On Some Short (and Dubious) Fragments of Aristophanes  

ματιολοιχός. 12 In particular, αἰσχρολοιχός indicates the sexual practice of λείχειν that is considered shameful (αἰσχρο-); it is, however, not at all comparable with the hetero- or homosexual fellatio (pace Lobeck: βροτολοιχός = “fellator”), for which not licking, but rather sucking is practiced (so too the λάπτειν of the quoted Phot. λ 96). 13 Furthermore, an important cultural factor cannot be overlooked: in fifth-century Athenian society, paederastic love is also in no way frowned upon and is completely compatible with heterosexual marriage, as it is reflected in contemporary comedy — unlike homosexual tendencies among adults; by contrast, a (heterosexual) practice like cunnilinctus was stigmatized and contrasted with natural sexual intercourse aimed at reproduction. 14 It is of course possible that Aristophanes related the high-poetic βροτολοιγός to cunnilingus in the sense of people-destroying, thus only in terms of content, for parodic purposes — a practice which in fact does not contribute to the continuation of humankind. Yet how can the reference to αἰσχρολοιχός be explained? If only the meaning were concerned, the assonance -λοιγός / -λοιχός, which can hardly be a product of chance, would sound very dubious. 15 It would appear far more pointed if Aristophanes had varied the serious epithet, which his audience would promptly recognize, slightly (a γ for a χ) for the sake of obscene wordplay, according to his usual practice (see for example the wordplays of this kind, that is with very slight changes — a phoneme or an accent —, listed in Ar. Ach. 575 λόφων ~ λόχων, Eq. 954 δῆμος / δημός, 1060 πυέλους ~ Πύλος, Nub. 394 βροντή ~ πορδή, Av. 1287 νομόν ~ νόμον, Eccl. 184 Ἀγύρριον ~ ἀργύριον, 903 μήλοις ~ μηροῖς): a comic lexis βροτολοιχός simultaneously evokes people-licking and peopledestroying perverts — which if nothing else makes a productive argument for Aristophanic authorship.

 12 See Dover 1968, zu Ar. Ran. 451: “ΣRVE alleges μάτιον τὸ ἐλάχιστον εἰώθασι λέγειν, and it may be one of many colloquial words of which we catch only a glimpse [...], but ΣRV betrays uncertainty by mentioning alternative theories, one of which connects the word impossibly with μάταιος and the other with the measure which is called (in Roman Egypt!) μάτιον. Bentley’s emendation ματτυολοιχός (cf. ματτιο- O7) would mean ‘greedy parasite’”; cf. Phot. μ 146 = Sud. μ 284 [cf. Hsch. μ 384. 401] ματιολοιχός· ὁ περὶ τὰ μικρὰ πανοῦργος καὶ λίχνος. μάτιον γὰρ ὡς βέλτιον τῷ τόνῳ μικρόν. 13 See Napolitano 1994, 74 n. 25. 14 For its far-reaching implications in comic mockery, see the important study of Napolitano 1994, on Ἀριφράδης πονηρός. 15 On κνισολοιχός, the only other compound with -λοιχός in comedy see Papachrysostomou 2016, ad Amph. fr. 10,1b [Gynaikomania] K–A.

  Andreas Bagordo To sum up: 1) in Ar. fr. 938 [dub.] K–A κνιστά (like στέμπφυλα) is autonomous from λάχανα (also in the lexicographical tradition); 2) there is no reason to consider Ar. fr. 941 [dub.] K–A (ἀμφήκη γνάθον) as a misreading or variant of Ar. Nub. 1160 (ἀμφήκει γλώττῃ); 3) Ar. fr. 900 K–A (τετραχίζειν) should be attributed to Aristophanes of Byzantium (or at least be edited among the Aristophanic Dubia); 4) in Ar. fr. 969 [dub.] K–A (βροτολοιγός) one could read a more pointed (and therefore Aristophanic) βροτολοιχός (the authenticity has not to be questioned; with ὁ κωμικός Eustathius always means Aristophanes). In conclusion: in dealing with fragments, not only the shortest ones, one should never trust Hesychius or Photius blindly, one should never trust Porson or Kassel and Austin blindly, one should just trust himself, his intuition and ability to understand, compare, and combine passages, his knowledge of Greek, or what one believes it might sound like Greek.

Bibliography Bagordo, A. (2018), Aristophanes fr. 821–976. Übersetzung und Kommentar, (Fragmenta Comica 10.11), Göttingen. Biles, Z.P./Olson, S.D. (2015), Aristophanes, Wasps. Edited with Introduction and Commentary, Oxford. Blümner, H. (1879–19122), Technologie und Terminologie der Gewerbe und Künste bei Griechen und Römern. I, Leipzig/Berlin 19122 [1. Aufl. 1875]; II: 1879; III: 1884; IV: 1886. Càssola, F. (1993), “Aristofane di Bisanzio e Solone”, in: F. Càssola (ed.), Scritti di storia antica I: Grecia, Napoli, 201–211. Coughanowr, E. (1984), “On the Meaning of δίστομος in Euripides”, CQ n.s. 34, 235–236. Degani, E. (1963), “Varia Graeca”, RCCM 5, 286–292 (= Filologia e storia. Scritti di E. D. Vol. II, Hildesheim/Zürich/New York 2004, 837–843). Dettori, E. (2014), “Un’ipotesi etimologica per βροτολοιγός”, in: A. Gostoli/R. Velardi (eds), Mythologeîn. Mito e forme di discorso nel mondo antico. Studi in onore di Giovanni Cerri, Pisa/Roma, 411–413. Dover, K.J. (1968), Aristophanes: Clouds. Edited with Introduction and Commentary, Oxford. Faraguna, M. (2012), “Hektemoroi, isomoiria, seisachtheia: ricerche recenti sulle riforme economiche di Solone”, Dike 15, 171–193. K–A = Poetae Comici Graeci (PCG): PCG I (Comoedia Dorica Mimi Phlyaces). Ediderunt R. Kassel et C. Austin, Berolini/Novi Eboraci 2001; PCG II (Agathenor—Aristonymus), 1991; PCG III 2 (Aristophanes. Testimonia et Fragmenta), 1984; PCG IV (Aristophon—Crobylus), 1983; PCG V (Damoxenus—Magnes), 1986; PCG VI 2 (Menander. Testimonia et Fragmenta apud scriptores servata), 1998; PCG VII (Menecrates—Xenophon), 1989; PCG VIII (Adespota), 1995. Kock, T. (1880–1888), Comicorum Atticorum Fragmenta. Ed. T. K. Vol. I (Antiquae comoediae fragmenta), Lipsiae 1880; vol. II (Novae comoediae fragmenta. Pars I), 1884; vol. III (Novae comoediae fragmenta. Pars II. Comicorum incertae aetatis fragmenta. Fragmenta incertorum poetarum. Indices. Supplementa), 1888.

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Lobeck, C.A. (1820), Phrynichi Eclogae Nominum et Verborum Atticorum [...] edidit, explicuit C.A.L., Lipsiae. Lorenzoni, A. (2017), “Aristofane in frammenti”. Review of M. Pellegrino, Aristofane. Frammenti, testo, trad. e comm., Lecce 2015, Eikasmós 28, 423–456. Napolitano, M. (1994), “Ἀριφράδης πονηρός: una riconsiderazione”, QUCC n.s. 48, 67–92. Papachrysostomou, A. (2016), Amphis: Introduction, Translation, Commentary, Fragmenta Comica 20, Heidelberg. Purgold, L. (1802), Observationes criticae in Sophoclem, Euripidem, Anthologiam Graecam et Ciceronem: adiuncta est e Sophoclis codice Ienensi varietas lectionis et scholia maximam partem inedita, Ienae/Lipsiae. Slater, W.J. (1986), Aristophanis Byzantii Fragmenta. Post A. Nauck collegit, testimoniis ornavit, brevi commentario instruxit W.J.S., Berlin/New York. Sternbach, L. (1886), Beiträge zu den Fragmenten des Aristophanes, WS 8, 231–261. Taillardat, J. (19652), Les images d’Aristophane. Études de langue et de style, Paris. Taillardat, J. (1967), Suétone. Περὶ βλασφημιῶν. Περὶ παιδιῶν (Extraits byzantins), Paris. Theodoridis, C. (1982–2013), Photii Patriarchae Lexicon. Edidit C. T. Vol. I (Α–Δ), Berlin/New York 1982; vol. II (Ε–Μ), 1998; vol. III (Ν–Φ), Berlin/Boston 2013.

Ioannis M. Konstantakos

Heracles’ Adventures at the Inn, or How Fragments and Plays Converse  The conversation of fragments “Words, displaced and mutilated words, words of others, these were the poor alms bequeathed to him by the hours and the centuries”. 1 This quote by Jorge Luis Borges, from a short story called The Immortal, haunts the students of the fragmentary literatures of the past, those who delve into the small surviving pieces of lost texts. Like the hero of Borges’ tale, we, the philologists of fragments, are the recipients of the meagre alms of intellectual history, even though, unlike him, we can rarely aspire to immortality, even in the limited domain of scholarly fame. However, if we pursue our researches long enough and with the necessary patience, diligently shoring fragments against our ruins, we may finally reap some fruits from the literary wasteland. 2 One of the rewards is the discovery that the fragments of poetic works, even in their disjointed state, never lose the basic qualities of literariness which distinguish all the products of the art of writing. These “micro-texts” still retain the ability to strike us with a powerful poetic image, impress with an apt metaphor, amuse with a witty bon mot, or make us nod at a polished apophthegm. Above all, like all poetic creations, regardless of size or completeness, the fragments ceaselessly communicate and converse with each other and with the literary works that have survived whole. All these texts hold a tacit dialogue among themselves, a dialogue which is pursued through the time of grammatological history, between the oeuvres of individual authors, across the genres of the canon, and even over the blank spaces of the printed page. On this level of comprehension, the bleak Borgesian definition of the literary fragment is transcended. As the scholar realizes, a fragment is not merely a string of dislocated words. To speak in terms of the theme of the present volume, the dramatic fragment, the excerpt or citation from a lost tragic or comic play, is rather a small piece of theatre history which conveys important information about the corresponding dramatic genre; it may encapsulate a seminal motif of the plot, a recurrent theme of the tragic or comic repertoire, or a prominent trait of a stock character. Therefore, a tragic or comic fragment cannot be properly appreciated

 1 Borges 1974, 544. 2 Cf. T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land V 431: “These fragments I have shored against my ruins”. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-022

  Ioannis M. Konstantakos if it is examined in isolation, as a bit of text fit only for grammatical and linguistic commentary, metrical analysis, elucidation of factual references, or exercises in textual criticism. To disclose its full hermeneutical and literary-historical potential, the fragment needs to be viewed as a part of the entire panorama of the ancient theatre as an art form. Every fragmentary text must be constantly examined in correlation and in comparison with other fragments of the same dramatic genre, as well as with the plays which have been integrally preserved. Thus every individual fragment comes to occupy a specific spot in the grand jigsaw-puzzle of classical Greek drama, the puzzle whose overall design can no longer be fully seen but may still be guessed. Nowadays it is well appreciated that, say, Aristophanes or Menander did not create their works in a void, the former secluded in his estate in Aegina, the latter locked in his house at Piraeus. They both had many colleagues and rivals, who competed against them in the same festivals and often stole the prize from their hands. All these poets watched each other’s productions and derived inspiration or purloined ideas from one another. The preserved extracts from their largely vanished oeuvres help us recover this kind of literary perspective; they enable us reconstruct, at least partially, the spiritual milieu in which every playwright of antiquity worked. Thus, the fragments of tragic and comic texts find their place in the complex network of intertextual relations and mutual influences, creative borrowings and poetic rivalries, fierce competitions and jealous collaborations, which was woven among the authors of ancient drama. Seen in this light, fragments cease to be perplexing scraps from the rubbish heap and become materials for the construction of literary history. Apart from a small number of masterpieces, most of the plays produced and enjoyed during the period of the great acme of ancient Greek theatre have not survived into the medieval manuscript tradition. With regard to classical drama, therefore, the extant fragments of so many tragic and comic poets make up the equivalent of what T.S. Eliot would have called “the environment of the great writer”. These fragments are all that has been left to represent now those “secondary writers”, the craftsmen “of the second or third, or lower ranks”, who, in Eliot’s insightful view, “provide collectively, and individually in varying degrees, an important part of the environment of the great writer, as well as his first audience, his first appreciators, his first critical correctors — and perhaps his first detractors”. It is largely these “secondary writers” that preserve the continuity of a literary tradition, by offering “a body of writings which is not necessarily read by posterity, but which plays a great part in forming the link between those writers

Heracles’ Adventures at the Inn, or How Fragments and Plays Converse  

who continue to be read”. 3 Furthermore, this body of writings is necessary for the emergence of the great literary geniuses. Without a literary tradition, without a surrounding milieu of fellow-artists and rivals, competitors and opponents, precursors and epigones, a major writer will simply not come into being. All this is directly applicable to the study of ancient drama. To take comic theatre as an example, the tradition of Greek comedy does not consist solely of the two famous top authors, Aristophanes in the fifth century and Menander in the fourth. In each one of these periods there was also a large group of other comic writers who worked and produced alongside the great geniuses. Some of these writers were accomplished first-rank artists, such as Cratinus and Eupolis in Aristophanes’ time, or Diphilus and Philemon in the age of Menander (compare e.g. Marlowe and Ben Jonson in the times of Shakespeare). Others, in so far as we may judge from the meagre remains of their works and from the appreciation of ancient audiences and critics, may have been figures of lesser stature. Nevertheless, all these authors collectively produced the theatrical tradition that was necessary for the creation of the masterpieces which are still preserved, read, and performed worldwide. Whatever has survived from the oeuvres of these writers must be closely studied, in constant reference to the extant dramas of the great luminaries. This is the only way to form an idea of the literary tradition that gave rise to the momentous artistic phenomenon of ancient Greek drama. This kind of study is also of paramount importance for a better appreciation of the great dramatic texts which have been integrally preserved. In fact, as will transpire from the present chapter, the process is mutual and works in both directions. The extant dramas, with their fully developed themes, integral characters, and amply observable techniques, often help us guess the subject-matter of a dramatic fragment, place its text within the overall scheme of the play, or connect it with particular character figures, patterns of action, and scenic artifices. Conversely, the fragmentary excerpts, by indicating a broader tradition of dramaturgical trends and thematic concerns in tragic or comic writing, provide the background against which a great poet’s peculiar variation or innovation, as seen in one of his surviving plays, may be interpreted and assessed.

 3 Eliot 1965, 147.

  Ioannis M. Konstantakos

 The adventures of Heracles at the inn I propose now to investigate a good example of this process of conversation between fragments and extant plays. A number of comic citations and testimonia, coming from different periods in the history of Attic comedy, illustrate a dramatic situation which may be called “Heracles at the inn”. The Boeotian hero, in his comic guise, is shown putting up as a guest at an inn or similar establishment. There he undergoes amusing adventures which bring forth some of his typical comic traits, 4 especially his unruly character and his unrestrained appetites for food and sex. 5 Plato Comicus’ Zeus Kakoumenos (“Zeus maltreated”) may have been produced during the late fifth or the early fourth century. The great acme of this kind of mythological travesty on the Attic stage seems to have started from about 410– 400 BC and continued well into the fourth century, until the 340s. 6 Plato Comicus, a contemporary of Aristophanes, was a keen proponent of this particular form of comic drama. At least ten of his attested thirty or so plays treated mythological stories, and it is interesting that their remains present strong similarities to the myth burlesques of Middle Comedy in terms of themes, choice of materials, comic techniques, and plot patterns. 7 It is thus plausible to assume that Plato Comicus’ mythical plays belong to the later phase of his career; they are more likely to have been produced in the final decade of the fifth or the early years of the fourth century, chronologically close to the similar productions of Middle Comedy. Nevertheless, it is impossible to fix the date of Zeus Kakoumenos with certainty. 8 It is equally unknown what the title of the comedy refers to. In the surviving textual passages Zeus

 4 On Heracles’ figure in ancient comedy and satyr play see Schiassi 1955, 103–110; Hošek 1963; Woodford 1966, 93–115; Galinsky 1972, 81–100; Pike 1980; Hourmouziades 1984, 120–164, 230– 248; Vollkommer 1988, 72–78; Pappas 1991; Gallo 1992, 23–36; Casolari 2003, 247–295; Lauriola 2004; Bruzzese 2004, 144–170; Stafford 2012, 104–117; Lämmle 2013, 394–396; García Soler 2015. 5 On these characteristics of Heracles, apart from the references given in the previous note, cf. also Brelich 1958, 248–250; Pike 1977; Loraux 1995, 123–125, 297; Scarpi 1996, 135–142; LadaRichards 1999, 194–198; Casolari 2003, 230–246. 6 See Schiassi 1955, 100–102; Hunter 1983, 23f.; Nesselrath 1990, 189–204; Mangidis 2003, 25– 28; Konstantakos 2014a, 161f. 7 See Giannini 1956, 234, 239–242; Giannini 1959, 191–194, 201–203; Nesselrath 1990, 202–204, 234; Rosen 1995, 120–137; Sanchís Llopis 1997; Casolari 2003, 268; Telò 2014, 124–128; cf. Pirrotta 2009, 45f., 55–75, 118–142, 154–161, 179–183, 196–212, 338–374. 8 See Giannini 1959, 190–194; Pirrotta 2009, 124f.

Heracles’ Adventures at the Inn, or How Fragments and Plays Converse  

does not make an appearance, and the nature of his “maltreatment” cannot be determined. 9 The dominating figure in the preserved fragments is Heracles. Athenaeus (15.667b), in transmitting fr. 47, specifies that in this passage Heracles is being given instructions on how to play the kottabos game (see below). It may thus be assumed that the same hero takes part in fr. 46, the longest and most illuminating excerpt of the comedy, which also revolves around a game of kottabos and implicates three characters. 10 This is the text of fr. 46, with the distribution of parts adopted by Kassel and Austin: (Α.) πρὸς κότταβον παίζειν, ἕως ἂν σφῷν ἐγὼ τὸ δεῖπνον ἔνδον σκευάσω. (Ἡρ.) πάνυ βούλομαι. †αλλα νεμος ἐστ† (Α.) ἀλλ’ ἐς θυείαν παιστέον. (Ἡρ.) φέρε τὴν θυείαν, αἶρ’ ὕδωρ, ποτήρια παράθετε. παίζωμεν δὲ περὶ φιλημάτων. (Α.) < > ἀγεννῶς οὐκ ἐῶ παίζειν. τίθημι κοττάβεια σφῷν ἐγὼ τασδί τε τὰς κρηπῖδας, ἃς αὕτη φορεῖ, καὶ τὸν κότυλον τὸν σόν. (Ἡρ.) βαβαιάξ· οὑτοσὶ μείζων ἀγὼν τῆς Ἰσθμιάδος ἐπέρχεται (Plato Com. fr. 46 K–A)  9 Since Heracles is the protagonist in the extant remains of Zeus Kakoumenos, it is a common assumption that he would be portrayed as a prodigal son abusing his divine father (Giannini 1956, 241; Giannini 1959, 193f.; Storey 2011, 108f.; Zimmermann 2011, 755; García Soler 2015, 142). Pirrotta (2009, 125, 133f.) suggests that the Zeus of this play may have been a tight-fisted paterfamilias who was financially ruined and driven to despair by the profligacy and the expensive debaucheries of his son Heracles (cf. Strepsiades and Pheidippides in the Clouds); cf. similarly Casolari 2003, 267f.; Telò 2014, 125f. On the other hand, Storey (2011, 447f.) has ingeniously hypothesized that a scene from Zeus Kakoumenos is illustrated on the Apulian bell-crater PhV2 31 (ca. 370–360 BC, Trendall 1967, 33), which shows Heracles in Zeus’ temple, standing before his enthroned divine father. Heracles holds a large plate of edibles and ostentatiously eats the last morsel from it; the plate presumably contained offerings (fruit, sweetmeats etc.) destined for Zeus, the god of the temple. Zeus watches from his throne and indignantly gesticulates with his hands and feet; but he is pictured as a very small man placed on a high chair, and is evidently incapable of achieving any practical result (for discussion of this painting and further bibliography see Konstantakos 2015a, 190–192). This scene would well explain the title of Plato’s comedy and might form a pivotal episode, to which the play owed its name. In the surviving fragments Heracles appears indeed (though in a different setting, a brothel or an inn, see below) as a lustful personage, incapable of restraining his hedonistic impulses. If Storey’s hypothesis is correct, Zeus Kakoumenos may have been a kind of episodic play about Heracles the rake and his adventures — a picaresque comedy revolving around the great glutton and lecher of the Greek mythical tradition. 10 Cf. Rosen 1995, 125; Olson 2007, 313; Pirrotta 2009, 125–127; Storey 2011, 108.

  Ioannis M. Konstantakos (Α.) … to play kottabos, until I prepare dinner inside for the two of you. (Her.) I am quite willing. But is there a bowl? 11 (A.) No, you have to play in a mortar instead. (Her.) Fetch the mortar, bring water, set cups beside us. Let’s play for kisses. (A.) ... I shall not let you play in an unworthy manner. I set as kottabos-prizes for the two of you these platform shoes here that she is wearing and your goblet. (Her.) Wow! This contest that is coming up is bigger than the one at the Isthmian games.

Heracles appears in this scene together with two other personages. One of them, mentioned by character A and clearly present on stage (v. 8, αὕτη), even though she does not speak in the extant piece of dialogue, is a woman wearing a pair of high platform shoes (v. 8). The other character (A), who pronounces the first words in the surviving text, is unidentifiable and may be male or female. This third character proposes to Heracles to play a game of kottabos with the woman. The kottabos was a favourite sympotic pastime of classical Athens; 12 it had a strongly erotic dimension and is often associated in ancient sources with Aphrodite and the pleasures of sex. 13 In the meantime, character A undertakes to prepare dinner inside the house; he or she must therefore have the role of the host. Heracles eagerly accepts to play and proposes that the prize should be kisses. This is a significant detail which helps understand the broader scheme of the comic action at this point. Presumably the woman is young and beautiful and Heracles is attracted to her. 14 The hero therefore comes up with an arrangement which he obviously deems favourable for him. There is no indication of another player being around and ready to participate in the kottabos alongside Heracles and the wench; on the contrary, character A has used from the beginning the dual

 11 The text transmitted by codex A of Athenaeus in v. 3, αλλα νεμος ἐστ, is corrupt. In the translation I have followed for convenience Kock’s conjecture: ἀλλ’ ἄγγος ἔστ’; “But is there a vase?” The vase would have been a necessary piece of equipment for the type of game called κότταβος ἐν λεκάνῃ or δι’ ὀξυβάφων. In this particular variety of the kottabos a large bowl or other capacious vase was filled with water, and small vessels (ὀξύβαφα) were placed inside it, to float on the surface. The aim of every player was to sink as many of the little vessels as possible by hitting them with the wine lees from his drinking cup (see Ath. 15.667e; Schol. Ar. Pax 1244a–c; Sparkes 1960, 206f.; Luppe 1992; Campagner 2002, 115f.; Pütz 2007, 180–183). The host replies that instead of a bowl the mortar will be used as a container. For other possible emendations of the text see the apparatus of Kassel/Austin 1983–2001, VII 451; Pirrotta 2009, 128f. 12 On the kottabos see Sparkes 1960; Lissarrague 1990, 80–86; Campagner 2002; Pütz 2007, 175–192; Pirrotta 2009, 127–129; Lämmle 2013, 411–417; and more bibliography in Konstantakos 2014b. 13 See Lissarrague 1990, 83–86; Csapo/Miller 1991; Campagner 2002, 117–121; Pütz 2007, 184– 192; Pirrotta 2009, 129; Konstantakos 2014b, 32–35. 14 Cf. Giannini 1959, 193; Casolari 2003, 268; Olson 2007, 313; Pirrotta 2009, 129.

Heracles’ Adventures at the Inn, or How Fragments and Plays Converse  

pronoun σφῷν (“you two”, vv. 1, 7), which shows that the hero and the woman are the only persons envisaged as players, and presumably the only ones present on stage together with A. Hence, the purpose of the game cannot be to determine which player will win the beautiful woman’s kisses as a prize. Heracles’ suggestion can only imply one kind of arrangement: if the hero wins, he will give kisses to the girl; if he loses, he will receive her kisses. Either way, Heracles is bound to enjoy the woman’s erotic ministrations. The host, however, does not agree and considers kisses as too cheap a trophy. A proper game should have stakes of greater value. Therefore, the host puts up as prizes, respectively, the girl’s platform shoes and Heracles’ kotylos, a drinking vessel that the hero is carrying along. This exchange does not particularly appeal to Heracles, who exclaims with comic hyperbole that this kottabos game will be grander than the Isthmian festival, presumably meaning that the stakes are too high, comparable to the prizes of the athletic agones at the Isthmia. The kotylos was a large, deep and bowl-like drinking cup; it would doubtless have been an expensive artefact, especially if it was made of precious metal, gold or silver. 15 The lady’s shoes, on the other hand, are everyday items of small worth and would have been of no use to Heracles himself. Thus the host emerges as a figure of cunning, intent on deceiving the hero. With the arrangement he proposes, the wench has very little to lose in the game, while Heracles stands to forfeit a valuable possession, if he is defeated. 16 The hyperbolical comparison with the Isthmian games shows that Heracles is aware of the disadvantageous nature of this settlement. Apparently, the hero discerns or suspects the host’s plan. Yet he takes part in the game anyway. This is indicated by fr. 47, in which the speaker instructs Heracles how to gracefully bend his hand and achieve a successful throw of the kottabos: ἀγκυλοῦντα δεῖ σφόδρα τὴν χεῖρα πέμπειν εὐρύθμως τὸν κότταβον (Plato Com. fr. 47 K–A) You must thoroughly crook your hand and then throw your kottabos gently and nicely. 17

 15 See Athen. 11.478b–d; Clark/Elston/Hart 2002, 101, 145. 16 Cf. Norwood 1931, 174; Giannini 1959, 193; Sanchís Llopis 1997, 326; Pütz 2007, 184. 17 Athen. 15.667b καὶ Πλάτων δ’ ἐν τῷ Διὶ κακουμένῳ. παρακελεύεται δέ τις τῷ Ἡρακλεῖ μὴ σκληρὰν ἔχειν τὴν χεῖρα μέλλοντα κοτταβίζειν. It is not easy to decide who the speaker of these lines is (cf. Casolari 2003, 268). One possibility would be the host (character A of fr. 46), who might give Heracles some instructions about the kottabos game and cunningly feign that he is

  Ioannis M. Konstantakos The content of these instructions implies that Heracles was a clumsy player, incapable of dexterously performing the movements of the game. 18 Because of his awkwardness and heavy-handedness the hero would be bound eventually to lose. It is not hard to guess why he decided to remain and play, in spite of the risks. As becomes clear from his proposal of kisses, Heracles is attracted to the pretty girl and hopes for an opportunity to enjoy her erotic favours. His sexual appetites get the better of his reasoning, and the hero becomes prey to his host’s profiteering scheme. Heracles’ kotylos is also mentioned in fr. 48 (τὸν κότυλον φέρει, “he/she is carrying the cup”); apparently, this artefact had a significant function in the scenario of the comedy. 19 It may have been the prime factor that attracted the host’s attention to Heracles; the value of this object would have incited the wily host to concoct his scheme, in order to relieve the ingenuous hero of the precious cup. In the end, Heracles may well have forfeited his kotylos in the game, and possibly lost more of his possessions to the wily host. 20 The speaker of fr. 49 sounds like a person facing hard financial circumstances: ὥσθ’ ἅττ’ ἔχω ταῦτ’ ἐς ταρίχους ἀπολέσω, “as a result, all these things I have I shall lose for some salted fish”. This speaker might be again the ever hungry Heracles, who considers spending all of his money or his belongings in order to pay for the meal of salted fish which he craves to consume. The comic Heracles is indeed an enthusiastic eater of τάριχος and gulps down large quantities of it (Ran. 558). In itself, the huge quantity of food needed to satisfy the gluttonous hero’s appetite would require heavy expenses. Viewed in such a context, fr. 49 may forecast some kind of financial hardship or trouble arising between Heracles and the host or seller who will demand payment for providing the salted fish. 21  sympathetic to the hero and wishes him to play well. This might happen at the very beginning of the game, before the host goes inside to cook dinner, as he has promised (fr. 46.1f.). It could also take place during the game; the host might keep coming out of the house, in the course of the preparation of the dinner, to check on the two players and display his supposed care for Heracles. Alternatively, the woman herself, Heracles’ opponent, might feel pity for the gullible and victimized hero and might try to help him with some guidance, so as to make him compete more efficiently. Given that fr. 46 practically excludes the presence of a fourth character, either as a player or as an observer of the game (see above), it is better not to imagine that fr. 47 is spoken by another personage, different from the host and the lady. 18 Cf. Pirrotta 2009, 125, 131. 19 Cf. Sanchís Llopis 1997, 326; Pirrotta 2009, 130, 132. 20 Fr. 53 from Eubulus’ Kerkopes describes a similar predicament: Heracles was involved in an affair with the hetaira Okimon at Corinth, and as a result he “prattled away” and lost his tunic (κατελήρησα τὴν ἐξωμίδα). See Schiassi 1955, 108; Hunter 1983, 139–141; Casolari 2003, 276f. 21 Cf. Casolari 2003, 268; Pirrotta 2009, 133f.

Heracles’ Adventures at the Inn, or How Fragments and Plays Converse  

What was the setting of the episode of the kottabos game? A private household, to which Heracles has been welcomed with hospitality, cannot be excluded. Nonetheless, one must take into account the host’s greedy machinations and his practical, trader’s attitude; note that in fr. 46 he goes inside to prepare the meal himself, while in an ordinary household this task would have normally been assigned to slaves. These parameters point rather to a more professional type of establishment for the accommodation of guests. If fr. 49 belongs to an incident set in the same milieu, the obligation to pay for the food would also presuppose a commercial provision of services and wares. All things considered, therefore, Heracles appears to have settled at an inn or a brothel which also provides boarding and dining services. The beautiful wench would then be a slave-girl or a prostitute working at the establishment; the wily host is the innkeeper, pimp, or procuress who runs the place. 22 They may also be mythical characters, presented here as petty professionals, in accordance with the comic technique of degradation, which is usual in myth burlesque. 23 Alternatively, they might be common figures of the ancient demimonde who are involved in the mythical hero’s adventures, in a way familiar from Aristophanic fictions such as the Frogs and the Birds. In any case, the comic Heracles was introduced into the lowlife environment and was lured into laughable situations, which highlighted the most ridiculous qualities of his character — rawness and clumsiness, gullibility and irrepressible lust. A different variation of the same theme is found later in Eubulus’ Amaltheia, which must have been produced during the heyday of fourth-century myth burlesque. Eubulus’ writing career extended from approximately 380–375 BC to the 330s. 24 He was something of a specialist in mythological burlesque; more than half of his known plays have mythical themes. 25 Given the stark decline of this particular genre of drama after the mid-fourth century, the Amaltheia is more

 22 Cf. Norwood 1931, 174; Giannini 1956, 241; Giannini 1959, 192–194; Hošek 1963, 126; Galinsky 1972, 92; Rosen 1995, 125; Sanchís Llopis 1997, 326; Casolari 2003, 267f.; Olson 2007, 313; Pütz 2007, 184; Pirrotta 2009, 125, 127–131; Storey 2011, 108; García Soler 2015, 142. 23 For other examples of this technique, by means of which gods and heroes are turned into low-brow artisans or tradesmen, like the ones found in ordinary Greek society, cf. the Sirens presented as cooks in Epicharmus’ Sirens (fr. 122, Konstantakos 2015b, 26f.); Apollo acting as a grumpy moneylender in Com. Adesp. fr. 1062.9–13; Oedipus appearing as a parasite in Eubulus’ Oedipus (fr. 72, Hunter 1983, 162f.); and the mythical citharode Linus portrayed as a schoolteacher (grammatistes) in Alexis’ Linus (fr. 140, Arnott 1996, 404–415). See in general Konstantakos 2014a, 163–172. 24 See Hunter 1983, 7–10; Nesselrath 1990, 195f. 25 Cf. Hunter 1983, 22–30.

  Ioannis M. Konstantakos likely to belong to the earlier decades of Eubulus’ activity, roughly between 380 and 350 BC. Athenaeus (2.63d) attests that Heracles was a character in Eubulus’ Amaltheia and spoke fr. 6. The hero states his strong preference for nutritious meat and his dislike of paltry vegetables and salad herbs. As he points out, it is this kind of substantial food that he hopes to enjoy at a certain place to which he has now come: θερμότερον ἢ κραυρότερον ἢ μέσως ἔχον, τοῦτ’ ἔσθ’ ἑκάστῳ μεῖζον ἢ Τροίαν ἑλεῖν. κἀγὼ γὰρ οὐ καυλοῖσιν οὐδὲ σιλφίῳ οὐδ’ ἱεροσύλοις καὶ πικραῖς παροψίσι βολβοῖς τ’ ἐμαυτὸν χορτάσων ἐλήλυθα. ἃ δ’ εἴς τ’ ἐδωδὴν πρῶτα καὶ ῥώμης ἀκμὴν καὶ πρὸς ὑγίειαν, πάντα ταῦτ’ ἐδαινύμην, κρέας βόειον ἑφθὸν ἀσόλοικον μέγα, ἀκροκώλιόν τε γεννικόν, †ὀπτὰ δελφάκι’ ἁλίπαστα τρία (Eubul. fr. 6 K–A) Whether it is warmer or crisper or something in-between, this is for any man more important than conquering Troy. As for me, I have not come here with the intention to stuff myself with plant-stalks or silphium or bulbs or all those god-damned bitter salad-dishes! But what is held as first and foremost with regard to nutrition and healthiness and vigour of strength — all this I am bound to eat; for example, a large and pure slice of stewed beef, and a generous pork leg, and two or three roast pork fillets well sprinkled with salt...

In the mythical tradition Heracles is not directly associated with Amaltheia, the fabulous goat or nymph who nursed and suckled the infant Zeus. A remote connection between them is made in a variant version of a well-known tale, Heracles’ fight against the shape-shifting river god Achelous, as transmitted by Pindar and later mythographical sources. 26 According to the story, Achelous took the form of a bull, but the hero overcame him and broke off one of his horns; Achelous then received another horn from Amaltheia and gave it to Heracles, in order to take his

 26 Pind. fr. 249a Snell-Maehler (from Schol. Hom. Il. 21.194, V p. 165 Erbse); Apollod. Bibl. 2.7.5; Schol. Tzetz. ad Lycophr. 50 (p. 37 Scheer); Eust. Comm. ad Dionys. Per. 431 (II 299.4–6 Müller). Cf. Gantz 1993, 28, 41f.; Stern 1996, 78; Stafford 2012, 75; Fowler 2013, 323f. For artistic representations of Heracles holding the horn of plenty see Woodford 1966, 135f., 184–186; Boardman/ Palagia/Woodford 1988, 776f., 783; Verbanck-Piérard 1992, 100; Wolf 1993, 117f., 139f.

Heracles’ Adventures at the Inn, or How Fragments and Plays Converse  

own horn back. In this curious version Heracles wins Amaltheia’s horn as an exchange prize; Apollodorus (Bibl. 2.7.5) specifies that the magical horn of plenty is meant, for which Amaltheia was proverbially famous in ancient tradition, 27 although it is not explained why she would have given such a wondrous and invaluable possession to Achelous to trade with. In another, even rarer mythical variant, Hermes offers Heracles the horn of Amaltheia, when the hero sets out to fetch the cattle of Geryon (Hesych. α 3410). There is, however, another peculiar anecdote which brings together Heracles and Amaltheia, although it lies outside the mainstream mythological tradition. One version of it is included in Palaephatus’ On Incredible Things (Περὶ ἀπίστων), a mythographical collection probably going back to the second half of the fourth century BC, 28 in which a series of wonder tales from Greek mythology are explained in a rationalizing manner as having arisen from ordinary incidents of everyday life. This is the entry on “Amaltheia’s horn” (45, pp. 66f. Festa): Φασὶν ὡς Ἡρακλῆς τὸ Ἀμαλθείας κέρας καλούμενον πανταχοῦ περιέφερεν, ἐξ οὗ ἐγίνετο αὐτῷ ὅσα ἐβούλετο εὐξαμένῳ. ἡ δὲ ἀλήθεια ἥδε. Ἡρακλῆς ἀποδημῶν κατὰ Βοιωτίαν μετὰ Ἰολάου τοῦ ἀδελφιδοῦ καταλύει ἐν Θεσπιαῖς ἔν τινι πανδοκείῳ, ἐν ᾧ ἐτύγχανε γυνὴ καλουμένη Ἀμάλθεια πανδοκεύουσα, ὡραία καὶ καλὴ σφόδρα. Ἡρακλῆς δὲ ἡδόμενος αὐτῇ πλείονα χρόνον ἐπεξενοῦτο. Ἰόλαος δὲ βαρέως φέρων ἐπινοεῖ τὴν ἐμπολὴν τῆς Ἀμαλθείας ἐν κέρατι κειμένην ἀφελέσθαι, ἐξ ἧς ἐμπολῆς ὅ τι ἤθελεν ὠνεῖτο ἑαυτῷ τε καὶ Ἡρακλεῖ. ἔλεγον οὖν οἱ συνέκδημοι “Ἡρακλῆς τὸ Ἀμαλθείας κέρας ἔσχεν, ἐξ οὗ ὠνεῖτο ὅσα βούλοιτο ἑαυτῷ”. (Palaeph. On Incredible Things 45.66f. Festa) As they say, Heracles carried around everywhere the so-called horn of Amaltheia, from which he obtained whatever he desired and prayed for. This is the truth of the matter. Heracles was once travelling in Boeotia together with Iolaus, his nephew, and put up at an inn at Thespiae. The owner of the inn happened to be a young and very beautiful woman called Amaltheia. Heracles enjoyed her company and therefore prolonged his stay as a guest there. However, Iolaus was grieved by this and devised a scheme to steal Amaltheia’s earnings, which were deposited inside a horn. With this money he bought whatever he wanted for himself and Heracles. Hence their fellow-travellers used to say that “Heracles obtained the horn of Amaltheia, thanks to which he would buy whatever he desired for himself”.

 27 See e.g. Pherec. fr. 42 Fowler; Anac. fr. 361 Page; Phocyl. fr. 7 Diehl; Ar. fr. 707; Antiph. fr. 108; Philem. fr. 68; Ov. Fast. 5.121–128. 28 On the dating of Palaephatus and his work see Stern 1996, 1–5; Santoni 2000, 38–42; Hawes 2014, 37–39, 227–238.

  Ioannis M. Konstantakos A variant of the same story is found in the Byzantine lexicon transmitted by codex Coislinianus 177 (14th century). This is a compendium of the Suda but incorporates in addition a large number of proverbial expressions (the so-called Proverbia Coisliniana), often accompanied with legendary or anecdotal stories by way of explanation. 29 Ἀμαλθείας κέρας: Ἐπὶ τῶν ἀφθόνως ζώντων. Ἀπὸ τῆς Ἀμαλθείας τῆς τροφοῦ τοῦ Διός, ἣ γάλακτι αὐτὸν ἔτρεφεν· αὕτη δὲ αἲξ ἦν· ἢ ἀπὸ Ἀμαλθείας γυναικὸς καπηλίδος, ἥτις πᾶσαν τὴν ἐμπολὴν κέρατι εἶχεν· εἰς ἣν χάριν πότου Ἡρακλῆς εἰσιὼν τὸ κέρας κέκλοφεν, ἀφ’ οὗ φασὶν εὐθηνήσαντα τὸν Ἡρακλέα καλῶς ζῆσαι. 30 (Proverbia Coisliniana 23) Amaltheia’s horn: This is applied to those who live in abundance. It comes from Amaltheia, the nurse of Zeus; she was a goat and nourished him with milk. Or it was so called from a certain woman called Amaltheia, a tavern-keeper, who kept all the earnings from her shop inside a horn. Heracles entered her tavern to have a drink and stole the horn; and because of this, as it is said, Heracles had money in abundance and enjoyed high living.

There are minor differences between the two variants, mostly because the shorter version of the Byzantine lexicon makes no mention of Iolaus and has Heracles commit the theft of the horn alone. In Palaephatus’ version, on the other hand, Iolaus’ initiative is emphasized; the purloining of the money is presented as a scheme devised by Iolaus, who is evidently jealous of Heracles’ flirtations with the beautiful hostess. Presumably Palaephatus’ fuller version, which is richer in circumstantial details and psychological motivations, represents the original form of the tale, while the later variant is the result of an abridgement. Nonetheless, it should not be assumed that in the primary and fully-fledged version Heracles is innocent of the theft and that the entire sly operation would be planned  29 See Gaisford 1836, iv–v, 121–154; Schneck 1892; Adler 1938, 263–265; Bühler 1987, 277–279. 30 Gaisford 1836, 122f. (no. 23); cf. Kassel/Austin 1983–2001, V 191. Essentially the same version is narrated by the Byzantine scholar Eustathius of Thessalonike (Comm. ad Dionys. Per. 431, II 299.26–37 Müller), with one significant difference: Amaltheia is described as an old woman, crafty and skilful in commerce (ἱστοροῦσι γραῦν τὴν Ἀμάλθειαν γενέσθαι κερδαλέαν, ἐμπορικήν). This is different from Palaephatus’ young, beautiful, and flirtatious innkeeper. The version of the Coislinian codex gives no indication of Amaltheia’s age, but retains her occupation as an innkeeper or tavern hostess (καπηλίς); while Eustathius makes no mention of this latter profession and only vaguely styles Amaltheia a woman of commerce. These divergences with regard to the lady’s age and trade could be due to Eustathius himself, arising from a misunderstanding or a loose adaptation of a version such as that of the Proverbia Coisliniana. Alternatively, these peculiar elements might represent a third variant of the tale, which Eustathius drew from a now unidentifiable source.

Heracles’ Adventures at the Inn, or How Fragments and Plays Converse  

and executed by Iolaus alone. In Palaephatus’ narrative, as in that of the later proverb, Heracles also enjoys the luxurious goods acquired with the stolen money. In addition, it is repeatedly stressed in Palaephatus’ text that Heracles was regarded as the proprietor of the horn; he was said by fellow-travellers to have “obtained the horn in order to buy whatever he desired”; he was commonly described as carrying around the horn everywhere. Clearly, Heracles was as much an accomplice in the theft as his comrade. This narrative involves Heracles and Amaltheia in an amusing storyline, which reads very much like the plot synopsis of a mythological comedy. Many scholars have indeed considered this tale as a probable summary of the scenario of Eubulus’ Amaltheia — the only comic drama known to have implicated the homonymous mythical figure. 31 It is not surprising to find the summary of a comic plot paraphrased and turned into an entry within a mythographical handbook, such as Palaephatus’ compilation of Apista, or inserted into the erudite explanations of proverbial phrases and mythical realia, as in the Coislinian codex. Ancient scholars, mythographers, and paroemiographers, in the Alexandrian period and later, had access to an ample repository of dramatic scripts, from which they could draw mythological materials and variants. Not only famous masterpieces of the great tragedians, but also the creations of comic poets, such as Cratinus or even the lesser-known Amphis, are expressly referred to and tersely retold in mythographical collections and derivative scholia. 32 Concerning Palaephatus in particular, it is interesting that his rationalistic explanations of wondrous mythical stories are often based on procedures very similar to the techniques employed in mythological comedies for the burlesque treatment of gods, heroes, and their fabulous adventures. In both cases the mythical marvels, monstrous beings, or supernatural phenomena are reduced to ordinary and plainly explicable incidents of everyday reality by means of linguistic

 31 See Crusius 1888, 612; Hunter 1983, 27, 89f.; Kassel/Austin 1983–2001, V 191; Boardman/Palagia/Woodford 1988, 729; Nesselrath 1990, 233; Santoni 2000, 139; Casolari 2003, 288f.; Rusten 2011, 470. 32 The storyline of Cratinus’ Nemesis is included in an entry of the late Alexandrian Catasterismi, a compilation of aetiological star-myths attributed to Eratosthenes (25, p. 31 Olivieri, p. 79 Pàmias); see Henderson 2012. Amphis’ burlesque of the myth of Callisto (fr. 46) is summarized in the scholia to Aratus’ Phaenomena 37–44 (p. 90 Martin) and their Latin derivatives; see Henrichs 1987, 254–262; Konstantakos 2015a, 175f. On mythography and tragic plots cf. Hawes 2014, 75–80 with further references.

  Ioannis M. Konstantakos metaphors, wordplays and homonymy, or visual analogies. 33 Furthermore, Palaephatus’ mythical figures are often debased into familiar human types which are also favourite stock characters of the comic stage. 34 Given these similarities, it is not unlikely that the original author of the Peri apiston received some inspiration or ideas from the funny trivializations of myths which were rampant in Attic comedy. For an author active in the late fourth century BC it would have been possible to personally witness some of the mythological burlesques of Middle Comedy in live performance. 35 In general, there may have been connections, exchanges, and mutual influences between the vulgarizations of mythical episodes in comic drama and the rationalizing mythography which was keenly practised in the intellectual circles of Classical Athens. 36 Fr. 6 tallies with the humorous outline provided by Palaephatus and the later sources. Heracles would pronounce these words on the first time he entered Amaltheia’s inn, so as to give the landlady an idea of his favourite menu. The setting is broadly similar to that of Plato Comicus’ earlier drama. The role of the

 33 On Palaephatus’ methods of rationalization see Osmun 1956; Stern 1996, 12–22; Santoni 2000, 28–36; Stern 2003, 54–62, 65–71; Hawes 2014, 24–36, 59–68. On the comic techniques exploited in mythological burlesque see Konstantakos 2014a, 162–176; Konstantakos 2014c, 83–98; Sumler 2014. For example, according to Palaephatus 1, the Centaurs were actually men riding horses (visual analogy); cf. the comedy illustrated on the Apulian bell-crater PhV2 37, in which the Centaur Chiron is shown as an arthritic old man, pushed from behind by an assistant; their two bodies visibly merge and create an impression that the old fellow is four-legged. In Palaephatus 3 the Spartoi are not men who sprang up from the dragon’s teeth that Cadmus sowed (ἔσπειρεν); they are enemies who were defeated by Cadmus and dispersed (διεσπάρησαν) in various regions (wordplay and homonymy). Cf. Anaxandrides’ Tereus, in which the central hero is not physically transformed into a bird (ὄρνις) but only acquires the nickname Ὄρνις (“cock”), because he was roughly treated by the women of his household, as though a cock beaten by hens (fr. 46). In Palaephatus 7 Diomedes’ mares do not eat human flesh. Diomedes simply spent so much on his beloved mares, that he finally lost all his property; thus the mares were called “man-eaters” (linguistic metaphor). Cf. the comedy about Cronus and his offspring in Com. Adesp. fr. 1062: Cronus does not really eat his children but sells them as slaves in the market and spends his earnings on food and drink. More examples are analyzed by Sumler 2014. 34 Apart from Amaltheia as an innkeeper, note Diomedes and Glaucus as spendthrifts who waste all their money on horse-breeding (7, 25, cf. Pheidippides in the Clouds); Actaeon as an imprudent youth who ruins his property (6, cf. Alex. fr. 110, 248, Antiph. fr. 236, Nicomach. fr. 3, Men. fr. 247, 264); Pasiphae as an adulterous wife and Minos as her suspicious husband (2); Polyidus as a learned doctor (26); Pandora as a coquettish lady who put on a lot of cosmetics (34, cf. Ar. Eccl. 877–1111, Alex. fr. 103, Eubul. fr. 97). Cf. Hawes 2014, 103–114 and Sumler 2014, 88–93 for the same practice in the later collection of mythological apista by Heraclitus. 35 Cf. Hunter 1983, 90; Casolari 2003, 288. 36 Cf. Sumler 2014, 81f.

Heracles’ Adventures at the Inn, or How Fragments and Plays Converse  

money-grabbing and tight-fisted publican is here definitely played by a mythical figure, who has been amusingly debased into a low-class tradeswoman. However, the pattern of Plato’s plot is reversed. In Zeus Kakoumenos the guileful host deceives Heracles and tries to misappropriate the hero’s precious belongings. In Eubulus, conversely, it is Heracles or his companion who swindles the innkeeper and steals her possessions. The common milieu of the public house functions again as an effective backdrop for bringing on stage the comic Heracles’ hedonistic features. The hero’s voracity and gluttony would have been amply illustrated through his large consumption of meat and other foodstuffs in Amaltheia’s refectory, as suggested in fr. 6, and also through his indulgence in costly living after the theft of the money. His soft spot for pretty women, already developed in Zeus Kakoumenos, would emerge through his flirtation with the beautiful landlady, which is highlighted in Palaephatus’ version. Once again the shift in Heracles’ portrayal, by comparison to Plato’s comedy, is noteworthy. Plato’s Heracles was a gullible dupe, unable to control his sexual urges, which made him apt to be fooled and fleeced. In Eubulus, on the contrary, Heracles becomes himself a trickster and cheats his hostess; he enjoys her amorous company but does not let his sexual desire thwart his fraudulent schemes. This ethological volte-face, a rare phenomenon in Heracles’ overall presentation in ancient comedy, suggests that the theme of “Heracles at the inn” was a well-exploited routine in the Attic theatre, liable to innovative variations and playful transformations. 37 Possibly the setting of the inn was exploited also in other Athenian comedies, among the many that featured Heracles in the late fifth and the fourth century. For example, all three surviving excerpts from Antiphanes’ Omphale (frr. 174– 176) consist in declarations of gastronomic preferences; in each one of these passages the speaker states that he likes or dislikes specific items of food or drink, in a manner quite similar to Heracles’ attitude in fr. 6 of Eubulus’ Amaltheia. It is thus very likely that all three fragments are spoken by Heracles, who expresses again his culinary tastes and distastes. 38 In fr. 174 the hero waxes lyrical about the excellent loaves of bread that fill the kitchen of a certain house, presumably Omphale’s household. Such delicacies, as he admits, would prevent any true gentleman from leaving:

 37 The same is true of other standard comic routines, such as “Heracles cheated of his meal”. See Konstantakos 2015a, 186–197. 38 Cf. Schiassi 1955, 106, 108–110; Kassel/Austin 1983–2001, II 408–410; Mangidis 2003, 199– 201; Casolari 2003, 281–284; Olson 2007, 265; Easterling 2007, 291; Sidwell 2014, 65.

  Ioannis M. Konstantakos πῶς γὰρ ἄν τις εὐγενὴς γεγὼς δύναιτ’ ἂν ἐξελθεῖν ποτ’ ἐκ τῆσδε στέγης; ὁρῶν μὲν ἄρτους λευκοσωμάτους ἰπνὸν καταμπέχοντας ἐν πυκναῖς διεξόδοις, ὁρῶν δὲ μορφὴν κριβάνοις ἠλλαγμένους, μίμημα χειρὸς Ἀττικῆς, οὓς δημόταις Θεαρίων ἔδειξεν (Antiph. fr. 174 K–A) How could a man of noble birth ever get out of this house? For in here he sees white-bodied loaves of bread crowding the kilns, frequently going in and coming out, and he also sees how these change their form in the oven. These are the imitations of the Attic handicraft, which Thearion showed to his countrymen.

In fr. 175 the speaker forbids the boiling of water in a kettle, deeming it appropriate only for sick people. Presumably he refuses to drink a hot potion or soup which is being prepared for him, perhaps on Omphale’s orders: 39 ἐν χύτρᾳ δέ μοι ὅπως ὕδωρ ἕψοντα μηδέν’ ὄψομαι. οὐ γὰρ κακὸν ἔχω μηδ’ ἔχοιμ’. ἐὰν δ’ ἄρα στρέφῃ με περὶ τὴν γαστέρ’ ἢ τὸν ὀμφαλόν, παρὰ Φερτάτου δακτύλιός ἐστί μοι δραχμῆς (Antiph. fr. 175 K–A) Let me not see anyone boiling water in a kettle for me. I am not suffering, and may I never suffer from anything! And if I feel some twist in my belly or around the navel, I have a ring of cure, which I bought from Phertatus for one drachma.

Finally, in fr. 176 the hero addresses a young maiden and protests his dislike for salted fish (οὐ φιλοτάριχος οὐδαμῶς εἰμ’, ὦ κόρη, “I am not a fan of saltfish, not at all, girl”). This is not in accordance with Heracles’ ample consumption of τάριχος in other comedies (Ran. 558, Plato Com. fr. 49); but it tallies with the broader tendency of expressing one’s eating and drinking tastes, which pervades the other two fragments. Perhaps Antiphanes introduced in his Omphale a slight variation on the stock figure of the gluttonous Heracles, reversing a standard trait of this hero’s comic portrait. The Antiphanean Heracles repudiated one of the most emblematic foodstuffs which formed the object of the hero’s huge appetite in the

 39 Cf. Schiassi 1955, 110; Mangidis 2003, 199f.

Heracles’ Adventures at the Inn, or How Fragments and Plays Converse  

comic tradition. He may have done so because he had turned his attention towards different, more gourmet or expensive fare; 40 alternatively, he may only have feigned to spurn salted fish in order to hide his gluttony or please in some way the young woman whom he was addressing. These extracts yield no information as to the manner in which Omphale’s court was depicted. Nevertheless, Heracles’ attitude, with his exigent demands and blunt statements of gastronomical preferences, is not compatible with the role of a slave, as the hero was presented in the traditional myth. 41 Indeed, if Heracles were portrayed as a slave, he could hardly contemplate (and reject) the possibility of leaving his mistress’ house with such nonchalance (fr. 174). Neither does this hero bring to mind the courteous bearing of a guest invited to a banquet or offered hospitality in a mansion. Rather, Heracles’ behaviour is close to that of an exacting customer who seeks entertainment and evaluates the catering. Therefore, the palace of the mythical queen of Lydia was perhaps comically represented as a kind of dining establishment, an inn or tavern to which Heracles was attracted because of the quality of the food. 42 Once again, the comic routine helps bring the hero’s Gargantuan traits to the fore. His gourmandism is evident in his spirited orders about the menu. His lustful nature may have been revealed in his relations with the maiden addressed in fr. 176, who may be Omphale herself in the role of the hostess or a pretty servant-girl of the household. 43 After all, a sexual relationship between the hero and the Lydian queen was part of the myth, if not from the fifth, at least from the fourth century BC onwards. 44 In variant versions,

 40 Cf. Mangidis 2003, 200; Casolari 2003, 284. 41 See e.g. Soph. Trach. 248–257, 356f.; Pherec. fr. 82b Fowler; Herodor. fr. 33, 41a Fowler; Diod. Sic. 4.31.5–8; Apollod. Bibl. 2.6.3; Gantz 1993, 439f.; Wulff Alonso 1996; Easterling 2007; Fowler 2013, 318–321. Mangidis (2003, 197–201) notices that the tone of the three fragments is incompatible with a slave’s condition, but thinks that the comedy simply illustrated “Heracles’ difficulties in submitting to Omphale” and the impossibility to satisfy his voracious appetite with the meagre fare he was allowed under the hard conditions of slavery. 42 Casolari (2003, 282f., 286) suggests similarly that Omphale’s household was depicted as a brothel, Omphale herself as the brothel-keeper, and Heracles as a customer. 43 Cf. Schiassi 1955, 110; Mangidis 2003, 200f. 44 See Panyassis fr. 23 West/20 Bernabé (from Sch. Hom. Il. 24.616b, V p. 624 Erbse); Palaeph. 44 (pp. 65f. Festa); Diod. Sic. 4.31.8; Apollod. Bibl. 2.7.8; Sch. Hom. Il. 18.219b (IV p. 474 Erbse); Ov. Her. 9.53–118; Ov. Fast. 2.303–358; Sen. Her. Oet. 371–377; cf. the fragments of Old Comedy in which Aspasia, Pericles’ mistress, is compared to Omphale (Cratin. fr. 259, Eupolis fr. 294, Com. Adesp. fr. 704). See Schauenburg 1960; Pike 1977, 80f.; Vollkommer 1988, 31f.; Gantz 1993, 439f.; Wulff Alonso 1996; Casolari 2003, 277–286; Easterling 2007; Karl 2007, 165–171; Stafford 2012, 132–134; Fowler 2013, 318–320.

  Ioannis M. Konstantakos preserved by Hellanicus and Diodorus, Heracles also has an affair and begets a son with one of Omphale’s female slaves. 45 Examined collectively and in comparison, the remains of these comedies allow us to trace “the adventures of Heracles at the inn” as a distinctive comic theme, which must have been operative in the Attic theatre for decades. The three plays examined above include a group of common motifs, by means of which the main situation is developed and the comic effect is produced. First of all, Heracles displays his impetuous sensuality and keen appetites for food or sex. He greedily praises the bread and meat he likes to consume (Eubul. fr. 6, Antiph. fr. 174, cf. Plato fr. 49) and may have been shown indulging in lavish meals, as implied in the plot synopsis of Amaltheia. There is always a young and beautiful woman, a hostess or servant of the establishment, whom the hero lusts after and flirts with (Plato Com. fr. 46, Antiph. fr. 176, Palaephatus’ synopsis of Amaltheia). A second element, closely associated to the first one, is the declaration of the hero’s culinary preferences, which usually takes the form of a list of food items. Heracles orders the preparation of particular dishes or comments on the menu offered at the inn (Eubul. fr. 6, Antiph. fr. 174–176). Finally, the hero often has problematic financial transactions with his host. In Plato’s Zeus Kakoumenos he was lured into a gambling game by the greedy innkeeper and was probably forced to part with his valuable belongings, in order to pay off his debt. In Eubulus’ Amaltheia, conversely, Heracles himself or his companion robbed the landlady of her money, instead of paying the bill.

 The meta-dramatic Heracles of the Frogs Against the background of this recurrent comic theme, a side-splitting scene of Aristophanes’ Frogs (549–578) may be better appreciated. Dionysus, while journeying to the realm of the dead in Heracles’ guise, arrives at an inn near the gate of Hades. There the two landladies come out and confront him with angry shouts and harsh complaints. Apparently, the true Heracles had lodged in their inn during his earlier visit to the underworld and had wreaked havoc with his voracity and violent temper. The women mistake the disguised Dionysus for Heracles and voice their indignation against him, threatening him with punishment for his offences and damages.

 45 See Hellanic. fr. 112a Fowler (from Steph. Byz. α 156 Billerbeck); Diod. Sic. 4.31.8.

Heracles’ Adventures at the Inn, or How Fragments and Plays Converse  

INNKEEPER Plathane, Plathane, over here! Here’s the scoundrel himself, The person who came to our inn some time ago And devoured those sixteen loaves without paying. PLATHANE By Zeus, It’s the very same man all right. XANTHIAS Here’s trouble for someone! INNK. There was more besides — all that stewed meat he managed to eat, Twenty portions no less. XA. Then someone will pay for his crime! INNK. And huge chunks of garlic. DIONYSUS Just stop all this prattle, you woman! You’re making no sense. INNK. Yes I am! And you didn’t expect That I’d recognize you because you were wearing then those boots on your feet. And I haven’t yet mentioned the piles of saltfish that you ate! PL. No you haven’t, my dear. And what about all the fresh cheese That he gorged himself on, even eating the baskets as well? INNK. And when I tried to get him to settle the bill He gave me the sourest look and started to bellow. XA. That sounds just like him! It’s always the way he behaves. INNK. He started to pull out his sword — we thought he was mad! PL. Yes we did, poor me! INNK. We were so alarmed That the pair of us jumped right up onto one of the roof-beams While he rushed out, purloining some mats for good measure. XA. Oh yes, that’s typical too. INNK. Now it’s time to act. [to a slave] Hurry up and ask my patron, Cleon, to come. PL. [to another slave] And you must fetch Hyperbolus, if you can find him, To help us destroy this man. INNK. [to Dionysus] You filthy gullet, How I’d love to take a stone and smash your molars, The ones you used to devour all those provisions of mine! PL. And I’d like to hurl you down in the criminals’ pit! INNK. And I’d like to take a sickle and cut out your throat, The one with which you gobbled my sausages down! I’m off to get Cleon. He’ll come back here today And issue a summons and tear this man to pieces. 46 (Ar. Ran. 549–578)

This scene incorporates, in a synoptic manner, most of the familiar ingredients of the routine of “Heracles at the inn”. 47 The innkeepers enumerate a long list of foodstuffs which the hero gulped down, from dozens of bread loaves and chunks of stewed meat to great quantities of garlic, salted fish, and whole baskets of fresh cheese. Heracles’ unrestrained appetite is thus amply illustrated, along with his

 46 For reasons of space, only the translation of this long passage is given here, based on Halliwell 2015, 195f., with minor alterations. 47 Hunter (1983, 90) and Casolari (2003, 288) note the analogy between this Aristophanic scene and the mythographical summary of Eubulus’ Amaltheia.

  Ioannis M. Konstantakos preference for solid nutritious cuisine. The financial problems and troubled relations with the hostesses are also present. When he was asked to pay the bill, Heracles roared fiercely, drew out his sword, and acted wild, terrifying the two women, who hid themselves in the loft for safety. The hero then left, taking away with him the rush mats of the bedrooms, a gesture that recalls the thieving Heracles of Eubulus’ Amaltheia. However, the Aristophanic scene presents a notable difference by comparison to the other specimens of the same stage routine, which were examined in the previous section. The central situation, the confrontation between the hero and the publican in the setting of the inn, is now presented with theatrical selfconsciousness, as though a play within the play. The standard motifs of the routine — the hero’s gluttony, the catalogue of foodstuffs signalled out for consumption, the trouble over the payment of the expenses, the theft — are not acted out live but are narrated as incidents of a past occasion. The “Heracles” of this episode is not the authentic hero but a role performed by Dionysus, the god of drama, in theatrical disguise. Thus, Aristophanes turns the traditional comic routine into a second-level construct, a meta-version of the dramatic pattern of “Heracles at the inn”, inserted as a miniature comic play within Dionysus’ adventures. An additional effect of irony is produced by the topography. The inn is not located, as usual, somewhere in the vast area of Heracles’ peregrinations on earth, but in Hades; the afterlife in the meta-world of the dead matches the post-life of the theatrical creatures in the meta-space of the stage. This is, in fact, a recurrent process in the first part of the Frogs. In a previous scene (503ff.), Dionysus and his slave Xanthias, each one alternately putting on Heracles’ guise, had gone through another one of the stock scenarios associated with the Boeotian hero in mythological burlesque, “Heracles cheated of his meal” (Ἡρακλῆς τὸ δεῖπνον ἐξαπατώμενος, cf. Wasps 60). 48 The comic underworld proves to be a metadramatic reflection of Athenian theatrical life. The god of theatre, having assumed Heracles’ scenic attire and role, is also obliged to undergo  48 While Xanthias is wearing Heracles’ disguise, Persephone’s maid comes out and mistakes him for the great hero; she invites him to enter her mistress’ palace and savour a lavish meal, which Persephone has been preparing for Heracles (Frogs 503–518). As soon as Xanthias makes ready to enter, Dionysus stops him and demands the costume of Heracles back, so as to wear it again and enjoy the banquet himself; Xanthias is once more relegated to the slave’s position (519–548). However, before Dionysus has time to go inside and partake of the feast, the two innkeepers appear and abuse him (549ff.). After the innkeepers’ scene, Aeacus rushes out and threatens to punish “Heracles” for the abduction of Cerberus (605ff.). The prospect of the banquet is thus abandoned, and the presumed “Heracles” loses the meal he was led to expect. On this comic theme see Konstantakos 2011, 238–244; Konstantakos 2015a, 186–197.

Heracles’ Adventures at the Inn, or How Fragments and Plays Converse  

the usual adventures of this latter hero in comedy; as long as he performs Heracles’ part, Dionysus has to experience all the typical situations which the dramatic character Heracles encountered on the Attic comic stage. 49 In this case, therefore, the comparative study of fragments sheds light on the meaning and the interpretation of an episode in one of the canonical plays. Through the correlation of the Aristophanic text with the fragmentary myth burlesques, it transpires that the scene of the Frogs is not an isolated gag or a felicitous momentary invention, but a playful and innovative reworking of a recurrent topos in the context of a long tradition. In conclusion, some thoughts may be forwarded concerning the genesis and evolution of this particular comic routine. The dramatic setting of the inn was perhaps developed as a more popular variation of another well-known theme, “Heracles at the symposion”. 50 This latter conception was widespread in the repertoire of Greek myth. Various traditional tales presented the hero feasting and drinking in the cave of the Centaur Pholus, the wedding banquet of Ceyx, the dining hall of Coronus the king of the Lapiths and of Lepreus of Arcadia, or the illstarred party of Eurytus the king of Oechalia. These stories were given a literary form already in Archaic epic and lyric poetry. 51 In Archaic and Classical iconography (especially in vase-painting), from the sixth to the fourth century BC, Heracles is frequently portrayed as a symposiast, reclining and drinking in a banquet, in the company of mortals (in particular his relatives Iolaus and Alcmene) or gods, especially Dionysus, Hermes, and Athena. 52 Indeed, the association with the banquet was also prominent in Heracles’ cult, manifested through the sacred dining clubs of the parasitoi and the festivals of theoxenia, in which the hero was

 49 On Dionysus’ and Xanthias’ metadramatic disguises and role-playing in this part of the Frogs cf. Pappas 1991, 261–268; Lada-Richards 1999, 159–215; Slater 2002, 188–191, 205f. 50 Cf. Lada-Richards 1999, 193–200 and Casolari 2003, 252f., 261, who read the innkeepers’ scene in Frogs 549–578 as a perversion of the civilized symposion or of the rituals of the theoxenia. 51 See the pseudo-Hesiodic epyllion The Marriage of Ceyx, frr. 263–269 M–W (Ceyx’s wedding feast); ibid. fr. 265 M–W (eating competition with Lepreus at dinner); Panyas. Heraclea fr. 9 West/7 Bernabé (probably Pholus’ banquet), frr. 19–22 West/16–19 Bernabé (Eurytus’ symposion); Stesich. Geryon. frr. 22–24 Davies-Finglass (Pholus); Pind. fr. 168 Snell-Maehler (Coronus’ feast); P.Oxy. 2736 (probably by Pindar), fr. 1 col. ii 10 (Eurytus’ banquet). On all these texts see Merkelbach/West 1965; Matthews 1974, 76–78, 129f.; Angeli Bernardini 1976; Wolf 1993, 167–175; Lavecchia/Martinelli 1999, 9f.; Casolari 2003, 238–244; Lazzeri 2003, 181f.; Bruzzese 2004, 147; Lazzeri 2008, 275–309, 385–387; Davies/Finglass 2014, 238f., 290–293. 52 See Woodford 1966, 132, 180–183; Boardman/Palagia/Woodford 1988, 816–821; VerbanckPiérard 1992; Wolf 1993; Lada-Richards 1999, 201–205; Casolari 2003, 234f.

  Ioannis M. Konstantakos imagined to take part in communal meals alongside the faithful. 53 Inevitably, the same theme was taken up in the theatre, especially in comic dramatizations of Heracles, from the prosatyric Alcestis and the Epicharmean plays (The Wedding of Hebe frr. 40–64, Heracles chez Pholus) to Aristophanes’ Dramas or the Centaur (frr. 279–282, 284, 287), Archippus’ Heracles gets married (frr. 8–13), and numerous myth burlesques of the fourth century. 54 The comic act of Heracles at the inn may have been invented by the Attic dramatists as a plebeian and funnier equivalent of the old and sanctioned sympotic model. In this new comic variant the aristocratic milieu of the symposion was replaced by the low-brow tavern, brothel, or boarding house. In myth and poetry Heracles was welcomed or invited to banquets by the magnates of various communities, while he was travelling around the world in order to perform his heroic labours. The same context was easily assimilated into the popularized variation; Heracles would take up residence at an inn in the course of his journeys, as indicated by the plot summary of Eubulus’ Amaltheia. It is noteworthy that in the poetic and theatrical tradition Heracles often occupies a marginal or irregular position in the symposion, as an uninvited, parasitic, or troublesome guest. 55 Already in the Hesiodic epyllion The Marriage of Ceyx he gatecrashes Ceyx’s wedding feast at Trachis (Hes. fr. 264 M–W). 56 He also turns up without warning at Pholus’ door; in Aristophanes’ Dramas or the Centaur, a comedy which treated the story of Pholus’ banquet, Heracles apparently assumed the traits of the comic parasite and came uninvited to the Centaur’s home for dinner. 57 In comic theatre, overall, Heracles is regularly invoked as the patron of parasites, the prime model for people who wish to dine without paying their own expenses. 58 In Euripides’ Alcestis Heracles comes unexpectedly at a  53 See Ziehen 1949; Woodford 1966, 16–21; Verbanck-Piérard 1992, 91–97, 101; Belardinelli 1998, 280–283; Casolari 2003, 233–236; Stafford 2012, 178–180. 54 See Alex. Hesione frr. 88–89; Cratinus Iun. Omphale fr. 4; Eubul. Auge fr. 14; Philyl. Auge frr. 3–5. On the comic depictions of Heracles at the symposion see Galinsky 1972, 83–85, 91–94; Casolari 2003, 248, 251–259, 281–295; Bruzzese 2004, 155; Miccolis 2018, 61–91. For similar scenes of satyr-play see Ion Omphale fr. 20–30; Eur. Syleus fr. 691; Soph. fr. 756; Hourmouziades 1984, 133– 146, 239–245; Wolf 1993, 175–180; Mangidis 2003, 198f. 55 On this aspect of Heracles see Lada-Richards 1999, 196–200; Casolari 2003, 252f. 56 Cf. Merkelbach/West 1965, 302f.; Wolf 1993, 169; Casolari 2003, 238f., 257. 57 Ar. fr. 284 χωρεῖ δ’ ἄκλητος ἀεὶ δειπνήσων· , “he always comes uninvited for dinner; no thorns in his way”. See Ribbeck 1883, 22; Casolari 2003, 255–258, 293; Bruzzese 2004, 145, 155; Pellegrino 2015, 179–183. 58 See Archip. fr. 8; Diodorus Com. frr. 2.23–35; Naev. Colax fr. I Ribbeck; Plaut. Curc. 358, Stich. 233, 386, 395; Arnott 1996, 544; Belardinelli 1998, 282f.; Casolari 2003, 293; Bruzzese 2004, 155– 170.

Heracles’ Adventures at the Inn, or How Fragments and Plays Converse  

most unwelcome time for Admetus’ household and is only offered hospitality because of the host’s excessive sense of decorum (476–567). Heracles’ riotous and drunken behaviour at dinner severely disturbs the mourning and the funeral preparations for the dead lady of the house (747–825). 59 In Ephippus’ Geryones, another myth burlesque of the fourth century, Heracles was apparently denied the feast he expected to enjoy in a certain household (frr. 3, 5). 60 In some cases Heracles even proved to be a catastrophic guest, producing a fatal outcome for the other participants or for the host of the symposion. When he was invited by Eurystheus to a sacrificial feast, after the completion of his labours, Heracles felt insulted because he was served a poor portion of meat, and killed three of Eurystheus’ sons. 61 In various local traditions the hero was said to have killed a boy servant or cupbearer during a symposion, either accidentally or because the boy maladroitly splashed him with sacral water from the basin. 62 The banquet given by King Eurytus of Oechalia also degenerated into a violent combat; Heracles behaved in an unruly manner, was involved into a rash dispute with the king and his sons, and fought them with his fists or his arrows. 63 On the same occasion, Heracles also fell in love with Eurytus’ daughter Iole, and he ultimately returned with an army, slew the king, and destroyed the entire city, in order to possess the girl and satisfy his passion. 64 The banquet in Pholus’ cave ended up in a fight between Heracles and the other Centaurs, who were attracted by the smell of the wine; Heracles had to kill most of them with his poisonous arrows,

 59 See Seidensticker 1982, 132–138; Hourmouziades 1984, 136–139, 239f.; Conacher 1988, 184– 187; Casolari 2003, 244f. 60 See Nesselrath 1990, 220f.; Casolari 2003, 274f.; Konstantakos 2011, 238–244. 61 Anticleides FGrH 140 F3 (from Ath. 4.157f–158a); Lada-Richards 1999, 198f.; Casolari 2003, 236. 62 See Hellanicus fr. 2 Fowler; Herodorus fr. 3 Fowler; Nicander fr. 17 Schneider; Athen. 9.410f– 411a. 63 This turbulent banquet is pictured on Archaic and Classical vase-paintings: see Olmos 1988; Davies 1991, xxxiv–xxxvii; Gantz 1993, 434–437; Wolf 1993, 11f., 42–45, 51–53; cf. Lada-Richards 1999, 199; Fowler 2013, 332f. It is also mentioned in literary sources: see Soph. Trach. 260–269; Panyassis fr. 19–22 West/16–19 Bernabé; Matthews 1974, 76–78, 129f.; Wolf 1993, 167–170, 174f.; Lavecchia/Martinelli 1999, 8–10; Casolari 2003, 240f. 64 See Hes. fr. 26.31–33 M–W; Soph. Trach. 240–290, 351–368, 475–478; Eur. Hipp. 545–554; Pherecydes fr. 82 Fowler; Herodorus fr. 37 Fowler; Menecrates fr. 5b Fowler; Diod. Sic. 4.31.1f., 4.37.5; Apollod. Bibl. 2.6.1, 2.7.7; Pike 1977, 79f.; Davies 1991, xxii–xxxvii; Lavecchia/Martinelli 1999, 8–10; Stafford 2012, 82–84; Fowler 2013, 329–332.

  Ioannis M. Konstantakos which also accidentally wounded and caused the death of Pholus himself, the innocent host. 65 This awkward place of the hero in the sympotic milieu finds a hilarious equivalent in the derivative comic routine of the inn, reflected in the hero’s troubled financial transactions with the landlord. The uninvited or unwelcome sympotic guest was turned into a Falstaffian customer unable or unwilling to pay the expenses of his carousals. The murderous banqueter, who dispatched his hosts to the underworld, was watered down into a riotous tavern rascal, who terrifies his landlady with a scolding or a thrashing and flees with the coffer. Eavesdropping on the dialogue between fragments and plays, the scholar may hit upon such thematic constellations and fill in some vacant spots on the incomplete map of ancient drama. Fragments are the alms bequeathed to us by the mysterious fate of books. We shall continue shoring them against the ruins of literary history.

Bibliography Adler, A. (1938), Suidae Lexicon, vol. V, Leipzig. Angeli Bernardini, P. (1976), “Eracle mangione: Pindaro, fr. 168 Snell-Maehler”, QUCC 21, 49– 52. Arnott, W.G. (1996), Alexis: The Fragments. A Commentary, Cambridge. Belardinelli, A.M. (1998), “Diodoro”, in: A.M. Belardinelli/O. Imperio/G. Mastromarco/M. Pellegrino/P. Totaro (eds), Tessere. Frammenti della commedia greca: studi e commenti, Bari, 255–289. Boardman, J./Palagia, O./Woodford, S. (1988), “Herakles”, in: Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae IV/1, 728–838. Borges, J.L. (1974), Obras completas 1923–1972, Buenos Aires. Brelich, A. (1958), Gli eroi greci. Un problema storico-religioso, Roma. Bruzzese, L. (2004), “Lo Schwerathlet, Eracle e il parassita nella commedia greca”, Nikephoros 17, 139–170. Bühler, W. (1987), Zenobii Athoi proverbia, vol. I, Göttingen. Campagner, R. (2002), “Il gioco del cottabo nelle commedie di Aristofane”, QUCC 72, 111–127. Casolari, F. (2003), Die Mythentravestie in der griechischen Komödie, Münster. Clark, A.J./Elston, M./Hart, M.L. (2002), Understanding Greek Vases. A Guide to Terms, Styles, and Techniques, Los Angeles. Conacher, D.J. (1988), Euripides: Alcestis, Warminster.

 65 See Diod. Sic. 4.12.3–8; Apollod. Bibl. 2.5.4; Gantz 1993, 390–392; Noël 1993; Wolf 1993, 41f., 171f., 175; Leventopoulou 1997, 672, 706–710; Lada-Richards 1999, 199f.; Casolari 2003, 241, 254– 258; Lazzeri 2003, 180–185; Lazzeri 2008, 281–285, 301; Stafford 2012, 68–70.

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Massimiliano Ornaghi

Ethnic Stereotypes and Ethnic Mockery in Ancient Greek Comedy The derision of people coming from places other than Athens is thought to have been a normal way to make laugh in ancient Attic comedy: this is a common assumption, and we have an excellent example of this kind of mockery in the Acharnians of Aristophanes (in the episodes of Pseudartabas, the Megarian and the Boeotian talking to Dikaiopolis), and in the character of the Spartan Lampito in the Lysistrata. In these cases, the poet makes fun of the oddities and the traditional habits of these non-Athenian people, and also of the distinctive elements of their culture — their language, for instance —, to create a comic sketch, or a comic motif, and to provoke an easy laugh, sometimes hinting at recent events that are relevant for political or cultural reasons. 1 In many fragments of the other comic poets we can recognize (or guess) the same kinds of mockery, so that we are used to think that this kind of derision was widespread in Greek comedy (Old, Middle, and New). But we can pose many questions on the use of such ethnic allusions — as also of the non-Athenian characters, or the non-Athenian settings — with comic purposes. For instance: how much were these comic tools shared by the comic poets? Could some poets have employed them more often than their rivals, or in more complex forms than Aristophanes did? Can we recognize clear ethnic stereotypes, attested in different comic fragments, or used by different authors? If an ethnic provenance was associated with a stereotype, could this stereotype be transferred to the realia of the same provenance? 2 To (try to) answer these questions, I have drawn up a survey of all the fragments of the comic poets — excluding Aristophanes and Menander —, looking for

 I would like to express my gratitude to Anna Lamari and Anna Novokhatko (also for their kind patience), Beatrice Gavazza (for her assistance on the proofs) and Andreas Willi (for his extraordinary help in improving the English diction of this paper.)  1 Only as introduction to these matters, see (for Acharnians) Olson 2002, lxx–lxxv, and Negri/ Ornaghi 2008 (on the character of Pseudartabas and his lines); (for Lysistrata) Henderson 1987, xlv–l, and 77 (note to l. 77). 2 In other words, could an object recognized as typical of some ethnicity be affected by the same stereotypical mockery that is adopted for the people of the same provenance? If not a complete answer, at least some hints to a better understanding of the matter may be found on the next pages. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-023

  Massimiliano Ornaghi the cues that could indicate the use of a geographical provenance as a comic tool, but considering also the geographical references used as stereotypes, probably as a means of making fun. On the following pages we will assign to the words “ethnic” and “ethnicity” the wide meaning that we find, for instance, in some lexicographers, to indicate the provenance of one person, his geographical origin and his culture: our investigation will not, therefore, consider just the Ionians, Aeolians or Dorians — ἔθνη in a narrow sense —, but all the markers of a polis, country, State etc., that we can suppose were used with a comic purpose. And this is also the meaning of the qualifier “ethnic” that I have used, also for the title of this piece of research. 3 The survey of the comic fragments has produced a list of about 600 items: this is surely a provisional outcome — because I fear omissions are unavoidable — but it can still be a fair starting point for some comments. However, a number of provisos must be made at the outset. Even if the number of items is huge, for the interpretation of the texts we have to face the usual difficulties posed by their fragmentary nature: these are texts without contexts. So, in many fragments, we are not able to understand if a comic hint at ethnicity depends on a common opinion (stereotype) about some population group, or if it is the invention of a specific poet. Moreover, the fragments almost never allow us to recognize ethnic mockeries based on (or developed in) stage action, that is employed in a dramaturgical way (as in the Megarian scene of Acharnians): usually we seem to find ethnic puns or jokes (hints of verbal mockery), but we do not know if they were further explicited on stage (in dramatic-dramaturgical mockery). 4 It is difficult to appreciate, moreover, the diachronic development that — at least in some cases — may have affected some stereotypes: in other words, an ethnic joke could have been produced directly in one comedy, but then became so successful as to develop into a stereotype in a second phase. We are not able to detect this kind of process, above all due to a lack of evidence: only for some fragments, we may imagine a pre-stereotypical nature, but no more than this. 5  3 Recent — and often excellent — books have focused on many aspects of the perception of ethnic origins in classical antiquity: for instance, see Hall 1997; Malkin 2001; Derks – Roymans 2009; McInerney 2014. Always useful is also the big (and well organized) archive of ethnic paroemia presented in Göbel 1915. For the theatrical stage, two reference books are Long 1986, and Hall 1989, both focusing on a specific kind of “ethnicity”, as the titles show (see also Part III External Others: The Portrayal of Foreigners, in Cohen 2000, 313ff.; Mitchell 2007; and Chapters 4 and 5 in Papadodima 2013, 135ff.): ethnic perceptions within the Greek world remain less studied. 4 For some possible exceptions, see pp. 414ff. 5 See for instance pp. 408–409.

Ethnic Stereotypes and Ethnic Mockery in Ancient Greek Comedy  

 Ethnic Stereotypes and Ethnic Mockery in Comedy: Some Typologies Among the many variations of ethnic mockery or geographical references (probably used with a comic scope) that we find in the fragments, four types of occurrences may be distinguished, above all for their “morphology” (that is the way — or linguistic shape — of structuring a comic allusion in an ethnic reference). 6

. Plain References The majority of ethnic jokes is based on the plain (explicit) reference to a population group, made by means of a noun or an adjective: the mention of the population activates a connected stereotype, which — quite often — is exploited in a pun, or in a witz. In almost all such cases we know from other sources (notably extra-comic ones) that the knowledge of the peculiar habits of the ethnic group involved in the pun was widespread, so that the comic effect would have been easy to appreciate. 1. Pherecrates, fr. 159 (from the comedy Χείρων = schol. in Ar. Ran. 1308 [Tzetzes]): λεσβιάζειν δὲ τὸ παρανόμως πλησιάζειν. διεβάλλοντο γὰρ ἐπὶ τούτῳ οἱ Λέσβιοι. καὶ ἐν τῷ εἰς Φερεκράτην ἀναφερομένῳ Χείρωνι· (A.) δώσει δέ τοι γυναῖκας ἑπτὰ Λεσβίδας. / (B.) καλὸν τὸ δῶρον, ἕπτ’ ἔχειν λαικαστρίας. 7

About the sexual habits of the Lesbian women. 8

 6 The comic fragments are quoted according to the Kassel & Austin edition of PCG; the quotations are always listed in an approximately chronological order (unless otherwise stated). 7 Cf. Eust. in Il. 9.129–130, p. 677, 12ff. van der Valk: περὶ τοῦ […] λεσβιάζειν οὗ χρῆσις καὶ παρὰ τῷ Κωμικῷ (cf. Ar. Ran. 1308) […] γράφουσιν οἱ παλαιοὶ καὶ ταῦτα. εἰσὶ βλασφημίαι καὶ ἀπὸ ἐθνῶν καὶ πόλεων καὶ δήμων πολλαὶ ῥηματικῶς πεποιημέναι· […] ἐκ πόλεων δέ, οἷον λεσβιάζειν, τὸ αἰσχροποιεῖν. εἶτα παραγαγόντες Φερεκράτους χρῆσιν ἐν ἰάμβῳ τὸ “δώσει δέ σοι γυναῖκας ἑπτὰ Λεσβίας”, ἐπάγουσιν ἀμοιβαῖον τὸ “καλόν γε δῶρον ἕπτ’ ἔχειν λαικαστρίας”, ὡς τοιούτων οὐσῶν τῶν Λεσβίων γυναικῶν. 8 Cf. Ar. Vesp. 1346 (and the scholia to this line), with MacDowell 1971, 308; Biles/Olson 2015, 473; Eccl. 920, with Vetta 1989, 241; Ran. 1308, with Dover 1993, 351–352. See also Göbel 1915, 86–88; Cassio 1983; Henderson 1991, 183–184.

  Massimiliano Ornaghi 2. Cratinus, fr. 492 (incertae fabulae = Hsch. σ 1156 Hansen): Σκυθικός· Κρατῖνος Σκυθικὸν ἔφη τὸν Ἱππόνικον, διὰ τὸ πυῤῥὸν εἶναι.

About the use of the adjective “Σκυθικός” to indicate a red complexion of the skin. 9 3. Hermippus, fr. 57 (from the comedy Στρατιῶται = Athen. 12.524f): καὶ Ἀβυδηνοί — Μιλησίων δ’ εἰσὶν ἄποικοι — ἀνειμένοι τὴν δίαιτάν εἰσι καὶ κατεαγότες, ὡς παρίστησιν Ἕρμιππος ἐν Στρατιώταις· χαῖρ’ ὦ διαπόντιον / στράτευμα, τί πράττομεν; / †τὰ μὲν πρὸς ὄψιν μαλακῶς / ἔχειν ἀπὸ σώματος† / κόμῃ τε νεανικῇ / σφρίγει τε βραχιόνων. / (Β.) ᾔσθου τὸν Ἄβυδον ὡς / ἀνὴρ γεγένηται;

About the luxury and laxity of the Abydians (Ionians). 10 4. Plato Com. fr. 106 (from the comedy Πείσανδρος = Phot. α 2817 Theodoridis = Apost. III 73): Ἀρκάδας μιμούμενος· παροιμία, ᾗ κέχρηται Πλάτων ἐν Πεισάνδρῳ, ἐπὶ τῶν ἄλλοις ταλαιπωρούντων· μαχιμώτατοι γὰρ ὄντες αὐτοὶ μὲν οὐδέποτε ἐνίκησαν, ἄλλοις δὲ αἴτιοι νίκης πολλοῖς ἐγένοντο. καὶ ὁ Πλάτων τὰς κωμῳδίας ποιῶν ἄλλοις παρέχων διὰ πενίαν Ἀρκάδας μιμεῖσθαι ἔφη. 11

About the motto “to imitate the Arcadians”, for people who take a risk on behalf of others. 12 5. Ephippus, fr. 2 (from the comedy Βούσιρις = Athen. 10.442d): κωμῳδοῦνται δὲ ὡς μέθυσοι Ἀργεῖοι μὲν καὶ Τιρύνθιοι ὑπὸ Ἐφίππου ἐν Βουσίριδι. ποιεῖ δὲ τὸν Ἡρακλέα λέγοντα· οὐκ οἶσθά μ’ ὄντα, πρὸς θεῶν, Τιρύνθιον / Ἀργεῖον; οἳ μεθύοντες αἰεὶ τὰς μάχας / πάσας μάχονται. (Β.) τοιγαροῦν φεύγουσ’ ἀεί.

About the Argives’ and the Tyrinthians’ liking for wine. 13

 9 Cf. Hippoc. Aer. 20: Πυρρὸν δὲ τὸ γένος ἐστὶ τὸ Σκυθικὸν διὰ τὸ ψύχος, οὐκ ἐπιγιγνομένου ὀξέως τοῦ ἡλίου· ὑπὸ δὲ τοῦ ψύχεος ἡ λευκότης ἐπικαίεται καὶ γίγνεται πυρρή. 10 See Comentale 2017, 233–234, 236. 11 Cf. Hermip., fr. 63.18 (with Comentale 2017, p. 272). See also Pirrotta 2009, 229–230. 12 See also Göbel 1915, pp. 54–55. 13 Cf. Ael. VΗ 3.15 (though this chapter could be a resumé of the same passage of Athenaeus).

Ethnic Stereotypes and Ethnic Mockery in Ancient Greek Comedy  

6. Eubulus, fr. 53 (from the comedy Κέρκωπες = Ath. 13.567b–c): ὃς [Cynulcus] οὐδ’ ἐγκαλύπτεται, ἀλλ’ ἀναφανδὸν τὰ Εὐβούλου αἰεὶ ἐκ Κερκώπων λέγει· Κόρινθον ἦλθον. ἡδέως ἐνταῦθά πως / λάχανόν τι τρώγων Ὤκιμον διεφθάρην· / κἀνταῦθα κατελήρησα τὴν ἐξωμίδα. καλός γε ὁ τῶν Κορινθίων σοφιστής, ὁ τοῖς μαθηταῖς διηγούμενος ὅτι Ὤκιμον ἑταίρας ὄνομα.

About Corinth as a well known place of prostitution. 14 7. Eriphus, fr. 6 (from the comedy Πελταστής = Ath. 4.137d): εὐτράπεζοι δ’ εἰσὶν ὄντως οἱ Θετταλοί, καθὰ καὶ Ἔριφός φησιν ἐν Πελταστῇ οὕτως· τάδ’ οὐ Κόρινθος οὐδὲ Λαίς, ὦ Σύρε, / οὐδ’ εὐτραπέζων Θετταλῶν ξένων τροφαί, / ὧν οὐκ ἄμοιρος ἥδε χεὶρ ἐγίνετο.

About the voracity of the Thessalians, and their great banquets. 15 8. Antiphanes, fr. 145 (from the comedy Λύκων = Ath. 7.299e): Ἀντιφάνης δ’ ἐν Λύκωνι κωμῳδῶν τοὺς Αἰγυπτίους φησίν· τά τ’ ἄλλα δεινούς φασι τοὺς Αἰγυπτίους / εἶναι τὸ νομίσαι τ’ ἰσόθεον τὴν ἔγχελυν· / πολὺ τῶν θεῶν γάρ ἐστι τιμιωτέρα. / τῶν μὲν γὰρ εὐξαμένοισιν ἔσθ’ ἡμῖν τυχεῖν, / τούτων δὲ δραχμὰς τοὐλάχιστον δώδεκα / ἢ πλέον ἀναλώσασιν ὀσφρέσθαι μόνον· / οὕτως ἔσθ’ ἅγιον παντελῶς τὸ θηρίον.

About the Egyptians and their cult of eels. 16 9. Com. Adesp. fr. 368 (= Hsch. κ 2850 Latte): Κλαζομένιοι· οὕτω κωμῳδοῦνται. δοκοῦσι γὰρ ἐπικύπτοντες προστιλᾶν.

About a scatological habit attributed to the Clazomenians (?). 17

 14 A rich collection of quotations on the Corinthian lust is offered in Göbel 1915, 32ff.; about prostitution (not just sacred), see also Pironti 2013. 15 Cf. Ath. 10.418c–d; 11.662f–663a; cf. also Ar., fr. 507 (from the comedy Ταγηνισταί), with Pellegrino 2015, 295–296 (for further bibliographic references). See also below, p. 415. 16 Cf. Hdt. 2.72. See also below, p. 431 n. 86. 17 In PCG the entry κ 2850 of Hesychius is followed by the entry κ 2851: Κλαζομένιος· οὗτος Ἡρακλείδης ὁ Κλαζομένιός, τε καὶ ὁ βασιλεὺς καλούμενος, but βασιλεὺς is a correction (by Houtsma) for a word βαῢς transmitted by the codices, which maybe hides something else (a dialectal word?); see also Maltomini 1980. Possibly the two entries are the weak and confused echo of a single comic occurrence.

  Massimiliano Ornaghi 10. Com. Adesp. fr. *372 (cf. Hsch. κ 3627 Latte): Κορίνθιαι πέδαι· αἱ ἀπὸ Κορίνθου τῆς πόλεως γυναῖκες. 18

About an idiom “Corinthian shackles”, used to refer to the women of Corinth. 11. Com. Adesp. fr. 456 (= [Longinus] Subl. 38.5): τὰ κωμικά, καίτοιγ’ εἰς ἀπιστίαν ἐκπίπτοντα, πιθανὰ διὰ τὸ γελοῖον· ἀγρὸν ἔσχ’ ἐλάττω γῆν ἔχοντ’ ἐπιστολῆς / .

About the brevity of the Laconians, that is their “laconism”. 19 For some fragments, however, we cannot establish if an ethnic reference is used to denote a geographic origin as such, or if its stereotypical or antonomastic value is already prevailing. [12.] A doubtful case is represented by Crates, fr. 37 (from the comedy Τόλμαι = Ath. 6.247f): ἐπισιτίου δὲ (μνημονεύει) Κράτης Τόλμαις· ποιμαίνει δ’ ἐπισίτιον· / ῥιγῶν δ’ ἐν Μεγαβύζου / †δέξετ’ ἐπὶ μισθῷ σῖτος†, because we cannot be sure that the name “Megabyzos” was employed to indicate generally a rich Persian, and indeed “appare […] del tutto verosimile che l’evocazione del nome Megabizo negli anni in cui fu attivo sulla scena Cratete fosse inteso in relazione al personaggio ben noto agli Ateniesi e non come un generico riferimento antonomastico”. 20 Similar conclusions could be drawn for the mention of the Persian Zopyros in Cratinus, fr. 187 (from the comedy Πυλαία = Phot. ζ 83 Theodoridis = Apost. 8.35; cf. Zenob. vulg. 4.9): Ζωπύρου τάλαντα. 21 [13.] Equally unclear is the value of the adjective “Mysian” referred to AcestorSacas in Theopompus, fr. 61, and Metagenes, fr. 14; cf. schol. Ar. Vesp. 1221: Ἀκέστερος· ἐπεὶ καὶ αὐτὸν τὸν Ἀκέστορα ξένον κωμῳδοῦσι τὸν τραγικόν [TrGF 25 T 1], ὃς ἐκαλεῖτο Σάκας. Θεόπομπος Τισαμενῷ οὐ κοινῶς ξένον, ἀλλὰ Μυσόν· […] τὸν δὲ Μύσιον / Ἀκέστορ’ ἀναπέπεικεν ἀκολουθεῖν ἅμα [PCG Theopomp.,  18 PCG print the text of Meineke; the version of Hsch. (Latte) is Κορίνθιαι· αἱ πέδαι, καὶ ἀπὸ Κορίνθου τῆς πόλεως γυναῖκες; Nauck suggested a correction of πέδαι in πεζαί, cf. Eup. fr. 184 (see also Olson 2016, 112–113; and Eubul. fr. 53 [above listed as nr. 6]). 19 Cf. Strab. I 2.30 εἰσί τινες ὑπερβολαὶ ἐπὶ ὑπερβολαῖς, ὡς τὸ κουφότερον εἶναι φελλοῦ σκιᾶς, δειλότερον δὲ λαγὼ Φρυγός, ἐλάττω δ’ ἔχειν γῆν τὸν ἀγρὸν ἐπιστολῆς Λακωνικῆς. See also Göbel 1915, 51–52. 20 Perrone 2019, 187–188. Megabyzos was the Persian general who fought the Athenians during the Egyptian expedition in the mid fifth century BC. 21 See PCG ad loc. for other sources and references.

Ethnic Stereotypes and Ethnic Mockery in Ancient Greek Comedy  

fr. 61]. καὶ Μεταγένης Φιλοθύτῃ ὁμοίως· ὦ πολῖται, δεινὰ πάσχω. τίς πολίτης δ’ ἐστὶ < ⏒ > / πλὴν ἄρ’ εἶ Σάκας ὁ Μυσὸς καὶ τὸ Καλλίου νόθον; [PCG Metag. fr. 14]. We do not know if “Mysian” was used properly, to stress the (real) foreign origin of Acestor, or was employed by antonomasia (“Mysian” as “barbarian”, “slave”), to denigrate the poet, who was originally a free citizen and then became a slave. 22

. (New) Words with Ethnic Roots A peculiar kind of ethnic mockery attested in the comic fragments is that of words created — sometimes (if not often) ex novo, as we can infer — from an ethnic name, and used to express a peculiar habit of a certain population, or to better stress it: verbs made from ethnics (often ethnic adjectives); nouns (or adjectives) composed of an ethnic and another root; abstract nouns made from an ethnic. In this type of words, in particular, we recognize an aspect of the powerful imagination of the comedians (mainly of Old Comedy) in manipulating language to create comic effects, probably also revitalizing a tradition that went back to archaic iambic poetry. 23 14. Pherecrates, fr. 176 (incertae fabulae = Phot. ε 46 Theodoridis): ἐγκιλικίζειν· πονηρεύεσθαι. Φερεκράτης· ἀεί ποθ’ ἡμῖν ἐγκιλικίζουσ’ οἱ θεοί. ἀπὸ τῶν Κιλίκων ὡς πονηροῦ ἔθνους (cf. Phot. ε 975 Theodoridis; Etym. Gen. AB s.v. ἐγκιλικίζειν; Phot. κ 711 Theodoridis = Sud. κ 1609 Adler; Zenob. Ath. II 62).

On the Cilicians as crooked and brutal people. 24 15. Cratinus, fr. 77 (from the comedy Θρᾷτται = Phot. α 1241 Theodoridis): … Κρατῖνος Θρᾴτταις· οὗτοι δ’ εἰσὶν συοβοιωτοί, κρουπεζοφόρον γένος ἀνδρῶν.

On the Boeotians as swine. 25

 22 See Cratin. fr. 92; Callias fr. 17; Eupol. fr. 172.14–16, with Olson 2016, 93–94; see also Orth 2014, 462 (on Metagenes); Biles/Olson 2015, 400 (on Vesp. 1221) and 77 (n. 1) for the ethnic slave names (with reference to Fraser 2009, 104–111). 23 The case of Hipponax is paradigmatic: see e.g. Bettarini 2017, 48–49, 65–68, 103–113. 24 On the rusticity of the Cilicians, see also Com. Adesp. fr. *468 (= Macar. V 15). 25 See also Ornaghi 2007, 38. This stereotype (maybe presupposed by the fr. 346 inc. fab. [= schol. in Ar. Pax. 741] of the same Cratinus) was probably part of a wide imagery connected to

  Massimiliano Ornaghi 16. Cratinus, fr. 406 (incertae fabulae = Eust. in Od. I, p. 149, 14ff. Stallbaum): αἰγυπτιάζειν … τὸ πανουργεῖν καὶ κακοτροπεύεσθαι, ὡς ὁ κωμικός φασι Κρατῖνος δηλοῖ.

On the Egyptians as rogues. 26 17. Cratinus, fr. 460 (incertae fabulae = Phot. ι 293 Theodoridis): ἰωνόκυσος· κατεαγώς· οὕτως Κρατῖνος.

On the Ionians as perverts (or sexually pathic). 27 18. Eupolis, fr. 385 (incertae fabulae = Ath. 1.17d): Εὔπολις δὲ τὸν πρῶτον εἰσηγησάμενον τὸ τῆς ἀμίδος ὄνομα ἐπιπλήττει λέγων· (Α. = Alcibiades?) μισῶ λακωνίζειν, ταγηνίζειν δὲ κἂν πριαίμην. / (Β.) πολλὰς δ’ οἶμαι νῦν βεβινῆσθαι. / (Α.) ..... ὃς δὲ πρῶτος ἐξεῦρεν τὸ πρῲ ‘πιπίνειν; / (Β.) πολλήν γε λακκοπρωκτίαν ἡμῖν ἐπίστασ’ εὑρών. / (Α.) εἶεν· τίς εἶπεν ‘ἀμίδα παῖ’ πρῶτος μεταξὺ πίνων; / (Β.) Παλαμηδικόν γε τοῦτο τοὐξεύρημα καὶ σοφόν σου.

On the Spartans as — probably in this context, following other sources — addicted to having sex with young boys. 28 19. Phrynicus, fr. 67 (incertae fabulae = schol. in Ar. Pax 344a): συβαρίζειν· Καλλίστρατος τρυφᾶν, ἀπὸ τῆς Συβαριτικῆς τρυφῆς· Ἀρτεμίδωρος ἁπλῶς θορυβεῖν. καὶ Φρύνιχος· πολὺς δὲ συβαρισμὸς αὐλητῶν < … > ἦν.

 Boeotia: see infra p. 425. A different kind of compound, equally referring to Boeotia, is the title Φιλοθήβαιος of Antiphanes. 26 Cf. (fortasse) also Philem. fr. 62. See also Sofia 2016, 86–88. 27 For the use of κυσός as “anus” referring to “the abuse of pederasts”, see Henderson 1991, 131 n. 123. 28 So Hsch. λ 224 Latte = Phot. λ 48 Theodoridis = Sud. λ 62 Adler, the last two quoting Ar. fr. 358: λακωνίζειν· δὲ παιδικοῖς χρῆσθαι. Ἀριστοφάνης Θεσμοφοριαζούσαις βʹ). Cf. also Com. Adesp. fr. 511, quoted in the text listed as nr. 24. In the fragment of Eupolis, maybe this meaning was stressed by the anaphoric echo λακωνίζειν… λακκοπρωκτίαν (see also Olson 2014, 128). About the other meanings of λακωνίζειν (which perhaps would have to be presupposed also for the Eupolidean passage), see Olson 2014, 126. For λακεδαιμονίζειν, see Aristophanes, fr. 97 (from the Βαβυλώνιοι); cf. also Ar. Av. 1281. Of the comedy Φιλολάκων of Stephanus we have just the title and a fragment of 5 lines (fr. 1): see PCG ad loc.

Ethnic Stereotypes and Ethnic Mockery in Ancient Greek Comedy  

On the Sybarites as an epitome of opulence (or people involved in very noisy banquets?). 29 20. Aristophon, fr. 3 (from the comedy Δίδυμοι = Phot. [z] ined.; cf. Sud. χ 42 Adler): χαλκιδίζειν καὶ χαλκιδεύεσθαι· ἐπὶ τῶν γλισχρευομένων καὶ φιλαργυρούντων, ὡς Ἀριστοφῶν ἐν Διδύμοις τέταχεν. ἔνιοι δὲ τὸ χαλκιδίζειν ἐπὶ τοῦ παιδεραστεῖν, ἐπεὶ παρ’ αὐτοῖς οἱ ἀρρένων ἔρωτες ἤσκηντο.

On the Chalcidians as stingy, at least in this context. 30 21. Philetaerus, fr. 10 (from the comedy Λαμπαδηφόροι; cf. Ath. 10.12 [418c]): ὅτι δὲ καὶ πάντες Θετταλοὶ ὡς πολυφάγοι διεβάλλοντο Κράτης φησὶν ἐν Λαμίᾳ· ἔπη τριπήχη Θετταλικῶς τετμημένα [= Crates fr. 21]. τοῦτο δ’ εἶπεν ὡς τῶν Θετταλῶν μεγάλα κρέα τεμνόντων. Φιλέταιρος δ’ ἐν Λαμπαδηφόροις καὶ χειροβαρὲς σαρκὸς ὑείας θετταλότμητον κρέας.

On the Thessalians as gluttons (and hence inclined to cut big pieces of meat to eat). 31 22. Com. Adesp. fr. 438 (= Hsch. φ 687 Hansen – Cunningham): φοινικελίκτην καὶ λόγων ἀλαζόνα· ἀπατηλὸν καὶ κάπηλον.

On the Phoenicians as tricksters. 32 23. Com. Adesp. fr. 498 (= Phot. δ 762 Theodoridis = Etym. Gen. AB [Etym. Magn. p. 288, 15] = Sud. δ 1515 Adler): δρυαχαρνεῦ [δραχαρνεῦ Suid.]· δρύϊνε Ἀχαρνεῦ, ἀναίσθητε· ἐκωμῳδοῦντο γὰρ οἱ Ἀχαρνεῖς ὡς ἄγριοι καὶ σκληροί; (Hsch. δ 2415 Latte) δρυαχαρνεῦ· ἢ δρύϊνε Ἀχαρνεῦ καὶ ἀναίσθητε. δοκοῦσι γὰρ οἱ Ἀχαρνεῖς σκληροὶ τὴν γνώμην εἶναι καὶ ἄτεγκτοι.

 29 See Göbel 1915, 127–129. 30 For the well-attested tradition of the Chalcidians as pederasts, cf. Plut. Amat. 16–17 (760e– 761b); Ath. 13.601e. For the Chalcidians (Euboeans) as courageous men, see Philisc. fr. 3; to this meaning we should probably trace back also the proverb ὥσπερ Χαλκιδικὴ τέτοκεν ἡμῖν ἡ γυνή (on the fertility), alluded by Polyzel. fr. 9 (cf. Zenob. Ath. III 51 = Zenob. vulg. VI 50). 31 See infra p. 425. 32 This tradition goes back to the Odyssey (14.300; 15.388–484); see Skinner 2012, 86–89.

  Massimiliano Ornaghi On the toughness of the Acharnians (the inhabitants of the Attic deme of Acharnai). 33 24. Com. Adesp. fr. 511 (= Phot. κ 1263 Theodoridis): κυσολάκων· ὁ Κλεινίας ὁ τῷ κυσῷ λακωνίζων· τὸ δὲ τοῖς παιδικοῖς χρῆσθαι λακωνίζειν λέγουσιν. Ἑλένῃ γὰρ Θησεὺς οὕτως ἐχρήσατο, ὡς Ἀρίσταρχος.

On the mockery on Spartans, see supra on Eup. fr. 385 (listed as nr. 18); on the name compounded with κυσός, see supra on Cratin. fr. 460 (listed as nr. 17). 34 25. Com. Adesp. fr. *840 (= schol. Aesch. Pers. 42): καὶ ὁ λυδοφοίτης δὲ μυροπώλης τὴν τρυφὴν ταύτην δηλοῖ.

On the Lydians’ sophistication. 35 26. Com. Adesp. fr. 875 (= Steph. Byz. β 116, 22ff. Billerbeck): Βοιώτιος καὶ Βοιωτία, ἀφ’ οὗ ἡ παροιμία Βοιωτία ὗς, καὶ Βοιωτίς. καὶ Βοιωτίδιον ἐκ Βοιώτιος. Ἀριστοφάνης Ἀχαρνεῦσιν (v. 872) ὦ χαῖρε κολλικοφάγε Βοιωτίδιον. καὶ ῥῆμα βοιωτιάζειν ἔμαθες. 36

On the Boeotians, in a meaning difficult to establish. 37 27. Com. Adesp. fr. *942 (= Zenob. Ath. III 54; cf. Prov. Bodl. 860 Gaisford): σιφνιάζειν· ὡς κρητίζειν καὶ λεσβιάζειν, ἀπὸ νήσου Σίφνου καλουμένης· ἔστι δὲ τὸ ἅπτεσθαι τῆς πυγῆς δακτύλῳ. Cf. Hsch. σ 783 Hansen: σιφνιάζειν· καταδακτυλίζειν. διαβέβληνται γὰρ οἱ Σίφνιοι ὡς παιδικοῖς χρώμενοι· σιφνιάσαι οὖν τὸ σκιμαλίσαι.

 33 Cf. Ar. Ach. 179–181. 34 Com. Adesp. fr. 381 (= Hsch. λ 199): λακιδαίμονος (glossed by ψοφοῦντος, ἠχοῦντος), could possibly refer to the same semantic domain: “‘nimirum ad similitudinem Λακεδαίμονος a voce λακίς. explicatio Hesychii num vera sit dubito’ Kock” (PCG ad loc.). The word λακίς means “rift”, “gash”. 35 For a similar compound, see Ar. fr. 156.7 (from the comedy Γηρυτάδης): θρᾳκοφοίτης (with Pellegrino 2015, 113-114). The word λυδοφοίτης, at any rate, seems to be based on a stereotype, whereas the word θρᾳκοφοίτης could be inspired by historical events. 36 For the comic nature of the verb, see PCG ad loc. (“‘fortasse Aristophanis, certe comici poetae verba sunt’ Meineke ad loc. (cf. FCG IV p. 689)”). 37 Cf. Cratin. fr. 77 (listed as nr. 15).

Ethnic Stereotypes and Ethnic Mockery in Ancient Greek Comedy  

On the Siphnians as pederasts (maybe addicted to a particular kind of sexual activity). 38 The sources of these fragments (often combined with other parallel sources) show that some peoples were associated with more than one stereotype, or with a stereotype that could have many nuances: each comic context could suggest the stereotypical meaning involved by itself, even in those cases that now seem debatable. 39 For some other fragments, incidentally, it is more difficult to know if the compound or derivative word depends on a stereotype, or — by contrast — refers to a recent specific event, or evokes an “adherence” (affiliation, empathy etc.) to a certain population, with political implications. The next list gives some examples. 28. Eupolis, fr. 214 (from the comedy Μαρικᾶς = Steph. Byz. θ 35, 7ff. Billerbeck): (Θεσσαλία) … λέγεται καὶ θετταλίζω ὡς δωρίζω, ἀφ’ οὗ τὸ ἐντεθετταλίσμεθα παρὰ τῷ Εὐπόλιδι ἐν Μαρικᾷ, τουτέστι χλαμύδα Θετταλικὴν φοροῦμεν. Θετταλικὸν περόνημα.

An allusion to Thessaly, probably with a political subtext. 40 29. Hermippus, fr. 32 (from the comedy Θεοί = Steph. Byz. τ 7, 7ff. Billerbeck): Ταίναρος· πόλις … λέγεται καὶ ταιναρίζειν, ὡς Ἕρμιππος Θεοῖς καὶ σέ τι χρὴ παραταιναρίζειν.

An allusion to Cape Tainaron; this may be better explained by reference to historical events. 41

 38 See Göbel 1915, 74. But cf. also Ar. fr. 930 (dubium), the comments ad loc. (in particular the reference to Thesm. 133) and Poll. Onom. 4.65–66 (for a possible musical key of the verb meaning; cf. also Dover 1993, 351 [on Ar. Ran. 1308]). For the Aristophanic fragment, see also Pellegrino 2015, ad loc. (477–478). On the Siphnians as ἀσελγεῖς see also Com. Adesp. fr. *284. 39 See also the possible allusion to βεργαΐζειν in Alex. fr. 90; to σινωπίζειν in Alex. fr. 109; to κορινθιάζομαι in Philetaerus (tit. Κορινθιαστής, cf. Ar. fr. 370) and in Poliochus (same tit.). 40 See also Olson 2016, 222–223. 41 See also Comentale 2017, 135–136.

  Massimiliano Ornaghi 30. Leuco, fr. 5 (from the comedy Φράτερες = Phot. ε 24 Theodoridis): ἐγγεγορτυνωμένος· οἷον εὐτελής. ἐσκώπτοντο γὰρ εἰς εὐτέλειαν οἱ Κρῆτες. κέχρηται δὲ Λεύκων ἐν Φράτορσι τῷ ονόματι.

An allusion to the economy (parsimony) or to the cheapness of the Cretans, or to some event involving the inhabitants of Gortys in particular (to justify the occurrence of the name of this town, and not of the island as a whole). 42 31. Com. Adesp. fr. *329 (= Hsch. ε 2356 Latte): ἐμμακεδονίξαι· χρήσασθαι * * *

32. Adespota, fr. *387 (= Hsch. μ 485 Latte = Phot. μ 173 Theodoridis [λιμώσσοντες] = Sud. μ 384 Adler = Lex. Bachm. p. 296, 8): μεγαρίζοντες· λιμώττοντες. ἢ μεγάλα λέγοντες.

If not fully inspired by Ar. Ach. 822 (and, in general, by the scene of the Megarian), μεγαρίζειν in this case could depend on a stereotype (ἢ μεγάλα λέγοντες), or may refer to historical circumstances (λιμώττοντες). 43

. Ethnic Titles, Ethnic Comedy As was already noted at the outset, the limited extent of almost all the fragments makes it difficult to understand if an ethnic motif may have been developed in a dramaturgical way. Regarding the exact location of the comic action, we also lack evidence for almost all the fragmentary plays, and usually we infer an Athenian setting: lines such as those of Heniochus, fr. 5 inc. fab. (= Stob. 4.1.27), 6–8 — τὸ χωρίον μὲν γὰρ τόδ’ ἐστὶ πᾶν κύκλῳ / Ὀλυμπία, τηνδὶ δὲ τὴν σκηνὴν ἐκεῖ / σκηνὴν ὁρᾶν θεωρικὴν νομίζετε — are just a precious exception. 44 In some cases, however, even in the absence of fragments, we can imagine that the ethnic motif may have affected the structural components of a comedy:

 42 See also Bagordo 2014b, 30–31. 43 See also Ornaghi 2016, 275–279 (and, in general, for the use of the term “Megarian” to indicate a kind of drama — cf. Ecphantid. fr. 3; Eup. fr. 261 –, see pp. 245ff.). 44 On this fragment (and its supposed original comedy: Πόλεις?), see Mastellari 2020, 241ff.; on the comedies with a non-Athenian location, see again Leo 1912, 219 n. 3 (though just for New Comedy).

Ethnic Stereotypes and Ethnic Mockery in Ancient Greek Comedy  

namely in those comedies that have ethnic titles, and above all plural ethnic titles, like the ones listed in the following selection. Tab. 3: Ethnic titles of comedies (in plural) Chionides Πέρσαι ἢ Ἀσσύριοι

Metagenes Θουριοπέρσαι

Cratinus iunior Ταραντῖνοι

Magnes Λυδοί

Nicochares Κρῆτες Λάκωνες Λήμνιαι (mythic plot?)

Nicostratus Λάκωνες

Crates Σάμιοι Pherecrates Πέρσαι Cratinus Θρᾷτται Λάκωνες Σερίφιοι (mythic plot) Eupolis Λάκωνες Apollophanes Κρῆτες

Plato 45 Λάκωνες ἢ Ποιηταί Strattis Μακεδόνες ἢ Παυσανίας Φοίνισσαι Anaxandrides Λοκρίδες Antiphanes Αἰγύπτιοι Λήμνιαι (mythic plot?) Σκύθης vel Σκύθαι ἢ Ταῦροι

Eubulus Λάκωνες ἢ Λήδα (mythic plot?) Timocles Αἰγύπτιοι Καῦνιοι (mythic plot?) Xenarchus Σκύθαι Alexis Θηβαῖοι Λοκροῖ Μιλήσιοι Ὀλύνθιοι

Clearchus Κορίνθιοι

At least for some of these comedies, it is likely that the titles designed the members of the chorus. 46 For these, we can also suppose that the ethnic motif could

 45 Plato Com. also wrote a comedy Ἑλλὰς ἢ Νῆσοι (frr. 19–26), perhaps with contents — at least partially — similar to the Πόλεις of Eupolis (see infra in the text, listed as nr. 39): see Pirrotta 2009, 86–89. 46 We cannot address here the question of the role of the chorus in Middle Comedy: it seems possible that some authors, in some comedies, still employed a chorus with a full dramatic function, not just to perform ἐμβόλιμα. For some remarks on this matter, see Csapo 2000; Hughes 2012, 32–33.

  Massimiliano Ornaghi have represented a frequently activated tool of the laughing mechanism, or possibly a feature of the plot itself. 47 An interesting example is provided by the Helots (Εἵλωτες) of Eupolis, perhaps performed between 429 and 425 BC: 48 a comedy without a real ethnic title (because εἵλωτες is a word of social and political connotation), but referred to a clear geographical area, that is the Southern Peloponnese. 49 About this comedy we know very little, and we have very few fragments: 50 the main part of them, though, seems to be “oriented” in a coherent direction. 33. Eupolis, Εἵλωτες, fr. 147 (= Ath. 4.138e): αἴ κα γένηται τοῦδε σάμερον κοπίς. 51

The Doric word κοπίς referred to a Spartan festival. 34. Eupolis, Εἵλωτες, fr. 149 (= Hdn. Περὶ μονήρους λέξεως II p. 917, 1 Lentz): τέμενος Ποτειδᾶ ποντίω. 52

The Doric form of the name of Poseidon, maybe used to indicate the sanctuary at Cape Tainaron. 35. Eupolis, Εἵλωτες, fr. 150 (= Poll. Onom. 9.74): ὀβολὸν τὸν καλλιχέλωνον.

The name of a typical coin of the Peloponnese.

 47 Sometimes, by chance, the pervasiveness of the ethnic motif is apparently confirmed by isolated fragments: cf. Apolloph. fr. 7 (from the comedy Κρῆτες): καὶ λεπαστά μ’ ἁδύοινος εὐφρανεῖ δι’ ἁμέρας. “A line from Apolloph. Cretans (fr. 7) may have been spoken by one of the eponymous islanders” (Colvin 2000, 292). 48 See Storey 2003, 65–66; and now Olson 2016, 12–13 (with n. 1). 49 On the knowledge of the Helots in Athens, in the second half of the fifth century BC, see Storey 2003, 176–178; Olson 2016, 11–12. 50 See Storey 2003, 178–179; and now Olson 2016, 11–26, for a detailed commentary on all the fragments (PCG Eup. frr. 147–155). 51 See Colvin 1999, 271–272 (5.1.2.3.1). 52 See Colvin 1999, 272 (5.1.2.3.2).

Ethnic Stereotypes and Ethnic Mockery in Ancient Greek Comedy  

36. Eupolis, Εἵλωτες, fr. 151 (= Hdn. Περὶ μονήρους λέξεως II p. 933, 1 Lentz): ἀθροῦν. οὐδὲν εἰς ουν λήγει ἐπίρρημα, ἀλλὰ μόνον τὸ ἀθροῦν. * * * ὅπερ καὶ ἐπεκτάσεσι ποιητικαῖς κέχρηται καὶ παραθέσει ἄρθρου ἑνικοῦ καὶ πληθυντικοῦ. παραιτοῦμαι δὲ τὸ αἰσχοῦν, ὃ εἴρηται παρὰ τῷ τοὺς Εἵλωτας †αίμην ἀλλὰ μισχοῦν καθήμενοι, ἐπεὶ ὀνοματικά ἐστι. 53

A Laconian dialect word/gloss. 37. Eupolis, Εἵλωτες, fr. 154 (= Zenob. Ath. III 61): λιμοδωριεῖς· μέμνηται ταύτης (τῆς παροιμίας) Εὔπολις ἐν Εἵλωσι. Αἰσχρίων δέ φησιν ὁ Βυζάντιος ὡς σιτοδείας ποτὲ γενομένης ἐν Πελοποννήσῳ ἐφόδιά τινες λαβόντες ἀπῆραν· πλανωμένους δὲ αὐτοὺς ὑπεδέξατο ἡ ἐν Ῥόδῳ τρίπολις. ἐκλήθησαν δὲ διὰ τοῦτο λιμοδωριεῖς. 54

A proverbial expression “hunger-Dorians”. 38. Eupolis, Εἵλωτες, fr. 155 (= Poll. Onom. 10.98): … καὶ τάγηνον δέ. ἀλλὰ μὴν καὶ τήγανον ἂν ἔχοις εὑρεῖν εἰρημένον ἐν Εἵλωσιν Εὐπόλιδος, καὶ ἐν Τηλεκλείδου Ἀψευδέσιν. 55

A Doric form of a word. The ethnic dimension of the comedy probably was pervasive: if we exclude fr. 148 (4 lines, in choral metre, perhaps of a parabasis), 56 the other 8 fragments are each of one line, or one word; among these, 6 fragments show the use of Doric words and/or a reference to Laconian culture. 57 For these reasons too we are allowed to think that the comedy “included at least one Doric-speaker as a character”, 58 and maybe that “most if not all the action will have taken place in Laconia”. 59  53 Cf. Theognost. p. 162, 19–20 Cramer (Εἰς υν λῆγον ἐπίῤῥημα οὐδέν ἐστιν ὅτι μὴ τὸ βίσχυν βαρύτονον μόνον ὄν), and Hsch. β 638 Latte (βίσχυν· ἰσχύν. σφόδρα †ὀλίγον. Λάκωνες). 54 Cf. Hsch. λ 1041 Latte: λιμοδωριεῖς· οὕτως ἐκλήθησαν οἱ ἀπὸ Πελοποννήσου, ἀφορίας χαλεπῆς ἐκεῖ γενομένης, ἀποικισθέντες διὰ ταύτην τὴν αἰτίαν, καὶ κατοικήσαντες περὶ Ῥόδον καὶ Κνίδον. Δίδυμος δὲ τοὺς περὶ τὴν †Κύτην κατοικοῦντας οὕτως λέγεσθαι, διὰ τὸ λιμώττειν καὶ μοχθηρὰν ἔχειν ταύτην. 55 Cf. Phryn. PS p. 112, 11 de Borries (τάγηνον οἱ Ἀττικοί, τήγανον οἱ Δωριεῖς), and Moeris p. 210, 12 Bekker (τάγηνον Ἀττικοί, τήγανον Ἕλληνες). 56 See Olson 2016, 15–17. 57 For other possible attributions to the Helots, see also Eup. frr. 472, 480, with Olson 2014, 234– 236, 241–242. 58 Olson 2016, 12; see also Colvin 1999, 272. 59 Colvin 1999, 272; more caution in Storey 2003, 178 (and n. 10).

  Massimiliano Ornaghi It is still difficult to infer something about the plot of the comedy, but the use of geographically marked elements (words, pronunciation, material things such as clothes, coins, pots etc.) may have been associated with ethnic mockeries, also to exploit simple comic jokes, for instance using the motif of the foreigner, the stranger, the uneducated barbarian (always from the point of view of the Athenian audience). 60 [39.] Of the same Eupolis, the Cities (Πόλεις) too represent an interesting case study: the comedy — performed around 420 BC — put on stage the member-cities of the Athenian league, probably (at least in some cases) disguised as female characters. 61 In contrast to the Helots, in the fragments of this comedy it is difficult to find clues of dialect parody, but we have depictions of πόλεις that, maybe, reflected some stereotypes (above all because these depictions seem to depend on the Athenian point of view). For instance, fr. *244 (a quotation from Photius: πεφυτευμένη δ’ αὕτη ’στὶν, ἢ ψιλὴ μόνον;) was perhaps referred to Seriphos, a dull and barren island; fr. 245 (a quotation from the Aristophanic scholia: Τῆνος αὕτη, / πολλοὺς ἔχουσα σκορπίους ἔχεις τε συκοφάντας) showed Tenos as a place of scorpions and sycophants; fr. 246 (like the previous: αὕτη Χίος, καλὴ πόλις < ... > / πέμπει γὰρ ὑμῖν ναῦς μακρὰς ἄνδρας θ’ ὅταν δεήσῃ, / καὶ τἄλλα πειθαρχεῖ καλῶς, ἄπληκτος ὥσπερ ἵππος) praised the support and the allegiance of Chios; fr. 247 (like the previous: ἡ δ’ ὑστάτη ποῦ ’σθ’; ἥδε Κύζικος πλέα στατήρων. / ἐν τῇδε τοίνυν τῇ πόλει φρουρῶν ποτ’ αὐτὸς / γυναῖκ’ ἐκίνουν κολλύβου καὶ παῖδα καὶ γέροντα, / κἀξῆν ὅλην τὴν ἡμέραν τὸν κύσθον ἐκκορίζειν) focused on the wealth of Cyzicos, but also on its sexual receptiveness; perhaps fr. 256 (from Harpocratio, μνημονεύουσι δὲ οἱ κωμικοὶ πολλάκις τῶν ἀμοργίνων, ὡς καὶ Ἀριστοφάνης Λυσιστράτῃ καὶ

 60 The title Κωραλίσκος of Epilycus — albeit singular, and not specifically geographic — is intriguing too, because of the explanation of Photius (κ 1328 Theodoridis) κωραλίσκον· τὸ μειράκιον Κρῆτες (“Die Benennung einer Komödie nach einem Ausdruck eines fremden Dialekts ist ohne Parallele”, Orth 2014, 252), and the presence of non-Attic or unusual words in the few fragments of the comedy. The plot is unintelligible: maybe (more than) one Laconian character was involved. For a full commentary, see Orth 2014, 252–277; for the dialect of fr. 4 of this comedy, see Colvin 2000, 291–292. For the title Μαρικᾶς of Eupolis’ comedy, by contrast, we probably have to think of a foreign word in common use in Athens: see Cassio 1985. 61 On this comedy, see Storey 2003, 216ff., and Olson 2016, 228ff. (both also for more details about the datation theories). On the motif of the “islands” (and the Athenian attitude towards them) in the comedy of the late fifth century BC, see also Ornaghi 2009, 104–109. The reconstruction of a title Νησ]ιῶται or Σικελ]ιῶται for a comedy of Teleclides is doubtful: cf. PCG test. 5, l. 8.

Ethnic Stereotypes and Ethnic Mockery in Ancient Greek Comedy  

Εὔπολις Πόλεσιν) suggested also an involvement of Amorgos in this articulated puzzle of descriptions. 62

. Non-Athenian Words or Pronunciations As in the case of the Eupolidean Helots, close attention should be paid, more generally, to the fragments that preserve non-Athenian words, or mockeries about dialects or speech impediments, because they could hide possible links to ethnic jokes. 63 These fragments are interesting also to understand the average knowledge of non-Attic vocabulary that every Athenian could have (foreign or also foreignsounding words), or maybe to recognize a small set of non-Attic words (or words of different dialects) that could be of common use in ancient Athens. 64 We will list just some examples. 65

 62 Eupolis also wrote a comedy Λάκωνες, of which just one fragment of one line survives (fr. 191): see Olson 2016, 119–120. The list of products preserved in Hermip. fr. 63 (from the comedy Φορμοφόροι: see Comentale 2017, 249ff.) is less focused on the description of the places mentioned, as in the case of Ar. frr. 428–431 (from the comedy Ὁλκάδες: see Pellegrino 2015, 253– 255). 63 The connection between dialects and jobs/professions is also interesting: the case of the Doric doctor is paradigmatic (see Colvin 2000, 293–294). This we can recognize, for instance, in Alex. fr. 146 (from the comedy Μανδραγοριζομένη: a mockery about the preference accorded to foreign doctors, above all Dorians, playing with Dorian pronunciation: see Arnott 1996, 430– 434; Stama 2016, 284–285). But in Ameips. fr. 17 (from the comedy Σφενδόνη: see Totaro 1998, 174ff.), we find the Ionic form λαγός (instead of the Attic λαγώς) in connection with a medical prescription: spoken by an Ionic doctor? 64 See also the cases already mentioned in note 1 (Negri/Ornaghi 2008) and 60 (Cassio 1985). 65 Quotations with more disputed values and context are (this list follows a simple alphabetical order): Anaxand. fr. 11 (use of the word βρέτας [properly a wooden image of a god] to mean an insensitive or stupid person; we know also [cf. Anecdota Graeca, ed. Bekker I, p. 223, 4–5] that especially the Cyrenaeans used the word in this sense: see Millis 2015, 78–79) and fr. 32 (use of the word γογγυσμός, probably Ionic [cf. Phryn. Ecl. 335]: see Millis 2015, 150–151); Antiph. fr. 97 (use of the non-Attic word σφύραινα for a kind of fish, or — maybe better — a less polite way to indicate it) and fr. 129 (use of the word κέρμα); Ariston. fr. 8 (use of the word ψώσματα, probably Boeotian); Cratin. fr. 218 (use of the word βρίκελος); Eupol. frr. 309–310 (words distorted in a barbarian way?); Eupol. fr. 341 (see Colvin 2000, 291); Philem. fr. 52 (use of the word βούνος, probably Libyan) and fr. 90 (use of the word σαννάκια, probably Persian); Philyl. fr. 19 (v. 1: βέδυ: see Colvin 2000, 287–288; Orth 2015, 231–232); Pherecr. fr. 74 (see Colvin 2000, 293); Telecl. fr. 64 (a Lydian word?); Com. Adesp. frr. *262, 510 and 1037 and 1038.

  Massimiliano Ornaghi 40. Cratinus, fr. 78 (from the comedy Θρᾷτται = Phot. α 1241 Theodoridis; Sud. α 1646 Adler): ἀμπαλίνωρος· ἀναστρέφων τὴν αὐτὴν ὁδόν. […] δοκεῖ δὲ Βοιωτιακὸν εἶναι τὸ ὄνομα. Κρατῖνος Θρᾴτταις· οὗτοι — ἀνδρῶν [= fr. 77, listed supra as nr. 15]. καὶ μετ' ὀλίγον· ἀμπαλίνωρος. σημαίνει δὲ τὸ ἀμπαλίνωρον καὶ τὸ ὀπίσω καὶ τὸ ὀλίγωρον καὶ τὸ παλιμπόρευτον. καὶ ὁδὸν τὴν ἐπιστροφὴν οὐκ ἔχουσαν.

Perhaps a Boeotian word (adjective) to indicate something that “does (not?) come back”: maybe the word was used by the chorus (?) of the Boeotians mentioned in fr. 77 (see also PCG ad loc.). 41. Cratinus, fr. 490 (incertae fabulae = Poll. Onom. 10.143): (στρατιώτου σκεύη) καὶ ξυστὰ δ’ εἴποις ἂν καὶ κάμακας καὶ παλτὰ καὶ σαρίσσας καὶ σαυνία· τὸ μὲν γὰρ ὄνομα ἐπ’ ἀνδρείου αἰδοίου ἐστὶ παρὰ Κρατίνῳ, ἐπὶ δὲ τοῦ δόρατος ἐν Φιλαδέλφοις Μενάνδρου. Cf. Hsch. σ 273 Hansen: σαυνίον· ἀκόντιον βαρβαρικόν. καὶ (Hansen, Meineke) σαθρὸν, χαῦνον, ἀσθενές, παρὰ Κρατίνῳ.

Probably a non-Attic word for “spear”, used by Cratinus to indicate a penis. 42. Eupolis, fr. 390 (incertae fabulae = Choerob. in Theodos. Can. [GrGr IV 1] p. 145, 25 Hilgard): … καὶ χωρὶς τῶν διὰ τὸ μέτρον»· ἔστι γὰρ ὁ ζήλας τοῦ ζήλα, οὕτω δὲ λέγεται κατὰ Θρᾷκας ὁ οἶνος, καὶ τούτου ἡ δοτικὴ εὑρίσκεται παρὰ τῷ Εὐπόλιδι χωρὶς τοῦ ι· συστεῖλαι γὰρ βουλόμενος τὸ α οὐ προσέγραψε τὸ ι, οἷον ταυτὸν ποιεῖ τό τ’ Ἀττικὸν τῷ ζῆλα συγκεραννύς.

The Thracian word for “wine” (or “beer”). 66 43. Hermippus, fr. 86 (incertae fabulae = Hsch. λ 1255 Latte; cf. Phot. λ 394 Theodoridis): λολλοῦν· τὰ παιδία τῶν θεῶν [τῶν Εὐβοέων Schmidt]. κέχρηται τῇ λέξει Ἕρμιππος. Cf. Phot. λ 461 Theodoridis: †λυλω†· βρῶμά τι παιδίων ἐν Εὐβοίᾳ γινόμενον ἐκ γιγάρτων καὶ σύκων κεκομμένων.

Possible Euboean (?) word for a kind of sweet for children. 67

 66 See Olson 2014, 142–144. 67 “Se Ermippo ha davvero utilizzato lo ionismo λολλοῦν, allora la parola sarà da attribuire a una situazione scenica in cui qualcuno parla in dialetto ionico” (Comentale 2017, 331).

Ethnic Stereotypes and Ethnic Mockery in Ancient Greek Comedy  

44. Callias, fr. 36 (incertae fabulae = Phot. μ 80 Theodoridis): μαμμᾶν· Ἀργεῖοι τὸ ἐσθίειν· οὕτω Καλλίας.

An Argive word for “eat” (used for children?). 68 45. Plato Com. fr. 64 (from the comedy Κλεοφῶν = Poll. Onom. 10.56): Πλάτων ὁ κωμικὸς ἐν Κλεοφῶντι μάραγναν τὴν μάστιγα ὠνόμασεν.

Probably a non-Attic word (Syriac) for “whip”. See infra p. 424. 46. Plato, fr. 158 (from the comedy Σοφισταί = Antiatt. κ 40 Valente): κέρκους· τὰς οὐρὰς οὐκ οἴονται δεῖν λέγειν· ἐπιχωριάζει δὲ κατὰ τὴν Ἀσίαν, βάρβαρον μέντοι νομίζεται. Πλάτων Σοφισταῖς.

An alleged barbarian word for “tail” (or maybe a word with a barbarian origin, then borrowed into Greek), probably (like οὐρά) “mit dem Doppelsinn ‘Körpersteil eines Tieres’ und ‘Penis’”. 69 47. Plato Com. fr. 183 (from the comedy Ὑπέρβολος = Hdn. Περὶ μονήρους λέξεως II p. 926, 3 Lentz): (ὀλίγος) Πλάτων μέντοι ἐν Ὑπερβόλῳ διέπαιξε τὴν ἄνευ τοῦ γ χρῆσιν ὡς βάρβαρον, λέγων οὕτως· ὁ δ’ οὐ γὰρ ἠττίκιζεν, ὦ Μοῖραι φίλαι, / ἀλλ’ ὁπότε μὲν χρείη διῃτώμην λέγειν, / ἔφασκε δῃτώμην, ὁπότε δ’ εἰπεῖν δέοι / ὀλίγον, ἔλεγεν.

A joke about a speech impediment, which was a sign of non-Attic provenance. See infra p. 425. 48. Strattis, fr. 49 (from the comedy Φοίνισσαι = Ath. 14.621f): ὅτι δὲ καινουργοῦσιν κατὰ τὰς φωνὰς οἱ Θηβαῖοι Στράττις ἐπιδείκνυσιν ἐν Φοινίσσαις διὰ τούτων· ξυνίετ’ οὐδέν, πᾶσα Θηβαίων πόλις, / οὐδέν ποτ’ ἀλλ’ ἢ πρῶτα μὲν τὴν σηπίαν / ὀπιτθοτίλαν, ὡς λέγουσ’, ὀνομάζετε· / τὸν ἀλεκτρυόνα δ’ ὀρτάλιχον, τὸν ἰατρὸν δὲ / σάκταν, βέφυραν τὴν γέφυραν, τῦκα δὲ / τὰ σῦκα, κωτιλάδας δὲ τὰς χελιδόνας, / τὴν ἔνθεσιν δ’ ἄκολον, τὸ γελᾶν δὲ κριδδέμεν, / νεασπάτωτον δ’, ἤν τι νεοκάττυτον ᾖ.

 68 See Colvin 1999, 276; Bagordo 2014a, 211. 69 Pirrotta 2009, 297; see also Henderson 1991, 128.

  Massimiliano Ornaghi A list of differences between Attic and Boeotian words, which — for the main part — could be considered real (not comic creations). 70 49. Theopompus, fr. 18 (from the comedy Θησεύς = Phot. [b, z] α 66 = Lex. Bachm. p. 6, 12): ἀβυρτάκη· ὑπότριμμα βαρβαρικὸν ἐκ δριμέων σκευαζόμενον, φημὶ ἐκ καρδάμων καὶ σκορόδων καὶ σινάπεως καὶ σταφίδων, ᾧ πρὸς κοιλιολυσίαν ἐχρῶντο. Θεόπομπος Θησεῖ· ἵξει δὲ Μήδων γαῖαν, ἔνθα καρδάμων / πλείστων ποιεῖται καὶ πράσων ἀβυρτάκη. […]

Perhaps a kind of purgative sauce (?) of barbarian custom (if not a comic invention of the poet: a purge in a barbarian fashion). 50. Theopompus, fr. 78 (incertae fabulae = Ath. 6.264a): Θετταλῶν δὲ λεγόντων πενέστας τοὺς μὴ γόνῳ δούλους, διὰ πολέμου δ’ ἡλωκότας, Θεόπομπος ὁ κωμικὸς ἀποχρησάμενος τῇ φωνῇ φησι· δεσπότου πενέστου ῥυσὰ βουλευτήρια.

The word πενέστης, used by the Thessalians to indicate a type of slave. 51. Theopompus, fr. 105 (incertae fabulae; cf. Eust. in Il. II 868–877, p. 581, 26ff. van der Valk): ἰστέον δὲ καί, ὅτι οὐ μόνον ἡ τῶν καρβάνων ἤτοι βαρβάρων λέξις ἐκ τῶν Καρῶν εἰλῆφθαι δοκεῖ, ἀλλὰ καὶ οἱ παρὰ τῷ Παυσανίᾳ κάρδακες, ὅ ἐστι στρατιῶται περὶ Ἀσίαν. […] Αἴλιος Διονύσιος οὕτω φησί· “κάρδακες οὐ δίκαιόν τι γένος, ἀλλὰ οἱ μισθοῦ στρατευόμενοι βάρβαροι, παρὰ Θεοπόμπῳ”. ἁπλῶς δέ, φησίν, οἱ Πέρσαι πάντα τὸν ἀνδρεῖον καὶ κλῶπα κάρδακα ἐκάλουν.

A Persian (?) word for barbarian mercenaries. 52. Amphis, fr. 14 (from the comedy Διθύραμβος = Ath. 4.174f): ἐγὼ δὲ τὸν γίγγραν γε τὸν σοφώτατον. (Β.) τίς δ’ ἔσθ’ ὁ γίγγρας; (Α.) καινὸν ἐξεύρημά τι ἡμέτερον, ὃ θεάτρῳ μὲν οὐδεπώποτε ἔδειξ’, Ἀθήνησιν δὲ κατακεχρημένον ἐν συμποσίοις ἤδη ‘στί. (Β.) διὰ τί δ’ οὐκ ἄγεις

 70 Cf. Orth 2009, 217–222; Fiorentini 2017, 191–199 (“[…] qui a parlare è con tutta probabilità un abitante dell’Attica […] in una tirata, in cui la stupidità e l’inferiorità caratteristiche dei Beoti sono prima annunciate (vv. 1s.) e poi dimostrate, per così dire, su basi linguistiche”, 199).

Ethnic Stereotypes and Ethnic Mockery in Ancient Greek Comedy  

εἰς τὸν ὄχλον αὐτό; (Α.) διότι φυλὴν περιμένω σφόδρα φιλονικοῦσαν λαχεῖν τιν’. οἶδα γὰρ ὅτι πάντα πράγματ’ ἀνατριαινώσει κρότοις.

Use of the word γίγγρας that indicated a small pipe, coming from the East, maybe from Phoenicia: the title of the play suggests a dithyrambic contest, but might also refer to the epithet of the god Dionysus (a character of the play?). 71 53. Antiphanes, fr. 199 (from the comedy Σκύθης = Poll. Onom. 7.59): ἐν δὲ τοῖς Σκύθαις Ἀντιφάνης ἔφη σαράβαρα καὶ χιτῶνας πάντες ἐνδεδυκότες. τὰ δὲ τοιαῦτα ὀνόματα μηνύειν με καὶ μὴ κρίνειν νόμιζε. Cf. also Poll. VII 168 (for a second quotation of the fragment) and Phot. σ 75 Theodoridis: σαράβαρα· ἐσθὴς Περσική· ἔνιοι δὲ λέγουσι βρακία (more circumscribed Hesych. σ 190 Hansen: *σαράβαρα· τὰ περὶ τὰς κνημῖδας ἐνδύματα).

A Persian (?) word for trousers. 54. Nicostratus, fr. 36 (incertae fabulae = Phot. ζ 48 Theodoridis): ζιγγοῦν· τὸ ὑποπίνειν Κίλικες· οὕτως Νικόστρατος.

The Cilician word for “drink (moderately)”, maybe used ironically (in reference to the Cilicians: see the fr. listed as nr. 14). 55. Xenarchus, fr. 11 (from the comedy Σκύθαι = Ath. 10.12 [418d–e]): Θετταλοὶ γὰρ τὰς ἀπήνας καπάνας ἔλεγον. Ξέναρχος Σκύθαις· ἑπτὰ δὲ καπάνας ἔτρεφον εἰς Ὀλύμπια. / (B) τί λέγεις; (A) καπάνας Θετταλοὶ / πάντες καλοῦσι τὰς ἀπήνας. (B) μανθάνω.

A Thessalian word for “chariot”, explicitly pointed out as unusual for the other Greeks (cf. πάντες καλοῦσι). 56. Alexis, fr. 320 (incertae fabulae = Phryn. Ecl. 316 Fischer): καμμύειν· τοσαύτη κακοδαιμονία περί τινάς ἐστι τῆς βαρβαρίας, ὥστε, ἐπειδὴ Ἄλεξις κέχρηται τῷ καμμύειν ἠμελημένως ἐσχάτως, αἱρεῖσθαι καὶ αὐτοὺς οὕτω λέγειν, δέον ὡς οἱ ἄριστοι τῶν ἀρχαίων καταμύειν.

 71 “The title […] lands in the very centre of a prominent Middle Comedy trend: the so-called ‘paradithyramb’, i.e. the parody or — simply — the imitation of dithyrambic style” (Papachrysostomou 2016, 94).

  Massimiliano Ornaghi Use of the form καμμύειν (instead of καταμύειν, “to close [the eyes]”), marked as “barbarian” by Phrynicus. 72 57. Com. Adesp. fr. 914 (= Strab. 10.1.10 + Eust. in Il. II 537, p. 429, 17ff. van der Valk): (Strab.) (Eretrienses) τῷ γράμματι τῷ ρ πολλῷ χρησάμενοι οὐκ ἐπὶ τέλει μόνον τῶν ῥημάτων ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐν μέσῳ κεκωμῴδηνται. (Eust.) ἐκωμῳδοῦντο δέ, φασίν, οἱ Ἐρετριεῖς ὡς πολλῷ τῷ ρ ἐν ταῖς ὁμιλίαις χρώμενοι. διὸ καὶ αὐτοί, καθὰ καὶ Ἠλεῖοι, βαρβαρόφωνοι ἐκαλοῦντο, ὡς ἐν ῥητορικῷ εὕρηται λεξικῷ.

The inappropriate (barbarian?) use of “rho” made by the Eretrians in their dialect. The use of non-Attic words or non-Attic/strange pronunciations to mock people as non-Athenian could have been recurrent, if not systematic, in two comedies of Plato (comicus): the Cleophon and the Hyperbolus. Both plays criticized politicians of the late fifth century BC, probably imputing on them (also) a foreign bloodline, and showing it with linguistic oddities. 73 In the Cleophon, Plato Com. introduced the mother of Cleophon as a character speaking in a barbarian way. Cf. Plato Com., fr. 61 (= schol. vet. in Ar. Ran. 681 Chantry): (681a) Θρῃκία χελιδὼν ἐπὶ βάρβαρον· ἵνα διαβάλῃ αὐτὸν ὡς βάρβαρον. (681b) κωμῳδεῖται δὲ ὡς υἱὸς Θρᾴσσης. καὶ Πλάτων ἐν Κλεοφῶντι δράματι βαρβαρίζουσαν πρὸς αὐτὸν πεποίηκε τὴν μητέρα. καὶ αὐτὴ δὲ Θρᾷσσα ἐλέγετο. To the same comedy belongs fr. 64 (listed supra as nr. 45) and we may also attach to it fr. 247 incertae fabulae (= Eust. in Od. II p. 73, 9ff. Stallbaum: καὶ Πλάτων δέ, φησιν, ὁ κωμικὸς, ὁ πρόσωπος εἴρηκεν ἀντὶ τοῦ πρόσωπον, καὶ ἀντὶ τοῦ γάλακτος ἢ γάλατος τοῦ γάλα ἔκλινε δισυλλάβως). 74 In the Hyperbolus, on the other hand, Plato Com. affirmed the non-Athenian (Lydian) origin of Hyperbolus. 75 Cf. Plato Com. fr. 185 (= schol. Luc. Tim. 30, p. 114, 28 Rabe): (de Hyperbolo) Πολύζηλος δὲ ἐν Δημοτυνδάρεῳ [fr. 5] Φρύγα αὐτὸν εἶναί φησιν εἰς τὸ βάρβαρον σκώπτων. Πλάτων δὲ ὁ κωμικὸς ἐν Ὑπερβόλῳ Λυδὸν αὐτόν φησιν εἶναι Μίδα γένος, καὶ ἄλλοι ἄλλως. ἔστι δὲ τῇ ἀληθείᾳ Χρέμητος, ὡς

 72 “What governed Alexis’ choice here (? contemporary usage; imitation of a non-Attic dialect; parody of epic, lyric or tragedy […]) remains uncertain” (Arnott 1996, 804). 73 For their historical and political background, see Connor 1971, passim. 74 See Pirrotta 2009, 151. For another case of barbarian mother, cf. also Eupol. fr. 262 (from the comedy Προσπάλτιοι), with Olson 2016, 352–354. 75 It is possible that, in his Ἀρτοπώλιδες (frr. 7–12), Hermippus too presented the mother of Hyperbolus as a barbarian baker: cf. Colvin 2000, 289; Comentale 2017, 65–68.

Ethnic Stereotypes and Ethnic Mockery in Ancient Greek Comedy  

Θεόπομπος ἐν τῷ Περὶ δημαγωγῶν [fr. 115 Jacoby]. Also, the barbarian nature of the character of Hyperbolos could have been stressed by jokes such as those attested in fr. 183 (listed supra as nr. 47), on his speech impediment. 76

 Some Trends in the Comic Ethnic Mockeries At the end of our survey, we can try to answer — always minding our initial provisos (see p. 404) — the questions posed at the beginning of the investigation, and we can also try to draw some provisional conclusions on the main trends that we recognize in the comic uses of the ethnic-geographical references and stereotypes. These comic tools were apparently shared by all the comic poets, and on a wide timescale, although with different frequency: Eupolis and Plato, for instance, seem to have exploited the features of ethnic comedy in a more complex and structured way (see the fragments listed as nrr. 4, 18, 28, 33–39, 42, 45–47). More generally, from the evidence perhaps we can also infer a stronger creativeness (applied to the ethnic tools) among the poets of Old Comedy and an increasing penchant for ethnic stereotypes among the poets of Middle and New Comedy. Some stereotypes can be considered transversal and diachronically distributed: 77 – dullness and gluttony (often related to eels) of the Boeotians, in Alex. fr. 239; Antiph. frr. 191 (eels), 216 (eels), 233; Demonic. fr. 1; Ephip. fr. 15; Eubul. frr. 11, 33, 38, 52, 66 (gluttony); frr. 36, 64 (eels); Mnesim. fr. 2; Strat. fr. 45 (Copaid eels); Com. Adesp. frr. 1146, 46 (eels); 78 – voracity and “excess” (in actions, banquets, portions etc.) of the Thessalians, in Alex. fr. 216; Antiph. fr. 249 (voracity); Crates fr. 21; Eriph. fr. 6; Eubul. fr. 87 (voracity and brutality); Hermip. fr. 43; Philet. fr. 10 (listed supra as nr. 21); 79

 76 See Pirrotta 2009, 329–331. Contra, for a socio-cultural explanation of the features of the Hyperbolus-character in Plato’s comedy, see Colvin 1999, 289–290. On Hyperbolus as non-Athenian, cf. Eupol. fr. 199 (from the comedy Μαρικᾶς, with Olson 2016, 198–200); more problematic is the attribution of the attack included in fr. 99, l. 25 (from the comedy Δῆμοι: see now Olson 2017, ad loc.). 77 The examples are listed in the alphabetical order. 78 On Boeotia as place from which it is better to run away, cf. Laon fr. 2; Pherecr. fr. 171. On the Boeotians as tricksters, cf. Cratin. fr. 13. On the prostitutes of Tanagra, cf. Sophil. fr. 5. 79 Cf. also Ar. fr. 507 (from the comedy Ταγηνισταί).

  Massimiliano Ornaghi –

–

– – – –

simplicity and brevity of the Spartans, in Antiph. frr. 46 and 115 (actual misery); Diph. fr. 96 (on the Laconians); Com. Adesp. fr. 456 (brevity); but also long hair as typical Spartan custom, in Amph. fr. 49; Plato Com. fr. 132 (and fr. 134); luxury of the Ionians (people of the Western coast of the Anatolian Peninsula), in Alex. fr. 94; Antiph. fr. 91; Callias fr. 8; Eup. frr. 247 (Cyzicenian lust), 272; penchant for scuffle and spying (sykophantia) of the Argives, in Aristophon fr. 5 (fighters); Diph. fr. 119; Philonid. fr. 11 (robberies?); Com. Adesp. fr. 183; 80 general bad habits and coarseness of the Megarians, in Philonid. fr. 5; Theopomp. fr. 3; Com. Adesp. fr. *85; 81 sexual expertise of the Lesbians (especially the Lesbian women), in Pherecrates, fr. 159 (listed supra as nr. 1); Theopomp. fr. 36; 82 penchant for cooking of the Sicilians (renowned chefs, above all for fish dishes), in Alex. fr. 24; Antiph. fr. 90; Cratin. iunior fr. 1; Ephip. fr. 22; Epicr. fr. 8. 83

Even certain “regional products” seem to have been mentioned often because of their popularity, such as the wine of Thasos (in Alex. frr. 232, 277; Antidot. fr. 4; Antiph. frr. 138, 238; Epilyc. fr. 7; Epinic. fr. 1; Eubul. fr. 121) and of Lesbos (in Alex. frr. 276, 277, 278; Antiph. fr. 172; Bato fr. 2; Clearch. fr. 5; Ephip. fr. 28; Eubul. fr. 121; 84 or also the prostitutes at Corinth (in Alex. fr. 213; Alex. fr. 255; Eubul. fr. 53 [listed supra as nr. 6]; Philet. and Polioch. tit. Κορινθιαστής; Strat. fr. 27); 85 If we expand our view beyond the Greek world, we recognize above all a distinction — adopting an extreme simplification — between the peoples beyond the Northern (and Southern) boundaries and those beyond the Oriental boundaries:

 80 On their drunkenness, cf. also Ephip. fr. 2 (listed supra as nr. 5). 81 See supra p. 414. On Megara as place of prostitution, cf. Callias fr. 23; Strat. fr. 27. 82 See supra p. 405. On the Lesbian songs, cf. Cratin. fr. 263. 83 Good chefs also in Eretria, according to Alex. fr. 84; and in Elis, according to Epicr. fr. 8. 84 Other good wines come from Chios (Anaxil. fr. 18; Epilyc. fr. 7; Eubul. fr. 121), Mende (Cratin. fr. 195, Eubul. fr. 123), Acanthus (Amph. fr. 36), Leucades (Eubul. fr. 129), Skiathos (Strat. fr. 64), Athens (Epinic. fr. 1) and Euboea (Alex. fr. 303); bad wines come from Decelea (Alex. fr. 286) and probably also Corinth (Alex. fr. 292). Cf. also the rich catalogues of wines in Hermip. fr. 77, and Philyl. fr. 23. 85 See supra p. 407. Other renowned local products attested in the comic fragments are, for instance, the cheese of Sicily (Philem. fr. 79; Com. Adesp. fr. *124) and of Kythnos (Alex. fr. 178); the oil from Samos (Alex. fr. *245; Antiph. fr. 212); the Parian marble (Alex. fr. 22). Cf. also the short list in Amph. fr. 40. A complete list would exceed the limits of this investigation.

Ethnic Stereotypes and Ethnic Mockery in Ancient Greek Comedy  

the first ones are models of “barbarian” (uncivilized) habits, the second ones are models of luxury and wealth, both with many variations. 86 – Barbarians are mentioned for their peculiar (strange) customs in Alex. fr. 243 (on the Triballians); Amph. tit. Ἀκκώ (dullness); Cratin. fr. 492 (see supra fr. listed as nr. 2); Com. Adesp. fr. *874 (on the proskynesis). In particular: Cilicians as brutal people (Alex. fr. 43; see also supra frr. listed as nr. 14 and 54); Libya for producing monsters (Anaxil. fr. 27); Caria as a source of slaves (Cratin. fr. 18; 87 Philem. fr. 17); Thracians as drinkers of pure wine (Alex. frr. 9, 113; Anaxandr. fr. 42 [and butter-eaters]; Eubul. fr. 75 [Triballians as winelovers]). 88 – Among the Orientals, paradigmatic for their luxury are the Lydians (Alex. fr. 67 [Sardis’ perfumes]; Cratin. fr. 276 [depilation habit]; Hermip. fr. 57 [Abydenian laxity]; Pherecr. fr. 195; Plato Com. fr. 230 [Sardis and the purple]; Com. Adesp. frr. *839, 944 [masturbation], 1125 [gold]) and the Persians (Antiph. fr. 170; Cratin. fr. 279; Metagen. tit. Θουριοπέρσαι), like the Greeks of Ionia (see previous p.). 89 Curious, and against the stream, is only the case of the Mysians, stigmatized for their pettiness: cf. Magnes fr. 5; Metagen. fr. 14. To conclude, almost all the poets seem to have used ethnic mockeries or geographical references with comic purposes, often drawing on the rich field of stereotypes involving non-Athenian people: this trend is visible across the main periods of the history of Athenian comedy. Building upon this preliminary survey it would be interesting to further study this ethnic creativity for each main comedian and for each comic period, but also to adopt, in parallel, a perspective change: even if the ethnic mockery that we find in the comic fragments is — almost universally — oriented towards mocking non-Athenian subjects (because they are products of authors nearly all of whom were Athenian and written for an Athenian audience), occasional hints seem to be focused also on Athenians themselves, that is on the holders of the main point  86 More complex is the approach that the fragments show about Egyptian culture, between rejection (if not disdain) and attraction for the peculiar customs of this country: cf. Anaxandr. fr. 40 (l. 5: eels); Antiph. fr. 145 (eels cult); Cratin. iunior fr. 2; Timocl. fr. 1 (zoomorphic cults); and Dexicr. fr. 1, Eup. fr. 204, Plato Com. fr. 71, on the Egyptian perfumes. See also Sofia 2016, XXVI– XXIX. 87 See Bianchi 2016, 124–127. 88 On Thracian (and Persian) voracity, cf. Com. Adesp. fr. 144. Antiph. frr. 58 and 157, hints at the absence of wine in Scythia (and so at the sobriety of the Scythian women). 89 Other references in Alex. frr. 63, 309 (Babylonia); Ameips. fr. 34 (βαυκισμός); Canthar. fr. 1. But also in this case this list cannot be considered exhaustive.

  Massimiliano Ornaghi of view adopted in the comedies. We may therefore wonder if the Athenians were inclined to adopt a scoptical attitude towards themselves similar to the one adopted towards non-Athenian people; or if we can find in the comic fragments ethnic stereotypes regarding the Athenians themselves. Also these questions might suggest further investigations and define some new objectives.

Bibliography Arnott, W.G. (1996), Alexis: the Fragments. A Commentary, Cambridge. Bagordo, A. (2014a), Alkimenes – Kantharos. Einleitung, Übersetzung, Kommentar, Fragmenta Comica 1.1, Heidelberg. Bagordo, A. (2014b), Leukon – Xenophilos, Einleitung, Übersetzung, Kommentar, Fragmenta Comica 1.2, Heidelberg. Bettarini, L. (2017), Lingua e testo di Ipponatte, Pisa/Roma. Bianchi, F.P. (2016), Cratino. Archilochoi – Empimpramenoi (frr. 1–68), Introduzione, Traduzione, Commento, Fragmenta Comica 3.2, Heidelberg. Biles, Z./Olson, S.D. (2015), Aristophanes, Wasps, Edited with Introduction and Commentary, Oxford. Cassio, A.C. (1983), “Post-Classical Λέσβιαι”, CQ 33.1, 296–297. Cassio, A.C. (1985), “Old Persian Marīka-, Eupolis Marikas and Aristophanes Knights”, CQ 35.1, 38–42. Cohen, B. (ed.) (2000), Not the Classical Ideal. Athens and the Construction of the Other in Greek Art, Leiden/Boston/Köln. Colvin, S. (1999), Dialect in Aristophanes and the Politics of Language in Ancient Greek Literature, Oxford. Colvin, S. (2000), “The Language of Non-Athenians in Old Comedy”, in: D. Harvey/J. Wilkins (eds), The Rivals of Aristophanes. Studies in Athenian Old Comedy, London/Swansea, 285–298. Comentale, N. (2017), Ermippo, Introduzione, Traduzione e Commento, Fragmenta Comica 6, Mainz. Connor, W.R. (1971), The New Politicians of Fifth-Century Athens, Princeton N.J. Csapo, E. (2000), “From Aristophanes to Menander? Genre Transformation in Greek Comedy”, in: M. Depew/D. Obbink (eds), Matrices of Genre: Authors, Canons and Society, Cambridge, 115–133. Derks, T./Roymans, N. (eds) (2009), Ethnic Constructs in Antiquity. The Role of Power and Tradition, Amsterdam. Dover, K. (1993), Aristophanes, Frogs, Edited with Introduction and Commentary, Oxford. Fiorentini, L. (2017), Strattide. Testimonianze e frammenti, Bologna. Fraser, P.M. (2009), Greek Ethnic Terminology, Oxford. Göbel, M. (1915), Ethnica, Pars prima (De Graecarum civitatum proprietatibus proverbio notatis), Diss. inaug. philol., Vratislaviae. Hall, E. (1989), Inventing the Barbarian. Greek Self-Definition through Tragedy, Oxford. Hall, J.M. (1997), Ethnic Identity in Greek Antiquity, Cambridge.

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Henderson, J. (1987), Aristophanes, Lysistrata, Edited with Introduction and Commentary, Oxford. Henderson, J. (1991), The Maculate Muse. Obscene Language in Attic Comedy, Second Edition, New York/Oxford. Hughes, A. (2012), Performing Greek Comedy, Cambridge. Leo, F. (19122), Plautinische Forschungen zur Kritik und Geschichte der Komödie, Berlin. Long, T. (1986), Barbarians in Greek Comedy, Carbondale/Edwardsville. MacDowell, D.M. (1971), Aristophanes, Wasps, Edited with Introduction and Commentary, Oxford. Malkin, I. (ed.) (2001), Ancient Perceptions of Greek Ethnicity, Washington D.C. Maltomini, F. (1990), “βαλευς = βασιλεύς?”, ZPE 80, 295–296. Mastellari, V. (2020), Eubulides – Mnesimachos, Introduzione, Traduzione, Commento, Fragmenta Comica 16.5, Göttingen. McInerney, J. (ed.) (2014), A Companion to Ethnicity in the Ancient Mediterranean, Chichester. Millis, B. (2015), Anaxandrides, Introduction, Translation, Commentary, Fragmenta Comica 17, Heidelberg. Mitchell, L. (2007), Panhellenism and the Barbarian in Archaic and Classical Greece, Swansea. Negri, M./M.Ornaghi (2008), “Pseudartabas e gli Ioni. Appunti per l’esegesi linguistica e dammat(urg)ica di Ar. Ach. 100(-106)”, Ἀλεξάνδρεια/Alessandria 2, 81–126. Olson, S.D. (2002), Aristophanes, Acharnians, Edited with Introduction and Commentary, Oxford. Olson, S.D. (2014), Eupolis frr. 326–497. Translation and Commentary, Fragmenta Comica 8.3, Heidelberg. Olson, S.D. (2016), Eupolis. Heilotes – Chrysoun genos (frr. 147–325). Translation and Commentary, Fragmenta Comica 8.2, Heidelberg. Olson, S.D. (2017), Eupolis. Testimonia and Aiges – Demoi (frr. 1–146), Introduction, Translation and Commentary, Fragmenta Comica 8.1, Heidelberg. Ornaghi, M. (2007), “Note di onomastica comica (II): Aristofane e i poeti comici del V secolo”, QUADERNI del Dipartimento di Filologia Linguistica e Tradizione Classica “Augusto Rostagni” [N.S.] 6, 23–60. Ornaghi, M. (2009), “Lico e la zuppa di lenticchie: una eco letteraria fra Eupoli e Aristofane”, SIFC [IV Ser.] 7.1, 79–128. Ornaghi, M. (2016), Dare un padre alla commedia. Susarione e le tradizioni megaresi, Alessandria. Orth, C. (2009), Strattis. Die Fragmente, Ein Kommentar, Berlin. Orth, C. (2014), Aristomenes – Metagenes, Einleitung, Übersetzung, Kommentar, Fragmenta Comica 9.2, Heidelberg. Orth, C. (2015), Nikochares – Xenophon, Einleitung, Übersetzung, Kommentar, Fragmenta Comica 9.3, Heidelberg. Papachrysostomou, A. (2016), Amphis, Introduction, Translation, Commentary, Fragmenta Comica 20, Heidelberg. Papadodima, E. (2013), Foreignness Negotiated. Conceptual and Ethical Aspects of the GreekBarbarian Distinction in Fifth-Century Literature, Zürich/New York. Pellegrino, M. (2015), Aristofane. Frammenti. Testo, traduzione e commento, Lecce. Perrone, S. (2019), Krates, Introduzione, Traduzione, Commento, Fragmenta Comica 2, Göttingen.

  Massimiliano Ornaghi Pironti, G. (2013), “L’Afrodite di Corinto e il ‘mito’ della prostituzione sacra”, in: P. Angeli Bernardini (ed.), Corinto. Luogo di azione e luogo di racconto, “Atti del Convegno Internazionale, Urbino, 23–25 settembre 2009”, Pisa/Roma, 13–26. Pirrotta, S. (2009), Plato comicus. Die fragmentarischen Komödien. Ein Kommentar, Berlin. Skinner, J.E. (2012), The Invention of Greek Ethnography. From Homer to Herodotus, Oxford. Sofia, A. (2016), Aigyptiazein. Frammenti della commedia attica antica, Milano. Stama, F. (2016), Alessi. Testimonianze e frammenti, Testo, traduzione e commento, Castrovillari. Storey, I.C. (2003), Eupolis. Poet of Old Comedy, Oxford. Totaro, P. (1998), “Amipsia”, in: A.M. Belardinelli/O. Imperio/G. Mastromarco/M. Pellegrino/ P. Totaro (eds), Tessere. Frammenti della commedia greca: studi e commenti, Bari, 133– 194. Vetta, M. (1989), Aristofane, Le donne all’assemblea, traduzione di D. Del Corno, Milano. Zimmermann, B. (2014), “Dialekte und ‘foreigner talk’ im griechischen Drama”, Komparatistik Online 2, 1–11.



Part IV: The Reception of Tragic Fragments

Piero Totaro

Aeschylean Fragments in the Herculaneum Papyri: More Questions than Answers. Prometheus Unbound in Philodemus’ On Piety The eruption of Vesuvius that destroyed Pompeii and Herculaneum in 79 AD brought death and ruin. It destroyed, inter alia, many of the books collected in the rich library of the so-called Villa dei Papiri at Herculaneum, whose first phases of construction can be dated to the third quarter of the first century BC, as demonstrated by the most recent archaeological digs at the site, conducted from July 2007 to the end of March 2008. 1 The ruins of the Villa, which are yet to be comprehensively explored, remain, as well as that which was saved from its library: fragments of charred rolls and drawings, the so-called Neapolitan and Oxonian apographs, made between the end of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth century by draftsmen who were generally inexpert in Greek. 2 Compared to other collections (especially to the Oxyrhynchus Papyri), the Herculaneum papyri, without doubt, have only a marginal relevance to studies of ancient Greek theatre. However, it is worth considering them, or rather reconsidering them, because of what they can tell us about lost plays by the great Athenian dramatists of the fifth century BC. If we limit our field of investigation to tragedy, in the Epicurean works restored to us through the Herculaneum papyri we can identify a reasonable number of references to the authors of the tragic canon: 3 fewer than twenty to Aeschylus, more than twenty to Sophocles, and still more to Euripides, according to the estimates that Gioia Rispoli has reported in “Tragedia e tragici nei papiri ercolanesi” (published in Vichiana 2005). Her paper traces a comprehensive assessment of tragedy as it emerges above all from the remains of poetic works composed by Philodemus of Gadara and Demetrius Laco, and therefore does not aim  1 Cf. Guidobaldi/Esposito 2009, Guidobaldi 2014, Dorandi 2017, Brennan 2018, Lapatin 2019; López Martínez – Sabater Beltrá 2017 for recent bibliography (years 2000–2016). 2 On the Herculaneum library, of fundamental importance are Cavallo 1983, Capasso 1991, Delattre 2006; useful surveys of its content can be found in articles by Longo Auricchio 2008, Cavalieri 2010, Del Mastro 2011, Cavallo 2014, Capasso 2017, Longo Auricchio/Indelli/Leone/Del Mastro 2020. 3 See Indelli 2015. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-024

  Piero Totaro at a collection and systematic analysis of all the Herculaneum testimonies on the tragedians. Felicetta Amarante and Giuliana Auriello have come close to this specific goal, having published in Cronache Ercolanesi (1998) articles dedicated to Aeschylus (Amarante) and Sophocles (Auriello). We still lack a complete, up-todate study of Euripides: we have only a few partial contributions, such as those by Nardelli 1982, Romeo 1982, Dürr 1990, Di Matteo 2000, Antoni 2004, Erbì 2005, Parisi 2011, Indelli 2015. 4 Those who, like me, are in the midst of an international project promoted and financed by the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei (Rome), and are now working on a new edition of Aeschylus’ fragmentary tragedies, must necessarily engage with Amarante’s “Eschilo nei papiri ercolanesi”. She collects 18 “quotations”, 16 “citazioni di titoli e versi di drammi eschilei certi” (one from Agamemnon, one from Heliades, one from Phineus, two from Phrygians, two from Prometheus Bound, four from Prometheus Unbound, one from Prometheus the Fire-Bearer, one from Semele, one from Seven against Thebes, and one from Bone-Gatherers) and two “citazioni di Fabulae incertae”. With the exception of four cases, in which the source is Demetrius Laco (On Poetry and his unknown work in P.Herc. 1012), the source is always Philodemus – in two cases from his On Music, and in the remaining twelve from Περὶ εὐσεβείας. This last treatise, On Piety, is comprised of two parts (not two books, but one book sub-divided into two sections, as Dirk Obbink has recently argued): the first contained a defence against the accusations of impiety made against Epicurus and his school, the second was a harsh criticism of the tales told about the gods by poets and philosophers, including Stoics. Given the theme, therefore, the second section of the work was peppered with continuous, pointed references to mythological narratives and literary re-elaborations of well-known and less well-known myths, with their rich store of variations: an extraordinarily dense, and somewhat chaotic piece of material; it is a shame that we can no longer read it today, except in the sparse scraps of the Herculaneum fragments. What remains of the first section was published by Dirk Obbink (1996), with a far-reaching introduction; for the second part, while awaiting the longdesired edition by Obbink (long desired), we refer to Theodor Gomperz’s editio princeps (1866) and to Adolf Schober’s dissertation (1923, which has long remained unpublished). 5 From the second part of On Piety and on the basis of the fragments reproduced in the Neapolitan drawings, we know of four ‘quotations’ established by Amarante  4 Many passages of Philodemus and other Herculaneum texts quoting Euripides are collected by Parisi 2010–2011, 80–81 nn. 328 and 332. 5 Finally printed in Cronache Ercolanesi 1988.

Aeschylean Fragments in the Herculaneum Papyri  

in the section on Prometheus Unbound, and it is these that I would like to discuss here. I intend to bring them to bear as case studies for several reasons: because these passages are full of problems (but this is nothing new for a philologist and, in particular, for one who edits fragments); and because Amarante’s recent edition does not exhaust or resolve any of these problems — rather, it raises more questions, including ones of methodology in ecdotic analysis. The annotated translation by Lucas de Dios — in the volume of Aeschlyus’ fragments published by Gredos in 2008 — is based on the text established by Amarante. Also published in 2008 was the Loeb volume of Aeschylean fragments edited by Alan Sommerstein in which, however, in line with the editorial selection criteria of the series, the Herculaneum fragments were neither printed nor translated; in the same way, these fragments were excluded from the edition of Prometheus Bound and fragments of the other Promethean plays edited in 2015 by Calderón Dorda for the Consejo superior de investigaciones científicas de Madrid. I will proceed with my analysis of the fragments following the numbering given by Lucas de Dios and the critical text established by Amarante, on which, as I have said, Lucas de Dios’ translation and exegesis are based. 6 κατ’ Ἀπολλων[ίδη καὶ κατὰ [Ἡσίοδον καὶ κα[τὰ Στησίχορον ἐν [᾽Ορεστεία̣ι καὶ παρ᾽ ἃ [πρὶν ἔ]φην τ⸢ὸ⸣ν Κρόνον δι᾽ αὐτοῦ τα⸢ρ⸣[ταροῦσθ]α̣[ι]. καὶ ὁ Δ[ιόνυσος] ὑπὸ Πενθ[έως συ]νδεῖται κατὰ τὸν Εὐριπίδην [ὁμοίως καθάπερ τ̣ [ῶν Γιγάντω]ν τ̣ ι̣ νὰ π̣[οιεῖ Ἄρη αὐτὸν ἐ[μβ]αλεῖν εἰς πίθ]ον. κα[ὶ τοὺς ἰδίους [ἀδελφούς, Ἑκατόν]χειρας κ]αὶ [Κύκλωπας, ὄντας] υἱοὺς [Γῆς, πάντας ὁ] Κρόνο̣ [ς εἰς δεσμω]τήριον κα[τέβαλε, ὃν] κα‹ὶ› τάχ᾽ Αἰσχύλος ἐν τῶι λ[υο]μέν̣ [ωι

 6 I give my own translation of Amarante’s text.

5

10

15

20

  Piero Totaro Πρ]ομηθεῖ [φησιν ὑπ]ὸ Διὸς δεδ[έσθαι. καὶ πάντες [καταταρτα]ρωθέντες [ἤδη πρὶν ὑπ᾽] Οὐρανοῦ κ[αταδέδεντ]αι· Διόσκουροι δὲ] ἄρα ὑπ᾽ Ἀ[φαρειδῶν ἐο̣ [ί]κασιν ἐν [ – – –

25

30 (Fr. 202a Lucas de Dios [= 9 Amarante, Philod., Piet., P.Herc. 1088 III])

According to Apollonides and Hesiod and Stesichorus in the Oresteia, and in line with the things said before, that Cronus is thrown into Tartarus because of this person. And Dionysus is imprisoned by Pentheus according to Euripides similarly as it is narrated that one of the Titans pushes Ares into a pot. And the brothers, Hecatoncheires and Cyclops, who were the sons of the Earth, Cronus threw both in prison, he who perhaps Aeschylus also in Prometheus Unbound said was tied up by Zeus. And all thrown into Tartarus even before they had been imprisoned by Uranus. And the Dioscuri then from the Aphareids seem …

At this point in the work there are several examples of gods being imprisoned, with appropriate literary references. Yet many details remain uncertain and the integrations proposed by scholars are so diverse as to lead us in a direction completely different from the one proposed by Amarante. In lines 5–8, for example, Amarante prints the solution proposed by Philippson 7 (but without specifying so in her apparatus or commentary). She also declared herself unfavorable to the idea that Philodemus initially spoke of Prometheus, as in Schober’s reconstruction, which, in fact, preceded line 1 with the words [καὶ ὁ Προμηθεὺς συνδεῖται | κατὰ Αἰσχύλον | καὶ] 8 and then integrated lines 5–8 with καὶ παρ’ ἃ[ς τὸ πρὶν] | [ἔ]φην ποι[νὰς ὑπ᾽] | αὐτοῦ τα[ρταροῦ|ται]; 9 thus, following Schober, the translation of lines 1–8 would be “according to Apollonides and Hesiod and Stesichorus in … 10 and in addition to the punishments of which I spoke earlier, (Prometheus) is thrown into Tartarus by him” (namely, by Zeus). A problem of no little import for the stability of Schober’s  7 Cf. Philippson 1920, 250. 8 P.Herc. 433 IV, 23–25 in Schober 1923 (1988, 90). 9 Cf. Schober 1923 (1988, 90). 10 The title of Stesichorus’ work is irremediably lost. Amarante and Lucas de Dios accept the text supplemented by Bücheler 1865, 523 (= 1915, I 591); Gomperz 1866, 39, dubitanter, printed ἐν [Ὀρεστεί|αι but proposed ἐν [Εὐρωπεί|α]ι in the apparatus. Bergk’s (1882, 207) ἐν [Γερυονηί|δ̣ι is supported by Parisi 2013, 120: “il riferimento alla punizione di Prometeo ad opera di Zeus ben si potrebbe adattare alle vicende del protagonista Gerione, ugualmente oggetto della vendetta di Eracle, testimone del nuovo ordine olimpio”.

Aeschylean Fragments in the Herculaneum Papyri  

reconstruction is also raised by Davies/Finglass in their commentary on Stesich. fr. 274: “Schober conjectures that the figure cast into Tartarus in addition to other punishments was Prometheus (cf. [Aesch.] PV 1026–1029, 1050–1052, Nisbet and Hubbard on Hor. Carm. 2.13.37), but Hesiod, at least, does not include Tartarus among his afflictions”. 11 In the following lines at least, two certain literary references are indicated: one to Euripides (ll. 8–11), mentioned for Dionysus of the Bacchae imprisoned by Pentheus; and the other to Prometheus Unbound by Aeschylus (ll. 21ff.), since in this play there was a discussion of the imprisonment of a god by Zeus. We cannot say more in this regard, given the incompleteness of the papyrus. Various reconstructions have been attempted: to the many given by Radt 1985 in the apparatus to fr. 202a, we can add the proposal made by Luppe in Cronache Ercolanesi in the same year. Nonetheless, the confidence with which Amarante declares “Di Eschilo e del suo Prometeo liberato vi è un semplice accenno come testimonianza della punizione di Crono” seems imprudent. Cronus here emerges as Zeus’ victim only thanks to a very uncertain hypothesis made by Philippson reconstructing line 21 ὃν] κα τάχ’ Αἰσχύλος (supported by Amarante, once more without specifying its authorship). We start from ΚΑΤΑΧΑΙϹΧΥΛΟϹ preserved in the Neapolitan drawing. The insertion of τάχ(α) would inject a strong dose of doubt into Philodemus’ argumentation, so much so that Amarante (1998, 143) is forced to admit: “È comunque da notare che nei frammenti a noi pervenuti del Prometeo liberato non vi è nessun accenno a queste vicende mitologiche, che, invece, sono narrate estesamente dallo stesso Prometeo nel Prometeo incatenato (v. 197 ss.) laddove vi è anche l’episodio della detronizzazione di Crono da parte di Zeus (vv. 219–221, dove però Crono è nascosto in una ‘cavità del profondo abisso del Tartaro’)”; so Amarante concludes: “Saremmo dunque dinanzi ad un errore di attribuzione di Filodemo o, se è giusta la correzione alla linea 21 del καταχ del disegno napoletano in καὶ τάχ’, almeno ad un dubbio del filosofo di Gadara”. 12 I believe that the candid expression of a

 11 Davies/Finglass 2014, 564. On the tragedian Apollonides (nr. 152 in TrGF I2) we actually have no information: cf. Kotlińska-Toma 2015, 153–155. A relationship between Stesichorus’ Oresteia and Hesiod is established by Philodemus, On Piety, regarding Iphigenia turned into Hecate: cf. Hes. fr. 23b M–W = 20b Most2 (Catalogue of Women) and Stesich. fr. 178 Davies-Finglass. 12 Followed by Lucas de Dios (2008, 557 n. 1867): “El contexto de Filodemo es la lucha de los dioses entre sí, en especial los relatos de sucesión Urano-Crono-Zeus. Por los restantes fragmentos no podemos deducir con certeza que en esta tragedia hubiera alguna digresión sobre estos acontecimientos, como sí sucede con el conservado Prometeo encadenado (vv. 197ss.). Esto podría llevarnos a pensar en un error de Filodemo al precisar la obra de referencia, lo que Amarante intenta salvar leyendo «tal vez» en el papiro, lo que equivale a suponer una duda en el comentario del filósofo. De todas formas, dada la presencia de los Titanes en calidad de coro, no debería tal vez extrañarnos una alusión al episodio de Crono, en cuyo entorno mítico se desarrolla la historia de

  Piero Totaro doubt of this kind by a champion of mythography, as Philodemus reveals himself to be in On Piety, would constitute a truly calamitous, actually somewhat laughable défaillance. To my mind, the simpler and more obvious correction, and one that would be in line with Philodemus’ usus scribendi, appears to be Wilamowitz’s (1914, 67) κατὰ δ᾽ Αἰσχύλον, which Luppe (1985, 128–129; 1987, 28) accommodates with conviction and which is judged favourably by Gianluca Del Mastro — something I learned from him while discussing this disegno in Naples. – – –]δὲ ΚΑ[– – – – – –]ΑΙ τῶι Π[– – – ἐν Π]ρομηθε[ῖ δὲ τῶι] λυομέ[ν]ω[ι τῆς Θέτ]ιδος ἐ]ρᾶσθαι. καί] ⸢φ⸣ασιν [– – – καὶ ὁ τ]ὰ Κύπ[ρια ποήσας τῆ‹ι› Ἥ]ραι χαρ[ιζομένη]ν φεύγειν αὐ[τὴν τὸ]ν γάμον Δ[ίος. τὸν δ᾽ ὀ]μόσαι χʽοʼλω[θέντ]α διότι ⸢θ⸣νη[τῶι συ]νοικ⸢ί⸣σει. κα[ὶ παρ᾽ Ἡ]σιόδω‹ι› δὲ κε[ῖται τ]ὸ παραπλήσ[ιον, Πείσανδρος [δὲ π]ερὶ Κλυμένης [αὐτ]ὸν ἐρασθέν[τα ̣]ΕΣΤΙΝ[– – – – – –] καὶ [– – –]ΤΟΝ

5

10

15

20 (Fr. 202b Lucas de Dios [= 12 Amarante, Philod., Piet., P.Herc. 1602 V])

in Prometheus Unbound (Aeschylus says that Zeus) was in love with Thetis. And they say ... and the author of the Kypria 13 says that she, to please Hera, fled the wedding with Zeus; and that he, angry, swore that he would give her to a mortal in marriage. Even in Hesiod 14 there

 aquéllos”; and by Indelli 2015, 47: “Nei frammenti conservati del Prometeo liberato, che faceva parte della trilogia comprendente il Prometeo portatore di fuoco e il Prometeo incatenato, non si accenna alla punizione di Crono di cui parla Filodemo, mentre dei miti a cui si riferisce Filodemo anche nelle linee precedenti e seguenti si parla ampiamente nel Prometeo incatenato. Si può ipotizzare un errore di attribuzione di Filodemo o, se è esatta la correzione κα τάχ’ da καταχ del disegno napoletano, un dubbio dell’Epicureo nell’attribuire l’episodio all’una o all’altra tragedia”. 13 Cf. fr. 2 Bernabé, with commentary by West 2013, 70–71 and Davies 2019, 36–46. 14 Cf. fr. 210 M–W = fr. 151 Most2.

Aeschylean Fragments in the Herculaneum Papyri  

is more or less the same story. Peisander, 15 instead, (narrates) about Clymene that being in love ...

This fragment, placed in the context of divine love, particularly in relation to Zeus, shows that the theme of Zeus falling in love with the Nereid Thetis was present in Prometheus Unbound. 16 This datum can be put in relation to what we learn from another Philodemean part of On Piety to which Amarante and Lucas de Dios afford the status of an autonomous fragment from Unbound (see below, on fr. 202c), unlike Radt, who instead simply quotes it while introducing the play, numbering P.Herc. 1602 V as fr. 202b. [ὑπ]̣ὸ̣ Διὸς εἰπὼν δεδέ]σθαι μή ποτέ τινι κ]ατασκευάσωσιν ὅ]πλα· καὶ τὸν Προμη]θέα λύεσθαί φησιν] Αἰσχύλος ὅτι τὸ λ]όγιον ἐμήνυσε]ν τὸ περὶ Θέτιδ]ο̣ ς ὡς χρε[ὼ]ν εἴη] τὸν ἐξ αὐτῆς γενν]ηθέντα κρείττ]ω κατασ[τῆν]αι τ]οῦ πατρός· [ὅθεν κ]αὶ θνητ[ῶι συνοικί]ζουσιν α[ὐτή]ν. Ἀμέλ]ει δὲ καὶ με‹με›λληκέ]ναι ποτέ φησιν. Ὅ]μηρος ὑπὸ τῆς Ἥρας] καὶ τοῦ Ποσειδῶν]ο̣ ς καὶ τἀπολλω]νος ἢ τῆς Ἀθην]ᾶ̣ς συνδεθῆναι, τοῦ δ᾽] Αἰγαίωνος ἀχ⸢θ⸣έντ]ος ὑ⸢π⸣ὸ τῆ[ς Θ]έτιδ]ος φοβηθέντας ἤδ]η λῆξαι τῆς ἐπιβο]λ̣ῆς. καὶ Στησίμ-

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 15 Cf. FGrHist 16 F 12 = fr. 16 Bernabé (dubium), and see Salati 2012, 250–251. 16 See Luppe 1986; l. 3 ἐν Π. δὲ τῷ suppl. Reitzenstein 1900, 73–74; ll. 4–5 φησι suppl. Schober 1923 (1988, 105), ἐ[ρᾶν vel ἐ[πιθυμεῖν, sc. φησὶν Αἰσχύλος τὸν Δία Luppe 1986, 64.

  Piero Totaro βρο]τος τεκοῦσάν φησ]ι̣ τὴν [.]HNAPTE (Fr. 202c Lucas de Dios [= 11 Amarante, Philod., Piet., P.Herc. 1088 V]) saying that they had been imprisoned by Zeus so that they would never prepare weapons for anyone. And Aeschylus says that Prometheus was released because he revealed the oracle concerning Thetis, namely that it was the destiny of the child born of her to become more powerful than the father; and for this reason they give her in marriage to a mortal. Moreover, Homer says that (Zeus) was once to be bound by Hera, by Poseidon and by Apollo or Athena, and that, having led Aegaeon from Thetis, (the gods) were frightened and gave up the attack. 17 And Stesimbrotos 18 says that having generated that ...

Repeatedly throughout Prometheus Bound (cf. vv. 168–177, 187–192, 511–525, 764–774, 907–931, 984–996) we find allusions to a secret that Prometheus knows about the destiny of Zeus — a secret that the Titan does not intend to reveal for the moment, in the knowledge that it will furnish the means of forcing Zeus to come to an agreement with him later — an agreement that will secure his liberation from the punishment that currently oppresses him. As for the content of the secret, in Bound Thetis is never named, but it is explicitly stated that Zeus’ danger derives from his unhappy marriage (vv. 764, 908–909) to a wife who ‘will give birth to a son more powerful than the father’ (ἣ τέξεταί γε παῖδα φέρτερον πατρός, v. 768). A pair of ancient scholia to Bound mention that the revelation takes place in the following play (schol. 522 Herington), or rather, in Lyómenos, in which Prometheus is freed (schol. 511b Herington). For an editor of Aeschylus’ fragments, this poses a problem. What are we to make of Philodemus’ testimony from P.Herc. 1088 V? Do we consider it an autonomous fragment, following Amarante and Lucas de Dios? And yet we can observe here that Philodemus a) quotes Aeschylus but does not specify the title of a play; b) is referring to a theme — the liberation of Prometheus as a consequence of the

 17 Cf. Il. 1.399ff., in particular vv. 399–400 ὁππότε μιν ξυνδῆσαι Ὀλύμπιοι ἤθελον ἄλλοι, / Ἥρη τ᾽ ἠδὲ Ποσειδάων καὶ Παλλὰς Ἀθήνη. Philodemus, therefore, knows the variant reading καὶ Φοῖβος Ἀπόλλων (in place of καὶ Παλλὰς Ἀθήνη), attested in the Homeric scholia A (where it is attributed to Zenodotus: 400a, I p. 114 Erbse) bT (τινὲς γράφουσι καὶ Φοῖβος Ἀπόλλων: 399–406, 400b, I pp. 113–114 Erbse) and D (Α 399–400 p. 63 van Thiel); cf. also Eust. ad Il. 1.399 s. I p. 189 van der Valk; on this version of the myth see Cerri 2012. So Amarante is wrong when she affirms: “probabilmente si tratta di un errore di memoria da parte di Filodemo, dato che nei versi precedenti del luogo omerico si fa più volte menzione del dio”; this case, in fact, confirms that Philodemus is a champion of mythography, as I have already observed above, on fr. 202a. 18 Cf. FGrHist 107 F 15, and see Salati 2012, 256.

Aeschylean Fragments in the Herculaneum Papyri  

revelation of the secret about the birth of a son who would have dethroned Zeus — which, as can be seen, emerges in several refrains already in Bound. My proposal would be to gather all the material relating to the secret about Thetis under one fragment. First of all, I would give precedence to the Philodemean testimony from P.Herc. 1602 V, which contains an explicit reference to Prometheus Unbound and to the theme of Zeus falling in love with the Nereid; then I would refer to what Philodemus says in P.Herc. 1088 V, and to what is noted by the scholia vetera to Prometheus Bound 511 and 522; in the commentary, of course, I would consider the research that records the numerous passages in Bound relating to the secret and to the future liberation of the Titan, as well as other sources pertinent to the theme, such as a scholium to Pindar — which I translate as “Zeus wanted a relationship with Thetis, but Prometheus impeded him; he then took the opportunity to give her in marriage to Peleus. The story repeats itself across prose writers and poets, and is also discussed in detail in Aeschylus’ Prometheus Bound”. 19 It is both interesting and significant that the scholium attributes the narrative of love between Zeus and Thetis to Bound, not to Unbound, unless one wants to correct the δεσμώτῃ preserved from the codex to λυομένῳ, as Bergk suggested. 20 – – –]ΑΠΡΟΣ – – –]ΣΤΗΝΕΑ – – –]ΤΡΑΠΕ – – – Ἀ]τλα[.] – – –]ΝΟΝΚΩ – – –]ΙΤΩΝ – – –]ΘΑΙXΑΙ – – –]ΙΣΤ – – – ἐπι]τιθε[ὶς – – – α]ὐτοῦ τῶι Προ]μηθεῖ τὰς ἐκ τῶ]ν̣ καυμάτων καὶ χε]ιμώνω[ν καὶ] θ̣ ερῶν καὶ] τῶν σπ[αρ]αγμῶν καὶ] κολάψεω[ν

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 19 Schol. D Pind. Isthm. 8.57b, III p. 273, 21–25 Drachmann ὁ Ζεὺς βουλόμενος Θέτιδι πλησιάσαι ἐκωλύθη ὑπὸ τοῦ Προμηθέως· εἶτα Πηλεῖ ἔδοξεν αὐτὴν ἐγγυῆσαι. τεθρύλληται δὲ ἡ ἱστορία παρά τε συγγραφεῦσι καὶ ποιηταῖς, ἀκριβῶς δὲ κεῖται καὶ παρὰ Αἰσχύλῳ ἐν Προμηθεῖ δεσμώτῃ. Cf. also schol. Aesch. PV 167; Prob. ad Verg. Ecl. 6.42 p. 22 Keil; Serv. ad Verg. Ecl. 6.42 p. 73 Thilo; Hyg. Poet. astr. 2.15, Myth. Vat. II 83, Hygin. Fab. 54; on these last sources, see Gargiulo 1979, 95, West 1979, 142–144, Griffith 1983, 301 ad Lyómenos frr. XVa–c, Dain 2000, 123–124. 20 Cf. Bergk 1884, 321–322 n. 116. On ancient sources not uncommonly confusing the epithets attributed to Promethean dramas, see Pattoni 2019, 231–232.

  Piero Totaro ἀλγηδ]όνας συνάπτεσθ]αι [ἠκ]έσα[το. – – – φη]σιν [– – –]KΩ – – –] ΤΟΝ̣[– – – – – –]Α̣ΝO[– – – – – – καὶ] Εὐριπίδης ἔχοντα «χ]αλκέ[ο]ι̣ ς» [Ἄτλαντα] «νώτοις o[ὐρανὸν»] Ἴωνι πεποίηκεν · Σ]ιμωνίδης δὲ τὸν] οὐρανὸν ἐπὶ τῶν] ὤμων αὐτοῦ τίθη]σιν· [καὶ κ]α[θ’ Ἡσίοδον «εὐρ]ὺν ἔχ[ει] κρατερῆς ὑπ᾽ ἀ]νάγκης»

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30 (Fr. 202d Lucas de Dios [= 9 Amarante, Philod., Piet., P.Herc. 1088 II a dext. pars col.])

... Atlas ... placing on top ... of him ... to Prometheus prevented the unison of the suffering caused by the burns and the winters and the summers and the lacerations and the peckings ... 21 and Euripides in Ion represented Atlas as he who supports the “sky with his bronze shoulders”; Simonides, on the other hand, puts heaven on his shoulders; and according to Hesiod, “under strong constraint, holds up the broad (sky)”

The piece contains clear references to the sufferings of Atlas and Prometheus. Atlas, who carries the sky, is depicted through direct quotations from the incipit of Euripides’ Ion (ll. 21–25) and from vv. 517 and 519 of Hesiod’s Theogony (ll. 28–30 of column I and 1–3 of column II), as well as through a reference to Simonides of Ceos (PMG 556). One cannot exclude the possibility that Philodemus named several authors also in relation to Prometheus, but the condition of the papyrus does not allow us to endorse any hypothesis in this direction. 22 On the other hand, several points remain obscure in the reconstruction of ll. 11–17. In particular: – at the end of l. 13, in the Neapolitan drawing one can read ]ΟΕ, which has been corrected in different ways: ὡς (Schober); θε, as the start of θε|[ρῶν (Philippson, integrated also by Amarante, once more without specifying its authorship); θη, as the ending of πά]θη (Luppe).

 21 Amarante 1998, 141 translates: “impedì a Prometeo di unire le sofferenze derivanti dalle bruciature e dagli inverni e dalle estati e dalle lacerazioni e dalle beccate”; Lucas de Dios 2008, 558: “para Prometeo [impidió (Atlante) que se juntaran] los dolores derivados de las quemaduras, de las penalidades del invierno y del verano, y de los despedazamientos y picotazos”. 22 See in this regard the balanced observations of Salati 2012, 251.

Aeschylean Fragments in the Herculaneum Papyri  

–

ll. 16–17: συνά|[πτεσθ]αι is an integration by Philippson (accepted by Schober and also by Amarante, who fails to attribute it to its original author). ἠκ]έσα[το is a mere suggestion by Luppe 1983, who, focusing on “AtlasZitate”, hypothesized that in ll. 8–17 one could confirm a version of the myth not hitherto known, one that would strictly read the affairs of Atlas and Prometheus and would foresee a kind of cure, a relief for the Titan’s sufferings; in short, something like: --- ? τ[ὸν oὐρανὸν ἐ]π̣ιθε[ὶς τῶι αὐχένι? α]ὐτοῦ, [ὅτι (ἐπεὶ) τῶι Προ]μηθεῖ τὰ τ̣’ ἐκ τῶ]ν̣ καυμάτων καὶ χε]ιμώνω[ν πά]θ͓ η͓ καὶ τὰς] τῶν σπ[αρ]αγμῶν ἢ] κολάψεω[ν ἀλγηδ]όνας ?σὺν α[ ]αι [ἠκ]έσα[το?

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“Meines Erachtens ist hier vielmehr der Grund angegeben, warum Atlas leidet: Er hat — so vermute ich — die Bestrafung seines Bruders zu lindern gesucht. Dementsprechend wird auch α]ὐτοῦ in Zeile 10 nicht etwa auf Zeus, sondern auf den kurz zuvor (Z. 4) genannten Atlas gehen”; Luppe (1983, 51), however, clarifies: “|Dabei sind freilich die Ergänzungen vor dem Begründungssatz sowie das Verb ἀκέσασθαι nur exempli gratia zu verstehen’|; 23 he does not venture to put these lines in relation with Prometheus Unbound. This passage from Philodemus was included among the fragments of Unbound in Wilamowitz’s Aeschyli tragoediae, as noted by Radt in the introduction to the play. 24 This thesis is now relaunched by Amarante and Lucas de Dios, who are persuaded that the narration of the sufferings of Prometheus took place in Unbound, namely in the tragedy following Bound. We can read a touching description of the tribulations of Prometheus in twenty-eight senari that Cicero, in Tusculanae Disputationes, says are the fruit of

 23 One might object to Luppe’s conjecture, ]αι [ἠκ]έσα[το in l. 17, that hiatus is generally avoided by Philodemus: I am grateful, for this and other observations, to the discussants of my paper in Lecce (29.07.2019, Herculaneum Papyri session of the 29th International Congress of Papyrology), especially to Mario Capasso, Michael McOsker, Richard Janko and Franco Montanari. On the avoidance of hiatus in Philodemus and in Epicurean authors in general, see, most recently, after the old dissertation of Strathmann 1893, McOsker 2017 and Fleischer 2018. 24 Cf. also the Aeschylean fragment 321 edited by Mette 1959.

  Piero Totaro his personal translation of Aeschylus, most likely from the Lyómenos: Prometheus, turning to the Titans, his blood relatives (who perhaps constituted the chorus), presents himself nailed to hard rocks, at the behest of Iuppiter and at the hands of Mulciber (the Latin name for Hephaestus), who has wounded him with wedges and split his limbs; he complains of having been tormented at regular intervals, every other day, by Iovis satelles, the eagle that attacks him, tears him to shreds with hooked claws, devouring his liver. Ancient, woeful ruin, grown with the turning of these horrid centuries, infests his body, from which drops fall, liquified by the heat of the sun, to ooze on the rocks of the Caucasus below. 25 Effectively, in this rhêsis we discover once more several examples of the Promethean pathémata recorded by Philodemus, On Piety: sparagmos (rending) and pecking by the eagle, as well as the heat of the sun. But I would allow myself to observe that, likewise, we can find all of the examples noted by Philodemus also in Prometheus Bound: the hot/cold binary, καύματα/χειμῶνες, is found in the prologue, in which Hephaestus says that he, reluctantly, will have to nail Prometheus to a cliff beaten by winter storms (δῆσαι βίᾳ φάραγγι πρὸς δυσχειμέρῳ, v. 15) — to a rock where, immobile, baked by the sun, skin peeling due to the tremendous heat, the Titan will be glad when night falls, that is, until the sun returns to burn him again: an eternal, cyclic torment (σταθευτὸς δ’ἡλίου φοιβῇ φλογί / χροιᾶς ἀμείψεις ἄνθος·νἀσμένῳ δέ σοι / ἡ ποικιλείμων νὺξ ἀποκρύψει φάος, / πάχνην θ᾽ ἑῴαν ἥλιος σκεδᾷ πάλιν, vv. 22–24). The same can be seen with the pecking/laceration binary (σπαραγμοί/κολάψεις): one needs only to think of the end of the tragedy, in which Hermes forewarns Prometheus of forthcoming tortures from the eagle which, in its greed, will tear his body to shreds and eat his liver (Διὸς δέ σοι / πτηνὸς κύων, δαφοινὸς αἰετός, λάβρως / διαρταμήσει σώματος μέγα ῥάκος, / ἄκλητος ἕρπων δαιταλεὺς πανήμερος, / κελαινόβρωτον δ’ ἧπαρ ἐκθοινάσεται, vv. 1021–1025). Why, then, the need to put the passage from On Piety in a relationship with Prometheus Unbound? As we have seen, the terms used to describe Prometheus’ suffering can also be found in the imagery of Bound. What is more, a clear reference to the same play could be found at the end of P.Herc. 433 III, which Schober, in his edition, locates directly before P.Herc. 1088 II a: καὶ παντο[δαπαῖς δ[ὲ τ]ιμωρί[αις παρεισήχασιν [τοὺς θεοὺς συνεχομ[ένους οἷον Αἰσχύλο[ς θέαν

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 25 Cf. Aesch. fr. *193 R., and see Totaro 2012–13, 73–77, Totaro/Roscino 2019, 325–327.

Aeschylean Fragments in the Herculaneum Papyri  

ἐν Πρ[ομ]ηθε[ῖ τίθησιν τὸ[ν ἀ]νηρ[τημένον ἐν πέτραι] 26

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The tragedian is here cited as an example of authors who have represented the gods’ afflictions from every kind of punishment, and in the Neapolitan drawing one can easily read Aeschylus’ name followed by the title of an unspecified Prometheus play, ἐν Πρ[ομ]ηθε[ῖ: against Wilamowitz, who proposed that this is a reference to Unbound, 27 Indelli (2015, 48) argues convincingly that ‘un’analisi delle citazioni filodemee di Eschilo mostra che l’Epicureo riporta di questa tragedia sempre il titolo completo; dunque, nel caso di P.Herc. 433 potrebbe trattarsi di un’altra tragedia, il Prometeo incatenato, nella quale ugualmente il Titano per gran parte del dramma è legato a una rupe’. In light of the arguments made so far, therefore, I would exclude P.Herc. 1088 II a from the group of Lyómenos fragments. In conclusion: 1. in my edition for the Accademia dei Lincei, I include in Lyómenos only two fragments (not four) from the Herculaneum papyri of Philodemus’ On Piety; 2. compared to Amarante and Lucas de Dios, I offer a more circumscribed critical text, capable of focusing better, I believe, on the heart of the Philodemean reference to Aeschylus’ Prometheus Unbound. In the commentary, of course, I will extend the discussion to broader questions of context; 3. I exclude the matter of ‘Atlas-Zitate’ in P.Herc. 1088 II a from the fragments of Lyómenos; but I deal with this in my introduction to the play; 4. last but not least, speaking methodologically, since words are not merely labels, I consider the Philodemean testimonies to be “references” to Aeschylus, rather than true and proper “quotations”.

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 26 P.Herc. 433 III, 15–21, in Schober 1923 (1988, 92); ll. 19ff. are so recontructed by Luppe (1987, 29; 1987a, 84): οἷον Αἰσχύλο[ς μὲν]| ἐν Πρ[ομ]ηθε[ῖ δείκνυ]|σιν το[ῦτο]ν πρ[οσπατ||ταλευόμενον. 27 Wilamowitz 1914, 67: cf. Radt 1985, 306–307.

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Aeschylean Fragments in the Herculaneum Papyri  

Longo Auricchio, F./Indelli, G./Leone, G./Del Mastro, G. (2020), La Villa dei Papiri. Una residenza antica e la sua biblioteca, Rome. López Martínez, M.P./Sabater Beltrá, A.M., (2017), “La Villa de los Papiros de Herculano en el siglo XXI: actualización científica y estado de la cuestión (2000–2016)”, Hélade 3.1, 205– 227. Lucas de Dios, J.M. (2008), Esquilo, Fragmentos. Testimonios, Madrid. Luppe, W. (1983), “Atlas-Zitate im 1. Buch von Philodems De pietate”, CErc 13, 45–52. Luppe, W. (1985), “Götterfesselungen bei Hesiod, Aischylos und Euripides – Zu Philodem PHerc. 1088 III 8ff.”, CErc 15, 127–129. Luppe, W. (1986), “Zeus und Thetis in Philodem 1602 V”, MH 43, 61–67. Luppe, W. (1987), review of S. Radt, Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta, vol. 3: Aeschylus, Göttingen 1985, GGA 239, 24–38. Luppe, W. (1987a), “Zu einigen Stellen in Philodem Περὶ εὐσεβείας P. Herc. 433”, APF 33, 79– 85. McOsker, M. (2017), “Hiatus in Epicurean Authors”, CErc 47, 145–162.
 Mette, H.J. (1959), Die Fragmente der Tragödien des Aischylos, Berlin. Nardelli, M.L. (1982), “Euripide nella ‘Poetica’ di Filodemo”, La regione sotterrata dal Vesuvio. Studi e prospettive, Naples, 471–491. Obbink, D. (1996), Philodemus, On Piety: Part 1, Oxford. Parisi, A. (2010–2011), Ricerche sul PHerc. 831, Tesi di Dott. Univ. Federico II, Naples. Parisi, A. (2011), “Le citazioni poetiche nei papiri ercolanesi: tre citazioni euripidee nei papiri di Demetrio Lacone”, CErc 41, 37–50. Parisi, A. (2013), “Testimonianze filodemee su Stesicoro di Imera”, CErc 43, 117–123. Pattoni, M.P. (2019), “Prometheus Vinctus (a proposito di alcune questioni interpretative ancora aperte)”, in: G. Cavallo/S. Medaglia (eds), Reinterpretare Eschilo. Verso una nuova edizione dei drammi, Rome (Suppl. n. 32 al “Bollettino dei Classici”, Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei), 225–247. Philippson, R. (1920), “Zu Philodems Schrift über die Frömmigkeit”, Hermes 55, 225–278, 364– 372. Radt, S. (1985), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta (TrGF), vol. 3: Aeschylus, Göttingen. Reitzenstein, R. (1900), “Die Hochzeit des Peleus und der Thetis”, Hermes 35, 73–105. Rispoli, G.M. (2005), “Tragedia e tragici nei papiri ercolanesi”, Vichiana 7, 195–230. Romeo, C. (1982), “Sulle tracce di poeti tragici nell’opera ‘Sulla poesia’ di Demetrio Lacone”, in: La regione sotterrata dal Vesuvio. Studi e prospettive, Naples, 427–442. Salati, O. (2012), “Mitografi e storici in Filodemo (De Pietate, pars altera)”, CErc 42, 209–258. Schober, A. (1923), Philodemi De pietate Pars prior, Diss. Königsberg (first published in: CErc 18, 1988, 67–125). Sommerstein, A.H. (2008), Aeschylus, vol. III: Fragments, Cambridge Mass./London. Strathmann, G. (1893), De hiatus fuga quam invenimus apud Philodemum Epicureum, in: Jahresbericht Nr. 16 über das Real-Progymnasium der Stadt Viersen für das Schuljahr 1891–1892, Viersen. Totaro, P. (2012–13), “Prometeo, incatenato e liberato”, Aevum(ant) 12–13, 71–81. Totaro, P./Roscino, C. (2019), “Le tragedie perdute di Eschilo: testo e immagini. Il caso del Prometeo liberato”, in: G. Cavallo/S. Medaglia (eds), Reinterpretare Eschilo. Verso una nuova edizione dei drammi, Roma (Suppl. n. 32 al «Bollettino dei Classici», Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei), 323–367.

  Piero Totaro West, M.L. (1979), “The Prometheus Trilogy”, JHS 99, 130–148 (also in M.L. West, Hellenica. Selected Papers on greek Literature and Thought, vol. II: Lyric and Drama, Oxford 2013, 250– 286, with a “Postscript 2004”). West, M.L. (2013), The Epic Cycle. A Commentary on the Lost Troy Epics, Oxford. von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, U. (1914), Aeschyli tragoediae, Berolini.

Anton Bierl

Paratragic Fragmentation and PatchworkCitation as Comic Aesthetics: The Potpourri Use of Euripides’ Helen and Andromeda in Aristophanes’ Thesmophoriazusae and Their Symbolic Meaning For most scholars dramatic fragments are remnants normally neatly packed away in immensely learned corpora, proofs of philological erudition, such as TrGF by Kannicht-Snell and PCG by Kassel-Austin. Usually one only opens them for looking up single fragments for references. It is certainly not the easily digestible and exciting reading at home, for a seminar or lecture courses where students expect interpretations of entirely transmitted classical masterpieces like the Oresteia, Antigone, Bacchae or Frogs and Birds. Now at least scholars have access to translations and even commentaries of the dramatic fragments. However, fragments tend to be seen in isolation, as self-contained unities that in their fractures can be related to other fragments. One philological puzzle to solve is the attempt to reconstruct plots from a series of few isolated fragments that are attested to one single play. But often the material is so scarce that this remains an enterprise of speculation with multiple solutions without certainty. Another approach to the topic is to explore the practice of fragmentation that has already been in use among the ancient dramatists, i.e. quotations taken from their original context and integrated into a new whole where they assume a different meaning. The anatomized bits are cohesive and constituent of the new text as performance and still partially recognizable as foreign and detachable units. This second understanding has to do with a productive form of dramatic play and experimentation. A very good example is the paratragic use of tragedy in Old comedy. Aristophanes is a master in this highly sophisticated game of doubledirectional parody. 1  I would like to thank Antonios Rengakos and his colleagues of the Organizing Committee for the kind invitation to Thessaloniki, as well as the editors of this volume, Anna Lamari and Anna Novokhatko. Aristophanes is cited after Nigel Wilson, Euripides’ Helen after James Diggle, the fragments of Euripides’ Andromeda after Richard Kannicht (TrGF V.1). The translation of Thesmophoriazusae is from Jeffrey Henderson’s Loeb text.  1 See Rau 1967. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-025

  Anton Bierl Moreover, applying small fractured parts extracted in fragmentation from their context and in dissociated forms re-aggregated in a new whole of cohesion resembles contemporary art. According to the French philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy art is intrinsically and necessarily bound to fragmentation, dislocating, interrupting, fracturing norms and discourses. Differing between senses, sense and symbolic order are suspended. In a poetics of fragmentation the fragment is reevaluated in its character as event, in a performative act of making itself present, coming into presence and its existence. It is a sensuous, almost erotic event, where immanence and transcendence, self and other, collapse. Fragments interact, touch each other at their fractures and become a promiscuous plurality, producing traces of meaning in abundance or lack, vestiges where the absence of sense is the sense or nonsense goes with sense. The signifying unit becomes the symbol in its literal sense, sym-bolon, thrown together in mutual touching. In the moment of its interruption it releases an excess of energy. 2 The main difference between contemporary and archaic and classical literature in regard of fragmenting and quoting is the relation to the whole. Since in fifth century BC drama usually is not received as a written text to be read but as speech-art performed orally in a specific occasion, it can hardly be conceived as a fixed whole and distinctive unit like a book to be read but rather as a performance. As a multimodal event usually performed only once and devised for the Athenian audience under specific socio-political circumstances at a particular year it will be remembered by most of the spectators only as a fluid impression of a basic plot. 3 As Ralph Rosen states in this volume, its wholeness can be conceptualized only in a notional manner. At least in evaluating the aesthetic essence, it is mostly conceived as a conglomerate of dissociated parts. This applies, of course, also for Aristophanic comedies full of paratragodia where verses and entire passages are extracted from their original context of a specific tragedy and neatly embedded into a new wholeness of a comic play. Yet in their marked form of immersed fragments the quotations assume a special presence and release a signification force that lays emphasis on their symbolic content. While the quotations are perfectly integrated into the overall structure, supporting the surface plot, as still detachable fragments they hint at a symbolic surplus meaning based on cultural patterns. With the specific difference of media and reception in mind, Aristophanes makes operable an aesthetics and poetics of fragmentation in his comedies. The vivid mise en scène in Thesmophoriazusae is a good test-case to demonstrate the  2 Nancy 1993. 3 This, of course, also applies, if Aristophanes used a written manuscript of Euripides for his parodies, as Nieddu 2004, esp. 351–360 argues.

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theoretical argument in practice. With its wide use of paratragodia and poetic reflection about mimesis and drama this comedy seems to have its sense in an intertextual and metatheatrical play about drama itself. 4 After Inlaw’s arrest in the Thesmophorion alone four Euripidean tragedies of special Euripidean mechanai are comically acted out in paratragodia to attempt a sophisticated flight and reach salvation. Do these comic scenes amount just to comic amusement on the paradigmatic level without furthering the syntagmatic course of action and its deeper symbolic meaning? Recently the ritual frame of the performance in the festivals of Dionysus and the ritual embedding of the comic action in the Thesmophoria were taken more seriously for this comedy. Froma Zeitlin began to read Thesmophoriazusae and its mythic-cultic background mainly as an expression of marginality, as a metatheatrical or even metaritual statement about the threshold between festival and theater, Dionysus and Demeter, tragedy and comedy, man and woman. 5 Other scholars like Angus Bowie or Angeliki Tzanetou followed to take the Demeter ritual into serious account for the working of the play. 6 However, as I showed in my own detailed analysis, the decisive feature of the Thesmophoria, as Henk Versnel has demonstrated, and the ensuing syntagmatic operability of Thesmophoriazusae is the fact that during the festival of exception the mature Athenian women, in separation from their husbands, notionally reproject themselves back into their state of nymphai, young maidens on the very point to become women. 7 The temporary separation from their husbands and the interruption of sexual relations are experienced as a repetition of the status of a parthenos, in which a chaste and pure life without sex is prescribed. Greek culture, literature, myths and rituals are not only imbued with the tripartite structure of rites of passage (on the sequence separation, transitional phase of crisis and a reintegration) especially linked to rituals of maturity, 8 but also often based on a strongly felt pattern according to which adult women reenact their status before marriage. 9 While the women return to parthenoi and to their state of liminality and transition, Inlaw in his female dressing notionally reactualizes his transitional state of “betwixt and between” as well. 10 Both sides, the women of the chorus as well as Inlaw as the intruder against whom they act, notionally reenact their sexual threshold characterized by a paradoxical simultaneity of male and  4 On Thesm., see Sommerstein 1994; Prato 2001; Austin/Olson 2004; Saetta Cottone 2016. 5 Zeitlin 1981. 6 Bowie 1993, 205–227; Tzanetou 2002. 7 Bierl 2009, 196–227, based on Versnel 1993, 235–288. 8 Van Gennep 1909. 9 See Moreau 1992; Padilla 1999; Bierl 2007a, 23–25 and Bierl 2007b. 10 Turner 1967, 93–111.

  Anton Bierl female signs — the male Inlaw returns to a girl dressed in a saffron-gown (krokotos), the women to partial men. 11 While Telephus and Palamedes have little success since Inlaw applies the action pattern from his male perspective, Helen and Andromeda as sophisticated escape-tragedies are much more vital to the progress of action since the male protagonist adopts a female role appropriate to his costume and to the main pattern of a rite de passage. 12 Both Helen and Andromeda are indeed closely linked with the paradigm of female initiation. Helen in her double identity has a cultic function for girls at the transition and for women in marriage, reflecting the tension between women and virgins in the case of the Thesmophoriazusae. 13 As I have shown elsewhere, Euripides plays this pattern out in his Helen of 412 BC, one year before the performance of Thesmophoriazusae, the wife, secluded and separated form her husband in the transitional realm of Egypt, notionally returning to her status right before marriage, until she can flee with her husband Menelaus back home where they notionally celebrate their remarriage. 14 Andromeda, the heroine of the eponymous play performed with Helen in the same trilogy is the quintessential example of the young maiden on the threshold to marriage. 15 In the myth, fettered and exposed to the monster Ketos as bride of Hades, she emblematically experiences the transitional phase of a symbolic death in initiation before Perseus arrives to free her and leading her to marriage. 16 Thus by assuming the role of Helen and Andromeda as maidens on the brink of marriage (or remarriage) Inlaw assimilates himself to the status of the women celebrating the Thesmophoria, notionally returning to this status themselves. Therefore it is understandable that they find an agreement with Euripides who must save his alter-ego.  11 Bierl 2009, 223–224. 12 Bierl 2009, 220–244 and 126–129. On Helen and Andromeda together with Iphigenia among the Taurians as escape-tragedies, see Wright 2005. 13 On Helen’s initiatory function, see Calame 1977, 333–350, 354–357, 443, 447 (English translation Calame 1997, 191–202, 204–206, 260, 262). 14 Bierl 2009, 224–230. On the mythic-ritual structure of Euripides’ Helen, especially its link to Demeter and Persephone/Kore, see also Guépin 1968, 120–142; Wolff 1973; Robinson 1979; Foley 1992; Rehm 1994, 121–127; Voelke 1996; Zweig 1999; Swift 2009; Swift 2010, 218–240; moreover see the unpublished dissertation by Luppi 2011a (and the prepublication Luppi 2011b); on the exploration of the themes of female sexuality and marriage, see Swift 2009. 15 See Bierl 2009, 231–244. 16 On the threat of being devoured by a monster as a characteristic indication of initiation, see Moreau 1992, especially 221–225, on Andromeda and the κῆτος ibid., 224; see also the comparative morphology of initiation in Brelich 1969, 25–44 and 60–112, ibid. 90 n. 116. On the topos of marriage with Hades, see Seaford 1987. On Perseus’ action as an initiatory trial, see Burkert 1992, 82–87, especially 85 and Bremmer 1994, 62.

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The hymnic song separating the Helen scene from the Andromeda parody (Thesm. 947–1000), revolving around the ritual embedding of the Thesmophoria, the role of the chorus’s character, and choral dancing in self-referentiality shifting into the Dionysian framing of the performance in their function — the theme of choral dance so to speak builds the common ground between the perspectives — establishes their strong presence and assigns them energy. 17 Last not least the chorus will sing about Dionysus, the god of theater that is metatheatrically put on stage, as well as dance and music, culminating in his echo sound reverberating from the mountains, thus building a link to the Echo scene to come. 18

Helen (Thesm. 846–946) The restriction of length forbids me to go into detail about the Helen scene (855– 919), the less interesting case for our question. 19 Becoming aware of his feminine attire (γυναικεία στολή, 851) the comic hero Mnesilochus, the one who reenacts the phase of lochos in his initiation, 20 decides to take the initiative himself by reenacting on stage, a comic, new and very basic Helen (τὴν καινὴν Ἑλένην μιμήσομαι, 850), a play initiated with the hope that Euripides will appear to take on the role of Menelaus to rescue him. Whereas before Inlaw had little theatrical knowledge, now he becomes the stage director himself, taking the initiative from the expert Euripides. The export of some citations in a poetics of fragmentation from the original of the year before works on a simple logic and following exactly the sequence of the first third of Euripides’ Helen. 21 In case we had not the entire whole by Euripides, Aristophanes would provide us with fragments as parts set in a sequence that easily make sense in a simple syntagmatic order in a tripartite structure (introduction, situation of danger, recognition of the couple — that should directly lead into the flight): 1. Inlaw takes important parts of the prologue as steps to introduce the scene at the Nile; over sixty verses (Thesm. 855–905) are interspersed with at least seven citations reaching also in the original over around seventy verses; the marked entrance of Helen 1–3 provides the scenery,  17 See Bierl 2009, 84–125. 18 See Bierl 2009, 125–129. On Echo as a nymph and maiden on the threshold of becoming a woman, see Bierl 2009, 126. 19 See Rau 1967, 53–65; Kannicht 1969, 79–82; Nieddu 2004, 336–350; Bierl 2009, 221–230; Saetta Cottone 2016, 35–40. 20 See Bierl 2009, 244–249. 21 See appendix 1.1 and 1.2 based on Austin/Olson 2004, 279 ad 855–919.

  Anton Bierl but stands, of course, in stark contrast to the here and now. Inlaw/Helen mentions her origin in Sparta, the goal of the flight, and the Trojan catastrophe; only here she slightly leaves the direct sequence. Inlaw/Helen must complain about the loss of her husband. This is the signal for Euripides to appear as Menelaus (49) (also partly taking on Teucer as messenger to prepare his master’s appearance); 2. Reducing the frequency to four instances, we move forward to the doorkeeper scene concentrating on the nucleus of thirteen lines (Thesm. 874–886) where Euripides/Menelaus receives the information about his new whereabouts in Egypt and about Proteus’ tomb as a safe haven for the woman in only four marked verses in close vicinity to the source (Hel. 460–466); 3. Then the next dense cluster of cited verses between 904–912 introduces the sentimental recognition scene. Here both actors interact in their role: Ευ. τουτὶ τί ἐστιν; ἀφασία τίς τοί μ’ ἔχει. ὦ θεοί, τίν’ ὄψιν εἰσορῶ; τίς εἶ, γύναι; Κη. σὺ δ’ εἶ τίς; αὑτὸς γὰρ σὲ κἄμ’ ἔχει λόγος. Ευ. Ἑλληνὶς εἶ τις ἢ ’πιχωρία γυνή; Κη. Ἑλληνίς. ἀλλὰ καὶ τὸ σὸν θέλω μαθεῖν. Ευ. Ἑλένῃ σ’ ὁμοίαν δὴ μάλιστ’ εἶδον, γύναι. Κη. ἐγὼ δὲ Μενελέῳ σ’ ὅσα γ’ ἐκ τῶν ἀμφίων. Ευ. ἔγνως ἄρ’ ὀρθῶς ἄνδρα δυστυχέστατον. Κη. ὦ χρόνιος ἐλθὼν σῆς δάμαρτος ἐσχάρας,

905

910

(Ar. Thesm. 904–912) Euripides: What can this be? A speechlessness holds me fast! O gods, what sight do I see? Who are you, lady? Kinsman: And who are you? The same thought strikes us both. Euripides: Are you Greek, or a native woman? Kinsman: Greek. But I now would learn your story. Euripides: I cannot help but see Helen in you, lady! Kinsman: And I Menelaus in you—to judge from your rags! Euripides: You have recognized aright the unluckiest of men! Kinsman: O timely come into your own wife’s charms! (Translation by J. Henderson)

In a very unnatural manner Inlaw knows how to react to Euripides’ remarks from Hel. 557, — line 559, a praise of Helena’s beauty, is left out — 561, 563 and 565 in his replies arranged in the directly following verses of a stichomythic exchange (558, 562, 564, 566). The recognition is introduced with Menelaus’ remark about his stunning surprise (549), leaving out some lines up to 557. This extract works like a fragment, a fractured part from the entire play. It is deployed as the decisive

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transition toward the possible escape. Inlaw insists (Thesm. 913–916): “O hold me, hold me, husband, in your arms! Come, let me kiss you! Take, oh take, oh take me away posthaste!” 22 At this point Critylla interferes. The simple play culminating in and aiming at the attempted flight actually would not need the highly emotional scene of reunion in love acted out in this density. They know each other anyway, but Inlaw leaves out the decisive trick and focuses on love and remarriage. His play is apparently perfect, he even seems to involve Critylla, modeling her to Theonoe as a possible blocking figure, leaving aside her ritual purity and semi-helping function, and taking account of the Prytanis as Theoclymenus. 23 However, the scene is reduced to a farce, to a scene between a very weak and powerless woman that must be saved by the strong hero, extinguishing Euripides’ strong, clever and dramatic heroine. All intellectual ambiguities and philosophical nuances are left out. In view of the lack of so-called illusion the relative oscillates between various identities. As Helen the relative becomes a player who is yet one step further removed from the staged reality of the Thesmophoria plot, that is why Critylla refuses to play along in the role of Theonoe and the rescue ultimately fails. The comic effect results from the contrast between source and new context, between the fractured lines as presentifications of events touching the comic surrounding in breach and fricture. Critylla only acknowledges the pragmatic here and now, the entire farce is useless. Emotional recognition does not impress the female guard to forget her duty. But it is funny, because it makes both male players to a homoerotic couple. While it does not achieve its planned outcome, the staged reunion of wife and husband anticipates, on a symbolic level, the women’s return to marriage after the festival of exception and Inlaw’s return to his wife. Thus it is not just nonsensical paradigmatic farce, but it has a function in the syntagmatic structure that works on a symbolic level. If we had only these fragments we obviously would have a very different impression of Euripides’ Helen. We would be left with fractured parts, disiecti membra poetae (Horace Satires 1.4.62), parts of Euripides so to speak torn apart, without a link to the whole. The comic operation reduces Helen to a simple escape story followed by a highly emotional recognition of the couple. The background

 22 The scene imitates the recognition of a separated married couple. The successful rescue of the “wife” would correspond to a new wedding. This corresponds to the ritual pattern at the Thesmophoria. 23 On the role of the maidenly Theonoe, who represents the righteous matter of marital fidelity, see Des Bouvrie 1990, 311–312.

  Anton Bierl of why Helen is in Egypt and her double identity with all the philosophical implications would be lost. Yet as marked fragment taken from the whole context that the audience supplements as a notion it can add to the symbolic picture of a transition through death in a rite of passage, before the reintegration is reached.

Andromeda (Thesm. 1001–1135) With the entry of the Prytanis summoned by Cleonymus, who orders his Scythian police-henchman to fasten the offender to a wooden board and to guard him, the Helena-scene comes to an abrupt and rude end (929–946). From this new pragmatic situation of being bound departs the next scene after the long choral intermission (947–1000). The Inlaw as a man was not allowed to be bound naked. This would have resulted in throwing off his saffron-gown, the signal for the end of the girls’ initiation in Brauron. 24 Thus he remains still the girl in marked disguise in the transitional phase of the betwixt and between; he is fettered, he complains about the evilness of the Scythian, his only hope is Euripides to appear with another trick. The Scythian has left to get a mat behind the scene (1007). Thus Inlaw is alone, desperate, exposed, bound to plank. At this moment he realizes Euripides, in his flight-movement in nervous agitation he seems to give him a sign as Perseus (σημεῖον ὑπεδήλωσε Περσεὺς ἐκδραμών, 1011). From external and coincidental signs he takes his metatheatrical initiative now himself. Almost stumbling onto his role, he wittily concludes that he must play Andromeda (ὅτι δεῖ με γίγνεσθ’ Ἀνδρομέδαν, 1012). Again based on the escape pattern we witness a much more complicated course of action of scenic excess and energetic effervescence. It carries the potential of aria-like multimodal overdoing and self-referential lyric lament that fails to lead to a quick success. Indeed, focused entirely on the paradigmatic simple comic story, the actors miss the right moment of escape due to their excessive theatrical play. The Scythian, the negligent guard, left the stage at line 1007 and seems to have come back only at line 1082. Euripides could just have unbound his relative so that both can escape from the Thesmophorion. Instead the rustic Inlaw starts singing a monodic aria, whereas Euripides behaves obviously like an enthusiastic listener of his own poetry sample. Moreover, unlike in the case of Helen, the play does not proceed on the exact order of the Euripidean original taking few select passages of the escape story that should lead to the early arrival of Perseus to set Inlaw free (identification of names, arrival, escape). Rather, Aristophanes switched

 24 See Bierl 2009, 228–230 with n. 423.

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the two parodied parts of Euripides’ Andromeda. 25 In the Euripidean source Andromeda sings first about her lonely and stationary situation (frr. 114–115), soon Echo responds (fr. 118) staging an anapestic duet with Andromeda. This is followed by the parodos sung by the chorus of young female attendants who engage with Andromeda in an amoibaion (frr. 117–122). Andromeda must first have ordered Echo to keep quiet in order to be able to lament with the chorus (fr. 118). Afterwards Perseus appears flying in, having pity with the girl with whom he falls in love. In Thesmophoriazusae the main emphasis is on Andromeda’s amoibaion, put on top of the sequence. The quotations are extracted from her monodic address to the chorus. Since, in the first place, no blocking person who must be deceived is present on stage, the very beginning of the prologue, Andromeda’s initial lonely lament providing with the scene, is postponed until lines 1065ff. (corresponding to frr. 114 and 115), used as introduction to the Echo-scene. Then we encounter a short focus on Perseus’ arrival and his reaction of pity (1098–1110). Following fr. 124 only fr. 128 is set in front of fr. 127, since Inlaw has the initiative, not Perseus/Euripides: Thus, in contrast to the proceedings in the tragedy, it is not Perseus/Euripides who first pities Andromeda so that the girl can address him to rescue her, but Inlaw immediately comes to the point: λῦσόν με δεσμῶν (1108). Therefore Aristophanes leaves out fr. 129–135, leading to a simple escape story. Finally Euripides must play the role of Perseus since the Scythian does not play along and functions like Critylla as blocker. Moreover, the focus of the scene shifts on eros, leaving aside the main goal and purpose. But let’s have a closer look at the beginning of the scene (1008–1055) (see appendix 2.1 and 2.2): Kinsman This is the reward I get for befriending Euripides! (peering into the distance) Ah! Ye gods and Savior Zeus, there’s still hope! It seems the man won’t give up on me: he just popped up as Perseus, meaning I’m supposed to be Andromeda. I’ve certainly got the requisite chains, and he’s obviously on his way to rescue me; otherwise he wouldn’t have zipped by!

117 (to the chorus)

 25 See appendix 2.1 and 2.2. On the scene, see Mitsdörffer 1954; Rau 1967, 65–89; Zeitlin 1981, 190–194, Zimmermann 1985, 7–13; Hall 1989; Sier 1992; Sommerstein 1994, 222–231; Parker 1997, 436–445; Prato 2001, 314–328; Olson/Austin 2004, 312–333; Mastromarco 2008; Major 2013; Saetta Cottone 2016, 283–296. On the Andromeda of Euripides, see Bubel 1991; Klimek-Winter 1993, 55–315; Jouan/Van Looy 1998, 147–190; Collard/Cropp/Gibert 2004, 133–168; Pagano 2011.

  Anton Bierl Dear maidens dear, how might I get away and escape the Scythian? Do you hear me, you in the caverns, who reply in song to my cries? Permit me, do let me go home to my wife! Pitiless he who enchained me, most sorely tested of mortal men! I got free of a rotten old hag only to die anyway! For this Scythian guard, long posted over me, has hung me up, doomed and friendless, as supper for vultures!

Behold, not now in dances nor with girls my own age do I stand wielding a voting-funnel; nay rather enchained in tight bondage am I set out as fodder for the monster Glaucetes! Mourn me, ladies, with a hymn not of marriage but of jail, for wretched do I suffer wretchedly —alas alack, woe is me!— and from kin lawless sufferings, lawless, tho I implored the man, igniting tearfullest Stygian groans —ai ai! oh oh!—the one who first

shaved me, who put on me these saffron things and to top it off sent me up to this sanctuary where the women are. O force of my destiny that a god engendered! O me accursed! Who will not behold my suffering, with its drastic evils, as unenviable? Ah, would that a fiery bolt from heaven above would obliterate that barbarian! No more is it agreeable to look upon the sun’s deathless flame, when I am hung up, damned by the gods to cut-throat grief, bound for a quicksilver trip to the grave. (Translation by J. Henderson)

Dear maidens, my friends . . . 118 Andromeda Hello, do you hear? I appeal to you in the cave—leave off, Echo, and let me mourn as I long to with my friends. 119+120

Feel my pain with me, for the sufferer who shares his tears has some relief from his burden. Chorus Pitiless the man who fathered you but now has dispatched you, most tormented of mortals, to Hades to die for your homeland. . . . (further remnants) . . . (121 = 115a above) 122

Do you see? Not in dancing choruses nor amongst the girls of my age do I stand holding my voter’s funnel, but entangled in close bonds I am presented as food for the monster Glaucetes, with a paean not for my wedding but for my binding. Bewail me, women, for I have suffered pitiful things in my pitiful plight—O suffering, suffering man that I am!—and other lawless afflictions from my kin, though I implored the man, as I light a lament filled with tears for my death. (Translation by C. Collard/M. Cropp)

Paratragic Fragmentation and Patchwork-Citation as Comic Aesthetics  

The relative’s aria (1015–1055) integrates words that both the lamenting Andromeda originally directs to her choral retinue and that the chorus reply in a potpourri manner. 26 At the moment of the utterance the initial address “Dear maidens, dear and lovely” (1015 = fr. 117) becomes part of the address to the actual chorus of women at the Thesmophoria who ritually re-experience the condition of παρθενία. Since the Scythian is absent and the chorus remain in the orchestra after their intense self-referential song (947–1000), Inlaw directs these kind words to them, establishing a friendly contact. In a completely free fashion he glides back and forth between his new role and his actual situation. Thus the assumption of a fluctuating male and female gender identity in grammatical terms is in no way synchronized with this. In a mix of voices a comic and uncoordinated, triply-encoded and mutually connected texture comes to the fore, while at the same time we witness a juxtaposition of two roles, behind which the actual player remains present. Behind the imperfect, theatrical mimesis of Andromeda the male identity continues to shine through, just as the chorus also switches between their plot-internal role and their plot-external function. The relative laments in desperation about the real situation: how shall he “get away and escape the Scythian?” (1017). The question “Do you hear me, you in the caverns, who reply in song to my cries?” (κλύεις, ὦ προσᾴδουσ’/ ἀυταῖς ἐν ἄντροις; 1018–1019) comes at a surprise. With the transposition of the beginning, Echo, uttering a voice in the cave, is here out of context. After the lyric interchange with Echo in her cave, reverberating the lament from the rock, Andromeda orders Echo to cease her disturbing interventions, since she should let her attain the object of her desire, the goos with her friends (fr. 118). The command to stop ἀπόπαυσον, ἔασον becomes an order to agree to let him return to his wife: κατάνευσον, ἔασον/ τὴν γυναῖκά μ’ ἐλθεῖν (1020–1021). But the Inlaw’s aria is actually motivated by a goou pothos (cf. fr. 118.4) as well not fitting to the pragmatic context. At this point the audience has little idea about the identity of the female voice. It is like a riddle, only the very experienced members can gather that it probably refers to Echo. Euripides is such a sophisticated spectator. The remark will give him the signal to act as Echo after the monody. But Euripides cannot possibly make him escape in his role as Echo, but only as Perseus. Echo is circular, self-contained and recurring to its acoustic source, but it does not lead to a goal in a trajectory. Gliding back to the actual scene Inlaw condemns the brutal Scythian who becomes the foil for Cepheus. In the contorted pragmatic situation it is not clear whom Inlaw addresses now with “do you see?” (ὁρᾷς, 1029). He laments: “Do you see? Not in dancing choruses nor amongst the girls of my age do I stand holding my voter’s  26 See Kornarou 2006/07.

  Anton Bierl funnel, …” (ὁρᾷς, οὐ χοροῖσιν οὐδ’/ ὑφ’ ἡλίκων νεανίδων/ κημὸν ἕστηκ’ ἔχουσ’, 1029–31). Since “do you hear” (κλύεις, 1018) was directed to the voice, perhaps of Euripides, it is uncertain whether the “you” again means Euripides or the present chorus, oscillating between singular and plural, I and “we”. Already in Euripides’ version this is a paradox: the girl describes her loneliness with the absence of the chorus (fr. 122), although the girls arrived to sing with her. Andromeda and Echo, like all young women before marriage, indulge in beautiful dance and song surrounded by the circle of their age-mates as chorus in order to honor the gods. 27 But Andromeda cannot dance with them, as she stands in a stationary position, bound in fetters. She has so to speak left the chorus, the sign for passing the step towards becoming the adult woman. Moreover, Inlaw is not without choruses since he just witnessed the chorus of the women at the Thesmophoria singing and dancing (947–1000) who are still present in the orchestra. The relative probably addresses the chorus not being of the same age, since they are adult women, and he is not participating since they oppose him as trespasser. His hope would consist in becoming part of the group, in getting integrated as empowered dancer in order to leave. Another paradox is the fact that they are notionally of Andromeda’s age as they return to virgins. Now Inlaw as Andromeda summons the women, addressing the present women chorus with plural form to wail for him/her (γοᾶσθέ μ’, ὦ γυναῖκες), as she/he is wretched (μέλεα μὲν πέπονθα μέλεος, ὦ τάλας ἐγώ, τάλας) (1036–1038). The lament should not be intoned with a wedding paean, but with a binding one (γαμηλίῳ μὲν οὐ ξὺν παιῶνι, δεσμίῳ δέ, 1034–1035). Ironically the song serves as a paean to escape from a crisis, 28 it has indeed to do with marriage, since he soon will return to his wife, just like the chorus to their husbands. As bride of Hades Andromeda/Inlaw sings also a Hades-lament, using the closeness between goos and wedding song. 29 The song becomes ironically a desmios paean, since she/he is fettered. But it alludes also to the famous hymnos desmios (cf. Aesch. Eum. 306) of the Erinyes in Aeschylus’ Eumenides (321–396) who attempt to enchant their opponents through magic words, dance and music; here it perhaps refers to the chorus or the Scythian who will soon return. And she/he has suffered (πέπονθα, 1037) terrible things from her relatives (ἀπὸ δὲ συγγόνων ἄνομ’ ἄνομα πάθεα, 1039), Andromeda from her fa-

 27 See Eur. El. 178–180 (Electra), IT 1143–1152 (chorus of Greek maidens serving as temple slaves in the land of the Taurians) and Phoen. 1265–1266 (Antigone); on Echo see Long. 3.23. 28 See Käppel 1992. 29 On the association of funerary lament and lament before marriage, see Alexiou 1974, 120– 122; Seaford 1987, 113–114. See also Nagy 2013, 559–560.

Paratragic Fragmentation and Patchwork-Citation as Comic Aesthetics  

ther, Inlaw from Euripides. Thus instead of searching help from his potential savior Euripides he condemns him. Euripides is the one who shaved him (1043), put him into the saffron-gown (1044) and sent him among the women (1045–1046). He/she laments about her emitting “cut-throat grief” (λαιμότμητ’ ἄχη, 1054), a link to the fragmenting poetics in the next scene, where fractured words are, so to speak, cut in the throat. In the second part (Thesm. 1056–1097) (see appendix 2.1 and 2.2) Euripides enters now on stage, but not as Perseus to finally save Inlaw but as Echo, thus wasting time in the short period without guard. 30 The perspective is soon shifted back to the beginning of Euripides’ play. Echo’s appearance as a real person, as an old lady, not as a maiden or voice in the backstage is a real surprise. Inlaw’s address to the famous voice (1018–1019) seems to have been the catalyst for this scene, as he exceedingly loved his musical idea about the echo effect. Notwithstanding Inlaw’s harsh condemnation Euripides wishes to play with him. But it will be an interlude where the dialogue partners will soon loose their mode of cooperation during the communication. Despite his self-presentation as Echo, “who just last year, in this very place, personally assisted Euripides in this contest” (1060–1061), Echo resumes her role from the previous choral song where it is linked with the reverberating, circling Dionysian energy of dance (985–1000, esp. 995–1000). The god of theater, so to speak, sends his creative Muse of fragmentation. In this role Euripides makes the potential help a counterproductive interlude. Echo, with the voice of the cuckoo (ἐπικοκκάστρια, 1059), acts like the comic parasite making his sound resemble the true source, just like the hosts’ eggs. Instead of cooperation the communication collapses into non-communication. The amoibaion of sound echoes in mimicry becomes a futile exercise without any purpose. Inlaw now shifts back to the very prologue of Euripides’s play (1065ff. and fr. 114). The echo effect of repeating the last part of the verse makes

 30 See Bierl 2009, 126–129. It is still hotly debated whether Echo appears in person to console the relative playing the role of Andromeda (Heath 1987, 51 n. 106; Sommerstein 1994, 226–227 ad 1056–1097; Gilula 1996; Hartwig 2009) or whether Euripides takes over the role of Echo and thus himself takes his Echo-idea in the Andromeda ad absurdum. Sier 1992, 75–76 (with n. 41) argues that Echo was invisible, reduced to her voice alone, and yet, as the scholia also maintain (schol. Thesm. 1056), was played by Euripides; see also Prato 2001, 321 ad 1056–1064; similarly Bubel 1991, 10 n. 10. Klimek-Winter 1993, 140–143, with Hansen 1976, 182–183, believes Echo was visible to the audience and played by Euripides/Perseus, though she remained invisible for the parties affected, the relative and the Scythian (this seems to be the position of Austin/Olson 2004). The report in the scholia probably means nothing else than that the momentarily released actor, who otherwise played the role of Euripides, here provided the voice of Echo. On the Echo part in general, see Mureddu 1987 for more detail.

  Anton Bierl it to a small fragment. Sense is suspended, but touches potential new sense. The nonsensical “through Olympus” (1069b) stands alone but perhaps it is a link to the Olympians addressed in the song before. Inlaw as Andromeda laments about the share of his/her ills (1070–1071 = fr. 115). When μέρος ἐξέλαχον (1071) resounds in the mouth of Euripides/Echo, this means that Euripides parasitically appropriates the suffering of his counterpart, sharing it with Inlaw/Andromeda. And perhaps it refers to Euripides’ taking on his role (μέρος ἐξέλαχον). Soon cooperation capsizes into non-cooperation. Now the scene refers to the situation in Euripides’ Andromeda fr. 118 already used in an affirming manner (1018–1019), where Andromeda asks Echo to stop since she wants to lament with her comrades. Inlaw says “You’re killing me, old bag, with your jabbering!” (ἀπολεῖς μ’, ὦ γραῦ, στωμυλλομένη, 1073) — the echo reverberating “Jabbering!” in isolation makes him jabbering as well. But we see that Euripides has dressed up as an old woman, a possible anticipation of Euripides’ costume as old Bawd in the deceitscene. At this point Inlaw says, similar to the situation in fr. 118: “Dear fellow, please let me finish my monodic song, thank you very much. Do stop!” (ὦγάθ’, ἔασόν με μονῳδῆσαι, καὶ χαριεῖ μοι, παῦσαι, 1077–1078). It is a talk at cross-purposes, pure nonsense. His singing a monody, μονῳδῆσαι, is as futile as the fragmentation. As dissociated part in reverberation παῦσαι (1078) assumes the meaning that the scene should stop indeed. Moreover, perhaps this sound element resumes the mention of Pauson in line 949. After a while the playful scene as long intermission must slowly come to an end. Fragmentation full of paradigmatic humor about mimicry and mimesis produces new sense in nonsense. Only at this point the Scythian comes back on stage (1083), and whereas the fragmentation was auto-deconstructive in the scene with Inlaw, Euripides can mock now the archer using it in combination with the echo-effect. At his point Echo must have moved behind the scene so that the Scythian suffers from disorientation: he wonders from where the voice is coming (1086). Saying “it’s that woman right there!” (ἀλλὰ γυνὴ πλησίον αὕτη, 1090), the Scythian underlines his guess that it must originate from Inlaw/Andromeda. The repetition in fragmentation “right there” (1090–1091) creates again the effect of loss of the deictic orientation. The answer “She’s getting away!” (καὶ δὴ φεύγει, 1092) anticipates again the comic mocking and the escape scheme in the end (1160–1231). Only at this point Euripides, having lost so much time with unnecessary derision, appears as Perseus to initiate a simple escape drama (1098ff.). In doing so he integrates a cluster of citations from Andromeda not in strict sequence (fr. 124.1–3 (123 N2 = 124.6–7), 125.1, 128, 127). Just like Critylla the Scythian again does not go along with the play and insists on the pragmatic reality. Euripides’ prop, the head of Gorgo-Medusa, cannot be seen by the archer who thinks it should be the head of

Paratragic Fragmentation and Patchwork-Citation as Comic Aesthetics  

a well known person, Gorgos the secretary. Oral speech comically decapitates a producer of alphabetical scripts, a monster, thus writing, that is it fragments language, written language composed by Euripides into dissociated fractured parts. Euripides calls Inlaw a maiden (1105, 1110 [fr. 125.1, 127]) and acts out the famous scene of falling in love with Andromeda (1110–1122). When Euripides declares his love for the prisoner, the barbarian guard interprets this on the level of pure reality in the here and now as a homosexual relationship of that he does not want to stand in the way. Once the saffron-dress is torn off from Inlaw, the Scythian insists that the alleged kysto (1114) is something else, a membrum virile. On the level of language and oral play Inlaw is both male and female. The barbarian is quite generous as far as sexual matters are concerned. Inlaw must not be released from his fetters, but Euripides can certainly turn the man around and tie him to the plank with his head facing towards it so that Euripides can satisfy his homosexual drives and penetrate him anally (1119–1120); Euripides still insists to release (1121, cf. 1108) Andromeda/Inlaw to “couch her on the nuptial bed” (πεσεῖν ἐς εὐνὴν καὶ γαμήλιον λέχος, 1122), an anticipation of the return to marriage. But the archer is so liberal to allow Euripides to drill a hole through the wood so that he can service his lover from behind (1123–1124). The audience would certainly have broken into hearty laughter at these coarse remarks. Still, these are not just dirty jokes pandering to the tastes of simple folk in a performance of Old comedy, but actually intensify the message on the symbolic level. Because of the women’s clothing and the apparently pederastic relationship, the relative is simultaneously equated to a young man in the liminal phase of initiation. In the eyes of the Scythian Euripides becomes the ἐραστής, the relative his ἐρώμενος. Inlaw is thus still betwixt and between, but on the way to reach again his male adulthood. The parody aims again at the erotic theme to reach the point to release Andromeda/Inlaw. However, this passage is not based on the tragic text, but it becomes a purely Aristophanic scene. The Euripidean tragedy fails again, but on a symbolic level we come closer to the reestablishment of marital relations, to re-marriage. Furthermore, the comic end (1160–1231) is anticipated. The chorus becomes a partner, assimilated to and in accordance with their transitional stage. The women at the Thesmophoria are addressed as dear (1015), they are notionally between maidens and adult women. The barbarian’s focus on coarse sex finally makes Euripides aware of how he must deceive the Scythian on the comic level, i.e. with sexual distraction and simple tricks.

  Anton Bierl

Conclusion The fragmenting paratragodia is not just paradigmatic comic intertextual and metatheatrical play in endless repetitions, but the parasitic and parodic use of Helen and Andromeda supports the syntagmatic course of action on a symbolic level. On this level that works on the concept of female and male initiation we can even detect an increasing trajectory towards the comic end. Laying bare fractured parts of texts as well as integrating them into a new entity do not make the fragments isolated remnants, passages to be packed away into collections, but to vivid centers of energy. The fractured surface gets in touch with the comic embedding, creating often suspension of sense or even nonsense from which new sense can emanate. Fragmentation is creative, bringing forth art, it releases energy and potentials of new sense and meaning. In our case Euripides is mistaken to use fragments of his escape tragedies to bring about escape. The four plays in play show an increasingly complex nature. Cooperation in simple play makes way to comic excess, to multimodality, musical extravagance, marked song and finally to an interruption of the cooperation of the dialogue partners in agonistic opposition. The excess in citing fragments leads to a mania of art, to a breach of a sequential order, to sampling, shifting, moving forwards and backwards. It culminates in deconstructive mini-fragments of aping echo-effects that stand in free context until they undermine the own project in its trajectory. Almost forgetting the main aim, the play in play becomes free play, pure comic art in fragmentation, but when Euripides comes back on track he finally deploys hardly any tragic passage in citation for his last plot of failure. The escape pattern and the cultural idea of passage in puberty thus move towards a comic solution without any tragic citations, to a comic trick, and, to the end of the phase of transitional exception by reestablishing marriage and sexual contact.

Appendix  Helen 1.1 Survey Ar. Thesm. a) prologue 855–857 859–860

Eur. Hel. 1–3 16–17

Paratragic Fragmentation and Patchwork-Citation as Comic Aesthetics  

862 864–865 866 868 871 901 905

22 52–53 49 56 68 54–55 72–73

b) Menelaos-doorkeeper 874 878 881 886

460 461 467 466

c) initial recognition 904 905 906 907–912

549 557 558 561–566

1.2. Text Ar. Thesm.

E. Hel.

Κη. Νείλου μὲν αἵδε καλλιπάρθενοι ῥοαί, () ὃς ἀντὶ δίας ψακάδος Αἰγύπτου πέδον λευκῆς νοτίζει μελανοσυρμαῖον λεών. Κρ. πανοῦργος εἶ, νὴ τὴν Ἑκάτην τὴν φωσφόρον. Κη. ἐμοὶ δὲ γῆ μὲν πατρὶς οὐκ ἀνώνυμος, Σπάρτη, πατὴρ δὲ Τυνδάρεως. (860) Κρ. σοί γ’, ὦλεθρε, (860, bis) πατὴρ ἐκεῖνός ἐστι; Φρυνώνδας μὲν οὖν. (861) Κη. Ἑλένη δ’ ἐκλήθην. Κρ. αὖθις αὖ γίγνει γυνή, (862, bis) πρὶν τῆς ἑτέρας δοῦναι γυναικίσεως δίκην; (863) Κη. ψυχαὶ δὲ πολλαὶ δι’ ἔμ’ ἐπὶ Σκαμανδρίοις ῥοαῖσιν ἔθανον. (865) Κρ. ὤφελες δὲ καὶ σύ γε. (865, bis) Κη. κἀγὼ μὲν ἐνθάδ’ εἴμ’· ὁ δ’ ἄθλιος πόσις (866) οὑμὸς Μενέλεως οὐδέπω προσέρχεται. τί οὖν ἔτι ζῶ; Κρ. τῶν κοράκων πονηρίᾳ. (868, bis) Κη. ἀλλ’ ὥσπερ αἰκάλλει τι καρδίαν ἐμήν. (869)

Ελ. Νείλου μὲν αἵδε καλλιπάρθενοι ῥοαί, () ὃς ἀντὶ δίας ψακάδος Αἰγύπτου πέδον λευκῆς τακείσης χιόνος ὑγραίνει γύας. Ελ. ἡμῖν δὲ γῆ μὲν πατρὶς οὐκ ἀνώνυμος (16) Σπάρτη, πατὴρ δὲ Τυνδάρεως· ἔστιν δὲ δὴ

Ἑλένη δ’ ἐκλήθην. ἃ δὲ πεπόνθαμεν κακὰ (22)

ψυχαὶ δὲ πολλαὶ δι’ ἔμ’ ἐπὶ Σκαμανδρίοις (52) ῥοαῖσιν ἔθανον· ἡ δὲ πάντα τλᾶσ’ ἐγὼ κἀγὼ μὲν ἐνθάδ’ εἴμ’, ὁ δ’ ἄθλιος πόσις (49) τί οὖν ἔτι ζῶ; θεοῦ τόδ’ εἰσήκουσ’ ἔπος (56)

  Anton Bierl μὴ ψεῦσον, ὦ Ζεῦ, τῆς ἐπιούσης ἐλπίδος. (870) Ευ. τίς τῶνδ’ ἐρυμνῶν δωμάτων ἔχει κράτος, ὅστις ξένους δέξαιτο ποντίῳ σάλῳ καμόντας ἐν χειμῶνι καὶ ναυαγίαις; Κη. Πρωτέως τάδ’ ἐστὶ μέλαθρα. Κρ. ποίου Πρωτέως, (874,bis) ὦ τρισκακόδαιμον; ψεύδεται νὴ τὼ θεώ, (875) ἐπεὶ τέθνηκε Πρωτέας ἔτη δέκα. Ευ. ποίαν δὲ χώραν εἰσεκέλσαμεν σκάφει; Κη. Αἴγυπτον. Ευ. ὢ δύστηνος· οἷ πεπλώκαμεν. (878, bis) Κρ. πείθει τι τῷ κακῶς ἀπολουμένῳ (879) ληροῦντι λῆρον; Θεσμοφόριον τουτογί. (880) Ευ. αὐτὸς δὲ Πρωτεὺς ἔνδον ἔστ’ ἢ ’ξώπιος; Κρ. οὐκ ἔσθ’ ὅπως οὐ ναυτιᾷς ἔτ’, ὦ ξένε, ὅστις ἀκούσας ὅτι τέθνηκε Πρωτέας ἔπειτ’ ἐρωτᾷς· “ἔνδον ἔστ’ ἢ ’ξώπιος;” Ευ. αἰαῖ· τέθνηκε. ποῦ δ’ ἐτυμβεύθη τάφῳ; (885) Κη. τόδ’ ἐστὶν αὐτοῦ σῆμ’, ἐφ’ ᾧ καθήμεθα. Κρ. κακῶς γ’ ἄρ’ ἐξόλοιο—κἀξολεῖ γέ τοι— ὅστις γε τολμᾷς σῆμα τὸν βωμὸν καλεῖν. Ευ. τί δαὶ σὺ θάσσεις τάσδε τυμβήρεις ἕδρας φάρει καλυπτός, ὦ ξένη; (890) Κη. βιάζομαι (890,bis) γάμοισι Πρωτέως παιδὶ συμμεῖξαι λέχος. (891) Κρ. τί, ὦ κακόδαιμον, ἐξαπατᾷς αὖ τὸν ξένον; οὗτος πανουργῶν δεῦρ’ ἀνῆλθεν, ὦ ξένε, ὡς τὰς γυναῖκας ἐπὶ κλοπῇ τοῦ χρυσίου. Κη. βάυζε τοὐμὸν σῶμα βάλλουσα ψόγῳ. (895) Ευ. ξένη, τίς ἡ γραῦς ἡ κακορροθοῦσά σε; Κη. αὕτη Θεονόη Πρωτέως. Κρ. μὰ τὼ θεώ, (897, bis) εἰ μὴ Κρίτυλλά γ’ Ἀντιθέου Γαργηττόθεν· (898) σὺ δ’ εἶ πανοῦργος. Κη. ὁπόσα τοι βούλει λέγε. (899, bis) οὐ γὰρ γαμοῦμαι σῷ κασιγνήτῳ ποτὲ (900) προδοῦσα Μενέλεων τὸν ἐμὸν ἐν Τροίᾳ πόσιν. Ευ. γύναι, τί εἶπας; στρέψον ἀνταυγεῖς κόρας. Κη. αἰσχύνομαί σε τὰς γνάθους ὑβρισμένη. Ευ. τουτὶ τί ἐστιν; ἀφασία τίς τοί μ’ ἔχει.

Τευ. τίς τῶνδ’ ἐρυμνῶν δωμάτων ἔχει κράτος; (68)

Γρ. Πρωτέως τάδ’ ἐστὶ δώματ’, Αἴγυπτος δὲ γῆ. (460)

Με. Αἴγυπτος; ὦ δύστηνος, οἷ πέπλευκ’ ἄρα. (461)

Με. ποῦ δῆτ’ ἂν εἴη; πότερον ἐκτὸς ἢ ’ν δόμοις; (467) Γρ. τόδ’ ἐστὶν αὐτοῦ μνῆμα, παῖς δ’ ἄρχει χθονός. (466)

Με. ἔκπληξιν ἡμῖν ἀφασίαν τε προστίθης. (549) cf. 72–73

Paratragic Fragmentation and Patchwork-Citation as Comic Aesthetics  

ὦ θεοί, τίν’ ὄψιν εἰσορῶ; τίς εἶ, γύναι; (905)

Με. τίς εἶ; τίν’ ὄψιν σήν, γύναι, προσδέρκομαι; (557) Κη. σὺ δ’ εἶ τίς; αὑτὸς γὰρ σὲ κἄμ’ ἔχει λόγος. Ελ. σὺ δ’ εἶ τίς; αὑτὸς γὰρ σὲ κἄμ’ ἔχει λόγος. (558) Ευ. Ἑλληνὶς εἶ τις ἢ ’πιχωρία γυνή; (561) Κη. Ἑλληνίς. ἀλλὰ καὶ τὸ σὸν θέλω μαθεῖν. Ελ. Ἑλληνίς· ἀλλὰ καὶ τὸ σὸν θέλω μαθεῖν. (562) Ευ. Ἑλένῃ σ’ ὁμοίαν δὴ μάλιστ’ εἶδον, γύναι. Με. Ἑλένηι σ’ ὁμοίαν δὴ μάλιστ’ εἶδον, γύναι. (563) Κη. ἐγὼ δὲ Μενελέῳ σ’ ὅσα γ’ ἐκ τῶν ἀμφίων. (910) Ελ. ἐγὼ δὲ Μενέλεώι γε σ’· οὐδ’ ἔχω τί φῶ. (564) Ευ. ἔγνως ἄρ’ ὀρθῶς ἄνδρα δυστυχέστατον. Με. ἔγνως ἄρ’ ὀρθῶς ἄνδρα δυστυχέστατον. (565) Κη. ὦ χρόνιος ἐλθὼν σῆς δάμαρτος ἐσχάρας, Ελ. ὦ χρόνιος ἐλθὼν σῆς δάμαρτος ἐς χέρας. (566) λαβέ με λαβέ με πόσι, περίβαλε δὲ χέρας. (913–914) φέρε σε κύσω. ἄπαγέ μ’ ἄπαγ’ ἄπαγ’ ἄπαγέ με (915) λαβὼν ταχὺ πάνυ. Κρ. κλαύσετ’ ἄρα, νὴ τὼ θεώ, (916, bis) ὅστις σ’ ἀπάξει τυπτόμενος τῇ λαμπάδι. (917) Ευ. σὺ τὴν ἐμὴν γυναῖκα κωλύεις ἐμέ, τὴν Τυνδάρειον παῖδ’, ἐπὶ Σπάρτην ἄγειν;

2 Andromeda 2.1 Text Ar. Thesm. 1008–1135 Κη. ταυτὶ τὰ βέλτιστ’ ἀπολέλαυκ’ Εὐριπίδου. ἔα· θεοί, Ζεῦ σῶτερ, εἴσ’ ἔτ’ ἐλπίδες. ἁνὴρ ἔοικεν οὐ προδώσειν, ἀλλά μοι (1010) σημεῖον ὑπεδήλωσε Περσεὺς ἐκδραμών, ὅτι δεῖ με γίγνεσθ’ Ἀνδρομέδαν· πάντως δέ μοι τὰ δέσμ’ ὑπάρχει. δῆλον οὖν ἔσθ’ ὅτι ἥξει με σώσων. οὐ γὰρ ἂν παρέπτετο. φίλαι παρθένοι, φίλαι, (1015) πῶς ἂν ἀπέλθοιμι καὶ τὸν Σκύθην λάθοιμι; κλύεις, ὦ προσᾴδουσ’ ἀϋτὰς ἐν ἄντροις; (1018–19) σαυδῶ σὲ τὰν ἐν ἄντροις, κατάνευσον, ἔασον ὡς (1020) τὴν γυναῖκά μ’ ἐλθεῖν. ἄνοικτος ὅς μ’ ἔδησε, τὸν πολυστονώτατον βροτῶν· μόλις δὲ γραῖαν ἀποφυγὼν

Eur. Andromeda

fr. 117 φίλαι παρθένοι, φίλαι μοι address to chorus

fr. 118 Echo out of context (

Euripides, not Cepheus

ΗΧΩ χαῖρ’, ὦ φίλη παῖ· τὸν δὲ πατέρα Κηφέα ὅς σ’ ἐξέθηκεν, ἀπολέσειαν οἱ θεοί. Κη. σὺ δ’ εἶ τίς, ἥτις τοὐμὸν ᾤκτιρας πάθος; fr. 127.2 N2 Ηχ. Ἠχώ, λόγων ἀντῳδὸς ἐπικοκκάστρια, ἥπερ πέρυσιν ἐν τῷδε ταὐτῷ χωρίῳ Εὐριπίδῃ καὐτὴ ξυνηγωνιζόμην. ἀλλ’, ὦ τέκνον, σὲ μὲν τὸ σαυτῆς χρὴ ποιεῖν, κλαίειν ἐλεινῶς. Κη. σὲ δ’ ἐπικλαίειν ὕστερον. (1063, bis) Ηχ. ἐμοὶ μελήσει ταῦτά γ’. ἀλλ’ ἄρχου λόγων. (1064) Κη. ὦ νὺξ ἱερά, (1065) fr. 114 ὡς μακρὸν ἵππευμα διώκεις

Paratragic Fragmentation and Patchwork-Citation as Comic Aesthetics  

ἀστεροειδέα νῶτα διφρεύουσ’ αἰθέρος ἱερᾶς τοῦ σεμνοτάτου δι’ Ὀλύμπου. Ηχ. δι’ Ὀλύμπου. (1070) Κη. τί ποτ’ Ἀνδρομέδα περίαλλα κακῶν (1070) μέρος ἐξέλαχον—

shift into Echo’s rap Ηχ. μέρος ἐξέλαχον— (1071, bis) Κη. θανάτου τλήμων— (1072) Ηχ. θανάτου τλήμων— (1072, bis) Κη. ἀπολεῖς μ’, ὦ γραῦ, στωμυλλομένη. (1073) babble Ηχ. στωμυλλομένη. Κη. νὴ Δί’ ὀχληρά γ’ εἰσήρρηκας (1075) λίαν. Ηχ. λίαν. (1076, bis) Κη. ὦγάθ’, ἔασόν με μονῳδῆσαι, (1077) καὶ χαριεῖ μοι. παῦσαι. Ηχ. παῦσαι. (1078, bis) Κη. βάλλ’ ἐς κόρακας. (1079) Ηχ. βάλλ’ ἐς κόρακας. (1079, bis) Κη. τί κακόν; (1080) Ηχ. τί κακόν; (1080, bis) Κη. ληρεῖς. (1080, ter) Ηχ. ληρεῖς. Κη. οἴμωζ’. (1081–82) Ηχ. οἴμωζ’. (1081–82, bis) Κη. ὀτότυζ’. (1081–82, ter) Ηχ. ὀτότυζ’. (1081–82, quat) Το. οὖτος, τί λαλῖς; (1083) Ηχ. οὖτος, τί λαλῖς; (1083, bis) Το. πρυτάνεις καλέσω. (1084) Ηχ. πρυτάνεις καλέσω. (1084, bis) Το. τί κακόν; (1085) Ηχ. τί κακόν; (1085, bis) Το. πῶτε τὸ πωνή; (1086) Ηχ. πῶτε τὸ πωνή; (1086, bis) Το. σὺ λαλῖς; (1087) Ηχ. σὺ λαλῖς; (1087, bis) Το. κλαύσαι. (1088) Ηχ. κλαύσαι. (1088, bis)

fr. 115 discourse in fragmentation and repetition: suspension of truth, new truth mutual suspension: absurdity ROLE

End of cooperation Old WOMAN –> – comic mockery: sincerity of discourse subverted

Metatheater: monody: let me sing! Stop and Pauson (949) Disorientation

Ευ. ὦ θεοί, τίν’ ἐς γῆν βαρβάρων ἀφίγμεθα fr. 124 ταχεῖ πεδίλῳ; διὰ μέσου γὰρ αἰθέρος τέμνων κέλευθον πόδα τίθημ’ ὑπόπτερον (1100) Περσεὺς πρὸς Ἄργος ναυστολῶν, τὸ Γοργόνος fr. 123 N2 = 124.5 κάρα κομίζων. Το. τί λέγι; τὴ Γόργος πέρι (1102, bis) τὸ γραμματέο σὺ τὴ κεπαλή; (1103) writer – literacy/orality Ευ. τὴν Γοργόνος (1103, bis) ἔγωγε φημί. (1104) Το. Γόργο τοι κἀγὼ λέγι. (1104, bis) Ευ. ἔα· τιν’ ὄχθον τόνδ’ ὁρῶ καὶ παρθένον (1105) fr. 125 θεαῖς ὁμοίαν ναῦν ὅπως ὡρμισμένην; Κη. ὦ ξένε, κατοίκτιρόν με τὴν παναθλίαν, fr. 128 λῦσόν με δεσμῶν. fr. 129a Το. οὐκὶ μὴ λαλῆσι σύ; (1108, bis) //Interruption: babble κατάρατο, τολμᾷς ἀποτανουμένη λαλῆς; (1109) Ευ. ὦ παρθέν’, οἰκτίρω σε κρεμαμένην ὁρῶν. (1110) fr. 127 Το. οὐ παρτέν’ ἐστίν, ἀλλ’ ἀμαρτωλὴ γέρων καὶ κλέπτο καὶ πανοῦργο. Ευ. ληρεῖς, ὦ Σκύθα. (1112, bis) αὕτη γάρ ἐστιν Ἀνδρομέδα, παῖς Κηφέως. (1113) Το. σκέψαι τὸ κύστο· μή τι μικρὸν παίνεται; Sex: female/male Ευ. φέρε δεῦρό μοι τὴν χεῖρ’, ἵν’ ἅψωμαι κόρης· (1115) φέρε, Σκύθ’· ἀνθρώποισι γὰρ νοσήματα ἅπασίν ἐστιν· ἐμὲ δὲ καὐτὸν τῆς κόρης ταύτης ἔρως εἵληφεν. cf. fr. 136ff. Το. οὐ ζηλῶσί σε· (1118, bis) ἀτὰρ εἰ τὸ πρωκτὸ δεῦρο περιεστραμμένον, (1119) οὐκ ἐπτόνησά σ’ αὐτὸ πυγίζεις ἄγων. (1120) Ευ. τί δ’ οὐκ ἐᾷς λύσαντά μ’ αὐτήν, ὦ Σκύθα, πεσεῖν ἐς εὐνὴν καὶ γαμήλιον λέχος; cf. fr. 137 and 132 Το. εἰ σπόδρ’ ἐπιτυμεῖς τὴ γέροντο πύγισο, τὴ σανίδο τρήσας ἐξόπιστο πρώκτισον.

Paratragic Fragmentation and Patchwork-Citation as Comic Aesthetics  

Ευ. μὰ Δί’, ἀλλὰ λύσω δεσμά. (1125) Το. μαστιγῶσ’ ἄρα. (1125, bis) Ευ. καὶ μὴν ποιήσω τοῦτο. (1126) Το. τὸ κεπαλή σ’ ἄρα (1126, bis) τὸ ξιπομάκαιραν ἀποκεκόψι τουτοΐ. (1127) Ευ. αἰαῖ· τί δράσω; πρὸς τίνας στρεφθῶ λόγους; fr. 139 Ν2 ἀλλ’ οὐκ ἂν δέξαιτο βάρβαρος φύσις. σκαιοῖσι γάρ τοι καινὰ προσφέρων σοφὰ (1130) μάτην ἀναλίσκοις ἄν. ἀλλ’ ἄλλην τινὰ cf. 140.2 μέγα φρονοῦσι δ’ οἱ λόγοι τούτῳ πρέπουσαν μηχανὴν προσοιστέον. Το. μιαρὸς ἀλώπηξ, οἶον ἐπιτήκιζί μοι. Κη. μέμνησο, Περσεῦ, μ’ ὡς καταλείπεις ἀθλίαν. Το. ἔτι γὰρ σὺ τὴ μάστιγαν ἐπιτυμεῖς λαβεῖν;

2.2 Text of Eur. Andromeda fr. 114–156 K (with N2) (114.) ΑΝΔΡ. Ὦ νὺξ ἱερά, ὡς μακρὸν ἵππευμα διώκεις ἀστεροειδέα νῶτα διφρεύου– σ’ αἰθέρος ἱερᾶς τοῦ σεμνοτάτου δι’ Ὀλύμπου. (5) ΗΧΩ δι’ Ὀλύμπου [(114a. N2-Sn.)] (115.) ΑΝΔΡ. τί ποτ’ Ἀνδρομέδα περίαλλα κακῶν μέρος ἐξέλαχον, θανάτου τλήμων μέλλουσα τυχεῖν; (115a. = 121 N2) ἐκθεῖναι κήτει φορβάν (116.) ποῖαι λιβάδες, ποία σειρήν (117.) ΑΝΔΡ. ad Chorum φίλαι παρθένοι, φίλαι μοι (118.) ΑΝΔΡ. κλύεις, ὤ; προσαυδῶ σὲ τὰν ἐν ἄντροις, ἀπόπαυσον, ἔασον Ἀχοῖ με σὺν φίλαις γόου πόθον (κόρον Ν2) λαβεῖν. (119. + 120.) ΑΝΔΡ. συνάλγησον, ὡς ὁ κάμ⌋νων δακρύων μεταδοὺς ἔ⌋χει κουφότητα μόχθ⌋ων. ΧΟΡ. ἄνοικτος ὃς τεκ⌋ὼν σὲ τὰν πολυπονωτάτα⌋ν βροτῶν μεθῆκεν Ἅιδᾳ πάτρας ὑπερ⌊θανεῖν … … … … … …

Ar. Thesm. 1065–1069a

1056–81/82

1070–73 1033 1015 1018–1019

1022–1023

1015–1055

  Anton Bierl … (120a.) … … … … … … (121. N2 = 115a.) ἐκθεῖναι κήτει φορβάν 1033 (122.) Ar. Thesm. 1029–1042 ΑΝΔΡ. ὁρᾷς; οὐ χοροῖσιν οὐ– (1029) δ’ ὑφ’ ἡλίκων νεανίδων (1030) κημὸν ἕστηκ’ ἔχου– σ’, ἀλλ’ ἐν πυκνοῖς δεσμοῖσιν ἐμπεπλεγμένη κήτει βορὰ Γλαυκέτῃ πρόκειμαι. γαμηλίῳ μὲν οὐ ξὺν παιῶνι, δεσμίῳ δέ, (1035) γοᾶσθέ μ’, ὦ γυναῖκες, ὡς μέλεα μὲν πέπονθα μέλεος, – ὦ τάλας ἐγὼ τάλας –, ἀπὸ δὲ συγγόνων †ἀλλὰν† ἄνομα πάθεα, φῶτά τε λιτομένα, (1040) πολυδάκρυτον Ἀίδα γόον φλέγουσαν – αἰαῖ αἰαῖ ἒ ἔ – * * * (123. N2 = 124.5 sq.) Περσεὺς πρὸς Ἄργος ναυστολῶν τὸ Γοργόνος 1101–1102 κάρα κομίζων (124. (124 + Tr. Adesp. 157 + 123 N2) ΠΕΡΣ. ὦ θεοί, τίν’ εἰς γῆν βαρβάρων ἀφίγμεθα ταχεῖ πεδίλῳ; διὰ μέσου γὰρ αἰθέρος τέμνων κέλευθον πόδα τίθημ’ ὑπόπτερον. ὑπέρ τε πόντον χεῦμ’ ὑπέρ τε Πλειάδα 1101–1102 Περσεὺς πρὸς Ἄργος ναυστολῶν τὸ Γοργόνος κάρα κομίζων (125.) ΠΕΡΣ. ἔα, τίν’ ὄχθον τόνδ’ ὁρῶ περίρρυτον 1105–1106 ἀφρῷ θαλάσσης παρθένου τ’ εἰκώ τινα ἐξ αὐτομόρφων λαΐνων τυκισμάτων σοφῆς ἄγαλμα χειρός; (126.) σιγᾷς· σιωπὴ δ’ ἄπορος ἑρμηνεὺς λόγων. (127.) ΠΕΡΣ. ὦ παρθέν’, οἰκτίρω σε κρεμαμένην ὁρῶν. 1110 (128.) ΑΝΔΡ. ὦ ξένε, κατοίκτιρόν με τὴν παναθλίαν 1107–1108 (129.) ΠΕΡΣ. ὦ παρθέν’, εἰ σῴσαιμί σ’, εἴσῃ μοι χάριν; (129a. = 132 N2) ΑΝΔΡ. ἄγου δέ μ’, ὦ ξέν’, εἴτε πρόσπολον θέλεις εἴτ’ ἄλοχον εἴτε δμωίδ’ . . . . .

1098–1135

Paratragic Fragmentation and Patchwork-Citation as Comic Aesthetics  

ὦ ξένε, κατοίκτιρόν με τὴν παναθλίαν, λῦσόν με δεσμῶν.

1107–1108

(130.) ΠΕΡΣ. τὰς συμφορὰς γὰρ τῶν κακῶς πεπραγότων οὐπώποθ’ ὕβρισ’, αὐτὸς ὀρρωδῶν παθεῖν. (131.) ΑΝΔΡ. μή μοι προτείνων ἐλπίδ’ ἐξάγου δάκρυ. γένοιτό τἂν πόλλ’ ὧν δόκησις οὐκ ἔνι. [(132. N2 = 129a ) ἄγου δέ μ’, ὦ ξεῖν’, εἴτε πρόσπολον θέλεις εἴτ’ ἄλοχον εἴτε δμωίδ’ . . . . .

ὦ ξένε, κατοίκτιρόν με τὴν παναθλίαν, λῦσόν με δεσμῶν.

1107–1108]

(133.) ἀλλ’ ἡδύ τοι σωθέντα μεμνῆσθαι πόνων. (134.) εὔκλειαν ἔλαβον οὐκ ἄνευ πολλῶν πόνων. (134a. = 149 N2) νεότης μ’ ἐπῆρε καὶ θράσος τοῦ νοῦ πλέον. (135.) ἦ που τὸ μέλλον ἐκφοβεῖ καθ’ ἡμέραν· ὡς τοῦ γε πάσχειν τοὐπιὸν μεῖζον κακόν. (136.) ΠΕΡΣ. σὺ δ’ ὦ θεῶν τύραννε κἀνθρώπων Ἔρως, 1115ff. ἢ μὴ δίδασκε τὰ καλὰ φαίνεσθαι καλά, ἢ τοῖς ἐρῶσιν, ὧν σὺ δημιουργὸς εἶ μοχθοῦσι μόχθους, εὐτυχῶς συνεκπόνει. καὶ ταῦτα μὲν δρῶν τίμιος †θεοῖς† ἔσῃ, (5) μὴ δρῶν δ’ ὑπ’ αὐτοῦ τοῦ διδάσκεσθαι φιλεῖν ἀφαιρεθήσῃ χάριτας αἷς τιμῶσί σε. (137.) ΧΟΡ. τῶν γὰρ πλούτων ὅδ’ ἄριστος γενναῖον λέχος εὑρεῖν. 1122 (138.) ὅσοι γὰρ εἰς ἔρωτα πίπτουσιν βροτῶν, ἐσθλῶν ὅταν τύχωσι τῶν ἐρωμένων, οὐκ ἔσθ’ ὁποίας λείπεται τόδ’ ἡδονῆς. (138a. = 1054 N2) ἔρωτα δεινὸν ἔχομεν· ἐκ δὲ τῶν λόγων ἑλοῦ τὰ βέλτισθ’· ὡς ἄπιστόν ἐστ’ ἔρως, κἀν τῷ κακίστῳ τῶν φρενῶν οἰκεῖν φιλεῖ. [(139. N2) αἰαῖ, τί δράσω; πρὸς τίνας στρεφθῶ λόγους;1128–1129 ἀλλ’ οὐκ ἂν ἐνδέξαιτο βάρβαρος φύσις.] (140.) ὦ τλῆμον, ὡς σοὶ τὰς τύχας μὲν ἀσθενεῖς ἔδωχ’ ὁ δαίμων, μέγα φρονοῦσι δ’ οἱ λόγοι. (141.) ἐγὼ δὲ παῖδας οὐκ ἐῶ νόθους λαβεῖν· τῶν γνησίων γὰρ οὐδὲν ὄντες ἐνδεεῖς νόμῳ νοσοῦσιν· ὅ σε φυλάξασθαι χρεών. (142.) χρυσὸν μάλιστα βούλομαι δόμοις ἔχειν· καὶ δοῦλος ὢν γὰρ τίμιος πλουτῶν ἀνήρ, ἐλεύθερος δὲ χρεῖος ὢν οὐδὲν σθένει. χρυσοῦ νόμιζε σαυτὸν εἵνεκ’ εὐτυχεῖν. (143.) χρήμασιν γὰρ εὐτυχῶ·

  Anton Bierl ταῖς συμφοραῖσι δ’, ὡς ὁρᾷς, οὐκ εὐτυχῶ. (*144.) μὴ τὸν ἐμὸν οἴκει νοῦν· ἐγὼ γὰρ ἀρκέσω. (145.) ὁρῶ δὲ πρὸς τὰ παρθένου θοινάματα κῆτος θοάζον ἐξ Ἀτλαντικῆς ἁλός. (146.) πᾶς δὲ ποιμένων ἔρρει λεώς, ὃ μὲν γάλακτος κίσσινον φέρων σκύφος πόνων ἀναψυκτῆρ’, ὃ δ’ ἀμπέλων γάνος. (147.) οἱ κατ’ οἶκον ἀμφὶ δαῖτα καὶ τράπεζαν Αἰθίοπες (148.) τέλειος (κρατήρ) (149. = 134a.) νεότης μ’ ἐπῆρε καὶ θράσος τοῦ νοῦ πλέον. (150.) οὐκ ἔστιν ὅστις εὐτυχὴς ἔφυ βροτῶν, †ὃν μὴ τὸ θεῖον ὡς τὰ πολλὰ συνθέλει† (151.) τήν τοι Δίκην λέγουσι παῖδ’ εἶναι Διὸς ἐγγύς τε ναίειν τῆς βροτῶν ἁμαρτίας. (152.) ΧΟΡ. ... τὸ δαιμόνιον οὐχ ὁρᾷς ὅπῃ μοίρα⟨ς⟩ διεξέρχεται; στρέφει δ’ ἄλλους ἄλλως εἰς ἁμέραν. (153.) ΧΟΡ. ὃ μὲν ὄλβιος ἦν· τὸ δ’ ἀπέκρυψεν θεὸς ἐ⟨κ⟩ κείνων τῶν ποτε λαμπρῶν. νεύει βίοτος, νεύει δὲ τύχη κατὰ πνεῦμ’ ἀνέμων. (154.) τὸ ζῆν ἀφέντες τὸ κατὰ γῆς τιμῶσί σου – κενόν γ’· ὅταν γὰρ ζῇ τις †εὐτυχεῖ κρεών† (155.) ἀγρεύματα (155a. = 1096 N2) ἀμβλωπὸς ὄψις (156.) ἀμείβεται

Bibliography Alexiou, M. (1974), The Ritual Lament in Greek Tradition, Cambridge [20022]. Austin, C./Olson, S.D. (eds) (2004), Aristophanes. Thesmophoriazusae, edited with introduction and commentary, Oxford. Bierl, A. (2007a), “Literatur und Religion als Rito- und Mythopoetik. Überblicksartikel zu einem neuen Ansatz in der Klassischen Philologie”, in: A. Bierl/R. Lämmle/K. Wesselmann (eds), Literatur und Religion. Wege zu einer mythisch-rituellen Poetik bei den Griechen, I, Berlin/ New York, 1–76. Bierl, A. (2007b), “Mysterien der Liebe und die Initiation Jugendlicher. Literatur und Religion im griechischen Roman”, in: A. Bierl/R. Lämmle/K. Wesselmann (eds), Literatur und Religion. Wege zu einer mythisch-rituellen Poetik bei den Griechen, II, Berlin/ New York, 239–334. Bierl, A. (2009), Ritual and Performativity. The Chorus in Old Comedy, trans. by A. Hollmann, Hellenic Studies 20, Cambridge, MA/London (German original: Der Chor in der Alten Komödie. Ritual und Performativität (unter besonderer Berücksichtigung von Aristophanes’ Thesmophoriazusen und der Phalloslieder fr. 851 PMG), Munich/Leipzig 2001).

Paratragic Fragmentation and Patchwork-Citation as Comic Aesthetics  

Bierl, A./Lämmle, R./Wesselmann, K. (eds), Literatur und Religion. Wege zu einer mythisch-rituellen Poetik bei den Griechen, I-II, Berlin/New York. Bowie, A.M. (1993), Aristophanes. Myth, Ritual and Comedy, Cambridge. Brelich, A. (1969), Paides e Parthenoi, I, Rome. Bremmer, J. (1994), Greek Religion, Greece & Rome: New Surveys in the Classics 24, Oxford. Bubel, F. (ed.) (1991), Euripides, Andromeda. Palingenesia 34, Stuttgart. Burkert, W. (1992), The Orientalizing Revolution. Near Eastern Influence on Greek Culture in the Early Archaic Age, trans. by M.E. Pinder/W. Burkert, Cambridge, MA. Calame, Cl. (1977), Les chœurs de jeunes filles en Grèce archaïque, I. Filologia e critica 20, Rome. Calame, Cl. (1997), Choruses of Young Women in Ancient Greece. Their Morphology, Religious Role, and Social Function, trans. D. Collins/J. Orion, Lanham, MD. Collard, C./Cropp, M.J./Gibert, J. (eds) (2004), Euripides. Selected Fragmentary Plays, II, Oxford. Des Bouvrie, S. (1990), Women in Greek Tragedy. An Anthropological Approach, Symbolae Osloenses supplement 27, Oslo. Foley, H.P. (1992), “Anodos Dramas: Euripides’ Alcestis and Helen”, in: R. Hexter/D. Selden (eds), Innovations of Antiquity, New York, 133–160 (= Foley, Female Acts in Greek Tragedy, Princeton 2001, 301–332). Gilula, D. (1996), “A Singularly Gifted Actor (Ar. Th. 1056–1096)”, Quaderni di Storia 44, 159– 164. Guépin, J.P. (1968), The Tragic Paradox. Myth and Ritual in Greek Tragedy, Amsterdam. Hall, E.M. (1989), “The Archer Scene in Aristophanes’ Thesmophoriazusae”, Philologus 133, 38–54. Hansen, H. (1976), “Aristophanes’ Thesmophoriazusae: Theme, Structure, and Production”, Philologus 120, 165–185. Hartwig, A. (2009), “A Double Echo? Problems in the Echo Scene of Aristophanes’ Thesmophoriazusae”, Seminari Romani di Cultura Greca 12, 61–84. Heath, M. (1987), Political Comedy in Aristophanes. Hypomnemata 87, Göttingen. Jouan, F./Van Looy, H. (eds) (1998), Euripide, VIII. Fragments 1: Aigeus-Autolykos, Paris. Kannicht, R. (ed.) (1969), Euripides. Helena, I, Heidelberg. Käppel, L. (1992), Paian. Studien zur Geschichte einer Gattung, Berlin. Klimek-Winter, R. (1993), Andromedatragödien. Sophokles, Euripides, Livius Andronikos, Ennius, Accius. Text, Einleitung und Kommentar, Stuttgart. Kornarou, E. (2006/07), “Inlaw’s Monody in Aristophanes’ Thesmophoriazusae 1015–55”, Eranos 104, 93–104. Luppi, V. (2011a), Forme di una poetica mitico-rituale nell’Elena di Euripide, Diss. Basel. Luppi, V. (2011b), “La doppia identità di Elena nell’ononima tragedia di Euripide”, QUCC 98.2, 11–20. Major, W.E. (2013), “Staging Andromeda in Euripides and Aristophanes”, CJ 108, 385–403. Mastromarco, G. (2008), “La parodia dell’Andromeda euripidea nelle Tesmoforiazuse di Aristofane”, Cuadernos de filologia clásica (G): Estudios griegos e indoeuropeos 18, 177– 188. Mitsdörffer, W. (1954), “Das Mnesilochoslied in Aristophanes’ Thesmophoriazusen”, Philologus 98, 59–93. Moreau, A. (1992), “Initiation en Grèce antique”, Dialogue d’Histoire Ancienne 18.1, 191–244.

  Anton Bierl Mureddu, P. (1987), “Un caso singolare di ‘teatro nel teatro’: La scena di Eco nelle Tesmoforiazuse”, Annali della Facoltà di Lettere e Filosofia dell’Università di Cagliari 6 [1985], 15– 22. Nagy, G. (2013), The Ancient Greek Hero in 24 Hours, Cambridge, MA. Nancy, J.-L. (1993), “L’art, fragment”, Lignes 18/1, 151–173.
 Nieddu, G.F. (2004), “A Poet at Work: The Parody of Helen in the Thesmophoriazusae”, GRBS 44, 331–360. Padilla, M.W. (ed.) (1999), Rites of Passage in Ancient Greece. Literature, Religion, Society, Lewisburg, PA. Pagano, V. (ed.) (2011), L’Andromeda di Euripide, edizione e commento dei frammenti, Turin. Parker, L.P.E. (1997), The Songs of Aristophanes, Oxford. Prato, C. (ed.) (2001), Le donne alle Tesmoforie. Traduzione di Dario Del Corno, Milan. Rau, P. (1967), Paratragodia. Untersuchung einer komischen Form des Aristophanes. Zetemata 45, München 1967 Rehm, R. (1994), Marriage to Death. The Conflation of Wedding and Funeral Rituals in Greek Tragedy, Princeton. Robinson, D.B. (1979), “Helen and Persephone, Sparta and Demeter. The ‘Demeter Ode’ in Euripides’ Helen”, in: G.W. Bowersock/W. Burkert/M.C.J. Putnam (eds), Arktouros. Hellenic Studies Presented to Bernard M.W. Knox on the Occasion of His 65th Birthday, Berlin, 162–172. Saetta Cottone, R. (ed.) (2016), Aristophane. Les Thesmophories ou La fête des femmes, Paris. Seaford, R. (1987), “The Tragic Wedding”, Journal of Hellenic Studies 107, 106–130. Sier, K. (1992), “Die Rolle des Skythen in den Thesmophoriazusen des Aristophanes”, in: C.W. Müller/K. Sier/J. Werner (eds), Zum Umgang mit fremden Sprachen in der griechisch-römischen Antike. Palingenesia 36, Stuttgart, 63–83. Sommerstein, A.H. (1994), Thesmophoriazusae. Comedies of Aristophanes 8, Warminster. Swift, L.A. (2009), “How to Make a Goddess Angry: Making Sense of the Demeter Ode in Euripides’ Helen”, CPh 104, 418–438. Swift, L.A. (2010), The Hidden Chorus. Echoes of Genre in Tragic Lyric, Oxford. Turner, V. (1967), The Forest of Symbols. Aspects of Ndembu Ritual, Ithaca. Tzanetou, A. (2002), “Something to Do with Demeter: Ritual and Performance in Aristophanes’ Women at the Thesmophoria”, AJPh 123, 329–367. van Gennep, A. (1909), Les rites de passage. Étude systematique des rites, Paris. Versnel, H.S. (1993), Inconsistencies in Greek and Roman Religion, II: Transition and Reversal in Myth and Ritual. Studies in Greek and Roman Religion 6.II, Leiden. Voelke, P. (1996), “Beauté d’Hélène et rituels féminins dans l’Hélène d’Euripide”, Kernos 9, 281–296. Wolff, C. (1973), “On Euripides’ Helen”, Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 77, 61–84. Wright, M. (2005), Euripides’ Escape-Tragedies. A Study of Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia among the Taurians, Oxford. Zeitlin, F.I. (1981), “Travesties of Gender and Genre in Aristophanes’ Thesmophoriazousae”, in: H.P. Foley (ed.), Reflections of Women in Antiquity, New York, 169–217 (= Zeitlin, Playing the Other. Gender and Society in Classical Greek Literature, Chicago 1996, 375–416). Zimmermann, B. (1985), Untersuchungen zur Form und dramatischen Technik der Aristophanischen Komödien, II: Die anderen lyrischen Partien, Königstein. Zweig, B. (1999), “Euripides’ Helen and Female Rites of Passage”, in: M.W. Padilla (ed.) Rites of Passage in Ancient Greece. Literature, Religion, Society, Lewisburg, PA, 158–180.

Christian Orth

Fragmentary Comedy and the Evidence of Vase-Painting: Euripidean Parody in Aristophanes’ Anagyros  Textual evidence The Anagyros is one of Aristophanes’ better attested fragmentary plays. What makes it a particularly interesting object of study is the unusual variety of different sources that combine to form a complex (although far from complete) picture. Besides the title and 26 fragments from indirect tradition, there are two further pieces of textual evidence that are likely to be connected (in some way or other) with this play: The first of these is two versions of the legend of Anagyros, the eponymous hero of the Attic deme Anagyrous. The second is a papyrus containing parts of a commentary on (in the preserved part) the parabasis of a play of Aristophanes, which by an overlap between one of the lemmata in the commentary and one of the fragments from indirect tradition can probably be identified with the Anagyros. The single pieces of evidence for this play may conveniently be divided into (1) elements that are likely to be connected to the plot, and (2) elements that are likely not to be part of the plot. To this second category belong the two Eupolidean verses (fr. 58 K–A und fr. 59 K–A), the above-mentioned papyrus fragments of a commentary, and other fragments that present interesting links to some of the lemmata in the papyrus commentary. Since these elements not only show Aristophanes’ reflection on his own poetry and his rivals, but are also particularly interesting for dating this play, they shall be discussed here first. Fr. 58 K–A ἐκ δὲ τῆς ἐμῆς χλανίδος τρεῖς ἁπληγίδας ποιῶν (“from my cloak making three tunics” [transl. J. Henderson]) is generally taken to be an accusation of plagiarism (or, perhaps better, derivativeness 1 combined with inferior quality) directed against Eupolis, and this seems likely in view of Ar. Nub. 553–554 Εὔπολις μὲν τὸν Μαρικᾶν πρώτιστον παρείλκυσεν / ἐκστρέψας τοὺς ἡμετέρους Ἱππέας

 I am grateful to Eric Csapo for his generous help and valuable comments on an earlier version of this paper, and to James Fraser (Nicholson Museum, Sydney) for the permission to publish an image of the Lucanian bell krater NM2013.2.  1 Cf. Halliwell 2015, 237. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-026

  Christian Orth κακὸς κακῶς, “First of all Eupolis hauled his Maricas on to the stage, serving a vile rehash of 2 my Knights like the vile fellow he is” (transl. A.H. Sommerstein), with a similar metaphor from clothing, and in the same metre, and other evidence for an intense debate between Aristophanes and Eupolis about the originality of their comedies. 3 While the χλανίς can most easily be identified with the Knights, there has been much debate on the identity of the three ἁπληγίδες (a good possibility would be Eupolis’ Chrysoun genos, Marikas and Poleis, which all have elements in common with the Knights). 4 More difficult is the interpretation of fr. 59 ἀλλὰ πάντας χρὴ παραλοῦσθαι καὶ τοὺς σπόγγους ἐᾶν (“but everyone should bathe together 5 and let the sponges be” [transl. J. Henderson]), which has been understood either (as suggested by the citation context in Photius and the Suda) as a political statement about the relationship between the rich and the poor, or as another comment on plagiarism directed against Aristophanes’ rivals. Both fragments are Eupolidean verses and were generally (on the grounds of both metre and content) assigned to the main part of the parabasis, which is, in Aristophanes, usually in anapaestic tetrameters, but in the preserved second version of his Clouds in Eupolideans. There is now, however, strong evidence against this view. In 1968, Edgar Lobel published a papyrus (P.Oxy. 2737 = Ar. fr. 590) with remains of a commentary on a play by Aristophanes, 6 whose preserved part deals with a parabasis, all the regular parts of which can be found in the lemmata (main part in anapaestic tetrameters, ode, epirrhema in trochaic tetrameters, antode, antepirrhema in trochaic tetrameters). That the play in question is the Anagyros (as proposed by Hofmann 1970), can be concluded from an overlap of one of the lemmata (line 33–35 τήν[δ’ ἕωλον ἀναβε-]/βραγμένην· διαλελυμ[ένην / εἶτα νε-

 2 Literally, “turning inside out” (ἐκστρέψας), like a garment (cf. Schol. Ar. Nub. 88a,2–3). 3 Cf. Eup. fr. 89 (from Baptai) †κἀκεῖνος† τοὺς Ἱππέας / ξυνεποίησα τῷ φαλακρῷ ⟨ ⟩ κἀδωρησάμην („†and that man† his Knights I helped the bald guy compose ⟨ ⟩ and I made him a gift of it“, transl. S.D. Olson) with Olson 2017, 273–276, and see in general Kyriakidi 2007, 110–114. 4 Orth 2017a, 316–317, taking up a suggestion by Kyriakidi 2007, 178–184, who, however, takes χλανίς to refer not to a single play of Aristophanes, but his attacks against Cleon in general. But if the three ἁπληγίδες are three plays by Eupolis, the image would be more effective if χλανίς also referred to a single play by Aristophanes (suggesting that Eupolis, by making three bad plays out of one good, not only takes over Aristophanes’ ideas but also regards the ideas of one Aristophanic play as sufficient for three plays of his own). 5 The exact meaning of παρακαλοῦσθαι is unclear, and it may well mean “bathe in the (used) water of others” (cf. Orth 2017a, 323–329, 330). 6 That the poet in question is Aristophanes, is clear from line 19 π]ροείρηται ἐν Ἱππεῦσι (probably a reference to a commentary to Aristophanes’ Knights by the same author, who seems to have commented on several — or even all — plays by Aristophanes; cf. Montana 2012, 169).

Fragmentary Comedy and the Evidence of Vase-Painting  

ναγμένην πάλι[ν]) and fr. 51 K–A τήνδ’ ἕωλον ἀναβεβρασμένην (quoted by Photius α 1404 for ἀναβεβρασμένη meaning ἀνακεκινημένη) from that play, 7 and is further supported by the similar imagery in ll. 6–10 of the papyrus and fr. 59 K–A. and the interesting connections between ll. 19–27 of the papyrus and fr. 62 K–A. 8 If the attribution of the papyrus commentary to the Anagyros is correct, it follows that fr. 58 and 59 from that play cannot come from the main parabasis, which had, as we now know, its main part in anapaestic tetrameters; it would, however, be quite possible, that they belong to a second parabasis, 9 which in this case would have presented thematic links to the main parabasis. The Anagyros is usually dated to about 418 or 417 BC, and although the evidence is not really conclusive, there are several hints that support such a date: 10 fr. 58 with the accusation of plagiarism or derivativeness directed against a rival in Eupolidean verses has its closest parallel in the second version of Clouds (both for the content and for the use of the metre), and if the target is Eupolis, and one of the plays hinted at here is the Marikas (performed at the Lenaea 421 BC), the possible date range for the Anagyros is limited (by the known dates of Aristophanes’ other plays and the probable date of Eupolis’ death in 411 BC) to 420–415 or 413–412 BC. If the Anagyros is also the play commented on in the papyrus commentary Ar. fr. 590, it follows that it had a complete parabasis with all its parts (which, in Aristophanes’ extant plays, is found for the last time in Birds, where it has lost, however, its personal content with direct reference to the poet himself that is still visible in the papyrus); this seems to confirm independently the date suggested by the attack against Eupolis in fr. 58. The allusion to the inn-keeper Perdix in fr. 57 (also mentioned in the Birds) and several close parallels to the second Clouds (to which we will return later) strengthen the case for a date not long before 414 BC and close to the second Clouds. 11 The papyrus may even contain an indication of a precise date of 417 BC, but this is for several reasons uncertain. 12

 7 On the orthographical/morphological variants -βεβραγμένην (papyrus) and -βεβρασμένην (Photius) cf. Orth 2017a, 277 with note 139. 8 Cf. Orth 2017a, 338–341. 9 In any case, the one known certain example where Eupolideans are used in the main parabasis (in Aristophanes’ second Clouds) does not prove that the same metre could not have been used also in the epirrhemata of a second parabasis; for detailed discussion see Orth 2017a, 317–318. 10 Cf. Orth 2017a, 233–236. 11 For the date of the second version of Clouds (c.419–416 BC) cf. (with further literature) Sommerstein 2001, 250. 12 Cf. Orth 2017a, 235–236.

  Christian Orth The evidence discussed so far helps to contextualize the Anagyros in the particularly competitive environment of the the early 410s BC with the rivalry of Aristophanes and Eupolis, but does not yet tell us anything about the plot, or even the subject matter, of the play. For this, the most important single piece of evidence is the title. ἀνάγυρος is (1) the name of a plant, the Stinking Bean Trefoil (Anagyris foetida) which emits, when rubbed, a bad smell, and (2) the name of the eponymous hero of the Attic deme Ἀναγυροῦς (named after the plant). Aristophanes alludes to the bad smell of the plant (and a proverb κινεῖς τὸν ἀνάγυρον derived from it) in the Lysistrata (67–68 πόθεν εἰσίν; :: Ἀναγυρουντόθεν. :: νὴ τὸν Δία· / ὁ γοῦν ἀνάγυρός μοι κεκινῆσθαι δοκεῖ), and it can not be excluded a priori that the title of the Anagyros, too, refers directly to the plant (although it is not easy to see how it could be made the subject of a whole comedy). On the other hand, the eponymous hero of the deme Anagyrous is the subject of an interesting local legend preserved in two variants in lexicographical and paroemiographical sources: Tab. 4: The legend of Anagyros Phot. α ,– = Sud. α ,– (= Paus. att. α  Erbse)

Prov. Coisl.  p.  Gaisford

Ἀναγυράσιος δαίμων: ἐπεὶ τὸν παροικοῦντα πρεσβύτην καὶ ἐκτέμνοντα τὸ ἄλσος ἐτιμωρήσατο Ἀνάγυρος ἥρως. Ἀναγυράσιοι δὲ δῆμος τῆς Ἀττικῆς. τούτου δέ τις ἐξέκοψε τὸ ἄλσος. ὁ δὲ τῷ υἱῷ αὐτοῦ ἐπέμηνε τὴν παλλακήν, ἥτις μὴ δυναμένη συμπεῖσαι τὸν παῖδα διέβαλεν ὡς ἀσελγῆ τῷ πατρί. ὁ δὲ ἐπήρωσεν αὐτὸν καὶ ἐγκατῳκοδόμησεν. ἐπὶ τούτοις καὶ ὁ πατὴρ ἑαυτὸν ἀνήρτησεν, ἡ δὲ παλλακὴ εἰς φρέαρ ἑαυτὴν ἔρριψεν. ἱστορεῖ δὲ Ἱερώνυμος ἐν τῷ Περὶ τραγῳδιοποιῶν (fr.  Wehrli = a White) ἀπεικάζων τούτοις τὸν Εὐριπίδου Φοίνικα.

Ἀναγυράσιος δαίμων: ὅταν χαλεπή τις τύχη καὶ πονηρὰ δυστυχία κατασείσῃ πᾶσαν οἰκίαν ἀλλεπαλλήλοις δεινοῖς, ἡ παροιμία λέγεται. φασὶ γὰρ γενέσθαι τινὰ γεωργὸν ἐν τῷ Ἀναγυρασίων δήμῳ, αἰτίαν ἔχοντα ἐξυβρίζειν εἰς τὸν πλησίον ἱδρυμένον βωμόν· διὸ συμφοραῖς τὸν ἄνθρωπον δειναῖς περιπεσεῖν· πρῶτον μὲν γὰρ †ἀπέλαβε† (fort. ἀπέβαλε) τὴν γυναῖκα, ἐξ ἧς αὐτῷ παῖς ἐγεγόνει· εἶτα τὸν υἱὸν ἐπήρωσε διαβολῇ πλαστῇ τῆς μητρυιᾶς χρησάμενος· καὶ λαβὼν αὐτὸν ἀνεβίβασεν εἰς πλοιάριον, καὶ εἰς λυπρὸν ἐξέθηκε νησίδιον· εἶτα ὀνείδει κατεχόμενος αὐτός τε καὶ ἡ γυνὴ κατὰ πᾶσαν τὴν πόλιν, αὐτὸς μὲν συγκλείσας ἑαυτὸν μετὰ πάντων τῶν κτημάτων ἐν τῇ οἰκίᾳ καὶ πῦρ ὑποβαλὼν ἐκαύθη· ἡ δὲ γυνὴ εἰς φρέαρ ἑαυτὴν ἔρριψεν.

“The demon from Anagyrous’: because Anagyrus the hero took vengeance on the old man who lived nearby and cut trees in his groove. Anagyrous is an Attic deme and someone from there cut wood in the grove. The

“The demon from Anagyrous’ ... proverbial ... for they say there was a farmer in the deme Anagyrous who was accused of offending against the hero’s tomb nearby and so encountered dire misfortunes. First, he divorced his

Fragmentary Comedy and the Evidence of Vase-Painting  

hero made the man’s concubine fall madly in love with his son. When she could not persuade the boy she denounced him as wanton to his father, who mutilated and immured him. Thereupon the father hanged himself and the concubine threw herself into a well. This story is told by Hieronymus in his On tragic poets, where he compares to it the Phoinix of Euripides’ (Translation by J. Henderson, except for the last sentence).

wife, with whom he had had a son, and then, relying on a fabricated denounciation by the stepmother, he mutilated his son, put him aboard a ship and cast him off on a desolate little island. Then, overwhelmed by censure throughout the whole city, both he and the woman, the man locked himself up in his house with all his possessions and setting it afire was burned to death, and the woman threw herself into a well” (Translation by J. Henderson).

Although this legend contains some elements well compatible with comedy, especially the daily-life setting and the old man from a country deme as central character, it does not look at all like a comic plot but seems, if anything, to be closer to tragedy than to comedy (and it is interesting, in this context, that Hieronymus of Rhodes actually found parallels between this legend and Euripides’ Phoinix). It is therefore rather unlikely that one of the two versions of the legend directly reflects the content of Aristophanes’ play or can even be read as a kind of hypothesis to this play. It would, however, be possible, that Aristophanes himself used one of these versions (or a third, similar one) and transformed it for the comic purposes of his play. The preserved fragments of the Anagyros do not contain anything that may be related directly to either the plant or the legend of the local hero, although the inhabitants of the deme Anagyrous are mentioned in fr. 54.2 χαίρειν δ’ ἀτεχνῶς Ἀναγυρασίους. At first sight, the most interesting element that seems to be somehow relevant for the plot is a group of several fragments related to horses, some of which present striking parallels to the prologue of Clouds and suggest that in the Anagyros, too, there may have been a young man with a passion for horses (fr. 42 μὴ κλᾷ’· ἐγώ σοι βουκέφαλον ὠνήσομαι, fr. 43 ψῆχ’ ἠρέμα / τὸν βουκέφαλον καὶ κοππατίαν, fr. 44 [A.] ὡς δ’ ὀρθοπλήξ. [B.] πέφυκε γὰρ δυσγάργαλις, fr. 61 στόμια πριονωτά, fr. 64 πνιγεύς, fr. 66 ψήκτρα). 13 While the parallels to the preserved (but not staged) second version of Clouds are interesting in itself (especially if one considers further parallels between the two plays in fr. 58, 62, and perhaps also fr. 41), 14 there is no obvious connection between this motive and

 13 The similarity of fr. 42 (and 43) K–A to the prologue of Clouds has been first noted by Ritter 1830, 796 and Bergk 1840, 960; cf., with further literature, Orth 2017a, 244–245. 14 On these parallels, cf. Orth 2017a, 229–230.

  Christian Orth anything that we know about the plant ἀνάγυρος or the legend about the local hero of the Attic deme Anagyrous. The missing link is, however, provided by another group of fragments, which are similar in both content and metre (anapaestic dimeters), 15 and should be probably assigned to the same scene of the play: 16 fr. 53 πρὸς θεῶν· ἔραμαι τέττιγα φαγεῖν / καὶ κερκώπην θηρευσαμένη / καλάμῳ λεπτῷ fr. 55 κἂν μηδὲν ἕλῃς, στῆσον μυάγραν fr. 57 καὶ μὴν χθές γ’ ἦν πέρδιξ χωλός

Cf. also fr. 56 (either a catalectic anapaestic dimeter, or the end of an anapaestic tetrameter) οὐχ ἑψητῶν λοπάς ἐστιν (which may or may not belong to the same scene). In fr. 53, a female speaker utters the wish to eat a cicada and a cricket, after hunting it with a thin reed. As has long been recognized, first by Theodor Bergk in 1840, 17 this is a parody of line 219–222 from the dialogue between Phaedra and the nurse at the beginning of Euripides’ Hippolytus (πρὸς θεῶν· ἔραμαι κυσὶ θωύξαι / καὶ παρὰ χαίταν ξανθὰν ῥῖψαι / Θεσσαλὸν ὅρπακ’, ἐπίλογχον ἔχουσ’ / ἐν χειρὶ βέλος “In heaven’s name, how I want to shout to the hounds and to let fly past my golden hair a javelin of Thessaly, holding in my hand the sharp-tipped lance!”, translation by D. Kovacs). The similarities between the two passages go far beyond the identical (and unusual) beginning with πρὸς θεῶν· ἔραμαι and extend to the similar syntactical structure with infinitives and participles, the content (a wish to go hunting) and the (in both cases female) speaker. It is also worth noting that elsewhere, too, anapaestic dimeters are used by Aristophanes in a paratragic context (cf. e.g. the famous parody of a scene from the Bellerophontes in the prologue of Peace). 18 But the differences between Aristophanes’ parody

 15 Similarity of content or the use of the same metre (other than iambic trimeter) alone would not be enough: So it is impossible to say whether some or all of the fragments about horses (frr. 42, 43, 44, 61, 64, 66) belong to the same scene, and there is one more fragment of the Anagyros in anapaestic dimeters that seems to belong to a different context (fr. 54; see below p. 494). 16 Cf. Schmid 1946, 199 n. 5, who interpretes fr. 53, 56 and 57 as “Reste von anapästischen Dimetern einer Arie (?)”, Tsantsanoglou 1984, 83–84, who assignes frr. 53, 55, 56, and 57 to a scene in which a female character suffers from extreme hunger. 17 Bergk 1840, 962 (and cf. 959–960). 18 Ar. Pax 82–101 (cf. Rau 1967, 91–92), and cf. also the paratragic elements in Ar. Vesp. 741– 759 (cf. Rau 152–154), 1482–1495 (cf. Rau 1967, 155–156), and Thesm. 39–62 (cf. Rau 1967, 99– 102), and see for parodies of Euripidean passages in anapaestic dimeters (with further references) Rau 1967, 13.

Fragmentary Comedy and the Evidence of Vase-Painting  

and the tragic model are here no less interesting than the similarities. Aristophanes replaces the big animals that are implied in Phaedra’s words with a cicada and a cricket, and the lance with a fine reed (used also for hunting birds), and the real objective of the speaker seems to be rather to eat the cicada than to hunt it. 19 The speaker of fr. 55 tells another person to set a moustrap, if he or she does not catch anything. The most difficult fragment in this group is fr. 57, which according to the citation context alludes to an innkeeper named Perdix, but on another level seems also to talk about a partridge that yesterday still was lame (and therefore, one may presume, easy to hunt). All three fragments have in common the subject of hunting, which is, however, comically distorted by the choice of animals that have little in common with the more dignified hunting objects of Hippolytus in the Euripidean play alluded to in fr. 53. And not only fr. 53, but also fr. 55 (where in case of a failure to catch some other prey even a mouse is accepted) suggest that the motive here is rather the desperate need of a woman (the speaker of fr. 53) suffering from hunger than a real wish to go hunting. Finally, of the three fragments one probably and another almost certainly indicates that the context is no monologue but a dialogue. The use of καὶ μὴν in fr. 57 makes it more probable than not that it followed immediately or very soon after a change of speaker, 20 while the second person verb and the imperative in fr. 55 are almost certainly addressed to another person present on stage. A dialogue in anapaestic dimeters also forms the scene of Phaedra and the nurse in the Hippolytus, a passage of which is, as we have already seen, the model for the parody in fr. 53, and beside the fact that here too the speaker is female, there are two elements in the fragments already discussed that would acquire far greater significance if they actually belonged to a more extended comic parody of that tragic scene. The famine of the speaker of fr. 53 suffers from could now be seen in connection (or rather meaningful contrast) to Phaedra’s attempt to starve herself to death in Euripides’ play, 21 and fr. 57 καὶ μὴν χθές γ’ ἦν Πέρδιξ χωλός (which can be translated: “but still yesterday Perdix was lame”), 22 if spoken by  19 Both changes may not only reflect generic differences between tragedy and comedy in general, but also contain criticism of Euripides’ own plays as being less dignified and closer to comedy than they should (on this aspect of Euripidean parody in Aristophanes cf., e.g., Nelson 2016, 70–72, 248). 20 Out of 21 exemples of καὶ μὴν ... γε with only one word between καὶ μὴν and γε in Aristophanes, in 18 there is a change of speaker immediately before, and in 2 more there is a change of speaker shortly before καὶ μήν (for the references see Orth 2017a, 309). 21 Cf. Eur. Hipp. 135–140, 275–277. 22 For a similar joke with a wordplay on the name of a bird and that of a person (κόροδυς “Lark” and the parasite Korydos) cf. Ath. 6.241e Φιλόξενος δ’ ἡ Πτερνοκοπὶς ἐμπεσόντος λόγου ὅτι αἱ

  Christian Orth another woman (perhaps an old slave that corresponds to the Euripidean nurse), could be interpreted as a confession that the speaker just yesterday had visited the lame innkeeper Perdix, thereby confirming the comic stereotype of women that are over-fond of drinking wine. 23 The main reason why such an hypothesis is attractive is, however, the general similarity between the plot of Euripides’ Hippolytus and the preserved versions of the legend of Anagyros. 24 Both stories have the same set of main characters: A father, his son from a former marriage, the new wife or παλλακή of the father, and a god who takes revenge for an offence committed by either the father or the son. In the Hippolytus Aphrodite, in order to punish Hippolytus for his complete lack of reverence, causes his stepmother Phaedra, the wife of his father Theseus, to fall in love with him, and after being rejected, to commit suicide leaving a note in which she accuses Hippolytus of having tried to violate her. Theseus believes her, curses Hippolytus and tells him to leave his country; as a consequence of Theseus’ curse, Hippolytus has an accident with his chariot and dies (he comes, however, still alive, back to the stage, and is reconciled with his father who has, in the meantime, learnt the truth from Artemis). In the legend of Anagyros the local hero of the deme Anagyrous takes revenge on an old farmer who cut trees in his grove by causing the παλλακή of the farmer to fall in love with his son from a former marriage. When she fails to convince him, she denounces him (according to the first version ὡς ἀσελγῆ τῷ πατρί, which probably means a similer offence to the one Hippolytus is accused of); as a consequence, the farmer either mutilates and immures his son or sends him to a desert island, and in the end both the farmer and his concubine commit suicide. It is immediately obvious that it would be quite simple for a comic poet to combine the legend of Anagyros with paratragic elements from Hippolytus, and this parody of Euripides may even have been Aristophanes’ main reason for

 κίχλαι τίμιαί εἰσι καὶ τοῦ Κορύδου παρόντος, ὃς ἐδόκει πεπορνεῦσθαι, “ἀλλ’ ἐγώ”, ἔφη, “μνημονεύω ὅτε ὁ Κόρυδος ὀβολοῦ ἦν”. 23 Innkeepers are quite frequently mentioned in this connection, cf. Ar. Lys. 464–466 ἢ γυναιξὶν οὐκ οἴει / χολὴν ἐνεῖναι; :: νὴ τὸν Ἀπόλλω καὶ μάλα / πολλήν γ’, ἐάνπερ πλήσιον κάπηλος ᾖ, Thesm. 735–737 ὢ θερμόταται γυναῖκες, ὦ ποτίσταται / κἀκ παντὸς ὑμεῖς μηχανώμεναι πιεῖν, / ὢ μέγα καπήλοις ἀγαθόν (…), Plat. Com. fr. 188.3–4 (where women are addressed) ὑμῖν γὰρ οὐδέν, καθάπερ ἡ παροιμία, / ἐν τῷ καπήλῳ νοῦς ἐνεῖναί μοι δοκεῖ (for the problems of this perhaps corrupt passage cf. Pirrotta 2009, 345–346), Antiph. fr. 25, Eubul. fr. 80 (about a nurse); Henderson 1987, 127 ad Ar. Lys. 462–466. 24 This, too, has been first noticed by Bergk 1840, 959–960; cf. with further literature Orth 2017a, 224 n. 22.

Fragmentary Comedy and the Evidence of Vase-Painting  

choosing Anagyros as a subject for his play. 25 In any case, the legend of Anagyros, which is rather grim than tragic and includes local Attic colour would be perfectly suitable for a play in which Euripides is ridiculed for including in his tragedies elements of daily life and undignified characters that are actually more appropriate for comedy (a tendency that can be observed already in the parody of the Telephos in Acharnians). 26 It should also be remembered here that there are several further references to Euripides’ Hippolytus in Aristophanes’ completely preserved plays (conveniently collected in the index of Rau 1967, 215–216), showing that the play was one of Aristophanes’ favorite targets for Euripidean parody: Besides the famous lines Eur. Hipp. 345 (from a dialogue between Phaedra and the nurse that follows immediately after the anapaestic dimeters alluded to in fr. 53) πῶς ἂν σύ μοι λέξειας ἁμὲ χρὴ λέγειν “Could you but speak the words that I must say!” (translation by D. Kovacs), quoted at Ar. Eq. 16, 27 and Eur. Hipp. 612 ἡ γλῶσσ’ ὀμώμοχ’, ἡ δὲ φρὴν ἀνώμοτος “My tongue swore, but my mind is not on oath” (translation by D. Kovacs), quoted or alluded to in Ar. Thesm. 275–276, Ran. 101–102, 1471, 28 Aristophanes takes up also Eur. Hipp. 375–376 ἤδη ποτ’ ἄλλως νυκτὸς ἐν μακρῷ χρόνῳ / θνητῶν ἐφρόντισ’ ᾗ διέφθαρται βίος “I have pondered before now in other circumstances in the night’s long watches how it is that the lives of mortals have been ruined” (translation by D. Kovacs) in Ar. Ran. 931–932, 29 and probably also Eur. Hipp. 1238–1239 σποδούμενος μὲν πρὸς πέτραις φίλον κάρα / θραύων τε σάρκας, δεινὰ δ’ ἐξαυδῶν κλύειν “his head being smashed against the rocks and flesh being torn, uttering things dreadful to hear” (translation by D. Kovacs) in Ar. Ach. 1180–1183, thereby connecting Lamachus’ accident at the end of Acharnians with Hippolytus’ accident in Euripides’ play, 30 and Eur. Hipp. 675–677 τίς ἂν θεῶν ἀρωγὸς ἢ τίς ἂν βροτῶν / πάρεδρος ἢ ξυνεργὸς ἀδίκων ἔργων / φανείη “What god, what mortal will appear to help me, sit at my side, and lend a hand to my unjust deeds?” (translation by D. Kovacs) in Ar. Thesm. 715–716. 31 There may even

 25 Cf. Muhl 1881, 48, Crusius 1910, 53. 26 Cf. above, note 20. 27 On this reference cf. now Lauriola 2016, who argues that “almost the entire initial scene of the prologue of Knights might be shaped as a parody of the skirmish that takes place between the nurse and Phaedra in Euripides’ Hipp. 310–351” (ibid. 84). 28 Cf. Rau 1967, 216. 29 Cf. Rau 1967, 120, who sees an allusion to the same lines also in Ar. Eq. 1290ff. 30 Cf. Rau 1967, 140, and for the Euripidean character of the whole scene with Lamachus coming onto the stage after his accident (like Hippolytus in Hippolytus) Rau 1967, 142 and Olson 2002, 352. 31 Cf. Rau 1967, 49 and Austin/Olson 2004, 249.

  Christian Orth be another allusion to the anapaestic dialogue of Phaedra and the nurse in Ar. Vesp. 751 κείνων ἔραμαι, κεῖθι γενοίμαν (where especially κεῖθι γενοίμαν may refer to Eur. Hipp. 230 εἴθε γενοίμαν ἐν σοῖς δαπέδοις, whereas ἔραμαι here seems to be more closely connected to Eur. Alc. 866 ζηλῶ φθιμένους, κείνων ἔραμαι). 32 Besides, Phaedra is repeatedly mentioned (alongside other heroines like Melanippe and Stheneboia) as an example of a typically bad woman in Euripidean tragedy. 33 While this characterization fits better the Phaedra of the lost first Hippolytus (which does, however, not yet prove that it actually refers to this version), all the parallels mentioned here are to lines found in the second Hippolytus, 34 and the same is true also of the Euripidean elements in fr. 53 from the Anagyros, and the easiest interpretation of the evidence seems to be that they actually referred to this second version rather than the first (although it can not be excluded that some of the lines parodied by Aristophanes were already found in the first version; but this would just mean that both versions were quite similar in the scenes in question and that we can disregard the differences between the two versions here). And if, as is generally assumed, one of the main changes of the play was Phaedra’s character and the role of the nurse in the plot, the scene of Phaedra and the nurse may well have been one of the innovations in the second version. 35 A good test for the plausibility of a hypothesis about the content of a lost play based just on some of its fragments is to have a look at the other fragments in order to see whether they are compatible with the hypothesis or even more easily explained by it. 36 In the case of the Anagyros, there are several fragments that fit well into a play that combines the legend of Anagyros with elements from Euripides’ Hippolytus: This is true in particular for the already mentioned fragments that have to do with horses (frr. 42, 43, 44, 61, 64, 66). 37 The horses which Hippolytus uses while hunting on a chariot, and which also are involved in the accident that leads to his death, are an important element in the Euripidean play. We may compare in particular fr. 43 from the Anagyros, ψῆχ’ ἠρέμα / τὸν βουκέφαλον καὶ

 32 Cf. Rau 1967, 153 with n. 45. 33 Ar. Thesm. 497, 546–547, 550, Ran. 1043, 1052; cf. Austin/Olson 2004, 107 ad Ar. Thesm. 153. 34 On the two versions of Hippolytus, see Barrett 1964, 15–45 (on the nurse esp. 35–36), and (with further literature) Collard/Cropp 2008a, 466–471. 35 On the other hand, the nurse may have been a character already in the first version, although there is no direct evidence for this (cf. Barrett 1964, 35–36). 36 For a similar (although more incertain) case, cf. my discussion of Philyllius’ Poleis (Orth 2015, 186–190, esp. 189; Orth 2017b, 107–110, esp. 109). 37 Cf. Muhl 1881, 48–49, Crusius 1910, 53, Kaibel ap. Kassel/Austin, PCG III.2 (1984) 52.

Fragmentary Comedy and the Evidence of Vase-Painting  

κοππατίαν “gently curry / the ox-head and the koppa” (translation by J. Henderson) with the scene of the Hippolytus where the title hero comes back from hunting and tells his servants to prepare the meal and to rub down the horses (Eur. Hipp. 108–112 χωρεῖτ’ ὀπαδοί, καὶ παρελθόντες δόμους / σίτων μέλεσθε· τερπνὸν ἐκ κυναγίας / τράπεζα πλήρης· καὶ καταψήχειν χρεὼν / ἵππους, ὅπως ἂν ἅρμασι ζεύξας ὕπο / βορᾶς κορεσθεὶς γυμνάσω τὰ πρόσφορα “Go, servants, enter the house and prepare the meal. After a hunt a full table is a pleasure. And you must rub down my horses so that when I have eaten my fill I can yoke them to my chariot and give them proper exercise”, [translation by D. Kovacs]), and the rare word ψήκτρα “currycomb” is used in classical times — apart from fr. 66 of the Anagyros and a fragment of Sophocles cited by Pollux in the same context — only in line 1174 of the Hippolytus (ψήκτραισιν ἵππων ἐκτενίζομεν τρίχας). But here, again, the comparison also reveals interesting differences. For even if frr. 42 and 43 are related to the parody of Euripides’ Hippolytus they contain elements that clearly belong to the comic world and not to the tragic model: In any case, the types of the horses mentioned in both fragments and the reference to buying such a horse in fr. 43, both of which have close parallels in the prologue of the second Clouds, fit much better the generic conventions of comedy than those of tragedy and may give a glimpse of how Aristophanes modified the elements of the tragic plot in his comic version. Moreover, it is possible to interpret fr. 50 (ἐκλιμάκισεν ὥστ’ ἐς μέσην / ἔπεσε τὴν τάφρον) as part of a narration of an accident similar to that of Hippolytus at the end of Euripides’ play (though presumably less fatal), 38 and even the thunder in fr. 46 (καὶ ξυννένοφε καὶ χειμέρια βροντᾷ μάλ’ εὖ), which creates a threatening atmosphere and suggests that something bad might happen, may be seen as directly parallel to the noise of the earth heard immediately before Hippolytus’ accident in Euripides, which is compared by the messenger to the thunder of Zeus (Eur. Hipp. 1201–1202 ἔνθεν τις ἠχὼ χθόνιος, ὡς βροντὴ Διός, / βαρύν βρόμον μεθῆκε, φρικώδη κλύειν). 39 And finally it is also possible to connect fr. 52 πλὴν ἀλεύρου καὶ ῥόας, which mentions a typical diet given to sick people, to the situation of the παλλακή who (like Phaedra in the Hippolytus) may be represented as suffering from a sickness (which at least in the case of Phaedra is caused by the love for her stepson). 40

 38 Cf. Orth 2017a, 231, 273–274 (and for the possibility that the subject here is a horse, already Kock 1893, 583, and cf. also Tsantsanoglou 1984, 84). For another possible allusion in Aristophanes to Hippolytus’s accident (Ar. Ach. 1180–1183) see above p. 491–492. 39 Cf. Muhl 1881, 48, Crusius 1910, 53. 40 Cf. Crusius 1910, 53 with n. 2, and Kaibel ap. Kassel/Austin, PCG III.2 (1984), 57.

  Christian Orth The picture becomes more complicated in fr. 54 χαίρειν μὲν Ἄλον τὸν Φθιώτην, / χαίρειν δ’ ἀτεχνῶς Ἀναγυρασίους. Although it is, like frr. 53, 55 and 57, in anapaestic dimeters, from the content (where the speaker either greets or says goodbye to both the city Alos in Phthia and the inhabitants of the deme Anagyrous, or possibly says that he does not care for them at all) it seems rather unlikely that it belongs to the same scene. A much more appropriate context would be a scene corresponding to the moment where Hippolytus, who has just been sent into exile by his father, says farewell to both Athens and Troizen (Eur. Hipp. 1094–1097). The reference to the Phthiotian Alos remains, however, puzzling, and it has been suggested that the tragic model is here not the Hippolytus but another play of Euripides, the Phoinix, 41 whose plot was compared to the legend of Anagyros already in the 3rd century BC by Hieronymus of Rhodes, 42 and whose title hero lived in exile at the court of Peleus where he became the teacher of Achilleus. There is even a fragment from the Phoinix that is generally interpreted as a farewell to his homeland that he is forced to leave. 43 If fr. 54 really alludes to Phoinix, it would offer further evidence for Aristophanes’ combination of the legend of Anagyros with similar plots in Euripidean tragedy. 44 But even if we leave this difficult fragment aside, the other fragments discussed above considerably strengthen the plausibility of the hypothesis that the Anagyros combined the legend of Anagyrus (or rather one version of it) with elements from Euripides’ Hippolytus (and possibly other Euripidean plays as well), and thus add further support also to the plausibility of a comic adaptation of the dialogue between Phaedra and the nurse in one scene of that play. If the argument advanced so far, or at least its central conclusion, is correct, the Anagyros is (besides Acharnians, Peace, Thesmophoriazusae and Frogs, and fragmentary plays like Phoinissai and Aiolosikōn) another interesting example of  41 So Wilamowitz-Moellendorff 1907, 10–11, and cf. Schmid 1946, 198 Anm. 7, Kassel/Austin, PCG III.2 (1984) 58 (contra: Gil 1989, 58, but cf. Orth 2017a, 297 n. 186), and on a possible connection between the Anagyros and the Phoinix already Bothe 1844, 20, Kock 1880, 402 (and for a more sceptical view Rau 1967, 209). 42 See above, pp. 494. 43 Eur. fr. 817 σὺ δ’, ὦ πατρῴα χθὼν ἐμῶν γεννητόρων, / χαῖρ’· ἀνδρὶ γάρ τοι, κἂν ὑπερβάλλῃ κακοῖς, / οὐκ ἔστι τοῦ θρέψαντος ἥδιον πέδον (for the contextualization of this fragment cf. Collard/Cropp 2008b, 406). Where was the homeland of Phoinix in Euripides’ play is unclear (according to Hom. Il. 9,447 the region Phoinix has to leave is Ἑλλάς, which is mentioned in the Catalogue of Ships as part of the land of the Myrmidons besides Alos and Phthia, but Euripides may have chosen as home for Phoinix a nearby region that sounded less ambiguous to a Greek audience of the 5th century BC). 44 References to both the Hippolytos and the Phoinix are later combined also in Menander’s Samia (cf. Sommerstein 2014).

Fragmentary Comedy and the Evidence of Vase-Painting  

a comedy of Aristophanes that engages extensively with Euripidean tragedy. At the same time the play offers us an interesting early example of a comedy that combines in its plot the world of myth and tragedy with comedy’s contemporary world. 45 And it also shows Aristophanes as an innovator who does not (as he claims his rivals did) 46 repeat himself, but follows, in the Anagyros, a new path which seems to be quite different from his earlier plays. 47 And a last, more speculative, possibility would be to interprete the Anagyros also as a kind of response to Aristophanes’ failure with the first Clouds. Under such a perspective, the already mentioned parallels to the preserved second version of Clouds (to which we may now add also a possibly similar conception of the comic hero, who in the Anagyros, as in the Clouds, may in some respect have resembled more a tragic than a comic hero) 48 could be explained under the hypothesis that Aristophanes, at some point around 418–417 BC, decided not to stage the Clouds again, but instead chose to use some of its elements in a completely new play, the Anagyros.

 Pictorial evidence So far, my discussion of the play has been based entirely on textual evidence (as one would expect in such a case). However, by a remarkable coincidence, there is evidence of a different kind that a comic adaptation of the very scene of Phaedra and the nurse from Euripides’ Hippolytus actually existed in a play of 5th century Attic Comedy. In 2014, J.R. Green published an article with the title “Two Phaedras: Euripides and Aristophanes?”, in which he offers a preliminary discussion of a comic scene on a Lucanian red-figure bell-krater that had recently been donated by James Ede in his honour to the Nicholson Museum in Sidney and is also known as the “Green Krater”. The main scene shows “a female moving forward from the left (her left leg is forward) toward a woman who appears to be falling back on a

 45 To judge from the preserved titles and fragments, such plots seem to have been particularly popular in the comic production from c. 410 BC to c. 350 BC. 46 In the Anagyros, we may compare fr. 58 and parts of the parabasis in the papyrus commentary Ar. fr. 590 (see above pp. 484–485). 47 Extended parody of one particular Euripidean tragedy in several parts of the same play is however not completely new for Aristophanes, as the use of Telephos in Acharnians shows (cf. Olson 2002, liv–lxi). 48 On the combination of comic and tragic elements in the representation of Strepsiades at the end of Clouds cf. Revermann 2006, 224–235.

  Christian Orth bed with a pillow at its head”. 49 According to Green, the shape of the vase and the style of the drawing point to a date around 400 BC or a little earlier. About the scene to be seen on the painting, Green reaches the following conclusions: 1. “The style and the detail of the figures make it clear that we are dealing with a scene from contemporary comedy” (Green 2014, 101). 2. “The figure approaching from the left must be a servant or slave. She wears a simple garment without any tie around the waist, and more particularly, her musk is ugly and her hair rough — very close in appearance to that of male slaves. She has never been near a hairdresser (even within the house). As part of the definition of her character, she is given large ears, a sure sign of stupidity for contemporary Athenians. Her patent stupidity alone is probably enough to make for humorous dialogue, even if we cannot know how well she spoke Greek. We may note in passing the way the actor’s sleeves come down to the wrist (as also on the left arm of the woman on the bed); this is standard costume as well as further confirmation, should it be needed, that we are dealing with a comic performance” (Green 2014, 103). 3. “To return to the woman on the bed, within the terms of the depiction, her dress is finer and more elegant, and there is a headband around her curly hair. She is not beautiful: she has the mask of a wife. In Greek comedy of the later 5th and the 4th centuries, wives (as distinct from lovers or what one might describe as women wanted as wives) are never beautiful or attractive. They are given blunt noses, not straight ones. Their hair is usually shown as a tight curly mop without elegance or style and is often held by a simple, undecorated band around the head. Their mouths are wide with heavy lips” (Green 2014, 105). 4. “The body language exhibited on our vase is fascinating. The painter is attempting to convey to the viewer the character, movement, action and even dialogue as they were enacted. In doing so, since he cannot show a sequence of gestures, he gives a compacted view. Two arms, two gestures, all in addition to the way the body is shown. As we have seen, the servant is given a short, stocky body; she is graceless. The gesture of her left hand, toward the chin, is a common one of shock or dismay, prompted here by the sight of her mistress’ condition. With her right hand, she makes the well-known gesture of asking a question that really needs an answer, indeed a positive answer. The gesture still survives in Greek lands and to some extent elsewhere. The wife leans or collapses back against her pillow, this in itself indicating weakness or a lack of authority in front of her servant, or else giving some sense of fainting, whether for joy or grief or both. Her left hand for some reason (the  49 Green 2014, 101.

Fragmentary Comedy and the Evidence of Vase-Painting  

stupidity of her servant? the hopelessness of her own situation?) makes a gesture of despair. Her right hand comes over the back of her head. This gesture with here right hand is well known from representations of the symposium, particularly when there is music in addition to the wine. It describes a condition one might describe as swooning (to use an old-fashioned term) or (metaphorically) being carried away” (Green 2014, 106–107). 5. By a detailed comparison with other depictions of Phaedra on vase paintings, Green identifies the scene depicted on the vase as a comic parody of the dialogue between Phaedra and her nurse in Euripides’ preserved second Hippolytus, vv. 170ff. (Green 2014, 121). Green ends his article with some speculation on the author of the comic parody depicted on the vase, which he believes to be Aristophanes (“It seems to me for many reasons likely to be Aristophanes: there are hints of his style, and he certainly liked to play with and have his characters express strong feelings on Euripidean themes, including Phaedra, as Frogs demonstrates. One might see our scene parallel to those in Acharnians of 425 BC and Thesmophoriazousai of 411 BC, which offer a likely period, given the date of our vase”), and he mentions as a possible candidate from such a play Aristophanes fr. 616 (preserved without play-title) αἰσχρὸν νέᾳ γυναικὶ πρεσβύτης ἀνήρ (“for a young wife an old husband is a disgrace” [translation by J. Henderson]). Although Green does not make clear what the “hints of [Aristophanes’] style” (Green 2014, 130) are on the vase painting, and although Euripidean parody in late 5th century Attic comedy was not limited to Aristophanes (another good candidate would be Strattis), 50 I believe that in this case we actually can with some confidence identify the play represented on the vase painting with a play of Aristophanes, the Anagyros, which (as we have already seen) both fits the date range mentioned by Green and seems actually to have contained a parody of the very scene represented on the vase painting. 51 Even if one does not follow all the conclusions of my discussion of the Anagyros, the parody of a part of this scene in Ar. fr. 53 would alone already justify such a hypothesis, which is further strengthened by the evidence of both the title and other fragments of the Anagyros. 52 Of  50 Mentioned by Green 2014, 130 with n. 69. 51 When I arrived at the conclusion that the Anagyros contained a parody of the scene with Phaedra and the nurse from Hippolytus, I was not yet aware of Green’s article, which I could mention only briefly in my commentary (Orth 2017a, 226). 52 Incidentally, Green may even be right with his tentative suggestion that Ar. fr. 616 αἰσχρὸν νέᾳ γυναικὶ πρεσβύτης ἀνήρ belongs to the play represented on the vase. The verse is quoted by Stobaeus in slightly different form as coming from the Phoinix of Euripides (Eur. fr. 807 K. πικρὸν νέᾳ γυναικὶ πρεσβύτης ἀνήρ), and Aristophanes fr. 616 may well be (as Sommerstein 2014, 171

  Christian Orth course, absolute certainty is impossible, not the least because one can not exclude that there existed more than one comic parody of that same scene by different authors or even by Aristophanes himself (cf. the parody of the same scene from the Euripidean Telephos in both Acharnians and Thesmophoriazusae). If this identification is correct, we may now add to the “Würzburg Telephus” (which almost certainly shows a scene from Aristophanes’ Thesmophoriazusae) 53 and the now lost “Berlin Heracles” (which probably showed the prologue of Frogs) 54 a third South Italian vase painting which can be directly connected to a particular play of Aristophanes, 55 and which is at the same time the first to be attributed to a fragmentary play of Aristophanes. 56 The three vases also offer interesting insight into the reception of Attic drama in South Italy. It has been argued above that in the Anagyros the parody of Euripidean tragedy was not limited to the rewriting of single lines but may well have been a central (if not the central) element in the whole plot of that play. The three plays shown on the vases may, therefore, reflect also a preference of South Italian audiences who presumably were much more familiar with Euripidean tragedy than they were with the details of Athenian political life. 57 But while the vase is important for the reception of the Anagyros (and Aristophanic comedy in general) in South Italy, can we also learn from it something new about the Anagyros itself? Here we are on much less safe ground, and the question can be put only in a hypothetical way: If the vase actually depicts a scene from the Anagyros, what can we learn from the vase about this scene that goes beyond what we already can infer from the fragments? First of all, the vase painting supports the hypothesis that Aristophanes reproduced the scene of Phaedra and the nurse from Hippolytus with a very similar  n. 19 suggests) a paratragic reference to that play (which may also have been one of the tragic models of Anagyros; see above p. 494). 53 This has first been demonstrated by Csapo 1986 and Taplin 1987, and cf. Taplin 1993, 36–41, Austin/Olson 2004, lxxv–lxxvii, Taplin 2007, 14, Walsh 2009, 74–79, Csapo 2010, 53–58, Duncan 2017, 542–543. 54 Cf. Csapo 2010, 58–61. 55 To these may be added the Apulian relief gutti that probably show the Telephus parody from Aristophanes’ Acharnians (cf. Csapo 2010, 64–65). 56 The only other vase painting that can be connected with some confidence to a fragmentary play of Old Comedy is a Paestan bell-krater with a cithara player called Phrynis and old man called Pyronides, which probably refers to Eupolis’ Demes; cf. Csapo 2010, 61–64. 57 There are numerous South Italian vase paintings from the 4th century that can be related to plays by Euripides (see in general Taplin 2007, 108–219 and Duncan 2017, 539–543). On scenes from the Hippolytus see Taplin 2007, 109, 130–138 (on a possible representation of the scene of Phaedra and the nurse esp. 131–132).

Fragmentary Comedy and the Evidence of Vase-Painting  

constellation of characters (a free woman, possibly rather a wife than a παλλακή, and a slave) in a very similar situation. There are already some hints for this in the fragments (like the female participle in fr. 53 and the possible allusion to an illness in fr. 52), but the vase offers welcome confirmation. On the other hand, apart from details like the big ears of the servant that may be a sign of stupidity (which could be interesting for the interpretation of fr. 57, where the apparent play on a double meaning of πέρδιξ may then be due to a simple misunderstanding of the preceding words of the interlocutor), there are no interesting departures from the tragic model to be seen in the vase painting. This may suggest that here the comic transformation was more on a verbal level, but there is also some comic potential in the simple fact that comic characters are to be seen here in a quite faithfully reproduced tragic scene. But we may also wonder how much the painter himself knew about the scene from Anagyros. Had he himself seen a performance, or was he just told that the play contained a comic parody of the scene with Phaedra and the nurse, and then used his knowledge of Euripides’ Hippolytus (and/or the iconographic tradition of the scene in question) and his general idea of what comedy looked like? Whatever the answer to this question may be, it is probable that the painter had at least some knowledge of the conventions of dramatic performances, and we may therefore use the painting (despite some modifications due to iconographic conventions or limitations of space on the vase) 58 also as a source of information on how this particular scene from Anagyros may have been staged, how the stage may have been organized, what kind of gestures the actors may have used, how they may have been dressed, and what props may have been used. And more generally, it helps to remind us that every comic fragment was originally part of a comic performance, and that in all attempts to recontextualize fragments of lost comedies they should be viewed not only as parts of an originally complete text, but also as parts of a comic scene performed at least once (and often repeatedly) on stage in Athens and elswhere.

 58 Cf. Green 2014, 103: “Because of the limits imposed by the available space on our vase, the scene is more compact or squashed together than it would have been onstage. Thus the woman on the right is lying or in the act of falling back on her bed, which would of course have been longer onstage in the original performance”.

  Christian Orth

Fig. 7: “Green Krater”, Lucanian bell krater (410–390 BC), attributed to the Creusa Painter/NM 2013.2 © Nicholson Museum, The University of Sydney, gift of James Ede in honour of Professor J.R. Green.

Bibliography Austin, C./Olson, S.D. (2004), Aristophanes. Thesmophoriazusae. Edited with Introduction and Commentary, Oxford. Barrett, W.S. (1964), Euripides. Hippolytos, Edited with Introduction and Commentary, Oxford. Bergk, Th. (1840), “Aristophanes”, in: A. Meineke, Fragmenta Comicorum Graecorum II.2, Berolini, 893–1224.

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Bothe, F.H. (1844), Aristophanis Dramatum Fragmenta, Lipsiae. Collard, C./Cropp, M. (2008a), Euripides. Fragments. Aegeus - Meleager, Cambridge, Mass./ London. Collard, C./Cropp, M. (2008b), Euripides. Fragments. Oidipus – Chrysippus. Other Fragments, Cambridge, Mass./London. Crusius, O. (1910), Paroemiographica. Textgeschichtliches zur alten Dichtung und Religion (Sitzungsberichte der Königlich-Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Philosophisch-philologische und historische Klasse 1910, 4. Abhandlung), Munich, [reprinted in: Corpus Paroemiographorum Graecorum. Supplementum, Hildesheim 1961]. Csapo, E. (1986), “A Note on the Würzburg Bell-Crater H5697 (Telephus Travestitus)”, Phoenix 40, 379–392. Csapo, E. (2010), Actors and Icons of the Ancient Theater, Chichester. Duncan, A. (2017), “Euripides in the Fourth Century BCE”, in: L. McClure (ed.), A Companion to Euripides, Chichester, 533–545. Gil, L. (1989), “El Aristófanes perdido”, CFC 22, 39–106. Green, J.R. (2014), “Two Phaedra: Euripides and Aristophanes?”, in: S.D. Olson (ed.), Ancient Comedy and Reception. Essays in Honor of Jeffrey Henderson, Berlin/Boston, 94–131. Halliwell, S. (2015), Aristophanes. Clouds. Women at the Thesmophoria. Frogs. A Verse Translation, with Introduction and Notes, Oxford. Henderson, J. (1987), Aristophanes. Lysistrata. Edited with Introduction and Commentary, Oxford. Henderson, J. (2007), Aristophanes. Fragments, Cambridge, Mass./London. Hofmann, H. (1970), “Ein Kommentar zum Anagyros des Aristophanes (P. Oxy. 2737)”, ZPE 5, 1–10. Kann, S. (1909), De iteratis apud poetas antiquae et mediae comoediae Atticae, Giessen. Kassel/Austin, PCG III.2 = R. Kassel/C. Austin, Poetae Comici Graeci. Vol. III 2. Aristophanes. Testimonia et Fragmenta, Berolini/Novi Eboraci 1984. Kock, T. (1880), Comicorum Atticorum Fragmenta. Volumen I, Lipsiae. Kock, T. (1893), “Komiker-Fragmente im Lexicon Sabbaiticum”, RhM 48, 579–591. Kyriakidi, N. (2007), Aristophanes und Eupolis. Zur Geschichte einer dichterischen Rivalität, Berlin/New York. Lauriola, R. (2016), “Aristophanes and Euripides, once again: From Hippolytus 345 to Knights 16–18”, Prometheus 5, 71–95. Montana, F. (2012), “Aristophanes 27 P.Oxy. XXXV 2737”, in: Commentaria et Lexica Graeca in Papyris Reperta (CLGP). Pars I. Commentaria et Lexica in Auctores. Vol. 1. Aeschines – Bacchylides. Fasc. 4. Aristophanes – Bacchylides. Editio altera, 157–182. Muhl, J. (1881), Zur Geschichte der alten attischen Komödie, Augsburg. Nelson, S. (2016), Aristophanes and his Tragic Muse. Comedy, Tragedy and the Polis in 5th Century Athens, Leiden/Boston. Olson, S.D. (2002), Aristophanes. Acharnians. Edited with Introduction and Commentary, Oxford. Olson, S.D. (2017), Eupolis, Testimonia and Aiges – Demoi (frr. 1–146). Introduction, Translation, Commentary, Fragmenta Comica 8.1, Heidelberg. Orth, C. (2015), Nikochares – Xenophon. Einleitung, Übersetzung, Kommentar, Fragmenta Comica 9.3, Heidelberg. Orth, C. (2017a), Aristophanes. Aiolosikon – Babylonioi (fr. 1–100). Übersetzung und Kommentar, Fragmenta Comica 10.3, Heidelberg.

  Christian Orth Orth, C. (2017b), “Die athenische Außenpolitik in den Fragmenten der attischen Alten Komödie nach 404 v.Chr.”, in: G. Mastromarco/P. Totaro/B. Zimmermann (eds), La commedia attica antica, Forme e contenuti, Lecce, 93–114. Rau, P. (1967), Paratragodia. Untersuchungen einer komischen Form des Aristophanes, Munich. Revermann, M. (2006), Comic Business. Theatricality, Dramatic Technique, and Performance Contexts of Aristophanic Comedy, Oxford. Ritter, F. (1830), Rez. W. Dindorf, Aristophanis Fragmenta, Lipsiae 1829, Allgemeine Schulzeitung 7 (1830), Abth. II. Nr. 96–98 (777–799). Schmid, W. (1946), Geschichte der griechischen Literatur I.4, Munich. Sommerstein, A.H. (2001), Wealth. Edited with translation and commentary (The Comedies of Aristophanes: Vol. 11), Warminster. Sommerstein, A.H. (2014), “Menander’s Samia and the Phaedra Theme”, in: S.D. Olson (ed.), Ancient Comedy and Reception. Essays in Honor of Jeffrey Henderson, Berlin/Boston, 167– 179. Taplin, O. (1987), “Phallology, Phlyakes, Iconography and Aristophanes”, PCPS 213, 92–104. Taplin, O. (1993), Comic Angels and Other Approaches to Greek Drama through Vase-Painting, Oxford. Taplin, O. (2007), Pots and Plays. Interactions between Tragedy and Greek Vase-Painting of the Fourth Century B.C., Los Angeles. Tsantsanoglou, K. (1984), New Fragments of Greek Literature from the Lexicon of Photius, Athens. Walsh, D. (2009), Distorted Ideals. Greek Vase-Painting: The World of Mythological Burlesque, Cambridge. Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, U. v. (1907), Zum Lexikon des Photios. Verbesserungen von Dichterstellen in dem Berliner Stücke des Buchstabens A, Sitzungsberichte der Preußischen Akademie der Wissenschaften 1907, 2–14.

Poulheria Kyriakou

Α Cause for Fragmentation: Tragic Fragments in Plato’s Republic Following the extensive discussion of a Simonidean fragment (542 PMG = 260 Poltera) in Plato’s Protagoras (339–347a), Socrates concludes that it is best to leave poets aside and not engage in literary disputes that cannot be resolved, as one cannot ask poets about the meaning of their compositions (347e; cf. Hp. mi. 365e8ff.). 1 Like several other philosophers and all students of poetry, Plato failed to follow Socrates’ advice. Most poets are notoriously expelled from Plato’s socalled ideal state, but poetry, especially epic poetry, is never pushed aside in Plato’s work. 2 He is critical of the thematology, mode, and treatment of myth in traditional elite poetry in general and mimetic poetry in particular. 3 The latter is unacceptable not only because of its content but also its form. It reproduces things as they appear and appeals to the non-rational part of the soul. 4 Moreover, it places actors, who were men, and the male members of the audience in positions that undermine their civic roles. Last but not least, its variegated metres, music and style are objectionable because they are detrimental to the unity of the soul and the appropriate behavior of the good citizen. 5 Drama features quite prominently in several Platonic dialogues, primarily in the discussion of the education of the guardians in Republic 2 and 3. Plato famously calls legislators the competitors of tragic poets (Leg. 817b–d; cf. 858c– 859a, Plt. 297c): both tragedians and lawmakers deal with serious matters and specifically with imitation, or representation, of the best life. 6 Tragedy, though, does not present the flourishing of the good and the withering of the bad, or the  1 For the literary critical discussion in the scene see Ferrari 1989, 99–103. 2 Cf. Halliwell 2000, 94: “In the case of Plato, an engagement with the culturally powerful texts and voices of poetry is so evident, so persistent, and so intense as to constitute a major thread running through the entire fabric of his writing and thinking. It is in Plato, after all, that an awareness of ‘a long-standing quarrel between philosophy and poetry’ articulates itself explicitly and urgently (Resp. 10.607b5–6)”. 3 Plato’s own work, though, is dramatic in mode, and dialogues may have been performed orally; see Ryle 1966, 24–27 and Blondell 2002, 23–25. For the use of dramatic images and terms in the Republic see Monoson 2000, 212–223. 4 See Moss 2007, 441–442. 5 See Bakewell 2017, 262–263; cf. Ferrari 1989, 109: “In a poetic performance…the image and what is imitated become, in a sense, one. Therein lie both its potential benefit and its danger.” 6 Cf. Leg. 668b6–7: “A proper imitation, as we have argued, depicts accurately the proportions of the object it imitates”. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-027

  Poulheria Kyriakou importance of justice in securing happiness in human life. 7 Tragedy affirms values “in what it mourns and what it grieves”, 8 encouraging the tendency of citizens to take human goods such as health and wealth seriously and to indulge their propensity for lamentations over their loss. Sound legislation teaches the citizens that the most important goods, wisdom and the rest of the virtues, are divine and that citizens should care for them, as human goods are proper and valuable only when informed by the virtues. 9 On the other hand, Plato quotes very few tragic lines, in contrast to epic. The tragic passages he criticizes in Republic for presenting a dangerous and thus blamable view of gods and heroes are all from Aeschylean dramas (380a, 381d, 383a–b, 391e). They are spoken by female characters, the first probably so, and concern women. Socrates argues that the future guardians may learn about, imitate or identify with morally blameless male characters (395b9–c8), so the choice of the speaker’s gender in the fragments is not surprising. However, the choice of dramatist and accusation are not self-evident or expected, and I wish to focus first on their possible rationale and then on the main strategy Plato adopts in his criticism. I will then briefly discuss the fragments. Obviously, for the purpose of castigating tragic references to gods, religion or the morality of heroes, Plato might easily have chosen any number of Euripidean plays. Among the extant ones, Bacchae and Heracles, for instance, would be very likely candidates. Of Sophocles’ characters, Creon in Antigone, Jocasta in OT, or even the goddess Athena in the prologue of Ajax make, mildly put, controversial claims. Plato, though, mentions Sophocles least, by name only in two dialogues. In Republic (329b) he reports an anecdote about the poet’s attitude to sex in old age, and in Phaedrus (268c–269a) he constructs a thought experiment, which also includes Euripides. Plato quotes no lines, but a gnomic line (σοφοὶ τύραννοι τῶν σοφῶν ξυνουσίᾳ), “rulers are wise through association with wise men”, which he (Resp. 568a8–b2) and Antisthenes (fr. 59 Decleva Caizzi) attribute to Euripides, is ascribed to Sophocles’ Ajax the Locrian (fr. 14 Radt) in various later sources. 10 I will return to this line in a moment. For the rest, Sophocles is apparently included in references to tragic poets who dealt with popular stories  7 See Murray 2013, 302. 8 Halliwell 1996, 338. 9 See Sauvé Meyer 2007, 402. For the division between divine and human goods see Leg. 631b6– d2. For the inappropriateness of lamentations and the danger of their representation in poetry see Resp. 387d–388d, 603d–606b. 10 See Radt 1999, 120–121. The line is cited and attributed to Euripides also in [Theages] 125b7, d4, although in that work the associates of the tyrant are fellow tyrants rather than his retinue; see Joyal 2000, 236.

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such as the inventions of Palamedes (Resp. 522d) or the crimes of Thyestes or Oedipus (Leg. 838c). Euripides is mentioned more often, although not more often than Aeschylus, and he is not much criticized. Polus in Gorgias (466b, 468d, 470d) adapts a fragment from Euripides’ Bellerophon (286.5–9 Kannicht), in which the speaker says that tyrants, who kill, rob and break oaths with impunity, are more prosperous than pious private citizens (cf. Leg. 661b2). Polus claims that orators may kill, rob and send into exile any citizen they please. Callicles (Grg. 484d–486c) uses Zethus’ speech to Amphion from Antiope (fr. 183–186 Kannicht) to argue that devotion to philosophy and neglect of public affairs and rhetoric are harmful and shameful for an adult male citizen. There is no blame of the poet, and Socrates says that he would like to continue his conversation with Callicles and adapt Amphion’s response to Zethus in his refutation of Callicles’ argument (Grg. 506b5– 6). 11 The only exception is the line mentioned a moment ago, “rulers are wise through association with wise men” (Resp. 568b1). Socrates interprets τύραννοι as tyrants rather than rulers or kings and suggests that their “wise associates” are sycophants. He mocks Euripides and ignores the context of the gnome. Glaucon agrees with Socrates and further castigates Euripides for calling tyranny “godlike” (ἰσόθεον). The phrase is from the lament of Hecuba over the body of her grandson Astyanax and obviously refers to kingship, as the old queen, now enslaved, wishes in standard lament mode that the boy had died defending Troy as adult married king: εἰ μὲν γὰρ ἔθανες πρὸ πόλεως, ἥβης τυχὼν γάμων τε καὶ τῆς ἰσοθέου τυραννίδος, μακάριος ἦσθ’ ἄν, εἴ τι τῶνδε μακάριον· (Eur. Tro. 1168–1170) If you had died defending the city, having attained adulthood and marriage and godlike kingship, you would have been blessed, if any of these things is blessed.

Glaucon claims that there are many pronouncements in praise of tyranny in the works of Euripides and other poets (Resp. 568b3–4). 12 In this vein, Socrates concludes that such praise is one of the reasons why poets should be expelled from

 11 For the tragic debate as a model for the debate between Callicles and Socrates cf. Nightingale 1995, 72–73. 12 Much earlier Glaucon, in another thought experiment, called godlike the man able to do as he pleases with absolute impunity (360c2). If the magical ring of Gyges (or his ancestor) were

  Poulheria Kyriakou the state: they are corrupting the states and are honored by corrupt regimes, tyranny and democracy (Resp. 568b5–d1). 13 As already suggested, Aeschylus is singled out for blame more often than his colleagues, and for the crime of impiety rather than civic corruption, although the two are closely related. Moreover, he is blamed not only for moral faults but also for inaccuracies such as the claim in his Telephus (fr. 239 Radt) that the route to Hades is a simple one (Phdr. 107e) and the casting of Achilles in the Myrmidons (fr. 134a Radt) as Patroclus’ lover (Symp. 180a). Aeschylus foolishly or outrageously ignored Homer’s version according to which Patroclus was older than Achilles (Il. 11.787) and thus the natural lover. 14 To stress the point Phaedrus, the speaker, even claims that according to Homer Achilles was much younger than Patroclus. In Republic 7 (522d) Aeschylus is not named but he is certainly in-

 available both to just and unjust men, not even the just would have the power to resist the temptation of committing crimes and enjoy the benefits without paying the price for their crimes (Resp. 359d–360d; cf. 612a–b). Cf. next n. Glaucon quotes Aeschylus’ praise of Amphiaraus (Aesch. Sept. 592, 593–594) twice, in connection with the good and the bad man respectively (Resp. 361b7–8, 362a7–b1); cf. n. 30 below. A similar case may be Socrates’ quotation of Pindar (fr. 209 Maehler), which disparages natural philosophy, but Socrates uses it to attack foolish mockery of guardian practices (Resp. 457b2). 13 Adeimantus too much earlier, following Glaucon’s praise of injustice, accused the poets of being inconsistent, in extolling justice and the benefits of the just while praising injustice as beneficial, and hypocritical, in scorning the indigent just men, whom they acknowledge as the better men, but honoring the unjust rich in private and in public (Resp. 363e4–364b2; cf. Leg. 662b4–c5). Blondell 2002, 241 argues that Adeimantus is more influenced by poetry than Glaucon and a living proof of its pernicious influence. His speech includes quotations from epic (e.g. 363b1–4 [Hes. Op. 232–234], 364c8–d3 [Hes. Op. 287–290], 363b5–c3 [Hom. Od. 19.109, 111–13], 364d6–e2 [Hom. Il. 9.497, 499–501]) and lyric poetry (e.g. 365b2–3 [Pind. fr. 213 Maehler], 365c1– 2 [Simon. 598 PMG = 308 Poltera], 365c4–6 [Archil. 185–187]) and references to it but none from drama. Poets do say that many unjust men enjoy benefits but never suggest that injustice is disgraceful “only in opinion and by convention” (δόξῃ δὲ μόνον καὶ νόμῳ αἰσχρόν, 364α4). They also invariably assert that injustice never pays off in the long run: punishment of transgressors may not always be swift but it is guaranteed and ruthless; see e.g. Hes. Op. 217–218, Solon 13.8, 25–32 W2, Bacchyl. 18.43–45, Aesch. Supp. 732–733, Ag. 58–59, 462–464, Soph. Ant. 302–303, Eur. Ion 1615, 1621–1622, fr. 222, 223.57–58, 800, 835, 979 Kannicht, Tr. Adesp. fr. 624 KannichtSnell. Adeimantus refers to poets who claim that transgressions may be forgiven by means of spells and rituals, but Aeschylus at least stresses that divine anger cannot be assuaged by any means (Ag. 67–71; cf. 396, Supp. 385–386, Eum. 382–384); see Fraenkel 1950, 43–44. 14 Gill 1993, 46 correctly points out that falsehood goes beyond factual inaccuracy.

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cluded and partially quoted (fr. 181a–182 Radt) in the disparagement of tragedians: their praise of Palamedes’ inventions and benefactions resulted in a laughable denigration of Agamemnon’s knowledge and leadership. 15 Since Plato does not regularly draw distinctions among poets, his singling out of Aeschylus for criticism is puzzling, and for clues one could do worse than turn to Aristophanes’ treatment of tragedians. Penelope Murray, for instance, has argued that Aristophanes’ distinction in Frogs between war-like Aeschylus and unmanly Euripides (and Agathon in Women at the Thesmophoria) collapses in Plato. 16 This is true as far as it goes, but in my view the demolition is much more extensive. On the basis of Aristophanes’ portrayal of the tragedians, in late fifth century Aeschylus seems to have become canonized as the moral and pious tragedian par excellence, and even as a model citizen. Aeschylus, who fought in the glorious battles of the Persian wars, was a prominent member of the generation glorified as legendary (Ach. 180–181, 677; cf. Nub. 1364–1379). Their victories against barbarian invaders, slaves of a tyrant, encapsulated the essence of collective Greek moral and civic superiority. In any case, Aeschylus’ alleged preference for war-like subjects and related rejection of love stories as well as his piety might qualify him as the tragedian likeliest to be considered by many as an appropriate civic educator. 17 Plato would not share the view of Aeschylus presented in comedy and possibly espoused by many of his contemporaries. Aeschylus was not a preacher, and his presentation of human folly and divine punishment was nuanced and on several occasions ambivalent. Apart from the gods in Eumenides, for instance, there are indications that gods may have been presented ambivalently in a number of now fragmentary plays. For example, Semele or Water-carriers, the Carians or Europa, the Archeresses and possibly Callisto dramatized the travails of mortals, mainly women, who became the objects of divine favors and hostility, with grave consequences for them and their families. One of the fragments Plato castigates is now attributed to Semele, and I will discuss it below. In a substantial fragment from the Carians or Europa the heroine narrates, perhaps to the chorus, the story of her abduction by a bull and her travails as the mother of three excellent sons fathered by Zeus, Minos, Rhadamanthys and Sarpedon (fr. 99 Radt): ταύρῳ τε λειμὼν ξένια πάμβοτος πάρα. τοιόνδε μὲν Ζεὺς κλέμμα πρεσβύτου πατρὸς  15 As far as is known today, Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides as well as Astydamas II composed Palamedes plays; cf. Austin/Olson 2004, 259. 16 Murray 2011, 187–188: Plato considers all tragedy as feminized. 17 For the later view of Euripides as a poet of love see Wright 2017, 222–224.

  Poulheria Kyriakou αὐτοῦ μένων ἄμοχθον ἤνυσεν λαβεῖν. τί οὖν; τὰ πολλὰ κεῖνα διὰ παύρων λέγω. γυνὴ θεῷ μειχθεῖσα παρθένου σέβας ἤμειψε, παίδων δ’ ἐζύγη ξυνάονι. καὶ τρὶς γοναῖσι τοὺς γυναικείους πόνους ἐκαρτέρησ’ ἄρουρα, κοὐκ ἐμέμψατο τοῦ μὴ ’ξενεγκεῖν σπέρμα γενναῖον πατρός. ἐκ τῶν μεγίστων δ’ ἠρξάμην φυτευμάτων Μίνω τεκοῦσα… Ῥαδάμανθυν, ὅσπερ ἄφθιτος παίδων ἐ̣ μῶν. ἀλλ’ οὐκ ἐν αὐγαῖς ταῖς ἐμαῖς ζόη σφ’ ἔχει· τὸ μὴ παρὸν δὲ τέρψιν οὐκ ἔχει φίλοις. τρ̣ίτον δέ, τοῦ νῦν φροντίσιν χειμάζομαι, Σαρπηδόν’, αἰχμὴ μὴ ’ξ Ἄρεως καθίκετο. κ̣λέος γὰρ ἥκειν Ἑλλάδος λωτίσματα π̣ά̣σης, ὑπερφέροντας ἀλκίμῳ σθένει, α̣ὐχεῖν δὲ Τρώων ἄστυ πορθήσειν βίᾳ. πρὸς οὗ δέδοικα μή τι μαργαίνων δόρει ἀνυπέρβατον δράξῃ τε καὶ πάθῃ κακόν. λεπτὴ γὰρ ἐλπὶς ἠδ’ ἐπὶ ξυροῦ μένει μὴ πάντα παίσασ’ ἐκχέω πρὸς ἕρματι (Aesch. fr. 99 Radt) …for the bull a rich grazing meadow as gift of hospitality. Such was the theft that Zeus succeeded in committing at the expense of my aged father, without moving from his place and without any toil. Well, to make the long story short, a mortal woman united with a god, lost the honor of her virginity and had children with her partner. I endured the pains of childbirth three times, and my fertile field did not complain or refuse to bear to the end the noble seed of the father. I first gave birth to Minos, the greatest of my offspring…[then to] Rhadamanthys, the son who became immortal. His life, though, is out of my sight, and absence does not gladden loved ones. My third son is Sarpedon, the one I am currently anxious about lest he has perished in battle. Rumor has it that the best men of all Greece, outstanding in fighting prowess, have arrived with the ambition to conquer the city of Troy. I fear that Sarpedon in his fighting fury suffer irreparable harm. I nourish a slight hope and I am on the razor’s edge whether I may strike against a reef and lose everything

Unlike the common version of the story found in Hesiod (fr. 140–141 M–W) and Bacchylides (fr. 10 Maehler), the bull was not the transformed Zeus but an animal he sent to fetch Europa, presumably to Crete, where he waited to mate with her. The speaker, now apparently residing in Lycia, 18 has already lost one son, the late

 18 Cf. Podlecki 2009, 326–327, who follows West 2000 in suggesting that the play was likely part of a tetralogy that also included Memnon and Psychostasia. For the name of the play see Keen 2005.

A Cause for Fragmentation: Tragic Fragments in Plato’s Republic  

Minos, and can take little comfort from the immortalization of Rhadamanthys, with whom she can have no contact. To make matters worse, her third son, Sarpedon, is now fighting at Troy against the formidable Greek army and she fears that his impetuousness will kill him and render her completely childless. It is plausible that the play dealt with his death by the hand of Patroclus, his transport to Lycia and burial. The fragment has similarities with speeches and laments of unfortunate mothers, such as the Homeric Thetis (Il. 18.54–62, 429–443), the Stesichorean Callirhoe (fr. 17 Finglass) and the Simonidean Danae (PMG 543 = 271 Poltera). Equally significant, Europa seems to be a precursor of the Sophoclean Deianeira in Trachiniae (1–58) and the Euripidean Creusa in Ion (859–922). She is a mature woman whose life has been turned upside down by the whims of the gods and fate. Uprooted from her family and home, she became a fertile field for the production of children and is now in danger of losing even her last anchor and consolation in life. She may not have blamed Zeus later on, indeed she may not have reappeared in the play at all. However, several elements may combine to show that Europa is not a woman in awe of her divine lover’s glory and her good fortune in mating with him. She emphasizes not only the crafty stratagem of Zeus and the deception of her naïve father but also the callousness of the god, which is perhaps reinforced by the implicit juxtaposition with the common version of the story: Zeus did not even bother to abduct her himself but sent his bovine emissary to do his bidding. Last but not least, her description of her union with the god and the process of childbearing may be thought to reflect the view of her abductor: she lost her virginity and became the fertile soil that brought forth his noble issue. In Callisto too Zeus perhaps satisfied his desire for the eponymous heroine, a companion of Artemis, in a callous manner. Only a two-word fragment of the play survives (98 Radt), and there is no information about the plot. Since the tradition has preserved several versions of the myth of Callisto and her son Arcas, it is impossible to surmise which one Aeschylus dramatized or whether he innovated. 19 Still, it is virtually certain that Zeus impregnated Callisto, who had taken a vow of chastity, and thus exposed her to his daughter’s wrath, perhaps in a variant of Hera’s traditional fury at her husband’s infidelities. Zeus’ rape of Callisto shows his indifference toward the sensitivities of one of his daughters. In any case, Callisto was probably transformed into a bear and perhaps persecuted by her son Arcas.  19 For the myth see Gantz 1993, 725–729. Radt 1985, 216 suggests that Aeschylus may have dramatized the story as narrated in Hesiod (fr. 163 M–W), for which see Sale 1962 and 1965.

  Poulheria Kyriakou Zeus’ dealings with his objects of desire perhaps took a more sinister turn in Archeresses. The play dramatized the terrible dismemberment of Actaeon, the son of Autonoe and Aristaeus, in the form of a deer by his own hunting hounds, following an offense against Artemis or Zeus. The plot is not known, but it is plausible that Zeus became angry and enlisted Artemis’ help in punishing Actaeon because Actaeon lusted after his aunt Semele and/or sought to marry her, perhaps knowing that the god was his rival. 20 Even so, it is possible that Actaeon was a hubrist, or morally compromised. 21 A rival’s elimination is shocking to modern sensitivities but it is beyond doubt that according to Greek beliefs a mortal who fails to respect a god’s sexual choices suffers retribution. 22 Whether Actaeon was in the wrong or not, it is hard to imagine a crime committed by Europa or Callisto, although they may have suffered because of reasons such as pride or ancestral offenses. In any case, it is implausible that Aeschylus would ever fail to stress human error or immorality even if he did not always and unqualifyingly glorify divine morality. Plato apparently wishes to suggest that even the characters of Aeschylus, both mortal and immortal, are reprehensible. In Plato’s view, character representation, or in Aristotelian terms êthos, is paramount in the assessment of plays. This would serve as Plato’s answer to his actual or potential critics, who might wish to uphold distinctions between tragedians and praise Aeschylus. According to Plato, not even Aeschylus satisfies the criteria for the role of pious moral educator. His characters, who include many distraught or overbearing females, speak and behave in ways that are unacceptable for educational/civic purposes. In this light, they are just as blamable as those of other poets.

 20 Fr. 221 Radt from Semele (Ζεύς, ὃς κατέκτα τοῦτον) perhaps belongs to an account of Actaeon’s punishment by Zeus. Hadjikosti 2006b argues that the body of Actaeon was on stage. 21 Euripides (Bacch. 337–340) suggests that Actaeon boasted of being a better hunter than Artemis. Later authors recount other offenses against the goddess, seeing her bath and wooing her respectively (Callim. Hymn. 5.106–107 [cf. Ov. Met. 3.138–252], Diod. Sic. 4.81.4). The story of the rivalry of Zeus and Actaeon for the hand of Semele is found in Stesichorus (fr. 285 Finglass) and Acusilaus (FGrH 2 F 33 = EGM gr. 33), and may already have appeared in Hesiod’s Catalogue (fr. 217A M-W); see Davies & Finglass 2014, 571–572. 22 Coronis in Pindar’s Pythian 3 is a famous example, although she is not the god’s rival but his lover: she slept with Ischys when already pregnant with Asclepius by Apollo, who sent his sister Artemis to punish her; the goddess destroyed also several innocent neighbors of the woman (8– 37), but apparently not Ischys.

A Cause for Fragmentation: Tragic Fragments in Plato’s Republic  

To achieve his end, the collapse of distinctions between tragedians, Plato presents Aeschylus as impious and civically dangerous by using the time-honored method of quoting and criticizing out of context. 23 Plato eschews all discussion of the structure or outcome of the plays, indeed of their plot development, let alone their ambivalence. He focuses on specific utterances and ignores their context, just as he ignored the subject matter or outlook of Aeschylus’ plays while focusing on the representation of particular characters. He does not take into account the context of most of his epic quotes or references either, but several may hardly be called ambivalent, although Plato cares little about epic conventions in the presentation of gods and heroes, 24 insisting that they are good by definition and should only be portrayed as such. In any case, the discussion of Achilles’ behavior in Hippias Minor is quite extensive. 25 Although Socrates engages in sophistic argumentation, he and Hippias reach the conclusion that Achilles does not “lie” willfully but has honorable intentions. 26 Dramatic works, though, are organic unities. The development of the plot and especially reversals of fortune

 23 For this practice in Greek authors see Blondell 2002, 93–94. 24 A prominent example is the castigation of Phoenix’ admonition to Achilles to rejoin the war with Agamemnon’s gifts but not without them and Achilles’ alleged avarice in demanding gifts for the ransom of Hector’s body (Resp. 390e5–391a2). Achilles’ renouncement of the wrath and even the ransom presuppose restitution for his honor; see e.g. Postlethwaite (1998). However, a discussion of the institutional background, although helpful and important, would not affect the outcome of the events. In contrast to the tragic characters Socrates castigates, Achilles’ choices and outlook concerning the insult and gifts do not change in the course of the epic, and not even Socrates suggests that they do, although he places emphasis on the hero’s alleged, presumably consistent, reprehensible covetousness rather than the honorable concern for his honor. 25 Ion, a dialogue named after a performer and interpreter of epic, focuses on the issue of the interpretation of Homer and the identification of the expert(s) best qualified to engage in it and indeed blurs the distinction between poet and interpreter. Cf. Hunter 2012, 89–108, who argues that the figure of Ion as presented in the dialogue is a precursor of modern Homerists rather a peer of the polymath sophists of the fifth century: “…unlike a Protagoras or a Hippias or a Prodicus, Ion has no ‘intellectual’ activity beyond the recitation and discussion of Homer; he does not teach rhetoric or virtue or even write his own poetry, he is through and through a ‘Homerist’…and as a professional performer in public of his own sophia (this is ‘what he does’)…he is actually much closer in some respects to the modern conception of ‘the scholar’ than are the great sophists of the later fifth century” (93). 26 Blondell 2002 suggests that to discuss poetry in a dialectical context one has to reduce its utterances to philosophical arguments, but Socrates thinks that this is absurd. Halliwell (2000) 104 argues that the cultural authority of poetry blurs the distinction between mythoi (imaginative or fictive stories) and logoi (statements or arguments). Cf. e.g. Phd. 61e2, where mythologein seems to anticipate the entire subsequent discussion rather than the final myth, and Grg. 502c; cf. Mouze 2005, 336 and Jouet-Pastré 2006, 142.

  Poulheria Kyriakou and resulting shifts in characters’ positions are paramount in their articulation. Isolating dramatic fragments from their complex context transforms them into sinister bits, a sort of moral free radicals that may cause serious damage. Plato’s choice to quote tragic passages out of context is not as unexpected or puzzling as their selection from Aeschylus’ drama. However, it is not incidental or trivial that the passages in question do not ever become the subject of any analysis or debate. By contrast, Plato has Socrates discuss at some length not only epic passages but also lyric fragments of Simonides, Pindar, Theognis and Tyrtaeus. 27 The discussion of Simonides’ fragment about the difficulty of becoming a noble man (Prt. 339–347a), already mentioned at the beginning, begins with Protagoras’ allegation of inconsistency on Simonides’ part (Prt. 339b–d), and Socrates’ lengthy refutation includes references to and analysis of glosses (Prt. 341b–c) and style (Prt. 343e) as well as sense-breaks and punctuation (Prt. 346e2– 3). 28 Pindar’s fragment is the famous one about the universal power of law over mortals and immortals (169a.1–8 Maehler; Grg. 484b, Leg. 690b8–c2, 714e–715a): Νόμος ὁ πάντων βασιλεύς θνατῶν τε καὶ ἀθανάτων ἄγει δικαιῶν τὸ βιαιότατον ὑπερτάτᾳ χειρί. τεκμαίρομαι ἔργοισιν Ἡρακλέος· ἐπεὶ Γηρυόνα⸥ βόας Κυκλώπει⸥ον ἐπὶ πρόθυρο⸤ν⸥ Ε⸤ὐρυσ⸥θ̣ έος ἀνατεί τε] κ⸥αὶ ἀπριάτας ἔλασεν, (Pind. fr. 169a.1–8 Maehler)

 27 He also adduces Sappho and Anacreon as authorities for Socrates’ first speech to Phaedrus about love (Phdr. 235c2–4), before turning to Stesichorus’ palinode. Although Socrates does not say that his speech will be based on any specific poem or utterance of the old masters, he vows that his readiness to present a speech better than Lysias’ may only be attributed to what he has heard from such reputable authorities, since he is ignorant himself and has unfortunately forgotten even the source of the streams that have filled him through his ears as if he were a vessel (Phdr. 235c8–d3). Socrates also quotes Ibycus as a model for his concern over his insult to Eros (Phdr. 242c7–d2) before he turns to Stesichorus; cf. Demos 1999, 77. Cf. Prm. 136e9–137a4 (an evocation of Ibycus by the philosopher Parmenides, who likens himself to the narrator of a poem about an older lover fearing a new onslaught of boy love) and n. 29 below. No tragedian ever enjoys the status of a model, and barely ever the status of an authority. Even in the gathering of the Symposium the only colleague of Agathon present and speaking is Aristophanes, although in the dramatic time of the work both Sophocles and Euripides were alive. 28 Cf. Halliwell 2000, 105 n. 41.

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Law, the king of all, of mortals and immortals, governs, claiming extreme violence as its right with sovereign hand. I bring as evidence the deeds of Heracles, for he drove the cattle of Geryon to the Cyclopean portal of Eurystheus without punishment and payment

The fragment has been much discussed because of the controversial meaning of nomos and the relationship of nomos and justice. Callicles in Gorgias uses it as proof for his thesis on the primacy of nature and its law over the written variety: the strong individuals in a society are the carriers of the law of nature, the only valid and sovereign one, in contrast to the written laws the majority of weaklings passed to sideline and hoodwink the strong in order to protect themselves. To be sure, Callicles’ thesis is not praised or justified, but it is important that Pindar is not just vilified, or praised for that matter, but discussed and interpreted. 29 Although the discussion does not help modern interpretation of the fragment, not least because Callicles focuses on a small part and ignores the rest, his appeal to Pindar’s authority indicates that violence rather than justice is the main attribute of nomos, in his case the law of nature. If so, then his use of Pindar’s poem is not as rhetorically inadequate as many critics have thought, although his focus on material possessions draws the scathing irony of Socrates a little later on (Grg. 490b–491b). In a similar vein, in Laws Plato interprets Pindar, adding “according to nature” in his reference to the initial gnome of the fragment (κατὰ φύσιν, Leg. 690b8; cf. Leg. 690c2, 715a1–2) and suggesting that the rule of the stronger over the weaker applies to all living beings (Leg. 690b7–8). 30 He then even ironically apostrophizes “wisest Pindar” (ὦ Πίνδαρε σοφώτατε, Leg. 690c1) and suggests that willing submission of the ignorant to the rule of the knowledgeable rather than violence is the highest form of governance (Leg. 690b8–c2). He also discusses Simonides’ definition of justice (Resp. 331e–332c), to give to each his due. The interlocutors reach the conclusion that this definition is wrong (Resp. 335e), but Socrates, initially at least, allows that the poet may have expressed himself allusively (Resp. 332b9–c3):

 29 In the Republic (331a) Pindar is praised for his pronouncement on the old age of the pious and just (fr. 214 Maehler), and in Meno (81a5–c4) he is one of the divine poets who share the views of “wise men and women”, priests and priestesses, about metempsychosis (fr. 133 Maehler); see Nicholson 1999, 26. 30 It is ironic, and may not be incidental, that the statements of Callicles (Grg. 483d5–6 τὸν κρείττω τοῦ ἥττονος ἄρχειν καὶ πλέον ἔχειν) and Socrates (Leg. 690b4–5 τὸ κρείττονα μὲν ἄρχειν, τὸν ἥττω δὲ ἄρχεσθαι) about the rule of the stronger according to nature, for which they adduce Pindar as authority, are similar, although Callicles emphasizes possessions while Socrates focuses on justice.

  Poulheria Kyriakou Ἠινίξατο ἄρα, ἦν δ’ ἐγώ, ὡς ἔοικεν, ὁ Σιμωνίδης ποιητικῶς τὸ δίκαιον ὃ εἴη. διενοεῖτο μὲν γάρ, ὡς φαίνεται, ὅτι τοῦτ’ εἴη δίκαιον, τὸ προσῆκον ἑκάστῳ ἀποδιδόναι, τοῦτο δὲ ὠνόμασεν ὀφειλόμενον. (Pl. Resp. 332b9–c3) So, I said, it seems that Simonides expressed allusively his concept of justice, because, as it appears, he thought that justice is to give to each what is appropriate but he called that his due.

In this light, the poet meant something else than what he appeared to say prima facie. 31 Theognis (33–36, 434–438) comes under fire over an alleged self-contradiction concerning the teachabilility of virtue (Men. 95d–96a; cf. Xen. Symp. 2.4–6, Mem. 1.2.20). Socrates quotes first the poet’s advice to Cyrnus (33–36): καὶ παρὰ τοῖσιν πῖνε καὶ ἔσθιε, καὶ μετὰ τοῖσιν ἵζε, καὶ ἅνδανε τοῖς, ὧν μεγάλη δύναμις. ἐσθλῶν μὲν γὰρ ἄπ’ ἐσθλὰ διδάξεαι· ἢν δὲ κακοῖσιν συμμίσγῃς, ἀπολεῖς καὶ τὸν ἐόντα νόον. (Thgn. 33–36 West) Drink and eat with them [i.e. the noble] and sit with them and be pleasing to the powerful. For noble men will teach you noble things, but if you associate with the base, you will lose what sense you have.

He then suggests that in other verses (ἐν ἄλλοις δέ γε ὀλίγον μεταβάς) he propounds a contradictory view, namely that there is no way to instill virtue and good sense to anyone. 32 Socrates quotes 435 (εἰ δ’ ἦν ποιητόν, φησί, καὶ ἔνθετον ἀνδρὶ νόημα) before 434 (πολλοὺς ἂν μισθοὺς καὶ μεγάλους ἔφερον) and then the end of the passage (436–438):

 31 For the similarities between the account of justice in book 1 and 4 (442e–443a) see Kosman 2007, 126, who argues that “…Plato’s dialectic in its search for definition looks to the discovery not of some privileged formula but of the proper understanding of the several formulas that tradition supplies to the learned” and that in book 4 the interlocutors have reached an understanding of the proper sense of “render” and “his due”. 32 ὀλίγον μεταβάς does not seem to indicate that the passage is close to the previous one and that Plato perhaps had a different edition of Theognis’ work or was quoting from memory. The phrase probably suggests ironically that Theognis “slightly” modified his view; see Selle (2008) with previous bibliography.

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οὔποτ’ ἂν ἐξ ἀγαθοῦ πατρὸς ἔγεντο κακός, πειθόμενος μύθοισι σαόφροσιν· ἀλλὰ διδάσκων οὔ ποτε ποιήσεις τὸν κακὸν ἄνδρ’ ἀγαθόν. (Thgn. 436–438 West) There would never be a base son of a noble father because he would listen to sound advice. But you will never teach the base man to be noble.

Obviously, there is a contradiction, and by pointing it out Socrates corroborates his point. 33 Still, it is indicative that Plato chooses to discuss a self-contradiction of a poet whose elegies are not a unified and continuous work but he does nothing even remotely similar in the case of dramatic poets, whose plays, both individually and collectively, apparently offered rich material for such critique. Last but not least, the Athenian Stranger in Laws discusses Tyrtaeus 12 twice (Leg. 629a–30b, 660e–661a). In the first instance, he suggests that there is a prowess superior to the bravery against foreign foes praised by the excellent poet Tyrtaeus. The Athenian Stranger agrees that bravery in battles against foreign enemies outranks all other virtues and advantages, but stresses that one should consider superior to it loyalty in civil strife, the most terrible and challenging kind of conflict. He adduces Theognis (77–78) as authority (Leg. 630a5–6): πιστὸς ἀνὴρ χρυσοῦ τε καὶ ἀργύρου ἀντερύσασθαι ἄξιος ἐν χαλεπῇ, Κύρνε, διχοστασίῃ. (Thgn. 77–78 West) A loyal man is as worthy as gold and silver, Cyrnus, during terrible civil strife.

The Athenian Stranger suggests that only noble citizens may have this virtue, which is superior to bravery because it combines in itself all others (Leg. 630a8– b3), while bravery may be shown by men who are immoral such as the majority of mercenaries (Leg. 630b3–8). In the second passage he adopts a more radical approach: he takes his earlier discussion virtually for granted but further suggests that the Spartans make their poets stress that virtue is paramount. He then quotes part of Tyrtaeus’ poem, without naming him, and claims that he emphasizes the importance of virtue over all other assets and juxtaposes it with vice. He goes on to suggest that commonly valued assets such as health, beauty and  33 Cf. Janaway 2006, 389, who suggests that “any few lines of poetry can be ambiguous and contradict other utterances of the poet, leading to endless unresolved dispute about their meaning (Prt. 339a1–347a4)”. On Simonides in Prt. 340–348 see Baltussen 2015, 182–183.

  Poulheria Kyriakou power are valuable and beneficial when they belong to a just and noble man but are useless and even dangerous if they belong to the unjust, and concludes by suggesting that this is what should be prescribed to the poets (Leg. 661b4– 6…661c5–7) ὑμεῖς δὲ καὶ ἐγώ που τάδε λέγομεν, ὡς ταῦτά ἐστι σύμπαντα δικαίοις μὲν καὶ ὁσίοις ἀνδράσιν ἄριστα κτήματα, ἀδίκοις δὲ κάκιστα σύμπαντα…ταῦτα δὴ λέγειν, οἶμαι, τοὺς παρ’ ὑμῖν ποιητάς, ἅπερ ἐγώ, πείσετε καὶ ἀναγκάσετε, καὶ ἔτι τούτοις ἑπομένους ῥυθμούς τε καὶ ἁρμονίας ἀποδιδόντας παιδεύειν οὕτω τοὺς νέους ἡμῶν. (Pl. Leg. 661b4–6 … 661c5–7) You and I agree on this, namely that all these [i.e. assets] are excellent in the possession of men who are just and pious but most terrible in the possession of the unjust…I think that you will persuade and force your poets to suggest the ideas that I propound and furthermore to employ the rhythms and harmonies appropriate to them for the sake of the education of our youth. 34

These discussions indicate two things. First, literary analysis and debates about the meaning of specific passages are not ruled out as a priori unnecessary or irrelevant, although they may ultimately prove unhelpful. Second, unlike tragedians, other poets do not invariably become targets of attack. Their work is not castigated as completely immoral and unsuitable for the education of the young, although the poets are usually acknowledged as authorities that require correction or improvement. Obviously, the thematology of the fragments of Simonides or Theognis is not subject to the strictures that disqualify tragedy in the Republic and Laws, but Pindar’s fragment about the universal power of law in Gorgias might have been. The view of Callicles is rejected, as is his adaptation of Zethus’ attack on a male citizen’s devotion to music and the arts from Euripides’ Antiope that I already mentioned, but not without discussion. 35

 34 It is possible and congruent with the general drift of the discussion about Spartan institutions in general and Tyrtaeus’ poem in particular that the Athenian Stranger is not favorably disposed to them. If so, he may suggest that the Spartans and Tyrtaeus should have stressed the importance of virtue over all other assets to begin with. It is likelier, though, that, as in the first passage, he agrees with Tyrtaeus but proceeds to suggest crucial improvements. These may be thought to be tantamount to a radical revision or even rejection of the poet’s view, but Plato does not deal with the poem polemically. 35 Pindar along with tragedians is castigated for presenting a greedy Asclepius (Resp. 408b– c) — in extant tragedy there is no report of Asclepius’ vice. There is also a brief discussion about the correctness and applicability of a maxim by Phocylides (Resp. 407a–b).

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By contrast, tragic fragments are never the subject of any debate, and thus not even castigated for inconsistencies, as no discussion of dramatic development ever takes place. The fragments are never discussed or debated with a view to the poet’s use of allusive or ambivalent language, for instance. Not even a mild doubt about the meaning or any alternative interpretation of the fragments is included, and this despite their being not isolated utterances or relatively short lyric songs but parts of an organic whole. In a well-argued and justly celebrated paper, Timothy Gantz suggests that Plato is not interested in the facts of each tragic case and quotes Eduard Fraenkel, who noted that Plato never wanted to be fair to Aeschylus. 36 This is obviously true, and it is also true that Plato would never consider a character subject to emotional outbursts, and more generally to ethical inconsistency, admirable or a model for the education of the young. Instead, the passionate turmoil and the shifts of perspective characteristic of elite characters become main targets of his ethical and psychological criticism. In other words, a discussion of the fragments or plays would not absolve Aeschylus of the charges just mentioned. Still, it remains noteworthy that Plato is fair, or, at the very least, fairer to other poets and their work while he allows no room for any comprehensive sketch of the plays he quotes, let alone for even a partial vindication of Aeschylus. 37 He certainly never quotes any fragment in which a character acknowledges his or her folly.

 36 Gantz 1981, 32. Halliwell 2000, 112 is less critical of Plato, arguing that he ignores the internal context of Aeschylus’ work and focuses on the external, or the reception and influence of passages such as the fragments from Niobe, the dramatic power of which may sweep along, and be detrimental to, the audience (cf. Resp. 605b–606b). Murray 2013, 310 makes a similar point about the emphasis on the spectator rather than the performer in Laws; cf. Peponi 2013, 225–226. There is no doubt about Plato’s choice of context and his concerns, but it is certainly remarkable that only Aeschylus’ fragments become the target of unrelenting, out-of-context criticism, unlike those of other poets. For the importance of internal and external contextualization in literary interpretation see e.g. Most 1994. 37 Bakewell (2017) argues that Socrates in the Republic eventually redeems Aeschylus and to an extent tragedy with a sort of palinode that shares elements with the palinode in Phaedrus. In the latter, Socrates resorts to poetry for the sake of Phaedrus. Likewise, in the Republic he goes along with Glaucon and Adeimantus who are fond of poetry and perhaps already negatively influenced by it (cf. n. 13 above) and presents Aeschylus’ Septem as one of the plays that may be acceptable because its presentation of the behavior of Amphiaraus and especially Eteocles promotes civic virtue and sacrifice. Following the early quotations of the play by Glaucon and the critique of Aeschylus’ fragments, Socrates much later refers to Amphiaraus in the play (Resp. 550c) and Adeimantus to Aeschylus (Resp. 563c) again, without quoting verbatim. This shows that the right choice of play and the suppression of meter make even some parts of drama acceptable. Every part of this argument is difficult to accept, especially since both Amphiaraus and especially Ete-

  Poulheria Kyriakou In Republic, Plato castigates Aeschylus for allegedly promoting impiety by portraying gods as liars and deceivers. They are mean-spirited enemies not only of mankind but also of their own relatives and fellow-gods (cf. Resp. 377–378). As already suggested, heroes, especially children and descendants of gods, are by definition excellent and should be portrayed as such. However, poets in general and tragedians in particular present them in unacceptable manner, as if the heroes were common immoral mortals: their character and behavior exemplify various moral vices, including lack of constancy and self-control, which undermine the proper education of the young. The first and last tragic fragments censured in Republic are from Aeschylus’ Niobe. Like Plato’s choice of Aeschylus among tragedians, the choice of Niobe among Aeschylus’ plays is rather unexpected and puzzling. There is no indication that Aeschylus sought to justify Niobe and her family or allowed them the benefit of any doubt, although he may have emphasized the severity of the punishment inflicted on the offending heroine by the gods, which is anathema to Plato. The censure of the second Niobe fragment (391e) is less severe than the rest. The title character is the speaker (Strabo 12.8.21) and she refers to her family’s lofty descent from Zeus (fr. 162 Radt): οἱ θεῶν ἀγχίσποροι, Ζηνὸς ἐγγύς, ὧν κατ’ Ἰδαῖον πάγον Διὸς πατρῴου βωμός ἐστ’ ἐν αἰθέρι, κοὔ πώ σφιν ἐξίτηλον αἷμα δαιμόνων (Aesch. fr 162 Radt)

 ocles, despite their virtues, may hardly serve as models for the guardians. For instance, according to Bakewell (273), Eteocles “resembles το λογίστικον [sic]” and “only (my italics) in his irrational eagerness to take on his brother Polyneices does Eteocles depart from the high moral standards of the guardians of Kallipolis.” It is beyond the scope of this paper to engage in detailed refutation, but Eteocles’ impious urge to kill his brother is at the center of the play and his presentation. Even if the argument may not be rejected in its entirety, as I believe it should, the play Bakewell envisages is at best a shadow of Aeschylus’ work and thus has little to do with Aeschylus except formally and superficially. Murray 2013, 303–307 argues in a similar manner against scholars such as Morrow (1960) and Mouze (2005) who have suggested that tragedy may be acceptable in the Laws if it conforms with the ideals of the legislators: while some educational uses of tragedy are not ruled out, tragedy as it stands, with its privileging of emotions and emphasis on the pleasure of indulging them, cannot be accepted because the conditions for its acceptance are such that render it non-tragic. There is no doubt that a “reformed” kind of tragic poetry would be acceptable, but no such tragedy is forthcoming, let alone already in existence and needing a mild treatment to be of service. Cf. Naddaff 2002, 2 and Moss 2007, 442.

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Those who are near of kin to the gods and close to Zeus, whose altar of Ancestral Zeus is high in the upper air on the crags of Ida, and in whom the divine blood has not yet lost its potency (Translation by A. Sommerstein)

Socrates warns that the young may find in such utterances an excuse for evil behavior because even lofty heroes and relatives of gods behaved badly. 38 There is nothing impious, arrogant or immoral in the utterance itself, and Socrates does not suggest the opposite. Besides, as far as one may surmise today, the play apparently dramatized the ruinous consequences of human folly, not least perhaps in connection with the close association of the offenders with gods. The issue Socrates raises, though, may not be dismissed: those seeking support for their mischief may use all avenues, even when they have nothing to do with their folly. This is not a sufficient basis for censorship but at least there is no direct criticism of Aeschylus or Niobe as promoters of impiety. By contrast, the first Niobe fragment quoted (380a4–5; 154154a.15–16 Radt), “a god plants a cause in mortals when he wishes to ruin a family completely”, is treated very differently. The gnome belongs to a speech, 39 which describes Niobe’s predicament and current situation (fr. 154a Radt):

 38 The Sophoclean Niobe probably also referred to Zeus’ favor toward her (fr. 447 Radt), and Bacchylides (fr. 20 D Maehler) seems to contrast the ruthlessness of Apollo and Artemis with the pity that Zeus showed toward Niobe. Direct association of mortals and heroes is deemed to be inappropriate and dangerous also in Sophocles’ Antigone. When Antigone, a headstrong maiden, compares herself to Niobe and claims that she is very similar to her (Ant. 823–833), the chorus of cautious Theban elders hasten to point out that this is not so (Ant. 834–838): Niobe is a goddess (cf. El. 150) and descendant of gods while they and Antigone are mortals and of mortal descent, and the best she can hope for is the fame that she was comparable to divine individuals in life and death. Unlike Niobe, Antigone committed no hubris in burying her brother, and thus does not seek to justify herself through the comparison with Niobe. However, the comparison is potentially hubristic not only because Antigone assimilates herself to a heroine close to the gods but also because she may be thought to accuse the gods of causing inordinate suffering, to her and her “model”, disregarding all differences of status and circumstances between the two; cf. Hester 1971, 34 and Kyriakou 2008, 278–279. For Niobe as a goddess see Hahnemann 2012, 176. 39 The identity of the speaker is unknown, as indeed the identity of the chorus, the likely addressee of the speech. If fr. 155 Radt refers to the chorus, they may be Theban maidens. Seaford 2005, 121, 123 suggests that the women around the tomb on which Niobe is sitting or in which she is standing on South Italian vase-paintings he is discussing may be the members of the chorus. The speaker knows much about Niobe, and is apparently quite close to her and anxious about preserving her reputation (14). Garzya (1987) and Moreau (1995) have suggested that she is her mother, but it is not clear that she was alive, or why she would be in Thebes before Tanta-

  Poulheria Kyriakou ο]ὐ̣δὲν εἰ μὴ πατέρ’ ἀναστενά̣ζ̣ε[ται τὸν] δ̣όντα καὶ φύσαντ̣α, Ταντάλου β[ίαν, εἰς οἷ]ο̣ ν ἐξώκειλεν ἀλ̣ίμενον γάμ̣ον. ]ς κακοῦ γὰρ πνεῦ̣μα προσβ[ ․ ․ ․ ․] ․δο[ ]δ’ ὁρᾶτε τοὐπι[τ]έ̣ρ̣μιον γάμ̣ου τριταῖ]ον ἦμαρ τόνδ’ ἐφημένη τάφον τέκν⸥οις ἐπῴζει – ⏑ τοῖς τεθνηκόσιν ]υ̣σα τὴν τάλαιναν εὔμορφον φυήν ]ς κακωθεὶς δ’ οὐδὲν ἄλλ’ ε[ἰ] μὴ σ̣κ̣ι̣ά̣ ] μὲν ἥξει δεῦρο Ταντάλου βία, ] κόμιστρα τῆσδε, καὶ πεφα̣[․ ․ ․ ․ ]ν ] δε μῆνιν τίνα φέρων Ἀμ̣φίονι ] ̣ ον αἰ̣κῶς ἐξεφύλλασεν γέν̣ ο̣ς̣ ]ος ὑμᾶς· οὐ γάρ ἐ̣σ̣τε δύσφρονε[ς ] θεὸς μὲν αἰτίαν φύει β⸤ροτοῖς, ὅταν κα⸥κῶσαι δῶμα παμπήδη⸤ν θέλῃ ]ε θνητὸν ὄντα χρὴ τὸν ․ [ π]εριστέλλοντα μὴ θρασυστομ[εῖν. ] εὖ πράσσοντες οὔποτ’ ἤλ̣πισα[ν ]ντες ἐκχεῖν ἣν ἔχως [ γ]ὰ̣ρ ἐξα̣ρθεῖσα [κ]αλλισ̣[τ

5

10

15

20

(Aesch. fr. 154a Radt) [She is] groaning loudly over nothing so much as that her father [who] begot her and gave her in marriage, the [m]ighty Tantalus, ran her aground [on suc]h a harbourless shore of a union; for a storm of [every kind of (?)] evil has as[saile]d [this] h[ouse (?)]. And you [yourselves] can see the final outcome of this marriage: this is the [third (?)] day that she has been sitting at this tomb, a living mother brooding over her dead children, with the unhappy beauty of her form [melt]ing away. A [mortal] afflicted is nothing but a shadow. [And now (?)] mighty Tantalus will be coming here [to apply(?)] means to bring her home and [...]. And what anger did [Phoebus(?)] bear towards Amphion, that he so humbled this [flourish]ing family and stripped it bare? [I will tell] you, for you are not unfriendly. When god wishes to ruin a family completely, he plants a cause among its members; [but all the same], seeing that one is mortal, one should cherish the [prosperity that comes from the gods(?)] and not be rash in speech. [But those who] enjoy [continuing(?)] success never expect to [slip up(?)]

 lus’ arrival. Similarly, Niobe’s mother-in-law Antiope may already be dead and she would perhaps not be as sympathetic to Niobe as the speaker is; see Sommerstein 2008, 163. An attendant of Niobe, perhaps her nurse, is the likeliest candidate, in view of the presumed plot and especially the attitude of the speaker to Niobe, her family and her predicament. For a review and discussion of the various suggestions about the identity of the speaker and iconographic evidence see Pennesi 2008, 28–32, who also thinks that the speaker is Niobe’s nurse.

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and lose the [prosperity(?)] they have. For [this woman], elated by [her(?)] surpassing beauty [and the number of her children(?)...] (Translation by A. Sommerstein)

The lines in question (15–16) are gnomic and may easily be quoted and even interpreted out of context to illustrate a point. 40 Socrates censures the gnome for the wrong and impious view of divine agency it promulgates: primarily the young but also the rest of the community should never come to espouse such beliefs. As already suggested, the gnome is used to illustrate a view of the gods the play itself did not present, as it apparently did not blame gods or exonerate humans for the terrible misfortunes of the family. In fact, in the lines immediately following the gnome (17–21), the speaker stresses Niobe’s folly, which exemplifies the ruinous behavior of privileged individuals such as those mentioned in the second fragment. The earlier reference to divine anger toward Amphion (10–13), Niobe’s husband, may be inscribed in the same framework. Niobe’s father Tantalus also appears in the play and talks about his erstwhile arrogance and current humbling (fr. 159 Radt): θυμός ποθ’ ἁμὸς οὐρανῷ κυρῶν ἄνω ἔραζε πίπτει καί με προσφωνεῖ τάδε· ‘γίγνωσκε τἀνθρώπεια μὴ σέβειν ἄγαν’ (Aesch. fr. 159 Radt) My spirit, which once reached up to the high heavens, has fallen to earth and says this to me: “Learn not to give too much honour to anything that is human” (Translation by A. Sommerstein)

In both lyric and tragedy individuals favored by the gods with exceptional gifts and prosperity are often said to be prone to arrogance and hubris, which brings divine punishment on them. In this light, the fragment and the play as a whole could certainly have been used to illustrate the main part of the rule that Socrates sets for the presentation of gods and their dealings in poetry: gods are invariably just and benevolent and never harbor evil designs or cause harm to any human; instead, in their goodness and benevolence they punish only those who deserve  40 In Protagoras (342e4–343c5) Socrates claims that the wisdom of the Seven sages was encapsulated in famous gnomes such as those carved at Delphi. Simonides allegedly attacked Pittacus’ widely cited saying about the difficulty of being noble because the poet wished to gain fame by proving it wrong.

  Poulheria Kyriakou punishment and thus benefit from it (Resp. 380a–c10). As Stephen Halliwell has pointed out, Plato never refers to any tragic or epic passage that rejects the idea of divine responsibility for evil. 41 We may find it hard to believe that Aeschylus stressed the benefit that Niobe and her family reaped from their misfortune. Nevertheless, it is perhaps not accidental that the play dramatized the aftermath of the children’s killing, a story of grief and reckoning. 42 Tantalus at least seems to have realized the folly of human arrogance and thus to have acquired some measure of wisdom. Niobe too may have come to see the error of her ways, although she would probably not have accepted her fate. There may be some intentional irony in Socrates’ use of a drama that would fit the bill or might be acceptable by his standards. However, this does not eliminate the sweeping character of his condemnation of poetry on moral and civic grounds, and the castigation of tragic passages without discussion of their context or the outcome of the plays the passages come from. 43 There is much less to go on in the assessment of the next fragment (220a.16– 17 Sommerstein = 168.16–17 Radt): νύμφα̣ι ναμερτεῖς, κυδραὶ θεαί, αἷσιν ἀγείρω Ἰνάχου Ἀργείου ποταμοῦ παισὶν βιοδώροις (Aesch. fr. 220a.16–17 Sommerstein = 168.16–17 Radt) Infallible nymphs, glorious goddesses, for whom I collect alms, life-giving daughters of the Argive river Inachus (Translation by A. Sommerstein)

In the framework of his argument against the casting of gods as deceivers and agents of evil, Socrates suggests that poets should never present gods changing their form (Resp. 381c10–d7). He cites only the second line of the fragment, long ascribed to Wool-Carders but now plausibly believed to be from Semele or Water-

 41 Halliwell 2002, 108–109. 42 Cf. the praise of Aristotle, who commends Aeschylus’ choice to dramatize only one part of the story (Poet. 1456a14). 43 Halliwell 1988, 12 points out that audience response to drama may be more complex than Plato allows, combining sympathy for the plight of the characters with an awareness of their responsibility for outrages dramatized.

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Carriers. 44 The play apparently dramatized the destruction of the eponymous heroine, pregnant with Dionysus, through her notorious request from Zeus to appear to her in all his glory. Hera, the speaker of the line, transformed herself into a mendicant priestess in order to destroy Semele and apparently her fetus by tricking her into making the fateful demand (cf. [Diog.] Epist. 34.1–2 p. 248 Hercher). There can be no certainty as to whether the transformed goddess actually suggested the request. It is possible that she merely encouraged Semele, who had conceived the desire on her own, or following a mortal’s suggestion. 45 In any case, not only the Platonic Socrates and his friends but also most people would find the dramatization of the goddess’ ruthless deviousness reprehensible. On the other hand, it is not certain or easy to believe that Hera would appear as totally immoral or amoral. The request of Semele conceivably revealed, and stemmed from, her pride or arrogance or, at the very least, from lack of prudence, possibly fostered by anxiety over her reputation. Semele was a young woman enjoyed by the supreme god, and her vulnerability may have been increased by the possible hostility of her family and community toward her. 46 Alternatively, and not mutually exclusively, Semele herself may have come to harbor some doubts as to the identity of her suitor. Although this is a lapse arguably less serious than pride, it would not necessarily go unpunished, since it indicated that Semele did not trust the god or had come to trust invidious or foolish mortals more than Zeus. Be that as it may, the gods destroyed Semele, both wittingly, in the case of Hera, and unwittingly, in the case of Zeus, but it is likely that Semele’s responsibility in the matter and probably her restitution would be included in the play. If so, that play too would fit the bill of Socrates’ standard concerning the punishment of evil mortals by gods, although it is true that Hera’s transformation and agency render the play more ambivalent than Niobe.

 44 For the attribution and discussion of the evidence see Taplin 1977, 427–428, Hadjikosti 2006a and Sommerstein 2008, 225–227. 45 In another version of the story, which is attested in later sources (Ov. Met. 3.256–315, Hyginus 179), Hera took the form of Beroe, Semele’s old nurse. Whether both versions, either one, or a similar one predated Aeschylus cannot be known, but Hera does not appear in any other surviving play. See Easterling 1993, 78–79. Aeschylus apparently wished to involve Hera in person and on stage in the destruction of Semele, although the goddess could naturally inspire Semele’s wish from afar or act through intermediaries. The dramatic rationale and impact of his choices, especially Hera’s disguise into a priestess, are beyond recovery. Perhaps the authority of a priestess would be likely to make Semele more amenable to the fateful suggestion. In Aristotelian terms, it is plausible that the appearance of the goddess was meant to create awe and amazement to the audience, which would enhance pity and fear. 46 This was perhaps what the chorus refers to (220a.8–9 Sommerstein = 168.8–9 Radt).

  Poulheria Kyriakou Ambivalence does not seem to come into question in Thetis’ invective against Apollo in the last quoted fragment, from a play the title of which Plato unfortunately did not cite (fr. 350 Radt): Apollo in nuptiis meis cecinit τὰς ἐμὰς εὐπαιδίας νόσων τ’ ἀπείρους καὶ μακραίωνας βίου, ξύμπαντά τ’ εἰπὼν θεοφιλεῖς ἐμὰς τύχας παιῶν’ ἐπηυφήμησεν εὐθυμῶν ἐμέ. κἀγὼ τὸ Φοίβου θεῖον ἀψευδὲς στόμα ἤλπιζον εἶναι, μαντικῇ βρύον τέχνῃ· ὁ δ’ αὐτὸς ὑμνῶν, αὐτὸς ἐν θοίνῃ παρών, αὐτὸς τάδ’ εἰπών, αὐτός ἐστιν ὁ κτανὼν τὸν παῖδα τὸν ἐμόν (Aesch. fr. 350 Radt) [Apollo at my wedding sang that I would have] excellent offspring, who would enjoy good health and a long life. After all that, he struck up a holy paean to celebrate my good fortune in being favored by the gods, which delighted me. And I expected that the divine mouth of Phoebus, full of prophetic skill, would not lie. But the singer of that song, the participant in the feast, the speaker of those words, it was he who became the killer of my son

It is his longest continuous tragic quotation, not incidentally placed at the end of book 2 and the discussion about the habituation of the young to piety (383a9– b9). The fragment is famous, or notorious, as the case may be. In the wedding of Thetis and Peleus Apollo was among the guests and prophesied that the offspring of the couple would be healthy and long-lived. At a point after the death of Achilles by the hand of Apollo, of which Thetis was apparently unaware before the fact, she blames the god for his false prophecy 47 and may imply that he breached guest-host etiquette. The directness and vehemence of the invective are not surprising, as the speaker is not only a bereaved mother but also a goddess who feels ruthlessly deceived by a fellow divinity. As Alan Sommerstein has pointed out, the formulation of the prophecy was ambiguous and misleading, mainly because it omitted all reference to Achilles’ early death but also because the reference to excellent offspring seems to imply several children. 48 In any case, there may be

 47 Burgess 2004, 26–33 argues against scholars who suggest that Aeschylus followed the Iliad, the Cypria, the Aethiopis and Hesiod’s Catalogue in including a prophecy of Apollo at the wedding of Thetis and Peleus and the invective of Thetis against the god at her son’s funeral; see Scodel 1977, 55–56 and March 1987, 8–23. His main argument is the foreknowledge of Thetis about Achilles’ death, which is absent in Aeschylus, but is a major theme in the epic tradition. 48 Sommerstein 2008, 309.

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little doubt that the prophecy, even its most controversial part about the offspring’s longevity, would eventually prove to be true, like all prophecies and predictions in tragedy. Achilles would be long-lived because the gods, in one version of the story Thetis herself (Aethiopis 69.21–22 Bernabé), made him immortal. 49 There is no reason to believe that Aeschylus would present Apollo as the giver of a false prophecy and Thetis as incapable of, or prevented from, realizing the truth. Plato’s censure obviously focuses on the utterance of a misguided or ignorant character, who would eventually become illuminated and perhaps consoled. He cites it as the kind of utterance that would justifiably disqualify entire plays for performance and use in the education of the young. He may suggest or warn that fragments, especially gnomic and/or striking utterances, are likely to acquire a life of their own, even if they had not yet done so in his own age, and that prudent educators and rulers should take care to suppress them and the plays they belong to. From a modern perspective, Plato has saved the fragments for us but he also reduced them to fragments long before the loss of the plays they belonged to. In effect, he turned the quotes into isolated utterances by ignoring their internal context and thus threw out the baby with the bathwater. This fragmentation became a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy: as parts of their original wholes, the fragments might not be criticized or considered dangerous, even by the standards of Socrates or Plato; as isolated fragments, though, they become dangerous and unacceptable, condemning their origin to oblivion and poetry to ignominy. By adopting or addressing the potential attitude of some impressionable members of the tragic audience, mainly the young, he turns out to behave, and deal with the dramas, as they do. Plato indeed plants a cause and destroys an entire house. 50

 49 Proclus does not explicitly say that Thetis made him immortal but that she transported his body to the island of Leuce in the Black Sea. For Achilles’ posthumous fate see Pind. Nem. 4.49, Eur. Andr. 1260–1262, IT 435–437 and Johnston 1999, 12–14. Euripides also mentions a prophecy given by Chiron and delivered at the wedding of Thetis and Peleus by the Centaurs (IA 1058– 1075). The prophecy does not include any reference to Achilles’ longevity but focuses on his glorious participation in the Trojan war with his divine armor. The only potentially misleading element is his role in the burning of Troy but the fut. participle ἐκπυρώσων (1070) may easily indicate his intention rather than his agency in the future event. 50 For the quotation of tragic fragments in later philosophy see Gill 2005.

  Poulheria Kyriakou

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A Cause for Fragmentation: Tragic Fragments in Plato’s Republic  

Keen, A. (2005), “Lycians in the Cares of Aeschylus”, in: F. McHardy et al. (eds), Lost Dramas of Classical Athens. Greek Tragic Fragments, Exeter, 63–82. Kosman, A. (2007), “Justice and Virtue: The Republic’s Inquiry Into Proper Difference”, in: G.R.F. Ferrari (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Plato’s Republic, Cambridge, 116–137. Kyriakou, P. (2008), “Female kleos in Euripides and His Predecessors”, in: G. Avezzù (ed.), Didaskaliai II, Verona, 241–292. March, J.R. (1987), The Creative Poet, London. Monoson, S. (2000), Plato’s Democratic Entanglements. Athenian Politics and the Practice of Philosophy, Princeton. Moreau, A. (1995), “La Niobé d’Eschyle: quelques jalons”, REG 108, 288–307. Morrow, G.R. (1960), Plato’s Cretan City. A Historical Interpretation of the Laws, Princeton. Moss, J. (2007), “What is Imitative Poetry and Why Is It Bad?”, in: G.R.F. Ferrari (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Plato’s Republic, Cambridge, 415–444. Most, G.W. (1994), “Simonides’ Ode to Scopas in Contexts”, in: De Jong, I.J.F/J.P. Sullivan (eds), Modern Critical Theory and Classical literature, Leiden, 127–152. Mouze, L. (2005), Le législateur et le poète. Une interprétation des Lois de Platon, Lille. Murray, P. (2011), “Tragedy, Women and the family in Plato’s Republic”, in: P. Destrée /F.-G. Herrmann (eds) (2011), Plato and the Poets, Leiden, 175–193. Murray, P. (2013), “PAIDES MALAKON MOUSON. Tragedy in Plato’s Laws”, in: A.-E. Peponi (ed.), Performance and Culture in Plato’s Laws, Cambridge, 294–312. Nadaff, R. (2002), Exiling the Poets. The Production of Censorship in Plato’s Republic, Chicago. Nicholson, G. (1999), Plato’s Phaedrus, West Lafayette, Ind. Nightingale, A. (1995), Genres in Dialogue. Plato and the Construct of Philosophy, Cambridge. Pennesi, A. (2008), I frammenti della Niobe di Eschilo, Amsterdam. Peponi, A.-E. (2013), “Choral Anti-Aesthetics”, in: A.-E. Peponi (ed.), Performance and Culture in Plato’s Laws, Cambridge, 212–239. Podlecki, A.J. (2009), “Aiskhylos the Forerunner” in: J. Jouanna/F. Montanari (eds), Eschyle. À l’aube du théâtre occidental (Entretiens Fondation Hardt 55), Geneva, 319–362. Postlethwaite, N. (1998), “Akhilleus and Agamemnon: Generalized Reciprocity”, in: C. Gill et al. (eds), Reciprocity in Ancient Greece, Oxford, 93–104. Radt, S. (1985), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta. Vol. 3, Aeschylus, Göttingen. Radt, S. (1999), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta. Vol. 4, Sophocles, Göttingen. Ryle, G. (1966), Plato’s Progress, Cambridge. Sale, W. (1962), “The Story of Callisto in Hesiod”, RhM 105, 122–141. Sale, W. (1965), “Callisto And The Virginity of Artemis”, RhM 108, 11–35. Sauvé Meyer, S. (2007), “Legislation As A Tragedy: On Plato’s Laws VII 817b–d”, in: P. Destrée/ F.-G. Herrmann (eds) (2011), Plato and the Poets, Leiden, 387–402. Scodel, R. (1977), “Apollo’s Perfidy: Iliad Ω 59–62”, HSCP 81, 55–57. Seaford, R. (2005), “Death and Wedding in Aeschylus’ Niobe”, in: F. McHardy et al. (eds), Lost Dramas of Classical Athens. Greek Tragic Fragments, Exeter, 113–127. Selle, H. (2008), Theognis und die Theognidea, Berlin/New York. Sommerstein, A. (2008), Aeschylus. Fragments, Cambridge, Mass. Sommerstein, A. (2010), Aeschylean Tragedy, London. Taplin, O. (1977), The Stagecraft of Aeschylus. The Dramatic Use of Exits and Entrances in Greek Tragedy, Oxford. Wright, M. (2017), “A Lover’s Discourse: Erôs in Greek Tragedy”, in: R. Seaford et al. (eds), Selfhood and the Soul, Oxford, 219–242.

Richard Hunter

Dio Chrysostom and the Citation of Tragedy “Dramatic fragments” are usually taken to refer to passages from lost plays, both those preserved on papyri and other ancient artefacts, as well as those preserved in quotation by other ancient (normally prose) writers. 1 An important tool, however, for the interpretation of those dramatic fragments is the other kind of “dramatic fragment”, namely quotations of surviving plays in later authors. With such quotations we have a control which allows us to see what quoting authors (and/or the scribes of their manuscripts) have done with the verses they are citing, and the knowledge gained can then be applied, as far as speculation allows, to extant citations from lost plays. There is a huge field of study here, and there has been much important recent work on the citational habits of writers such as Plutarch and Athenaeus. In this paper I consider two cases of citations of surviving Euripidean plays in Dio Chrysostom to see what (familiar) lessons may be drawn. Dio is a particularly instructive source in this context because he sometimes explicitly discusses the rationale for citation. My first example is, however, something of “a cheat” — as there is no actual citation in the text that survives to us. In the Euboean Oration, Dio discusses and demonstrates that the poor are in fact better hosts than the rich, and he explains that one draws on the wisdom of the poets as a kind of shorthand access to widely held beliefs: ἆρ’ οὖν οὐ σφόδρα ἄξιον ἄγασθαι τοῦ πλούτου κατὰ τὸν ποιητὴν καὶ τῷ ὄντι ζηλωτὸν ὑπολαβεῖν, ὅ φησιν αὐτοῦ μέγιστον εἶναι ἀγαθόν, τὸ δοῦναι ξένοις, καὶ ἐάν ποτέ τινες ἔλθωσι τρυφῶντες ἐπὶ τὴν οἰκίαν, μὴ ἀδύνατον γενέσθαι παρασχεῖν κατάλυσιν καὶ προθεῖναι ξένια, οἷς ἂν ἐκεῖνοι μάλιστα ἥδοιντο; λέγομεν δὲ ταῦτα μεμνημένοι τῶν ποιητῶν, οὐκ ἄλλως ἀντιπαρεξάγοντες ἐκείνοις οὐδὲ τῆς δόξης ζηλοτυποῦντες ἣν ἀπὸ τῶν ποιημάτων ἐκτήσαντο ἐπὶ σοφίᾳ, οὐ τούτων ἕνεκα φιλοτιμούμενοι ἐξελέγχειν αὐτούς, ἀλλὰ παρ’ ἐκείνοις μάλιστα εὑρήσειν ἡγούμενοι τὴν τῶν πολλῶν διάνοιαν περί τε πλούτου καὶ τῶν ἄλλων ἃ θαυμάζουσι, καὶ τί μέγιστον οἴονταί σφισι γενέσθαι ἂν ἀφ’ ἑκάστου τῶν τοιούτων. δῆλον γὰρ ὅτι μὴ συμφωνοῦντος αὐτοῖς τοῦ ποιήματος μηδὲ τὴν αὐτὴν γνώμην ἔχοντος οὐκ ἂν οὕτω σφόδρα ἐφίλουν οὐδὲ ἐπῄνουν ὡς σοφούς τε καὶ ἀγαθοὺς †γενέσθαι† καὶ τἀληθῆ λέγοντας. ἐπεὶ οὖν οὐκ ἔστιν ἕκαστον ἀπολαμβάνοντα ἐλέγχειν τοῦ πλήθους, οὐδ’ ἀνερωτᾶν ἅπαντας ἐν μέρει, Τί γὰρ σύ, ὦ ἄνθρωπε, δέδοικας τὴν πενίαν οὕτως πάνυ τὸν δὲ πλοῦτον ὑπερτιμᾷς, τί δ’ αὖ σὺ ἐλπίζεις κερδανεῖν μέγιστον ἂν τύχῃς πλουτήσας ἢ νὴ Δία ἔμπορος γενόμενος ἢ καὶ  1 An important exception to my “normally prose” assertion are those interpolated verses in extant tragedy which may be “fragments” of lost plays; in this area, however, certainty is a very rare commodity. For the preservation of other kinds of verse “fragments” within verse texts cf., e.g., the quotations from Apollodorus in the prologue of [Scymnus], Periodos 24–44. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-028

  Richard Hunter βασιλεύσας; ἀμήχανον γὰρ δὴ τὸ τοιοῦτον καὶ οὐδαμῶς ἀνυστόν. οὕτως οὖν ἐπὶ τοὺς προφήτας αὐτῶν καὶ συνηγόρους, τοὺς ποιητάς, ἐξ ἀνάγκης ἴμεν, ὡς ἐκεῖ φανερὰς καὶ μέτροις κατακεκλεισμένας εὑρήσοντες τὰς τῶν πολλῶν δόξας· καὶ δῆτα οὐ πάνυ μοι δοκοῦμεν ἀποτυγχάνειν. τοῦτο δὲ σύνηθες δήπου καὶ τοῖς σοφωτέροις, ὃ νῦν ἡμεῖς ποιοῦμεν· ἐπεὶ καὶ αὐτοῖς τούτοις τοῖς ἔπεσιν ἀντείρηκε τῶν πάνυ φιλοσόφων τις, ὃν οὐδείς, ἐμοὶ δοκεῖν, φαίη ἄν ποτε φιλονεικοῦντα τούτοις τε ἀντειρηκέναι καὶ τοῖς ὑπὸ Σοφοκλέους εἰς τὸν πλοῦτον εἰρημένοις, ἐκείνοις μὲν ἐπ’ ὀλίγον, τοῖς δὲ τοῦ Σοφοκλέους ἐπὶ πλέον, οὐ μήν, ὥσπερ νῦν ἡμεῖς, διὰ μακρῶν, ἅτε οὐ παραχρῆμα κατὰ πολλὴν ἐξουσίαν διεξιών, ἀλλ’ ἐν βίβλοις γράφων. (Dio Chrys. 7.97–102) Is it not, then, most unfitting to admire wealth as the poet does and regard it as really worth seeking? He says that its greatest good lies in giving to guests and, when any who are used to luxury come to one's house, being in a position to offer them lodging and set such tokens of hospitality before them as would please them most. And in advancing these views we cite the poets, not to gainsay them idly nor because we are envious for their reputation for wisdom that they have won by their poems; no, it is not for these reasons we covet the honour of showing them to be wrong, but because we think that it is in them especially that we shall find the thought and feeling of men generally, just what the many think about wealth and the other objects of their admiration, and what they consider would be the greatest good derived from each of them. For it is evident that men would not love the poets so passionately nor extol them as wise and good and exponents of the truth if the poetry did not echo their own sentiments nor express their own views. Since, then, it is not possible to take each member of the multitude aside and show him his error or to cross-question everybody in turn by saying, “How is it, sir, that you fear poverty so exceedingly and exalt riches so highly?” and again, “What great profit do you expect to win if you happen to have amassed wealth or, let us say, to have turned merchant or even become a king?” Such a procedure would involve infinite trouble and is altogether impracticable. Therefore, because we must, let us go to their prophets and spokesmen, the poets, with the conviction that we shall find among them the beliefs of the many clearly put and enshrined in verse; and in truth I do not think that we fall very far short of our object in so doing. And our present procedure, I believe, is the usual one even with men wiser than myself. Indeed, one very great philosopher has expressly contradicted the sentiments contained in these same lines of Euripides, and he is a man whom I think no one would ever accuse of contradicting them and Sophocles’ words about wealth in any spirit of captiousness. He objects briefly in the former instance but in more detail in the case of Sophocles, and yet not at great length as we are now doing, since he was not discussing the question ex tempore with an orator's full privilege but was writing in a book. (Translation by J.W. Cohoon)

Dio Chrysostom and the Citation of Tragedy  

There is much that one could say about how Dio here uses (and inverts) the persona of Socrates from Plato’s Apology, 2 but my concern here is with citational practice. This part of the speech is evidently a lecture based on a reading of a passage from Euripides’ Electra, which was clearly well known to the anthological and moralising tradition, namely the old peasant’s meditation on the power of wealth: ἐν τοῖς τοιούτοις δ’ ἡνίκ’ ἂν γνώμη πέσῃ, σκοπῶ τὰ χρήμαθ’ ὡς ἔχει μέγα σθένος ξένοις τε δοῦναι σῶμά τ’ ἐς νόσους πεσὸν δαπάναισι σῶσαι· τῆς δ’ ἐφ’ ἡμέραν βορᾶς ἐς σμικρὸν ἥκει· πᾶς γὰρ ἐμπλησθεὶς ἀνὴρ ὁ πλούσιός τε χὠ πένης ἴσον φέρει.

430

(Eur. El. 426–431) When my thought lights on matters like these, 3 I observe that while money has great power and allows you to give gifts to your guests and to keep your body alive when it has fallen into disease, it makes little difference to daily sustenance. When his belly is full, everyone, rich man and poor alike, holds an equal amount. (Translation by D. Kovacs)

These verses are nowhere cited in our extant text of the Euboikos, but scholars have postulated that they may have been quoted in a lost opening of the essay or have dropped out somewhere along the way. 4 Commentators first (and rightly) detect their presence in chapter 82: ἅπαντα δὴ τοῦτον τὸν λόγον διῆλθον οὐκ ἄλλως οὐδ’ ὡς τάχ’ ἂν δόξαιμί τισιν, ἀδολεσχεῖν βουλόμενος, ἀλλ’ οὗπερ ἐξ ἀρχῆς ὑπεθέμην βίου καὶ τῆς τῶν πενήτων διαγωγῆς παράδειγμα ἐκτιθείς, ὃ αὐτὸς ἠπιστάμην, τῷ βουλομένῳ θεάσασθαι λόγων τε καὶ ἔργων καὶ κοινωνιῶν τῶν πρὸς ἀλλήλους, εἴ τι τῶν πλουσίων ἐλαττοῦνται διὰ τὴν πενίαν πρὸς τὸ ζῆν εὐσχημόνως καὶ κατὰ φύσιν ἢ τῷ παντὶ πλέον ἔχουσιν. καὶ δῆτα καὶ τὸ τοῦ Εὐριπίδου σκοπῶν, εἰ κατ’ ἀλήθειαν ἀπόρως αὐτοῖς ἔχει τὰ πρὸς τοὺς ξένους, ὡς μήτε ὑποδέξασθαί ποτε δύνασθαι μήτε ἐπαρκέσαι δεομένῳ τινί, οὐδαμῇ τοιοῦτον εὑρίσκω τὸ τῆς ξενίας, ἀλλὰ καὶ πῦρ ἐναύοντας προθυμότερον τῶν πλουσίων καὶ ὁδῶν ἀπροφασίστους ἡγεμόνας· (Dio Chrys. 7.81–82)

 2 Cf. Hunter 2018, 27–28. 3 The meaning of this verse is disputed. 4 Moles 1995, 179 n. 15 suggests that they dropped out from chapter 82 (on which see further below).

  Richard Hunter Now I have not told this long story idly or, as some might perhaps infer, with the desire to spin a yarn, but to present an illustration of the manner of life that I adopted at the beginning and of the life of the poor — an illustration drawn from my own experience for anyone who wishes to consider whether in words and deeds and in social intercourse the poor are at a disadvantage in comparison with the rich on account of their poverty, or in every way have the advantage. And really, when I consider Euripides’ words and ask myself whether as a matter of fact the entertainment of strangers is so difficult for them that they can never welcome or succour anyone in need, I find this by no means to be true of their hospitality. They light a fire more promptly than the rich and guide one on the way without reluctance … (Translation by J.W. Cohoon)

Opinions may differ as to whether this passage implies a yet earlier quotation of, or reference to, the Euripidean verses, but Dio’s τὸ τοῦ Εὐριπίδου σκοπῶν is a remarkable example of what we might call meta-quotation. Whereas Euripides’ peasant “observes” (σκοπῶ) the power of wealth, Dio “looks at” Euripides’ verses on the same subject: general reflection on the way of the world is now for Dio a two-stage process, of which the first is the choice of appropriate classical texts to guide that reflection. There could hardly be a better microcosmic representation of the place of classical literature in the cultural mindset of educated Greeks under the Roman empire. Dio’s paraphrase in 7.82 of Eur. El. 426–431 is not a close one. We have the reference to ξένοι, but the ability to help someone else (or indeed yourself) who has fallen sick is replaced by the more general ἐπαρκέσαι δεομένωι τινί, “bring help to someone in need”, another traditional duty which wealth imposes upon those lucky enough to possess it. 5 ὑποδέξασθαι is too obvious a word in the circumstances to wish to tie it to the tragic text Dio has in mind, but I note (for what it is worth) that in vv. 404–405 Electra upbraids her husband: Ηλ. ὦ τλῆμον, εἰδὼς δωμάτων χρείαν σέθεν τί τούσδ’ ἐδέξω μείζονας σαυτοῦ ξένους; Αυ. τί δ’; εἴπερ εἰσὶν ὡς δοκοῦσιν εὐγενεῖς, οὐκ ἔν τε μικροῖς ἔν τε μὴ στέρξουσ’ ὁμῶς; (Eur. El. 404–407) Electra. Fool, knowing the poverty of your house, why did you receive these men as guests who are grander than you?

 5 Cf., e.g., Men. Sam. 15–16, with Sommerstein’s note.

Dio Chrysostom and the Citation of Tragedy  

Farmer. What do you mean? If they are as they seem well-born, will they not be content equally in straitened circumstances and in not?

In chapter 97, on the other hand, the reference to the verses from the Electra is unmistakable. We might, however, note in passing that if the verses of the Electra had not survived, then we can be sure that more than one nineteenth-century scholar would have tried to turn Dio’s paraphrase into a “fragment” in trimeters from a lost play. They might have got close, but it would not have been close enough, because Dio’s paraphrase in chapter 97 is (again) a mixture of “quotation” and invention. τὸ δοῦναι ξένοις is indeed close to El. 428, but the peasant says nothing about τρυφῶντες, “men used to luxury”, coming to one’s house. The motif is common enough (we will think of Menander’s Dyskolos) and in part arises from the autobiographical narrative which Dio tells in the first part of the speech (cf. further below), but in fact what we have in chapter 97 is a trace derived from earlier parts of this scene in Euripides’ play. When the peasant first catches sight of Orestes and Pylades his words imply that they do not look like countrypeople (vv. 341–344), and the exchange between Electra and her husband in vv. 404–407 (cited above) makes this very clear. In other words, Dio’s paraphrase of the verses stretches out beyond the particular passage he is “citing” (as we would say), but we would never know that if the Electra had not in fact survived. Even more strikingly, παρασχεῖν κατάλυσιν, “to offer them lodging”, picks up Orestes’ δεξώμεθ᾽ οἴκων καταλύσεις, “let us accept lodging in the house”, in v. 393 and προθεῖναι ξένια οἷς ἂν ἐκεῖνοι μάλιστα ἥδοιντο, “set such tokens of hospitality before them as would please them most”, picks up Electra’s words in her instructions to her husband to fetch the old shepherd who will lead to the recognition: κέλευε δ’ †αὐτὸν τόνδ’ ἐς δόμους ἀφιγμένον† ἐλθεῖν ξένιά τ’ ἐς δαῖτα πορσῦναί τινα. ἡσθήσεταί τοι καὶ προσεύξεται θεοῖς, ζῶντ’ εἰσακούσας παῖδ’ ὃν ἐκσῴζει ποτέ. (Eur. El. 413–416) [Go to his house] 6 and tell him to come and bring some guest provisions for a feast. He will surely be overjoyed and offer prayers to the gods when he hears that the child he once rescued is alive. (Translation by D. Kovacs)

 6 The text of v. 413 is uncertain.

  Richard Hunter The paraphrase in chapter 97 thus brings together “fragments” scattered throughout a whole scene, not just the particular verses which were well known to the anthological tradition. This lesson is hardly new, but it is important and bears repetition, particularly for those who believe that the prose-writers of the Second Sophistic worked largely (or indeed entirely) from anthologies of passages (the forebears of Stobaeus) and not from texts of, or their knowledge of, whole plays. Although Dio draws on very many classical texts in the Euboean Oration, it would not be unfair to consider the Odyssey and Euripides’ Electra as the principal “sources” for the part of the speech (chaps. 1–102) concerned with rural, rather than urban life. In focusing on the hospitality which the poor can and cannot offer, Dio is presumably reflecting a long tradition of critical and moralising discourse; for what it is worth, a fragmentary hypothesis to the Electra, which survives on a papyrus of the third century AD (P.Oxy. 420), also singles out this theme of hospitality with respect both to the farmer and to the gifts which the old family-retainer brings at vv. 494–500. Dio’s narrative of his hospitable welcome by Euboean rustics can be seen to be shaped, not just by the return of the disguised Odysseus to Eumaeus’ hut, but also by the return of the disguised Orestes to Electra’s rustic dwelling in Euripides’ tragedy, whether or not Dio had explicitly referred to those scenes in a lost opening to the Euboean Oration. This link between the “rural” experiences of Odysseus and Orestes is a variation on the exploitation of Odysseus’ return by (particularly) Sophocles and Euripides in their dramatization of Orestes’ return in their respective Electra tragedies, which in its turn draws on, and varies, the persistent analogy in the Odyssey between the story of Odysseus, Telemachus and Penelope and that of Agamemnon, Orestes and Clytemnestra. More specifically, we may wonder whether the critical tradition had already traced a line of descent from Odysseus’ reception at the hut of Eumaeus to Orestes’ reception by Electra’s poor rustic husband in Euripides’ play; Dio’s narrative and subsequent moralising reflections could then be seen as a kind of “window allusion” written very large, in which one text which is thought to reflect an earlier text is combined with it to form a new “combinatory” rewriting. My second example is another famous passage of Euripides well known to the ethical tradition, namely Jocasta’s plea to Eteocles in the Phoenissae on the subject of φιλοτιμία: τί τῆς κακίστης δαιμόνων ἐφίεσαι Φιλοτιμίας, παῖ; μὴ σύ γ’· ἄδικος ἡ θεός· πολλοὺς δ’ ἐς οἴκους καὶ πόλεις εὐδαίμονας ἐσῆλθε κἀξῆλθ’ ἐπ’ ὀλέθρῳ τῶν χρωμένων·

Dio Chrysostom and the Citation of Tragedy  

ἐφ’ ᾗ σὺ μαίνῃ. κεῖνο κάλλιον, τέκνον, Ἰσότητα τιμᾶν, ἣ φίλους ἀεὶ φίλοις πόλεις τε πόλεσι συμμάχους τε συμμάχοις συνδεῖ· τὸ γὰρ ἴσον νόμιμον ἀνθρώποις ἔφυ, τῷ πλέονι δ’ αἰεὶ πολέμιον καθίσταται τοὔλασσον ἐχθρᾶς θ’ ἡμέρας κατάρχεται.

535

(Eur. Phoen. 531–540) Why do you strive for Ambition for power, the basest of divinities, my son? Do not do so: she is an unjust goddess! Often she goes in and out of prosperous cities and houses and ruins those who have dealings with her! Yet for her you have lost your senses. Far finer, my son, to honour Equality, which binds friends to friends, cities to cities, and allies to allies. For Equality, men find, conduces to lawfulness, whereas the lesser is always hostile to the greater and making war against it. (Translation by D. Kovacs, adapted)

Dio cites these verses in Oration 17, which our manuscripts label περὶ πλεονεξίας: καὶ μὴν ὅ γε Εὐριπίδης, οὐδενὸς ἧττον ἔνδοξος ὢν τῶν ποιητῶν, τὴν Ἰοκάστην εἰσάγει λέγουσαν πρὸς τὸν Ἐτεοκλέα, παρακαλοῦσαν αὐτὸν ἀποστῆναι τοῦ πλεονεκτεῖν τὸν ἀδελφόν, οὕτω πως· τί τῆς κακίστης δαιμόνων ἐφίεσαι Πλεονεξίας, παῖ; μὴ σύ γ’. ἄδικος ἡ θεός. πολλοὺς δ’ ἐς οἴκους καὶ πόλεις εὐδαίμονας εἰσῆλθε ἐπ’ ὀλέθρῳ τῶν χρωμένων· ἐφ’ ᾗ σὺ μαίνῃ. τοῦτο κάλλιστον βροτοῖς, ἰσότητα τιμᾶν καὶ φίλους εἶναι φίλοις πόλεις τε πόλεσι συμμάχους τε συμμάχοις συνδεῖν· τὸ γὰρ ἴσον νόμιμον ἀνθρώποις ἔφυ, τῷ πλέονι δ’ ἀεὶ πολέμιον καθίσταται τοὔλασσον, ἐχθρᾶς θ’ ἡμέρας κατάρχεται. παρεθέμην δὲ ἑξῆς τὰ ἰαμβεῖα. τὸ γὰρ τοῖς καλῶς εἰρημένοις αὐτοῖς χρῆσθαι νοῦν ἔχοντός ἐστιν. ἐν δὴ τούτοις ἅπαντα ἔνεστι τὰ συμβαίνοντα ἐκ τῆς πλεονεξίας, ὅτι μήτε ἰδίᾳ μήτε κοινῇ συμφέρει, τοὐναντίον δὲ καὶ τὴν τῶν οἴκων εὐδαιμονίαν καὶ τὴν τῶν πόλεων ἀνατρέπει καὶ διαφθείρει· καὶ πάλιν ὡς νόμος ἀνθρώποις τιμᾶν τὸ ἴσον, καὶ τοῦτο μὲν κοινὴν φιλίαν καὶ πᾶσιν εἰρήνην πρὸς ἀλλήλους ποιεῖ, τὰς δὲ διαφορὰς καὶ τὰς ἐμφύλους ἔριδας καὶ τοὺς ἔξω πολέμους κατ’ οὐδὲν ἕτερον συμβαίνοντας ἢ διὰ τὴν τοῦ πλείονος ἐπιθυμίαν, ἐξ ὧν ἕκαστος καὶ τῶν ἱκανῶν ἀποστερεῖται. καίτοι τί τοῦ ζῆν ἀναγκαιότερόν ἐστιν, ἢ τί τούτου περὶ πλείονος ποιοῦνται πάντες; ἀλλ’ ὅμως καὶ τοῦτο ἀπολλύουσι χρημάτων, οἱ δὲ καὶ τὰς πατρίδας τὰς αὑτῶν ἀναστάτους ἐποίησαν. μετὰ ταῦτα τοίνυν ὁ αὐτὸς ποιητὴς οὔ φησιν ἐν τοῖς θείοις εἶναι πλεονεξίαν· διὰ τοῦτο ἄφθαρτα καὶ ἀγήρω μένειν αὐτὰ, τὴν προσήκουσαν ἓν ἕκαστον ἑαυτῷ τάξιν φυλάττοντα, τήν τε νύκτα καὶ τὴν ἡμέραν καὶ τὰς ὥρας. εἰ γὰρ μὴ

  Richard Hunter τοῦτον εἶχε τὸν τρόπον, οὐκ ἂν αὐτῶν οὐδὲν δύνασθαι διαμένειν. ὅταν οὖν καὶ τοῖς θείοις ἡ πλεονεξία φθορὰν ἐπιφέρῃ, τί χρὴ νομίζειν τἀνθρώπεια πάσχειν ἀπὸ ταύτης τῆς νόσου; καλῶς δὲ μέμνηται καὶ μέτρων καὶ σταθμῶν, ὡς ὑπὲρ τοῦ δικαίου καὶ τοῦ πλεονεκτεῖν μηδένα μηδενὸς τούτων εὑρημένων. (Dio Chrys. 17.8–11)

And further too, Euripides also, a poet second to none other in reputation, brings Iocasta on the stage addressing Eteocles and urging him to refrain from trying to overreach his brother, in some such words as these: I have cited the iambic verses in full sequence; a sensible man will use what has been excellently said in that form. In this passage, then, are enumerated all the consequences of greed: that it is of advantage neither to the individual nor to the state; but that, on the contrary, it overthrows and destroys the prosperity of families and of states as well; and, in the second place, that the law of men requires us to honour equality, and that this establishes a common bond of friendship and peace for all toward one another, whereas quarrels, internal strife, and foreign wars are due to nothing else than the desire for more, with the result that each side is deprived even of a sufficiency. For what is more necessary than life, or what do all men hold as of more importance than this? But nevertheless men will destroy even that for money, and some too have caused even their own fatherlands to be laid waste. The same poet then goes on to say that there is no greed among the divine beings, wherefore they remain indestructible and ageless, each single one keeping its own proper position night and day and through all the seasons. For, the poet adds, if they were not so ordered, none of them would be able to survive. When, therefore, greed would bring destruction even to the divine beings, what disastrous effect must we believe this malady causes to human kind? And he aptly mentions measures and weights as having been invented to secure justice and to prevent any man from over-reaching another. (Translation by J.W. Cohoon, adapted)

Here, then, we have first citation and then paraphrase, first of the cited verses themselves and then (rather more loosely) of the verses which follow the cited passage. The methodology is familiar, but what is of particular importance here is that we can for once be as confident as due caution allows that Dio only cited vv. 531–40 before he reverted to paraphrase. It is a very familiar problem of the study of embedded citations that our manuscripts may preserve less of the citation than the citing author originally offered, whether because scribes get bored or on a kind of “part for whole” principle. Here, however, Dio marks the shift from paraphrase of the cited verses to paraphrase of the uncited by μετὰ ταῦτα τοίνυν ὁ αὐτὸς ποιητής ..., “the same poet then goes on to say …”. Τhe shift serves a purpose, of course: in this way Dio keeps control of his own essay — he does not let Euripides take it over completely. Balance between citation and paraphrase

Dio Chrysostom and the Citation of Tragedy  

was important: Chrysippus was famously criticized for essentially abandoning his essays to citations. 7 The most striking thing about Dio’s citation is, of course, the replacement of personified Φιλοτιμία by (presumably personified) Πλεονεξία; this textual change is unique in the rich indirect tradition of these verses. In his note on v. 532 Donald Mastronarde calls Dio’s citation of this passage “extraordinarily unreliable” and also notes that πλεονεξία “is the more obvious word here and intruded for that reason”. Of these three claims, the first is a matter of judgement, the second demonstrably true and the third demonstrably untrue. Πλεονεξίας has replaced Φιλοτιμίας because that is the subject of Dio’s essay, as (for example) chapter 6 of the oration makes very clear, whatever credit we wish to give to the title transmitted in our manuscripts. How painless the switch in terms was, however, is made plain both by the evidence which Mastronarde adduces for the virtual synonymity of πλεονεξία and φιλοτιμία in its negative sense and by the emphasis on the acquisition of τὸ πλέον throughout Jocasta’s speech (cf. vv. 539, 552–553). The speech moves backwards and forwards between claims about desire for tyranny and claims about desire for greater possessions, so that the two are virtually equated, as indeed they are to some extent in Greek thought; the triad of πλέον — ἴσον — ἔλασσον structures Jocasta’s plea. Dio seems also to acknowledge his own textual shift later in the speech: πλέον ἄλλος ἄλλου φιλοτιμούμεθα (17.20). It would, I think, be very difficult to deny that Πλεονεξίας is what Dio actually “cited”, but whether we should ascribe the switch to a knowing act of rewriting or a faulty memory or something in-between is rather harder to say. Whether or not Dio had predecessors in this textual change we also cannot say, though the circumstantial evidence suggests not. Things happen, of course. When, for example, in Dio’s citation of Orestes 2 at 4.82 the unmetrical συμφορὰν δαιμόνιον has replaced συμφορὰν θεήλατον, I think that most readers would blame the scribes of Dio’s manuscripts, not Dio himself, whereas when (6.55) he cites Orestes 6 with κεφαλῆς rather than κορυφῆς, we might feel greater hesitation; the phenomenon is very familiar from, for example, the citations of Homer and other poets which we find in the manuscripts of Plato. What makes the present case of great interest is that Dio again comments upon his own citational practice:

 7 Cf. Hunter/Russell 2011, 12.

  Richard Hunter παρεθέμην δὲ ἑξῆς τὰ ἰαμβεῖα. τὸ γὰρ τοῖς καλῶς εἰρημένοις αὐτοῖς χρῆσθαι νοῦν ἔχοντός ἐστιν. (Dio Chrys. 17.10) I have cited the iambic verses in full sequence; a sensible man will use what has been excellently said in that form.

How unusual Dio wants us to consider such a generous practice is unclear, but this is a precious (and under-appreciated) testimony to what might seem normal in antiquity. In the circumstances, particularly if we remember Mastronarde’s characterization of this citation, Dio’s claim might seem either charmingly disingenuous or simply deceitful. We must be careful here, however, and I do not think that we can take the introductory οὕτω πως as necessarily preparing us for the fact that this will not be a verbatim quotation. Dio’s claim apparently is that he has not, by selectivity, i.e. presumably by omitting verses, misrepresented Euripides, and we have already seen that the change from Φιλοτιμίας to Πλεονεξίας has indeed not essentially changed the meaning of the passage. Whether this claim can, however, shed light on the mental (and scriptural) process by which Πλεονεξίας entered his text, i.e. does it help us with how knowingly deliberate a change it was, must remain doubtful. It is also, I think, not clear that any of the other differences between the vulgate text of Euripides and the transmitted citation in Dio change the significance of the verses in any important way. What is of some interest, however, is that, although the change of Φιλοτιμίας to Πλεονεξίας is of a very common kind, namely the substitution of a more common synonym, we have seen good reason for thinking that on this occasion it did not “intrude” (to use Mastronarde’s verb) in an entirely normal way, whereas some of the other changes in Dio’s citation are also of very familiar kinds and may have happened in very familiar ways, whether before or after Dio. Of these other changes the most interesting, and the one with perhaps the greatest ramifications for the study of dramatic fragments more generally, is the substitution in v. 535 of τοῦτο κάλλιστον βροτοῖς for κεῖνο κάλλιον, τέκνον. The removal from cited passages of references which would anchor the verses in a particular dramatic context is a very familiar phenomenon, but what stands out here is that, in introducing the passage, Dio goes out of his way precisely to give us that particular dramatic context. Does this suggest that Dio is using a text already influenced by the anthological tradition, or is Dio’s strategy to combine a very specific scene-setting, thus anchoring his quotation to the didactic authority

Dio Chrysostom and the Citation of Tragedy  

of a well known passage of a very well known play, 8 with a statement of the widest general significance, τοῦτο κάλλιστον βροτοῖς, one which falls into a very familiar kind of ancient gnōmē, namely what is κάλλιστον for mankind? These are questions with obvious implications for anyone interested in the quotation of dramatic fragments, and they are not made less interesting by another quotation of part of this passage. In On exile Favorinus, who may well have known Dio’s essay (cf. Philostr. VS 490), 9 takes a leaf out of Jocasta’s book to taunt those who are stupidly proud of the offices they hold and the lineage of their family: πρὸς δὲ τοὺς ἐπὶ τοῖς τοιούτοις φυσωμένους εἴποι τις ἂν ἅπερ ἡ μήτηρ πρὸς τὸν Πολυνείκην λέγει νουθετοῦσα· τί τῆς κακίστης δαιμόνων ἐφίεσαι, Φιλοτιμίας, παῖ; μὴ σύ γ’· ἄδικος ἡ θεός· πολλοὺς δ’ ἐς οἴκους καὶ πόλεις εὐδαίμονας ε[ἰσ]ῆλθε ἐπ’ ὀλέθρῳ τῶν χρωμένων· ἐφ’ ᾗ [σὺ] μαίνῃ. ἐγὼ δὲ ταῦτα τῇ Ἰοκάστῃ προσ̣[......· τ]ί δὲ κομπάζεις, ὦ δύστη[νε, καὶ ἐπ]ὶ σαυτῷ φρονεῖς μέγα; (Favorinus, On exile 20.3–4) To those puffed up by such trappings, one might speak Jocasta’s words of reproach to Polyneices: “Why, my son, do you pursue the vilest of divinities, Ambition? Do not! That goddess is unjust: she visits many wealthy houses and cities, with ruinous results for those who cultivate her. She is the one whom you are craving madly”. I would supplement the words of Jocasta as follows: Why are you boasting, you wretched man, and why do you exalt in your station? (Translation by T. Whitmarsh, adapted) 10

Favorinus then proceeds to pour scorn on the pursuit of high position in a passage which may, but need not, be seen as a free-wheeling expansion of Jocasta’s verses on the same theme (vv. 549–554). Our papyrus text of Favorinus, essentially reproduced above, shares with the manuscripts of Dio the omission of in v. 534; this is an easy scribal error which could happen twice independently, but even so it gives pause for thought. Of modern editors, Adelmo Barigazzi at least thought that the second verb had been (deliberately) omitted in  8 Cf., e.g., Cribiore 2001. 9 Cf., e.g., Whitmarsh 2001, 137. 10 Cf. Whitmarsh 2001, 317.

  Richard Hunter the anthological tradition “for greater clarity” and that both Dio and Favorinus took over from that tradition and kept a metrically deficient verse; 11 others have thought that the omission might be due to Dio and/or Favorinus themselves. 12 To what extent both the anthological tradition and moralisers such as Dio and Favorinus were prepared to tolerate metrically deficient trimeters is another question of obvious broader interest in the context of the study of dramatic fragments. Favorinus, like Dio also, gives an explicit dramatic context for the passage he cites, but he does not name the poet and he claims that the verses are addressed to Polyneices, rather than to Eteocles, though Eteocles is in fact explicitly named as the addressee in v. 529, immediately before the cited passage. Again, however, we must not here leap to hasty conclusions. The mistake of the name, which there is no reason to ascribe to the scribe of the papyrus rather than to Favorinus himself, cannot of itself prove that Favorinus is here using an anthological text which started from v. 531 only, though that is indeed (as Dio too shows) the “natural” place to start; the preceding verses themselves entered the anthologising tradition and they have a rich indirect tradition, 13 but it is essentially a separate one from vv. 531–540. What this mistake does show, I think (and again this is hardly a revolutionary thought), particularly when added to the omission of , is that our tendency to think in terms of citing from anthologies or citing from fuller texts of plays is too simple a dichotomy. It is not just that there are more than two possibilities, but rather that the various possibilities themselves are not necessarily distinct. Whereas Dio’s citational practice in one section of the Euboean Oration suggested that he was using (written or remembered) “texts” of a significant section of a play, the example from the Phoenissae offers much more mixed signals. We also tend to think too simply in terms of yet another dichotomy, namely that between citation and paraphrase: again, things may not be so clearcut. How and when does one bleed into the other is yet another important question in the study of dramatic fragments? 14

 11 Barigazzi 1966, 477. Favorinus seems to cite the second half of Eur. Ph. 536 (ἣ φίλους ἀεὶ φίλοις) as καὶ φίλους αἰεὶ φίλους, whereas Dio’s manuscripts offer καὶ φίλους εἶναι φίλοις; the phrase appears to have become proverbial (cf. Barigazzi 1966, 470), and both Dio and Favorinus offer versions appropriate to their own contexts, but the small difference might at least make us pause before accepting that both were drawing on an identical anthological tradition. 12 Cf. Tepedino Guerra 2007, 190, who also however acknowledges the possibility of simple scribal error. 13 Cf. further below. 14 For some related considerations cf. Hunter 2010.

Dio Chrysostom and the Citation of Tragedy  

One further matter thickens the plot of this “fragment” of Euripides’ Phoenissae yet further. In a chapter περὶ ἀδικίας Stobaeus (3.10.3) cites a passage which he ascribes to Menander: πλεονεξία μέγιστον ἀνθρώποις κακόν· οἱ γὰρ θέλοντες προσλαβεῖν τὰ τῶν πέλας ἀποτυγχάνουσι πολλάκις νικώμενοι, τὰ δ’ ἴδια προστιθέασι τοῖς ἀλλοτρίοις. (Men. fr. 722 K–A) Desire for more is the greatest ill for mankind. Often those who wish to secure their neighbours’ possessions are beaten and fail, and add their own possessions to those that others hold.

Both Kaibel and Kassel-Austin doubt the ascription to Menander on linguistic grounds, but more important in the present context is that Meineke recognized that Dio seems to be paraphrasing this passage in chap. 7 of Oration 17: ἡ πλεονεξία δὲ μέγιστον ἐστιν αὐτῷ τινι κακόν· λυπεῖ δὲ καὶ τοὺς πέλας. (Dio Chrys. 17.7) Desire for more is the greatest ill for each man [who has it], but it also damages his neighbours.

It is hard, I think, to doubt that Meineke’s intuition was correct: the two passages are close enough verbally (note, particularly, πέλας) to assuage, if not entirely eradicate, doubt. In these circumstances it is intriguing that the status of the comic fragment should be uncertain, but we may also wonder whether the paths of this fragment and of the passage from the Phoenissae crossed at some point in the long history of the anthological tradition; we will presently see such a phenomenon with regard to a fragment of Sophocles and a passage of the Phoenissae. The fragment of (?) Menander is quoted by Stobaeus as an example of ἀδικία and Jocasta indeed proclaims Φιλοτιμία to be an “unjust goddess”, just as Dio’s Jocasta labels Πλεονεξία. Finally, we may note that Jocasta’s plea to Eteocles, the subsequent history of which we have been tracing, is itself introduced by verses which point to what she is about to say as just the kind of wise moralizing which was almost bound to be anthologized:

  Richard Hunter ὦ τέκνον, οὐχ ἅπαντα τῷ γήρᾳ κακά, Ἐτεόκλεες, πρόσεστιν· ἀλλ’ ἡμπειρία ἔχει τι λέξαι τῶν νέων σοφώτερον. (Eur. Phoen. 528–530) My child, not every feature of old age, Eteocles, is bad. Experience can express a wiser thought than the young can muster.

This sense that she is about to say something which has long been proved true is strengthened by the fact that these introductory verses themselves reflect familiar proverbial wisdom suitable to very many different contexts. 15 Euripides lived in a world in which poets were cited precisely for their gnomic wisdom and where the practice of textual anthologising was all but certainly already underway; cases such as Phoen. 528–530 show how poets themselves invited and expected the anthological practices which we tend rather to associate with later ages. 16 We shall see another such case presently. To close this brief paper, I turn to what is certainly a fragment of a lost play, Sophocles, Aleadai fr. 88 Radt: τὰ χρήματ’ ἀνθρώποισιν εὑρίσκει φίλους, αὖθις δὲ τιμάς, εἶτα τῆς ὑπερτάτης τυραννίδος θεοῖσιν ἀγχίστην ἕδραν. ἔπειτα δ’ οὐδεὶς ἐχθρὸς οὔτε φύεται πρὸς χρήμαθ’ οἵ τε φύντες ἀρνοῦνται στυγεῖν. δεινὸς γὰρ ἕρπειν πλοῦτος ἔς τε τἄβατα καὶ †πρὸς τὰ βατά†, χὠπόθεν πένης ἀνὴρ οὐδ’ ἐντυχὼν δύναιτ’ ἂν ὧν ἐρᾷ τυχεῖν. καὶ γὰρ δυσειδὲς σῶμα καὶ †δυσώνυμον† γλώσσῃ σοφὸν τίθησιν εὔμορφόν τ’ ἰδεῖν. μόνῳ δὲ χαίρειν κἀν νόσων ξυνουσίᾳ πάρεστιν αὐτῷ κἀπικρύπτεσθαι κακά.

5

10

(Soph. fr. 88 Radt) It is money that finds friends for men, and also honours, and finally the throne sublime of royalty, nearest to the gods. And no one is an enemy to money, or if they are, men deny their hatred of it. For wealth has a strange power to get to places sacred and profane [text uncertain], and to places from which a poor man, even if he effects an entry, could not get what he desires. For wealth makes an ugly person beautiful to look on and a man of bad name

 15 Cf. Mastronarde on vv. 528–529. 16 Cf. further below; Wright 2016 is a valuable study of these developments.

Dio Chrysostom and the Citation of Tragedy  

[text uncertain] eloquent in speech; and wealth alone can enjoy pleasure even in sickness and can conceal its miseries. (Translation by H. Lloyd-Jones, adapted)

The reason I single out this (textually very difficult) passage 17 is because it seems all but certain that these are the verses which Dio pairs with the citation from Euripides’ Electra in chapter 102 of the Euboean Oration (cited earlier). The philosopher to whom Dio there refers appears to be Cleanthes (cf. SVF I 562), part of whose treatment of the Euripidean verses seems to survive in Plutarch’s How the Young Man Should Study Poetry 33c. The fragment is quoted in full with the poet’s name and play-title by Stobaeus 4.31.27; vv. 6–10 are cited by Plutarch (Mor. 21b), without poet or play-title, but in a context that strongly suggests that they are by Sophocles; 18 v. 1 is also cited separately by Stobaeus (4.31.103) and, in discussing how money wins you “friends”, particularly if you are childless, Plutarch cites the following passage as from Euripides: τὸ δ’ ὑπὸ τοῦ Εὐριπίδου λεγόμενον, τὰ χρήματ’ ἀνθρώποισιν εὑρίσκειν φίλους δύναμίν τε πλείστην τῶν ἐν ἀνθρώποις ἔχειν, οὐχ ἁπλῶς ἀληθές, ἀλλ’ ἐπὶ τῶν ἀτέκνων· τούτους οἱ πλούσιοι δειπνίζουσιν, οἱ ἡγεμόνες θεραπεύουσιν, οἱ ῥήτορες μόνοις τούτοις προῖκα συνηγοροῦσιν. (Plut. De amore prolis 497b–c) As for Euripides’ saying that “Money (allows) men to gain friends and to have the greatest influence on human affairs”, this is not just simply true but particularly of the childless. The rich give them dinners, leaders court them, to them alone do lawyers give their services for free.

The passage of Euripides that Plutarch has in mind is Phoenissae 439–440: πάλαι μὲν οὖν ὑμνηθέν, ἀλλ’ ὅμως ἐρῶ· τὰ χρήματ’ ἀνθρώποισι τιμιώτατα δύναμίν τε πλείστην τῶν ἐν ἀνθρώποις ἔχει (Eur. Phoen. 438–440)

 17 My discussion of this text will not touch on the most difficult textual cruces within it, and for this reason I have not provided a proper apparatus. 18 Cf. Hunter/Russell 2011, 119.

  Richard Hunter This has been very familiar for a long time, but I shall say it nevertheless: it is money to which men give most honour and which offers them the greatest influence on human affairs.

It is usually said that Plutarch (or his source) has here erroneously substituted a version of the very similar v. 1 of Sophocles fr. 88 Radt for Phoen. 440; this is presumably, at some level, correct, but the “mistake” may be rather more interesting than that. First, it is worth noting that Polyneices marks his γνώμη as a piece of proverbial wisdom (v. 438). When Strabo (9.2.40) cites vv. 439–440, without name of poet or title of play, he introduces the verses as ὁ κοινὸς λόγος, which may be (but of course does not have to be) a memory of v. 438. That it is in fact such a memory is perhaps suggested by the fact that, in his collection of ἔπαινος πλούτου, Stobaeus (4.31.2) includes v. 438 with his citation of vv. 439–440; it looks, then, as though the introductory verse travelled with the γνώμη. James Diggle, though not Donald Mastronarde, accepts the modern deletion of vv. 438– 442 from Euripides’ text, but the subject which the verses raise most urgently is (again) that of poets writing verses, if not designed to be anthologised, then at least in the knowledge that such things happened. Matthew Wright has recently well set out the kinds of questions which need to be asked. 19 The history of poetic anthologies has been fruitfully studied, 20 but we should accept that the anthological habit (or perhaps “mindset”) probably much predated the early fourth century, which seems to have been the key period in this development. Early elegy, where we find gnomic verses designed to be used and re-used on many successive occasions, will have been very important in developing that “mindset”. Plutarch’s two changes from the Euripidean vulgate, namely infinitives for finite verbs and τὰ χρήματ’ ἀνθρώποισιν εὑρίσκειν φίλους for τὰ χρήματ’ ἀνθρώποισι τιμιώτατα, are both appropriate to the context in which he cites the verses. This may simply be a case of an accidental or wilful change, but, again, something more interesting may also be going on. Although the text is uncertain, it is clear that in Soph. fr. 88 Radt, the speaking character makes a link between wealth and τυραννίς, and this latter has a famously significant role in the same scene of the Phoenissae which we have been considering: in v. 506 Eteocles describes τυραννίς as τὴν θεῶν μεγίστην, just as the Sophoclean character refers to τῆς ὑπερτάτης / τυραννίδος. 21 Less striking perhaps, but at least worthy of note,

 19 Wright 2016. 20 Cf. Hunter/Russell 2011, 15–26, citing earlier bibliography. 21 θεοῖσιν in v.3 of the Sophoclean fragment, as cited above, is however Conington’s emendation for the transmitted ἄκουσιν or τ᾽ ἄγουσιν.

Dio Chrysostom and the Citation of Tragedy  

is the correspondence between τιμάς in Sophocles fr. 88.2 and τιμιώτατα in Euripides. What seems to be going on here, though this can of course be no more than a suspicion, is that Sophocles fr. 88 Radt travelled with Euripides, Phoenissae 438–440 in some anthological and moralising traditions and that there was what amounted to a process of cross-fertilisation. From the point of view of someone interested in the text of Euripides, this may amount to textual corruption, but for those interested in what happens to passages of drama in citational traditions, that is not the best way to look at it. Rather, we might think of a kind of “mix and match” in which elements from such “fellow travellers” can be taken over and swapped at need (and with very varying levels of consciousness). Much about these processes must remain vague and only dimly perceived, but this whole set of phenomena suggests an attitude to texts and their meaning which is very different from our continuing pursuit of “the original text”. It is no surprise that dramatic fragments have very much to teach us about ancient reading practices and the interpretation of texts.

Bibliography Barigazzi, A. (1966), Favorino di Arelate, Opere, Florence. Cribiore, R. (2001), “The grammarian’s choice: the popularity of Euripides’ Phoenissae in Hellenistic and Roman education”, in: Y.L. Too (ed.), Education in Greek and Roman Antiquity, Leiden, 241–259. Hunter, R. (2010), “Rhythmical language and poetic citation in Greek narrative texts”, in: G. Bastianini/A. Casanova (eds), I papiri del romanzo antico, Florence, 223–245. Hunter, R. (2018), The Measure of Homer, Cambridge. Hunter, R./Russell, D. (2011), Plutarch, How to Study Poetry, Cambridge. Moles, J. (1995), “Dio Chrysostom, Greece, and Rome”, in: D. Innes/H. Hine/C. Pelling (eds), Ethics and Rhetoric, Oxford, 177–192. Tepedino Guerra, A. (2007), L’esilio (Pap. Vat. Gr, 11 verso), Favorino di Arelate, Rome. Whitmarsh, T. (2001), Greek Literature and the Roman Empire, Oxford. Wright, M. (2016), “Euripidean tragedy and quotation culture: the case of Stheneboea F661”, AJPh 137, 601–623.

Patrick O’Sullivan

From the Great Banquets of Aeschylus: Gorgias, Aristophanes and Xenakis’ Oresteia Reception of Aeschylus over nearly two and half millennia has proved to be very fertile ground both for creative artists, and scholarly speculations into the nature of the poet’s oeuvre and his influence. The last few years alone have witnessed two large edited volumes dedicated to the reception of the dramatist from antiquity to the twenty-first century; and the title of one of them, The reception of Aeschylus’ plays through shifting models and frontiers, indicates the diversity of meanings which his work has had for subsequent ages from Sophocles in the fifth century BC to modern pop music adaptations and more. 1 Yet, for all the multiplicity of responses that Aeschylus and his dramas have elicited, a number of conspicuous strands can be identified: among them that his poetry is “big” or “weighty” in every sense, for good or bad (i.e. its style is “grand”, “sublime” and “majestic”, or conversely it is “bombastic” and “monstrous”); that he is somehow “archaic” or “primitive”, or at the very least “old fashioned”; that his poetry is stylistically rough or harsh; that his dramaturgy is emotionally intense, at times spectacularly or terrifyingly so. Much of this is traceable, of course to the poets of Old Comedy, above all, Aristophanes, whose Frogs and other plays like Clouds have exercised such a profound influence on subsequent responses to Aeschylus in antiquity and beyond. 2 Obviously, much more could be added to these features in the poet’s reception. It is worth noting, for instance, that Aeschylus, presented as the blustering warrior poet in the Frogs, was also considered the finest exponent of satyr-play by the ancients, as we learn from Pausanias (2.13.6–7) and Diogenes Laertius (2.133). The great pioneer of tragedy, as Aeschylus appears in Pherecrates (fr. 100 K–A) and Aristophanes (Ran. 1004–1005), was also the master of “tragedy at play”, as Demetrius (Eloc. 69) dubbed satyr drama. My intention here is not to explore how accurate such judgements are, nor to explicate or “unpack” all the cultural baggage that comes with them. Rather, I wish to look closely at a couple of recurrent motifs or topoi in the ancient reception of Aeschylus, specifically from amongst the writings of the Sicilian sophist

 1 Kennedy 2017; Constantinidis 2017; for Aeschylus and pop music, see Wetmore 2017. 2 E.g. Pheidippides’ glib dismissal of Simonides and Aeschylus as old fashioned, much to the annoyance of his father, Strepsiades (Ar. Nub. 1366–1379). For discussion of the influence of Aristophanes in the reception of Aeschylus, see, for instance, Lefkowitz 2012, 70–77. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-029

  Patrick O’Sullivan Gorgias, from Aristophanes’ Frogs and other ancient sources such as the Vita Aeschyli. Scholarship has long documented the early reception of Aeschylus and the roles of Gorgias and Aristophanes as literary critics; 3 but there are elements in their responses to the tragedian that can, I believe, cast light on features of Aeschylean poetry, notably certain passages from the Seven against Thebes, which in turn can be seen to have played a more significant role in the poet’s reception than has been recognised. These elements, I will argue, involve the concept of magnitude as a metaphor for poetic or imagistic style which also has militaristic and heroic overtones, and which at times is linked to the concept of ἔκπληξις (astonishment, amazement, terror, etc.), a term that has a long and rich history in ancient literary and rhetorical criticism. 4 I also wish to assess the relevance of these concepts to the operatic Oresteia of Romanian-born Greek national Iannis Xenakis (1922–2001); this work is an important example of the reception of Aeschylus in the twentieth century, at once classicising in retaining Aeschylus’ Greek in the libretto, but also innovative in fragmenting and at times rearranging the text of the original. I will suggest that Xenakis’ Oresteia, with its blend of historicist and modernist trends, emerges as a work consistent with many important topoi in the ancient reception of Aeschylus which are traceable to figures like Gorgias, Aristophanes and beyond. The links between Aeschylus and opera have been well documented, early examples being Niccolo Piccini’s Clytemnestre (1787), and Antonio Salieri’s Danaïdes (1784), the latter a sequel to Aeschylus’ Suppliants; in 1895 Sergei Taneyev famously produced an Oresteia with a libretto adapted by Aleksey Venkstern; the early twentieth century saw Richard Strauss’ Elektra (1909), whose libretto by  3 A century ago Pohlenz 1920, who argued for the influence of Gorgias on the literary theories of Plato and Aristotle, also posited links between the literary views of the sophist and Aristophanes (esp. 159–162). See also Rosenmeyer 1955; Taillardat 1965, esp. 435–450; Walsh 1984, 80– 106, who suggests that Aristophanes in Frogs presents Aeschylus’ poetry as conforming to Gorgianic literary theories (89–92); O’Sullivan 1992, 7–22; Ford 2002, 188–201, 280–282; Porter 2010, 262–307, esp. 271–275. 4 The following examples are by no means exhaustive, but are some of the more notable instances of the term: Thucydides (2.65.9) uses κατάπληξις to describe the effects of Pericles’ rhetoric; Aristotle links ἔκπληξις to emotive rhetoric (Rh. 1408a24); other commentators used it to describe Gorgias’ rhetorical style (e.g., Timaeus, fr. 95 FHG I 216; Diod. Sic. 12.53.3). Plato (Ion 535b–c), Aristotle (Poet. 1460b 25) and Dio Chrysostom (12.67) all use it to denote the effects of Homeric epic; Demetrius (Eloc. 101, 283) sees it as an effect of allegorical speech; ps.-Longinus (15.2) and Plutarch (Mor. 16a–17e, 25d) see it as one of the key aims of poetry generally. For further discussion, see Pohlenz 1920, 161; Segal 1962, 130–131; Walsh 1984, 89–92, 154 n. 12; Heath 1987, 8, 15–16, 42–43; Easterling 2004, 24–29, who discusses its explicit association with Aeschylus (hypothesis to Agamemnon; Vita Aeschyli 332.4–5, 332.12, 333.8 Page OCT).

Morsels from the Banquet of Aeschylus  

Hugo von Hofmannsthal combined Aeschylean and Sophoclean elements; and in more recent decades a number of Aeschylus’ tragedies have been set to music. 5 The composer most often associated with the influence of Aeschylus is, of course, Richard Wagner, none of whose operas — or music-dramas as he called them — explicitly retell any Aeschylean tragedy or Greek myth. 6 But numerous scholars have long recognised the influence of ancient Greek mythology and culture on the composer’s work, especially in the parallels between Wagner’s Ring Cycle and the Oresteia in narrative structure, themes, imagery and characterisation. 7 Other connections between Wagner and Greek drama are confirmed in the composer’s numerous writings on Greek tragedy and modern (i.e. his own) opera. Here we find special praise of Aeschylus, as opposed to Euripides, in terms that show the

 5 These examples can, of course, be added to. For fuller discussion of the reception of Aeschylus within operas, see Brown 2004, 285–309, who calculates that there have been about 100 musical versions of Greek tragedy between c. 1965–2002; see id. 305–307 for a list of those based on the House of Atreus, most of which derive from the Oresteia; cf. also Ferrario 2017; Ewans 2017. 6 In 1847 Wagner did, however, revise the libretto and score of Christoph Gluck’s Iphigeneia in Aulis, so that the text at least would conform more closely to the Euripidean original (Wagner 1911, 408–410), and in 1849–1850 he made notes for a possible three-act drama on the life of Achilles (Millington 1984, 38; Nattiez 1993, 327 n. 5 with refs. and discussion). In a much-quoted passage from Mein Leben he writes powerfully of the overwhelming impact of reading (in Droysen’s translation) Aeschylus’ trilogy (Wagner 1911, 415): “… with real feeling and understanding … I could see the Oresteia with my mind’s eye, as though it were actually being performed and its effect on me was indescribable. Nothing could equal the sublime emotion with which the Agamemnon inspired me; and to the last word of the Eumenides, I remained in an atmosphere so far removed from the present day that I have never since been really able to reconcile myself with modern literature. My ideas about the whole significance of the drama and the theatre were without a doubt moulded by these impressions”. The tenor of these words is not so far removed from Xenakis’ own response to Archaic and Classical Greek culture, on which more below. 7 See, for instance, Schadewaldt 1970, 341–405 (originally published in the Bayreuth programmes for Lohengrin in 1962 and Die Meistersinger in 1963 and 1964); Lloyd-Jones 1982; Ewans 1982, passim; 2018, 210–214; Foster 2010; Seaford 2018. Some critics have felt that the case, at least as maintained by Ewans 1982, for Aeschylean influence on Wagner’s operatic tetralogy is taken too far, e.g. Millington 1984, 194 n. 3; Furness 1984. As Lloyd-Jones 1982, 131–132, points out, something similar could be said of Wagner himself whose claims about the influence of Greek myth on his own works sometimes can seem overstated; but the composer’s enthusiasm for fifth-century Greek theatre, especially the tragedies of Aeschylus and comedies of Aristophanes, is beyond dispute. Of the comic poet he writes: “My delight in the comedies of Aristophanes was boundless, when once his Birds had plunged me into the full torrent of the genius of this wanton favourite of the Graces, as he used to call himself with conscious daring”. (Wagner 1911, 415).

  Patrick O’Sullivan composer to be influenced, like Nietzsche, by Aristophanes’ Frogs on many levels; e.g. Art and Revolution, The Artwork of the Future, and Opera and Drama, all written when Wagner was in exile in Switzerland (1849–1851). So, why Xenakis? Very little has been written about his engagement with Aeschylus — which is my chief concern with the musician here — even though the composer himself has published some, albeit fairly perfunctory, thoughts on the project. 8 But in scholarly discussions by Classicists on the interaction between Greek theatre and twentieth century opera, Xenakis usually receives just a passing reference, or none at all. 9 It may be true that Xenakis’ Oresteia is “not a full dramatization in music of Aeschylus’ trilogy”; Xenakis reduces the original trilogy to about seventy minutes in performance. But to see Xenakis’ Oresteia as just “a setting of several extracts” 10 from the original trilogy fails to do it justice as a coherent piece in its own right, despite its being composed in various stages over a quarter of a century.

Aeschylus’ Big Fat Poetry To return to Aeschylus and his ancient reception: the idea of “bigness” as a stylistic feature of the tragedian’s work is evident from Old Comedy onward. Important though this notion of “bigness” is in the early reception of Aeschylus, it is not unique to the poet even in the fifth century BC. Aeschylus’ contemporary, Pindar, uses architectural metaphors to denote the grandeur of his own poetic creations, comparing his odes to grand edifices (Ol. 6.1–4; Pyth. 6.7–18 “the treasure-house of songs” image; fr. 194 S–M, etc.). 11 Democritus goes further and applies the imagery

 8 Musicologists have understandably focused on the composer’s numerous highly technical works and voluminous theoretical writings expounding such works, for which he is most wellknown; see Xenakis 1992; also below n. 37. For the composer’s comments on the Oresteia, see Xenakis 1966/7; id. 1996, 49–58. 9 Foley 2004, discussing twentieth-century performances of Agamemnon in the USA, contains much interesting material, but mentions Xenakis only briefly (309). Ferrario 2017, 177, acknowledges that Aeschylus enjoys renewed interest from opera composers in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, referring to Carl Orff’s Prometheus Bound (1968) and Andrew Simpson’s The Furies (Washington DC, 2006), but makes no mention of Xenakis. 10 So, Ewans 2017, 222, who refers to Xenakis only in passing. 11 Pindar’s sophisticated, at times implicitly agonistic, engagement with the plastic arts and use of images drawn from architecture — including the idea of the poet as metaphorical craftsman — has received much attention in recent decades; see Ford 2002, 113–130; O’Sullivan 2003, 2005; Porter 2010, 436–440, 510–519; Kirchenko 2016.

Morsels from the Banquet of Aeschylus  

of size and craft to Homer as both divinely inspired and as one who “structured a kosmos of all kinds of words”: ἐπέων κόσμον ἐτεκτήνατο παντοίων (B 21 D–K). 12 Pherecrates may have been the first to apply imagery of size and architectural grandeur to Aeschylus when he has the dead poet in Hades boast that it was he: “who built up a great art” (of tragedy) and bequeathed it to them (later poets): ὅστις γ’ αὐτοῖς παρέδωκα τέχνην μεγάλην ἐξοικοδομήσας (fr. 100 K–A). Aristophanes uses much the same imagery for himself in the parabasis of the Peace (749–750) as the poet who: ἐποίησε τέχνην μεγάλην ὑμῖν κἀπύργωσ’ οἰκοδομήσας ἔπεσιν μεγάλοις καὶ διανοίαις … (Ar. Pax 749–750) … made the art great for us, building up towers and edifices with great words and ideas …

In the Frogs (1004–1005), poetic “bigness” can likewise be a laudable quality. In imagery recalling Pherecrates, Aristophanes has Dionysos famously address Aeschylus as: …ὦ πρῶτος τῶν Ἑλλήνων πυργώσας ῥήματα σεμνὰ καὶ κοσμήσας τραγικὸν λῆρον, 13 θαρρῶν τὸν κρουνὸν ἀφίει. (Ar. Ran. 1004–1005) … o first of the Greeks to build towers of majestic expressions and adorn tragic nonsense, take heart and let forth your stream (of words).

Elsewhere again in Frogs the Aristophanic Aeschylus uses imagery of size to denote his own style, when, in response to Euripides’ complaint that he uses words the size of mountains such as Lycabettus or Parnassus (1056–1057), the older poet retorts that it is necessary (1059–1060):

 12 Κόσμος here could mean “adornment”, or “order”, as it does for Solon (fr. 1–2 W), Pindar (fr. 194 S–M), and Parmenides (B8.52 D–K); it is also likely it could denote something grander, i.e. that Homer builds an entire poetic world or universe; see Ford 2002, 169–172. Aristophanes’ use of κοσμήσας to describe Aeschylus’ influence on tragedy (Ran. 1005) may allude to these nuances of grandeur as well. 13 Reading with Dover 1993 ad loc. (cf. λῆρον at Ran. 1377); the lemma of Σ V has κλῆρον (“inheritance”, “allotment”), which Dover does not rule out. If λῆρον is correct, Dionysos could mean that Aeschylus improved the genre, which Aristotle tells us (Poet. 1449a19–21) initially had petty plots, ludicrous language, and only attained dignity relatively late.

  Patrick O’Sullivan μεγάλων γνωμῶν καὶ διανοιῶν ἴσα καὶ τὰ ῥήματα τίκτειν. κἄλλως εἰκὸς τοὺς ἡμιθέους τοῖς ῥήμασι μείζοσι χρῆσθαι· (Ar. Ran. 1059–1060) to produce words that are the equal of great thoughts and ideas. And anyway, it is appropriate that demi-gods use greater words.

In fact, it is this very quality of size and bulk that enables Aeschylus to win the contest of the scales (Ran. 1365–1411). As Pat Easterling has shown, “bigness” of thought, voice and style became a byword for Aeschylean style for centuries after his death: from Dio Chrysostom (52.4) and Himerius (Or. 8.4) to Basil of Caesarea (Epist. 74.2) and Photius in the ninth century, who refers to Aeschylus as μεγαλοφωνότατος (Bibl. 101b4). 14 But, as Plutarch records, from an early stage in the reception of Aeschylus, the idea of bulk and size was not always considered an unequivocal good. Plutarch gives the following account of how Sophocles understood his own development as a dramatist as a process of overcoming Aeschylus’ ὄγκος which is synonymous with his “harshness and artificiality” πικρὸν καὶ κατάτεχνον (Plut. Mor. 79b): ὥσπερ γὰρ ὁ Σοφοκλῆς ἔλεγε τὸν Αἰσχύλου διαπεπαιχὼς ὄγκον εἶτα τὸ πικρὸν καὶ κατάτεχνον τῆς αὐτοῦ κατασκευῆς τρίτον ἤδη τὸ τῆς λέξεως μεταβάλλειν εἶδος, ὅπερ ἠθικώτατόν ἐστι καὶ βέλτιστον ... For as Sophocles said, that only after handling with a light touch the weight of Aeschylus and next his harshness and artificiality in composition, did he, as a third step, change the character of the language, which has the most to do with moral character and goodness …

It is possible that the origin of this anecdote is traceable to Sophocles’ contemporary, Ion of Chios, whose Epidemiai was one of the first works to deal with the lives of poets. 15 In any case, Plutarch’s account makes clear that Aeschylus’ poetry in its stylistic harshness and bulk could have its unattractive features, at least in the eyes of other poets, and Sophocles elsewhere is noted for other jaundiced views of the older tragedian, even though Aristophanes presents them as close,

 14 See Easterling 2004, esp. 28–29. 15 As suggested by Bowra 1940, 386; for more recent discussion of Ion’s Epidemiai, see Pelling 2007, 75–109.

Morsels from the Banquet of Aeschylus  

affectionate allies in the Frogs (esp. 786–794). 16 Euripides in Frogs persists in attacking his opponent’s poetry, using the idea of bulk and size to denote Aeschylus’ style which he ridicules, while going in for a bit of fat-shaming at the same time. The younger poet complains about the obese state of tragedy under the influence of Aeschylus (939–944): ἀλλ’ ὡς παρέλαβον τὴν τέχνην παρὰ σοῦ τὸ πρῶτον εὐθὺς οἰδοῦσαν ὑπὸ κομπασμάτων καὶ ῥημάτων ἐπαχθῶν, ἴσχνανα μὲν πρώτιστον αὐτὴν καὶ τὸ βάρος ἀφεῖλον ἐπυλλίοις καὶ περιπάτοις καὶ τευτλίοισι λευκοῖς, χυλὸν διδοὺς στωμυλμάτων, ἀπὸ βιβλίων ἀπηθῶν· εἶτ’ ἀνέτρεφον μονῳδίαις, … But when I inherited the tragic art from you at first, when it was bloated still with bombast and with bucket loads of verbiage, first of all I thinned her out and removed her bulk with a diet of fat-free words and walking exercise, and white silver beet giving her diet drinks of chat, distilling them from slender volumes, then fed her up again with delicate solo infusions of song …

940

More than once in the Frogs Aristophanes, through the mouthpiece of Euripides, lampoons Aeschylus for the mass and monstrosity of his language which he also links to his bombastic military imagery that comes across as Homer on a bad day. Aeschylus’ “bigness”, then, is something laughable, at least in the eyes of the Aristophanic Euripides, and is part of the older poet’s attempts to imitate the great epic poet (Ar. Ran. 924–926, 928–930). … ῥήματ’ ἂν βόεια δώδεκ’ εἶπεν, ὀφρῦς ἔχοντα καὶ λόφους, δείν’ ἄττα μορμορωπά, ἄγνωτα τοῖς θεωμένοις. … (Ar. Ran. 924–926) ἀλλ’ ἢ Σκαμάνδρους καὶ τάφρους κἀπ’ ἀσπίδων ἐπόντας γρυπαιέτους χαλκηλάτους καὶ ῥήμαθ’ ἱππόκρημνα, ἃ ξυμβαλεῖν οὐ ῥᾴδι’ ἦν. (Ar. Ran. 928–930)

 16 Athenaeus (10.428f) records that, according to Chamaeleon, Sophocles said Aeschylus was drunk when he composed his plays and did not know what he was doing.

  Patrick O’Sullivan … he would utter expressions twelve ox-hides thick, that had fearful glares and plumes, such terrible hobgoblins incomprehensible to the spectators. … Scamanders and trenches and bronze-wrought griffins that were on shields, and huge insurmountable words, which were not easy to understand.

Here are a number of topoi combine, albeit exaggerated for comic effect, that have implications for Aeschylus’ dramas elsewhere in the play; these topoi can even, I suggest, cast some light on an image used by the poet himself in one of his own tragedies to which I’ll return. If Sophocles had seen in Aeschylean “bulk” a certain harshness and artificiality, Aristophanes adds another dimension here. For the comic poet likens the aggressive aspect of Aeschylean poetry to comically fearful eyebrows (ὀφρῦς) associated with figures such as the bullish Cleon (Cratin. fr. 228) and to bogeymen generally (μορμορωπά); 17 Aristophanes also links the stylistic notion of size to militarism and warlike imagery that is a pastiche of Homeric epic. Aeschylus’ words are comically assimilated to the gear of Homeric heroes such as oxhide shields (Il. 5.452–453, etc.) and a warrior’s typical helmet plume which Homer says “nods terribly from above” (δεινὸν δὲ λόφος καθύπερθεν ἔνευεν: Il. 3.337, 11.42, 15.481, etc.). 18 According to Euripides (Ran. 924), Aeschylus’ diction recalls and even exceeds the “tower” shield of the gigantic Ajax with its famous seven oxhides (Il. 7.219–223, 245, 266, etc.) by being twelve oxhides thick (ῥήματα … βόεια δώδεκα)! Ultimately, Aeschylus’ bombastic words are incomprehensible (ἄγνωτα … ξυμβαλεῖν οὐ ῥᾴδια) to the audience (Ar. Ran. 926, 930). For the Aristophanic Euripides, then, Aeschylus’ stylistic “bigness” as a poet involves ideas of a sub-Homeric militarism and incomprehensibility. These ideas occur again in Frogs and are extended to include the notion of ἔκπληξις. Contrasting himself with this rival, Euripides claims the following (Ran. 961–963): … ἀλλ’ οὐκ ἐκομπολάκουν ἀπὸ τοῦ φρονεῖν ἀποσπάσας, οὐδ’ ἐξέπληττον αὐτούς, Κύκνους ποιῶν καὶ Μέμνονας κωδωνοφαλαροπώλους. (Ar. Ran. 961–963) … but I didn’t talk big, distracting people from thinking, nor did I stun them out of their senses by staging people like Kyknos, or Memnon with bells on the cheek-plates of their horses.  17 See Dover 1993 ad loc.; Olson 1999. 18 At Il. 6.468–470 Hektor’s plume famously terrifies his infant son, Astyanax, causing mother and father to laugh.

Morsels from the Banquet of Aeschylus  

Euripides has already parodied Aeschylus’ poetry for its focus on war and weaponry which was linked to the idea of the “bigness” of his style. Here in Frogs Aristophanes now implies that Aeschylus is poet of ἔκπληξις when he has Euripides boast that, in contrast to his rival, he himself did not induce ἔκπληξις in his audience (οὐδ’ ἐξέπληττον αὐτούς: Ran. 962). The importance of ἔκπληξις as a term of rhetorical and literary criticism has already been noted, 19 and here the Aristophanic Euripides’ applies it to Aeschylus as poet of heroic grandeur or, rather, militaristic bombast. This is confirmed in the younger poet’s reference to his rival as producing (ποιῶν) warriors like Kyknos or Memnon whose military attire is described in the absurdly long compound κωδωνοφαλαροπώλους (“with bells on the cheek-plates of their horses”), and which induces the ἔκπληξις in the audience. As famous opponents and victims of Achilles (cf. Pind. Isthm. 5.39–41), these figures would once again put the audience in mind of Aeschylus as a quasiHomeric tragedian insofar as he is dealing with heroes from the Trojan cycle. 20 Taplin plausibly suggests that it is Aeschylus’ staging, as opposed to his poetry, that is considered to produce ἔκπληξις in his audience in this passage. 21 If so, then Aristophanes provides us with an early instance of ἔκπληξις as working through visual artifice (i.e., the staging and costumes) and sound, as opposed to words only. 22 But it is also possible that the reference is to Aeschylus’ verbal descriptions of these heroes in their grandiose military attire. In the famous shield-scene of the Septem the Argive attackers do not appear, but we learn from the Theban scout that one of them, Tydeus, has bronze-wrought bells on his shield, designed to terrify his enemies (Sept. 381–386). 23 In any case, for the comic poet in the late fifth century, a clear nexus of ideas emerges whereby Aeschylus’ stylistic “bigness” entails warlike imagery and “stunning” visual stage effects and/or poetry in the form of ἔκπληξις.

 19 Above, n. 4. 20 It is not known which Aeschylean play featured Kyknos, who is more likely be the son of Tithonos killed at Troy by Achilles (Pind. Ol. 2.82) than the son of Ares killed by Heracles [Hes.] Sc. 413–423). Aeschylus boasts elsewhere in Frogs of adorning the stage with other Homeric figures such as Patroklos and Teucer (1040–1041). An Aeschylean Memnon appears in the Medicean catalogue (TrGF iii T 78. 10b. 10); see Dover 1993 ad loc. 21 Taplin 1977, 76–77, 422–423. 22 Cf. Gorgias (Hel. 16) to be discussed below. Dio Chrysostom (Or. 12.51) sees a connection between ἔκπληξις and visual artifice, in making it one of the experiences induced by the sight of Pheidias’ statue of Zeus at Olympia; for discussion, see O’Sullivan 2011, 140–145. 23 On which more will be said below; cf. also [Eur.] Rhes. 306–308, 383–384 where a messenger and the chorus speak of Rhesus as having a bronze Gorgon with bells attached as part of the armour for his horses.

  Patrick O’Sullivan While the Euripidean claim that Aeschylus induced ἔκπληξις through his militaristic costuming or poetic imagery aims to produce a laugh (Ran. 962), it does allude to an idea that elsewhere occurs in more serious contexts that may also inform Aristophanes’ drama. Gorgias refers to the fear-inducing power of a warrior’s appearance in full armour, which Aeschylus had made a central concern in the Septem (83, 100, 151, 160, etc.) — a play evidently admired by the sophist (B 24 D–K). When discussing the powers of ὄψις and their psychological effects in the Encomium of Helen (B11 D–K), Gorgias states (Hel. 16): αὐτίκα γὰρ ὅταν πολέμια σώματα [καὶ] πολέμιον ἐπὶ πολεμίοις ὁπλίσῃ κόσμον χαλκοῦ καὶ σιδήρου, τοῦ μὲν ἀλεξητήριον τοῦ δὲ † προβλήματα, εἰ θεάσεται ἡ ὄψις, ἐταράχθη καὶ ἐτάραξε τὴν ψυχήν, ὥστε πολλάκις κινδύνου τοῦ μέλλοντος ὄντος φεύγουσιν ἐκπλαγέντες. (Gorg. Hel. 16) For whenever hostile bodies buckle on their warlike accoutrements (κόσμον) of bronze and iron to face their enemies, some designed for defence, others for offence, if the sight sees this, immediately it is alarmed and it alarms the soul, so that often men flee, panic-stricken (ἐκπλαγέντες) from future danger it were present.

Beyond a general thematic link of terror experienced before battle, some have noted Gorgianic echoes of the Septem here in terms such as προβλήματα for defensive weaponry (cf. Sept. 540, 676) and we could add others: for instance, Gorgias’ use of κόσμος to denote military equipment as a parallel to Eteokles’ use of the same term (Sept. 397). 24 Another important idea also emerges here, namely the concept of ἔκπληξις, which Gorgias says can be induced by the prospect of warriors in full armour and which, before battle has even begun, drives combatants to flee “panic sticken” (ἐκπλαγέντες). It is noteworthy that in the Encomium,

 24 Donadi 1977–1978, 64–68, was correct to see a link here links between Aeschylus and Gorgias, but his conjecture that Gorgias’ Encomium had been inspired by a specific restaging of the Septem in 405 BC is unconvincing; however, this is not to deny that fifth-century reperformances of Aeschylus’ dramas could have taken place even in Sicily (on which, see Lamari 2015; cf. Smith 2017). In any case, Aeschylus need not be the only source for Gorgias for the idea of combatants being driven to flight by the sight of enemy armour before fighting has begun; Homer memorably depicts Hektor fleei ng from the rampaging Achilles whose armour the poet emphasises in a spectacular simile, comparing its sheen to a raging fire or the rising sun (Il. 22.131–137). This moment from the Iliad was cited by Plato (Ion 535b–c) and Aristotle (Poet. 1460b 25) as an instance of the capacity of Homeric epic to induce ἔκπληξις.

Morsels from the Banquet of Aeschylus  

with its Aeschylean overtones, 25 Gorgias understands ἔκπληξις to work through the agency of sight, just as Aristophanes quite possibly does in the remark he puts into the mouth of Euripides and its reference to the armour of Kyknos and Memnon (Ran. 962–963). 26 Indeed, the intriguing possibility emerges that Aristophanes got the idea from Gorgias that ἔκπληξις is something induced by the terrifying qualities of armour, just as he has Aeschylus describe the Septem ad Frogs 1021 in terms borrowed from the sophist (see below). Whether or not Aristophanes invented the association of Aeschylus with ἔκπληξις, it was to have a long and influential legacy in the ancient reception of the tragedian and beyond, especially as far as the visual aspect of his dramaturgy was concerned.

The Spectre of the Seven Against Thebes Apart from the Homeric resonances in Aeschylean poetics, also important are references to the “helmet plumes” and “bronze-wrought griffins that were on shields”, which Euripides sees as typical of the older poet’s bombastic subject matter (Ar. Ran. 924–926, 928–930), since they can be seen to allude to one of Aeschylus’s extant tragedies. In the Septem and its famous shield-scene, or Redepaare, the terrifying threat posed by the Argive attackers is conveyed by the scout to the Theban king Eteokles with particular emphasis on the armour and images (σήματα) on the shields of the combatants. The full thematic resonances of these shield-images, their status as wrought artefacts with an “aesthetic code” and Eteokles’ sophisticated ripostes to the scout have been extensively discussed by others. 27 My point here is that in Frogs the Aristophanic Euripides’ putdown of Aeschylus’s supposed militarism would be likely to put the audience in mind of the Septem, in addition to Homeric epic and any plays featuring Kyknos and Memnon.

 25 These also include diction and oxymoronic compound words used by both authors; e.g. φιλοίκτος (“loving-pity”: Aesch. Ag. 240) cf. φιλοπενθής (“loving-grief”: Gorg. Hel. 9, etc.); for Aeschylus’ penchant for compound words, see also Vita Aeschyli (5) and its parody by the Aristophanic Euripides (Ran. 963, etc.). 26 In the Palamedes Gorgias sees logos in the form of false accusation as capable of engendering ἔκπληξις (Pal. 4), much like the effects of Cleon’s intimidating attacks on his opponents (Thuc. 3.42.2). 27 Some of the more notable discussions include: Solmsen 1937; Patzer 1958; Fraenkel 1964; Thalmann 1978, esp. Ch. 5; Vidal-Naquet 1986; Zeitlin 20092, who uses the term “aesthetic code” (75); Hutchinson 1985, et al.

  Patrick O’Sullivan In his lengthy description of Tydeus, who is the first Argive attacker shouting and raging for battle, the scout mentions the following (Sept. 384–386): τοιαῦτ’ ἀυτῶν τρεῖς κατασκίους λόφους σείει, κράνους χαίτωμ’, ὑπ’ ἀσπίδος δὲ τῶι χαλκήλατοι κλάζουσι κώδωνες φόβον. (Aesch. Sept. 384–386) With such cries his three overshadowing plumes, he shakes — his helmet’s mane — while from under his shield, bronze-wrought bells ring out terror.

Euripides in Frogs pastiches such Aeschylean imagery with verbal echoes from the Septem here; his reference to plumes (λόφους: Frogs 925) conceivably recalls the three plumes of Tydeus’ helmet (τρεῖς κατασκίους λόφους). More specifically, the “bronze-wrought” (χαλκηλάτους) griffins on the shields of Aeschylean warriors mentioned by Euripides (cf. Frogs 924) also recall Tydeus’ “bronze-wrought” (χαλκήλατοι) bells on his shield (Septem 386); indeed, the rare compound adjective χαλκήλατος is probably an Aeschylean coinage. 28 Likewise, Euripides’ comically monstrous κωδωνοφαλαροπώλους (“bells on the cheek-plates of their horses”: Frogs 963), which is part of the cavalry armour of Kyknos and Memnon, is a parodic echo of the Aeschylean Tydeus’ bells that “ring out terror” (κλάζουσι κώδωνες φόβον). In responding to the scout’s description, it is significant that Eteokles draws attention to these features of Tydeus’ armour as well as his shieldimage, if only to dismantle their talismanic force; for in doing so, he makes clear that such equipment embodies the threat which the attacker poses to Thebes (Septem 397–399): κόσμον μὲν ἀνδρὸς οὔτιν’ ἂν τρέσαιμ’ ἐγώ, οὐδ’ ἑλκοποιὰ γίγνεται τὰ σήματα. λόφοι δὲ κώδων τ’ οὐ δάκνουσ’ ἄνευ δορός· (Aesch. Sept. 397–399) I would not tremble before any ornament (κόσμον) on a man. Nor do symbols have the power to wound and kill. Plumes and a bell do not bite without the spear.

 28 The word is unattested in extant Greek literature before Aeschylus who uses it no fewer than five times, twice in the Septem alone (386, 539; also Cho. 290; frr. 225.2, 375a.5).

Morsels from the Banquet of Aeschylus  

Euripides’ dismissal of the comically terrifying presence of warrior armour in Aeschylean dramaturgy, which he sees as typical of his opponent’s bombastic, “big” style, need not, then, just be restricted to figures like Kyknos and Memnon. Nor does Euripides just parody Aeschylus as a “wannabe” Homer in Frogs. It is also plausible to see in Euripides’ disparagment of Aeschylus’ warlike imagery parodic allusions to certain passages in the Septem, a drama specifically mentioned later in the Frogs (1021). If the Septem is implicitly part of the literary background to the exchange between Aeschylus and Euripides early in their encounter in Frogs, its significance soon becomes explicit in the discussion of the role of poet as teacher (1006ff). In response to Euripides’ question as to how he has made the citizens of Athens “noble” (γενναίους), Aeschylus boasts of producing a drama Ἄρεως μεστόν (“full of Ares”: 1021), which he identifies as the Septem, and which, he says, would inspire every man who saw it with a desire to become a combatant (1019–1022). Gorgias, whose links to Aristophanes as a literary critic have already been noted, 29 famously used the same expression to describe the same play (B 24 D–K). Who coined this memorable soundbite? It is more likely that Aristophanes is alluding to the sophist, whom he mentions elsewhere in his comedies (e.g. Av. 1701). Plutarch attributes the quote to Gorgias with no mention of Aristophanes (Mor. 715e), which suggests that the comic poet has borrowed from this sophist, as he has from others. As Charles Segal argued, Aristophanes shows a debt to sophists in different contexts such as Protagoras and Prodicus apropos of their semantic theories and interest in the correct usage of language; in the so-called “battle of the prologues” (esp. Ran. 1119–1197) Aeschylus, when accused by Euripides of tautology, shows himself quite capable of picking apart synonyms like a wellschooled sophist (esp. 1152–1176). 30 The Aristophanic Aeschylus’ boast about the Septem at Frogs 1021, then, would seem more effective if he is echoing the sentiments of well-known intellectual such as Gorgias. For the poet who has been dead for half a century now appeals to the authority and enjoys the approval of a leading contemporary public figure, whose interest in tragedy (B 23 D–K), Homer  29 Above, n. 3. 30 Segal 1970. Protagoras, whose interest in correct usage of words (orthoepeia) is attested by Plato (Pl. Cra. 391b–c; Phdr. 267c), considered the understanding of poetry the most important part of a proper education and proceeded to demonstrate this in his famous stoush with Socrates over how to analyse a passage from Simonides (Pl. Prt. 339a–d, etc.); elsewhere, according to Aristotle (Soph. el. 173b19), Protagoras criticises Homer for “incorrect” use of language beginning with the first word of the Iliad! Democritus (B 20a D–K) likewise had an interest in Homer’s use of language. Plato also parodies Prodicus’ constant distinctions between synonyms (Pl. Prt. 337a–c); the sophist was linked with orthotês onomatõn (“correctness of names”) (A 11 D–K).

  Patrick O’Sullivan and Homeric figures is attested elsewhere (B 11, 25, 27 D–K, etc.). In any event, Gorgias, like Aristophanes’ Aeschylus, neatly combines the idea of bulk, size and militarism in referring to the Septem as “full” (μεστόν) of Ares, the god of war. What Euripides derided earlier in the play as bloated bombast, Aeschylus now celebrates: his poetry has magnitude, emotional power and martial, heroic force. This nexus of ideas can, I believe, shed light on parts of the Septem itself. In light of these connotations of poetic “bigness” that have been discussed, an expression which Aeschylus uses in the Septem for one of the shield-images of the Argive attackers emerges more clearly. Aeschylus has the scout describe the shield-image of the third attacker, Eteoklos, thus (Sept. 465–469): ἐσχημάτισται δ’ ἀσπὶς οὐ σμικρὸν τρόπον· ἀνὴρ ὁπλίτης κλίμακος προσαμβάσεις στείχει πρὸς ἐχθρῶν πύργον, ἐκπέρσαι θέλων· βοᾷ δὲ χοὖτος γραμμάτων ἐν ξυλλαβαῖς ὡς οὐδ’ ἂν Ἄρης σφ’ ἐκβάλοι πυργωμάτων. (Aesch. Sept. 465–469) His shield has been designed in no small manner, but a hoplite warrior climbing a ladder approaches the enemies’ tower, wanting to raze it. This man shouts in lettered words that not even Ares would throw him off the walls.

While much has been said of this and other shield-images in the play, my concern here is primarily with how the image is described as being “designed” (ἐσχημάτισται) 31 and with the expression οὐ σμικρὸν τρόπον (“in no small manner”), which has received very little comment so far. 32 The shield image is firstly presented in formal terms as a σχῆμα, a term Gorgias (Hel. 18) and Xenophon (Mem. 3.10.7) use to denote the stylised images that result from the working methods of painters who put together composite figures from different parts. The “aesthetic code”, to borrow Zeitlin’s term, in this description of the warrior’s equipment is thus immediately apparent and is extended in the adverbial phrase οὐ σμικρὸν τρόπον. The scholiast (Σ I1 ad loc.) rightly saw the metaphorical connotations of the expression, even if glossing it in rather understated terms as, inter al.,

 31 Reading with Page and West’s texts; some MSS contain variants ἐσημάτισται or εἰσημάτιστα. 32 Zeitlin 2009, 75, who rightly mentions the heightened “aesthetic code” of this treatment of the third shield-image compared to the first two, notes the expression οὐ σμικρὸν τρόπον only in passing; others pass over it in silence.

Morsels from the Banquet of Aeschylus  

“not trivial and cheap” (οὐ λιτῶς καὶ εὐτελῶς). But we may go further. The word τρόπος here clearly has connotations of style, as parallels from Pindar (Ol. 3.4; 14.17), Eupolis (fr. 326 K–A) and Aristophanes (Ran. 1329–1330), who refer to the τρόπος of certain types of poetry, all demonstrate. 33 Aeschylus therefore applies to a visual image — the σῆμα on Eteoklos’ shield — what Pindar, Eupolis, Aristophanes and others use to denote an aspect of poetry: the notion of style. But what sort of style? At Septem 463 the scout refers to another menacing aspect of Eteoklos’ war gear by saying that the muzzles of his horses “whistle in a barbaric manner (or ‘style’)” (συρίζουσι βάρβαρον τρόπον). 34 As for the warrior’s shield, the expression οὐ σμικρὸν τρόπον does not merely refer to its size, since it is immediately followed by a description of the image depicted on it: a hoplite climbing a ladder threatening to burn the city. The words οὐ σμικρὸν τρόπον, then, refer to the “big” manner in which this threatening image has been constructed. This nuances of this stylistic designation become clearer when we recall how notions of “bigness” came to be applied to Aeschylean and other kinds of poetry. As noted above, Pindar at times sees his own poems as grand architectural edifices (Ol. 6.1–4, etc.), as does Aristophanes (Pax 749–750, etc.) who boasts in a manner that echoed Pherecrates’ praise of Aeschylus’ grand poetic creations (fr. 100 K–A); and Democritus considers Homer to have structured an entire poetic kosmos (B21 D–K). But we have also seen how poetic “bigness” can have overtones of warlike valour, according to Gorgias (B24 D–K) and the Aristophanic Aeschylus (Ran. 1021, 1059–1060, etc.), which Euripides does not deny but ridicules as bombast and bluster (Ar. Ran. 924–926, 928–930). Anticipating these developments, Aeschylus in the Septem here makes the concept of size a stylistic feature of the image on Eteoklos’ shield to convey its menacing, warlike power, for the τρόπος of this shield-image is “not small”. In other words, the style of the image on Eteoklos’ shield is “big”, and is therefore like Aeschylus’ poetry, especially in its stirring, warlike aspects, at least according to Gorgias and Aristophanes, whose presentation of Aeschylus’ poetry generally in the Frogs has emphasised its overwhelming, martial, even terrifying aspects. All of these attributes are entirely appropriate for Eteoklos’ menacing shield-image, which is

 33 Pindar (Ol. 14.17) uses τρόπος to refer to the Lydian mode, and also, with customary modesty, speaks of the “sparkling style”: νεοσίγαλον … τρόπον of his odes (Ol. 3.4); and Eupolis (fr. 326 K–A) uses τρόπος twice to refer to styles of odes; and LSJ (s.v. V) note the use of τρόπος for “style” in speech and writing by Plato (Resp. 400d) and Isocrates (15.45). By 405 BC, τρόπος can have an aesthetic designation, as in Dionysos’ wish to examine the “style” (τρόπος) of Aeschylus’ and Euripides’ monodies (Ran. 1329–1330). 34 Reading with the MSS; Page accepts Schütz’ emendation βρόμον (“roar”).

  Patrick O’Sullivan designed likewise to convey warlike aggression and embody heroic force. Moreover, the notion of “bigness” as a metaphor for the “warlike” nature of Aeschylus’ tragedies can be seen to be traceable to Aeschylus himself when the poet is conveying the talismanic power of another artistic medium: the σῆμα on Eteoklos’ shield in the Septem. These connotations of οὐ σμικρὸν τρόπον cast light on another expression in the play, which has puzzled some commentators. Earlier Eteokles has stated how he will respond to the attackers in a manner consistent with this reading of οὐ σμικρὸν τρόπον (Sept. 282–284): ἐγὼ δέ γ’ ἄνδρας ἓξ ἐμοὶ σὺν ἑβδόμῳ ἀντηρέτας ἐχθροῖσι τὸν μέγαν τρόπον εἰς ἑπτατειχεῖς ἐξόδους τάξω μολών, (Aesch. Sept. 282–284) With myself as the seventh, I shall set up six warriors as defenders against the enemy “in the great manner” (τὸν μέγαν τρόπον) as I go to the seven walled exits.

Denys Page in the apparatus to his text of the play considered the expression τὸν μέγαν τρόπον corrupt, thinking it unintelligible. But, with perhaps a bit more imagination, the scholiast considered it as referring to the “kingly” manner in which Eteokles aims to defend his city, glossing it as ὡς βασιλεῖ πρέπει (Σ I1 ad loc.). Οthers have thought it referred to the menacing actions of the enemy or the defenders of Thebes. 35 This may be another instance of deliberate Aeschylean ambiguity in that τὸν μέγαν τρόπον could refer to the fighting manner of the attackers, the defenders or both groups. The point to be made here is that the “bigness” of the τρόπος signifies something impressively grand, warlike and aggressive, like the manner in which the σῆμα on Eteoklos’ shield has been designed, and like Aeschylean poetry itself, at least in the opinion of Gorgias and the Aristophanic Euripides and Aeschylus (Ran. 1059–1060, etc.). In this passage of the Septem, as in the initial description of Eteoklos’ shield-image, the martial, heroic qualities of metaphorical “bigness” are paramount, and therefore anticipate developments in the reception of the author himself of the play as the poet of “bigness”.  35 Verrall 1887 ad loc. links the expression to the ἀντηρέτας and translates: “champions to match the attack of the foe on this great scale”. Tucker 1908 ad loc. supposed a lost line containing a participle qualifying ἐχθροῖσι and renders “that proud manner of theirs”. Hutchinson 1985 assumes a lacuna between 283–284 and sees no help in οὐ σμικρὸν τρόπον.

Morsels from the Banquet of Aeschylus  

From ἔκπληξις to Xenakis Connected to the idea of Aeschylean “bigness”, as discussed above, is the notion of ἔκπληξις which appears as early as Aristophanes. This quality also re-emerges as a significant factor in the later biographical reception of the poet and, notably, in the hypothesis to the Agamemnon. Scholiasts also saw that ἔκπληξις was central to the experience of key scenes in the visual action of certain dramas by Aeschylus, such as the beginning of the Eumenides (schol. 1a/b ad Eum.), and in dramas by Sophocles (schol. ad Ajax 346, 815), such as the appearance of Ajax on the ekkyklema or his suicide onstage. 36 The hypothesis to the Agamemnon likewise mentions the ἔκπληξις of the moment when Cassandra prophesies her own death, having thrown off her garlands, and enters the house; we are told: “this part of the play is admired/wondered at (θαυμάζεται) for its power to arouse ἔκπληξις and pity in full measure (οἶκτον ἱκανόν)”. The Vita Aeschyli, whatever its shortcomings in terms of its historical reliability, is at least of value in providing evidence for popular ideas about famous poet in antiquity. As far as Aeschylus is concerned, a certain archaism is seen to be a key feature of his dramaturgy. At Vita 5 we are told that Aeschylus: “thought that cunning ingenuity (πανοῦργον κομψοπρεπές) and sententiousness (γνωμολογικὸν) were alien to tragedy” (ἀλλότριον τῆς τραγωιδίας), an idea which again is clearly traceable to Aristophanes. But the idea of Aeschylus as poet of ἔκπληξις also soon recurs. We hear (Vit. 7) that “he used visual effects and plots more for purposes of monstrous ἔκπληξις than for deceit” (ταῖς τε γὰρ ὄψεσι καὶ τοῖς μύθοις πρὸς ἔκπληξιν τερατώδη μᾶλλον ἢ πρὸς ἀπάτην κέχρηται). The infamous account in the Vita Aeschyli (9) speaks of the ἔκπληξις allegedly induced by the sight of the Erinyes leading to children’s feinting and women’s having spontaneous abortions. Again, the Vita (14) tells us that Aeschylus induced ἔκπληξις in his audience by the visual and aural — not necessarily verbal — dimension of his plays: “pictures, devices, altars, tombs, trumpets, images and Furies”. Aeschylus, then, is the poet of ἔκπληξις and seems to approximate the more modern notion of “total theatre”, in which all elements of a production contribute to the effect of a play; it is also an expression used by Xenakis of his own work when adapting Greek tragedy, which he considered a total synthesis of all the major arts. The Rumanian-born Xenakis spent most of his life in France as an exile for being part of the communist resistance against British forces which arrived in

 36 As Easterling 2004, 24–29, discusses.

  Patrick O’Sullivan Greece to restore the monarchy in the late stages of World War Two; but he identified as a native of Greece where lived as a child until the age of twenty-four. As a member of the Byron Brigade in the National Liberation Front (EAM), he had also fought against the Nazis from 1941–1944. Amongst musicologists, Xenakis is renowned for highly technical works designed around mathematical principles composed with computers, such as his Polytopes: light and sound shows for electronic music in architectural settings; in Paris he qualified as an architect and engineer and worked in Le Corbusier’s studio until the late 1950s. In his writings Xenakis compares the sonorities of the orchestra to building materials, calling it stochastic music, for which he is perhaps most well known. 37 But it is also worth noting that much of his oeuvre was based on Greek myth and poetry. My concern here is to make a few observations about Xenakis’ Oresteia, from the perspective of his reception of Aeschylus and discuss how this tallies with ideas which others read into the tragedian’s work that have been discussed above. In an interview with B.A. Varga Xenakis states: “It was around the age of sixteen that I consciously discovered for myself the riches of ancient civilisation: literature philosophy, architecture, history. I became engrossed once again with ancient Greek, which we had studied at school, but not thoroughly enough. It was my aim to be able to read the classics in the original … I felt I was born too late — I had missed two millennia”. 38 Despite his self-proclaimed rebellion against romanticism and emotion in music, 39 there is something again undeniably Wagnerian about his idealisation of archaic and Classical Greek culture. As already noted, Wagner famously writes that after reading the Oresteia, he was so moved or “transported” that he was never fully able to be reconciled with modern literature and saw himself more at home in ancient Athens (Mein Leben). 40 In any case, Xenakis’ output inspired by ancient Greece is considerable and includes: Aïs: Orchestral pieces for solo voice based on Homer’s Odyssey and the poetry of Sappho; a 1966 suite based on Seneca’s Medea. In 1962 in Stuttgart for the festival of Light Music Xenakis composed a suite, Polla ta Dhina, based on Sophocles’  37 Xenakis 1992, esp. 295–321. Some major studies include: Revault d’Allones 1975 (on Xenakis’ Polytopes); Matossian 1990; Eichert 1994; Baltensberger 1996; Solomos 1996; Harley 2004, among others. For a chronological list of Xenakis’ compositions, see Varga 1996, 220–241. 38 Varga 1996, 14–15. 39 Xenakis claimed not to have any emotional attachment to any of his compositions; see Varga 1996, 69. 40 Above, n. 6. Wagner (415–416) goes on to say that reading Aristophanes’ Birds and Plato’s Symposium also gave him “such a deep insight into the wonderful beauty of Greek life that I felt myself more truly at home in ancient Athens than in any conditions which the modern world has to offer”.

Morsels from the Banquet of Aeschylus  

“Ode to Man” from Antigone, glossing it in modernist terms as an ode to “rational optimism without religious overtones”. 41 In 1964 Xenakis composed music for Aeschylus’ Hiketides to be performed in the theatre at Epidauros and stipulated that the chorus be required to recite, dance, sing and play percussive instruments; this was part of his theory of “total theatre” in which all components of a production were to be combined into a synthetic whole greater than the sum of its parts. This was the basis of his understanding of Greek theatre, namely, that it is a “synthesis of the major arts” offering a “total spectacle” and is the essential point in his “Notice sur Orestie”. 42 There is something of another great lover of Greek tragedy here; Wagner’s Gesamtkunswerk theory that music-drama should aspire to be the “total work of art”. 43 It is worth recalling the view in the Vita (14) that Aeschylus’ dramaturgy achieves ἔκπληξις by its deployment of the visual and aural accoutrements of the theatre: “pictures, devices, altars, tombs, trumpets, images and Furies”. As far as the influence of Classical Greek theatre is concerned, these two ostensibly so different composers arguably have more in common than might first seem to be the case. Xenakis’ Oresteia originated as incidental music for a production of the trilogy based on Richmond Lattimore’s translation at Ypsilanti in Michigan in June 1966, directed by Alexis Solomos, to generally favourable reviews; it was part of a festival of Greek drama and included a performance of Aristophanes’ Birds, and took place on a base-ball field. 44 On his own admission, Xenakis claimed never to return to a piece of work to extend or re-work it, but his Oresteia proved to be the great exception. 45 The following year he produced a suite based on the choruses performed in Paris, and twenty years later in 1987 he added Kassandra — essentially an incorporation of Ag. 1073–1345 with only a few deletions — initially for baritone playing a psaltery and percussion. This had its premiere at Gibellina in Sicily. As if in tribute to the ancient dramatist Xenakis says: “I wrote Kassandra because Aeschylus is buried at Gela, a few kilometres away from Gibellina”. 46 The role of Kassandra can also be sung by soprano or countertenor; and some performances, like the one in Christchurch (New Zealand) in 2017, have featured one  41 Matossian 1990, 197–209, esp. 198. 42 Xenakis 1966–1967 passim. 43 Interestingly, Xenakis 1966–1967, 4 does refer to Wagner, but negatively; he says that the “sensibilité” of the musical sonorities of antiquity are not well suited to those of Wagner or, for that matter, Schönberg. 44 Hartigan 1995, 69; Foley 2004, 309. 45 Varga 1996, 69; cf. Evaggelia Vagopoulou, 2006, 250–257. 46 Varga 1996, 192. Gela as the traditional site of Aeschylus’ burial place: TrGF 3, T 1.10; Vita 10– 11.

  Patrick O’Sullivan singer capable of both a counter tenor (Cassandra) and baritone (chorus) range. 47 With this in mind Xenakis drew parallels with Japanese Noh theatre in which males sing female roles as well as noting that all actors in fifth-century Athens were male. 48 La Déesse Athéna, which largely focused on the Athena scene from Eumenides, completed the reconstructed and heavily fragmented trilogy in 1992 when it premiered in Athens. On returning to the Oresteia, Xenakis decided on using Aeschylus’ text, stating that “the poetics of speech is the most important tradition we have inherited. None of the translations render or will ever render its strength”. 49 Xenakis’ own brand of historicism is evident in the use of Aeschylus’ text, and in his view that Aeschylus, while addressing the concerns of fifth-century Athens, was a “somewhat archaic poet” in contrast to the skeptical, questioning Euripides. 50 Here Xenakis seems to be channeling Aristophanes in the Frogs or Clouds. 51 But anyone expecting a line-by-line replication of the Aeschylean original would be in for a big surprise. In Xenakis’ version neither Clytaemestra nor Aigisthos appear and the Agamemnon ends at 1566 with the chorus lamenting their dead king. In the Choephoroi we do not witness the confrontation between Orestes and his mother, and the roles of Electra and her brother are sung by choruses. Xenakis’ Eumenides likewise makes big cuts, but does depict the Erinyes at Delphi (Eum. 140–175, 244–245, 254–256, 259–260, 321–327) — a scene which supposedly induced extreme ἔκπληξις in women and children in the audience due to the Furies’ costumes (Vita 9); and it finishes with Athena’s persuading the Furies to become the Eumenides or “Kindly Ones” of Athens. We do not witness, then, Athena’s (in)famous speech which leads to Orestes’ acquittal on the basis that the rights of the male should always supersede those of the female (Eum. 734–741), a moment which in the opinion of many exposes the misogyny of the Oresteia. Instead, Xenakis’ La Déesse Athéna, cuts out over 550 lines and transitions from the chorus at Delphi calling down vengeance on Orestes (Eum. 321–327) to Athena’s speech of reconciliation at the Areopagus after Orestes’ acquittal (Eum. 893–947, 968–  47 This production of Xenakis’ Oresteia, had its NZ premier as part of the Christchurch Arts Festival in September 2017 as the Oresteia Experience, performed by UC Consortia, with soloist singing counter tenor and baritone, and a children’s choir; this was only the second time it had been performed in Australasia. 48 Xenakis 1966/7. 49 Xenakis, quoted in Vagopoulou 2006, 3. 50 Quote from interview in Charisma X documentary (2010: dir. Efi Xirou). 51 Above, n. 2. One could also compare the Vita Aeschyli (16) which points out that the tragedian only seems old fashioned compared to later poets but was ground-breaking and inventive in his own day.

Morsels from the Banquet of Aeschylus  

987). But, while we see no trial of Orestes and no Apollo, we do, however, see how the focus shifts from Orestes to the future glories of the native city of Aeschylus and the original audience. Xenakis not only cuts scenes but even disrupts the narrative flow of the text as in the following sequence (Cho. 489–490, 466–470): Οrestes ὦ γαῖ’, ἄνες μοι πατέρ’ ἐποπτεῦσαι μάχην. Electra ὦ Περσέφασσα, δὸς δέ γ’ εὔμορφον κράτος. Chorus ὦ πόνος ἐγγενής, [στρ. λ] καὶ παράμουσος ἄτας αἱματόεσσα πλαγά, ἰὼ δύστον’ ἄφερτα κήδη, ἰὼ δυσκατάπαυστον ἄλγος.

490 466

470

(Aesch. Cho. 489–490, 466–470) Orestes: O Earth, let my father emerge to watch me fight. Electra: O Persephone, grant still the wonder of success. Chorus: O pain grown into the race and grinding cry of disaster, blood-dripping stroke and moaning and impossible weight to bear. Sickness that fights all remedy.

As has been noted, Xenakis here is chiefly interested in the synchronous sound of “Oh!” as a common element in these lines (e.g. Vagopoulou 2006, 4). He gives us, then, a heavily emotional moment, the focus being on the suffering of the figures onstage, and is less interested in simply the logical flow of plot. By contrast, narrative clarity was something characteristic of the Aristophanic Euripides with his self-proclaimed penchant for logic and comprehensibility (Ran. 945–947, 959–962, etc.). If Xenakis seems generally to have been “interested in offering an incomprehensible text to his audience”, then this conceivably aligns him with the Aristophanic Aeschylus whose work Euripides dismisses as incomprehensible (Ran. 924–926, 928–9230, etc.). But such a quality in Aeschylean poetry, as we saw earlier, could also be linked to the important and powerful poetic effect

  Patrick O’Sullivan of ἔκπληξις. At the same time, the longest extended scene in Xenakis’ Oresteia is the magnificent Cassandra scene, played out almost in its entirety (1090–1331), and climaxing in the murder of Agamemnon and his anguished cries (1343, 1345). This famous scene, as noted earlier, was singled out in the hypothesis to the Agamemnon for its great capacity to induce ἔκπληξις and θαῦμα (“wonder”). In the wake of Agamemnon’s murder Xenakis writes “heavy conducting” into the score, which again puts one in mind of the stylistic qualities the ancients saw in Aeschylean poetry as something big, weighty and related to ἔκπληξις. Xenakis’ modern take on his ancient model, for all its fragmentation, both in the stages of its composition and its handling of Aeschylus’ Greek, remains a powerful challenging experience for modern listeners and performers. This reimagined Oresteia remains an intriguing mix of the composer’s own modernism and historicism and can be seen as something of a paradox. While the composer makes no mention of ἔκπληξις in any writings that I am aware of, his re-working of his Aeschylean model is remarkably insightful. Fuelled by a romantic imagination and informed by a familiarity with some of the major texts of Archaic and Classical Greece, Xenakis has produced a work that, despite everything that separates it from the ancient world, nonetheless draws on some of the key aspects of how the great tragedian’s art was perceived in antiquity.

Conclusion That Aeschylus is the poet of “bigness” and “grandeur” since Old Comedy has been widely recognized. What I have tried to show here is that this stylistic notion often carries overtones of bellicosity and heroic valour (or comical bombast) as well as intense emotional experiences like ἔκπληξις that have a number of important ramifications. Understanding the varied nuances of the poetics of “bigness” can inform the way we read certain passages from the Frogs and Septem as well as giving fuller insight into the significance of Gorgianic psychological speculations and the legacy of Aeschylus beyond antiquity. The Aristophanic Euripides’ disparagement of Aeschylus’ “big”, “bulky” poetics in the Frogs, for instance, by referring to helmet “plumes” and “bronze-wrought griffins”, can be understood to allude to figures in the Septem, such as Tydeus and his attire where similar stylized language of weaponry occurs. In addition, Euripides’ joke about the ἔκπληξις supposedly induced by warrior armour in Aeschylean plays can also be understood as comically reworking an idea from Gorgias. The sophist, an admirer of Aeschylus’ Septem, combines the idea of martial valour and “bigness” in speaking of the play as “full of Ares” (B 24 D–K); he also speaks of the ἔκπληξις

Morsels from the Banquet of Aeschylus  

experienced by combatants even before battle commences because of the sight of their enemies’ armour (Hel. 16) and may thus be the source for Aristophanes for this idea. The Aristophanic Euripides not only derides his older opponent, but implicitly takes a dig at one of his sophisticated admirers as well. A recognition of the poetics of metaphorical “bigness” also helps us understand certain phrases in the Septem where Aeschylus refers to the image on the shield of Argive aggressor Eteoklos as being designed οὐ σμικρὸν τρόπον (465) or to warriors as fighting τὸν μέγαν τρόπον (283). In both instances “stylistic bigness” of some kind is at issue; this has puzzled some commentators, but the nuances of each expression become clearer in the light of what “bigness” as a stylistic metaphor can connote: aggression, valour, grandeur, and the like. In the case of Eteoklos’ shield-image we can see how Aeschylus gives the idea of “bigness” of style aesthetic connotations, since he applies it to a visual artefact. Indeed, the origins of the stylistic category of “bigness” in an aesthetic sense — so often applied to Aeschylean poetry from Pherecrates onward — is arguably traceable to Aeschylus himself and seems, moreover, first to operate in the visual sphere in the dramatist’s description of one of shield-images in the Septem. A key feature in the ancient reception of Aeschylus is his perceived capacity to induce ἔκπληξις through his art, an idea first attested in Aristophanes’ Frogs — albeit coming from the derisive Euripides who imbues it with heavy-handed militaristic overtones. But it becomes recurrent a theme, more favourably treated, in ancient biographical and other accounts of the poet and his work. Beyond antiquity, this idea of Aeschylus as the poet of ἔκπληξις seems to make its presence felt in Xenakis’ Oresteia. While this modernised version cuts an oblique swathe through its Aeschylean model, it contains passages of visceral power and at times a harshness and an emotional intensity that the ancients often associated with Aeschylus himself. This is evident not least in Xenakis’ emphasising moments which the ancients associated with Aeschylean ἔκπληξις, such as the Cassandra scene from the Agamemnon or the opening of the Eumenides. Any reception of a figure like Aeschylus will always tell a partial story of its subject, as people from each era, to varying degrees, read into the poet and his work what they wish to see. Yet for all the arbitrariness that reception (ancient and modern) of any major figure can entail — amidst all the select quotes, paraphrases, parodies, homages and soundbites — such reception can sometimes yield fascinating insights which say as much about the observer as the observed. The kinds of characteristics read into the dramaturgy of Aeschylus may peddle myths, but they are often enduring and powerful ones worthy of their subject and the fruit of insightful and active imaginations. And these myths have played a significant role in informing the way artists and intellectuals from Gorgias and

  Patrick O’Sullivan Aristophanes to Xenakis and others, have gone about their own creative works inspired by the “father of tragedy”. 52

Bibliography Batlensberger, A. (1996), Iannis Xenakis und die Stochastische Musik, Berne. Bowra, C.M. (1940), “Sophocles on his own development”, AJPh 61, 385–401. Brown, P. (2004), “Greek Tragedy in the Opera House and Concert Hall of the Late Twentieth Century”, in: E. Hall/F. Macintosh/A. Wrigley (eds), Dionysus Since 69: Greek Tragedy at the Dawn of the Third Millennium, Oxford, 285–309. Constantinidis, S.E. (ed.) (2017), The Reception of Aeschylus’ Plays through Shifting Models and Frontiers, Leiden/Brill. Donadi, F. (1977–1978), “Gorgia, Elena 16”, Bollottino dell’ Istituto di Filologia Greca 4, 48–77. Dover, K. (1993), Aristophanes: Frogs. Edited with an Introduction and Commentary, Oxford. Easterling, P.E. (2004), “Agamemnon for the Ancients”, in: F. Macintosh et al. (eds), Agamemnon in Performance: 458 BC to AD 2004, Oxford, 23–36. Eichert, R. (1994), Iannis Xenakis und die mathematische Grundlagenforschung, Saarbrüken. Ewans, M. (1982), Wagner and Aeschylus: The Ring and the Oresteia, London. Ewans, M. (2017), “Aeschylus and Opera”, in: R.F. Kennedy (ed.), Brill’s Companion to the Reception of Aeschylus, Leiden, 205–224. Ferrario, S.B. (2017), “Aeschylus and Western Opera” in: S.E. Constantinidis (ed.), The Reception of Aeschylus’ Plays through Shifting Models and Frontiers, Leiden, 176–212. Foley, H. (2004), “The Millennium Project: Agamemnon in the United States”, in: F. Macintosh et al. (eds), Agamemnon in Performance: 458 BC to AD 2004, Oxford, 307–342. Ford, A. (2002), The Origins of Criticism. Literary Culture and Poetic Theory in Ancient Greece, Princeton. Foster, D.H. (2010), Wagner’s Ring Cycle and the Greeks, Cambridge. Fraenkel, E. (1964), “Die sieben Redepaare im Theban drama des Aischylos”, in: E. Frankel, Kleine Beiträge zur klassischen Philologie, Rome, 273–328. Furness, R. (1984), “Review of Ewans 1982”, The Modern Language Review 79, 239–240. Harley, J. (2004), Xenakis: His Life in Music, London/New York. Hartigan, K. (1995), Greek Tragedy on the American Stage, Westport CT. Heath, M. (1987), The Poetics of Greek Tragedy, London. Hutchinson, G.O. (1985), Aeschylus: Seven Against Thebes. Edited with an Introduction and Commentary, Oxford. Kennedy, R.F. (ed.) (2017), Brill’s Companion to the Reception of Aeschylus, Leiden. Kirchenko, A. (2016), “The Art of Transference: Metaphor and Iconicity in Pindar’s Olympian 6 and Nemean 5”, Mnemosyne 69, 1–28.

 52 My thanks to the editors, and audiences in Thessaloniki and Christchurch for feedback, as well as Mark Menzies and Jim Gardner for sharing their insights into the work of Iannis Xenakis.

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Lamari, A.A. (2015), “Aeschylus and the Beginning of Tragic Reperformances”, in: A.A. Lamari, (ed.), Reperformances of Drama in the Fifth and Fourth Centuries BC: Authors and Contexts, 189–206. Lefkowitz, M. (2012), The Lives of the Greek Poets2, Baltimore. Lloyd-Jones, H. (1982), Blood for the Ghosts: Classical Influences in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, London. Matossian, N. (1990), Xenakis, London/New York. Millington, B. (1984), Wagner, London/Melbourne. Nattiez, J.-J. (1993), Wagner Androgyne. A Study in Interpretation (tr. S. Spencer), Princeton. Olson, S.D. (1999), “Kleon’s Eyebrows (Cratin. fr. 228 K–A) and Late 5th-Century Comic PortraitMasks”, CQ 49, 320–321. O’Sullivan, N. (1992), Alcidamas, Aristophanes and the Beginnings of Greek Stylistic Theory, Stuttgart. O’Sullivan, P. (2003), “Victory Statue, Victory Song: Pindar’s Agonistic Poetics and its Legacy”, in: D. Phillips/D. Pritchard (eds), Sport and Festival in the Ancient Greek World, Swansea, 75–100. O’Sullivan, P. (2005), “Pindar and the Statues of Rhodes”, CQ 55.1, 96–104. O’Sullivan, P. (2011), “Dio Chrysostom and the Poetics of Phidias’ Zeus”, in: T. Stevenson et al. (eds), The Statue of Zeus at Olympia: New Approaches, Newcastle, UK, 137–154. Patzer, H. (1958), “Die dramatische Handlung der Sieben gegen Theben”, HSCPh 63, 97–119. Pelling, C. (2007), “Ion’s Epidemiai and Plutarch’s Ion”, in: V. Jennings/A. Katsaros (eds), The World of Ion of Chios, Leiden, 76–109. Pohlenz, M. (1920), “Die Anfängen der griechischen Poetik”, NGG, 142–178. Porter, J.I. (2010), The Origins of Aesthetic thought in Ancient Greece, Cambridge. Revault d’Allones, O. (1975), Xenakis: Polytopes, Paris. Rosenmeyer, T.G. (1955), “Gorgias, Aeschylus and Apate”, AJPh 76, 225–260. Schadewaldt, W. (1970), “Richard Wagner und die Griechen”, in: W. Schadewaldt, Hellas und Hesperien: gesammelte Schriften zur Antike und zur neueren Literatur, vol. II, Zurich, 341– 405. Seaford, R. (2017), “Form and Money in Wagner’s Ring and Aeschylean Tragedy”, in: R.F. Kennedy (ed.), Brill’s Companion to the Reception of Aeschylus, Leiden, 348–361. Segal, C. (1962), “Gorgias and the Psychology of the Logos”, HSCPh 66, 99–155. Segal, C. (1970), “Protagoras’ Orthoepeia in Aristophanes’ ‘Battle of the Prologues’ (Frogs 1119–97)”, RhM 113, 158–162. Smith, D.G. (2017), “The Reception of Aeschylus in Sicily”, in: R.F. Kennedy (ed.), Brill’s Companion to the Reception of Aeschylus, Leiden, 9–53. Solmsen, F. (1937), “The Erinys in Aischylos’ Septem”, TAPhA 68, 197–211. Solomos, M. (1996), Iannis Xenakis, Mercuès. Taillardat, J. (19652), Les Images d’Aristophane, Paris. Taplin, O. (1977), The Stagecraft of Aeschylus, Oxford. Thalmann, W. (1978), Dramatic Art in Aeschylus’ Seven Against Thebes, Yale. Tucker, T.G. (1908), The Seven Against Thebes of Aeschylus, Cambridge. Vagopoulou, E. (2006), “The Universality of Xenakis’ Oresteia”, in: M. Solomos/A. Georgaki (eds), Definitive Proceedings of the “International Symposium Iannis Xenakis”, Athens, 250–257. Varga, B.A. (1996), Conversations with Iannis Xenakis, London. Verrall, A.W. (1887), The Seven Against Thebes of Aeschylus, London.

  Patrick O’Sullivan Vidal-Naquet, P. (1986), “Les boucliers des héros”, in: P. Vidal-Naquet, Mythe et tragédie en Gréce ancienne, vol. II, Paris, 115–147. Wagner, R. (1911), My Life (Constable edn.), London. Wagner, R. (1914), Richard Wagners Gesammelte Schriften, 14 vols, (ed. J. Kapp), Leipzig. Walsh, G.B. (1984), The Varieties of Enchantment, Chapel Hill/London. Wetmore, K.J. (2017), “Pop Music Adaptations of Aeschylus’ Plays: What Kind of Rock was Prometheus Fastened to? ”, in: S.E. Constantinidis (ed.), The Reception of Aeschylus’ Plays through Shifting Models and Frontiers, Leiden/Brill, 236–249. Xenakis, I. (1966–1967), “Notice sur Orestie”, SIGMA 3. Xenakis, I. (1992), Formalized Music. Thought and Mathematics in Music, Stuyvesant, New York. Xenakis, I. (1996), Musique et Originalité, Paris. Zeitlin, F. (2009), Under the Sign of the Shield: Semiotics and Aeschylus’ Seven Against Thebes2, Rome.



Part V: The Reception of Comic Fragments

Eric Csapo

How Cratinus fr. 372 Made Theatre History The early history of the Athenian theatre is still generally assembled from scraps of confused information found in Byzantine lexica about poplars and stands of wooden seating called ἴκρια. Wilamowitz long ago and, more recently and most brilliantly, Scott Scullion demonstrated that the information in the lexica was manufactured through a process of misreading. 1 I have some additions and modifications to make to their arguments, but my main reason for revisiting the poplars and ἴκρια is that Wilamowitz and Scullion have generally been ignored. And yet their observations prove false the chief evidence at the foundation of virtually all published histories of the ancient theatre. Fragments require us to imagine the lost contexts that gave them meaning. The late lexicographers sometimes had no place to search for contexts but other fragments, and when this happened, one misreading led to another, proliferating a contagion of errors.

 Eratosthenes’ History of the Theatre of Dionysus Cratinus fr. 372 has only two or three words. The shortest and perhaps most likely form is αἰγείρου θέα. Olson and Seaberg translate this as “a poplar view”. 2 This is certainly right. Θέα can mean a spectacle, but in the language of the theatre it more often means a place from which one views a spectacle, usually the “seat” in the theatron sold by the theatropoles and later provided by the architekton. 3 Here, as we will see, the reference is to “a viewing place” outside the formal seating area of the theatre connected to “a poplar”. The fragment is glossed by Hesychius (α 1695, θ 166), Photius (θ 47), the Synagoge (α 497, a.k.a. Bekker Lexikon 6), Suda (α 2952), Eustathius (Od. 5.64), the Etymologicum Magnum 444, 17 and pseudo-Zonaras (65.8). These lexica report six (or seven) different variants, in most cases adding a preposition and changing the word order or the case of the nouns. A form with the preposition παρά appears in all but two of our sources (eight times in all), either as the main heading or as an alternative reading in the gloss. We also find a form ἀπ᾽ αἰγείρου θέα (reported

 1 Wilamowitz 1886, 597–603; Scullion 1994, 52–66; cf. Roselli 2010, 72–75. 2 Olson/Seaberg 2018, 194. 3 Csapo 2007, 90. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-030

  Eric Csapo three times). Hesychius’ παρ’ αἴγειρον θέα is the fullest entry (π 513 Hansen). 4 It cites Eratosthenes as its source (= Eratosth. fr. 3 Strecker), though we should expect that Eratosthenes’ words are abbreviated, subject to interpolation, and at least partly in paraphrase: παρ’ αἴγειρον θέα· Ἐρατοσθένης φησί, ὅτι πλησίον αἰγείρου τινὸς θέα — αἴγειρος δέ ἐστι φυτοῦ εἶδος — ἐγγὺς τῶν ἰκρίων. ἕως οὖν τούτου τοῦ φυτοῦ ἐξετείνετο καὶ κατεσκευάζετο τὰ ἰκρία, ἅ ἐστιν ὀρθὰ ξύλα, ἔχοντα σανίδας προσδεδεμένας, οἷον βαθμούς, ἐφ’ αἷς ἐκαθέζοντο, πρὸ τοῦ κατασκευασθῆναι τὸ θέατρον. (Hsch. π 513 Hansen) παραιγείρο θέα H παρ’ αἰγείρου θέα Mus. σκευασθῆναι Schmidt, Hansen

πρὸς τὸ κατασκευασθῆναι H πρὸ τοῦ κατα-

(Provisional translation:) “Viewing place (or “view”) alongside a poplar”: Eratosthenes says that near a poplar — a poplar is a kind of tree — there was a place to watch close to the stands of seats (ikria). The stands of seats used to extend and be built as far as this tree. Stands are upright timbers, with boards attached to them, like benches (bathmoi), and they sat upon them before the theatron was built (or with the ms. “for the purpose of a theatron being built”).

Eratosthenes describes an Athenian theatre where stands of seats (ikria) extended as far as a poplar. It is not clear from this passage whether the “viewing place alongside the poplar” is the upper part of the ikria, 5 or is meant to refer to a place beyond the ikria where the audience could watch the drama over the ikria,  4 Schmidt (following Musurus) interpreted the Hesychius manuscript’s παρ’ αἰγείρο θέα (accented thus) as implying παρ’ αἰγείρου θέα, but this is probably an error and in any case unlikely to reflect the original quotation, since the non-personal genitive with παρά is extremely rare in comedy, as in prose. Bernhardy 1822, 229: “Cum apud Aristophanem παρά cum genitivo apud nusquam [sic] significet, utrobique, adiuvante MS, legendum παρ᾽ αἴγειρον ex Photio et ex Anecd. Bekk. p. 354, 25”. Cf. Poultney 1936, 177–180. 5 I thank Ioannis Konstantakos for a colourful parallel. The seats at the very last rows of the theatre in Epidaurus have in modern times (at least since 1986) been referred to as τα πουρνάρια “the oaks”. Prof. Konstantakos first heard it in a television interview with Alexis Solomos, who predicted that his Lysistrata, starring Aliki Vouyiouklaki, would fill the ancient theatre “up to the oaks”. Prof. Konstantakos sends me two documented attestations: an interview of the Lygourio tavern-keeper, Leonidas Liakopoulos, who said that Maria Callas in Cherubini’s Medea in 1961, though the tickets cost 500 drachmas each, filled the theatre of Epidaurus στα πουρνάρια επάνω “up to the oaks” (interview accessed in June 2018 at https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/ OfBdCWLJY7ivKEEZF6CKIR?domain=argolikeseihseis.gr); and a report from Ethnos (4 Sept., 2011) where another local, the guard and caretaker of the theatre, speaking of the same performance used a variant of the same expression: “even the oaks were full of people”.

How Cratinus fr. 372 Made Theatre History  

and whether one viewed from this distant viewing place for a small cost or for free. 6 The general content of Eratosthenes’ commentary is reflected in all of our sources, but some provide more information. The Synagoge (Versio codicis B, α 1651 Cunningham) and Suda (α 2952 Adler) support the conclusion that the “poplar view” was in fact back beyond the ikria: ἀπ᾽ αἰγείρου θέα καὶ παρ᾽ αἴγειρον· ἡ ἀπὸ τῶν ἐσχάτων. αἴγειρος γὰρ ἐπάνω ἦν τοῦ θεάτρου, ἀφ᾽ ἧς οἱ μἠ ἔχοντες τόπον ἐθεώρουν. (Sud. α 2952) “Viewing place from a poplar and alongside a poplar”: the viewing place from those furthest out. This is because there was a poplar above the theatron from which those who had no seat used to watch.

And this is repeated by Eustathius (Od. 5.64 ἦν γοῦν φασιν αἴγειρος Ἀθήνῃσιν ἐπάνω τοῦ θεάτρου ἀφ’ ἧς ἐθεώρουν οἱ μὴ ἔχοντες τόπον, “they say at any rate that there was a poplar in Athens above the theatron from which those who had no seat watched”). Hesychius, on the other hand, might be taken to suggest that the back rows of the ikria are at issue. He writes (θ 166): εὐτελὴς δὲ ἐδόκει ἡ ἐντεῦθεν θεωρία· μακρόθεν γὰρ ἦν καὶ εὐώνου ὁ τόπος ἐπωλεῖτο, “it appears that watching from there was inexpensive, because it was far away and the place/seat was sold for a low price”. But one can interpret this to mean that behind the wooden stands there were places without seats that were less expensive. This seems to be how Eustathius took it, since he adds (to the above): καὶ ἦν φασιν εὐωνοτέρα ἡ παρ’ αἴγειρον θέα, “and the view alongside the poplar, they say, was cheaper”. Cratinus’ play might conceivably have been a Lenaean play, and, as there are still some scholars who believe in a separate Lenaean theatre, it is necessary to point out that the explicit topography in the glosses removes all doubt that the  6 The charges in question are not, strictly speaking, “admission charges” but payment for seating in the Theatre of Dionysus (for a full discussion of the evidence: Csapo 2007; Roselli 2010, 72–75). The reference to the arkhitekton is anachronistic in such passages as Ulpian On Dem. Olynthiac 1.1f. Dilts (ἐπειδήπερ χρήματα ἔχοντες στρατιωτικὰ οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι ἔναγχος αὐτὰ πεποιήκασι θεωρικά, ὥστε λαμβάνειν ἐν τῷ θεωρεῖν ἕκαστον τῶν ἐν τῇ πόλει δύο ὀβολούς, ἵνα τὸν μὲν ἕνα κατάσχῃ εἰς ἰδίαν τροφήν, τὸν δὲ ἄλλον παρέχειν ἔχωσι τῷ ἀρχιτέκτονι τοῦ θεάτρου — οὐδὲ γὰρ εἶχον τότε θέατρον διὰ λίθων κατεσκευασμένον) and Schol. Vesp. 1189d.1vet ἰκρίων θεωροῦντες τοὺς δύο ὀβολοὺς παρεῖχον (.) VΓAld τοῖς ἀρχιτέκτοσιν. V, Γ (?). The arkhitekton is first attested once the theatre is built in stone, but the word is used to designate his general function as the manager of the theatron, which was earlier assumed by the theatropoles or theatrones. See Csapo 2007, 108–113. See also Roselli 2010, 100–101 for the reported charge of “two obols”.

  Eric Csapo ikria they mention were in the Theatre of Dionysus on the south slope of the Acropolis. The poplar is said to be above the theatron. One would have to be pretty high up to see over the back of the stands. Our sources therefore assume steeply sloping ground to permit one placed behind the stands of seats to see over the seating into the theatre orchestra. As Scullion points out, there is no possibility that this would work on flat ground such as in the Agora or any of the other sites in Athens that have been imagined as locations for these ikria. 7 Eratosthenes was probably the lexicographical tradition’s sole source for both the fragment of Cratinus and the commentary upon it. Eratosthenes knew Cratinus well. He may be Eratosthenes’ second most cited comic author after Aristophanes. 8 In particular, Eratosthenes’ twelve-volume work, On Old Comedy, must have included information about the ikria and the poplar in the discussion of the fifth-century theatre for which Cratinus fr. 372 served as evidence. The same book gives us several other fragments preserving information about Athenian theatre practice 9 — enough that Polemon could write multiple volumes On Eratosthenes’ Stay in Athens, a work designed to expose the errors in On Old Comedy in an attempt to undermine Eratosthenes’ authority as an expert on the Athenian antiquities referred to in Old Comedy. Cratinus also gives us our earliest surviving mention of ikria in a theatrical context. The passage is again metatheatrical and probably from a parabasis (fr. 360): 10

 7 Scullion 1994, 60. Cf. Scullion 1994, 56–57: it is not just the geography, but the consistent use of the definite article in the lexica that makes it very clear that only the Theatre of Dionysus beside the Sanctuary of Dionysus were ever in question. For example: Hsch. α 1695 “by the sanctuary” (πλησίον τοῦ ἱεροῦ, ἔνθα πρὶν γενέσθαι θέατρον τὰ ἴκρια ἐπήγνυον); Schol. Ar. Thesm. 395a “since there were still ikria in the theatre” (ὡς ἔτι ἰκρίων ὄντων ἐν τῷ θεάτρῳ); or Sud. α 295 and Synagoge α 1651 “above the theatre” (ἐπάνω…τοῦ θεάτρου). 8 Geus 2002, 293. On Eratosthenes and comedy, see also Mureddu 2017 with further literature. For his antiquarian research Eratosthenes often drew upon Attic historians, like Philochorus (Mureddu 2017, 155–156). 9 Cf. Geus 2002, 293 n. 24. Note that Eratosthenes is reported to have written on nautical ikria in the Architektonikon (= fr. 22 Bagordo; cf. Sud. ι 275 cited above) which some take to be a supplement to On Old Comedy (Bernhardy 1822, 204–206; Nesselrath 1990, 88; Murredu 2017, 161–162). The original gloss also contained information on the mainly epic usage of the term ἴκριον/ ἴκρια and this is evident from the repetition of ὀρθὰ ξύλα σανίδες /σανιδώματα vel sim. in Hsch. ι 502, π 513; Collection of Useful Words versio antiqua ι 55; Phot. ι 106; Sud. ι 275; Etym. Magn. 470.83; Eustath. Od. 1.207.5; schol. Hom. Od. 5.163. 10 The fragment’s Archilochean metre indicates a choral part and the contents strongly suggest a parabasis (Bakola 2010, 40).

How Cratinus fr. 372 Made Theatre History  

χαῖρ’ ὦ μέγ’ ἀχρειόγελως ὅμιλε, ταῖς ἐπίβδαις τῆς ἡμετέρας σοφίας κριτὴς ἄριστε πάντων· εὐδαίμον’ ἔτικτέ σε μήτηρ ἰκρίων ψόφησις. (Cratin. fr. 360) Hail, O most gainlessly-laughing crowd, best judge of all of my cleverness on the days after the festival. Blessed bore you your mother, the noise of the ikria!

Here the word ikria may look as if it refers to the audience rather than the wooden stands of seats. It is the audience that laugh and judge. But it is the wooden auditorium that is the primary reference of the last line of verse: the audience cannot be said to be its own mother and it is the wooden stands that make the noise. At issue here is tthe practice of banging one’s heels against the wooden planks of the ikria to show disapproval, so ikria here unequivocally refers to the “wooden benches” (that ikria is used of the auditorium, not the audience, will be of some significance to the discussion below). 11 The next earliest reference to ikria is Aristophanes’ Thesmophoriazusae 395 (ὥστ᾽ εὐθὺς εἰσίοντες ἀπὸ τῶν ἰκρίων / ὑποβλέπουσ᾽ ἡμᾶς σκοποῦνταί τ᾽εὐθέως / μὴ μοιχὸς ἔνδον ᾖ τις ἀποκεκρυμμένος). 12 The scholion to the passage has a familiar ring: ὡς ἔτι ἰκρίων ὄντων ἐν τῷ θεάτρῳ καὶ ἐν ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις, ἐπὶ ξύλων καθημένων. πρὶν γὰρ γενέσθαι τὸ θέατρον, ξύλα ἐδέσμευον καὶ οὕτως ἐθεώρουν. (Schol. Ar. Thesm. 395) Because there were still ikria in the theatre and in the Assemblies they sat on planks. Before the theatre existed, they fastened planks together and spectated in this way.

Contents and language show that the scholion also draws at least partly on Eratosthenes and we might guess that this passage from Thesmophoriazusae was also cited in On Old Comedy. 13 A close paraphrase of this scholion appears in various lexica, among them Suda and Photius. The language of Suda (s.v. ἴκρια ι 275

 11 Poll. Onom. 4.122; Olson/Seaberg 2017, 167. 12 Thesmophoriazusae was probably performed at the Dionysia: see Austin/Olson 2004, xli– xliv. 13 That the glossomatic tradtions on the ἴκρια and the poplar both derive from Eratosthenes has been recognised since Strecker 1884, 22–23.

  Eric Csapo Adler) reveals several echoes of Eratosthenes fragment 3 as reported by Hesychius (I underline direct verbal echoes in words or roots, but it is the choice of content above all that suggests direct derivation): ἴκρια· ὀρθὰ ξύλα, ἢ σανιδώματα τῆς νηός. καὶ τὰ τῶν θεάτρων, ἃ ἦσαν καὶ ἐν ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις· ἐπὶ ξύλων γὰρ ἐκάθηντο πρὶν γένηται τὸ θέατρον. ξύλα ἐδέσμευον καὶ οὕτως ἐθεώρουν. (Sud. ι 275) “Ikria”: upright (or straight?) boards, or the planking of a ship. Also the ikria of the theatres that were also used in Assemblies, because they sat on boards before the theatre was built. They fastened planks together and spectated in this way.

Let me sum up the argument so far. Eratosthenes in his book On Old Comedy probably discussed the theatron in Cratinus’ day. He cited a fragment of Cratinus (fr. 372). Given his interest in ikria he may also have been the first to cite Cratinus fr. 360, though that fragment comes to us as a quotation from the second-century AD metrician Hephaestion and is there quoted for its Eupolidean metre. Possibly he also cited Thesmophoriazusae 395. In any case, the information from this section of Eratosthenes’ book entered the lexicographical tradition in two streams: one on the poplar, the other on the ikria. It is however unlikely that any of our immediate lexicographical sources had direct access to Eratosthenes’ book. They received Eratosthenes’ words indirectly, filtered through a common early source: Erbse guessed that the glosses on the poplar went back to the Atticists Aelius Dionysius and Pausanias in the second century AD, 14 and these compilers in turn probably drew upon the lexicon of Diogenianus, and, perhaps ultimately, the first-century AD Alexandrian Pamphilus. Our lexica are late in the chain.

 What Eratosthenes Said and What he Meant One important difference between Eratosthenes and his copyists is the language he uses to express when the ikria were used. Eratosthenes uses the infinitive κατασκευασθῆναι. The last phrase “πρὸ τοῦ κατασκευασθῆναι τὸ θέατρον” is usually understood as “before the theatre was built”, and this is how the lexicographic tradition took it, since it replaces Eratosthenes’ expression with πρὶν γενέσθαι or πρὶν γένηται τὸ θέατρον or something close. But if it originally meant  14 Erbse 1950, 122; Ael. Dion. θ*5, 163; Paus. α 128; cf. Cunningham 2003, 55 n. 127; Wilamowitz and Scullion, below, note 50.

How Cratinus fr. 372 Made Theatre History  

this, Eratosthenes would be describing the Theatre of Dionysus (as used by Cratinus and Aristophanes) “before the theatre was built”, which is absurd. Clearly, if Eratosthenes used the expression πρὸ τοῦ κατασκευασθῆναι τὸ θέατρον, or something close to this, he cannot have meant by it “before the theatre was built”. The solution adopted by Wilamowitz and Scullion is to take θέατρον to mean “auditorium”, not “theatre”, and specifically the stone auditorium of the “Lycurgan” Theatre of Dionysus that existed in Eratosthenes’ day. Eratosthenes means to say that the audience sat on wooden benches “before the auditorium was built”. One could perhaps imagine a context where words τὸ θέατρον tout court might carry the meaning “the auditorium that now exists”. But even so, one would have expected Eratosthenes to use more specific language (“stone” or “present-day”) to get his meaning across. Wilamowitz therefore argued that for Eratosthenes’ contemporaries τὸ θέατρον could mean “present-day stone auditorium”, because, he claimed, the word θέατρον was in fact never used of any theatre before stone theatres were built, and therefore no ambiguity existed: theatron could only mean “stone auditorium” or “stone theatre”. For almost all of the fifth century, he claimed, θέατρον meant “audience”. 15 Only at the very end of the fifth and in the fourth century, when we have stone theatres, did theatron refer to a building and take on the meanings “auditorium” and “theatre”. 16 According to Wilamowitz, in sum, τὸ θέατρον was, when used of buildings, only ever used of a stone theatre or a stone auditorium, and Eratosthenes therefore had no need to specify “stone” or “present-day” theatre when he described the theatre of Old Comedy πρὸ τοῦ κατασκευασθῆναι τὸ θέατρον, “before the theatron [tout court] was built”. In making this argument Wilamowitz sought corroboration for his view in the fact that the earliest unambiguous use of θέατρον for a building are Thucydides’ (8.93.1) and Lysias’ (13.32, 55) references to the theatre in Piraeus. He believed that the Piraeus theatre was a stone theatre that was built shortly before 403 BC. 17 This is wrong, however, as we know that Piraeus still had a wooden theatre in

 15 Wilamowitz 1886, 602: “Dabei mochte man immerhin den Platz, auf dem die ἴκρια alljährlich aufgeschlagen wurden, auch sonst schon θέατρον nennen, aber erst im vierten Jahrhundert; im funften bedeutet θέατρον nur das zuschauende Publicum”. 16 The word θέατρον always normally means “theatre” or “auditorium” or figuratively the people in the auditorium, viz. the audience (see below). The latter meaning is more common in the earlier sources, but this has something to do with the nature of the sources. The most useful general study of the word is by Frederiksen 2002, 69–76, 95–110 (Appendices I–III). 17 Willamowitz 1886, 602–603 n. 1.

  Eric Csapo 325/4 BC and probably as late as the second century BC. 18 Moreover, the very formation of the word θέατρον (discussed below) indicates a primary reference to a building. Only secondarily and by metonymy does theatron mean “audience”. But finally there are attestations of the word θέατρον/θέητρον that predate Thucydides. The word is used of a building in Hippocrates’ Epidemics, and probably means “theatre” in Herodotus. 19 Scullion rejects Wilamowitz’s solution, but offers a close variant. In the fifth century, Scullion claims, ikria was “the vox propria for the auditorium”, but later the word θέατρον meant auditorium. 20 This distinction fits with what we have already seen of the use of ikria in Cratinus fr. 360 and Aristophanes’ Thesmophoriazusai (both discussed above). Conversely as Scullion claims, theatron in Old Comedy does normally refer to the audience rather than the seating. 21 The main problem with Scullion’s hypothesis is its virtual undisprovability: it is extremely difficult to find attestations of the word θέατρον, not only in the fifth century, but at any time in antiquity, that unambiguously refer to the auditorium rather than the entire theatre. This kind of precision is only attainable in texts when different parts of the theatre are carefully delineated in opposition to one another, and this only happens in such texts as building contracts or the accounts related to the construction of theatres in sanctuaries, and these documents only survive from the fourth century BC onwards. But even in these texts it is almost never possible to find the word θέατρον meaning “auditorium” or “cavea” to the complete exclusion of “theatre”: for example, in the third-century accounts of the Pyleo-Delphic Amphictyony where different parts of the theatre are at issue and the terminology is in general precise, the diehard sceptic might still insist that “the cost of placing wooden benches in the Pythian theatron” (CID II 139 l. 27; CID IV 57) does not exclude the translation “theatre” in favour of “auditorium”. 22  18 SEG 33.143; Csapo 2007; Csapo/Wilson 2020, III Vvi. 19 Hipp. Ep. 1.20 Littré; Hdt. 6.67. R. Lane Fox will argue that Epidemics I was composed as early as the 460s BC. The traditional date, based on the secure identification of Antiphon son of Kritoboulos with the magistrate in IG XII 8, 277, l. 81 is ca. 420–410 BC. Montanari 2015, s.v. θέατρον cites Hdt. 6.67.3 for the meaning “a place for spectacles, theatre”. On the interpretation of Herodotus’ θέητρον see Kolb 1981, 3; Robertson 1992, 55; Csapo/Wilson 2020, IV Bix 1. For Hippocrates, see Csapo/Wilson 2020, IV Dxvi 2. 20 Scullion 1994, 56. 21 θέατρον can in fact usually be translated “audience” in Old Comedy, but only by metonymy from the root meaning: Ar. Ach. 629, Eq. 233, 508, Pax 735; Amph. fr. 14.3; Eup. fr. 192.156–157; Metagen. fr. 15.2; Plato Com. fr. 167.2. 22 Virtually unambiguous uses of θέατρον meaning “auditorium” appear in building inscriptions from Scepsis ca. 300 (Wilhelm 1900, 54–58) and Imperial Nisa (TAM II 736) where a theatron and a proskenion are built. The more restricted meaning of θέατρον is likely in Agora 19 L6,

How Cratinus fr. 372 Made Theatre History  

That the word θέατρον could mean “auditorium” in the fifth century can nevertheless be argued, if only indirectly. There are several good reasons for accepting this conclusion. 23 First and foremost is the formation and etymology of the word: the word must originally have meant “auditorium” and only came by extension to mean “theatre”. It is formed from the root of the verb θεάομαι “to view” and the instrumental suffix –τρον (sometimes also feminine –τρα) which designates “meistens ein Werkzeug oder ein Mittel zur Erreichung gewisser Zwecke”, including the place where one performs an action, in this case “the place where one views”, “lieu où se trouvent les spectateurs” (cf. λουτρόν “the place where one washes”, and indeed ὀρχήστρα “the place were one dances”). 24 Secondly, as Frederiksen puts it: “that θέατρον referred, first of all, to the auditorium of a more or less monumentalised theatre is indicated by the fact that the word was used for the auditorium of other monumental buildings as well” (2002, 74). Though one might take issue with the need for the word “monumentalised” here, the fifth-century Athenian Theatre of Dionysus is certainly covered by this consideration. 25 Xenophon (Hell. 7.4.31) uses theatron of a viewing area attached to the Temple of Hestia at Olympia. An Athenian inscription (IG II3 4, 352 ll. 17, 330/29 BC) mentions a Panathenaic theatron. Another from Oropos (IOrop. 292 ll. 28–33, 335–322 BC) mentions the use stones from the theatron opposite the altar in the Amphiareion. 26 We have no fifth-century examples, but it is implicit in Scullion’s argument that the defining moment which changed the vocabulary was the building of the “Lycurgan” stone theatre in Athens. The above-cited uses of theatron meaning “auditorium” predate the building of the “Lycurgan” auditorium or follow very soon after. Thirdly, compound words formed from θέατρον also reference the auditorium, not the theatre in general. Although the earliest appearance of these com-

 col. 3 fr. c. ll. 147–148, where the word skene also appears (see discussion in Csapo/Wilson 2014, 400–403). Some of the clearest examples are Latin, esp. CIL VI 32323 ll. 100–1: “ludique noctu sacrificio nfecto sunt commissi in scaena quoi theatrum adiectum non fuit nullis positis sedilibus”. Other Latin examples in Dörpfeld/Reisch 1896, 282. 23 Many of these arguments appear already in Dörpfeld/Reisch 1896, 281–283. 24 Kühner/Blass 1892, 271–272, sec. 27; Chantraine 1977, 425; Petersen 1986, 212. 25 Frederiksen 2002, 74–75. 26 One might have argued that the word σᾶτρον (= θέατρον) in a Laconian inscription of ca. 400 (Kourinou-Pikoula 1992–1998) was an unambiguous reference to a “viewing place” in the Temple of Athena Alea, but Lanérès 2012 has argued that this means “audience”. The theatron at Eleusis, mentioned in IE 141, l.7 (354/3 BC), is sometimes thought to be a theatron of the stadium, but that is uncertain: see Csapo/Wilson 2020, 90.

  Eric Csapo pounds is late, they also build directly on the semantic and historical core meaning of “viewing place”. In a Delian inscription of the middle of the third century BC, ἐπιθέατρον is used of the upper seating area: here it clearly means “addition to the auditorium” not “addition to the theatre”. 27 The word ἀμφιθέατρον (which does not appear until the Augustan period) also implies “auditoriums on both sides”, not “theatres on both sides”. 28 Fourthly, there is no strong connection between the word θέατρον and stone auditoria (as one would expect if the meaning “auditorium” arose after the “Lycurgan” auditorium was built in stone and one needed a new word to designate it, since ikria could no longer be used of a non-wooden seating area). In later Greek one could build a theatron with wooden seating: ἰκριῶσαι a θέατρον (as in Dio Chrys. 43.22). For this reason the man who contracted to build the ikria in the Athenian theatre was known as the θεατροπώλης, a “seller of viewing-places”, an “auditorium-seller”, but obviously not a “theatre-seller”. 29 This term is attested in Aristophanes’ Phoenissae, a late fifth- or early fourth-century play (fr. 575). In this usage ikria and theatron are semantic equivalents. If we are not content to understand Eratosthenes’ words “πρὸ τοῦ κατασκευασθῆναι τὸ θέατρον” by themselves to mean “before the building of the auditorium in stone”, we need to find another solution. One distinct possibility is, of course, that Eratosthenes’ words were abbreviated by Hesychius and his source. The verb κατασκευάζω means not just “build”, but can mean “equip”, “equip fully”, “furnish fully” (LSJ I 1–2). When it means “furnish with” the verb usually takes a dative of instrument or some other prepositional phrase. It is rather striking that several of our late sources that refer to the pre-“Lycurgan” Athenian theatron use this verb with the prepositional phrase διὰ λίθων, “in stone”, or something very close. It is not unlikely that they all draw ultimately upon Eratosthenes’ discussion. Ulpian (On Dem. Olynthiac 1.1f Dilts) uses the phrase “οὐδὲ γὰρ εἶχον τότε θέατρον διὰ λίθων κατεσκευασμένον”, “because they did not at that time have an auditorium furnished with stone”, to explain why Athenian citizens used part of the theoric distribution to pay the architekton (i.e. the official who built the  27 ID 287, A. l. 94, 120; Hellmann 1992, 153: “bien que ce terme ne puisse représenter que la partie qui est au-dessus ou au sommet de la cavea, le dictionnaire LSJ a préféré comprendre “building adjoining a theatre”, mais le déroulement chronologique des travaux montre bien que les gradins sont alors en cours d’installation, le promenoir ayant été tracé, et l’epitheatron est la dernière étape de la construction, avec ses pierres de couronnement”. 28 Petersen 1986, 211–213. Cf. Dörpfeld/Reisch 1896, 282: “Auch die Wortbildung amphitheatrum setzt noch die engere Bedceutung von θέατρον als herrschend voraus”. 29 Csapo 2007.

How Cratinus fr. 372 Made Theatre History  

ikria). 30 The scholiast to Lucian (Timon 49 Jacobitz IV, 50 [not in Rabe]) evidently also draws on the same source to make the same point about theoric distribution): the money was needed to pay for a seat in the theatre when “μήπω δὲ τοῦ θεάτρου διὰ λιθίνων κατεσκευασμένου”, “when the auditorium was not yet fully furnished with stone ”. The late sources on the theorikon (including Ulpian and the Scholiast to Lucian) adduce the fierce competition for a limited number of seats in the old wooden theatre as one of the reasons for charging admission. 31 The scholiast to Aelius Aristides (Pan. 102.17 Dind.) also draws upon the same source but badly garbles the information while nonetheless preserving the phrase in question: “ἐν ταῖς Ἀθηναίων ἑορταῖς ὅστις προὔλαβεν ἕτερον ἐκάθητο ἐν τῷ θεάτρῳ ἀπὸ λίθων κατεσκευασμένῳ”, “at the Athenian festivals the person who got a seat before another sat in the auditorium furnished from stones”. In each case there is already a theatron in existence before the theatron is fully furnished in stone. We could argue that these sources ultimately depend either upon the discussion of ikria by Eratosthenes (or possibly his source — Philochorus?) 32 and that Eratosthenes originally had “πρὸ τοῦ διὰ λίθων κατασκευασθῆναι τὸ θέατρον”, but the words διὰ λίθων (vel sim.) were omitted in the surviving paraphrase by Hesychius or the epitomator of Hesychius. But we do not actually require such a hypothesis. There is another option. The verb κατασκευάζεσθαι can be used absolutely, i.e. without a prepositional phrase or dative complement (and it may be for that reason that διὰ λίθων was dispensed with as unnecessary). Uzunoğlu’s recent study of the use of κατασκευάζειν and cognates in ancient building inscriptions finds that ‘the verb has a far-ranging sense, extending from construction to renovation, repair, embellishment or even the inclusion of further functions or features (rooms etc. to the building in question)’ (2018, 398). Among the nine inscriptions studied by Uzunoğlu are two inscriptions relating to the renovation of the theatre in Delphi in 160 where the term ἐπισκευά, which normally signifies renovation, is used interchangeably with κατασκευά (FD III 3, 237, l. 9 and 239, l. 12). A more precise parallel, not mentioned by Uzunoğlu, and much closer in time to Eratosthenes, is an inscription from Scepsis (ca. 300) relating to repairs to the theatre. Here κατασκευάσαι ... τὸ θέατρον clearly means “refurbish the seating area” at lines 12–13, as instructions are given for clearing away the remnants of

 30 See note 6, above. 31 Csapo 2007, 101. 32 On Philochorus or Theopompus as a possible source, see Csapo 2007, 103 n. 26.

  Eric Csapo the old theatron, and the verb probably again means “refurbish” a few lines further down where instructions are given to κατασκευάσαι δὲ καὶ τ[ὸ πρ]οσκήνιον (18–19). 33 It is moreover fairly clear that refurbishment in stone is contemplated as the inscription goes on to make provisions for the employment to the purpose of any already existing stone on the site. In Classical Attic too the verb κατασκευάζειν is used absolutely for fitting out already constructed ships whether for war or commerce, 34 or for equipping or furnishing buildings. 35 We could therefore understand Eratosthenes’ text to mean that the ikria were used “before the auditorium was fully furnished/renovated” (“πρὸ τοῦ κατασκευασθῆναι τὸ θέατρον”). Thanks to the recent excavations in the Theatre of Dionysus we are in a better position than ever to understand Eratosthenes’ phraseology and to confirm the historical accuracy of his claims. The Theatre of Dionysus was built ca. 500 BC. 36 It is the first and only archaeologically attested Athenian theatre before the building of the Odeon of Herodes Atticus in 161 AD. From 2002–2012 trenches were opened in three different sections of the the auditorium of the “Lycurgan” theatre to explore hitherto undisturbed layers of the Classical theatre beneath. All three trenches yielded clear evidence of large postholes for wooden ikria. 37 The recent excavations yielded another important discovery. The soil around the analemma walls contained no pottery later than around 430 BC. 38 The obvious conclusion is that the casing of the “Lycurgan” auditiorium, and evidently the plan for its completion in stone, was already in place in Pericles’ day. Yet the semicircular stone theatron was not in fact completed for another century, soon after 340 BC. 39 This was a process, not an event, and Eratosthenes was perfectly right to say that ikria used to be constructed “before the theatron was fully completed” or “fitted out”, πρὸ τοῦ κατασκευασθῆναι τὸ θέατρον.

 33 Wilhelm 1900; Csapo/Wilson 2020, IV Eiii. 34 Because tierarchs were meant to “fit out” hulls provided by the Athenian state, the verb is often used of “furnishing / fitting out” ships: Dem. 10.19, 18.194, 38.25, 47.25, 50.36; Din. In Dem. 96. 35 For furnishing buildings, used absolutely: Thuc. 2.17.3. Not used absolutely, see e.g. Hdt. 2.44, 8.33; 9.82. 36 Despinis 1996/7. 37 Papastamati-von Moock 2015, 53–57. 38 Papastamati-von Moock 2015, 60–62. 39 For the date of the completion of the western part of the stone theatron, see: Papastamativon Moock 2014, 28–35 and Csapo/Wilson 2014, 395–396, 398–399.

How Cratinus fr. 372 Made Theatre History  

 How a Theatre Came to be Placed in the Agora Wilamowitz and Scullion are therefore clearly right that Eratosthenes is not to be understood as describing a theatre “before the theatre was built”. 40 Eratosthenes described an auditorium that was regularly built of stands of wooden seating until it was fully furnished in stone and this conforms to what we know from the material and textual evidence. But later lexicographers misunderstood and misparaphrased Eratosthenes words. They were evidently confused by Eratosthenes’ claim, as they interpreted it, that there were ikria “before the theatron was built”. They had no doubt that the theatron meant the Theatre of Dionysus, and so they began to look for a place outside the theatre where these ikria were located. One theory, reported by only two Middle Byzantine sources, was that the ikria were located in the Agora before the Theatre of Dionysus was built. Photius (s.v. ἴκρια, ι 95 Theodoridis) says: ἴκρια· τὰ ἐν τῇ ἀγορᾷ, ἀφ’ ὧν ἐθεῶντο τοὺς Διονυσιακοὺς ἀγῶνας πρὶν ἢ κατασκευασθῆναι τὸ ἐν Διονύσου θέατρον. (Phot. ι 95 Theodoridis) “Ikria”: those in the Agora from which they viewed the Dionysian contests before the construction of the theatre in the Sanctuary of Dionysus.

Eustathius copies the same source (Commentary on the Odyssey 3.350): ἰστέον δὲ ὅτι ἴκρια προπαροξυτόνως ἐλέγοντο καὶ τὰ ἐν τῇ ἀγορᾷ ἀφ’ ὧν ἐθεῶντο τὸ παλαιὸν τοὺς Διονυσιακοὺς ἀγῶνας πρινὴ σκευασθῆναι τὸ ἐν Διονύσου θέατρον. (Eustath. on Od. 3.350) Be aware that ikria was pronounced with an accent on the first syllable and the (ikria) in the Agora from which in antiquity they used to watch the Dionysian contests before the construction of the theatre in the Sanctuary of Dionysus.

What happened? What new information made Middle Byzantine lexicographers think they could clarify the apparent problem of the theatre before the Theatre of

 40 The κατεσκευάζετο of Hsch π 513, Hsch. ω 39, Phot. ι 95 and Eust. Od. 3.350, simply means “build”, but this helps explain the lexicographers’ confusion with Eratosthenes’ expression πρὸ τοῦ κατασκευασθῆναι, for “build” seems to become the dominant meaning of κατασκευάζω in later Greek.

  Eric Csapo Dionysus? Although we do have archaeological evidence that ikria were regularly erected in the Agora, these were not ikria that can be connected with any theatre nor any space suitable for the performance of drama. Paradoxically, as we will see, Photius and Eustathius did not draw upon any independent knowledge of ikria in the Agora, but acquired their “information” from a source within the lexicographic tradition. That ikria were in fact sometimes erected in the Agora is attested by sets of postholes that date from the fifth century onwards. These have been found in various parts of the Agora: at the bend of the Dromos leading from the Dipylon and at several locations lining the route of the Panathenaic way. 41 These ikria were set up for (some of the luckier members of) the public to watch the Panathenaic procession and the Panathenaic contests held in the Agora. Hegesander recounts anecdotes illustrating the profligacy of Demetrios of Phaleron, grandson of the famous Demetrius of Phaleron, who at a Panathenaea around 250 BC gave seating to his girlfriend on ikria erected for the occasion at the bend of the road. 42 Ikria were doubtless also put up for the Dionysian parade, that Xenophon (Hipp. 3.2) tells us included short stationary choral performances (not drama) in various parts of the Agora. Some of these ikria gave the crowds at the processions a good view of the central open space of the Agora, called the Orchestra — because of the many short choral performances put on there during the processions. It is certainly not these ikria that Cratinus or Eratosthenes referred to. The ground in the Agora is flat and, as mentioned above, there was no possibility that anyone behind the stands could see over them. 43 These ikria, while they do provide what

 41 References collected in Csapo 2015, 98–100. 42 Hegesander FHG IV, fr. 8, 14–17 = Athen. 4.167f. 43 The only possible rise is the Kolonos Agoraios, which at the base of the Hephaisteion is not more than about seven metres above the level of the Orchestra, and less than five over the rising ground at the base of the hill where ikria would most profitably be placed. This is not enough of a rise to allow one to see comfortably over stands of any reasonable size. But it is otherwise unlikely that the ground at its base ever housed ikria. Though holes for the placement of ikria have been found in various parts of the Agora, they are not reported for this area (see references in Csapo 2015, 98–100). After about 450 BC they would in any case have been unnecessary. The Athenians in the mid fifth century placed four stone benches upon the lower slope, each stretching either 25 or 37 m. in length along the hill, and ideally suited to serve as benches for an estimated 200–400 to sit and view the Orchestra (Hollinshead 2015, 49–50). These stone benches remained in place through the fourth century (Camp 1986, 100). The benches did indeed serve as a viewing space but not a theatre in our sense. Buildings limited the view from these benches, the Stoa of Zeus Eleutherios, to the left, built around 430–420 BC (Camp 2001, 104), and, to the right, the Old Bouleuterion, built around 500 BC, or more probably soon after 480 BC in accord-

How Cratinus fr. 372 Made Theatre History  

could certainly be called a θέα, do not constitute a theatre or even a “theatral area” of the kind that would suit dramatic performances. 44 The ikria occupied several spots along the processional route. From any one of the stands the crowds could get a very partial view of the main festival processions, including partial views of the many short stationary performances put on by the processional choruses in the Orchestra and by the various altars place in and around the Agora. Nonetheless, the ikria in the Agora, even though known to Pollux (7.125), are not the main cause of the lexica’s placement of a theatre in the Agora. Oddly enough, it was not information about ikria, but information about poplars that precipitated this move. We can trace the source of a gloss “from poplars” as far back as Hesychius s.v. ἀπ’ αἰγείρων (α 5716): 45

 ance with arguments for the post-Persian War dating of public building in the Agora (Papadopoulos 2003, 271–316). The view from these benches was therefore quite limited from the beginning, and while it might serve as a comfortable perch to watch the passing of a procession, it fell far short of providing a large audience with the broad, concentrated and unencumbered view of the sort required by dramatic performance. 44 See Csapo 2015, 98. At the conference in Thessaloniki Prof. Andreas Bagordo rightly asked about the relevance of Aristophanes fr. dub. 968 from Photius s.v. ὀρχήστρα (ο 544 Theodoridis): πρῶτον ἐκλήθη ἐν τῇ ἀγορᾷ, εἶτα καὶ τοῦ θεάτρου τὸ κάτω ἡμίκυκλον, οὗ καὶ οἱ χοροὶ ᾖδον καὶ ὠρχοῦντο, “εἰς τὴν ὀρχήστραν· ἔτι γὰρ τὴν θέαν ᾠκεῖτ᾽ ἐκεῖ”, φησὶν ὁ κωμικός. It is not clear whether the orchestra referred to by the poet is in the Agora or the theatre (the introductory remarks by Photius display his learning by mentioning both possibilities). Nonetheless the Orchestra (“dancing place”) is a well attested toponym for the centre of the market square in the Agora and it certainly derived its name from its unique suitability for the choral performances. The centre of the Agora remained, until well into the fourth century, an ideally large open and flat space, not easy to find elsewhere in Athens. Yet, though Aristophanes fr. dub. 968 appears to be parabatic (Eupolidean meter), and therefore probably “metatheatrical”, one cannot take θέα, as do Kassel-Austin, following Meineke (IV 659), as equivalent somehow to θέατρον, let alone take it to imply drama: “adhuc enim (sc. antiquis temporibus, de quibus dixerat comicus) illic (in foro) theatrum incolebatis, i.e. ludos scaenicos spectabatis”. Supposing θέα could serve as object of οἰκέω, which is far from obvious (Dobree, in Wagner 1874, 47, says “Dixit se comicus οἰκεῖν θέαν alludens ad locutionem οἰκεῖν οἶκον”), it never means more than “viewing area” for any kind of performance. Despite LSJ the word does not simply mean “auditorium” tout court in the Piraeus theatre lease: θέα has a techinical meaning in the language of theatre leasing and refers to seating that is to be built up by the lessees (Csapo 2007, 93). Aristophanes fr. dub. 968 is, thus, very far from supporting the idea of dramatic performances in the Agora. Newiger 1976 has valuable comments on the Agora orchestra, though his comments, esp. p. 91, have not always received the consideration they deserve. 45 The texts by Kassel-Austin PCG VIII F 278 and Cunningham 2018 do not mark a lacuna before the last two words, as does Latte, but follow Schmidt in treating “τουτέστιν ἐξήρτων” as a parenthetic explanation of ἐξῆπτον making οἱ ἔσχατοι the subject of τὰ πινάκια ἐξῆπτον. It may be worth noting that the text of Hesychius was heavily interpolated from at least the eighth century

  Eric Csapo ἀπ’ αἰγείρων· “Ἀνδροκλέα τὸν ἀπ' αἰγείρων” ἀντὶ τοῦ συκοφάντην, ἐπειδὴ [δὲ] ἐκ τῆς ἐν τῇ ἀγορᾷ αἰγείρου τὰ πινάκια ἐξῆπτον, τουτέστιν ἐξήρτων [...] οἱ ἔσχατοι. (Hsch. α 5716) δὲ ἔκτισε ms. [δὲ] ἐκ τῆς ἐν Mus. ἐξῆπτον, τουτέστιν ἐξήρτων [...] οἱ ἔσχατοι Latte ἐξῆπτον, τουτέστιν ἐξήρτων, οἱ ἔσχατοι Schmidt “From poplars”: “the Androkles from the poplars” rather than “sycophant”, since they fastened the (?) lists of indictments from the poplar in the Agora, that is to say, they hung (something has dropped out here — perhaps the object is pinakia) …the furthest people (or, reading with Schmidt and Cunningham, “the furthest people hung, that is to say they appended, the (?) lists of indictments”).

There are some other remarkable features to this gloss. It should be noted first of all that the lemma gives “from poplars” (in the plural), while the explanation gives “from a poplar” in the singular. The lemma is eccentric because all lexicograhic entries related to the poplar behind the auditorium name only one poplar in the singular. Secondly, Hesychius is the first of our lexica to use the preposition ἀπό before the noun “poplar”. 46 Thirdly, from the explanation we can see that the poplars said to be in the Agora are none of them the same tree as the poplar we find in the tradition dependent on Cratinus fr. 372. Hesychius’ ἀπ’ αἰγείρων is a very different gloss, on a different quotation from comedy, and on different poplars. The meaning of Hesychius’ gloss here is obscure, hence Latte’s reasonable supposition of a lacuna, but we do have a few clues to understanding the content of Hesychius’ text. The politician Androkles, mentioned in Hesychius’ gloss, was ridiculed by various comic writers. 47 Cratinus in his Seasons (fr. 281) refers to Androkles as Androkolonokles (after the Kolonos in the Agora, the part of the market where day labourers were hired); Harpocration and Suda tell us that those who

 AD and was also radically epitomised (Dickey 2007, 89). “That is” (τουτέστιν) is a characteristic overture for explanatory interpolations. ἐξήρτων might well explain ἐξῆπτον, though an explanation hardly seems necessary. No reasonable sense can be made of οἱ ἔσχατοι in the passage as transmitted (see further note 49). 46 Otherwise the combination only appears in an entirely unrelated misquotation of Theoc. 1.147 by Philoxenus Gramm. fr. 506 Theod. and in Olympiodorus’ Commentary on Aristotle’s Meteora p. 67.3 Stüve. 47 Ar. Vesp. 1186 with schol.; Crat. frr. 223, 281; Telecl. fr. 16; Ecphantid. fr. 5. See Biles/Olson 2015 on Ar. Vesp. 1186–7.

How Cratinus fr. 372 Made Theatre History  

sold their services were called kolonitai or kolonetai. 48 Though Hesychius’ ἀπ' αἰγείρων might possibly be a quotation from a comedy, even one of Cratinus or his contemporaries, it has no other connection with Cratinus’ “poplar view”. And yet the gloss ἀπ’ αἰγείρων, “from poplars”, has clearly merged with ἀπ᾽ αἰγείρου θέα “view from a poplar”. This is only partly evident from the otherwise inexplicable change of “poplars” to “a poplar”, plural to singular. But it becomes obvious when we compare Hesychius’ gloss with the only three sources, all later than Hesychius, that employ the preposition ἀπό in quoting Cratinus fr. 372. The form ἀπ᾽ αἰγείρου θέα is known only from the Synagoge, the Suda and Eustathius. The glosses of the Synagoge (B α 1651 Cunningham), and Suda (α 2952 Adler) are the same: ἀπ᾽ αἰγείρου θέα καὶ παρ᾽ αἴγειρον· ἡ ἀπὸ τῶν ἐσχάτων. αἴγειρος γὰρ ἐπάνω ἦν τοῦ θεάτρου, ἀφ᾽ ἧς οἱ μὴ ἔχοντες τόπον ἐθεώρουν. (Synagoge B α 1651; Sud. a 2952) “Viewing place from a poplar and alongside a poplar”: the viewing place from those furthest out. This is because there was a poplar above the auditorium from which those who had no seat used to watch.

Eustathius also probably draws on this source (Commentary on Homer’s Odyssey 5.64 = vol. I, p. 199 Stallbaum): ἦν γοῦν φασιν αἴγειρος Ἀθήνῃσιν ἐπάνω τοῦ θεάτρου ἀφ’ ἧς ἐθεώρουν οἱ μὴ ἔχοντες τόπον. ὅθεν καὶ ἡ ἀπ’ αἰγείρου θέα ἐλέγετο. καὶ παρ’ αἴγειρον θέα, ἡ ἀπὸ τῶν ἐσχάτων. καὶ ἦν φασιν εὐωνοτέρα ἡ παρ’ αἴγειρον θέα. (Eustath. on Od. 5.64) They say at any rate that there was a poplar in Athens above the auditorium from which those who had no seat watched. And for this reason there was a saying “the viewing place from a poplar”. And “view along past a poplar” is that from those furthest out. And the view along past a poplar, they say, was cheaper.

Two reasons make it particularly clear that the independent gloss ἀπ’ αἰγείρων has merged with the gloss ἀπ᾽ αἰγείρου θέα. The eccentric ἀπό makes sense when one speaks of hanging pinakia from poplars, but less so when one speaks of a view from a poplar, unless one supposes that the audience has actually climbed

 48 Poll. Onom. 7.132–133; Harp. κ 72 Keaney (citing Hyperides fr. 8 Jensen); Hsch. κ 3410; Sud. κ 1961; schol. Ar. Av. 997; Bakola 2010, 226–227. Probably from Philochorus FGrH 328 fr. 26.

  Eric Csapo the poplar or stands right beside the poplar to view, since this preposition sooner implies movement from a position of contiguity than one of proximity. But the contents of the glosses themselves show clearly that they depend on the tradition depending on Cratinus fr. 372 that quotes παρ’ αἴγειρον θέα or simply αἰγείρου θέα which refer to a much broader viewing area than a single tree beyond the ikria. Notice too that all three of these eccentric glosses also all quote the more plausible form with παρά, and indeed Photius also has the usual glosses on the poplars under the lemmata αἰγείρου θέα and θέαν παρ’ αἴγειρον. But the clearest indication that our glosses ἀπ’ αἰγείρων and ἀπ᾽ αἰγείρου θέα have been run together is the reference to οἱ ἔσχατοι, which appears only in Hesychius’ ἀπ’ αἰγείρων and in these three glosses ἀπ᾽ αἰγείρου θέα in the Synagoge, the Suda, and Eustathius. Unlike the preposition ἀπό which makes perfect sense only in Hesychius’ ἀπ’ αἰγείρων, the reference to the ἔσχατοι makes no sense at all in Hesychius’ gloss, but is the vox propria for designating spectators ‘farthest away’ from the orchestra and stage in the theatre auditorium. 49 In Aristophanes’ Knights 703704, the Sausage Seller says to Cleon (who has just sworn “by his prohedria”): ἰδοὺ προεδρίαν· οἷον ὄψομαί σ’ ἐγὼ | ἐκ τῆς προεδρίας ἔσχατον θεώμενον, “I like that ‘prohedria’! How pleased I will be to see you sitting furthest out (ἔσχατος) from the prohedria”. The fact that the Synagoge, Suda and Eustathius are the only ones to use ἀπ᾽ αἰγείρου, and also the only ones in the tradition derived from Cratinus fr. 372 to make reference to the ἔσχατοι, is, of course, no coincidence. All must derive from the same strand of the lexicographic tradition. But, otherwise they give the explanations we are familiar with from the main tradition (and certainly refer to the Τheatre of Dionysus, not the Agora).

 49 Cf. Scullion 1994, 59. The suggestion of Kolb (1981, 35) that eschatoi means “die Niedrigsten, Gemeinsten, Armseligsten, Niederträchtigsten” is neither persuasive nor really helpful in understanding the passage, especially as the word is the lexicographer’s, not the poet’s. It is moreover unsupported by the passages he cites (Magnes fr. 5 and Philem. fr. 80, which both use the proverbial Mυσῶν ἔσχατος). Eschatos is, on the contrary, the appropriate term to use for those at the farthest reaches of the theatre auditorium: in addition to Ar. Eq. 704, cf. Alex. fr. 42; Plu. Flam. 19.8; Eun. VSp 10.4.10.

How Cratinus fr. 372 Made Theatre History | 591

Fig. 8: Stemmatic representation of the transmission of the contaminated gloss “From Poplar(s)”.

This seems to indicate that at some time in the tradition, αἰγείρου θέα or παρ’ αἴγειρον θέα was corrupted to ἀπ᾽ αἰγείρου θέα. An alphabetic lexicon then incorporated the gloss ἀπ᾽ αἰγείρου θέα into the entry ἀπ’ αἰγείρων. The mix-up possibly took place before Hesychius. At the same time the usual gloss, albeit with ἀπ’ (but always with the corrective “and παρ’ αἴγειρον”, and uniquely preserving a reference to the ἔσχατοι, continued on its separate course to be picked up the Synagoge, Suda and Eustathius. As a result of this mix-up, the poplar could now be located in the Agora. This “fact” gave the later lexicographers an opportunity to make sense of “the theatre before the theatre was built”.50 The theatres could be separated in time and space: a theatre with a poplar and ikria in the Agora was supposed to come first, then another was built in the Sanctuary of Dionysos. This nice but false solution — as I said — appears only in Photius and Eustathius. As mentioned Photius has the usual glosses on the poplars with αἰγείρου θέα and θέαν παρ’ αἴγειρον. But like

|| 50 Cf. Wilamowitz 1886, 599 n. 2 and esp. Scullion 1994, 59. Scullion (1994, 57–60) thinks the “conscious compiler” is the Atticist Pausanias.

  Eric Csapo the Synagoge, Suda and Eustathius, Photius also has an entry under ikria, which he now locates in the Agora (ι 95 Theodoridis). 51 ἴκρια· τὰ ἐν τῇ ἀγορᾷ, ἀφ’ ὧν ἐθεῶντο τοὺς Διονυσιακοὺς ἀγῶνας πρὶν ἢ κατασκευασθῆναι τὸ ἐν Διονύσου θέατρον. (Phot. ι 95) “Ikria”: those in the Agora from which they viewed the Dionysian contests before the construction of the theatre in the Sanctuary of Dionysus.

Eustathius copies the same source (Commentary on the Odyssey 3.350): ἰστέον δὲ ὅτι ἴκρια προπαροξυτόνως ἐλέγοντο καὶ τὰ ἐν τῇ ἀγορᾷ ἀφ’ ὧν ἐθεῶντο τὸ παλαιὸν τοὺς Διονυσιακοὺς ἀγῶνας πρινὴ σκευασθῆναι τὸ ἐν Διονύσου θέατρον. (Eustath. on Od. 3.350) Be aware that ikria was pronounced with an accent on the first syllable and the (ikria) in the Agora from which in antiquity they used to watch the Dionysian contests before the construction of the theatre in the Sanctuary of Dionysus.

These glosses draw upon the lexicographic stream flowing from Eratosthenes. This is clear from Photius’ πρὶν ἢ κατασκευασθῆναι τὸ ἐν Διονύσου θέατρον and Eustathius’ πρινὴ σκευασθῆναι τὸ ἐν Διονύσου θέατρον which echo Eratosthenes’ “πρὸ τοῦ κατασκευασθῆναι τὸ θέατρον”. But the Middle Byzantine lexicographers have now added something to the tradition. They place the ikria in the Agora, thanks to their “knowledge” that the poplar associated with the ikria is in the Agora. As a result they now confidently expand Eratosthenes’ words with the precision πρὶν ἢ κατασκευασθῆναι τὸ ἐν Διονύσου θέατρον, meaning “before the theatre in the Sanctuary of Dionysus was built”. In short, the placement of the ikria in the Agora began with a copying error that merged two unconnected glosses on poplars. The resulting relocation of the poplar to the Agora was then used to fix the problem of the “theatre before the theatre was built” by separating the theatres into different locations.

 51 Erbse guessed that the gloss in Photius was transmitted via the Atticist Pausanias (1950, 187 ι 3), but, following Wilamowitz 598–599 n. 2, he puts τὰ ἐν τῇ ἀγορᾷ into square brackets in reconstructing Pausanias’ text.

How Cratinus fr. 372 Made Theatre History  

 The Lenaean Theatre Once it was decided that the theatre “before the theatre was built” was in a location other than the Theatre of Dionysus, and in the Agora, it was an easy step to suppose that this theatre in the Agora must have been in a sanctuary of Dionysus, since it was known that drama was originally performed during “Dionysia”, and it was explicitly said the theatre was later moved to “the Sanctuary of Dionysus”. This sanctuary of Dionysus in the Agora was therefore identified as the Lenaion. This step was taken around the time of Photius, if not by Photius himself. This inference was facilitated by the belief that the Lenaion was located in the Agora, a belief engendered by the lexicographical tradition on Demosthenes’ On the Crown (129) that claimed that the shrine of Kalamites was near the Lenaion 52 and that the associated shed was in the Agora. 53 Further support came from another lexicographic misreading, the glossomatic tradition on “οὑπὶ Ληναίῳ ἀγών” in Aristophanes’ Acharnians. There is now nearly universal agreement that “οὑπὶ Ληναίῳ ἀγών” means simply “the Lenaean contest” 54 and does not mean “the contest in the Lenaion sanctuary”, as

 52 Hsch. s.v. Καλαμίτης ἥρως κ 404 “Καλαμίτης ἥρως· τῷ Ληναίῳ πλησίον” and Words together with Explanations from the Speeches of Demosthenes and Aeschines (Lexicon Patmense) s.v. Καλαμίτης ἥρως (Sakkelion) “Καλαμίτης ἥρως· ἥρως οὗτος Ἀθήνησι τιμώμενος, ἤτοι ἐξ ἐπωνυμίας, ἢ ἀπὸ καλάμων περιπεφυκότων ἱερῷ· τὸ δὲ ἱερὸν αὐτοῦ ἐστι πρὸς τῷ Ληναίῳ”. 53 Words together with Explanations from the Speeches of Demosthenes and Aeschines (Lexicon Patmense) s.v. Κλισίον (Sakkelion) “κλισίον· τὸ οἴκημα, τὸ μεγάλας ἔχον θύρας ἐν τῇ ἀγορᾷ”. These texts may seem to preserve some valid topographical knowledge, since they cannot be entirely based on inferences from the text of Demosthenes. That the associated shed was in the Agora may, however, be based on the text of Demosthenes since his father’s school is placed “by the Theseion” (on the Kolonos Agoraios), and it is an easy guess that his mother’s haunts were not far away. A stronger link is forged if Kalamites, by whom his mother worked, really is to be equated with the “hero doctor” near whom his father is said to have taught in On the False Embassy (19.249). The possibility that the connection between the Lenaion and the Agora is based on empty guesswork seems confirmed by the fact that the extensive American excavations of the Athenian Agora have yielded no trace of the Lenaion, albeit said by Hesychius (ε 4933), Photius (ε 1617 and λ 273), the Etymologicum Genuinum and Etymologicum Magnum s.v. ἐπὶ Ληναίῳ and Suda (ε 2442) to be a “large enclosure”. Certainly the Agora excavations have not somehow missed an entire theatre (see esp. Wycherley 1965; Thompson/Wycherley 1972, 128–129; Slater 1986). 54 See e.g. Pickard-Cambridge 1968, 40; Scullion 1994, 63; MacDowell 1990, 231; Olson 2002, 202; Rodríguez 2017, 54.

  Eric Csapo might appear from a literal interpretation of the expression and as was once argued by Anti and Russo. 55 The earliest Athenian practice was to distinguish the Lenaea from other Dionysia by calling it “the Dionysia at the Lenaion”, Διονύσια τὰ ἐπὶ Ληναίῳ, and once drama was introduced to the Lenaea, ca. 440, the competition was naturally called ὁ ἐπὶ Ληναίῳ ἀγών to distinguish it from the Dionysian competition, just as the parade, cited in the Law of Euegoros (Dem. 21.10), is named ἐπὶ Ληναίῳ πομπή. After the Classical period the fossilised expression ἐπὶ Ληναίῳ ceased to be used and Λήναια and Ληναϊκός became standard. 56 Consequently ἐπὶ Ληναίῳ puzzled later Greeks who took it literally to mean “at the sanctuary of the Lenaion”. There is no evidence for contests at the sanctuary of the Lenaion, but Aristophanes and others who used the expression ἐπὶ Ληναίῳ ἀγών were taken to indicate that the Lenaion was where drama was performed “before the theatre was built”. The earliest report that we get for the existence of a Lenaean theatre comes, once again, from Hesychius ε 4933): ἐπὶ Ληναίῳ ἀγών· ἔστιν ἐν τῷ ἄστει Λήναιον περίβολον ἔχον μέγαν καὶ ἐν αὐτῷ Ληναίου Διονύσου ἱερόν, ἐν ᾧ ἐπετελοῦντο οἱ ἀγῶνες Ἀθηναίων, πρὶν τὸ θέατρον οἰκοδομηθῆναι. (Hsch. ε 4933) Ἀθηναίων ms. Ληναίων Wilamowitz Ἀθηναίων Latte “Competition is Lenaean” (literally “competition in Lenaion”): There is in the city a Lenaion with a large enclosure and a sanctuary of Dionysus Lenaios in it, in which the competitions of Athenians took place before the theatre was built.

The expression “before the theatre was built” is a variation on the tag familiar from the glosses on “a poplar view” and on ikria. Someone had compared glosses and developed the compounded errors of the lexicographical tradition into a general theory. Photius is the next source to pick this up (ε 1617 Theodoridis): ἐπὶ Ληναίῳ· Λήναιον περίβολός τις μέγας Ἀθήνηισιν, ἐν ᾧ ἱερὸν Διονύσου καὶ τοὺς ἀγῶνας ἐποίουν πρὸ τοῦ τὸ θέατρον οἰκοδομηθῆναι. (Phot. ε 1617)

 55 Anti 1949, 185–247; Russo 1962, 16–18. 56 IG II2 3779, l. 7; IG II2 2130, l. 60; Rodríguez 2017, 52. When this happens the generic term “Dionysia” also ceases to be applied to the Lenaean festival (Rodríguez 2017, 54).

How Cratinus fr. 372 Made Theatre History  

“Lenaean” (literally “in Lenaion”): Lenaion a large enclosure in Athens, in which was a sanctuary of Dionysus and they produced the competitions before the building of the theatre.

Photius also has an entry under Lenaion with the same information (λ 273 Theodoridis): Ληναῖον· περίβολος μέγας Ἀθήνηισιν· ἐν ᾧ τοὺς ἀγῶνας ἦγον πρὸ τοῦ τὸ θέατρον οἰκοδομηθῆναι ὀνομάζοντες ‘ἐπὶ Ληναίῳ’· ἔστιν δὲ ἐν αὐτῷ καὶ ἱερὸν Διονύσου Ληναίου. (Phot. λ 273) “Lenaion”: a large enclosure in Athens, in which they performed the competitions before the building of the theatre naming them “Lenaean” (lit. “at Lenaion”). In it there is also a sanctuary of Dionysus Lenaios.

In these glosses Photius and Hesychius draw upon the same source. Virtually the same gloss can be found in the Λέξεις ῥητορικαί and this may allow us, following Alpers, to trace it to the Alphabetically Arranged Lexicon on the Ten Orators of Julianus of the 2nd century AD. 57 The lexicographical tradition has therefore left multiple traces of an early theatre history that the lexicographic tradition itself cobbled together from a series of misreadings, errors, and misunderstandings. This theory has taken deep root in modern scholarship, even though the extensive American excavations in the Agora have found neither Lenaion nor theatre and have left no unexcavated space where a Lenaion or a theatre might yet be uncovered. Schnurr (1995, 145) has tried to solve this problem by arguing that the Lenaion is to be located in the Old Agora which she would place on the northeast side of the Acropolis. This area has not been excavated, so this theory has the advantage over the New Agora that it cannot yet be falsified. It does not, however, get any support from the ancient testimonia, as the Lexicon Patmense (see note 52) is unlikely to preserve a memory of the Archaic Agora and indeed the glosses on the hero Kalamitis upon which the link with the Lenaion depends certainly refer to the Classical Agora. 58 More recent studies suggest the Old Agora should be placed east and southeast of the Acropolis 59 and this has shifted the search for ‘the theatre before the Theatre of Dionysus’ to a new location. Greco (2010, 31–34) has argued that the Lenaion was contiguous with the Sanctuary of Dionysus Eleuthereus. This partly

 57 Alpers 1981, 120–123; cf. Matthaios 2015, 284. 58 Cf. Sourvinou-Inwood 2003, 120–123. 59 Esp. Kavvadias/Matthaiou 2014.

  Eric Csapo revives the general assumption before Wilamowitz 1886 that the newly excavated Sanctuary of Dionysus Eleuthereus was in fact both the Lenaion and the Dionysion in the Marshes, a single area covered by two names. 60 Indeed, Wycherley completes his study with the observation that “the old idea that all three shrines were to the southeast more or less closely associated like Apollo Pythios and Delphinios, is not disproved” (1965, 76). Paradoxically, the location best supported by our ancient testimonia, that the Lenaion was in the (Classical) Agora, is the only possibility that can certainly be rejected (because disproved by excavation). But all of these hypotheses are wrong to the extent that they rely on the ancient lexicographers, despite their contradictions, as independent and reliable witnesses to Athenian topography. Before I finish, there is one small piece of the puzzle we need to look at. Pollux 4.121 is said to give independent testimony for a Lenaean theatre and offers a last resort of those who wish to believe in a Lenaean theatre: ἐπεὶ δὲ καὶ τὸ θέατρον οὐ μικρὸν μέρος ἐστὶ τῶν μουσικῶν, αὐτὸ μὲν ἂν εἴποις θέατρον καὶ Διονυσιακὸν θέατρον καὶ Ληναϊκόν, καὶ τὸ πλῆθος θεατάς. (Poll. Onom. 4.121)

But Pollux does not refer to a Lenaean theatre. In this section of the Onomasticon Pollux uses θέατρον to refer to the audience and auditorium. The passage should be translated: Since even the audience is not an inconsiderable part of musical entertainments, you would call it “audience”, or “Dionysian audience” or “Lenaean”, and the crowd “spectators”.

The meaning “Lenaean audience” in this passage is evident from the progression of topics in this part of the Onomasticon, dealing first with human participants, moving from chorus, to actors, to audience. 61 The section opened by these lines  60 Dörpfeld/Reisch 1896, 7. 61 Onom. 106–110 deal with the chorus, 111–112 with the choral odes of comedy, 113–114 with actors, 115–120 with actors’ costumes, 121–122 with the auditorium and audience, and 123–127 with other parts of the theatre, followed by sections on theatre machines and masks. A parallel for the expression Lenaean theatron referring to the Lenaean audience may exist in the papyrus commentary P.Oxy. 2737 fr. 1, col. ii. The supplement by Luppe in Austin CGFPR 56, 55–6 reads: [μὲ]ν εἶναι τὰ θέα[τρα Λην]αϊκὰ τὸ δὲ Ληναϊκ[]. Τhis can also be supplemented, as Luppe suggests: [διττὰ μὲ]ν εἶναι τὰ θέα[ματα εἴρ]η̣κα, τὸ δὲ Ληναϊκ[ὸν οὐχ ὁμ]ọίως ἔνδοξο[ν δοκεῖ εἶνα]ι διὰ τὸ ἔ[α]ρος συ]μμάχ[ους] ἤδη ἀφ[ικνεῖσ]θ̣α̣[ι ἔξωθε]ν καταθ[ε]α̣[σομένους καὶ πρ]αγματ[ευ]σομέν̣ [ους]. PCG III2 fr. 590, ll. 35–6, prints ]ν̣ εἶναι τὰ θεα̣[ | . ]. . κα τὸ δὲ Ληναϊκ[. But θέα[τρα Λην]αϊκὰ remains possible and preferable as the diaeresis, consistently used for the adjective Ληναϊκός is clearly visible on the papyrus (rather arbitrarily dismissed by Luppe 1971, 103–4, but

How Cratinus fr. 372 Made Theatre History  

treats exclusively with names for audience members. This is clear from the last words: “and [you would call] the crowd ‘spectators’”. A reference here to the “Lenaean theatre” would be arbitrary and contrary to the Onomasticon’s organisational structure.

 Conclusion The modern history of this lexicographic confusion is well known to anyone who has read commentaries on ancient comedy, topographical studies of Athens, or accounts of the early theatre from Bergk to Papastamati. From this tangle of errors scholars have extracted a theatre in the Agora, a theatre in the Lenaion, a theatre in the Lenaion which is also in the Agora, a theatre in the Limnaion, and even something like a theatre in the Old Agora. 62 The modern narrative has expanded to make the reported collapse of ikria in the time of Pratinas or Aeschylus the cause for moving the theatre from the Agora to the Sanctuary of Dionysus (no ancient source actually suggests that the collapse happened anywhere other than in the Theatre of Dionysus). Three sets of glosses, all apparently independent, seem to confirm one another: but the glosses on the poplar, ikria and Lenaea are not in fact independent. The information attached to both “a poplar view” and ikria were drawn from Eratosthenes, but, at a time when Eratosthenes’ words were misunderstood and the context of the fragments forgotten, the process of

 there is nothing else it could be). I would suggest something like [ἀλλοῖα μὲ]ν εἶναι τὰ θέα[τρα Λην]αϊκὰ, τὸ δὲ Ληναϊκ[ὸν οὐχ ὁμ]οίως ἔνδοξον δοκεῖ εἶναι …. 62 A theatre in the Lenaion or the Agora or both appear in most major histories of the theatre and topographical works. The most influential are: Bergk 1838, 262–3; Wachsmuth 1874, 510– 511; Kock 1880, 112; Dörpfeld 1895; Judeich 1890; Judeich 1905, 263–266; Pickard–Cambridge 1946, 12; Bieber 1961, 69–70; Russo 1962; Wycherley 1965; Pickard Cambridge 1968, 37–40; Travlos 1971, 3, 537; Hammond 1972, 390–405; Dinsmoor 1973, 119–120; Kolb 1981, 20–61; Slater 1986; Schnurr 1995; Spineto 2005, 134–142; Beacham 2007, 205; Gogos 2008, 19–25; Papastamati-von Moock 2015, 42–44. So, whereas some believe in a Lenaean theatre with dramatic competitions before the (first) creation of the Theatre of Dionysus Eleuthereus when the competitions were transferred to that Theatre (Wachsmuth 1897, 55; Kolb 1981, 55–6; Schnurr 1995, 150), others argue that competitions continued in the Lenaion until the Theatre of Dionysus was rebuilt in stone (Schneider 1835, 46; Wilamowitz 1886, 622; Slater 1986, 263). The theatre in the Old Agora emerges from Miller 1995, 218–219. Only Newiger 1976, Scullion 1994 and Sourvinou-Inwood 2003, 120–123 have maintained a healthy sceptical distance from this farrago of loose, fanciful connections.

  Eric Csapo transmission generated misinformation that seemed to clarify what Eratotsthenes meant when he described a theatre before the theatre existed. In applying the same misinformation to the Lenaion modern scholarship walks in the circle created by its ancient counterpart. It puts its trust in information only found in Byzantine lexica, a source it would scarcely trust, except as a last resort. It argues that the information must come from somewhere, that they did not simply make it up. But this is precisely what they did. Sometime in the first centuries AD, a phrase used by Eratosthenes was misunderstood and created a “theatre before the theatre”. This lexicographic-turnedhistorical problem was solved by evidence generated by a copying error probably later in the second but in any case before the fifth century AD. The solution generated false evidence for a theatre in the Agora and in the Lenaion. There is therefore no reliable testimony at all for drama in any theatre in Athens other than the Theatre of Dionysus. 63

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 63 I wish to thank Anna Lamari and Anna Novokhatko for the kind invitation to the Thessaloniki conference and Doug Olson and Scott Scullion for casting expert eyes on an early draft of this paper and saving me from a great many errors, inaccuracies and exaggerations. I alone, of course, am responsible for any that remain.

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Csapo, E. (2015), “The Earliest Phase of ‘Comic’ Choral Entertainments in Athens: The Dionysian Pompe and the ‘Birth’ of Comedy”, in: S. Chronopoulos/C. Orth (eds), Fragmente einer Geschichte der griechischen Komödie/Fragmentary History of Greek Comedy, Studia Comica 5, Heidelberg, 66–108. Csapo, E./Wilson, P. (2014), “The Finance and Organisation of the Athenian Theatre in the Time of Eubulus and Lycurgus”, in: E. Csapo/H.R. Goette/J.R. Green/P. Wilson (eds), Greek Theatre in the Fourth Century BC, Berlin/Boston, 393–424. Csapo, E./Wilson, P. (2020), Theatre Beyond Athens: Documents for a Social and Economic History of the Theatre, vol. 2, Cambridge. Cunningham, I.C. (2003), Synagoge/ Συναγωγὴ λέξεων χρησίμων: Texts of the Original Version and of MS. B, Berlin/New York. Despinis, G. (1995), “Il tempio arcaico di Dioniso Eleutereo”, ASAtene 74–75 (n.s. 58–59), 193– 214. Dickey, E. (2007), Ancient Greek Scholarship, Oxford. Dinsmoor, W.B. (1973), The Architecture of Ancient Greece: an Account of Its Development, New York. Dörpfeld, W. (1895), “Die Ausgrabungen am Westabhange der Akropolis II: Das Lenaion oder Dionysion in den Limnai”, AM 20, 161–206. Dörpfeld, W./Reisch, E. (1896), Das griechische Theater, Athens. Erbse, H. (1950), Untersuchungen zu den attizistischen Lexika, Abhandlungen der Deutschen Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin, Philosophisch–Historische Klasse 1949.2, Berlin. Frederiksen, R. (2002), “The Greek Theatre. A Typical Building in the Urban Centre of the Polis?”, in: T.H. Nielsen (ed.), Even More Studies in the Ancient Greek Polis, Papers from the Copenhagen Polis Centre 6, Stuttgart, 65–124. Geus, K. (2002), Eratosthenes von Kyrene: Sudien zur hellenistischen Kultur- und Wissenschaftsgeschichte, Munich. Gogos, S. (2008), Das Dionysostheater von Athen: Architektonische Gestalt und Funktion, Vienna. Greco, E. (2010), “Sulla topografia di Atene: un’introduzione ai problemi”, in: E. Greco (ed.), Topografia di Atene. Sviluppo urbano e monumenti dalle origini al III secolo d. C. vol. I: Acropoli -Areopago -Tra Acropoli e Pnice, Athens/Paestum, 19–43. Hammond, N.G.L. (1972), “The Conditions of Dramatic Production to the Death of Aeschylus”, GRBS 13, 387–450. Hellmann, M.-C. (1992), Recherches sur le vocabulaire de l’architecture grecque d’après les inscriptions de Délos, BÉFAR 278, Athens/Paris. Hollinshead, M.B. (2015), Shaping Ceremony: Monumental Steps and Greek Architecture, Madison, WI. Judeich, W. (1892), “Lenaion”, RhM 47, 53–60. Judeich, W. (1905), Topographie von Athen, Munich. Kavvadias, G./Matthaiou, A.P. (2014), “A New Attic Inscription of the Fifth cent. B.C. from the East Slope of the Acropolis”, in: A.P. Matthaiou/R.K. Pitt (eds), Ἀθηναίων ἐπίσκοπος: Studies in Honour of Harold B. Mattingly, Athens, 51–72. Kock, T. (1880), Antiquae comoediae fragmenta, vol. 1, Leipzig. Kolb, F. (1981), Agora und Theater, Volks- und Festversammlung, Berlin. Kourinou-Pikoula, E. (1992–1998), “Μνᾶμα γεροντείας”, Horos 10–12, 259–276. Kühner, R./Blass, F. (1892), Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache, vol. 1 part 2. 3rd ed., Hannover.

  Eric Csapo Lanérès (2012), “La dédicace du ‘trone’ d’Aléa SEG 46, 400, nouvelle lecture”, REG 125, 715– 724. Luppe, W. (1971), “Der ‘Anagyros’-Kommentar Pap. Oxy. 2737”, APF 21, 93–101. MacDowell, D.M. (1990), Demosthenes Against Meidias (Oration 21), Oxford. Matthaios, S. (2015), “Greek Scholarship in the Imperial Era and Late Antiquity”, in: F. Montanari/S. Matthaios/A. Rengakos (eds), Brill’s Companion to Ancient Greek Scholarship, Leiden, 184–296. Miller, S.G. (1995), “Architecture as Evidence for the Identity of the Early Polis”, in: M.H. Hansen (ed.), Sources for the Ancient Greek City-State: Symposium August, 24–27, 1994, Copenhagen, 201–244. Montanari, F. (2015), The Brill Dictionary of Ancient Greek, Leiden. Mureddu, P. (2017), “Eratostene sulla archaia komoidia”, in: G. Mastromarco/P. Totaro/ B. Zimmermann (eds), La commedia attica antica: Forme e contenuti, Lecce, 151–172. Nesselrath, H.G. (1990), Die attische Mittlere Komödie, Berlin. Newiger, H.-J. (1976), “Zwei Bemerkungen zur Spielstätte des attischen Dramas in 5. Jahrhundert v. Chr.”, WS 89, 80–92. Olson, S.D. (2002), Aristophanes Acharnians, Oxford. Olson, S.D./Seaberg, R. (2018), Kratinos frr. 299–514, Fragmenta Comica 3.6, Göttingen. Papadopoulos, J.K. (2003), Ceramicus Redivivus: The Early Iron Age Potter’s Field in the Area of the Classical Athenian Agora, Hesperia Suppl. 31, Princeton. Papastamati-von Moock, C. (2014), “The Theatre of Dionysus Eleuthereus in Athens: New Data and Observations on its ‘Lycurgan’ Phase”, in: E. Csapo/H.R. Goette/J.R. Green/P. Wilson (eds), Greek Theatre in the Fourth Century BC, Berlin/Boston, 15–76. Papastamati-von Moock, C. (2015), “The Wooden Theatre of Dionysos Eleuthereus in Athens: Old Issues, New Research”, in: R. Frederiksen/E.R. Gebhard/A. Sokolicek (eds), The Architecture of the Ancient Greek Theatre: Acts of an International Conference at the Danish Institute at Athens 27–30 January 2012, Monographs of the Danish Institute at Athens 17, Aarhus, 39–80. Petersen, H. (1986), “Wörter zusammengesetzt mit ΑΜΦΙ”, Glotta 64, 193–213. Pickard-Cambridge, A.W. (1946), The Theatre of Dionysus in Athens, Oxford. Pickard-Cambridge, A.W. (19682), The Dramatic Festivals of Athens, with Appendix by J. Gould/ D.M. Lewis, Oxford. Poultney, J.W. (1936), The Syntax of the Genitive Case in Aristophanes, Baltimore. Rodríguez, M.V.V.(2017), Epigrafía dionisaca en época clásica, PhD diss., Madrid. Roselli, D.K. (2011), Theater of the People: Spectators and Society in Ancient Athens, Austin. Russo, C.F. (1962), Aristofane, autore di teatro, Florence. Schneider, C.W. (1835), Das Attische Theaterwesen, Weimar. Schnurr, C. (1995), “Zur Topographie der Theaterstätten und der Tropodenstrasse in Athen”, ZPE 105, 139–153. Scullion, S. (1994), Three Studies in Athenian Dramaturgy, Beiträge zur Altertumskunde 25, Stuttgart/Leipzig. Slater, N.W. (1986), “The Lenaean Theater”, ZPE 66, 255–264. Sourvinou-Inwood, C. (2003), Tragedy and Athenian Religion, Lanham MD. Spinetto, N. (2005), Dionysos a teatro, Rome. Strecker, K. (1884), De Lycophrone, Euphronio, Eratosthene comicorum interpretibus, PhD diss., Greifswald.

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Thompson, H.A./Wycherley, R.E. (1972), The Athenian Agora, vol. 14, The Agora of Athens: The History, Shape and Uses of an Ancient City Center, Princeton. Travlos, J. (1971), Bildlexikon zur Topographie des antiken Athen, Tübingen. Uzunoğlu, H. (2018), “On the Use of ‘ΚΑΤΑΣΚΕΥΑΖΕΙΝ’ in Building Inscriptions”, Olba 26, 387– 404. Wachsmuth, C. (1874), Die Stadt Athen im Alterthum, Leipzig. Wagner, W. (1874), Petri Pauli Dobree Adversaria, vol. 3, Miscellaneae Observationes ad varios scriptores Graecos, Berlin. Wilamowitz, U. von, (1886), “Die Bühne des Aischylos”, Hermes 21, 597–622. Wilhelm, A. (1900), “Nachlese zu griechischen Inschriften”, ÖJh 3, 40–62. Wycherley, R.E. (1965), “Lenaion”, Hesperia 34, 72–76.

Kostas Apostolakis

Increasing Comic Fragmentation: Some Aspects of Text Re-uses in Athenaeus  Introduction It is well known that the lion’s share of the fragments of Middle Comedy has been preserved by Athenaeus in his Deipnosophists (late 2nd – early 3rd century AD). 1 Whether Athenaeus himself had read the entire plays to which the quoted comic fragments belong, or whether he draws the fragments from existing anthologies, is a matter of dispute. 2 Concerning the fragments of Middle Comedy in particular, it seems that he had a direct knowledge of plenty of plays, perhaps due to the material they contain (food, drink, courtesans, etc.), which is relevant to his deipnological setting. 3 Whatever the truth may be, in most cases the fragments have been detached from their original context and are embedded in a series of dialogues between the dinner companions, so that different authors from different literary genres coexist in the very same section. Athenaeus, when composing his Deipnosophists, attempts to render an old fragmentary material functional again in its new deipnological environment. In order to facilitate the flow of the discussion, he often uses connective bridges, usually in the form of informative comments, which supposedly introduce the following sections and the contained citations. When drawing on secondary sources, he sometimes avoids acknowledging his debt. 4 Moreover, he often seems to reduce any external information not associated with the subject matter of a particular unit, so that little, if any, traces of the original context of the quoted fragment survive. This procedure actually increases the fragmentation

 1 Cf. Nesselrath 2010, 434: “If someone claimed that — for us at least — Athenaeus is something like the ‘savior’ of Middle Comedy, he would be guilty of only a slight exaggeration, if at all.” 2 For the relevant discussion cf. Nesselrath 1990, 65–79. 3 Ath. 8.336d πλείονα τῆς μέσης καλουμένης κωμῳδίας ἀναγνοὺς δράματα τῶν ὀκτακοσίων καὶ τούτων ἐκλογὰς ποιησάμενος οὐ περιέτυχον τῷ Ἀσωτοδιδασκάλῳ, “though I have read more than eight hundred plays of what is called the Middle Comedy, and have made extracts from them, but still I have never fallen in with the Tutor of Intemperate Men”; cf. Steinhausen 1910, 56: “legit et excerpsit deipnosophista fabulas mediae praesertim comoediae, tamen maximam fragmentorum partem debet aliis”. 4 Cf. e.g. Papachrysostomou 2016, on Amph. fr. 36 K–A. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-031

  Kostas Apostolakis and may lead the reader astray, in the sense that the content of the cited fragments is often at variance with their new deipnological context. Sometimes the only connection between the quoted fragment and Athenaeus’ context is an implicit idea or an arbitrary association which is difficult to find at first sight. In this paper I attempt to show some aspects of Athenaeus’ method concerning the use of specific comic fragments, then proceeding to some suggestions on their original context and function. My case study is Timocles, a fourth-century comedian, whose work is characterized by inventiveness, imagination and a variety of themes which occur in both Old and New Comedy. The feature which renders Timocles exceptional among the poets of Middle Comedy is his caustic political satire, which calls to mind methods and techniques of Old Comedy. He also includes in his work the courtesans and parasites typical of Middle and New Comedy, and shows an interest in poetological issues. 5 Most of Timocles’ fragments (29 of 42) have been preserved by Athenaeus. From this point of view, therefore, Timocles’ work might offer an indicative glimpse of Athenaeus’ practice and methodology.

 Shifting the focus I will set out an instance of shifting the narrative focus. This comes from the sixth book of The Deipnosophists, whose opening is marked by an outer dialogue between Athenaeus and Timocrates. Athenaeus tells Timocrates not to expect him to invent new material, as in the Deipnosophists he only describes his own experiences (Ath. 6.222c). 6 Athenaeus goes on to compare his narrative to tragedy: both treat familiar tales rather than inventing new ones. He backs this up with a quotation from Antiphanes’ Poetry (fr. 189 K–A), where someone, presumably representing comic poets, complains that tragedy is much easier to write than comedy because it is based on plots and characters that are already known to the audience; comedy, on the other hand, has to invent things from scratch. This is followed by a fragment from Diphilus’ Olive-Grove Guards (fr. 29 K–A), to the effect that only tragic

 5 Cf. Apostolakis 2019, esp. 9–16. 6 Ath. 6.222c Ἐπειδὴ ἀπαιτεῖς συνεχῶς ἀπαντῶν, ἑταῖρε Τιμόκρατες, τὰ παρὰ τοῖς δειπνοσοφισταῖς λεγόμενα, καινά τινα νομίζων ἡμᾶς εὑρίσκειν, ὑπομνήσομέν σε τὰ παρὰ Ἀντιφάνει λεγόμενα ἐν Ποιήσει (fr. 189) τόνδε τὸν τρόπον.

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poets are allowed to do and say whatever they like. Athenaeus then adds a fragment from Timocles’ Dionysiazusae, changing the subject from the invention of new plots to the consolations of tragedy (Timocl. fr. 6.8–19 K–A): τοὺς γὰρ τραγῳδοὺς πρῶτον, εἰ βούλει, σκόπει, ὡς ὠφελοῦσι πάντας. ὁ μὲν ὢν γὰρ πένης πτωχότερον αὑτοῦ καταμαθὼν τὸν Τήλεφον γενόμενον ἤδη τὴν πενίαν ῥᾷον φέρει. ὁ νοσῶν τι μανικὸν Ἀλκμέων’ ἐσκέψατο. ὀφθαλμιᾷ τις· εἰσὶ Φινεῖδαι τυφλοί. τέθνηκέ τῳ παῖς · ἡ Νιόβη κεκούφικε. χωλός τις ἐστί· τὸν Φιλοκτήτην ὁρᾷ. γέρων τις ἀτυχεῖ · κατέμαθεν τὸν Οἰνέα. ἅπαντα γὰρ τὰ μείζον’ ἢ πέπονθέ τις ἀτυχήματ’ ἄλλοις γεγονότ’ ἐννοούμενος τὰς αὐτὸς αὐτοῦ συμφορὰς ἧττον στένει (Timocl. fr. 6.8–19) First consider, if you will, how the tragic poets/ benefit everyone. For someone who is poor,/ once he realizes that Telephus was poorer than he is,/ then endures his poverty more easily./One who suffers from madness thinks of Alcmaeon./ Someone has an eye disease? Phineus’ sons are blind./ Someone’s child has died? Niobe can console him./ Someone is a cripple? he looks at Philoctetes./ An old man falls on hard times? he learns about Oineus. / For when a person understands that all the misfortunes / that have happened to other people are worse than his own,/ he will then groan less about his own calamities.

Probably we have here pieces of a quasi-philosophical theory of tragedy, which echo possible attitudes towards fourth-century tragedy. As Rosen 7 has pointed out, Timocles seems to parody these assumptions, deflating high ideas and sentiments by treating them as literal and ascribing base motives to the heroes. This kind of parody is partly based on mimicking the style of literary critics of the time. It seems plausible that, having first listed the consolatory benefits of tragedy, the fragment would then have gone on to mention the corresponding benefits of comedy (cf. v. 8 τοὺς γὰρ τραγῳδοὺς πρῶτον… σκόπει), its main rival among the dramatic genres. 8 Satyr drama would probably not have enjoyed the same status at that period, although satyr plays were performed at dramatic festivals. In Antiphanes’ well-known comic comparison of comedy and tragedy (Poetry, fr. 189

 7 Rosen 2012, 179–182. 8 Cf. Sommerstein 2009, 116–117, who notes that, with the exception of Ar. Th. 157–158 and Com. Adesp. fr. 694, satyr drama is not mentioned in Attic Comedy.

  Kostas Apostolakis K–A) he makes no mention of satyr drama, although this may be due to the fact that the fragment is incomplete. The question here is what Athenaeus is actually trying to say. Wilkins 2000, 31 proposes that the sense of the passage is that, while the author’s own narrative is fact-based and experiential, the speeches he records at his dinners may be partly or wholly invented by the speakers; it is, however, unnecessary for him to make anything up. The Timoclean fragment he cites, which is seemingly unrelated to the preceding quotations, may be chosen because it, too, refers to the tragedian’s method of work. Another possible (though less likely) interpretation might be that the misfortunes of dramatic heroes mentioned by Timocles, used to console the audience for their own woes, are drawn from mythology rather than invented. Athenaeus, thus amusingly comparing himself to a tragic poet, argues that he, too, makes use of existing material, perhaps alluding to the books in his patron’s library, which he narrates to his own audience, the readers of the Deipnosophists. 9 Another example of such a possible shift of focus comes from the thirteenth book, where the deipnosophists discuss the advantages and disadvantages of having sexual relations with different kinds of women. In a long section on invectives against hetaerae (13.567d–571a), the Cynic philosopher Cynulcus attacks his fellow deipnosophist Myrtilus, whom he calls a ‘patron of hetaerae and pornography’ and advises him not to have sex at such an advanced age. In fact, he reverses the original meaning of Philetaerus’ fr. 6 K–A (from The Huntress). Cynulcus then, however, seems to undermine his own argument by citing Timocles’ Men of Marathon (fr. 24 K–A) on the benefits of sexual relations with a young girl. ὅσον τὸ μεταξὺ μετὰ κορίσκης ἢ μετὰ χαμαιτύπης τὴν νύκτα κοιμᾶσθαι. βαβαί, ἡ στιφρότης, τὸ χρῶμα, πνεῦμα, δαίμονες. τὸ μὴ σφόδρ’ εἶναι πάνθ’ ἕτοιμα, δεῖν δέ τι ἀγωνιᾶσαι καὶ ῥαπισθῆναί τε καὶ πληγὰς λαβεῖν ἁπαλαῖσι χερσίν· ἡδύ γε νὴ τὸν Δία τὸν μέγιστον

5

(Timocl. fr. 24) What a big difference there is between spending the night with a young girl and with a prostitute! Damn! The firmness of her flesh! Her complexion and breath! Ye gods! The fact that everything’s not too ready for you, and you have to

 9 Cf. Braund 2000, 3–22; Apostolakis 2019, 54.

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struggle a little, and get slapped and beaten by her soft hands. That’s sweet, by Zeus the greatest!

5

Again, Athenaeus’ argument is somewhat obscure. Cynulcus’ attack on Myrtilus is based on the contrast between young and old, while Timocles describes the delights offered by a free young girl as opposed to a hetaera. To fit this fragment into Athenaeus’ train of thought, we must go back to his earlier citations in the same section (Xenarchus fr. 4 K–A from the Pentathlete and Eubulus fr. 67 K–A from Nannion), to the effect that there is little sense in committing adultery and risking being caught, when one can visit prostitutes instead. The Timoclean fragment may provide a counter to this argument, dwelling on the young girl’s superior physical attributes and contrasting both her age and status to those of the prostitute. The fail to recognize a shift of focus in a string of examples in Athenaeus’ narrative may lead to an erroneous interpretation of the quoted fragments. Such is the case with Ath. 6.242d–f, where Anaxandr. fr. 35 (from Odysseus) is cited. Sandwiched among many fragments in a section on parasites (6.234c–248c), this particular fragment does not mention parasites, but instead contains a long list of Attic nicknames. Accordingly, Gulick 1967, 91 suggests that all these nicknames are applied to parasites. But, while this may be true of some nicknames (e.g. v.9 θεατροποιός), others are not suitable for describing a parasite. Therefore, it seems more probable that it is just the mention of a nickname in the preceding fragment (Alex. fr. 238 K–A) that accounts for the inclusion of Anaxandrides’ fragment in this particular section. 10

 Political satire in deipnological contexts . The fate of a political slogan In a convivial context, Athenaeus as persona loquens addresses his dinner companion Timocrates and promises to give back the leftovers of the deipnosophists, as a sympotic reciprocal offer.

 10 Cf. Millis 2015, 168 (on Anaxandr. fr. 35 K–A).

  Kostas Apostolakis ἀποδίδομέν σοι τὰ τῶν δειπνοσοφιστῶν λείψανα καὶ οὐ δίδομεν, ὡς ὁ Κοθωκίδης φησὶ ῥήτωρ Δημοσθένην χλευάζων, ὃς Φιλίππου Ἀθηναίοις Ἁλόννησον διδόντος συνεβούλευε μὴ λαμβάνειν, εἰ δίδωσιν ἀλλὰ μὴ ἀποδίδωσιν. (Ath. 6.223d) We are giving back the leftovers of the deipnosophists to you, and not simply giving them to you, as the orator from Cothoce says, deriding Demosthenes, who when Philip was offering Halonnesus to the Athenians, advised them not to accept it if Philip was simply giving it to them rather than giving it back.

Apparently these “leftovers” must be connected with that “known material” which Athenaeus has to recount rather than invent from the beginning. Athenaeus notes that he will follow the example of the orator of Cothoce, i.e. Aeschines, when the latter was deriding Demosthenes (6.223d). This is a deipnological adaptation of a rhetorical quip which was probably first delivered in the Athenian Assembly. More specifically, when Philip offered Halonnesus to the Athenians in 342 BC, Demosthenes advised them not to accept it if Philip was simply giving it to them rather than giving it back: Aeschin. 3.83 Ἁλόννησον ἐδίδου · ὁ δ’ ἀπηγόρευε μὴ λαμβάνειν, εἰ δίδωσιν ἀλλὰ μὴ ἀποδίδωσιν, περὶ συλλαβῶν διαφερόμενος “Philip offered to give us Halonnesus; Demosthenes urged us not to accept if he offers to give, not to give back, arguing about syllables”. Timocles exploited this in a scene containing political satire, although in the form of a rhetorical antitheton (fr. 12): (A.) οὐκοῦν κελεύεις νῦν με πάντα μᾶλλον ἢ τὰ προσόντα φράζειν. (Β.) πάνυ γε. (Α.) δράσω τοῦτό σοι. καὶ πρῶτα μέν σοι παύσεται Δημοσθένης ὀργιζόμενος. (Β.) ὁ ποῖος; (Α.) †ὁ Βριάρεως, ὁ τοὺς καταπάλτας τάς τε λόγχας ἐσθίων, μισῶν λόγους ἄνθρωπος οὐδὲ πώποτε ἀντίθετον εἰπὼν οὐδέν, ἀλλ᾽ Ἄρη βλέπων (Timocl. fr. 12) (Α). I see what you mean; you ask me to tell anything except/ what is appropriate. (B.) Just the thing! (A). I will do it for your sake./ This is the first: Demosthenes will stop being / angry with you. (B). Who is Demosthenes? (A) Briareos,/ who swallows catapults and spears,/ this hater of discourse, who never / used a single antithesis in his speech but has a martial stare.

This figure of speech is a paronomasia, a type of pun that Aeschines aptly describes as περὶ συλλαβῶν διαφερόμενος “arguing about syllables” (Aeschin. 1.83). The two characters are engaging in the ironic device of antiphrasis, in which

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the various descriptive features are replaced by their opposites. Thus Demosthenes is described as a warlike giant (Βριάρεως) who hates words (μισόλογος) and rhetorical antitheses; but in fact his true qualities are precisely the reverse. The fervent champion of war is a false Briareus, a cowardly battle-dodger and braggart whose martial ferocity is limited to blustering cries and witticisms directed against Philip. To judge from its frequent appearance in other plays of Middle Comedy, this rhetorical slogan must have been especially popular in Demosthenes’ time. But, while Timocles keeps it within a context of political satire, other poets of his time, Antiphanes, Alexis and Anaxilas, chose to exploit it in scenes including non-political transactions. For example, Alexis in his Stratiotes has the following dialogue between two characters (fr. 212 K–A): ἀπόλαβε τουτί. Β. τί τοῦτο δ’ ἐστίν; Α. ὃ παρ’ ὑμῶν ἐγὼ/ παιδάριον ἔλαβον, ἀποφέρων ἥκω πάλιν./ Β. πῶς; οὐκ ἀρέσκει σοι τρέφειν; Α. οὐκ ἔστι γὰρ/ ἡμέτερον. Β. οὐδ’ ἡμέτερον. Α. ἀλλ’ ἐδώκατε / ὑμεῖς ἐμοὶ τοῦτ’. Β. οὐ δεδώκαμεν. Α. τί δαί; / Β. ἀπεδώκαμεν. Α. τὸ μὴ προσῆκόν μοι λαβεῖν;, “Take this back! (B.) What’s this? (A.) I’ve taken the child I got from you and returned. (B.) Why? Don’t you want to raise it? (A.) No — it’s not ours. (B.) We didn’t give it to you. (A.) What do you mean? (B.) We gave it back. (A.) Something that wasn’t mine to take!”. In Alexis’ poetry, the emblematic slogan has lost its political flavor and is used in a typical recognition scene. The spectators must, of course, have recognized its initial context in order to appreciate this kind of humor. The comparison of Alexis’ and Timocles’ use of dounaiapodounai, combined with Athenaus’ explicit introductory information concerning its origin, may be instructive for other instances of political satire hidden in the new context which Athenaeus composes in his Deipnosophists.

. Thrice from the truth? Telemachus’ pot In a section of Athenaeus’ ninth book, in the course of a discussion about cookpots, the deipnosophist Ulpian addresses his dinner companion Democritus and calls upon him to identify Telemachus and explain the meaning of his famous pot. Ath. 9.407D: καὶ ὁ Οὐλπιανός· ἀλλά με ἀνέμνησας, καλὲ Δημόκριτε, μνησθεὶς χύτρας ποθοῦντα μαθεῖν πολλάκις τίς ἡ Τηλεμάχου καλουμένη χύτρα καὶ τίς ὁ Τηλέμαχος. “And then Ulpian said: Dear Democritus, when you mentioned a cookpot, you reminded me that I often wished to know what the so-called ‘cookpot of Telemachus’ is and who this Telemachus was”. Democritus cites three fragments by Timocles, where Telemachus is always mentioned in reference to a pot or beans: fr. 23 K–A from Lēthē, where someone

  Kostas Apostolakis asks Telemachus to lend him the pot in which he cooks beans, fr. 18 K–A from Ikarioi Satyroi, where Telemachus is again mentioned in reference to a heap of beans, and fr. 7 from Dionysos, where the same Telemachus is said to be carrying a thargēlos cookpot around under his arm. Democritus apparently takes the content of these fragments at face value, and concludes that Telemachus had an appetite for beans. Similarly, Eustathius reproduces this interpretation and we read in his commentary on the Odyssey (p. 1394.24) that Telemachus himself would always eat a pot of beans: ὅς φασι κυάμων χύτραν ἀεὶ σιτούμενος ἦν. Some modern scholars have also taken it for granted that Telemachus was a notorious kyamophagos, a bean-eater, and have proceeded to completely arbitrary speculations. Coppola 1927, 457 believed that Telemachus was a seller of beans who promoted his product for profit, whereas Edmonds 1959, 607 suggests that Telemachus organized soup kitchens for the people at which legumes were served. It seems, therefore, that we have here a case where the original meaning of the mysterious “Telemachus’ pot” is buried under two different strata, first the comic and then the deipnological one, and it is worthwhile to attempt to find an answer. Let us first consider Timocl. fr. 7 K–A: Α. ὁ δ’ Ἀχαρνικὸς Τηλέμαχος ἔτι δημηγορεῖ; Β. οὗτος δ’ ἔοικε τοῖς νεωνήτοις Σύροις. Α. πῶς; ἢ τί πράττων; βούλομαι γὰρ εἰδέναι. Β. θάργηλον (Meineke: θανατηγὸν Α) ἀγκάλῃ χύτραν φέρει (Timocl. fr. 7) A. Is Telemachus the Acharnian still speaking in public?/ B. This one is like newly bought Syrians./ A. In what way? What is he doing? I want to know./ B. He is carrying around his thargēlos pot under his arm.

The content of the surviving fragment of Dionysos is clearly political, since the first interlocutor asks the second whether Telemachus is still speaking in the Assembly. It is therefore a plausible inference that the answer must correspond to the frame of the question. Unfortunately, the answer is not enlightening. Telemachus is compared to newly bought Syrians, in the sense that he is carrying around his thargēlos pot under his arm. He is associated with Syrian slaves, to the extent that his (supposedly) beloved beans are compared with καταχύσματα, i.e. sweetmeats, nuts, figs, etc., which were thrown over the heads of newly-purchased slaves when they entered their new home. Far more difficult is the supposed clarification of the last line (v.4), which includes a corrupt text: θάργηλος

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(Meineke’s almost certain correction of the unmetrical θανατηγόν), which is interpreted by Hesychius as “a pot of a sacred boiled food”. 11 Thanks to inscriptional evidence we can identify Telemachus as a historical personality and form an idea of his activities. He was a known politician of the time, who was sometimes involved in discussions at the Assembly concerning the crucial matter of corn provision in Athens. He was probably an orator specializing in these matters. In 328/7 BC he proposed a decree in honor of the merchant Heracleides of Salamis, as an euergetēs, because he had donated 3,000 drachmas to Athens to buy corn. 12 Wilamowitz argues that the orator Telemachus may have suggested that Athenians should change their diet due to the corn shortage and eat beans instead, the traditional staple of Attica, following the practices of the Pyanopsia festival: “audire mihi videor Telemachum, stultum oratorem, … gravissimis verbis famelicos cives exhortantem, ut maiorum temperantiam imitati ad χύτραν Chytrorum et κυάμους Pyanopsiorum redirent” (Wilamowitz 1962, 690). Telemachus was also associated with his fellow-orator Lycurgus. The Austrian epigraphist Adolf Wilhelm argued in 1911 that the posthumous recipient of the twelve honorary decrees in IG II2 3207, col.2 (307/6 BC) was Lycurgus of Boutadai, who reached the height of his political career in 336–325 BC. One decree commemorates the awarding of a crown by “the tribesmen”, at the proposal of Telemachus of Acharnai. 13 Lycurgus and Telemachus were both from the tribe of the Oineis, as indicated by the latter’s deme. Lycurgus, in his capacity as manager of the public revenue, has been associated with the reform of the Athenian festivals. 14 Moreover, one of the surviving fragments from his speech Against Menesaechmus (fr. 14.2–3 Conomis), includes a mention of the Pyanopsia, a festival in honor of Apollo, where dishes of cooked

 11 Hsch. θ 106.1 θάργηλος · χύτρα ἱεροῦ ἑψήματος; θ 104.5 καὶ ὁ θάργηλος χύτρα ἐστὶν ἀνάπλεως σπερμάτων. 12 (IG 2 III/II 2.5.879b 28–34= SIG3 304,29.48) Τηλέμαχος Θεαγγέλου Ἀχαρνεὺς εἶπεν · ἐπειδὴ Ἡρακλείδης Σαλαμίνιος ἐπέδωκεν τὸν σῖτον τῷ δήμῳ πεντέδραχμον …ἐψηφίσθαι τὸν δῆμον ἐπαινέσαι Ἡρακλείδην Χαρικλείδου Σαλαμίνιον καὶ στεφανῶσαι αὐτὸν χρυσῷ στεφάνῳ φιλοτιμίας ἕνεκα τῆς εἰς τὸν δῆμον τῶν Ἀθηναίων), “Telemachus the son of Theangelus of Acharnai proposed: since Heracleides of Salamina was the first of the merchants who subsidized the corn for the Athenian deme with five drachmas… the Assembly should vote to praise Heracleides the son of Charicleides of Salamis and bestow on him a golden crown for his generosity towards the Assembly of the Athenians”. 13 Inscribed version of the decree honoring Lycurgus of Boutadai: IG II2 3207, col.2 (307/6 BC): Tηλέμαχος Ἀχαρνεύς εἶπεν: Crown n. 8 “Telemachus of Acharnae proposed”. 14 For Lycurgus’ well-attested religious administration cf. Parker 1996, 242–255.

  Kostas Apostolakis beans (πύανα) were offered. 15 We may also take into account that Athenaeus probably does not have at his disposal the integral text of the comic plays from which he draws his material, but he may have read more text than we do, or, alternatively, he may exploit explanatory comments from the anthologies he uses. In this context, Timocl. fr. 18 might be helpful. This fragment comes from a section of Athenaus’ Deipnosophists (9.407d–408a), where Democritus explains to his fellow-diner Ulpianus the meaning of Telemachus’ pot. Our fragment is preceded by Timocles’ fr. 23 K–A (from Lēthē) and fr. 7 K–A (from Dionysos), where the focus is “the so-called ‘pot of Telemachus’”, and is followed by Com. Adesp. fr. 118 K–A and Henioch. fr. 4 K–A. All Timocles’ fragments mention Telemachus and his pot of beans. This fragment, however, is also closer to the two following, which seem to deal with flatulence as a side-effect of excessive consumption of beans: ὥστ’ ἔχειν οὐδὲν παρ’ ἡμῖν. νυκτερεύσας δ’ ἀθλίως πρῶτα μὲν σκληρῶς καθηῦδον, εἶτα Θούδιππος βδέων παντελῶς ἔπνιξεν ἡμᾶς, εἶθ’ ὁ λιμὸς ἥπτετο. † ἐφέρετο πρὸς Δίωνα τὸν διάπυρον · ἀλλὰ γὰρ οὐδ’ ἐκεῖνος οὐδὲν εἶχε. πρὸς δὲ τὸν χρηστὸν δραμὼν Τηλέμαχον Ἀχαρνέα σωρόν τε κυάμων καταλαβὼν ἁρπάσας τούτων ἐνέτραγον. 〈ὁ〉 δ’ ὄνος ἡμᾶς ὡς ὁρᾷ ὁ 〈 〉 Κηφισόδωρος περὶ τὸ βῆμα ἐπέρδετο

5

(Timocl. fr. 18)

So that we had nothing with us. In addition, I spent a miserable night./ First I was trying to sleep on a hard bed; then Thudippus was farting/ and completely suffocated us; and I was starving./ Then, † it was brought to the red-hot Dion, but/ even he did not have anything. Afterwards I ran to Telemachus,/ that Acharnian who is a bit simple, I found a heap of beans,/ I grabbed some and ate them. But the donkey, when he saw us,/ 〈 〉 Cephisodorus started farting around the speaker’s platform.

Thus the crude joke cited by Athenaeus about Telemachus and the Pyanopsia, (9.407e ἐκ τούτων δῆλόν ἐστιν ὅτι Τηλέμαχος κυάμων χύτρας ἀεὶ σιτούμενος ἦγε Πυανέψια πορδὴν ἑορτήν “it is clear from these incidents that Telemachus, always feeding himself on pots of beans, celebrated the Pyanepsia as a festival of farts”), which is taken sometimes as an adespoton comic fragment, may find a meaning. 16 Should we suspect that the adjective χρηστός in Timocl. fr.18.5 alludes

 15 Cf. Apostolakis 2019, 71–74. 16 Cf. Meineke 1840, 604 ad loc.: “χρηστόν dicit fort. fatuum”.

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to his ineffective policy concerning food supplies, which is associated with his emblematic pot? 17

. Mocking new-comers: Chaerephilus and his sons In the very same section of Athenaeus’ Deipnosophists, where Democritus discusses Telemachus’ pot with his fellow-dinner Ulpian (9.407d), Timocles’ fr. 23 K–A from Lēthē is quoted. A character narrates an entertaining scene which probably takes place in the market. A person (a parasite?) seems to be looking for some utensils, apparently emblematic of their holders’ activities. μετὰ τοῦτον αὐτῷ Τηλέμαχος συνετύγχανε. καὶ τοῦτον ἀσπασάμενος ἡδέως πάνυ ἔπειτα “χρῆσόν μοι σύ, φησί, τὰς χύτρας ἐν αἷσιν ἕψεις τοὺς κυάμους.” καὶ ταῦτά τε εἴρητο καὶ παριόντα Φείδιππον πάνυ τὸν Χαιρεφίλου πόρρωθεν ἀπιδὼν τὸν παχὺν ἐπόππυσ’, εἶτ’ ἐκέλευσε πέμπειν σαργάνας (Timocl. fr. 23) After this man, Telemachus chanced to meet him./ He embraced him with great pleasure,/ and then said, ‘You loan me the pots,/ in which you cook your beans’. That’s what he said;/ and then he beheld from a long distance away/ Chaerephilus’ fat son Pheidippus passing by,/ and he smacked his lips at him and ordered him to send baskets.

This scene may recall the famine, since a starving citizen asks Telemachus for his famous pot (χύτρα) and Pheidippus for baskets (σαργάνας).The first person we encounter is Telemachus, while the second is Pheidippus, who was salt-fish dealer. 18 Pheidippus “the fat” and his baskets allude to his profession. Both Pheidippus and his father Chaerephilus were probably awarded citizenship due to their services to Athens during a period of corn shortage (330–327 BC); 19 cf. Ath. 3.119f τοσαύτην δ’ Ἀθηναῖοι σπουδὴν ἐποιοῦντο περὶ τὸ τάριχος, ὡς καὶ πολίτας ἀναγράψαι τοὺς Χαιρεφίλου τοῦ ταριχοπώλου υἱούς, ὥς φησιν Ἄλεξις ἐν Ἐπιδαύρῳ (fr. 77) “the Athenians were so eager for saltfish that they enrolled the sons  17 Ioannis Konstantakos reminds me that in the 1950s the cartoonist Phokion Demetriades always used to depict the minister Konstantinos Tsatsos with a chicken, because he had forbidden the performance of Aristophanes’ Birds. 18 Cf. Timocl. fr. 16 K–A, where two of the sons of Chaerephilus are called σαπέρδαι. 19 Arnott 1996, 69; cf. Worthington 2000, 296–298.

  Kostas Apostolakis of Chaerephilus the saltfish-seller as citizens, as Alexis says in Epidaurus”. Naturalized citizens were often treated with suspicion, especially when they were involved in public offices. Pheidippus, in particular, appears to have been a trierarch in 323 BC (IG II2.1631.622). 20 In this case Timocles’ satire probably has one further adjacent target. Chaerephilus and his sons were naturalized thanks to Demosthenes, who proposed the relevant decree. 21 It is noteworthy that they were registered in the deme of Paiania, according to the established practice of recording new citizens in the deme of their patron. 22 But the proposal was considered suspect, and Dinarchus accused Demosthenes of accepting bribes to perform the task. 23 Hyperides, on the other hand, who is satirized in Timocl. fr. 17 K–A as a fish-rich river, seems to have written two speeches in defence of Chaerephilus and his activities entitled Ὑπὲρ Χαιρεφίλου περὶ τοῦ ταρίχους (orr. 61 and 62, frr. 181–191 Jensen); cf. Harp. S.v. καταχειροτονία: παρά τε Δημοσθένει … καὶ Ὑπερείδῃ ἐν τῷ Ὑπὲρ Χαιρεφίλου περὶ τοῦ ταρίχους. The accusation refers to Demosthenes downgrading the citizens’ body for personal gain, by naturalizing metics who plied humble trades. The above fragment may allude to the general skepticism about the role of newcomer citizens and that of politicians. The ironic search for the pot and the basket, two utensils devoid of content, hints at unfulfilled promises made by those politicians charged with securing food supplies. It is also possible that the references are oblique attacks on Demosthenes himself, who was a patron of Chaerephilus and his sons. 24 He thus bore some of the prejudice  20 In Alex. fr. 221 K–A Pheidippus is described as a foreigner and an importer of salted fish: Φείδιππος ἕτερός τις ταριχηγὸς ξένος. This allusion however, is not necessarily dated prior to his becoming an Athenian citizen, as comic poets might satirise a new citizen’s origins even after his naturalisation (Arnott 1996, 70). Chaerephilus’ sons may be described as σκόμβροι ἐν τοῖς σατύροις for the same reason (Alex. fr. 77 K–A). Such scornful remarks on newcomers through naturalisation are probably not uncommon in fourth-century Athenian society. The case of Apollodorus, the so-called ‘eleventh orator’, is indicative (cf. especially the speech Against Polycles [Dem.] 50). 21 Χαιρέφιλος Παιανιεύς (PAA 975710; APF 15187; Osborne, Naturalization T 75) was a largescale importer of processed fish, called a ταριχοπώλης in Ath. 3.119f; 8.339d. On Chaerephilus and his sons cf. Timocl. frr. 15 and 16 K–A, where Pheidippus and Pamphilus appear as lovers of the courtesan Pythionice. See Davies 1971, 430, 566–567. 22 See Worthington 1992, 203. 23 Din. 1.41–43 ἀπὸ ποίων ψηφισμάτων οὗτος ἢ ποίων νόμων οὐκ εἴληφεν ἀργύριον; …εἴπατέ μοι πρὸς Διὸς ὦ ἄνδρες, προῖκα τοῦτον οἴεσθε … ποιῆσαι πολίτας ὑμετέρους Χαιρέφιλον καὶ Φείδωνα καὶ Πάμφιλον καὶ Φείδιππον… 24 In 328 BC Demosthenes was a corn commissioner (σιτώνης); (cf. Dem. 34.38–39; 18.248; Aeschin. 3.159; Din. 1.80–81). Webster’s (1970, 47) interesting but unsupported hypothesis is that Demosthenes was collaborating with Telemachus, meaning that the former is the intended target of Timocles’ satire, as in Dēlos and Hērōes (cf. Apostolakis 2019 on frr. 4 and 12).

Increasing Comic Fragmentation: Some Aspects of Text Re-uses in Athenaeus  

and discontent Athenians felt towards wholesale dealers of fish. 25 Both the proposer Demosthenes and Chaerephilus’ family faced Athenian suspicion (cf. Din. 1.43 with Worthington 1992 ad loc, p. 203), and it may be no accident that they are repeatedly satirized by Timocles. 26

 Conclusion In this paper I have attempted to suggest some indicative mechanisms of quoting comic fragments in the Deipnosophists, which may tentatively be described as “shifting the focus”, or “adapting political slogans to a culinary context”. Concerning the first practice, what at first sight appears to be a careless shifting of focus might be explained as a conscious — although latent — association with the main thread of the deipnological narrative. On the other hand, pieces of political satire survive in Athenaeus’ narrative. Detached from their contemporary political life, these ‘de-contextualized’ pieces are transformed and embedded in a timeless deipnological and sympotic environment. For the researcher of political satire, in particular, the detachment of the cited fragments from their new contexts is a necessary step before proceeding to an interpretative attempt. This process may include the reverse move from deipnological context towards the cited comic fragments and then to the initial environment where the satirized policy was produced, which may be helpful for any attempt at interpretation.

Bibliography Apostolakis, K. (2019), Timokles, Fragmenta Comica 21, Göttingen. Arnott, W.G. (1996), Alexis: The Fragments. A Commentary, Cambridge. Braund, D. (2000), “Learning, Luxury and Empire: Athenaeus’ Roman Patron”, in: D. Braund/ J. Wilkins (eds), Athenaeus and his World: Reading Greek Culture in the Roman Empire, Exeter, 3–22. Coppola, G. (1927), “Per la Storia della Commedia Greca: Timocles Ateniese e Difilo di Sinope”, RFIC 55.5, 453–467. Dalby, A. (2000), “Lynceus and the anecdotists”, in: D. Braund/J. Wilkins (eds), Athenaeus and his World: Reading Greek Culture in the Roman Empire, Exeter, 372–394.

 25 The hatred they felt for market fishmongers is comparable. Cf. Alex. frr. 130 and 131 with Arnott 1996. 26 Pheidippus and his brothers: Timocl. frr. 15 and 16.

  Kostas Apostolakis Davies, J.K. (1971), Athenian Propertied Families 600–300 B.C., Oxford. Edmonds, J.M. (1959), The Fragments of Attic Comedy, II, Leiden. Gulick, C.B. (1967), Athenaeus III, Cambridge. Meineke, A. (1840), Fragmenta Comicorum Graecorum, III Berlin. Millis, B.W. (2015), Anaxandrides, Fragmenta Comica 17, Heidelberg. Nesselrath, H.G. (1990), Die attische Mittlere Komödie. Ihre Stellung in der antiken Literaturkritik und Literaturgeschichte, Berlin/New York. Nesselrath, H.G. (2010), “Comic Fragments: Transmission and Textual Criticism”, in: G.W. Dobrov (ed.), Brill’s Companion to the study of Greek Comedy, Leiden/Boston, 423–454. Marshall, C.W./Kovacs, G. (eds) (2012), No Laughing Matter: Studies in Athenian Comedy, London. Nothers, Th. (1998), Athenaios. Das Gelehrtenmahl. Buch I-VI, Stuttgart. Papachrysostomou, A. (2016), Amphis, Fragmenta Comica 20, Heidelberg. Parker, R. (1996), Athenian Religion: A History, Oxford. Rosen, R.M. (2012), “Timocles’ fr. 6 K–A and the Parody of Greek Literary Theory”, in: C.W. Marshall/G. Kovacs (eds), No Laughing Matter: Studies in Athenian Comedy, London, 177–86. Sommerstein, A.H. (2009), Talking about Laughter, Oxford. Steinhausen, J. (1910), Κωμῳδούμενοι, Bonn. Wilkins, J. (2000), “Dialogue and Comedy: The Structure of the Deipnosophistae”, in: D. Braund/ J. Wilkins (eds), Athenaeus and his World: Reading Greek Culture in the Roman Empire, Exeter, 23–38. Whitmarsh, T. (2000), “The Politics and Poetics of Parasitism. Athenaeus on Parasites and Flatterers”, in: D. Braund/J. Wilkins (eds), Athenaeus and his World: Reading Greek Culture in the Roman Empire, Exeter, 304–315. Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, U. (1962), Kleine Schriften, IV, Berlin [= (1889), Commentariolum Grammaticum IV, Göttingen]. Worthington, I. (1992), A Historical Commentary on Dinarchus. Rhetoric and Conspiracy in Later Fourth Century Athens, Michigan. Worthington, I. (2000), “The date of Chaerephilus’ Citizenship”, ZPE 130, 296–298.

Athina Papachrysostomou

πλῆθος ὅσον ἰχθύων ... ἐπὶ πινάκων ἀργυρῶν (Ath. 6.224b): A Different Kettle of Fish Fragmentation — both as a consciously applied technique already known and extensively exercised in antiquity and as an incidental result of huge losses in manuscript tradition — constitutes a literary phenomenon / procedure (at times, a scholarly tool as well) of paramount importance, which plays a key role in modern-day research and has been receiving growing attention in the past recent years. 1 The present study focuses on the (thematically intriguing) triad of Athenaeus, fish, and comic fragments, in an attempt (i) to explore the inherently dramaturgic dynamics of both the fragmentation procedure and the fragmentary material, with regard to the literary notions of dissociation and cohesion, and (ii) to evince the overwhelming impact of fragmentation upon our perception / interpretation of surviving literary material. The fragmentarily surviving comic satire against fishmongers (preserved in Athenaeus’ Deipnosophistae Book 6, 224b–228c) constitutes the working material for the present study’s purpose. In this regard, fragmentation needs to be methodologically acknowledged as a procedure, which (a) was consciously carried out already in antiquity (whether by Athenaeus or a precedent compiler), and (b) entailed the twin processes of both dissociation and cohesion; i.e. the material was first excerpted / dissociated from the original work and was subsequently reassembled into a new cohesive ensemble, where it automatically received a whole new status, new contextualized connotations, and altered significance / specific weight.

 1 The ongoing “KomFrag” project (“Kommentierung der Fragmente der griechischen Komödie”: https://www.altphil.uni-freiburg.de/komfrag), funded by the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences, arguably constitutes the strongest and most substantial proof of the current, zealous interest in fragments within the academic community. The challenges for scholars dealing with fragments are discussed by Arnott 2000a. For further, trenchant discussions about fragments (e.g. methodological issues, hermeneutic challenges, etc.), see exempli gratia the collected volume Collecting Fragments-Fragmente sammeln, edited by G.W. Most in 1997 (especially the contribution by A.C. Dionisotti, “On Fragments in Classical Scholarship”, 1–33), and the collected volume The Classical Commentary: Histories, Practices, Theory, edited by R.K. Gibson & C.S. Kraus in 2002 (especially the contribution by S. Stephens, “Commenting on Fragments”, 67–88). https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-032

  Athina Papachrysostomou Given Athenaeus’ key role in the present analysis, the need for a brief discussion of (aspects of) his work suggests itself. As is universally acknowledged, Athenaeus’ Deipnosophistae is an invaluable work, for it constitutes a vast pool of quotations from practically every single literary genre; most importantly, in many cases Athenaeus is the only source for the text he preserves. Regarding his trustworthiness, it is generally agreed that he made every effort to assure the authenticity and correctness of his quotations (in terms of both context and content); besides, he probably had first-hand knowledge of literary material both in his hometown of Naucratis (a renowned place for intellectuals) and in Rome, where he had access to well-equipped private libraries (like the one owned by Larensis, the host of the symposion described in Deipnosophistae). Besides, during Athenaeus’ lifetime (late second — early third century AD), and also during the entire Second Sophistic period, anthologies, compendia, and compilations of excerpts were hugely popular; accordingly, it is reasonable to assume that Athenaeus used various such intermediary sources, while — in parallel — he directly excerpted material from original works (understandably, we cannot establish in any individual case whether a particular citation comes from a primary or a secondary source). 2 Throughout the narration of the supposedly recently held banquet described in Deipnosophistae, the serving of foodstuffs as well as other, non-food related, stimuli incite the dining polymaths to engage in a rivalry of scholarly quotations, apposite to each given occasion. For instance, when the sound of a hydraulis (water organ) is heard from a neighbouring house (4.174a), the banqueters turn their attention and erudition to it, and a spirited discussion sets off, which extends to all kinds of wind-, string-, and percussion instruments and further entails the quotation of all sorts of fragments (historic, philosophic, lyric, comic). This is a brief, albeit typical example of how Athenaeus engages with fragmentation and simultaneously practises both dissociation and cohesion of literary material; on one hand, he pulls out / dissociates the individual fragments from their original context, whilst on the other hand he compiles a cohesive ensemble, a treatise on the water organ in this case, which draws on more than one literary genre. Thus, Athenaeus provides his Second Sophistic audience with compact treatises on a

 2 On Athenaeus’ value as a reservoir of fragmentary material, his sources, his methods of quotation, his modus scribendi, etc., see the collected volume Athenaeus and His World, edited by D. Braund/J. Wilkins in 2000 (featuring numerous contributions that offer thorough analyses of several issues), Rudolph 1891, Düring 1936, Lukinovich 1990, Nesselrath 1990, 65–79, Jacob 2013, and Murray 2015. For a detailed discussion of the difficulties / controversy of using Athenaeus as a source, see Dalby 1996, 176–179. On Athenaeus’ manuscript tradition, see Arnott 2000b.

πλῆθος ὅσον ἰχθύων ... ἐπὶ πινάκων ἀργυρῶν  

large number of subjects; from bread types to sesame-cakes and from wine varieties to arrogant cooks, braggart soldiers, and emancipated hetairai. Food (often in the form of lengthy food catalogues extracted from Comedy) 3 naturally dominates the erudite conversations among the group of Athenaeus’ banqueters. The highlight of Book 6 is the serving of fish (224b): ἐπεισῆλθον οὖν ἡμῖν παῖδες πλῆθος ὅσον ἰχθύων φέροντες θαλασσίων λιμναίων τε ἐπὶ πινάκων ἀργυρῶν, ὡς θαυμάσαι μετὰ τοῦ πλούτου καὶ τὴν πολυτέλειαν (“slaves entered the room, bringing us such a quantity of saltwater and freshwater fish on silver platters that we were astonished both at our host’s wealth and at how much had been spent”). 4 Athenaeus emphatically observes that (6.224c) τῶν ἐν τῇ Ῥώμῃ ἴσον ἴσῳ τῶν τὸν ἰχθὺν πωλούντων … οἱ γὰρ ἐν τῇ Ῥώμῃ ἰχθυοπῶλαι οὐδ᾿ ὀλίγον ἀποδέουσι τῶν κατὰ τὴν Ἀττικήν ποτε κωμῳδηθέντων (“the people in Rome sell fish for their weight in silver … the fish-sellers in Rome are not much different from those in Attica who were attacked once upon a time in comedy”). Thenceforth, and on account of this last remark, there begins one of the most exhaustive and lengthiest string of fragments (eighteen in total) within Athenaeus’ entire work, all of which pertain to fishmongers. Throughout Greek Comedy (and beyond, throughout the gastronomically oriented catalogue poetry, e.g. Archestratus), fish is a most commonly recurring foodstuff that grows into a comic topos. Comedy abounds in all kinds of fish imagery; shopping for fish, ways of cooking it, consuming it, even getting a nickname out of one’s passion for it — just like the fourth-century politician Callimedon (PAA 558185) who was nicknamed Κάραβος (Crayfish; cf. Alex. fr. 57, Antiph. fr. 27, Euphro fr. 8). There is also a comic play by Archippus 5 called Ἰχθύες (Fishes), with twenty-one surviving fragments. Comedy’s treatment of fish as a madly sought-after delicacy (cf. how Dicaeopolis goes into raptures over an eel in Ar. Ach. 885–894) closely reflects Comedy’s contemporary reality. Within the

 3 Food (in any form) is part and parcel of the comic discourse throughout Greek Comedy (cf. Gilula 1995b, Wilkins 2000 passim). The food-catalogue / food-list is a conspicuous comic topos, ubiquitously featuring in Middle and New Comedy, but also — intermittently — during the period of Old. For analysis of some individual examples of this motif see Gilula 2000 (on Hermipp. fr. 63), Gilula 1995a and Papachrysostomou 2008, 186–210 (on Mnesim. fr. 4). 4 For all ancient Greek texts I use the English translation of the Loeb Classical Library series (slightly adapted on a few occasions), unless otherwise stated. 5 Archippus’ life and career straddle both centuries, fifth and fourth. Recorded — rather uncritically — by Suda as a poet of Old Comedy, Archippus won his first victory in the late 5th century (415/412 BC). Miccolis (2017, 11–13) points out Archippus’ strong thematic affiliations with Middle Comedy and convincingly registers him as a representative of the latter period.

  Athina Papachrysostomou Athenian society fish was considered to be the luxury food par excellence (cf. Davidson 1997, 11–20, Wilkins 2000, 293–304); as a result, ostentatious consumption of fish was regarded as an arrogant display of wealth and (political) power and could even be associated with tyrannical propensities, as Ar. Vesp. 495 suggests: οὗτος ὀψωνεῖν ἔοιχ’ ἅνθρωπος ἐπὶ τυραννίδι (“this man seems to be buying fish with an eye on tyranny”). 6 However, Athenaeus’ series of comic quotations in Book 6 is a different kettle of fish; and this is what makes the present case worth studying. These comic fragments share (a) the accident of chronology (they belong to either Middle or New Comedy), and (b) a strong feeling of antipathy against fishmongers 7 (which shows in various ways). In these fragments, fishmongers are unanimously portrayed as wicked and arrogant individuals, who have one single goal: to amass huge riches. They are described charging preposterously high prices for their ware and using scheming ways (e.g. sale of rotten fish) to deceive their clients and thus increase their profit. The satire exercised by the comic playwrights against the fishmongers is extremely sharp, almost hostile. 8 Arguably, the term “satire” may not even be accurate or strong enough to describe this “attack” (better say, “polemic”) against this professional group. Although Athenaeus employs the verb κωμῳδέω in his text (6.224c κωμῳδηθέντων), Loeb’s English translation (by D. Olson) features the term attack, and with good reason. Apparently, the satire against fishmongers was not meant to be anodyne or simply “funny”, but this is rather what Halliwell defines as vulgar laughter, expressive of hostility, in the sense of deriding, laughing down someone: καταγελᾶν (as opposed to playful and sophisticated laughter that involves only a pretence of ridicule). 9 In order to fully comprehend the quintessence and extent of — and eventually evaluate — the impact of Comedy’s caustic satire against fishmongers, it is methodologically necessary that we delve into the content and language of these eighteen fragments by undertaking a close-reading of them all. The first item in Athenaeus’ compilation is Antiphanes fr. 164; the speaker preposterously compares the feeling — and impact — of looking at the fish prices to the paralyzing effect of making eye-contact with the legendary and monstrous Gorgons.  6 For the socio-political implications of fish consumption see Davidson 1993 and 1995. For a collection of testimonies regarding fishing and the sale of fish, see Bohlen 1937, 20–25. 7 With perhaps one exception, Anaxandr. fr. 34 (no. 15 in Athenaeus’ list), ubi vide. 8 Nesselrath (1990, 291) argues that it was Antiphanes the first one who introduced this thematic pattern into Comedy. On the Athenian market-place as seen through the comic lens, see Wilkins 2000, 164–175 (esp. on fishmongers see pp. 168–169, 296–299). 9 Halliwell 2014, 190–192. Cf. Halliwell 2008, 206–263.

πλῆθος ὅσον ἰχθύων ... ἐπὶ πινάκων ἀργυρῶν  

 Antiphanes fr. 164 (ap. Ath. 6.224c–d) ἐγὼ τέως μὲν ᾠόμην τὰς Γοργόνας εἶναί τι λογοποίημα, πρὸς ἀγορὰν δ᾿ ὅταν ἔλθω, πεπίστευκ᾿· ἐμβλέπων γὰρ αὐτόθι τοῖς ἰχθυοπώλαις, λίθινος εὐθὺς γίγνομαι, ὥστ᾿ ἐξ ἀνάγκης ἔστ᾿ ἀποστραφέντι μοι λαλεῖν πρὸς αὐτούς. ἂν ἴδω γὰρ ἡλίκον ἰχθὺν ὅσου τιμῶσι, πήγνυμαι σαφῶς Before this, I thought the Gorgons were a fairytale; but, whenever I enter the marketplace, I believe in them. When I look at the fish-sellers there, I immediately turn to stone, and I have to turn my head away, when I talk to them. Because, if I see how much they’re charging for a miniscule fish, I am outright paralyzed

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Next, there come Amphis fr. 30 and Alexis fr. 16. In both cases the speaker accuses the fishmongers (a) of immoderate and undeserved arrogance, as he compares their attitude to that of the Generals, whose haughtiness is justifiable (given their high office and repute) and less pungent than the fishmongers’; and (b) of charging exorbitantly high prices. To evince his points the comic character cites — in both fragments — a typical dialogue between a fishmonger and a client. Apart from the high prices recorded, the fishmongers employ informal and colloquial language (featuring aphaeresis and syllable dropping), another symptom of their rude, dismissive attitude. Revealing of the speaker’s antipathy towards the fishmongers is the usage of the Homeric epithet ἀνδροφόνος (“killer”, “man-slayer”) by Amphis, in order to — metaphorically — describe fishmongers as being collectively cunning, deceptive, and voracious. This is by far the most malevolent description of fishmongers ever recorded in Comedy; Amphis also calls them καταράτους (“damned”; line 4), while Alexis describes them as κάκιστ’ ἀπολούμενοι (“damned to perish in the worst possible way”; line 5). 10

 10 For further analysis of Amph. fr. 30, see Papachrysostomou 2016, 190–203; for Alex. fr. 16, see Arnott 1996, 98–102. Nesselrath (1990, 294) discusses the conspicuous convergence between these two comic fragments.

  Athina Papachrysostomou

 Amphis fr. 30 (ap. Ath. 6.224d–e) πρὸς τοὺς στρατηγοὺς ῥᾷόν ἐστιν μυρίαις μοίραις προσελθόντ’ ἀξιωθῆναι λόγου λαϐεῖν τ’ ἀπόκρισιν ἂν ἐπερωτᾷ τις ἢ πρὸς τοὺς καταράτους ἰχθυοπώλας ἐν ἀγορᾷ. οὓς ἂν ἐπερωτήσῃ τις λαϐών τι τῶν παρακειμένων, ἔκυψεν ὥσπερ Τήλεφος πρῶτον σιωπῇ (καὶ δικαίως τοῦτό γε· ἅπαντες ἀνδροφόνοι γάρ εἰσιν ἑνὶ λόγῳ), ὡσεὶ προσήκων δ’ οὐδὲν οὐδ’ ἀκηκοὼς ἔκρουσε πουλύπουν τιν’· ὁ δ’ ἐπρήσθη x – ∪ – x καὶ τότ’ οὐ λαλῶν ὅλα τὰ ῥήματ’, ἀλλὰ συλλαϐὴν ἀφελὼν “τάρων βολῶν γένοιτ’ ἄν·” “ἡ δὲ κέστρα;” “κτὼ βολῶν.” τοιαῦτ’ ἀκοῦσαι δεῖ τὸν ὀψωνοῦντά τι

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It is infinitely easier to come before the generals and obtain a hearing and receive an answer to whatever one inquires about, than it is to approach the damned fishmongers in the market. Whenever someone, picking up something of the wares on 5 display, asks them a question, he hangs his head like Telephus in silence first (and they do this with reason; for, to put it in a word, they are all murderers), and, as if he had nothing to do with it, nor had he heard a word, he pounds an octopus, which tenses up a little. 10 … and then, without pronouncing his words entire, but clipping some syllables, “It would cost you fo’ obols”. “And this barracuda?” “Eigh’ obols”. This is what a fish-buyer must hear. (Text and Translation by A. Papachrysostomou)

 Alexis fr. 16 (ap. Ath. 6.224f–225a) τοὺς μὲν στρατηγοὺς τὰς ὀφρῦς ἐπὰν ἴδω ἀνεσπακότας, δεινὸν μὲν ἡγοῦμαι ποιεῖν, οὐ πάνυ τι θαυμάζω δὲ προτετιμημένους ὑπὸ τῆς πόλεως μεῖζόν τι τῶν ἄλλων φρονεῖν. τοὺς δ’ ἰχθυοπώλας τοὺς κάκιστ’ ἀπολουμένους ἐπὰν ἴδω κάτω βλέποντας, τὰς δ’ ὀφρῦς ἔχοντας ἐπάνω τῆς κορυφῆς, ἀποπνίγομαι.

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πλῆθος ὅσον ἰχθύων ... ἐπὶ πινάκων ἀργυρῶν  

ἐὰν δ’ ἐρωτήσῃς “πόσου τοὺς κεστρέας πωλεῖς δύ’ ὄντας; ” “δέκ’ ὀβολῶν” φησίν. “βαρύ· ὀκτὼ λάβοις ἄν;” “εἴπερ ὠνεῖ τὸν ἕτερον.” “ὦ ’τᾶν, λαβὲ καὶ μὴ παῖζε.” “τοσουδί; παράτρεχε.” ταῦτ’ οὐχὶ πικρότερ’ ἐστὶν αὐτῆς τῆς χολῆς;

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Whenever I see the generals giving people rude looks, I think they are behaving terribly, although I am not too surprised that men who have been awarded high honors by the city are a little prouder than others. But when I see the damned fish-sellers 5 staring at the ground, as stuck up as they can be, it makes me choke. If you ask “How much are you selling the two gray mullets for?”, he says “Ten obols.” “Ouch! Would you take eight?” “If you buy the other one too.” 10 “Take the money, buddy, and don’t fool around.” “That’s the price; run along!” Isn’t this bitterer than gall itself?

The next fragment is Diphilus fr. 67, where fishmongers are visualized as wild beasts (θηρία) and collectively considered as a treacherous breed (ἐπίβουλον γένος) by nature, who deceive their clients by mixing up Attic and Aeginetan coinage.

 Diphilus fr. 67 (ap. Ath. 6.225a–b) ᾤμην ἐγὼ τοὺς ἰχθυοπώλας τὸ πρότερον εἶναι πονηροὺς τοὺς Ἀθήνησιν μόνους. τόδε δ᾿, ὡς ἔοικε, τὸ γένος ὥσπερ θ η ρ ί ω ν ἐ π ί β ο υ λ ό ν ἐστι τῇ φύσει καὶ πανταχοῦ. ἐνταῦθα γοῦν ἔστιν τις ὑπερηκοντικώς, κόμην τρέφων μὲν πρῶτον ἱερὰν τοῦ θεοῦ, ὥς φησιν· οὐ διὰ τοῦτό γ᾿, ἀλλ᾿ ἐστιγμένος πρὸ τοῦ μετώπου παραπέτασμ᾿ αὐτὴν ἔχει. οὗτος ἀποκρίνετ᾿, ἂν ἐρωτήσῃς “πόσου ὁ λάβραξ;”, “δέκ᾿ ὀβολῶν”, οὐχὶ προσθεὶς ὁποδαπῶν. ἔπειτ᾿ ἐὰν τἀργύριον αὐτῷ καταβάλῃς, ἐπράξατ᾿ Αἰγιναῖον· ἂν δ᾿ αὐτὸν δέῃ κέρματ᾿ ἀποδοῦναι, προσαπέδωκεν Ἀττικά. κατ᾿ ἀμφότερα δὲ τὴν καταλλαγὴν ἔχει I used to think it was only the fish-sellers in Athens who were no good. But apparently this breed is like wild animals:

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  Athina Papachrysostomou their very nature makes them treacherous everywhere. Here, at any rate, there’s one who’s outdone them all; he’s growing his hair long, first of all, as an act of piety — so he says. That’s not the reason; he’s been tattooed, and he uses his hair as a screen to cover his forehead. If you ask him “How much for the sea-bass?”, he answers “Ten obols,” without specifying the currency. Then if you pay him the money, he charges you on the Aeginetan standard; and if he has to give change, he offers Attic coins! Either way, he makes money on the deal.

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This is followed by Xenarchus fr. 7, where the speaker describes the absurd resourcefulness of fishmongers, when it comes to bypassing the laws. Interestingly, Xenarchus’ fragment is the only surviving testimony about a specific law (lines 6–7) that supposedly forbade the fishmongers from sprinkling water on displayed (stale) fish to make them look fresh again. Although the absence of further corroborating testimonies to this law’s existence does not necessarily mean that this is a fictitious law (made up by Xenarchus), extreme caution is advised, since imaginary laws (along with all sorts of invented situations, like an all-female political regime, fantastic treaties, etc.) are popular comic themes (cf. Davidson 1993, 56, n. 36).

 Xenarchus fr. 7 (ap. Ath. 6.225c–d) οἱ μὲν ποιηταὶ (φησὶ) λῆρός εἰσιν· οὐδὲ ἓν καινὸν γὰρ εὑρίσκουσιν, ἀλλὰ μεταφέρει ἕκαστος αὐτῶν ταὔτ᾿ ἄνω τε καὶ κάτω. τῶν δ᾿ ἰχθυοπωλῶν φιλοσοφώτερον γένος οὐκ ἔστιν οὐδὲν οὐδὲ μᾶλλον ἀνόσιον. ἐπεὶ γὰρ αὐτοῖς οὐκέτ᾿ ἔστ᾿ ἐξουσία ῥαίνειν, ἀπείρηται δὲ τοῦτο τῷ νόμῳ, εἷς τις θεοῖσιν ἐχθρὸς ἄνθρωπος πάνυ ξηραινομένους ὡς εἶδε τοὺς ἰχθῦς, μάχην ἐπόησ᾿ ἐν αὐτοῖς ἐξεπίτηδες εὖ πάνυ. ἦσαν δὲ πληγαί, καιρίαν δ᾿ εἰληφέναι δόξας καταπίπτει καὶ λιποψυχεῖν δοκῶν ἔκειτο μετὰ τῶν ἰχθύων. βοᾷ δέ τις “ὕδωρ ὕδωρ”· ὁ δ᾿ εὐθὺς ἐξάρας πρόχουν τῶν ὁμοτέχνων τις τοῦ μὲν ἀκαρῆ παντελῶς κατέχεε, κατὰ τῶν ἰχθύων δ᾿ ἁπαξάπαν. εἴποις γ᾿ ἂν αὐτοὺς ἀρτίως ἡλωκέναι

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πλῆθος ὅσον ἰχθύων ... ἐπὶ πινάκων ἀργυρῶν  

The poets are a joke. They do not come up with anything new; instead, each of them mixes up the same ideas in a different way. There’s no breed more profound than the fish-sellers — or more depraved! Since they’re no longer allowed to sprinkle water on their fish, and the law prohibits this, when one total bastard saw his fish drying out, he quite deliberately started a fight among them. Punches were thrown; and he pretended to have taken a good shot, and fell down and was lying among his fish, apparently unconscious. Someone shouted “Water! water!”; and another man in the business picked up a pitcher and poured just a little on him — and all the rest over the fish! You would have said they had just been caught.

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The next two fragments by Antiphanes (frr. 159 and 217) dwell on the fishmongers’ habit of selling rotten fish, as Athenaeus cares to emphasize in introducing these passages (6.225d): ὅτι δὲ καὶ νεκροὺς πωλοῦσι τοὺς ἰχθῦς καὶ σεσηπότας ἐπισημαίνεται ὁ Ἀντιφάνης (“Antiphanes establishes that they sell rotten, dead fish”). The fishmongers are again described as κακῶς ἀπολούμενοι (cf. Alex. fr. 16.5 above).

 Antiphanes fr. 159 (ap. Ath. 6.225d–e) οὐκ ἔστιν οὐδὲν θηρίον τῶν ἰχθύων ἀτυχέστερον· τῷ μὴ γὰρ ἀποχρῆν ἀποθανεῖν αὐτοῖς ἁλοῦσιν, εἶτα κατεδηδεσμένοις εὐθὺς ταφῆναι, παραδοθέντες ἄθλιοι τοῖς ἰχθυοπώλαις τοῖς κακῶς ἀπολουμένοις σήπονθ᾿, ἕωλοι κείμενοι δύ᾿ ἡμέρας ἢ τρεῖς. μόλις δ᾿ ἐάν ποτ᾿ ὠνητὴν τυφλὸν λάβωσ᾿, ἔδωκαν τῶν νεκρῶν ἀναίρεσιν τούτῳ· κομίσας δ᾿ ἐξέβαλεν οἴκαδε, τὴν πεῖραν ἐν τῇ ῥινὶ τῆς ὀσμῆς λαβών There’s no animal more unfortunate than fish. It’s not enough for them to be caught and die, and then be eaten and given a funeral immediately; instead, the poor creatures are turned over to the damned fish-sellers

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  Athina Papachrysostomou and rot, lying there going bad for two or three days. If they finally find a customer who’s blind, they entrust him with disposing of the corpses. But after he gets them home, he throws them out when he catches a whiff of them with his nose.

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 Antiphanes fr. 217 (ap. Ath. 6.225f) οὐ δεινόν ἐστι, προσφάτους μὲν ἂν τύχῃ πωλῶν τις ἰχθῦς, συναγαγόντα τὰς ὀφρῦς τοῦτον σκυθρωπάζοντά θ᾿ ἡμῖν προσλαλεῖν, ἐὰν σαπροὺς κομιδῇ δέ, παίζειν καὶ γελᾶν; τοὐναντίον γὰρ πᾶν ἔδει τούτους ποεῖν· τὸν μὲν γελᾶν, τὸν δ᾿ ἕτερον οἰμώζειν μακρά. Isn’t it outrageous that, if someone happens to be selling fresh-caught fish, he knits his brow and addresses us with a scowl on his face; whereas if he has fish that are completely rotten, he tells jokes and laughs? They ought to do exactly the opposite: the first guy should be laughing, the other one groaning out loud.

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Next there comes Alexis fr. 204, where the speaker sounds desperate (better say, enraged) at the astronomical prices that fishmongers demand (cf. Arnott 1996, 587–589).

 Alexis fr. 204 (ap. Ath. 6.225f–226a) νὴ τὴν Ἀθηνᾶν, ἀλλ’ ἐγὼ τεθαύμακα τοὺς ἰχθυοπώλας, πῶς ποτ’ οὐχὶ πλούσιοι ἅπαντές εἰσι λαμβάνοντες βασιλικοὺς φόρους. (Β.) < φόρους > μόνον; οὐχὶ δεκατεύουσι γὰρ τὰς οὐσίας ἐν ταῖς πόλεσιν καθήμενοι, ὅλας δ’ ἀφαιροῦνται καθ’ ἑκάστην ἡμέραν; By Athena, I am amazed that the fish-sellers aren’t all rich, given that they receive tribute-payments large enough for kings. (B.) Just tribute-payments? Don’t they

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πλῆθος ὅσον ἰχθύων ... ἐπὶ πινάκων ἀργυρῶν  

sit in our cities and tax our property at 10%, and take it all away on a daily basis?

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The next two fragments by Alexis (frr. 130 and 131) praise a certain Aristonicus (PAA 173950; cf. Hansen 1983, 161), a legislator, who was believed to have attempted to circumscribe the liberties of fishmongers and define the legal framework of their business. In particular, the law referred to in Alex. fr. 130 is clearly intended to control fish prices and clamp down on unrestrained profiteering (see Arnott 1996, 377–381). With all probability, this was an existing legislative measure. 11 State control of the marketplace was already established in Athens by the fifth century BC (cf. Ar. Ach. 968, 723–724), if not earlier, 12 and we know of numerous, specialized officials charged with distinct aspects of market regulation, e.g. ἀγορανόμοι (“general overseers of buying and selling”), μετρονόμοι (“inspectors of weights and measures”), σιτοφύλακες (“superintendents of sale of corn, flour and bread”); cf. Arist. [Ath. Pol.] 51.1–3. 13 Most importantly, lying in market transactions was generally prohibited; cf. Dem. Lept. 9 κατὰ μὲν τὴν ἀγορὰν ἀψευδεῖν νόμον γεγράφθαι (“there is a law that forbids cheating in the marketplace”). A quasi-similar law is mentioned in Pl. Leg. 917b–c ὁ πωλῶν ὁτιοῦν ἐν ἀγορᾷ μηδέποτε δύο εἴπῃ τιμὰς ὧν ἂν πωλῇ, ἁπλῆν δὲ εἰπών, ἂν μὴ τυγχάνῃ ταύτης, ἀποφέρων ὀρθῶς ἂν ἀποφέροι πάλιν, καὶ ταύτης τῆς ἡμέρας μὴ τιμήσῃ πλέονος μηδὲ ἐλάττονος (“he that sells any article in the market shall never name two prices for what he is selling; he shall name one price only, and if he fails to get this, he will be entitled to take the article away; but he shall not put any other price, greater or less, upon it on that day”); cf. Pl. Leg. 849a–e. See Pringsheim 1950, 126–129. Regarding the law described in Alex. fr. 131 (compelling fishmongers to be standing whilst selling their ware), no matter how absurd it may seem, it is conceivable that this was also some existing, albeit dysfunctional, legal measure (on not always easily enforceable Athenian laws see Millett 1990, 172 n. 13, 192 n. 53).

 11 See Davidson 1997, 189–190 and the full-scale analysis of Davies 2016. 12 Cf. Solon’s attempt (in the early sixth century) to regulate trade; especially conspicuous is the (punishable if breached) prohibition that he implemented on all exports of goods, apart from olive oil (cf. Plut. De soll. an. 24.1–2.); see Stanley 1999, 229–234 (relevant to this discussion are also the pp. 234–256). 13 For further analysis and the specific duties of each group of market clerks, see Rhodes 1981, 575–578. For a thorough discussion of market regulation in ancient Athens, see Paulas 2010.

  Athina Papachrysostomou

 Alexis fr. 130 (ap. Ath. 6.226a–b) οὐ γέγονε κρείττων νομοθέτης τοῦ πλουσίου Ἀριστονίκου. † τίθησι γὰρ νυνὶ νόμον, τῶν ἰχθυοπωλῶν ὅστις ἂν πωλῶν τινι ἰχθὺν ὑποτιμήσας ἀποδῶτ᾿ ἐλάττονος ἧς εἶπε τιμῆς, εἰς τὸ δεσμωτήριον εὐθὺς ἀπάγεσθαι τοῦτον, ἵνα δεδοικότες τῆς ἀξίας ἀγαπῶσιν, ἢ τῆς ἑσπέρας σαπροὺς ἅπαντας ἀποφέρωσιν οἴκαδε. κἀνταῦθα καὶ γραῦς καὶ γέρων καὶ παιδίον πεμφθεὶς ἅπαντες ἀγοράσουσι κατὰ τρόπον. There’s never been a better legislator than the wealthy Aristonicus. † He’s currently proposing a law that any fish-seller who offers to sell someone a fish and then lowers the amount, and gives it to him for less than the price he specified initially, is to be hauled off to jail immediately. The hope is that they’ll get scared and be satisfied with an appropriate price, or else haul all their fish home in the evening rotten. Then every old woman, old man, or slave who’s sent for fish will buy what he’s supposed to.

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 Alexis fr. 131 (ap. Ath. 6.226b–c) οὐ γέγονε μετὰ Σόλωνα κρείττων οὐδὲ εἷς Ἀριστονίκου νομοθέτης· τά τ᾿ ἄλλα γὰρ νενομοθέτηκε πολλὰ καὶ παντοῖα δή, νυνί τε καινὸν εἰσφέρει νόμον τινὰ χρυσοῦν, τὸ μὴ πωλεῖν καθημένους ἔτι τοὺς ἰχθυοπώλας, διὰ τέλους δ᾿ ἑστηκότας· εἶτ᾿ εἰς νέωτά φησι γράψειν κρεμαμένους, καὶ θᾶττον ἀποπέμψουσι τοὺς ὠνουμένους ἀπὸ μηχανῆς πωλοῦντες ὥσπερ οἱ θεοί. After Solon, there has never been a better legislator than Aristonicus. He has passed all kinds of other laws; and now he is proposing a wonderful new one, that fish-sellers are no longer allowed to sit down when they conduct their business, but have to remain constantly on their feet.

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πλῆθος ὅσον ἰχθύων ... ἐπὶ πινάκων ἀργυρῶν  

Then next year, he says, he’ll draft one requiring them to hang in midair; they’ll send their customers away faster, if they’re selling from a crane, like the gods!

In the next fragment by Antiphanes (fr. 157) the exasperated speaker regards the fishmongers as “the most abominable group”: ἔθνος ἐξωλέστερον (lines 11–12).

 Antiphanes fr. 157 (ap. Ath. 6.226c–e) εἶτ᾿ οὐ σοφοὶ δῆτ᾿ εἰσὶν οἱ Σκύθαι σφόδρα, οἳ γενομένοισιν εὐθέως τοῖς παιδίοις διδόασιν ἵππων καὶ βοῶν πίνειν γάλα; μὰ Δί᾿ οὐχὶ τίτθας εἰσάγουσι βασκάνους καὶ παιδαγωγοὺς αὖθις, ὧν μείζω γε μαίας νὴ Δία· αὗται δ᾿ ὑπερβάλλουσι, μετά γε νὴ Δία τοὺς μητραγυρτοῦντάς γε· πολὺ γὰρ αὖ γένος μιαρώτατον τοῦτ᾿ ἔστιν, εἰ μὴ νὴ Δία τοὺς ἰχθυοπώλας τις † βούλεται λέγειν μετά γε τοὺς τραπεζίτας· ἔθνος τούτου γὰρ οὐδέν ἐστιν ἐξωλέστερον. So aren’t the Scythians remarkably clever, for giving their children horse-milk and cow-milk to drink the moment they’re born? By Zeus, they don’t bring in malicious wet-nurses and slave-tutors after that, than whom greater … — after midwives, by Zeus! They’re the worst – after Cybele’s mendicant priests, by Zeus! They’re far and away the vilest group there is – unless, by Zeus, someone † chooses to mention the fish-sellers … after the money-lenders; because there’s no group more abominable than them.

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Next, in Diphilus fr. 32 the speaker sarcastically observes that Poseidon would be far and away the richest god, if only he received 10% of the fishmongers’ profit (τὴν δεκάτην, line 2).

  Athina Papachrysostomou

 Diphilus fr. 32 (ap. Ath. 6.226e–f) οὐ πώποτ᾿ ἰχθῦς οἶδα τιμιωτέρους ἰδών. Πόσειδον, εἰ δεκάτην ἐλάμβανες αὐτῶν ἀπὸ τῆς τιμῆς ἑκάστης ἡμέρας, πολὺ τῶν θεῶν ἂν ἦσθα πλουσιώτατος. ὅμως δὲ τούτων εἴ με προσγελάσειέ τις, ἐδίδουν στενάξας ὁπόσον αἰτήσειέ με. γόγγρον μέν, ὥσπερ ὁ Πρίαμος τὸν Ἕκτορα, ὅσον εἵλκυσεν τοσοῦτο καταθεὶς ἐπριάμην I do not think I have ever seen fish more expensive. Poseidon, if you got 10% of what is spent on them every day, you would be by far and away the richest god there is! But all the same, if one of them smiled at me, I groaned and paid whatever he asked me for. I offered a conger eel’s weight in silver, like Priam ransoming Hector, and bought it.

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In the next fragment by Alexis (fr. 76) the speaker describes how people need to mortgage their property in order to buy some fish, while anyone who does make a purchase is abruptly reduced to a pauper. Clearly, this is a hyperbolic allegation, echoed in Alex. fr. 78 (also included in Athenaeus’ list and quoted further below, no. 16).

 Alexis fr. 76 (ap. Ath. 6.226f–227a) ἀεὶ δὲ καὶ ζῶντ᾿ ἐστὶ καὶ τεθνηκότα τἀν τῇ θαλάττῃ πολέμι᾿ ἡμῖν θηρία. ἂν ἀνατραπῇ γὰρ πλοῖον, εἶθ᾿, ὡς γίγνεται, ληφθῇ νέων τις, καταπεπώκασ᾿ εὐθέως· αὐτοί τ᾿ ἐπὰν ληφθῶσιν ὑπὸ τῶν ἁλιέων, τεθνεῶτες ἐπιτρίβουσι τοὺς ὠνουμένους. τῆς οὐσίας γάρ εἰσιν ἡμῖν ὤνιοι, ὁ πριάμενός τε πτωχὸς εὐθὺς ἀποτρέχει

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Alive or dead, sea-creatures are always our enemies. If a ship overturns, and then — as happens — a man’s caught while he’s swimming, they immediately gulp him down. And when the fishermen catch them, 5

πλῆθος ὅσον ἰχθύων ... ἐπὶ πινάκων ἀργυρῶν  

even after they are dead, they ruin the people who purchase them. Because we have to mortgage all our property to buy them, and the guy who buys them races off, abruptly reduced to a pauper.

The following fragment in the list, Archippus fr. 23, is a personal attack on a fishseller from Egypt, Hermaeus (PAA 402105), whom the comic character considers to be “utterly vile” (μιαρώτατον).

 Archippus fr. 23 (ap. Ath. 6.227a) Αἰγύπτιος μιαρώτατος τῶν ἰχθύων κάπηλος Ἕρμαιος, ὃς βίᾳ δέρων ῥίνας γαλεούς τε πωλεῖ καὶ τοὺς λάβρακας ἐντερεύων, ὡς λέγουσιν ἡμῖν Hermaeus the Egyptian, the vilest fish-seller, who violently fillets monkfish and dogfish, and guts sea-bass, and sells them, so they tell us.

After that, there comes Anaxandrides fr. 34; this is a preposterous eulogy of the art of fishing, featuring elevated language and bombastic style (cf. Millis 2015, 155–166). This is arguably the mildest quotation in Athenaeus’ list, since, apart from the arrogant and self-important tone, no direct accusation is made against the fishmongers.

 Anaxandrides fr. 34 (ap. Ath. 6.227b–d) τῶν ζωγράφων μὲν ἡ καλὴ χειρουργία ἐν τοῖς πίναξιν κρεμαμένη θαυμάζεται· αὕτη δὲ σεμνῶς ἐκ λοπάδος ἁρπάζεται ἀπὸ τοῦ ταγήνου τ᾿ εὐθέως ἀφανίζεται. ἐπὶ τίνα † δ᾿ ἄλλην τέχνην † ὦ χρηστὲ σύ, τὰ στόματα τῶν νεωτέρων κατακάετ’ ἢ ὠθισμός ἐστι δακτύλων τοιουτοσὶ ἢ πνιγμός, ἂν μὴ ταχὺ δύνηται καταπιεῖν; ἀλλ᾿ οὐ μόνη γὰρ τὰς συνουσίας ποεῖ εὔοψος ἀγορά; τίς δὲ συνδειπνεῖ βροτῶν φρυκτοὺς καταλαβὼν ἢ κορακίνους ὠνίους ἢ μαινίδ᾿; ὡραῖον δὲ μειρακύλλιον ποίαις ἐπῳδαῖς ἢ λόγοις ἁλίσκεται

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  Athina Papachrysostomou τίσιν, φράσον γάρ, ἄν τις ἀφέλῃ τὴν τέχνην τῶν ἁλιέων; ἥδε γὰρ δαμάζεται ἑφθοῖς προσώποις ἰχθύων χειρουμένη, ἄγουσ᾿ ὑπ᾿ αὐτὰ σώματ᾿ ἀρίστου πύλας, ἀσύμβολον κλίνειν τ᾿ ἀναγκάζει φύσιν The beautiful handiwork of painters is marveled at when hanging where paintings are sold; but this one is snatched haughtily from a pan and at once disappears from the griddle. And regarding what other art, my good man, are the mouths of young men scorched, or is there such a shoving of fingers or choking, if it cannot be gulped down quickly? For does not a market well-stocked with fish alone produce socializing? Who of mortals dines in company after laying hold of small-fry or ravenfish that was for sale or a sprat? With what sorts of charms or with what words is a handsome young boy caught, tell me, if someone takes away the art of fishermen? For this (art) conquers (them), subduing (them) with the boiled heads of fish, † bringing the gates of the best under the very bodies, † and it compels a free-loading nature to recline.

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(Translation by B. Millis)

The following quotation is Alexis fr. 78, where the comic character cynically realizes that a pauper is practically excluded from buying fish, unless he is or becomes a thief (cf. the comparable train of thought expounded in Alex. fr. 76 above, no. 13). The speaker names a certain fishmonger, Micio (PAA 652905), who is otherwise unknown (Arnott 1996, 217 rejects all identification attempts with synonymous figures).

 Alexis fr. 78 (ap. Ath. 6.227d–e) ὅστις ἀγοράζει πτωχὸς ὢν ὄψον πολὺ ἀπορούμενός τε τἆλλα πρὸς τοῦτ᾿ εὐπορεῖ, τῆς νυκτὸς οὗτος τοὺς ἀπαντῶντας ποεῖ γυμνοὺς ἅπαντας. εἶτ᾿ ἐπάν τις ἐκδυθῇ, τηρεῖν ἕωθεν εὐθὺς ἐν τοῖς ἰχθύσιν· ὃν ἂν δ᾿ ἴδῃ πρῶτον πένητα καὶ νέον παρὰ Μικίωνος ἐγχέλεις ὠνούμενον,

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πλῆθος ὅσον ἰχθύων ... ἐπὶ πινάκων ἀργυρῶν  

ἀπάγειν λαβόμενον εἰς τὸ δεσμωτήριον. If a beggar buys lots of fish and has enough money for this, but not for anything else, this guy’s stripping the robe off whoever crosses his path at night. So, when someone has his clothes stolen, let him keep watch in the fish-market as soon as the sun’s up; and let him arrest the first poor young man he sees buying eels from Micion, and drag him off to the jail!

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The penultimate fragment in Athenaeus’ list is Diphilus fr. 31. According to Athenaeus’ introductory note (Ath. 6.227e νόμον εἶναί φησι παρὰ Κορινθίοις), the fragment refers to a Corinthian law that compels anyone who buys fish to prove his affluent and legal revenue sources.

 Diphilus fr. 31 (ap. Ath. 6.227e–228b) νόμιμον τοῦτ᾿ ἐστί, βέλτιστ᾿, ἐνθάδε Κορινθίοισιν, ἄν τιν᾿ ὀψωνοῦντ᾿ ἀεὶ λαμπρῶς ὁρῶμεν, τοῦτον ἀνακρίνειν πόθεν ζῇ καὶ τί ποιῶν· κἂν μὲν οὐσίαν ἔχῃ, ἧς αἱ πρόσοδοι λύουσι τἀναλώματα, ἐᾶν ἀπολαύειν τοῦτον ἤδη τὸν βίον· ἐὰν δ᾿ ὑπὲρ τὴν οὐσίαν δαπανῶν τύχῃ, ἀπεῖπον αὐτῷ τοῦτο μὴ ποιεῖν ἔτι. ὃς ἂν δὲ μὴ πίθητ᾿, ἐπέβαλον ζημίαν. ἐὰν δὲ μηδ᾿ ὁτιοῦν ἔχων ζῇ πολυτελῶς, τῷ δημίῳ παρέδωκαν αὐτόν. (B.) Ἡράκλεις. οὐκ ἐνδέχεται γὰρ ζῆν ἄνευ κακοῦ τινος τοῦτον· συνιεῖς; ἀλλ᾿ ἀναγκαίως ἔχει ἢ λωποδυτεῖν τὰς νύκτας ἢ τοιχωρυχεῖν, ἢ τῶν ποούντων ταῦτα κοινωνεῖν τισιν, ἢ συκοφαντεῖν κατ᾿ ἀγοράν, ἢ μαρτυρεῖν ψευδῆ. τὸ τοιοῦτον ἐκκαθαίρομεν γένος. (B.) ὀρθῶς γε νὴ Δί᾿. ἀλλὰ δὴ τί τοῦτ᾿ ἐμοί; (A.) ὁρῶμεν ὀψωνοῦνθ᾿ ἑκάστης ἡμέρας οὐχὶ μετρίως, βέλτιστέ, σ᾿, ἀλλ᾿ ὑπερηφάνως. οὐκ ἔστιν ἰχθυηρὸν ὑπὸ σοῦ μεταλαβεῖν. συνῆκας ἡμῶν εἰς τὰ λάχανα τὴν πόλιν· περὶ τῶν σελίνων μαχόμεθ᾿ ὥσπερ Ἰσθμίοις. λαγώς τις εἰσελήλυθ᾿· εὐθὺς ἥρπακας. πέρδικα δ᾿ ἢ κίχλην γε νὴ Δί᾿ οὐκ ἔστιν δι᾿ ὑμᾶς οὐδὲ πετομένην ἰδεῖν. τὸν ξενικὸν οἶνον ἐπιτετίμηκας πολύ

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  Athina Papachrysostomou

This is the custom here in Corinth, my good man: if we see someone always ostentatiously buying fish, we question him about what he lives off and what his occupation is. If he’s got property whose revenues cover his expenses, we let him enjoy this life-style after that. And if he turns out to be spending more than he can afford, they forbid him to do this any longer; and they impose a fine on anyone who disobeys. But if someone with no property at all lives expensively, they turn him over to the public executioner. (B.) Heracles! (A.) Because it is impossible that this fellow’s surviving without doing something wrong. Do you get it? It’s inevitable that he’s either mugging people for their clothes at night, or committing burglaries; or else he’s an accomplice of this type of criminal; or he’s making false accusations in the marketplace, or perjuring himself. We’re eliminating this sort of person. (B.) And rightly so, by Zeus. But what does this have to do with me? (A.) We see you buying fish every day, my good sir, and not just a few, but prodigally. Because of you, it’s impossible to get any seafood. You’ve confined our city to the vegetable-market; we’re battling over celery, like at the Isthmian Games! A hare comes in; you immediately snatch it. It’s your fault that it’s now impossible, by Zeus, to catch a glimpse of a partridge or a thrush even flying around. You’ve driven the price of imported wine up considerably.

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The last item (no. 18) in Athenaeus’ catalogue is Sophilus fr. 2, cited in reported speech (6.228b): τὸ δὲ ἔθος τοῦτο καὶ Ἀθήνησιν εἶναι ἀξιοῖ Σώφιλος ἐν Ἀνδροκλεῖ ὀψονόμους ἀξιῶν αἱρεῖσθαι ὑπὸ τῆς βουλῆς δύ᾿ ἢ καὶ τρεῖς (“Sophilus in Androcles proposes that this should also be the practice in Athens, suggesting that the Council choose two or three fish-inspectors”). The practice (ἔθος) presently meant is the Corinthian law mentioned in the immediately preceding fragment by Diphilus (fr. 31); according to Sophilus’ fragment, this practice should be introduced in Athens as well, along with a couple of fish-inspectors. The reference to Sophilus’ fragment concludes Athenaeus’ long list of comic quotations. As thoroughly exhaustive as Athenaeus’ list might seem, it omits four comic fragments pertaining to fishmongers and their alleged crookedness; the

πλῆθος ὅσον ἰχθύων ... ἐπὶ πινάκων ἀργυρῶν  

first is Aristophanes fr. 402, where the speaker praises the countryside, where there is no sight of wily fishmongers constantly trying to cheat unsuspecting customers through scale tricks.

 Aristophanes fr. 402 (ap. Stob. 4.14.7) ὦ μῶρε, μῶρε, ταῦτα πάντ᾿ ἐν τῇδ᾿ ἔνι· οἰκεῖν μὲν ἐν ἀγρῷ τοῦτον ἐν τῷ γηδίῳ ἀπαλλαγέντα τῶν κατ᾿ ἀγορὰν πραγμάτων, κεκτημένον ζευγάριον οἰκεῖον βοοῖν, ἔπειτ᾿ ἀκούειν προβατίων βληχωμένων τρυγός τε φωνὴν εἰς λεκάνην ὠθουμένης, ὄψῳ δὲ χρῆσθαι σπινιδίοις τε καὶ κίχλαις, καὶ μὴ περιμένειν ἐξ ἀγορᾶς ἰχθύδια τριταῖα, πολυτίμητα, βεβασανισμένα ἐπ᾿ ἰχθυοπώλου χειρὶ παρανομωτάτῃ You fool, you fool! All of it’s in this life of peace: to live in the country on his small plot of land, free of the rat-race of the market, owning his very own yoke of oxen, and hearing the bleating of his flocks and the sound of new wine being bottled up, snacking on little finches and thrushes no hanging around the market waiting for smallfry days old, overpriced, weighed out for him by a crooked fishmonger with a thumb on the scales.

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Secondly, in Antiphanes fr. 204, preserved elsewhere in Athenaeus (Book 7), a typical fishmonger is metaphorically described as a τοιχωρύχος (burglar).

 Antiphanes fr. 204 (ap. Ath. 7.309d–e) ἥκω πολυτελῶς ἀγοράσας εἰς τοὺς γάμους, λιβανωτὸν ὀβολοῦ τοῖς θεοῖς καὶ ταῖς θεαῖς πάσαισι, τοῖς δ᾿ ἥρωσι τὰ ψαίστ᾿ ἀπονεμῶ. ἡμῖν δὲ τοῖς θνητοῖς ἐπριάμην κωβιούς. ὡς προσβαλεῖν δ᾿ ἐκέλευσα τὸν τοιχωρύχον, τὸν ἰχθυοπώλην, “προστίθημι,” φησί, “σοὶ τὸν δῆμον αὐτῶν· εἰσὶ γὰρ Φαληρικοί.” ἄλλοι δ᾿ ἐπώλουν, ὡς ἔοικ᾿, Ὀτρυνικούς

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  Athina Papachrysostomou

I have returned, after making some expensive purchases for the wedding feast. I am allowing an obol’s worth of frankincense for the gods and all the goddesses, and honey-and-barley cakes for the heroes; but for us mortals I bought gobies. When I asked that thief, the fish-seller, to throw in something else, he said: “I’m adding a few of their demesmen for you — because they’re from Phaleron.” The others were apparently selling the type that comes from Otrune!

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Thirdly, Archedicus fr. 3 (also preserved in Ath. Book 7) features a cook whining about the astronomical amount that he just paid at the market for some fish (three drachmas for some tiny glaukos-fish and five drachmas for a conger eel’s head); and he wishes to have hanged himself prior to making this purchase.

 Archedicus fr. 3 (ap. Ath. 7.294b–c) δραχμῶν τριῶν γλαυκίσκον < … > γόγγρου κεφαλὴν καὶ τὰ πρῶτα τεμάχια δραχμῶν πάλιν πέντ᾿ ὢ ταλαιπώρου βίου· δραχμῆς τραχήλους. ἀλλὰ νὴ τὸν Ἥλιον, κἀμοὶ τράχηλον ἕτερον εἴ ποθεν λαβεῖν ἦν καὶ πρίασθαι δυνατόν, ὃν ἔχω τοῦτον ἄν, πρὶν εἰσενεγκεῖν ταῦτα δεῦρ᾿, ἀπηγξάμην. οὐθεὶς δεδιακόνηκεν ἐπιπονώτερον. ἅμα μὲν πρίασθαι πολλὰ καὶ πολλοῦ σφόδρα, ἅμα δ᾿ εἴ τι χρηστὸν ἀγοράσαιμ᾿ ἀπωλλύμην, “κατέδοντ᾿ ἐκεῖνοι τοῦτο” πρὸς ἐμαυτὸν λέγων, “διαπυτιοῦσ᾿ οἶνον δὲ τοιοῦτον χαμαί.” οἴμοι. A small glaukos that cost three drachmas, and a conger eel’s head and the first slices of it for another five drachmas — what a difficult life! — and necks for a drachma. By the sun, if I could get myself another neck from somewhere and buy it, I would have tied a rope around this one I have got, before I brought all this stuff in here! No one has ever had a worse job: I bought a lot of food at a very high price, but at the same time, if I bought anything good, it ruined me. “They will eat this,” I said to myself,

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πλῆθος ὅσον ἰχθύων ... ἐπὶ πινάκων ἀργυρῶν  

“but they will spit wine like this out on the ground.” Oh my.

Finally, equally indignant is the speaker of Eupolis fr. 160 (also preserved in Athenaeus Book 7), who describes how eight sea-bass and a dozen giltheads cost him one hundred drachmas.

 Eupolis fr. 160 (ap. Ath. 7.328b) δραχμῶν ἑκατὸν ἰχθῦς ἐώνημαι μόνον, ὀκτὼ λάβρακας, χρυσόφρυς δὲ δώδεκα For one hundred drachmas I have bought nothing but fish: eight sea-bass and a dozen giltheads.

There are two significant remarks to be made about these four fragments that are left out from Athenaeus’ lengthy list in Book 6: (a) two of them belong to Old Comedy (nos. 19 & 22), and (b) three of them are preserved by Athenaeus, albeit in a different section of Deipnosophistae (in Book 7); naturally one wonders why Athenaeus did not include them too in the list of Book 6, since he had them at his disposal. Reasonably, these remarks call into question the provenance of Athenaeus’ long list of anti-fishmongers fragments in Book 6; two possibilities present themselves: either Athenaeus himself tracked down those eighteen fragments from within the vast comic output or he consulted an existing compilation of such material. Considering the aforementioned remarks, the latter possibility seems much more likely. Given that (a) all eighteen fragments in Athenaeus’ list belong to either Middle or New Comedy (whereas two of the omitted fragments belong to the period of Old) and (b) three of the omitted fragments were known to Athenaeus but are strangely preserved in a different Book of his work, the obvious and logical assumption is that Athenaeus (for that particular section in Book 6) consulted an anthology that drew its material from Middle and New Comedy (but not from Old). Understandably, certainty is impossible. Yet, regardless of who was the original author who compiled the list featuring in Deipnosophistae Book 6, Athenaeus or someone else, this is a typical case where fragmentation — already in antiquity — was consciously employed as an effective means and used for the accomplishment of a concrete outcome; to produce an anthology, a compendium of comic fragments that had a pronounced goal; to satirize — more or less seriously — the fishmongers (and, perhaps, even besmirch their reputation). The

  Athina Papachrysostomou unanimous grudge, grievance, even animosity, communicated through these fragments makes one likely to believe that the anthologist who compiled this list did not simply put together some randomly selected, anodyne and funny fishrelated fragments. To the contrary, the manifestly overflowing bitterness against fishmongers is revealing of a distinct thematic focus (apposite to an anthology’s nature), i.e. Comedy’s satire and / or polemic against the professional group of fishmongers. Of course, we cannot determine how serious / harmful or funny / anodyne the original compiler was meant to be or what the ultimate purpose of this anthology was. Such pointed cohesive ensembles, like the one preserved by Athenaeus about fishmongers, entail a good potential of proving useful in offering us instructive insights into contemporary reality (social, economic, and other), once we have established their bearing against the relevant literary structure (here, the entire comic corpus). Regarding the present case, Comedy’s testimonies about fish prices 14 are supplemented by some inscriptional evidence (a decree; SEG XXXII 450), from the Hellenistic period, originating from the Boeotian city of Acraephia (perhaps Ἀκραίφια; various forms of the name are attested in our sources). Expectedly, when comparing comic and inscriptional evidence, there ensue factual difficulties (even discrepancies, at times), which originate from differences of time, place, and, most importantly, mode of price-quoting; 15 the scholarly opinions are divided, and it is hard to decide with certainty to what degree Comedy’s prices reflect the reality of the market-place. Nonetheless, it is worthy to attempt to put Comedy’s fish prices into perspective. Bearing in mind that during the fourth century BC the remuneration for Athenian citizens participating in the Popular Assembly was between six and nine obols (depending on the kind of the Assembly, ordinary or sovereign), half a drachma (three obols) for attending the Courts, five obols for sitting at the Council of Five Hundred (cf. [Arist.] Ath. 62.2), and also that a daily wage of an unskilled labourer could hardly ever exceed the amount of two drachmas, 16 it soon becomes clear that the fish prices mentioned by the comic characters are noticeably and disproportionately high (cf. e.g. the claims made by the speaker in Arched. fr. 3 quoted above about how he paid three drachmas for some tiny glaukos-fish and five drachmas for a conger eel’s head; cf. Eup. fr. 160, also quoted above).

 14 The fish prices attested in ancient sources were first collected and catalogued by Boeckh 1886, 129. 15 For a recent reassessment of this Hellenistic decree and the information contained therein, see Lytle 2010. 16 For an exhaustive analysis of wages in Athens see Loomis 1998, passim (esp. 232–239).

πλῆθος ὅσον ἰχθύων ... ἐπὶ πινάκων ἀργυρῶν  

This distaste towards fishmongers may be interpreted in a number of ways, which are not — necessarily — mutually exclusive; it could be a cliché developed out of real-life supply shortage (so Arnott 1996, 98) or, as Wilkins advocates (2000, 164–175, 296–300), part of the widespread dislike towards commercial dealings in general. One could also follow Paulas’ train of thought (2010), who makes an elaborate case for a “bazaar economy” pattern (essentially defined by lack of both information and communication of information regarding the goods’ prices and quality), where the fish-sellers are perceived as embodying the trickiness of the marketplace transactions. Yet, there is one crucial parameter that we constantly need to keep in mind; and this is the social background of this professional group. The fishmongers lacked aristocratic origin, but they still managed to amass wealth 17 via their banausic trade. As such, they appeared to subvert and breach a traditional and deeply rooted social precept, according to which aristocratic, noble origin was — almost teleologically — inseparably linked with wealth, just like the following fragment by Alexis (fr. 94) emphasizes: 18 ἔστιν δὲ ποδαπὸς τὸ γένος οὗτος; (Β.) πλούσιος. τούτους δὲ πάντες φασὶν εὐγενεστάτους < εἶναι >· πένητας δ’ εὐπάτριδας οὐδεὶς ὁρᾷ What sort of family is this fellow from? (B.) He is rich. Everyone agrees that they’re the noblest people there are; no one has ever seen a pauper from a noble background.

The term εὐπατρίδαι designates the old, pre-Solonian, Athenian aristocracy — as opposed to ἀγροῖκοι / γεωμόροι (“farmers”) and δημιουργοί (“artisans / handicraftsmen”). 19 Traditionally, wealth (typically measurable in land ownership) was the prerogative of this upper, aristocratic social cast and was subsequently

 17 Although we lack all evidence as to the fishmongers’ financial status, it is reasonable to assume (given the high fish prices) that they were quite well-off, and — in any case — considerably better than what their low social rank would have initially guaranteed. 18 On the fragment’s linguistic issues and the possible word-play between the two meanings of ποδαπός (“from what country” and “of what kind”), see Arnott 1996, 246–248. 19 Cf. [Arist.] Ath. Pol. 13.2 (with Rhodes 1981, 183–184, 71–72, 74–76). See also Duplouy 2003 and Pierrot 2015.

  Athina Papachrysostomou considered a distinguishing quality that was inherent to the quintessence of noble origin and naturally accompanied it. 20 It is against this rigid and long-established ideological / moral structure that we need to comprehend the ‘disturbance’ caused by the professional group of fishmongers, who manage to transcend their original social rank by accumulating wealth. As a matter of fact, if we reverse the last, apophthegmatic verse of Alexis’ fragment (“no one has ever seen a pauper from a noble background”), another apophthegm — complementary to the first — is formulated: “no one has ever seen a rich from a non-noble background”; and this is exactly what the fishmongers are: well-off individuals from a non-noble background. Simultaneously, what seems to be an orchestrated attack against fishmongers can also be interpreted in an additional, different way. The targets of this comic satire may not be the fishmongers (or not only the fishmongers), but also the nouveau riche customers / buyers. It is not uncommon for Comedy to provide us with a fleeting glimpse into its contemporary milieu and register the ongoing socio-economic transformations. In this case Comedy could be reflecting the financial boom of the bourgeoisie in fourth century Athens that saw — among other things — the proliferation of spendthrifts, who seemed to disregard the long-established (tracing back to Solon, at least) social precept according to which conspicuous consumption was generally frowned upon (if not treated with explicit contempt and hostility). There is a specific socio-economic behavioural pattern, captured and described by the comic playwrights, according to which both ordinary and distinct, named individuals squander huge amounts of money, even entire properties, 21 mostly through frequent fish-purchases (pursuit of hetairai is another expensive habit), whilst an entire professional group, the fishmongers, with no noble, no aristocratic associations whatsoever (it is not uncommon to be even of slave origin instead) manage to accumulate wealth; both groups (the sellers and the buyers) are most eager to proudly display their riches. We do know that (especially the post-classical) Athenian society was hostile to conspicuous consumption. There is, for example, an assumption — frequently voiced by the orators — that individual properties ought to be modest and ostentation should be the preserve of the state buildings. In attacks on corruption the  20 A considerable number of élite studies offer trenchant discussions on this and other germane aspects of ancient Greek aristocracy and its multiple ramifications (political, social, financial, cultural); see e.g. MacKendrick 1969, Davies 1971 and 1981, Arnheim 1977, Starr 1992, Duplouy 2006 and 2015, Asmonti 2015, Lambert 2015, Bissa 2016, Marginesu 2016. Cf. Dover 1974, 109–115 and Taylor 2017, 69–114. 21 See e.g. Anaxandr. fr. 46, Antiph. frr. 27 and 236, Anaxipp. fr. 1.31–32, Alex. fr. 110 (cf. Arnott 1996, 295–296). Cf. Marginesu 2016, 127–136 (the case of the Athenian plutocrat Callias).

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orators seize on alleged magnificence of private property as evidence of civic decline and individual theft, arguing that private buildings now outstrip those of the state. This can never have been literally true, but it is evidently felt to work, as we can see from its repeated use. In 349 BC Demosthenes (Ol. 3.29) observes that ἔνιοι δὲ τὰς ἰδίας οἰκίας τῶν δημοσίων οἰκοδομημάτων σεμνοτέρας εἰσὶ κατεσκευασμένοι, ὅσῳ δὲ τὰ τῆς πόλεως ἐλάττω γέγονεν, τοσούτῳ τὰ τούτων ηὔξηται (“some have set up their private houses more magnificent than the public buildings; and as the city’s prosperity has declined, so theirs has increased”). 22 A variation on this is the allegation made by Aeschines (3.250) in 330 BC that ambassadors from foreign cities now go to the private houses of the leading politicians rather than to the Council and the Popular Assembly: τὸ μὲν βουλευτήριον καὶ ὁ δῆμος παρορᾶται, αἱ δ’ ἐπιστολαὶ καὶ αἱ πρεσβεῖαι ἀφικνοῦνται εἰς ἰδιωτικὰς οἰκίας (“the Council and the Popular Assembly are coming to be ignored, while the letters and ambassadors come to private houses”). A later version of this attitude materializes in Posidonius taking offense at the grandiose mausoleum dedicated to the hetaira Pythionice by her lover Harpalus (FGrH 87 F 14; ap. Ath. 13.594f–595a): τοῦτο δὲ τὸ μὲν πρῶτον, ὅπερ εἰκός, ἢ Μιλτιάδου φήσειεν σαφῶς ἢ Περικλέους ἢ Κίμωνος ἤ τινος ἑτέρου τῶν ἀγαθῶν ἀνδρῶν εἶναι, μάλιστα μὲν ὑπὸ τῆς πόλεως δημοσίᾳ κατεσκευασμένον, εἰ δὲ μή, δεδομένον κατασκευάσασθαι. πάλιν δ᾿ ὅταν ἐξετάσῃ Πυθιονίκης τῆς ἑταίρας ὄν, τίνα χρὴ προσδοκίαν λαβεῖν αὐτόν; (“initially, one would be likely to say that this must belong to Miltiades, or Pericles, or Cimon, or to some other distinguished individual, and that it was doubtless erected by the city at public expense, or failing that, that public permission must have been granted for its construction. But then, when he looks and sees that it belongs to Pythionice, what is he supposed to think?”). To conclude, the fact that Athenaeus preserves in Book 6 a striking sequence of eighteen comic fragments satirizing the Athenian fishmongers under the format of a cohesive ensemble (whether this was drawn from a preexisting anthology or not is largely immaterial) has had a decisive impact on the scholarly perception of this thematic pattern. No matter how we choose to interpret this satire towards fishmongers (and/or fish-buyers) and how polemical or merely funny we consider it to have appeared to contemporary audiences, the fact remains that this was not a prevalent pattern of either Middle or New Comedy; what makes it look so significant and outstanding is the cohesive function and the concomitant, cumulative effect of fragmentation, for which we should credit either Athenaeus or the anonymous compiler on whom Athenaeus heavily drew. Less than twenty  22 Keim 2016 offers an insightful analysis of Demosthenes’ attitude towards the wealth of Athens.

  Athina Papachrysostomou fragments on the fishmongers’ mischievous behaviour amount to practically nothing, when we consider the huge comic production yielded by some four hundred years of dramatic competitions (roughly from early fifth to late second century BC); approximately two hundred and fifty-five known comic playwrights wrote hundreds of comic plays, of which some thousands of fragments survive today. Among these thousands of comic fragments, there survive twenty-two of them (eighteen in Athenaeus Book 6, plus four additional ones, quoted above), which bitterly picture fishmongers as vile, depraved, and presumptuous scoundrels, who unashamedly extort money out of honest Athenian citizens. If approached through the catholic spectrum of the entire comic production, Athenaeus’ list seems trivial and its impact, if any, negligible, at best. Indeed, the catholic spectrum is a notion diametrically opposite to the quintessence of fragmentation; the latter operates instead just like a kaleidoscope; depending on one’s preferred and variable angle of vision, the resulting reflections and patterns change, allowing for numerous, individual deductions — optical, notional, even illusional. 23 In the present case of Athenaeus and fishmongers, it is incredibly easy to get carried away and inadvertently apply disproportional dimensions to one of many motifs of Comedy. Fishmongers charging ridiculously high prices whilst being rude and dishonest towards customers is indeed a comic stereotype; yet, the fact that all relevant comic passages have been dissociated from their original context and introduced into a new, cohesive ensemble, amounts to a procedure that automatically multiplies the impact of the referent by exclusively focusing on the common traits of the dissociated material. Athenaeus’ cohesive list in Book 6, made up from dissociated, fragmented parts, immediately assumes a life of its own and becomes a self-contained entity. This different kettle of fish archetypically showcases how fragmentation inescapably leads to isolation and alienation of the quoted part from its original context, while, at the same time, it inherently possesses the (risky) potential of shifting the focus from where the author intended it to be to wherever the anthologist wishes it to move. Ever since antiquity fragmentation has been yielding challenging textual contexts and contextual structures, which scholars — ancient and modern — readily engage with and attempt to interpret.

 23 Likewise, Olson 2015 warns against the potentially distorting effect that fragmentary material can have upon our understanding of wholes and entities. Cf. Olson 2017.

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Bibliography Arnheim, M.T.W. (1977), Aristocracy in Greek Society, London. Arnott, W.G. (1996), Alexis: The Fragments. A Commentary, Cambridge. Arnott, W.G. (2000a), “On Editing Comic Fragments from Literary and Lexicographical Sources”, in: F.D Harvey/J.M. Wilkins (eds), The Rivals of Aristophanes: Studies in Athenian Old Comedy, London, 1–13. Arnott, W.G. (2000b), “Athenaeus and the Epitome: Texts, Manuscripts, and Early Editions”, in: Braund/Wilkins (2000) 41–52. Asmonti, L. (2015), “Gentrifying the ‘Demos’: Aristocratic Principles and Democratic Culture in Ancient Athens”, SCO 61.1, 55–75. Bissa, E.M.A. (2016), “Wealth and Monopoly in the Classical Greek Polis”, in: E.M.A. Bissa/ F. Santangelo (eds), Studies on Wealth in the Ancient World, BICS Suppl. 133, London, 33– 42. Boeckh, A. (3. Aufl. von M. Fränkel) (1886), Die Staatshaushaltung der Athener, Berlin. Bohlen, D. (1937), Die Bedeutung der Fischerei für die antike Wirtschaft, Hamburg. Dalby, A. (1996), Siren Feasts: A History of Food and Gastronomy in Greece, London. Davidson, J.N. (1993), “Fish, Sex and Revolution in Athens”, CQ 43, 53–66. Davidson, J.N. (1995), “Opsophagia: Revolutionary Eating at Athens”, in: J. Wilkins/D. Harvey/ M. Dobson (eds), Food in Antiquity, Exeter, 204–213. Davidson, J.N. (1997), Courtesans and Fishcakes. The Consuming Passions of Classical Athens, London. Davies, J.K. (1971), Athenian Propertied Families, 600–300 B.C., Oxford. Davies, J.K. (1981), Wealth and the Power of Wealth in Classical Athens, New York. Davies, J.K. (2016), “Aristonikos and the Fishmongers”, in: E.M.A. Bissa/F. Santangelo (eds), Studies on Wealth in the Ancient World, BICS Suppl. 133, London, 21–32. Dover, K.J. (1974), Greek Popular Morality in the Time of Plato and Aristotle, Oxford. Duplouy, A. (2003), “Les Eupatrides d’Athénes, nobles defénseurs de leur patrie”, Cahiers du Centre Gustave Glotz 14, 7–22. Duplouy, A. (2006), Le prestige des élites. Recherches sur les modes de reconnaissance sociale en Grèce entre les Xe et Ve siècles avant J.-C., Paris. Duplouy, A. (2015), “Genealogical and Dynastic Behaviour in Archaic and Classical Greece: Two Gentilician Strategies”, in: N. Fisher/H. van Wees (eds), ‘Aristocracy’ in Antiquity: Redefining Greek and Roman Elites, Swansea, 59–84. Düring, I. (1936), “De Athenaei Dipnosophistarum indole atque dispositione”, Apophoreta Gotoburgensia Vilelmo Lundström oblata, Göteborg, 226–270. Gibson, R.K./Kraus, C.S. (2002), The Classical Commentary: Histories, Practices, Theory, Leiden. Gilula, D. (1995a), “Food – An Effective Tool of Amatory Persuasion: A Commentary on Mnesimachus fr. 4 K–A”, Athenaeum 83, 143–156. Gilula, D. (1995b), “Comic Food and Food for Comedy”, in: J. Wilkins/D. Harvey/M. Dobson (eds), Food in Antiquity, Exeter, 386–399. Gilula, D. (2000), “Hermippus and his Catalogue of Goods (fr. 63)”, in: F.D. Harvey/J.M. Wilkins (eds), The Rivals of Aristophanes: Studies in Athenian Old Comedy, London, 75–90. Halliwell, S. (2008), Greek Laughter: A Study of Cultural Psychology from Homer to Early Christianity, Cambridge.

  Athina Papachrysostomou Halliwell, S. (2014), “Laughter”, in: M. Revermann (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Greek Comedy, Cambridge, 189–205. Hansen, M.H. (1983), “Rhetores and Strategoi in Fourth-Century Athens”, GRBS 24, 151–180. Jacob, C. (2013), The Web of Athenaeus (transl. by A. Papaconstantinou), Washington. Keim, B. (2016), “Non-Material but not Immaterial: Demosthenes’ Reassessment of the Wealth of Athens”, in: E.M.A. Bissa/F. Santangelo (eds), Studies on Wealth in the Ancient World, BICS Suppl. 133, London, 7–20. Lambert, S. (2015), “Aristocracy and the Attic Genos: A Mythological Perspective”, in: N. Fisher/H. van Wees (eds), ‘Aristocracy’ in Antiquity: Redefining Greek and Roman Elites, Swansea, 169–202. Loomis, W.T. (1998), Wages, Welfare Costs, and Inflation in Classical Athens, Ann Arbor. Lukinovich, A. (1990), “The Play of Reflections between Literary Form and the Sympotic Theme in the Deipnosophistae of Athenaeus”, in: O. Murray (ed.), Sympotica: A Symposium on the Symposion, Oxford/New York, 263–271. Lytle, E. (2010), “Fish Lists in the Wilderness: The Social and Economic History of a Boiotian Price Decree”, Hesperia 79, 253–303. MacKendrick, P.L. (1969), The Athenian Aristocracy, 399 to 31 B.C., Cambridge MA. Marginesu, G. (2016), Callia l’Ateniese: metamorfosi di un’élite, 421–371 a.C., Stuttgart. Miccolis, E.R. (2017), Archippos: Einleitung, Übersetzung, Kommentar, Fragmenta Comica 12, Heidelberg. Millett, P. (1990), “Sale, Credit and Exchange in Athenian Law and Society”, in: P. Cartledge/ P. Millett/S. Todd (eds), Nomos. Essays in Athenian Law, Politics and Society, Cambridge, 167–194. Millis, B.W. (2015), Anaxandrides: Introduction, Translation, Commentary, Fragmenta Comica 17, Heidelberg. Most, G.W. (1997), Collecting Fragments-Fragmente sammeln, Göttingen. Murray, O. (2015), “Athenaeus the Encyclopedist”, in: J. Wilkins/R. Nadeau (eds), A Companion of Food in Ancient World, Chichester, 30–42. Nesselrath, H.-G. (1990), Die attische Mittlere Komödie, Berlin/New York. Olson, S.D. (2015), “Athenaeus’ Aristophanes and the Problem of Reconstructing Lost Comedies”, in: S. Chronopoulos/C. Orth (2015), Fragmente einer Geschichte der griechischen Komödie: Fragmentary History of Greek Comedy, Heidelberg, 35–65. Olson, S.D. (2017), “Epilogue: A Conversation on Fragments”, in: T. Derda/J. Hilder/J. Kwapisz (eds), Fragments, Holes, and Wholes: Reconstructing the Ancient World in Theory and Practice, Journal of Juristic Papyrology Suppl. 30, Warsaw, 393–406. Papachrysostomou, A. (2008), Six Comic Poets. A Commentary on Selected Fragments of Middle Comedy, Tübingen. Papachrysostomou, A. (2016), Amphis: Introduction, Translation, Commentary, Fragmenta Comica 20, Heidelberg. Paulas, J. (2010), “The Bazaar Fish Market in Fourth-Century Greek Comedy”, Arethusa 43, 403–428. Pierrot, A. (2015), “Who were the Eupatrids in Archaic Athens?”, in: N. Fisher/H. van Wees (eds), ‘Aristocracy’ in Antiquity: Redefining Greek and Roman Elites, Swansea, 147–168. Pringsheim, F. (1950), The Greek Law of Sale, Weimar. Rhodes, P.J. (1981), A Commentary on the Aristotelian ‘Athenaion Politeia’, Oxford. Rudolph, F. (1891), “Die Quellen und die Schriftstellerei des Athenaios”, Philologus Suppl. 6, 109–162.

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Stanley, P.V. (1999), The Economic Reforms of Solon, St. Katharinen. Starr, C.G. (1992), The Aristocratic Temper of Greek Civilization, New York/Oxford. Taylor, C. (2017), Poverty, Wealth, and Well-Being: Experiencing Penia in Democratic Athens, Oxford. Wilkins, J. (2000), The Boastful Chef: The Discourse of Food in Ancient Greek Comedy, Oxford.

Benjamin W. Millis

Fragments of Menander in Stobaeus Stobaeus is one of those source authors whom editors of fragments encounter most frequently. 1 In this regard, he can be paired in an obvious way with Athenaeus, although the latter is undoubtedly a more prolific quoter of comic fragments in terms of both overall number of fragments quoted and number of different comic poets represented by these fragments. 2 The range of authors that Stobaeus draws on is clearly somewhat more circumscribed than that used by Athenaeus, but the range of subject matter is not, or not necessarily so, even if the frequent banality creates the impression of a sort of uniformity. Athenaeus has been thought to be many things: a very learned man who had access to — and actually read — vast numbers of now lost plays or instead a third-rate scribbler who mostly cribbed from others and knew little material at first-hand; an overcredulous dullard or a sophisticated author playing with literary conventions and making clever juxtapositions; an author interesting in his own right or a tiresome complier. Whatever one’s view of Athenaeus, modern scholars have often thought about him, at least enough to have an opinion, whether good or bad. Stobaeus, on the other hand, has not even been thought about enough to be despised and remains little more than a cipher. Athenaeus himself has been the focus of a certain amount of study, as have numerous aspects of his work; there have been numerous editions of the Deipnosophistae, including by truly great scholars such as Casaubon. 3 For Stobaeus, in contrast, there was a certain

 1 I am grateful to the organizers of the conference, Antonios Rengakos, Bernhard Zimmermann, Anna Lamari and Anna Novokhatko, both for the invitation to participate and for the hospitality in Thessaloniki; I am likewise indebted to my fellow participants for helping to create a congenial atmosphere and for comments at the conference that improved this paper. 2 For a brief overview and comparison of Athenaeus with Stobaeus as a source for comic fragments, see Nesselrath 2014, 669–671 (for poets of “Middle” Comedy), 676–677 (for poets of “New” Comedy). The general trend is that the later the comedy, the more important Stobaeus is as a source of fragments: for fragments of “Old” Comedy he is a minor or even negligible source, for fragments of “Middle” Comedy he is a major source but still clearly secondary to Athenaeus, for fragments of “New” Comedy he comes into his own and eclipses Athenaeus as the single most important source (but note Nesselrath 2014, 676 for the caution that the character of an individual poet’s output can buck this general trend). 3 Most obviously, see the various articles in Braund and Wilkins 2000; for Athenaeus as a source of fragments, particularly of comedy, see also Olson 2015. Serious work on Athenaeus continues: e.g. Olson’s recent (2006–2012) eight volume Loeb edition as well as the same editor’s forthcoming Teubner edition. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-033

  Benjamin W. Millis amount of interest in the 16th century and shortly thereafter and then likewise a small amount of interest in the mid to late 19th century. But for the past century, i.e. since the completion of the Wachsmuth-Hense edition, there has been very little interest. 4 My point here is not to attempt a rehabilitation of Stobaeus or to try to convince anyone that he is a much more interesting author than many of us might have realized. Indeed, I might as well admit up front that when editing and commenting on fragments my heart sinks as much as anyone’s when I have a fragment that comes from Stobaeus as opposed to somewhere else that often seems a little more interesting, at least potentially. My primary aim instead is to look at a handful of comic fragments from Stobaeus in order to see if there is a fruitful way to approach them as fragments quoted in Stobaeus, that is to use the source as a means for extracting a little more information in the best case or, in the worst case, at least for setting some clear limits on how much one can reasonably say. Put more bluntly, I am here not particularly interested in Stobaeus or his collection per se but rather, as a commentator on fragments, only in any ways in which paying attention to Stobaeus can shed light on the material he preserves. But a brief look at a few fragments not from Stobaeus may perhaps help to set the stage. Every fragment is different, and every fragment has its own difficulties, but for many fragments I, and I assume I am far from alone in this, have developed a sort of methodology for editing and commenting that depends on the source material. Thus, for example, Menander fr. 435, the first Menander incertum that comes from Athenaeus (Ath. 2.71e): [fr. 186] φησὶ Μένανδρος. πάλιν (fr. 435)· τῆς σκιᾶς τὴν πορφύραν πρῶτον ἐνυφαίνουσ’, εἶτα μετὰ τὴν πορφύραν τοῦτ’ ἔστιν οὔτε λευκὸν οὔτε πορφύρα, ἀλλ’ ὥσπερ αὐγὴ τῆς κρόκης κεκραμένη. (Ath. 2.71e)

 4 The one major exception is the collection of studies in Reydams-Schils 2011. Much of the lack of interest in Stobaeus, especially when compared with Athenaeus, undoubtedly lies in the fact that the former is far less visible as an individual, i.e. his name is attached to a collection of quotations taken from other sources but he is not an author in the same sense that Athenaeus is. This absence of an explicit voice of Stobaeus in his collection does not of course prevent analysis of his intentions, methodology and much more, but it does make such studies somewhat less obvious and seemingly more theoretical than grappling with actual words that can (however misleadingly) be taken as representing the thoughts of an author.

Fragments of Menander in Stobaeus  

[fr. 186] says Menander. Again (fr. 435): First they weave in the purple, for the shadow; then after the purple comes this part, which is neither white nor purple, but is like a beam of light mixed into the woof. 5

Without going into some of the serious difficulties with this fragment, its apparent context 6 suggests that the fragment concerns blankets of some sort. The surrounding fragments provide parallels, help somewhat to elucidate the fragment and suggest a possible context for the fragment as found by Athenaeus, e.g. in a catalogue of bed equipment or the like. The context in Athenaeus in no way solves many of the real difficulties with the fragment, but it does enable us to situate the fragment somewhat and to understand a context for the fragment, even if not the original context. The knowledge suggested by the context in Athenaeus helps to direct what we do with the fragment and provides some parameters within which to work. A similar dynamic plays out with regard to Menander fr. 496, the first Menander incertum from Hesychius (ε 2515). ἔμπυος· ὁ ἐμπυϊκὸς παρὰ Μενάνδρῳ (Hsch. ε 2515) empuos [abscess]. ho empuikos [a man suffering from abscesses] in Menander. (Translation by S.D. Olson)

The Hesychius entry perhaps derives from an Atticist source and may or may not be related to a passing reference in Pollux (4.186 ἔμπυος, ὑπόπυος; part of a list of ailments); Bekker’s fifth lexicon and its derivatives offer apparently unrelated material of similar content, as seemingly do the Etymologica genuina and its derivatives. 7 As with the previous fragment, there are real limits to what we can do

 5 Trans. Olson 2006. 6 Menander frr. 186 and 435, followed by several fragments from other authors, are often printed in editions of Athenaeus at the conclusion of Book 2, i.e. directly after 2.71e (thus the reference in Kassel–Austin for example). These fragments seem to be a group composed of quotations that fell out of the main text of Book 2 of Athenaeus and were subsequently gathered up; for brief discussion, e.g. Olson and Seaberg 2018 on Cratin. fr. 334. In any case, Men. fr. 435 was originally probably located at 2.48c (thus Schweighäuser) or thereabout. 7 Bk.v = Λέξεις ῥητορικαί (Bekker, Anecdota Graeca 1.249.22–24) Ἔμπυος· ἔμπυός ἐστι πλήρης πύου, πύον δέ ἐστι τὸ σεσηπὸς αἶμα. εἰδέναι δὲ δεῖ ὅτι οὐ λέγουσιν ἔμπυον οἱ παλαιοί, ἀλλὰ πύον

  Benjamin W. Millis with this fragment and how far we push it, but the important point here is that we can situate the fragment in some sort of context, albeit secondary, and thus are provided with a frame of reference for discussing the fragment or at least one important aspect of it. The situation is somewhat different with a fragment like fr. 680, the first Menander incertum from Stobaeus (1.1.11). Μενάνδρου Ἅπαντα σιγῶν ὁ θεὸς ἐξεργάζεται. (Stob. 1.1.11) Menander God silently accomplishes everything.

Aside from the chapter heading 8 that tells us little more than a superficial reading of the fragment itself does, we are given precious little help in moving forward with the fragment. It is of course true that there are the other fragments found in the chapter, but these offer little more than additional iterations of the rather trite claim that God, or Zeus, is great or controls all, for example Trag. Adesp. fr. 471 (Stob. 1.1.5) or Odyssey 6.188–189 (Stob. 1.1.7). This situation arises again and again, not only with Menander but also with the fragments of numerous other comic poets, particularly those of the mid to late 4th century who form the bulk of the comic material in Stobaeus. The fragments, at least in their current isolation, tend to seem to be rather banal truisms stated in what is often relatively uninteresting language, and those of us who work on comic poets have yet, as far as I can see, to work out or articulate a useful or “standard” way of dealing with these fragments aside from noting some parallels for the thought and moving on. My goal here is to try to point to what I hope might be fruitful avenues of approach to some of these fragments or at least to try to define a little more clearly what we can say about these fragments. The material I am using as a check on what can

 (Empuos [abscess]: an empuos is full of puon [pus]; pus is blood that has become foul. Note also that the ancients did not use empuos but rather puos); essentially the same entry occurs also at Phot. ε 773. Derived from the Etym. Gen. is a variety of lexical material concerning both ἔμπυος and πύον; relevant here are EM 697.6–7 and Etym. Gud. 487.58–59. Possibly relevant but not obviously related is Σ Soph. Phil. 1378. 8 Ὅτι θεὸς δημιουργὸς τῶν ὄντων καὶ διέπει τὸ ὅλον τῷ τῆς προνοίας λόγῳ καὶ ποίας οὐσίας ὑπάρχει (“That God is the creator of all things and steers the universe with providential wisdom, and of what essence God is” [trans. Searby]); for a recent study of the chapter headings in Stobaeus, see Searby 2011.

Fragments of Menander in Stobaeus  

be said about comic fragments quoted by Stobaeus is quotations of Menander that subsequently turned up in papyrus finds and thus were belatedly given a context. My choice of Menander specifically, aside from the fact that he is the obvious relevant comic poet, is in part extraneous to this particular aim and one could just as easily use Euripides or some other extant author whom Stobaeus often quotes. 9 First the bad news, such as it is. As far as I can see, the chapter headings in Stobaeus have no value whatsoever in terms of supplying information about the fragments or their interpretation. They give no indication of any awareness or knowledge of any context and generally reflect a grouping of quotations by the most obvious and superficial reading of them. Attempting to use Stobaeus’ chapter headings as a path of entry to saying something interesting about the fragments is thus mostly a misguided and fruitless endeavour in my view unless one wishes to talk about the largely unrelated topic of Stobaeus and his interests. This lack of usefulness should, I think, surprise no one, given that the quotations, as they appear in Stobaeus, had in all likelihood already passed through numerous collections and so had presumably been divorced from their original contexts for centuries at a minimum. A tentative way forward can perhaps be found by looking at those original contexts of the quotations where that is now possible, but first a few preliminary remarks. I have found nine instances in which a Menandrian quotation preserved in Stobaeus overlaps with a papyrus find and so is given a larger context. 10 These nine are comprised of two from Aspis, one from Georgos (disputed; see below), two from Dyskolos, one each from Karchedonios and Kolax, and two from Samia. 11  9 Using Menander confers an advantage primarily when analysing the state of the text: since Menander has no medieval textual tradition, quotations in Stobaeus can be compared with the extant plays without any chance that there had been contamination between the two sources. The absence of a medieval tradition also means that quotations (not only from Stobaeus but from any source) from the now extant plays existed as fragments prior to the papyrus discoveries of the 19th and 20 centuries and were worked on as such for several centuries. This fact in turn provides an almost unparalleled example for assessing the success of earlier generations of scholars in emending and explicating comic fragments. Both these issues are extremely important and deserve attention but are touched on only briefly here, partly for reasons of space but mostly because the latter issue in particular involves far more sources than just Stobaeus. 10 These examples do not include instances in which Stobaean quotations from a quasi-extant play do not overlap with portions preserved on papyrus and thus remain isolated and bereft of context: e.g. Stob. 4.8.7 = Asp. fr. 1; Stob. 3.30.7 = Epit. fr. 6; Stob. 4.12.4 = Sik. fr. 2; etc. 11 Asp. 20–21 = Stob. 4.12.6; Asp. 326–327 = Stob. 3.23.4; Georg. 35–37 ≈ Stob. 4.15b.25; Dys. 797– 812 = Stob. 3.16.14; Dys. 860–863 = Stob. 3.29.45–46; Karch. 7–8 = Stob. 2.31.19; Kolax 43–45 = Stob. 3.10.21; Sam. 140–142 = Stob. 4.29.10; Sam. 163–164 = Stob. 1.6.9.

  Benjamin W. Millis The total number of examples is thus small and any results must be tempered by this fact. For what it is worth, most of the fragments (six out nine) come from early in the play, i.e. within the first 150 lines or so: the exceptions are one of the Aspis quotations, which is from about a third of the way through the play, and the two from Dyskolos which are from near the end, but there seems little reason to think that this distribution is terribly meaningful. The text of the fragments is generally very good, which is to say that it usually agrees closely with the papyrus texts. This is true even in cases where it might have suspected that a quotation had been altered somewhat in order to make it more generalizing. The one exception is the apparent quotation from Georgos, which veers so widely from the papyrus that there must be some serious underlying problem. Μενάνδρου Γεωργοῦ (fr. 96 Kock) Ἀγρὸν εὐσεβέστερον γεωργεῖν οὐδένα οἶμαι· φέρει γὰρ ὅσα θεοῖς ἄνθη καλά, κιττόν, δάφνην· κριθὰς δ’ ἐὰν σπείρω, πάνυ † δικαίως ἀπέδωχ’, ὅσα ἂν καταβάλω. (Stob. 4.15b.25) Menander Georgos I don’t think anybody farms on land more holy. It produces flowers beautiful like the gods, ivy, laurel; and if I plant barley, it yields an entirely fair return, however much I sow. ἀγρὸν εὐσεβέστερον γεωργεῖν οὐδένα οἶμαι· φέρει γὰρ μυρρ[ίνην, κιττὸν] καλόν, ἄνθη τοσαῦτα, τἆλλα δ’ ἄν τις καταβάληι ἀπἐδωκεν ὀρθῶς καὶ δικαίως, οὐ [πλέον] (Men. Georg. 35–38) I don’t think anybody farms on land more holy. It produces myrtle trees, fine [ivy], — and the flowers! Sow other crops, though, and it yields a just and fair return, no [surplus] 12

 12 All translations of passages from extant plays of Menander are from Arnott 1979–2000 with occasional minor modifications when the text of Stobaeus differs from the generally accepted text of Menander.

Fragments of Menander in Stobaeus  

The Stobaean quotation as a whole probably ought to be disassociated from the Georgos, but the situation is most likely more complicated than a simple misattribution and dismissing the entire quotation seems extreme. One possibility is that two distinct fragments have been conflated (cf. Gomme and Sandbach 1973 ad loc., although there is no reason to assume that both fragments must be Menander); perhaps less likely is that the quotation is a reworking of lines from Georgos that were reused elsewhere and were wrongly assigned here to that play. In any case, there seems clearly to be some sort of relation, even if not precisely identifiable, between the Stobaean quotation and the Georgos; the first part of the quotation does come from that play, and the quotation has (rightly) been used to correct and supplement the papyrus text. The fragments under consideration here have not, for the most part, been subject to sustained critical attention, but this is doubtless due mainly to language that is largely unexceptional and to an absence of any obvious cruces. Still, it is perhaps heartening to note that critics did sometimes successfully identify problematic points in the text, even if correct solutions were not always reached. See, for example, Dys. 860–863 (Stob. 3.29.45–46). Μενάνδρου Δυσκόλου (fr. 119 Koerte) Οὐδενὸς χρὴ πράγματος τὸν εὖ ποιοῦνθ’ ὅλως ἀπογνῶναί ποτε. Ἁλωτὰ γίνετ’ ἐπιμελείᾳ καὶ πόνῳ ἅπαντα. (Stob. 3.29.45–46) ποιοῦνθ’ SMA : πονοῦνθ’ Grotius : φρονοῦνθ’ pap. Menander Dyskolos A successful man never ought entirely to despair of any project. Every prize can be captured by care and work.

In line 861, Grotius put his finger on a textual problem and was able to offer a reasoned solution that was almost uniformly accepted prior to the discovery of the papyrus. 13 There was also a question of whether the quotation was one fragment or  13 For Grotius’ reasoning, cf. Koerte 1959 ad loc.: “πονοῦνθ᾽ Grotius, recte, nam caput Stobaei est περὶ φιλοπονίας”. The notable exception to acceptance of Grotius’ emendation is Gaisford in his edition of Stobaeus.

  Benjamin W. Millis two. One branch of the tradition presented the four lines as a single quotation, while the other separated it into two fragments of two lines each, although without an intervening lemma, thus implying that such a lemma had fallen out. Scholars generally articulated the two possibilities but tended to emphasize the cohesion of the two parts and thus keep the quotation as a single unit (although inertia may well have played a role here as well). Contrast Herwerden’s intervention at Karch. 7–8 (Stob. 2.31.19). Τοῦ αὐτοῦ (i.e. Menander; fr. 696 K–A precedes) Καρχηδονίῳ (fr. 228 Koerte) Ἔργον ἐκ πολλοῦ χρόνου ἄνοιαν ἡμέρᾳ μεταστῆσαι μιᾷ. γάρ inser. Herwerden post ἔργον (Stob. 2.31.19) The same (i.e. Menander) in Karchedonios It’s hard to cure longstanding folly in a single day!

His suggestion of a typical insertion in order to regularize the language is seemingly proven false; this passing observation is meant merely as a note of caution lest some current attempts at rehabilitating Herwerden and his fellow-traveller Blaydes swing the pendulum too far in their favour. 14 The one place critics seem really to have gone badly astray is in the title of the play now known as Samia, although even here the error is not stupid. Μενάνδρου Κνιδία (fr. 248 Koerte) Οὐδὲν γένους γένος γὰρ οἶμαι διαφέρειν. ἀλλ’ εἰ δικαίως ἐξετάσεις, καὶ γνήσιος ὁ χρηστός ἐστιν, ὁ δὲ πονηρὸς καὶ νόθος. (Stob. 4.29.10 [= Sam. 140–142]) κνηδία MA (om. S) (in Cnidia, i.e. Κνιδίᾳ, Gesner) Menander Knidia I think there’s no distinction when one’s born, but if you test them fairly, good men are legitimate, bad men are bastards

 14 To be fair, neither Herwerden nor Blaydes deserve the opprobrium in which they were long held (and often still are). They both made many suggestions of real merit, but in both cases their talents were not always suited to the delicate touch necessary for fragments and were perhaps better applied to extant authors.

Fragments of Menander in Stobaeus  

Μενάνδρου Κνιδίᾳ (fr. 249 Koerte) Ταὐτόματόν ἐστιν ὡς ἔοικέ που θεός, σῴζει τε πολλὰ τῶν ἀοράτων πραγμάτων. (Stob. 1.6.9 [= Sam. 163–164]) κηδείᾳ P : Ἀκηδεία F : Κνιδίᾳ Clericus Menander Knidia It seems that Chance somehow’s a kind of god — it watches over many things concealed from view

In the case of the second quotation, the manuscripts split between assigning it to the play Κηδεία (here marriage bond or something similar) or to Ἀκηδεία (carelessness or the like). But the first quotation is assigned to the play Κνηδία, an easy enough slip for Κηδείᾳ but also an obvious etacism for Κνιδίᾳ (and thus corrected by Gesner). Clericus meanwhile also corrected the other quotation from Κηδεία / Ἀκηδεία to Κνιδίᾳ, i.e. a woman from Knidos, and there things stood until the discovery of the papyrus fragments. These later finds were associated with the name Samia, known from a single fragment cited by Phrynichus but not found anywhere in the papyri (Sam. unnumbered fr. = fr. 437 Kock), 15 and thus has the play generally been called. 16 The best way to account for the evidence of both the papyrus and Stobaeus is to follow Austin in correcting all the variants in Stobaeus to Κηδεία and printing the title of the play as Σαμία ἢ Κηδεία. When faced with the apparently paleographic variants Κνηδία, i.e. Κνιδία, and Κηδεία, earlier scholars adopted the easy and obvious correction. This decision was bolstered by the facts that a title Κηδεία is unparalleled, while Κνιδία is well-paralleled both in its general form, i.e. a feminine ethnic, and in its specific form, i.e. Alexis wrote a play with the same title. An objection could have been made that the easier reading was being favoured over the more difficult, but in any case the treatment  15 There is no plausible place in the play as we have it where this fragment can be placed, and the fragment refers to a character Tryphe who does not otherwise occur in the play. The fragment is now generally, and likely correctly, disassociated from the play (cf. Austin 1969 ap. crit. ad loc.: “versum ex alia comoedia cum Samiae v. 158 fortasse confudit grammaticus dormitans”), but see Gomme and Sandbach 1973 ad loc. for what arguments can be made for retaining the fragment. 16 That the play represented by the papyrus finds was called Samia was originally a (plausible) conjecture by Lefèbvre when all that was known was the Cairo papyrus; his suggestion was proven correct by the subsequent discoveries of a mosaic in Mytilene that thus labels a scene and, more importantly, of the Bodmer papyrus containing a subscription.

  Benjamin W. Millis of the title here highlights a tendency, often unwarranted, to regularize and to remove anomalies. Looking a little more closely at the content of a few of these quotations can perhaps lead to some larger lessons. Even before being subsumed within largely extant plays, none of these fragments were subjected to any great examination, presumably because they generally express rather banal thoughts in relatively unremarkable language, which is indeed the essential problem in doing much of interest with many of the comic fragments preserved in Stobaeus. The one key insight that was made is Meineke’s comment on fr. 69 Koerte (Stob. 3.23.4) = Asp. 326–327. Ὃ βούλεται γὰρ μόνον ὁρῶν καὶ προσδοκῶν ἀλόγιστος ἔσται τῆς ἀληθείας κριτής. A man who only sees and thinks about his own desires will be a faulty judge of actual fact

Meineke, concerned about the absence of the definite article, realized that these lines could well be not a generalizing comment but rather something said about a particular individual who appeared in the play. 17 His suggestion, despite being made in response to a specific textual detail in a single fragment, turns out to be largely true not just in the case of this one particular fragment but in fact for all fragments of Menander in Stobaeus, albeit with one important caveat that will be discussed below. Fr. 69 Koerte could easily be read as a generalizing statement (hence the concern by Porson and Meineke about the absence of the article): the one who sees only what he wants is an irrational judge of the truth. But read in context as Aspis 326–327, the lines have no generalizing force whatsoever but rather describe a highly individual scene. Daos proposes that Chairestratos deceive Smikrines and he introduces the description of his plan with a short summary: 1. I have a plan to deceive Smikrines; 2. the plan will ensnare Smikrines to the benefit of Chairestratos; because 3. (= these two lines) Smikrines will be deceived. The lines

 17 Porson 1812, 292 had already been bothered by the absence of the definite article with the subject and so inserted it by reading ὁ μόνον ὁρῶν in fr. 69.1 = Asp. 326. Meineke 1823, 30 rightly found this suggestion to be scarcely credible and instead raised the possibility of emending ὁρῶν to ὁ δρῶν. But Meineke also saw that an argument could be made for retaining the transmitted text: “de certo quodam homine loqui puta, cuicunque haec verba tribuit poeta”. Meineke subsequently repeated his comments in abbreviated form in his edition of the comic fragments.

Fragments of Menander in Stobaeus  

in question are thus meant as a factual description of the precise behaviour expected from Smikrines. Similar is fr. 96 Kock from Georgos (see above for the text and brief discussion of its difficulties), assuming that at least the first part really does belong to that play; it is simply a straight-forward background description, albeit in somewhat high-flown terms. As best as we can tell, it really is nothing more than the description of the farm that it seems to be. In these cases, the simplest superficial reading of the fragment is in fact the correct one. So much for the easiest examples and now the important caveat. Most of the other fragments in question are equally grounded in their immediate context; that is, they are part of a description of, or response to, the dialogue or events at that specific moment in the play. They have the same particularizing relation to their larger context but express that thought in terms that are slightly more abstract and often sound rather “proverbial”. Take, for example, fr. 70 Koerte (Stob. 4.12.6) = Asp. 20–21. Στρατιώτην, Σμικρίνη, σωτηρίας ἔστ’ ἔργον εὑρεῖν πρόφασιν, ὀλέθρου δ’ εὔπορον. (Men. fr. 70 Koerte [Stob. 4.2.16] = Asp. 20–21) If you’re a soldier, Smikrines, it’s hard to find good reason for survival; for death though, easy.

Daos enters after returning from the East and while bemoaning the presumed death of his master Kleostratos. Smikrines overhears and demands to know the details of Kleostratos’ death. Daos obliges, but begins his account with a generalizing statement of the vagaries of war, namely this fragment: it is hard for a soldier to find a way to survive and easy to find a way to die. This is not quite as straight-forward a description of an individual as the other quotation from Aspis, but it is no less closely tied to the immediate context. The statement is phrased as a commonplace of general relevance, and in the abstract one might imagine that the lines suggest some larger concern with the operation of fate in war or perhaps with the harshness of war or even conceivably with fate in general or the sadness associated with a young life cut short. But in context, all it means is that two characters are discussing a third character who has apparently died in war. That is, there is no larger meaning here; the lines are simply a polite and conversationally apt way of saying “a soldier has died in war; it is sad, but these things happen”. The remaining fragments tend to follow more or less this same pattern, that is they directly address the situation at hand in the play and have little to no more general relevance. So, for example, fr. 248 Koerte (Stob. 4.29.10) = Sam. 140–142

  Benjamin W. Millis (see above for the text) gives the impression of making some point about the intrinsic nature of a person and about the meaning and use of terms of moral characterization and their interplay with terms of social status. This sort of thinking may well be behind the lines, and the lines do have the appearance of co-opting contemporary discourse on the subject, but all that is really going on here in the play is discussion of the legitimacy of an unborn child and how the mother and child should be treated. The lines have no greater salience and the extent to which they evoke current philosophical thought and/or language is probably much more a matter of a passing pop cultural reference than a point of deeper implications. Much the same is true of fr. 116 Koerte (Stob. 3.16.14) = Dys. 797–812, a fairly lengthy speech in which Sostratos addresses his father Kallippides on the nature of wealth. Περὶ χρημάτων λαλεῖς, ἀβεβαίου πράγματος· εἰ μὲν γὰρ οἶσθα ταῦτα παραμενοῦντά σοι εἰς πάντα τὸν χρόνον, φύλαττε μηδενὶ ἄλλῳ μεταδιδούς, αὐτὸς ὢν δὲ κύριος· εἰ μὴ δὲ σεαυτοῦ, τῆς Τύχης δὲ πάντ’ ἔχεις, τί ἂν φθονοίης, ὦ πάτερ, τούτων τινί; αὐτὴ γὰρ ἄλλῳ τυχὸν ἀναξίῳ τινὶ παρελομένη σοῦ πάντα προσθήσει πάλιν. διόπερ ἔγωγέ φημι δεῖν, ὅσον χρόνον εἶ κύριος, χρῆσθαί σε γενναίως, πάτερ, αὐτόν, ἐπικουρεῖν πᾶσιν, εὐπόρους ποιεῖν ὡς ἂν δύνῃ πλείστους διὰ σαυτοῦ· τοῦτο γὰρ ἀθάνατόν ἐστι, κἄν ποτε πταίσας τύχῃς, ἐκεῖθεν ἔσται ταὐτὸ τοῦτό σοι πάλιν. πολλῷ δὲ κρεῖττόν ἐστιν ἐμφανὴς φίλος ἢ πλοῦτος ἀφανής, ὃν σὺ κατορύξας ἔχεις.

5

10

15

(Men. fr. 116 Koerte [Stob. 3.16.14] = Dys. 797–812) Your theme is money, an unstable substance. If you know that it will stay with you for ever, guard it and don’t share with anyone. But where your title’s not absolute, and all’s on lease from fortune, not your own, why grudge a man some share in it, father? Fortune might take it all away from you, hand it to someone else who doesn’t perhaps deserve it. So, as long as you control it, father, you yourself, I say use it generously, aid everyone and by your acts enrich all whom you can.

Fragments of Menander in Stobaeus  

Such conduct never dies. If you by chance should ever stumble, it will yield to you a like repayment. Better far than hidden wealth kept buried is a visible true friend.

Despite the extent to which this seems like an abstract discussion when read in isolation, all is in fact closely grounded in the actual situation and it serves to move along the action of the play. To be sure, the speech does make use of abstract notions about the nature of wealth and how it should be used, even if these are perhaps better viewed as nuggets of folk wisdom rather than contemporary philosophy. But more importantly for the purpose here, the lines are, just as they seem on a superficial reading, a son speaking to a wealthy father and advocating how that father should use his wealth, i.e. not hoard it jealously but instead be generous. Somewhat similar in its direct relation to the events at hand is the second quotation from Dyskolos (fr. 119 Koerte [Stob. 3.29.45–46] = Dys. 860–863). Οὐδενὸς χρὴ πράγματος τὸν εὖ ποιοῦνθ’ ὅλως ἀπογνῶναί ποτε. ἁλωτὰ γίνετ’ ἐπιμελείᾳ καὶ πόνῳ ἅπαντα. (Men. fr. 119 Koerte [Stob. 3.29.45–46] = Dys. 860–863) A successful man never ought entirely to despair of any project. Every prize can be captured by care and work.

This is again spoken by Sostratos, but 50 lines later after he has convinced his father and achieved his aims; when says “no right-thinking man ought to give up on any task, since everything is achievable with diligence and hard work”, all he really means is “I persevered and so succeeded”. In fairness, trying to imagine a coherent context for many of these quotations, let alone a plausibly correct context, is very difficult, especially with examples like the last. So it is perhaps fitting to conclude with an example that is even more opaque and in fact casts doubt on the entire exercise of trying to deduce the original context. Fr. 249 Koerte (Stob. 1.6.9) = Sam. 163–164 is clear enough in context and means little more than “I am surprised at what I just learned”. Ταὐτόματόν ἐστιν ὡς ἔοικέ που θεός, σῴζει τε πολλὰ τῶν ἀοράτων πραγμάτων. (Men. fr. 249 Koerte [Stob. 1.6.9] = Sam. 163–164)

  Benjamin W. Millis It seems that Chance somehow’s a kind of god — it watches over many things concealed

But since perhaps little is so common in comedy as characters being surprised at something that has happened, realizing that this is the meaning seems to get us nowhere at all. In this regard, it is very similar to one of the examples I started with, namely fr. 680 (Ἅπαντα σιγῶν ὁ θεὸς ἐξεργάζεται [God silently accomplishes everything]), which must have much the same meaning. There are very many such fragments, almost all one or two lines, and they all seem to perform a very similar role, that is as something akin to conversational filler or, perhaps better put, conversational building blocks. When such quotations can be analysed in context, a pattern seems to emerge; namely, they often have a transitional function, occurring either near the beginning of a conversation as an introduction to a topic or near the end as a sort of summarizing conclusion. Not entirely dissimilar is the use in the midst of a dialogue, partially just as a polite response to something that was said, but also as a sort of conversational grease to keep the dialogue going. The evidence of these various quotations, even when taken together, does not necessarily offer any definite answers to any specific questions, but that was not really the point of the exercise here. The intention rather was to try to describe at least some of the sorts of fragments preserved in Stobaeus and to look for any patterns in their original contexts, ideally in order start to develop a sort of methodology of dealing with comic fragments in Stobaeus. In terms of concrete advice going forward, a very general rule of thumb seems to be that one should normally assume that there is less to the fragments than meets the eye. There are no hidden depths there or a grappling with eternal truths. The simplest, most superficial reading is normally the correct one, or at least so the evidence of Menander suggests, and the fragments should be interpreted as concretely as possible. Second, contrary to the impression given by the Stobaean fragments, Menander does not seem particularly interested in musings about the workings of fate or the power of the divine. Rather, fragments that seem to suggest such interests are normally parts of the conversational structure that take the form of platitudes and that serve to express sentiments such as surprise, resignation and so forth. Examining these fragments in those terms has the potential of shedding light on polished dialogue as represented by Menander and, by extension, other fourth century comic poets. The larger aim is of course to apply these tactics to the far more numerous fragments of both Menander and other comic poets that do not have a preserved context, but that is part of a much bigger enterprise, for which the suggestions presented here are merely a point of entry.

Fragments of Menander in Stobaeus  

Bibliography Arnott, W.G. (1979–2000), Menander (3 vols). Loeb Classical Library 132, 459, 460, Cambridge, Mass./London. Austin, C. (1969), Menandri Aspis et Samia I: Textus (cum apparatu critico) et indices. Kleine Texte für Vorlesungen und Übungen 188a, Berlin. Braund, D./J. Wilkins (eds) (2000), Athenaeus and his World: Reading Greek Culture in the Roman Empire, Exeter. Gomme, A.W./F.H. Sandbach (1973), Menander: A Commentary, Oxford. Koerte, A. (1959), Menandri quae supersunt. Pars altera: Reliquiae apud veteres scriptores servatae2 (rev. A. Thierfelder), Leipzig. Meineke, A. (1823), Menandri et Philemonis reliquiae, Berlin. Nesselrath, H.-G. (2014), “Later Greek Comedy in Later Antiquity”, in: M. Fontaine/A. Scafuro (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Greek and Roman Comedy, 667–679, New York. Olson, S.D. (2006), Athenaeus: The Learned Banqueters, Books I–III.106e. Loeb Classical Library 204, Cambridge, Mass./London. Olson, S.D. (2015), ‘Athenaeus’ Aristophanes and the Problem of Reconstructing Lost Comedies’, in: S. Chronopoulos/C. Orth (eds), Fragmente einer Geschichte der griechischen Komödie /Fragmentary History of Greek Comedy, 35–65, Heidelberg. Olson, S.D./R. Seaberg (2018), Kratinos frr. 299–514: Translation and Commentary, Fragmenta Comica 3.6, Göttingen. Porson, R. (1812), Adversaria, Cambridge. Searby, D.M. (2011), “The Intertitles in Stobaeus: Condensing a Culture”, in: G. Reydams-Schils (ed.), Thinking through Excerpts: Studies on Stobaeus, Turnhout, 23–70.

Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén

The Long Shadow of Fame: Quotations from Epicharmus in Works of the Imperial Period  Introduction While the presence of Epicharmus in the Sicilian and Attic culture of the Classical period has been the subject of discussion for more than a century, giving rise to many publications, 1 there are no global studies addressing knowledge of the poet in the Imperial period. In this essay, I will offer a quick, but I hope illustrative, review of the explicit mentions of Epicharmus in Greek writers between the 1st and 5th century AD (see the table at the end of this paper). 2 I work on the assumption that a quotation, although strictly connected to a sense of tradition, is not simply imitation or reproduction, but something that performs a role of its own in the work that has borrowed it, both conferring and deriving meaning in its new setting. 3 I will therefore focus particularly on why and how each author cites Epicharmus, and how this material (whether they be fragments or testimonies) is inserted in the work in question. I leave to one side the lexica and grammatical treatises which cite Epicharmus’ fragments for strictly linguistic reasons (i.e., merely as examples), 4 as well as Stobaeus’ Anthology 5 and the commentators on Aristotle who mention Epicharmus because he was cited by the philosopher, i.e., as a part of the text they are commenting on. 6  1 Von Salis 1909, Körte 1921, 1224–1225, Wüst 1950, Pickard-Cambridge 1962, 285–288, François, 1978, Cassio 1985, Melero 1995, Kerkhof 2001, Battezato 2008, Totaro 2012, Major 2013, Brown 2013, Willi 2015, all with further bibliography. 2 I leave aside those fragments that are not explicitly ascribed to Epicharmus by the authors considered, even if they are attributed to him by other sources. Nor will I consider here the Latin authors who cite Epicharmus in this same period, to whom I intend to dedicate a separate study. 3 Morawski 1970, Bakhtin 1982, 293, 347. 4 For the period under consideration these are, specifically, Rufus of Ephesus (1st–2nd century AD), Apollonius Dyscolus, Herodianus, the anonymous Antiatticista, Phrynichus Arabius and Pollux (2nd century AD), Helladius (4th century AD), Hesychius and the Etymologicum Orionis (5th century AD). For the references, see the Index fontium in Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén 1996, 223–224 and PCG 1, 373–377. 5 For the references, see Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén 1996, 226 and PCG 1, 391. 6 Specifically, Alexander of Aphrodisias (3rd century AD), commenting on Metaph. 1010a5, cf. Epich. fr. 213 R–N = 143 K–A, and Syrianus (5th century AD), commenting on Metaph. 1086a13, cf. Epich. fr. 214 R–N = 144 K–A. Alexander’s testimony, however, is not a mere paraphrase of Aristotle’s text. Rather, in contrast to Aristotle’s subtle and concise remark (διὸ εἰκότως https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-034

  Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén In the centuries preceding the period embraced by this study, Epicharmus had been the object of several Hellenistic scholars. 7 The first of these was Polemo of Ilium (3rd–2nd century BC), but it was Apollodorus of Athens (2nd century BC) who contributed most to our knowledge of Epicharmus. 8 According to the testimony of Athenaeus (14.648d), 9 Apollodorus (FGrH 244, fr. 226) also pointed out the spurious nature of several poems circulating under the name of the poet, 10 as certain earlier authors had done before him. In particular, Athenaeus mentions the Chiron, 11 by some unknown author, and the Republic — which Aristoxenus of Tarentum 12 (4th century BC) identified as the work of a flute-player called Chrysogonus —, as well as the Canon and the Maxims, 13 written — according to Philochorus (4th–3rd century BC) in his On Prophecy — by one Axiopistus of Lokroi or Sikyon. Beyond the grammatical sphere, this information was, however, ignored by most, and lines

 μὲν λέγουσιν, οὐκ ἀληθῆ δέ -οὔτω γὰρ ἁρμόττει μᾶλλον εἰπεῖν ἢ ὥσπερ Ἐπίχαρμος εἰς Ξενοφάνη), Alexander speaks of a rather aggressive attack against Xenophanes on the part of Epicharmus (ὡς Ἐπιχάρμου τοῦ τῆς κωμῳδίας ποιητοῦ εἰς Ξενοφάνην βλασφημότερά τινα καὶ ἐπηρεαστικὰ εἰρηκότος, δι’ ὧν εἰς ἀμαθίαν τινὰ καὶ ἀγνωσίαν τῶν ὄντων σκώπτων διέβαλεν αὐτόν). If, as has been suggested (see Álvarez Salas 2007b, 192 and n. 33 with further bibliography), Aristotle was, in this section, following Hippias of Elis’ (now lost) Συναγωγή, this might also be the ultimate source from which Alexander took the information that cannot be directly deduced from Aristotle’s words, but the question remains open. On the controversy between Epicharmus and Xenophanes, see Álvarez Salas, 2007b and 2017, 167–174, with further bibliography. 7 Pffeifer 1968, 249 and 265–266, Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén 1996, XXXIf. 8 Apollodorus’ work fostered that Epicharmus’ comedies were taken into account in the lexica and other grammatical works produced in the great Hellenistic libraries and subsequently. Before Apollodorus, Epicharmus does not seem to have figured in this kind of scholarly works; Callimachus, for instance, apparently was not acquainted with him. 9 Epich. test. 40 R–N = i. p. 138 K–A. 10 On the Pseudo-Epicharmean corpus (linked to Pythagoreanism) see Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén 1996, XXXIII–XXXVII, and 2012, 88–89; Álvarez Salas 2007a, Willi 2015, Favi forthcoming (which includes commentaries on frs. [240–295] K–A. I thank the author for kindly allowing me to read his manuscript before publication), all with further bibliography. 11 Another pseudo-Epicharmean work mentioned once as Ὀψοποιία (Epich. fr. [375] R–N = [289] K–A) might be a section of this same work, which was a treatise on medicine and veterinary practice. 12 In his Political Law (fr. 45 W). On Athenaeus’ mention of Aristoxenus in the passage referred to, and regarding the controversial identity of Chrysogonus, see Cassio 1985, 47–51, Kerhoff 2001, 113, Álvarez Salas 2007a, Willi 2015, 116. Aristoxenus (a Pythagorean-turned-Peripatetic) is the earliest known author to have written a Life of Pythagoras (or On Pythagoras and His Followers), a collection of Pythagorean Sayings, and a treatise On the Pythagorean Way of Life. 13 On the possible origin of the Maxims, see Crönert 1912, Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén 1996, XXXIII–XXXV, 1994, 660–661, and 2012, 88–89, Kerkhof 2001, 76–86, Álvarez Salas 2007a, Willi 2015, all with further bibliography.

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falsely ascribed to Epicharmus continued to be quoted for centuries in the belief that they were genuine. Thus, the authenticity of many quotations of the poet where the work of origin goes unmentioned is often hard to establish and — inevitably — debated. At the same time, these spurious works contributed enormously to establishing the image of Epicharmus as a wise man and, consequently, to the interest that he aroused in many authors, especially philosophers and Christian writers. In fact, while the fragments quoted as examples by lexica and grammarians are normally genuine, the majority of the material to be dealt with in this study is actually dubious or spurious, as we shall see.

 The 1st century AD The earliest known author to quote Epicharmus in the 1st century AD for purposes other than strictly linguistic ones is the grammarian and Stoic philosopher Lucius Annaeus Cornutus, 14 who mentions the poet in his Epidrome or Compendium of Greek Theology. Born in Leptis Magna (Libya), Cornutus, whose floruit is dated to the reign of Nero, spent most of his life in Rome, and he is known principally for having been the teacher of two well-known Latin poets, Lucan and Persius. In fact, he is considered to have exerted an important influence on Latin literature. The Epidrome is a treatise in Greek intended for the higher education of young students, presumably Roman, in which the author describes the divinities of the Greek pantheon in accordance with Stoic physical theology, and provides guidelines for the allegorical interpretation of their names, myths and worship ceremonies. Cornutus (Epidr. 35, 76.6–8 L.) 15 admits to relying on various earlier works, though he mentions neither their titles nor their authors. 16 He does, however, cite Epicharmus in chapter 14 (18.3 L.), 17 in a section where he explains that the myth  14 Still essential on this author is Noch 1931; see also Most 1989, Ramelli 2003, Boys-Stones 2009. 15 For the sake of convenience, I give the chapter, page, and line numbers of Lang’s edition. 16 The only exception is Cleanthes, whom he mentions once, in Epidr. 31, p. 64.16 L., in order to disagree with him. The old assumption that Cornutus’ only or main source was Apollodorus’ Περὶ θεῶν is nowadays dismissed. 17 Earlier in the same chapter (Epidr. 14.9 L.) Cornutus cites, introducing it with a mere καθὸ εἴρηται, a monostich sentence that Xenophon (Mem. 2.1.20) attributes to Epicharmus and which may be genuine (fr. 314 R–N = 236 K–A): ὦ πονηρέ, μὴ τὰ μαλακὰ μῶσο, μὴ τὰ σκλήρ’ ἔχῃς. The same line reappears later in Stobaeus (III 1.205b.26, III 29.8 and III 29.48a) and Syrian (in Hermog. 1.6.10), the latter ascribing it to Plato in error. There is no way to know if Cornutus knew the line through Xenophon, or whether he considered Epicharmus its author, but what is certain

  Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén according to which the nine Muses were conceived after Zeus laid for nine nights with Mnemosyne should be understood in the sense of education requiring study during the night hours (which is why the poets call the night εὐφρόνη). On this point, to illustrate and support his allegorical explanation of the myth, and, at the same time, give his story a moralistic touch, he adds that Epicharmus, for instance, says: αἴ τι κα ζητεῖς σοφόν, τᾶς νυκτὸς ἐνθυμητέον and πάντα τὰ σπουδαῖα νυκτὸς μᾶλλον ἐξευρίσκεται (frs. [360], [361] R–N = [259] K–A). It is evident that Cornutus considered Epicharmus an authority in questions of practical wisdom (we must not forget here that, for the Stoics, only the wise could be true poets). It is also of note that Epicharmus is cited by name, considering that, apart from him, the treatise only names Empedocles, Euripides, Hesiod and Homer. 18 The fact that these two trochaic tetrameters, only known through Cornutus and usually considered spurious, contain variations on the same practical theme suggests that he may well have come to know of them already joined together, perhaps through some collection of maxims.

 The transition between the 1st and 2nd century AD In the transition between the 1st and 2nd century AD Epicharmus is mentioned various times by the Middle Platonist Plutarch. 19 In On the Fortune or Virtue of Alexander, a rhetorical work of youth, 20 he attributes Epicharmus with a famous maxim, 21 whose first part had already been quoted anonymously in the Aristotelian Problemata (903a19). 22 In the treatise (Mor. 336b), Plutarch asserts that the

 is that the use of the quotation is very different in both authors. While Xenophon uses it as an argument from authority to support the thesis of the superiority of effort against indolence, Cornutus adduces it because it contains an instance of the verb μῶμαι (μῶσο) = ζητέω, when he explains the etymology of the name of the Muses (Μοῦσαι), which, according to him, comes from μώσις. 18 In fact, Epicharmus’ name was not unknown to the cultured Roman public from Ennius onwards. 19 For an earlier approach to this subject, see Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén 1994. 20 Jones 1971, 135. 21 The maxim reappears in Clement and other subsequent authors, as we will see. 22 In the Problemata the maxim is adduced in support of the answer to the question “Why do we hear better at night than during the day?”. It is argued that during the day the mind is too busy, whereas at night, as sight is inactive and the thought process is still, hearing is able to

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keys to Alexander’s success were his excellence and his bravery. The quote is presented as a premise of the principal thesis of the work: if it is true, as Epicharmus said, that νοῦς ὁρῇ καὶ νοῦς ἀκούει, τἄλλα δὲ τυφλὰ καὶ κωφά 23 (fr. [dub.] 319 R–N = 214 K–A), then it is only the mind which contributes to the success of a person, an idea on which Plutarch then dwells, commenting on and expanding the maxim. 24 It is clear that, for the young Plutarch, Epicharmus was an authority on philosophy, and it is unlikely that he would have known the aphorism, even if we consider it genuine, from reading a comedy. But, of course, maxims, whatever their origin, are circulated in writing and orally in many different ways. 25 Another maxim quoted by Plutarch in his Life of Publicola 15.5 (Epich. fr. [dub.] 340 R–N = 212 K–A), and known only through him, is of an entirely different tone. In criticising the opulence of the mansion of Domitian, Plutarch says that anyone who saw it would be moved to say something in the vein of the phrase that Epicharmus directs at a spendthrift: οὐ φιλάνθρωπος τύ γʼ ἐσσʼ, ἔχεις νόσον· χαίρεις διδούς. The idea is then repeated in prose, being extended and adapted to the context, exploiting it to the maximum as a tool of moralisation. 26 The humorous tone of the line, exceptional in the maxims attributed to Epicharmus, suggests that it might derive ultimately from one of his comedies. Two of the other mentions of Epicharmus in Plutarch are related to the aporia set out in the so-called “Growing Argument”, one of the many points of debate between Platonists and Stoics, 27 who criticized each other for eliminating and distorting the “common conceptions” (which they considered the foundation of knowledge and science), as infallible criteria of truth. Specifically, when commenting on the aporia in On Common Conceptions, against the Stoics, a philosophical treatise aimed at a specialized public, Plutarch says (Mor. 1083a) that the argument is ancient, for it was proposed, according to Chrysippus, by Epicharmus

 transmit information better. The purpose of the quotation can thus be seen to be very different from that of Plutarch. 23 Quoted thus in this passage; elsewhere the end of the maxim reads κωφὰ καὶ τυφλά. 24 Mor. 336b αἱ γὰρ αἰσθήσεις ἰδίας ἔχειν ἀφορμὰς δοκοῦσιν, ὅτι δὲ νοῦς ὠφελεῖ καὶ νοῦς κοσμεῖ καὶ νοῦς τὸ νικῶν καὶ κρατοῦν καὶ βασιλεῦον, τὰ δʼ ἄλλα τυφλὰ καὶ κωφὰ καὶ ἄψυχα παρέλκει καὶ βαρύνει καὶ καταισχύνει χωρὶς ἀρετῆς τοὺς ἔχοντας, ἀπὸ τῶν πραγμάτων λαβεῖν ἔστι. 25 The maxim, popular among the philosophers, reappears, without any mention of Epicharmus, in two posterior works of Plutarch. In On the Fortune (Mor. 98c) he uses it to reassert his warning against the deception of the senses, whereas in On the Intelligence of Animals (Mor. 961a) he employs it to support his assertion that sensation is not possible without the help of the mind. 26 Cf. Xenophontos 2012. 27 On Plutarch and Stoicism, see Babut 1969.

  Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén (cf. fr. 248 R–N and fr. 136 K–A). This refers to the treatise On the Growing Argument (cf. SVF 2.397) in which Chrysippus had responded to the reservations of the Platonists to the solution proposed by the Stoics. 28 Chrysippus’ treatise may well also be Plutarch’s source in On the Delay of Divine Justice (Mor. 559a–b) when he explains why sometimes a divine punishment affects a city long after a crime has been committed. This is because a city is a single entity, endowed with continuity, which is not transformed into something else over time. To deny this, says Plutarch, would be as in the verses of Epicharmus “from whom the Sophists derived the Growing Argument, according to which the person who contracted a debt in the past now owes nothing, and the person who was invited to dinner yesterday, arrives today with no invitation, since he is a different person”. An anonymous scholion to Plato’s Theaetetus 152e, previously dated to the beginning of the 2nd century AD, 29 but now generally considered the work of some representative of the Middle Platonism of the 1st century BC, 30 also implies that Epicharmus satirically exploited the absurdity of the argument when it is taken to the extreme in the face of common sense. The scholiast affirms that Epicharmus had frequented the Pythagoreans, but he leaves no doubt that he is referring to a comic plot, and adds some details that complement Plutarch’s remark. 31 This is in fact one of the very few occasions when a commentator refers to Epicharmus’ humour. It should also be remembered that, in the part of the Theaetetus that was the object of the scholion, Plato, after stating that nothing ever is, but is rather always becoming, cites in his support the greatest sages, among them Epicharmus, whom he calls ἄκρος κωμῳδίας. 32 It is most likely that the play(s) whose plot(s) or scenes were behind Plato’s statement were those summarized by Plutarch. In turn, Plato’s remark was probably the reason for Chrysippus’ interest in Epicharmus’ play, which is echoed by Plutarch. Furthermore, I find it likely

 28 On the paradox see Sedley 1982; cf. Long/Sedley 1987, vol. 1, 166–167, and vol. 2, 169–178; Álvarez Salas 2009. 29 A summary of the discussion in Opsomer 1998, 34–36. 30 Tarrant 1983, Bastianini/Sedley 1995. 31 See Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén 1994, 667–668, and 2012, 89, Willi 2012, 59–60. 32 It has been suggested (see Álvarez Salas 2007b, 94, 192 and n. 33, with further bibliography) that in this section of the Theaetetus Plato may have been using material deriving from Hippias of Elis’ now lost Συναγωγή (which, of course, does not imply that Plato may not also have had first-hand knowledge of Epicharmus’ plays).

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that all these testimonies were related to Epich. fr. 248 R–N = [276] K–A, 33 transmitted by Diogenes Laertius among several others (on which see below) gathered by the Sicilian historian Alcimus to demonstrate that Plato had “borrowed” some of his doctrines from Epicharmus. Very different is the mention of Epicharmus (test. 41 R–N = 11 K–A) contained in the Life of Numa 8.17, according to which those who deal with the relationship between Numa and Pythagoras, 34 apart from pointing out the similarities between the religious practices established by Numa and Pythagoreanism, “strive to find other proofs besides these, one of which would be that the Romans had bestowed citizenship on Pythagoras, according to what the comic poet Epicharmus (fr. [369] R–N = [296] K–A) recounts in certain In Response to Antenor”. We find no further mention of this spurious work, which Plutarch clearly cites second-hand, from some of his many readings on Pythagoreanism, a movement he showed great interest in, particularly in his youth, and which exercised some influence on his thinking. 35 There are, in addition, three writings attributed to Plutarch but generally considered spurious which mention Epicharmus. Although their dates of composition are uncertain, I will deal with them here for convenience. In the Consolation to Apollonius (Mor. 110a), a couple of trochaic tetrameters that the treatise attributes to Epicharmus: 36 συνεκρίθη καὶ διεκρίθη κἀπῆλθεν ὅθεν ἤλθεν πάλιν,/ γᾶ μὲν εἰς γᾶν, πνεῦμα δ’ ἄνω· τί τῶνδε χαλεπόν; οὐδὲ ἕν (fr. [386] R–N = 213 K–A) are quoted, once more, as an argument from authority, in this case in support of the notion that there is nothing to fear in death. The other two mentions of the poet in pseudo-Plutarchean treatises relate to clearly invented anecdotes that connect Epicharmus with the tyrant Hiero of Syracuse, 37 hinting at a problematic relationship between them, 38 and showing clear partiality towards the tyrant. One appears in the Sayings of Kings and Com-

 33 Kassel and Austin, however, reject this connection, which was first noted by Bernays 1853, and print Plut. Mor 559b and Mor. 1083c as a separate fragment (Epich., fr. 136 K–A), as they consider all the fragments “from Alcimus” spurious. 34 A relationship seriously doubted by many on chronological grounds, as previously explained by Plutarch. It has been suggested (Gabba 1967, 158; Cassio 1985, 50) that the originator of the story was Aristoxenus of Tarentum. 35 On Plutarch’s thought see Dillon 1996, 184–230. 36 I have edited the fragment as spurious; Kassel and Austin, in contrast, consider it genuine. 37 Their coincidence in time is stressed by Timaeus (FGrH 566, fr. 133, see below) and the Marmor Parium (Epich. test. 5 R–N = 7 K–A). 38 Cf. below the statement of Iamblicus in VP 36.266.

  Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén manders (Mor. 175b), where the author recounts that Hiero once, rightly, punished Epicharmus for saying something inappropriate in front of his wife (test. 16 R–N = 15 K–A). The other is found in How to Tell a Flatterer from a Friend (Mor. 68a), where Epicharmus is censured for having addressed to Hiero a critical remark using a double entendre, when he was invited by the tyrant to a feast a few days after he had put to death some of the poet’s friends (test. 15 R–N = 14 K–A). Still in the transition from the 1st to the 2nd century AD, we find a very peculiar mention of Epicharmus in the New History by the Alexandrian grammarian Ptolemaeus Chennos, 39 preserved only in fragments. As Photius points out (Bibl. 190, 146a–b), the work, besides being entertaining, brought together a huge quantity of mythological data, most of which were, however, absurd and unbelievable, and possibly to some extent invented by the author. The reference to Epicharmus, preserved in the summary included in Photius’ Library (190, 147a7), comes from the first book of the New History, and consists of a single phrase: “That the poet Epicharmus could trace his lineage back to Achilles, son of Peleus”. The isolated nature of the statement, combined with the work’s lack of logical structure, make it impossible to know what led to the author’s mention of Epicharmus and his making him a descendent of Achilles, who does not feature in any of his comedies, nor is mentioned in his fragments, and had no particular link to Sicily. 40 The reference, however, does show that Epicharmus was known among the cultured public, fond of bizarre stories, at whom this work was apparently aimed, represented by its dedicatee, a certain Tertulla, whom Ptolemaeus calls his δέσποινα.

 The 2nd century AD In the middle of the 2nd century AD, Epicharmus is mentioned by the Sophist Aelius Aristides in his speech To Capito, 47, written around 147 AD. This is one of his so-called “Platonic orations”, whose background theme is the criticism of Plato’s rejection of rhetoric. Specifically, Aristides calls on Epicharmus (test. 30

 39 The Suda (π 3037 Adler) dates the author to the reigns of Trajan and Hadrian. On the author and his work see Chatzis 1914, Tomberg 1967, Hose 2008, with further bibliography. 40 Tomberg 1967, 115, 191, thinks that the origin of this news was some local legend from Southern Italy and Sicily, but no sound data support his statement, and it may equally be an invention of Ptolemaeus’. Another possibility might be that the statement had to do with the spurious poem Chiron, as Achilles was one of the Centaur’s students.

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R–N = 3 K–A) when he accuses Plato of humiliating playwrights. What doubt exists, says Aristides, that Plato was right to consider Epicharmus the peak of comedy (κωμῳδίας ἄκρος), taking into account how extremely close he is to Attic language. Aristides is clearly alluding to Plato’s Theaetetus 152e, a passage that again proves important in explaining the interest of some authors in Epicharmus (although not always for the same reasons). Aristides is clearly being ironic in the passage, something which I believe has not always been understood properly. The key to capturing the text’s real sense lies in the fact that Aristides was a renowned Atticist, and Epicharmus, as the Dorian from Sicily that he was, was cited in Atticist lexica precisely as an example of language not conforming to correct Attic. 41 In other words, contrary to Plato, Aristides professed a poor opinion of Epicharmus as a playwright because his works were not written in Attic, something that he could deduce from lexica and grammatical treatises, even without a direct knowledge of the plays.

 The transition between the 2nd and 3rd century AD In the transition between the 2nd and 3rd century AD, Athenaeus of Naucratis stands out as the most important indirect source of Epicharmus, being, in addition, the only or primary source for the majority of the fragments he quotes. 42 Athenaeus wrote the Deipnosophists for a select group of learned readers, in order to provide them with a kind of “Encyclopaedia of Greek Banquet”, although he did not present that material in the form of a lexicon. Instead, he packaged it in a literary form with a long tradition in Greece, the banquet as a narrated dialogue, in the style of Plato. Thus the erudite material is brought in as the account of the banquet proceeds, usually through the dialogues of the guests, though sometimes in a more conventional way, when the narrator, identified with the author,  41 As can be seen twice in the Atticist Phrynicus’ Eclogae (43 and 79; Epich. frr. 18.2 and 287 R–N = 18.2 and 210 K–A), also written in the 2nd century AD. A little earlier, On the Names of the Body’s Parts by Rufus of Ephesus (ca. 80–150 AD), aimed at physicians, is the first extant lexicon to quote Epicharmus to exemplify the Sicilian-Dorian language. This implies that words taken from his plays were already present as examples of Dorian or Sicilian vocabulary in previous lexica, now lost, from which Rufus took his quotation. 42 For the references, see Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén 1996, 223–224, PCG I, pp. 375–377. On the author and his work see Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén 1998, 7–66. On the subject, see now Tosetti 2019.

  Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén summarizes the gist of the conversations. Athenaeus’ knowledge of Epicharmus probably comes from a mixture of second-hand sources, now lost, such as grammatical works, anthologies and lexica. 43 Nevertheless, he might also rely on some first-hand notes taken directly from some of the comedies, which he could have accessed in Alexandria in his youth, or in Rome at the well supplied library of his friend and patron Larensis. As I have already mentioned, 44 Athenaeus was well informed about the scholarship on the pseudo-Epicharmean poems, their real authors and those who had denounced them as spurious, including an acquaintance with Apollodorus’ work on the playwright. Unsurprisingly, Athenaeus mainly cites Epicharmus (usually mentioning the titles of the comedies) 45 to exemplify the use of certain words or expressions, 46 as the lexica and linguistic treatises do, so I am not going to deal with those quotations here. Nevertheless, a few times Athenaeus’ motives for mentioning Epicharmus are literary (or grammatical in the broader sense), and some of his quotes are accompanied by commentaries which help to understand or contextualize the fragments. Thus, some quotations are adduced to illustrate topics such as the stages of drunkenness (Epich. fr. 217 R–N = 146 K–A; Ath. 2.36c), Heracles’ gluttony (Epich. fr. 18 R–N/ K–A; Ath. 10.411a), the respect of the Greeks of older times towards their elders (Epich. fr. 235 R–N = 163 K–A; Ath. 8.363e), or, in one case, a type of pun (Epich. fr. 85 R–N = 76 K–A; Ath. 8.338d). Sometimes the quotations, preceded by an expression like “this is why Epicharmus says...”, are adduced after a scientific statement, as a kind of colophon, like in 2.60e, speaking of mushrooms which cause death by choking (Epich. fr. 224 R–N = 153 K–A), or in 7.324e,

 43 He openly states he is quoting Epicharmus indirectly only in 11.479a (through Diodorus and Pamphylus, fr. 8 Sch.), 14.618d (through Tripho fr. 113 V.) and, apparently, 14.628a–b (through Philochorus, FGrH 328, fr. 172). 44 See section 1 above. 45 With few exceptions in books 3–15. In the first two books alone, extant only in an epitomized version, are there no mentions of the plays at all, but that is certainly due to the epitomist, who shows a strong tendency to omit work titles in general. 46 Which sometimes includes a discussion of metrical or grammatical aspects (such as the gender or the inflection of a noun, etc.). As Athenaeus is not an Atticist writer, he is not particularly interested in quoting Epicharmus for his Syracusan Doric dialect, although he does sometimes mention it (Ath. 2.64f, 4.139b; cf. Ath. 2.52a, 3.119b, 9.366a–b, 9.400c, and 14.645f). If a fragment contains several words of interest, he sometimes reuses it two or more times, in its entirety or in sections, in different parts of the work. Athenaeus seldom reduces his quotes to the mention of an isolated word, tending to cover at least a syntagm, and frequently a sentence of one or two lines, and occasionally more. Paraphrases are very rare, literal quotations being the norm; the exceptions are Ath. 4.184f (Epich. fr. 39 R–N = 92 K–A), and 7.285a–b (cf. Epich. fr. 50 R–N = 53 K–A).

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speaking of a worm which parasitizes the red mullet (Epich. fr. 51 R–N = 57 K–A). In 6.235f, one of the characters, Plutarch, quotes the playwright (fr. 31 R–N/ K–A) to support the statement that it was Epicharmus, in Hope or Wealth — and not, as Carystius of Pergamum (FHG IV, fr. 17 p. 359) had said, Alexis —, who was the first to bring a parasite on stage. Similarly, in 10.429 A, another character, Democritus, criticizes Chamaeleon (fr. 40a W.) and other anonymous grammarians for not knowing that Epicharmus (fr. 237 R–N), rather than Euripides, was the first to bring a drunken man on stage (Crates in Neighbours having been the second), though this time without adducing any literal fragment. Only on one occasion (in 8.362b) does Athenaeus summarize the content of a play (Θεαροί), before adducing a literal quote. He was also aware of the existence of a revised version of the play Marriage of Hebe, under the title Muses, as he explicitly states in 3.110b. 47 Different from the rest is a quote adduced in Ath. 7.308c, in the middle of an argument between two characters, Ulpian and Myrtilus, who are discussing why fish are called ἔλλοπες by the poets. One of them, after rejecting the other’s answer to the problem as nonsensical, uses a saying by Epicharmus, τὰ πρὸ τοῦ δύ’ ἄνδρες ἔλεγον, εἷς ἐγὼν ἀποχρέω (fr. 288 R–N = 161 K–A), as an introduction to his own explanation. The quotation, besides adding animation to the dialogue, doubtless has an erudite purpose, as the same sentence, in a slightly different version, but also explicitly attributed to Epicharmus, had already been used by Plato (Grg. 505e), who put it in the mouth of Socrates, also in the course of a dialectical discussion (on a more serious topic, of course). At around this same period, we find the first known quotations of Epicharmus in a Christian author, the learned Clement of Alexandria. 48 Born into a pagan family and with an excellent literary and philosophical education, Clement advocates reutilizing Greek culture to exhort pagans to the Christian faith and to defend his own beliefs. 49 In his Exhortation to the Greeks, 2.29.1–2, he quotes Epicharmus in a section denouncing the falsity of the pagan gods, supporting his argument with various absurd and illogical stories taken from ancient Greek sources. 50 In particular, he uses the quote from Epicharmus to illustrate one of

 47 Cf. 3.85e Athenaeus quotes both plays separately on several occasions. 48 In fact, all the other Christian authors who quote Epicharmus in the period considered in this study borrowed their material from Clement, as we will see. 49 Camelot 1931a, id. 1931b, Van Den Hoek 1988, Isart Hernández 1992, id. 1993. 50 It is evident that Clement, besides having a first-hand acquaintance with some of the authors he quoted, often resorted (although always reusing the material in a personal way) to previous compilations of several kinds, now impossible to trace in detail. See Hiller 1886, Stählin 1905,

  Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén the multiple homelands of the god Ares, who, according to Epicharmus (fr. 240 R–N = 165 K–A), was a Spartan. The general context suggests that in this section Clement was following some previous source who had carefully sought out the data he borrows here. 51 In his Instructor (2.1.18.3), a practical moral treatise aimed at Greek converts, Clement quotes Epicharmus in the middle of a criticism of pagans, whose diet is excessive. So much so, that anyone following this regimen “can never do so in moderation, because he locks his spirit in his belly, just like the fish called hake, which Aristotle (fr. 296 R. = 244 G.) says is the only animal with its heart in its belly. Epicharmus the comedian calls it ἐκτραπελόγαστρος (cf. fr. 60 R–N/K–A)”. Clement clearly took these citations of Aristotle and Epicharmus from some grammatical text, as they also appear together in Athenaeus’ Deipnosophists (7.327f), 52 but he uses them in a very personal way, to metaphorically illustrate and animate his argument, as well as to give it an erudite tone. The other mentions of Epicharmus appear in the Miscellanies. The first (test. 6 R–N = 8 K–A), in book 1.14.64.2, belongs to a quote from the historian Timaeus of Tauromenium (4th–3rd century BC), and it serves to situate in time the philosopher Xenophanes of Colophon. On the one hand, Clement, following Timaeus (FGrH 566, fr. 133), says that Xenophanes was a contemporary of Hiero and Epicharmus; and, on the other, citing Apollodorus of Athens (FGrH 244, fr. 68c), he says that Xenophanes was born in the fortieth Olympiad, and lived to the times of Darius and Cyrus. The contrast between these two ways of dating Xenophanes suggests that, whereas at the turn of the 4th century BC Epicharmus was a wellknown figure in the Western-Greek tradition represented by Timaeus, this was not the case in the Easter tradition prior to Apollodorus (2nd BC). 53 Almost all the other mentions of Epicharmus in the Miscellanies conform to what Clement seeks in the pagan poets in general: short moralizing maxims, capable of saying a lot with a few words, which, disregarding their literary values, 54 serve to illustrate or support his arguments in philosophical-religious questions, and which he links in a totally natural way to Christian quotes, working them  47–65, Zeegers-Vander Vorst 1972, Van Den Hoek 1988, 1–4, id. 1996, 23–24, Blázquez 1998, 73– 113, with further bibliography. 51 Cf. Clement’s assertion, following his mention of Epicharmus, that Sophocles considered Ares a Thracian, which seems to refer to Antigone 970, where, however, the Thracian origin of Ares is not immediately apparent. 52 Athenaeus quotes the whole line where the word appears (from the comedy Marriage of Hebe) because it contains an instance of the Greek word for “hake” (ὄνος). 53 On whose studies on Epicharmus, see above. 54 Camelot 1931a, 61.

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together in such a way that they all lead in the same direction. For example, in Strom. 2.5.24.4, to complement and explain the biblical quote “he that hath ears to hear, let him hear” (Mt. 11.15, 13.9), Clement uses the line νοῦς ὁρῇ καὶ νοῦς ἀκούει, τἄλλα κωφὰ καὶ τυφλά (fr. [dub.] 319 R–N = 214 K–A), which he introduces by combining a question and an exhortative expression, addressing himself to his source 55 (καὶ τίς οὗτος; ᾿Επίχαρμος εἰπάτω). Similarly, in Strom. 4.26.167.2, after a quotation from 2 Cor. 5.9, Clement states his admiration for Epicharmus, “who clearly says (fr. [382] R–N = [254] K–A): εὐσεβὴς νόῳ πεφυκὼς οὐ πάθοις κ’ οὐδὲν κακόν/ κατθανών· ἄνω τὸ πνεῦμα διαμένει κατ’ οὐρανόν”. 56 In Strom. 4.3.8.3 Clement does things the other way round: 57 he uses part of a line attributed to Epicharmus: “and Epicharmus says: μέμνασ’ ἀπιστεῖν· ἄρθρα ταῦτα τᾶν φρενῶν” (fr. [dub.] 341 R–N = 218 K–A) 58, in the introduction of a section about the true excellence of man, which implies (among other requirements) neither disbelieving the truth nor believing what is false; then Clement goes on to discuss other ideas, adding more quotations, both Christian and pagan, in accordance with his typical associative way of thinking. 59 Similarly, in Strom. 4.7.45.3, defending the blessedness of martyrdom, Clement accumulates several quotations from Greek philosophers and poets in support of the thesis that, for those who have lived virtuously, death is the beginning of the true life, focusing on the weakness and unimportance of the body compared to the soul, an idea he illustrates with Epicharmus fr. 241 R–N = 166 K–A: 60 αὕτα φύσις ἀνθρώπων, ἀσκοὶ πεφυσημένοι, to which he immediately adds a quotation from the Gospels: “and the Saviour has said to us: ‘The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak’” (Mt. 27.41, Mc. 14.38), which he then follows with more biblical quotes. In Strom. 5.14.100.6, speaking of questions which he considers the wisest of Greek thinkers (οἱ παρʼ ῞Ελλησι λογιώτατοι) to have got right, approaching Christian truth, Clement cites Epicharmus, clearly spurious, fr. [383] R–N = [255] K–A: 61 “οὐδὲν ἐκφεύγει τὸ θεῖον· τοῦτο γιγνώσκειν σε δεῖ/ αὐτός ἐσθ’ ἁμῶν ἐπόπτης, ἀδυνατεῖ δ’οὐδὲν

 55 A typical feature of Clement, see van den Hoek 1996, 236. 56 Clement is the only source for this fragment. 57 Clement begins the section with an anonymous line, immediately preceding this one, which Kassel and Austin, following Wilamowitz, attribute to the spurious Maxims (Epich. fr. [253] K–A), but Clement does not ascribe it to Epicharmus. 58 On the possible connection between this fragment and Xen. 21 B 34 D–K, see Álvarez Salas 2007b, 119–120. 59 Van den Hoek 1996, 236. 60 The text appears deprived of its metrical structure. On the fragment, see Álvarez Salas 2007b, 121–126. 61 Perhaps, but not necessarily, as Kassel and Austin thought, from the Maxims.

  Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén θεός”. The quotation is accompanied by the indication that Epicharmus was a Pythagorean, a school of thought in which, as in the Platonic, Clement finds particular similarities with his way of understanding Christianity. In this same book (Strom. 5.14.118.1) Clement has also preserved 9 trochaic tetrameters from the Republic (frs. [372–374] R–N = fr. [240] K–A), which he ascribes to “the comic poet Epicharmus”, clearly unaware of their spuriousness, and which he approvingly cites because of what they say about reason. 62 Also, in Strom. 7.4.27.5, in a passage where Clement dismisses pagan purification practices as superstitions, he uses Epicharmus fr. [384] R–N = [258] K–A (again, clearly spurious): καθαρὸν ἂν τὸν νοῦν ἔχῃς, ἅπαν τὸ σῶμα καθαρὸς εἶ, to illustrate his idea that there is no other purity but abstinence from sins. Deviating slightly from the general tone are the 3 citations that Clement includes in book 6, in a long section where he intends to demonstrate that Greek authors had an inclination towards plagiarising each other, 63 this being a step towards defending the fact that, in the same vein, many of them took their inspiration from the prophetic books of the Old Testament. In doing this Clement is following a Christian trend that continued the Jewish apologetic tradition, 64 but it is clear that for this section in particular he borrowed his material from a grammatical source (or sources) of pagan origin, 65 for the numerous examples he gathers here show no apologetic intention at all. In fact, Clement states at the beginning (Strom. 6.2.5.) that in this part of the work he is not going to speak about philosophical dogma. Thus, throughout this section Clement compares passages from different Greek authors which deal with roughly the same topic, simply quoting them one after another, implying on each occasion that the first has been plagiarized by the next (more than one “plagiarist” is rarely adduced for each quotation). In the first two cases, Epicharmus is quoted as an original author who was “plagiarized” by Euripides, 66 and the third (Strom. 6.2.21.5) is Epicharmus

 62 On the passage, see Álvarez Salas 2007a, 130–133. 63 For an analysis of the whole section within the context of ancient plagiarism, see Stemplinger 1912, 57–80. 64 Zeegers-Vander Vorst 1972, 180–186. 65 Definitely posterior to Callimachus, the last author quoted here by Clement. In fact, the quotations from Epicharmus point to some source posterior to Apollodorus of Athens, or at least to Polemon of Illium. Herrero de Jáuregui 2010, 202–205, highlights either the Stoicism of Pergamum or Alexandrian Neopythagoreanism as the most likely origin of Clement’s source (assuming that it was just one treatise Περὶ κλοπῆς), although he considers the second alternative more probable. The question is still open to debate. 66 To be precise, in Strom. 6.2.8.3 Epicharmus fr. (dub.) 322 R–N = 167 K–A is confronted with Euripides fr. 914 K. (both roughly about what a woman does when a man leaves her for another —

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(fr. 242 R–N = [257] K–A) who appears as the plagiarist of a famous saying attributed to Chilon of Sparta (one of the Seven Sages). 67 Something similar can be observed in the quote from Epicharmus which appears in book I (273) of Against the Professors by the Pyrrhonian Sceptic Sextus Empiricus, which is from around the same period. In the passage concerned, Sextus defends the idea that although the best philosophy, which is capable of forming character, has its roots in the sententious sayings of the poets, the exegesis of the grammarians is not necessary to understand them. Among the examples he adduces to demonstrate this, he compares certain ideas from Epicurus with passages from Homer and Euripides, that in truth are only rather superficially related to the thought of the philosopher, to which he adds a quote from Epicharmus (fr. [dub.] 344 R–N = 230 K–A): “The idea that death is nothing to us has been suggested by Epicharmus when he says: ἀποθανεῖν ἢ τεθνάναι οὔ μοι διαφέρει”. 68 The general content of the passage suggests that Sextus found all the texts already related in some earlier grammatical source, and adapted them to his own ends. Somewhat younger than Athenaeus and Clement is the sophist Claudius Aelian, another typical example of the bookish Greek literature of this period. In his extant works, which are both moralizing and entertaining, and aimed at a wide public, Aelian refers to Epicharmus 3 times. In On the Characteristics of Animals 6.51, he mentions him incidentally, to help the reader to place another, less wellknown poet, Dinolochus, whom he calls the “rival of Epicharmus” (Epic. test. 11 R–N = 2 K–A; Dinol. test. 2 K–A). That a connection between both comic poets was something established in ancient scholarship is confirmed by the Suda (δ 338 Adler), where we read that Dinolochus (test. 2 K–A) was the son or, according to some, the disciple, of Epicharmus. Also in On the Characteristics of Animals, 13.4,

 seemingly younger — woman). And, in Strom. 6.2.13.3, Epich. fr. [359] R–N = [256] K–A is confronted with Euripides fr. 196.4–5 K., although the relationship between these two passages is really very far-fetched, one being an exhortation to always think the same throughout life, and the other, to enjoy life. Fragments of both authors bearing some similarities (Epich. fr. [dub.] 334 R–N = [297] K–A, and E. fr. 198 K.) also appear one after the other in a papyrus florilegium from the 3rd century AD (P.Petrie I 3 [1]). 67 Cf. Tziatzi-Papagianni 1994, 199–200. Both quotations are written in Doric, and make a link between guarantee or pledge (ἐγγύα) and blindness of the mind (ἄτα). 68 Further on in the same work (1.284), Sextus Empiricus focuses on the same subject, but this time naming Sophron, also Sicilian, instead of Epicharmus in error. A Latin version of the sentence, also attributed to Epicharmus, had already appeared in Cicero, Tusc. 1.7.15. Kassel and Austin consider the fragment genuine, whereas I have included it among the dubious in my edition.

  Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén when speaking of the fish called καλλιώνυμον, Aelian says that many state that it is not edible, and that there is hardly any mention of it in the descriptions of fish banquets, except for Epicharmus in the Marriage of Hebe, Earth and Sea and Muses (frs. 20 and 40 R–N = 29, 64 and 88 K–A) and Mnesimachus, in his Isthmian Victor (fr. 5 K–A). It is clear that Aelian is here following, without citing, some grammarian who had endeavoured to find mentions of the fish in literary works. 69 Finally, in his Historical Miscellany 2.34, Aelian tells a moralizing, and clearly fictitious, anecdote in which he presents Epicharmus (test. 17 R–N = 9, 16 K–A) as a very old man. The longevity of Epicharmus is also mentioned in the treatise 70 Long-livers, 25, spuriously attributed to Lucian, according to which Epicharmus (test. 13 R–N / K–A) was said to have lived until the age of 97; something similar is also said by Diogenes Laertius (on whom see next section).

 The 3rd century AD In the middle of the 3rd century AD, Diogenes Laertius 71 certifies that Epicharmus’ image as a wise man, and particularly as a Pythagorean, was well established among the educated, though non-specialist, circles interested in philosophy to whom he addressed his Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers. Diogenes first mentions Epicharmus (test. 44 R–N = 10 K–A) in passing in 1.42, when he reproduces Hippobotus’ 72 extended list of the Seven Sages, 73 where Epicharmus appears second-to-last, curiously, before and not after Pythagoras, disregarding the chronology or any supposed master-pupil relationship between them. Diogenes, however, does include a biography of Epicharmus (test. 7, 26, 42 R–N = 9 K–A) in the section dedicated to the Pythagorean philosophers (8.78). The data he offers,  69 That some previous scholar or scholars had resourced to Epicharmus’ plays when discussing the problem of the edibility and the identity of the καλλιώνυμος is confirmed by Athenaeus. In Deipnosophists 7.282 D we read that “Epicharmus mentions the ἔλοψ in Muses (fr. 48 R–N = 88 K–A), but says nothing of its being the same fish as the καλλιώνυμος”. In the context, this statement is quite unexpected, as Athenaeus hasn’t speak before about the alleged identity of both fish, which indicates that he was following, without reworking much his material, some grammatical source that had treated the problem in some length. 70 Whose date of composition is unknown. 71 On the known facts about the author, see Goulet-Cazé 1999, 9–27, Warren 2007 and Jouanna 2009. 72 A philosophical historian, probably dated between the 3rd and the 2nd century BC, see Gigante 1983, 152–158. 73 Twelve, in his version (fr. 6 Gigante, from the Register of Philosophers).

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mostly unsound minutiae, are split into two parts separated by an epigram. 74 In the first, he states as facts allegedly taken from Epicharmus’ own writings that he was the son of certain Helothales of Cos, and that at the age of six months he had been taken to Megara in Sicily, and after to Syracuse. 75 A comparison with another piece of information from the biography of Pythagoras, 76 8.7 (Epich. test. 8 R–N = 9 K–A), suggests that Diogenes might be following the Epitome of Sotion, by Heraclides Lembus (2nd century BC), here. It goes without saying that these data cannot come from any of Epicharmus’ plays, and that if they were not directly invented by Diogenes’ source, they must come from some of the pseudoEpicharmean writings. In the second part, Diogenes affirms (without mentioning any titles or including any quotations) that Epicharmus’ works dealt with physical, ethical and medical subjects, and that his authorship was proved by the many συγγράμματα he added to this writings, which, in fact, rather point to late pseudo-Epicharmean works. As a colophon, he states that Epicharmus (test. 7 R–N = 9 K–A) died at the age of 90. In contrast, Diogenes is here silent on Epicharmus’ activity as a comic playwright, nor does he make mention, for instance, of any relationship with Hiero. In the section dedicated to Plato (3.9–17), Diogenes also cites several Epicharmean fragments (248–251 R–N = [257–279] K–A) 77 in a long quote from the fourbook work To Amyntas by the Sicilian historian Alcimus (FGrH 560, fr. 6) that probably, despite its moderate tone, belongs to the anti-Platonic literature which

 74 Diogenes accompanies many of his biographies with epigrams, 49 of his own, others taken from elsewhere, as is the case of the one on Epicharmus (AP 7.78), allegedly written on a statue of the poet in Syracuse. 75 Cos is also mentioned as one of the alleged homelands of Epicharmus in Suda ε 2766 Adler (test. 1 R–N/K–A). Cf. Diomedes I 489.3 K (Epich. test. 24 R–N = 1.4 [adn.] K–A), who mentions an etymology of the Latin word comoedia which relates it to an alleged exile of Epicharmus in Cos. 76 Namely, that among the works allegedly written by Pythagoras there was one entitled Helothales the Father of Epicharmus of Cos. Diogenes’ treatment of Pythagoras does not seem to depend on the contemporary Neophythagoreanism, see Laks 2014. 77 Edited among the spuria by Kassel and Austin (followed by Kerhoff 2001, 59–63; cf. Willi 2015; see also Covotti 1930), although considered genuine by many, including myself. I apologize for not repeating here the arguments regarding the authenticity of these fragments, which can be seen in Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén 2004, 2012, 88–94, along with a commentary on the single fragments. See also Gigante 1953, Pickard-Cambridge 1962, 247–255, Berk 1964, 88–93, Álvarez Salas 2007b, 130–135, and 2007c, Battezzato 2008, Santoro 2012. See also section 3 above (on Plut. Mor. 1083a and 559a–b).

  Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén began to flourish in the last quarter of the 4th century BC. 78 With this treatise, Alcimus tried to demonstrate Plato’s alleged intellectual debt to Epicharmus, by comparing various ideas of the former with passages taken from works of the latter, though in fact the similarities are slight, as we have also already seen in other sources comparing Epicharmus with various poets and philosophers. Diogenes, however, does not seem to have any problem accepting that Plato was indebted to Epicharmus, whom this time he significantly calls a comic poet, no doubt following Alcimus. As a coda to this section, Diogenes comments that Epicharmus himself had foretold that he would have an imitator, and quotes 5 lines (Epich. fr. [dub.] 323 R–N = [280] K–A) to prove his point. It is uncertain what Diogenes’ source was for this last fragment, which does not belong to the quotation from Alcimus’ To Amyntas, and nor is it clear who the “I” speaking in the fragment or the alluded to imitator are, despite Diogenes’ identifying them with Epicharmus and Plato. This may just be an ad hoc interpretation which emerged once the lines were detached from their work of origin, where they may have had a very different meaning to that given to them by Diogenes (or his source). This does not, however, mean that the fragment is genuine, but leaves its authenticity open to discussion.

 The transition between the 3rd and 4th century AD In his Life of Plotinus 24 (written around 300 AD), Porphyry of Tyre mentions Epicharmus (test. 34 R–N/ K–A) incidentally, when he explains that, in editing the works of his teacher, he followed the example of both Apollodorus of Athens and the Peripatetic Andronicus, the former having collected the works of the comic poet Epicharmus in ten volumes. Thus, Porphyry supports and completes the information provided by Athenaeus (14.648d) regarding Apollodorus’ studies on Epicharmus. Although mainly known as a Neoplatonic philosopher, Porphyry had an excellent training in grammar, having studied in Athens under the tutelage of Longinus, which explains his acquaintance with Apollodorus’ work.

 78 And continued for centuries, making a strong resurgence in the 3rd century AD; see Geffcken 1929, Swift Riginos 1976 and the essays gathered in Dixsaut (ed.) 1993 and 1995. Gigante 1953 alone sees no polemic attitude towards Plato in To Amyntas. On the subject see also Cassio 1985, 43–45. Alternatively, Alcimus might have been trying to emphasise Western contributions to Greek culture.

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In these same years Epicharmus is also mentioned by another Neoplatonist, Iamblichus, in his On the Pythagorean Life, considered the richest source of information regarding the Pythagorean School, although it is full of fictitious tales linked to the legend of Pythagoras. 79 The mentions of Epicharmus are also clearly in this latter vein. In his first mention of the poet (VP 29.166), Iamblichus states that Epicharmus’ maxims, which are cited by everyone, including philosophers, are presented as one of the many examples of wisdom that emanated from the teachings of Pythagoras (Epich. 45 R–N = 12 K–A). He also claims (VP 34.241) that Epicharmus (test. 46 R–N = 13 K–A) was the father of a doctor, 80 also a Pythagorean, called Metrodorus, and an advocate, like Pythagoras himself, that Dorian was the best of the Greek dialects. Finally, he presents the poet as one of the “foreign” auditors (τῶν ἔξωθεν ἐκροατῶν) of the Pythagorean School (VP 36.266), who had allegedly concealed his allegiance amidst jokes for fear of Hiero (test. 45 R–N = 12 K–A). On the Pythagorean Life was an influential work, which undoubtedly contributed considerably to sustaining the image of Epicharmus as a Pythagorean for centuries to come. Also in this century we find Epicharmus cited once again, albeit indirectly, by a Christian author of great erudition, 81 Eusebius of Caesarea, in a long quote from book 5 of Clement’s Miscellanies, which is included in book 13 of his Preparation for the Gospel 8.247a (written around 312–318 AD). The quotations belong, in fact, to the spurious Republic (frs. [372–374] R–N = [255] K–A), ascribed to “Epicharmus the comic poet”, and to another poem whose title goes unmentioned (fr. [383] R–N = [255] K–A), the latter preceded by the statement that Epicharmus was one of the most learned of Greeks, and a Pythagorean. Eusebius merely reproduces the text of his predecessor, 82 but his work undoubtedly contributed to supporting and spreading the image of Epicharmus as both a comedy writer and a Pythagorean among readers of his work, which was primarily directed at newly converted Christians and to pagans, who Eusebius wanted to convince of the rationality of the new faith.

 79 See O’Meara 2014, with further bibliography. The order of priority between this work and Porphyry’s edition of Plotinus is uncertain. 80 The alleged connection of Epicharmus with medicine is probably related to the pseudoEpicharmean treatise Chiron, which dealt with medicine and veterinary practice. 81 See Carrikes 2003, Inowlocki 2011, with further bibliography. 82 On which, see above.

  Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén

 The 4th century AD Moving now into the 4th century proper, Epicharmus is mentioned by the philosopher and orator Themistius, one of the last pagan writers, in his Oration 27 (337b), written around 355 AD. In this work, in the form of a letter to a young man, Themistius defends the position that what is important in education is the quality of the teaching, and not the city where a person studies. Among the arguments he uses to support his thesis is the notion that the place where a discipline originates is not the only one that can later excel in it. Thus, for instance, comedy reached the peak of its development in Athens, despite having originated in Sicily “since that is where Epicharmus and Phormus were from” (Epich. test. 20 R–N = 5 K–A), 83 information which Themistius, and the cultured people of his time, no doubt knew through Aristotle, even though his name is not mentioned in the context. Themistius’ source may be Poetics 1449b5–9, 84 or perhaps, as Janko argues, the lost treatise On Poets. 85 In the same period, also Julian cites Epicharmus in his Consolation upon the Departure of Sallustius, 86 8.247a, written in 359 AD, when he had not yet become emperor. Julian, an admirer of Iamblichus’ Neoplatonism, 87 tries to comfort himself in the face of his separation from his friend and advisor Sallustius as a consequence of a court intrigue. One of the arguments 88 he uses to console both himself and his dear friend and comrade is that, even when they are separated by a long physical distance, and despite not being able to see one another with their  83 Cf. also Suda ε 2766 Adler (Epich. test. 21 R–N = 1.3-4 K–A). 84 Some consider that in the passage the names of Epicharmus and Phormus or Phormis (regarding this variant of the poet’s name see Janko 2011, 492–493) have been interpolated from a marginal note. For the arguments against this supposition, see Janko 1987, 80, and Bettarini 1995, with further bibliography. 85 Cf. also Poetics 1448a30–40. Following Gudeman 1934, 110, and Else 1957, 114–117, and 197– 200 (cf. also Garzya 1988, 65), Janko edits Themistius’ passage as Aristotle, On Poets, fr. 34. For a discussion on this, see Janko 2011, 336–367, 369–371 and, particularly, 492–493, with further bibliography. What makes me feel uncertain about Janko’s thesis is that Themistius’ use of this example suggests that he considered the information regarding Epicharmus and Phormus to be well known to the young students aiming to improve their education to whom he directed this Oration. However, it seems that in the 4th century AD On Poets had become “the preserve of learned philosophers” (Janko 2011, 392), while Poetics never stopped being read. 86 On this work, see Lössl 2012, with further bibliography. Regarding Julian’s life, the classic work is still Bidez 1930. On Julian’s intellectual profile see Athanassiadi-Fowden 1981, Bouffartigue 1992, De Vita 2011, with further bibliography. 87 Strongly tinged with Neopythagoreanism. 88 The argument is part of a fictitious speech put into the mouth of Pericles.

The Long Shadow of Fame  

eyes, friends can be more linked than ever within their minds, thanks to their thoughts and their memories. In support of this notion, as an argument from authority (introduced with the expression ὅτι δὲ οὐκ ἀμάρτυρος ὁ λόγος ἐστί μοι), he makes recourse to the first part of the line: νοῦς ὁρῇ καὶ νοῦς ἀκούει (Epich. fr. [dub.] 319 R–N = 214 K–A), which he attributes to “the Sicilian” (φησὶν ὁ Σικελιώτης). It should be noted that, like Aristotle (Pr., 903a20), Julian only cites the initial part of the line, but it is clear that he does not rely here on the former, who introduces the maxim with a mere “ὥσπερ εἴρτηται”, as a well-known saying of vague origin. Also noticeable in Julian is the indirect reference to Epicharmus, which lends a touch of erudition and at the same time seeks the complicity of the educated reader, who would have been able to identify Epicharmus as “the Sicilian” par excellence. All in all, Julian’s testimony demonstrates that in the 4th century Epicharmus’ image as a wise man was well established in the philosophical circles related to Neopythagoreanism.

 The transition between the 4rd and 5th century AD At the turn of the century, Epicharmus is cited once again as a Pythagorean and an authority on philosophical themes in one of the last Christian apologetic treatises, The Cure for Hellenic Maladies 89 by Theodoret of Cyrrhus, written before 423 AD. 90 Specifically, Theodoret, who sets out to demonstrate the truth of Christianity on the basis of Greek philosophy, 91 adduces, in different parts of the work, three quotes from Epicharmus taken from Clement’s Miscellanies, but employs them in a personal way, as is clear from a comparison of their respective texts. 92 Thus, in Affect. 1.82 (cf. Clem., Strom. 4.7.45.3), after criticising those who give credit to only what they can see and touch, and following a quotation from Plato, Theaet. 115e, 93 Theodoret adds that maybe it was with respect to such people (τοῖς οὕτω διακειμένοις ἀνθρώποις ) that Epicharmus the comic poet applied his old,

 89 On this work, see Canivet 2000, Ulrich 2009, Liebeschuetz 2014, Scholten 2015, with further bibliography. 90 Scholten 2015, 13. 91 See Siniossoglou 2008, Guinot 2012, Papadogiannakis 2012, with further bibliography. 92 For Clement, see above. 93 Cf. Clem., Strom. 5.6.33.5.

  Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén or famous, iambus (ἴαμβον ἐκεῖνον), 94 φύσις ἀνθρώπων, ἀσκοὶ πεφυσημένοι (fr. 241 R–N = 166 K–A); in this case, the quotation seems more than anything to serve to enliven his argument. In Affect. 1.88 (cf. Clem., Strom. 2.5.24.4), Theodoret uses the line νοῦς ὁρῇ καὶ νοῦς ἀκούει, τἄλλα κωφὰ καὶ τυφλά (Epich. fr. [dub.] 319 R–N = 214 K–A) to support the important role of faith; in this case, he reinforces Epicharmus’ authority by focusing on his being a Pythagorean (κατὰ γὰρ δὴ τὸν ᾿Επίχαρμον, τὸν Πυθαγόρειον λέγω). 95 Similarly, in Affect. 6.22 (cf. Clem., Strom. 5.14.100.6) Theodoret calls upon the authority of Epicharmus “the Pythagorean”, and quotes a (doubtless spurious) fragment: οὐδὲν ἐκφεύγει τὸ θεῖον· τοῦτο γιγνώσκειν σε δεῖ/ αὐτός ἐσθ’ ἁμῶν ἐπόπτης, ἀδυνατεῖ δ’οὐδὲν θεῷ 96 (fr. [383] R–N = [255] K–A) as an exhortation to reject superstition and to fear God.

 Conclusion This overview of the mentions of Epicharmus between the 1st and 5th century has enabled us to identify a number of routes through which knowledge of this poet was circulated in this period, although there are also some authors that fall outside of this framework, such as Ptolemy Chennos. On the one hand we have the strictly grammatical works, which seek in Epicharmus linguistic data, which I have knowingly left out of my study. In the literary field, this tradition, linked to the activities of the great Hellenistic libraries, is represented by Athenaeus, who has no difficulty distinguishing the comedies of Epicharmus from the pseudoEpicharmean writings. Occasionally, other educated writers such as Aelian, Porphyry and Clement also show some acquaintance with this grammatical tradition. On the other hand are those who seek in Epicharmus maxims of a serious, practical or philosophical nature, and who quote him as an authority. Among them, the Stoic Cornutus, although the majority were Platonists interested in or linked to Neopythagoreanism (Plutarch, Iamblichus, Julian) along with Christian authors sympathetic to this thinking (Clement and, after him, Eusebius and Theodoret), who followed a tradition which saw in Epicharmus a direct disciple of

 94 In the parallel passage, Clement does not call Epicharmus a comic poet, although he does do so in other places. 95 In Clement’s parallel Epicharmus is mentioned as one of Pythagoras’ ζηλωταί. 96 Clement’s version has θεός at this point.

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Pythagoras, as exemplified also by Diogenes Laertius. None of these authors appears to be aware that various works circulating under the name of the poet were, however, spurious. A “crossing” of these two routes appears to occur when, for a number of reasons, certain thinkers turn to works of literary exegesis in search of thematic parallels or imitations (which they prefer to call “plagiarism”) between earlier authors, among them Epicharmus. This can be seen in Clement, and in Sextus Empiricus, and (indirectly) in Diogenes Laertius. In these cases, the material taken from Epicharmus is sometimes adduced in critical or controversial ways. That aside, we also find Epicharmus at the centre of a dispute between the Stoics and the Platonists with regard to the aporia of the Growing Argument (Plutarch), which Chrysippus had identified in certain of the comedies of the Sicilian. In addition, he is used incidentally by the Atticist Aristides to criticize Plato. Apart from that, the mentions of Epicharmus in Plato and Aristotle undoubtedly favoured the educated public’s continued awareness of him, at least in name, for centuries to come, as Themistius still testifies in the 4th century. And, naturally, this also contributed to the long shadow of Epicharmus’ fame, in which humour, as we have seen, played little part. Tab. 5: Authors (or works) that mention Epicharmus between the 1st and 5th century AD (arranged alphabetically within each period) Century (AD)

Authors

st c.

Cornutus

st–nd c.

Plutarch

nd c.

Aelius Aristides (Anon.) Antiatticista Apollonius Dyscolus Herodianus [Lucian], Macrobius? Phrynichus Arabius Pollux

nd–rd c.

Aelian Athenaeus Clement of Alexandria Sextus Empiricus

rd c.

Alexander of Aphrodisias

Ptolemy Chennos

rd–th c.

Eusebius of Caesarea

th c.

Helladius grammaticus

th–th c.

Theodoret of Cyrus

th c.

Etymologicum Orionis

Rufus of Ephesus

Diogenes Laertius Iamblichus

Porphyry

Julian

Themistius

Hesychius

Stobaeus

Syrianus

  Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén

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  Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén Lössl, J. (2012), “Julian’s Consolation to Himself on the Departure of the Excellent Salustius: Rhetoric and Philosophy in the Fourth Century”, in: N. Barker-Brian/S. Tougher (eds), Emperor and Author: The Writings of Julian the Apostate, Swansea, 60–74. Major, W.E. (2013), “Sicilian Pioneers of Comedy and Rhetoric and Their Transmission to Athens”, in: id., The Court of Comedy. Aristophanes, Rhetoric, and Democracy in Fifth-Century Athens, Ohio State Univ. Press, 23–35. Melero, A. (1995), “Epicarmo y la comedia ática”, in: A. Melero (ed.), Primeras jornadas internacionales de teatro griego, Valencia, 25–42. Morawski, S. (1970), “The Basic Functions of Quotation”, in: A.J. Greimas et alii (eds), Sign, Language, Culture, The Hague/Paris, 690–705. Most, G.W. (1989), “Cornutus and Stoic Allegoresis: A Preliminary Report”, ANRW II 36.3, 2014–2065. Noch, A.D. (1931), “Kornutos”, RE Suppl. 5, coll. 995–1005. O’Meara, D.J. (2014), “Iamblichus’ On the Pythagorean Life in Context”, in: C.A. Huffman (ed.), A History of Pythagoreanism, Cambridge, 399–415. Opsomer, J. (1998), In Search of the Truth. Academic Tendencies in Middle Platonism, Brussels. Papadogiannakis, Y. (2012), Christianity and Hellenism in the Fifth-Century Greek East: Theodoret’s Apologetics against the Greeks in Context, Cambridge (Mass.). Pffeifer, R. (1968), History of Classical Scholarship, Oxford. Pickard-Cambridge, A. (1962), Dithyramb. Tragedy and Comedy, rev. ed. T.B.L. Webster, Oxford. Ramelli, I. (2003), Anneo Cornuto. Compendio di teologia greca, Milan. Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén, L. (1994), “Plutarco y Epicarmo”, in: M. García Valdés (ed.), Estudios sobre Plutarco: Ideas Religiosas, Madrid, 559–669. Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén, L. (1996), Epicarmo de Siracusa: Testimonios y fragmentos. Edición crítica bilingüe, Oviedo. Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén, L. (1998), Ateneo. Banquete de los eruditos, vol. I, Madrid, Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén, L. (2004), “Reseña a Kerhoff (2001)”, Emerita 72.1, 176–180. Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén, L. (2012), “On Epicharmus’ Literary and Philosophical Background”, in: K. Bosheer (ed.), Theater outside Athens, Cambridge, 76–96. Salis, A. von (1909), De Doriensium ludorum in comoedia Attica vestigiis, Basel. Santoro, F. (2012), “Platão e o plágio de Epicarmo”, Archai 8, 11–20. Scholten, C. (2015), Theodoret. De Graecarum affectionum curatione, Leiden/Boston. Sedley, D.N. (1982), “The Stoic Criterion of Identity”, Phronesis 27, 255–275. Shaw, C.A. (2014), “Sicilian Comedy and the Attic Satyr Play”, in: C.A. Shaw (ed.), Satyric Play. The Evolution of Greek Comedy and Satyr Drama, Oxford, 56–77. Siniossoglou, N. (2008), Plato and Theodoret: The Christian Appropriation of Platonic Philosophy and the Hellenic Intellectual Resistance, Cambridge/New York. Stählin, O. (1905), Clemens Alexandrinus, vol. I, Leipzig. Stemplinger, E. (1912), Das Plagiat in der griechischen Literatur, Leipzig/Berlin. Swift Riginos, A. (1976), Platonica. The Anecdotes Concerning the Life and Writings of Plato, Leiden. Tarrant, H. (1983), “The Date of the Anon. in Thaetetum”, CQ 33, 161–187. Tomberg, K.H. (1967), Die Kaine Historia des Ptolemaios Chennos. Eine literarhistorishe und quellenkritische Untersuchung, Diss. Bonn. Tosetti, S. (2019), “I frammenti di Epicarmo in Ateneo”, FsS 0, 124–147.

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Totaro, P. (2012), “Epicarmo e la tragedia attica”, in: G. Bastianini/W. Lapini/M. Tulli (eds), Harmonia. Scritti di filologia classica in onore di Angelo Casanova, Florence, 841–860. Tziatzi-Papagianni, M. (1994), Die Sprüche der sieben Weisen. Zwei byzantinische Sammlungen, Stuttgart. Ulrich, J. (2009), “The Reception of Greek Christian Apologetics in Theodoretus’ Graecarum affectionum curatio”, in: J. Ulrich et alii (eds), Continuity and Discontinuity in Early Christian Apologetics, Frankfurt am Main, 113–130. Ulrich, J. (1996), “Techniques of Quotation in Clement of Alexandria. A View of Ancient Literary Working Methods”, Vigiliae Christianae 50, 223–243. Warren, J. (2007), “Diogenes Laertius, Biographer of Philosophy”, in: J. Köning/T. Whitmarsh (eds), Ordering Knowledge in the Roman Empire, Cambridge, 133–149. Willi, A. (2012), “Challenging authority: Epicharmus between Epic and Rhetoric”, in: K. Bosher (ed.), Theater Outside Athens. Drama in Greek Sicily and South Italy, Cambridge, 56–75. Willi, A. (2015), “Epicharmus, the Pseudepicharmeia and the Origins of Attic Drama”, in: S. Chronopoulos/C. Orth (eds), Fragmentary History of Greek Comedy, Heidelberg, 109– 145. Wüst, E. (1950), “Epicharmus und die alte attische Komödie”, RhM 93, 337–364. Xenophontos, S. (2012), “Comedy in Plutarch’s Parallel Lives”, GRBS 52, 603–631. Zeegers-Vander Vorst, N. (1972), Les citations des poètes grecs chez les apologistes chrétiens du IIe siècle, Louvain.

 This work is part of the research project DISIECTA MEMBRA (II), funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (ref. FFI2017-83315-C2-1-P).

List of Contributors Kostas Apostolakis is Associate Professor in the Division of Classical Studies of the University of Crete. He studied Classics in the Universities of Crete and Groningen. He has published numerous articles and book chapters on Ancient Rhetoric, Attic Oratory, Attic Comedy and Ancient Historiography and he has authored three monographs: (1) [Lysias], or.20 For Polystratos (in Greek, Athens 2003), (2) [Demosthenes] or.42 Against Phaenippos (in Greek, Athens 2009), and (3) Timokles ([FrC 21], in English, Goettingen 2019). Andreas Bagordo has taught at Albert Ludwigs University of Freiburg since 1999 and has been a Professor there since 2005. He graduated from the Sapienza University of Rome, and gained his PhD at Göttingen in 1998 and his Habilitation at Freiburg in 2001. His main research interests are in Greek epic and lyric poetry and their reception, Attic drama, Hellenistic poetry, Roman literature of the Republican period, Greek and Latin language and style. Since 2011 he has been working on the project of the Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften to develop a commentary on the fragments of Greek comedy, and has published seven volumes in the series. Francesco Paolo Bianchi is Mitarbeiter for the research project Kommentierung der Fragmente der griechischen Komödie (KomFrag, Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften/Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg). His research focuses particularly on Old Comedy, and has been disseminated through several publications including two monographs on Cratinus (2016 and 2017, two further books are currently being prepared). His interests include the history of the collection and interpretation of fragmentary texts and their indirect transmission, and is also preparing an edition with commentary of the Athenian dithyrambic poet Cinesias. Anton Bierl is Professor for Greek Literature at the University of Basel (since 2002). He served as Senior Fellow at Harvard’s Center for Hellenic Studies (2005–2011) and is Member of the IAS, Princeton (2010/11). He is director and co-editor of Homer’s Iliad: The Basel Commentary and editor of the series Mythos Eikon Poiesis. His research interests include Homeric epic, drama, song and performance culture, the ancient novel, Greek myth and religion. His books include Dionysos und die griechische Tragödie (1991); Die Orestie des Aischylos auf der modernen Bühne (1996); Der Chor in der Alten Komödie (2001); English revised edition Ritual and Performativity (2009); and the co-edited volumes Literatur und Religion I–II (2007); Gewalt und Opfer (2010); Ästhetik des Opfers (2012); Intende Lector: Echoes of Myth, Religion and Ritual in the Ancient Novel (2013); The Newest Sappho (2016) and Time and Space in Ancient Myth, Religion and Culture (2017). His new translation of Sappho with a commentary and detailed introduction is in print. Martin Cropp is Professor Emeritus of Classics at the University of Calgary. He has co-edited the fragments of Euripides for Aris & Phillips Classical Texts and the Loeb Classical Library. His Minor Greek Tragedians, Volume 1: The Fifth Century was published in 2019.

  List of Contributors Eric Csapo is British Academy Global Professor at the University of Warwick. He has written widely on ancient theatre and mythology. Together with Peter Wilson he is currently writing A Social and Economic History of the Theatre to 300 BC of which the second volume, Theatre beyond Athens, was published by Cambridge University Press in 2020. P.J. Finglass is Henry Overton Wills Professor of Greek and Head of the Department of Classics and Ancient History at the University of Bristol, and Director of the Arts and Humanities Research Council South, West and Wales Doctoral Training Partnership. He has published a monograph Sophocles (2019) in the series “Greece and Rome New Surveys in the Classics”, as well as editions of Sophocles’ Oedipus the King (2018), Ajax (2011), and Electra (2007), of Stesichorus (2014), and of Pindar’s Pythian Eleven (2007) in the series “Cambridge Classical Texts and Commentaries”; has co-edited (with Adrian Kelly) The Cambridge Companion to Sappho (2021) and Stesichorus in Context (2015) and (with Lyndsay Coo) Female Characters in Fragmentary Greek Tragedy (2020); and edits the journal Classical Quarterly, all with Cambridge University Press. Massimo Giuseppetti is Assistant Professor of Greek at Roma Tre University. He is the author of L’isola esile. Studi sull'Inno a Delo di Callimaco (Rome 2013); Bacchilide: Odi e frammenti (Milan 2015); Artemide. La natura selvaggia (Milan 2018). He has written on Hellenistic poetry (especially Callimachus) and Euripidean drama. His current research projects are about the literary perception of Greek festivals and the ritual imagery in classical Athenian tragedy. Jeffrey Henderson is the William Goodwin Aurelio Professor of Greek Language and Literature, and former Dean of the College and Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, at Boston University. He is best known for his pioneering work on the language and history of sexuality, on Greek drama (especially comedy) and politics, and for his editions and translations of Aristophanes. Since 1999 he has been General Editor of the Loeb Classical Library, and is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Richard Hunter is Regius Professor of Greek at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of Trinity College. His research interests include Hellenistic poetry, ancient literary and cultural criticism and reception, and ancient drama. His most recent books include Hesiodic Voices. Studies in the ancient reception of the Works and Days (Cambridge 2014), Apollonius of Rhodes, Argonautica IV (Cambridge 2015), and The Measure of Homer (Cambridge 2018). Many of his essays are collected in On Coming After: Studies in Post-Classical Greek Literature and its Reception (Berlin 2008). Ioanna Karamanou is Associate Professor of Classics in the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. She has authored three books published by De Gruyter: Euripides: Danae and Dictys, Leipzig/ Munich 2006; Euripides: Alexandros, Berlin/ Boston 2017 (Academy of Athens Award for Classical Philology); Refiguring Tragedy: Studies in Plays preserved in Fragments and their Reception, Berlin/Boston 2019. She has edited four volumes and has published extensively on Greek drama. Her research interests include Greek drama and its reception, Greek tragic and comic fragments, papyrology and ancient literary theory (especially Aristotle) on tragedy. She participates in four international research projects and is currently writing a commentary on the fragments of Diphilus.

List of Contributors  

Ioannis M. Konstantakos studied classical philology at the universities of Athens and Cambridge and is now Professor of Ancient Greek Literature at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. His scholarly interests include ancient comedy, ancient narrative, folklore, and the relations between Greek and Near-Eastern literatures and cultures. He has published four books and many articles on these topics. He has received scholarships from the Greek State Scholarships Foundation and the “Alexander S. Onassis” Public Benefit Foundation. In 2009 his study Akicharos: The Tale of Ahiqar in Ancient Greece, vols. 1 and 2 (Athens 2008) was awarded the prize of the Academy of Athens for the best monograph in classical philology. In 2012 his book Legends and Fairy Tales about the Land of Gold: Archaeology of a Folktale Motif (Athens 2011) was shortlisted for the Greek state prize for critical essay. Poulheria Kyriakou is Professor of Greek Literature at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. Her research interests include archaic poetry, classical drama and philosophy and Hellenistic poetry. She is the author of Homeric hapax legomena in the Argonautica of Apollonius Rhodius (Stuttgart 1995), A commentary on Euripides’ Iphigenia in Tauris (Berlin/New York 2006), The past in Aeschylus and Sophocles (Berlin/Boston 2011) and Theocritus and his native Muse (Berlin/Boston 2018). She has also co-edited Wisdom and folly in Euripides (Berlin/Boston 2016) and written articles on Greek philosophy and poetry. Anna A. Lamari is Assistant Professor of Ancient Greek Literature at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. She is the author of Narrative, Intertext, and Space in Euripides’ Phoenissae (Berlin/New York 2010), and Reperforming Greek Tragedy (Berlin/Boston 2017). She is currently working on a commentary of Middle Comedy poets Nausicrates, Nicostratus, Ophelion, Philetaerus, Phillipus and Philiscus in the series Fragmenta Comica (FrC). Nikos Manousakis has studied Classics and Linguistics at the University of Athens, Greece. In his PhD thesis, he applied Computer Linguistics to the Aeschylean corpus, studying the authenticity of Prometheus Bound and the ending of Seven Against Thebes. He has taught Ancient Greek, Latin, and Linguistics at the University of Athens, and Greek drama at the Drama School of the National Theatre of Greece. He has also worked as an assistant director –for the staging of Greek drama– in the Athens and Epidaurus Festival. Currently, he is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Ancient Greek in the Department of Classics at the University of Athens, and a Research Associate at the Centre for Greek and Latin Literature of the Academy of Athens. Benjamin Millis (Hannoversch Münden, Germany) is the author of Anaxandrides (Heidelberg 2015) and, together with S.D. Olson, Inscriptional Records for the Athenian Dramatic Festivals (Leiden/Boston 2012). Michele Napolitano teaches Greek Language and Literature at the Università degli Studi di Cassino e del Lazio Meridionale. His study interests focus mainly on the fifth-century Attic theater, and in particular on the Ancient Comedy and satirical drama, on metric problems, and on the questions of the fate of Classics, especially in the historical-musical context. He has published editions with commentaries on the Cyclops of Euripides (Venice, Marsilio, 2003) and the fragments of the Kolakes of Eupolis (Mainz, Verlag Antike, 2012). Significant publications include a commentary on fragment 155 K.-A. (Pherecrates’ Chiron) and the article “Aristofane e i comici dell’archaia” for the Storia del teatro antico, in preparation for the Carocci. In the next

  List of Contributors few years he plans to prepare a work on the new Greek metric “Lustrum” (1970–2015) for the publisher Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht and a Greek metric manual for de Gruyter. Anna Novokhatko (Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg i.Br./Aristotle University Thessaloniki) has published widely on the history and terminology of early ancient scholarship, textual criticism and ancient Greek comedy. She is the author of an edition of the Invectives of PseudoSallust and Pseudo-Cicero (De Gruyter 2009) and a co-editor of eight volumes. In her habilitation thesis The first philological turn: textual scholarship in Archaic and Classical Greece (to be published soon), the ideas and notions of pre-Alexandrian criticism are examined. Furthermore, Novokhatko deals with cognitive and conceptual approaches in ancient theories of metaphor and with methodological and practical developments in the field of Digital Classics. S. Douglas Olson is Distinguished McKnight University Professor at the University of Minnesota. He is the author or co-author of numerous standard works, including editions of Aristophanes’ Acharnians, Wasps, Peace and Thesmophorizusae; of the fragments of Eupolis, Archestratus and Matro; and of the Deipnosophists of Athenaeus of Naucratis. He is currently at work on the fragments of Antiphanes and on Eustathius’ Commentary on the Odyssey. Massimiliano Ornaghi is Research Fellow of Greek Literature at the University of Torino (Italy) and has been Humboldt Research Fellow at the University of Freiburg (Seminar für Griechische und Lateinische Philologie, 2018-2020). His main interests are archaic poetry, Attic theatre (esp. Cratinus, Eupolis, Aristophanes), ancient chronography, biographical traditions of the ancient Greek poets. His publications include books on Archilochus (La lira, la vacca e le donne insolenti, 2009) and on the origins of comedy (Dare un padre alla commedia, 2016), and several papers: he is currently working on a book about Aristotle’s Poetica and De poetis. Christian Orth is Privatdozent at the Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg und Research Associate of the Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften on the project “Kommentierung der Fragmente der griechischen Komödie”. His publications include full-scale commentaries on the fragments of many poets of Old Comedy, including Strattis (2009) and Aristophanes’ Aiolosikon, Amphiaraos, Anagyros and Babylonians (2017). He just finished a volume on poets of Middle Comedy, including Aristophon, Axionikos and Dionysios (forthcoming). Patrick O’Sullivan is Associate Professor of Classics at the University of Canterbury, NZ, and a graduate of Melbourne and Cambridge Universities. He has published widely on Archaic and Classical Greek literature and cultural history, as well as on Greek and Roman art and their reception in antiquity and beyond. He has been awarded major research grants and Visiting Fellowships to Cambridge and Oxford Universities. In 2008 he was involved as translator and actor in a full production of Euripides’ Cyclops, produced in Christchurch, and he is the author (with Chris Collard) of Euripides’ Cyclops and Major Fragments of Greek Satyric Drama (Oxford 2013). He is working on a contracted book with Routledge/Taylor & Francis titled The Rhetoric of Greek Art. Athina Papachrysostomou is Tenured Assistant Professor of Ancient Greek Literature at University of Patras (Department of Philology). Her research focuses on Greek Comedy, Athenian Democracy, and Textual Criticism. She has published four monographs, articles, and chapters in

List of Contributors  

collected volumes. She is an external collaborator of the KomFrag project and she has received scholarships from the Onassis Foundation, the Loeb Classical Library Foundation, and the Fulbright Foundation Greece. Efstathia Papadodima is Researcher, Grade C, at the Academy of Athens (Research Centre for Greek and Latin Literature). She holds a DPhil from the University of Oxford and has held teaching positions at the Universities of Texas at Austin and Ioannina, Greece. Her research interests and publications focus on Greek tragedy—especially tragedy’s treatment of ethnic identities and moral values—and on the history of ideas. She is the author of: Foreignness Negotiated: Conceptual and Ethical Aspects of the Greek-Barbarian Interaction in Fifth-Century Literature (2013); Seneca’s Thyestes (2011, in Greek); and Sophocles’ Ajax (2018, in Greek). She has edited the volumes: Greek Drama and Popular Morality (2019, in Greek); Faces of Silence in Ancient Greek Literature (2020); and New Approaches to Ancient Epic (2020), with A. Stefanis. Serena Perrone is Associate Professor of Classical Philology at the University of Genoa. Her main research interests lie in papyrology and ancient Greek comedy. Her publications include first editions of papyri, particularly fragments held at the University of Genoa, the volume concerning comedy and mime of unknown authorship within the series Commentaria et Lexica Graeca in Papyris reperta (CLGP), and the comment on the fragments of the comic poet Crates within the project Kommentierung der Fragmente der Griechischen Komödie (KomFrag). Lucía Rodríguez-Noriega Guillén is professor of Greek Philology at the University of Oviedo. She has published critical editions, translations and articles on a wide range of topics, including textual criticism, pragmatics, linguistics, fragmentary comedy (especially Epicharmus and Sophron), literature of the Roman period (Aelian, Athenaeus of Naucratis and Porphyry) and literary tradition. Ralph M. Rosen is Vartan Gregorian Professor of the Humanities and Classical Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. He publishes broadly in various areas of Greek and Roman literature, with a focus on comic and satirical literary genres, comparative poetics, ancient aesthetics, and ancient medicine. He is cofounder of the Penn-Leiden Colloquia on Ancient Values and co-editor of five volumes (Brill) of essays from these events. Recent books include Making Mockery: The Poetics of Ancient Satire (Oxford, 2007), Ancient Concepts of the Hippocratic (Brill, 2016), co-edited with Lesley Dean-Jones, and Aristophanes and Politics: New Studies (Brill, 2020), co-edited with Helene P. Foley. Alan Sommerstein is Emeritus Professor of Greek at the University of Nottingham. He is the author of many books and articles on ancient Greek drama, language and society, and has edited or translated plays by Aeschylus, Sophocles, Aristophanes and Menander. He was editor of the Wiley-Blackwell Encyclopedia of Greek Comedy (2019) and is now preparing a Companion to Menander’s Epitrepontes. Oliver Taplin is Emeritus Professor of Classics at Oxford University and Fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford. His books range from The Stagecraft of Aeschylus (OUP, 1977), to Pots and Plays (Getty Publications, 2007). He founded the Archive of Performances of Greek and Roman Drama with Edith Hall, in 1996. He was elected to the British Academy in 1995, and was

  List of Contributors awarded an Honorary Doctorate by the University of Athens in 2013. The leading recurrent theme of his work has been the reception of poetry and drama through performance and material culture, in both ancient and modern times. In recent years he has been translating plays with the aim of including the kind of musicality and colour which will be effective in live performance. They include Sophocles Oedipus the King and other tragedies (Oxford World’s Classics, 2016) and Aeschylus Oresteia (Norton, 2018). Throughout his career he has tried to keep one foot outside the academy, especially in broadcasting and theatre, both within and beyond the UK. Productions that he has collaborated with include the Ôresteia (1981–2, dir. Peter Hall), The Thebans (1992, dir. Adrian Noble), the Ôresteia (1999–2000, dir. Katie Mitchell) and Swallow Song (2004, 2006 dir. Lydia Koniordou). Piero Totaro is Full Professor of Greek Literature and Greek Theatre History at the University of Bari, Italy. He is editor of the international book series “Prosopa. Teatro greco: studi e commenti” (with Giuseppe Mastromarco) and director of the international research centre for Carnival, Mask and Satire. His research interests include Greek comedy and tragedy of the fifth and fourth centuries BC. Among his publications: Le seconde parabasi di Aristofane (Metzler Verlag, Stuttgart – Weimar 20002, in: «Drama. Beiträge zum antiken Drama und seiner Rezeption», ed. by Bernhard Zimmermann); co-edited with G. Mastromarco, Commedie di Aristofane, vol. II (Classici greci UTET, Turin 2006), Storia del teatro greco (Mondadori, Milan). He has also written several entries for The Encyclopedia of Greek Comedy, ed. by Alan Sommerstein (Wiley – Blackwell, Hoboken, NJ – Medford, MA, 2019). He is currently completing a critical edition with commentary of Aristophanes’ Wealth, and the first volume of a new edition, with translation and commentary, of fragmentary plays by Aeschylus (for a project promoted and funded by the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, Rome). Kyriakos Tsantsanoglou is Professor emeritus of Greek Literature at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. He is the author of “Τὸ Λεξικὸ τοῦ Φωτίου: Χρονολόγηση, Χειρόγραφη παράδοση” (1967), “New Fragments of Greek Literature from the Lexicon of Photius” (1984), “The Derveni Papyrus” (with Th. Kouremenos & G.M. Parássoglou) (2006), “Of Golden Manes and Silvery Faces: The Partheneion 1 of Alcman” (2012), “Studies in Sappho and Alcaeus” (2019), and of numerous studies on Greek Tragedy and on fragmentarily preserved Greek Literature. Matthew Wright is Professor of Greek at the University of Exeter. He has published widely on Greek comedy and tragedy, with a particular focus on fragmentary works, and his books include The Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy (2 volumes, 2016–19) and The Comedian as Critic (2012). Bernhard Zimmermann (MA Classics and Ancient History in Konstanz and London, Promotion 1983, Habilitation 1988, Professor of Classical Philology in Zürich [1990–1992], Düsseldorf [1992–1997]), is Professor of Classical Philology in Freiburg since 1997. He is a member of the Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften, the Academia Europaea, the Accademia Roveretana degli Agiati und the Academy of Athens, President of the Deutscher Altphilologenverband (2011–2015). Has written numerous works on ancient drama and the ancient novel, Greek metrics and the reception of Ancient Literature.

Index of Sources Adesp. Com. fr. *85 PCG fr. 144 PCG fr. 183 PCG fr. *262 PCG fr. *329 PCG fr. 368 PCG fr. *372 PCG fr. *387 PCG fr. 438 PCG fr. 456 PCG fr. 498 PCG fr. 510 PCG fr. 511 PCG fr. *671 PCG fr. *840 PCG fr. *874 PCG fr. 875 PCG fr. 914 PCG fr. *942 PCG fr. 1062 PCG

430 431 n.88 430 423 n.65 418 411 412 418 415 412, 430, 456 415 423 n.65 414, n.28, 416 361 416 431 416 428 416 387 n.23, 392 n.33

Adesp. Tr. fr. 110 TrGF fr. 658 TrGF fr. 664 TrGF 2 fr. 665 TrGF fr. 672a TrGF 52 fr. 701a TrGF 52 fr. 846 TrGF 52

168–172 247 n.59 166 175–179 166 172–175 66

Aelian Various History 2.13 2.8 3.15 3.32

248 n.63 251 410 n.13 185 n.8

Aelius Aristides To Capito 47

670–671

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-036

Aeschines 3.83 3.250 Aeschylus Agamemnon 212 218–247 240 315 427–474 742–743 785 799–804 908 918–925 1050–1051 1069 1094–1096 1149 1186–1193 1202 1215–1222 1222 1277 1309–1310 Eumenides 244 306 447 457–458 607–608 625–628 662 685 ff. 743 801 Libation Bearers 466–470 489–490 578 631 631–638

608 641

362 314 555 n.25 194 314 219 n.79 198 314 198 314 301 n.3 197 160 n.7 371 160 n.7 198 160 n.7 218 196 197 194 464 194 160 222 n.91 202 n.9 194 202 n.9 198 197 565 565 160 n.7 192 192

  Index of Sources 639–651 192 667 194 760 198 954–955 198 992 222 n.91 1065–1076 160 n.7 Persians 188 225 n.100 463 197 703–758 147 Seven Against Thebes 22–23 160 217 194 282–284 560 283 567 384–386 556 386–387 310 n.28 397–399 556 463 559 465 567 465–469 558 505 225 n.100 595 295 n.65 612 160 Suppliant Women 37–39 156 39 198 40–67 159 287–289 202 n.9 291–324 72 n.25, 159 387–391 158 462 222 n.93 538–589 159 741–742 158 916–920 158 932–933 158 954 157 996–1013 156, 161 1006–1007 157, 162 fr. 29 TrGF 3 218 fr. 43 TrGF 3 161 fr. 61 TrGF 3 150 fr. 78a TrGF 3 194, 291 n.55 fr. 99 TrGF 3 505–506 fr. 123b TrGF 3 148–149 frr.131–132 TrGF 3 148 frr. 135–137 TrGF 3 149 n.10

fr. 138 TrGF 3 fr. 153 TrGF 3 fr. 154a TrGF 3 fr. 159 TrGF 3 fr. 162 TrGF 3 fr. 168 TrGF 3

149 149 n.10 150, 517–519 519 516–517 217, 224 n.98, 225 n.99, 520 fr. 168a TrGF 3 225 n.99 fr. 169 TrGF 3 215 n.62 fr. 175 TrGF 3 150 frr. 179–180 TrGF 3 161 frr. 181a–182 TrGF 3 28, 504–505 fr. 182 TrGF 3 28 n.40 fr. 187 TrGF 3 161 fr. 193 TrGF 3 196, 448 fr. 195 TrGF 3 150 fr. 196 TrGF 3 150 fr. 199 TrGF 3 150 fr. 202a TrGF 3 439–440, 441, 444 fr. 202b TrGF 3 442–443 fr. 221 TrGF 3 225 n.100, 508 n.20 fr. 239 TrGF 3 504 fr. 241 TrGF 3 202 n.10, 208, 216– 217 fr. 242 TrGF 3 216–219, 223 fr. 243 TrGF 3 216–219, 223 fr. 244 TrGF 3 215, 227 fr. 245 TrGF 3 213 fr. 246 TrGF 3 216, 221 fr. 266 TrGF 3 149 fr. 275 TrGF 3 150 fr. 281a TrGF 3 11, 183–198 fr. 281b TrGF 3 11, 183–198 fr. 318 TrGF 3 150 fr. 342 TrGF 3 203 n.14 fr. 350 TrGF 3 226 n.102, 522 fr. 372 TrGF 3 215 fr. 451 TrGF 3 219 n.81 [Aeschylus] Prometheus Bound 15 22–24 64–65 241 447–468 476–506

448 448 371 197 312 312

Index of Sources  

589 692 980 1021–1025 1023 1044

72 n.25 371 194 448 196 371

Alcaeus fr. 42 L–P fr. 203 L–P fr. 357 L–P

222 221 n.89 221 n.89

Alcman fr. 1.45–59 PMG fr. 58 PMG

220 n.84 190

Alexis fr. 16 PCG fr. 24 PCG fr. 76 PCG fr. 77 PCG fr. 78 PCG fr. 84 PCG fr. 90 PCG fr. 94 PCG fr. 109 PCG fr. 130 PCG fr. 131 PCG fr. 157 PCG fr. 178 PCG fr. 204 PCG fr. 212 PCG fr. 216 PCG fr. 221 PCG fr. 239 PCG fr. 243 PCG fr. 286 PCG fr. 292 PCG fr. 303 PCG fr. 320 PCG

622–623 430 630–631 614 n.20 632–633 430 n.83 417 n.39 639 417 n.39 628 628–629 87 n.18 430 n.85 626–627 609 429 614 n.20 429 431 430 n.84 430 n.84 430 n.84 427

Amphis fr. 14 PCG fr. 30 PCG

426–427 622

Anacreon fr. 417 PMG

220

Anaxandrides fr. 11 PCG fr. 34 PCG fr. 66 PCG

423 n.65 620 n.7, 631–632 87 n.18

Anaxilas fr. 19 PCG fr. 27 PCG

87 n.18 431

[Andocides] 4.20

364 n.49

Anthologia Palatina 5.180 1–2 374 12.37 374 Antigonus of Carystus Collection of Wonderful Tales 115. 1–2 223 Antiphanes fr. 145 PCG fr. 157 PCG fr. 159 PCG fr. 164 PCG fr. 174 PCG fr. 175 PCG fr. 176 PCG fr. 189 PCG fr. 191 PCG fr. 199 PCG fr. 204 PCG fr. 205 PCG fr. 217 PCG fr. 280 PCG [Apollodorus] Epitome 3.24 3.25 5.13 Library 1.4.5 2.1.3.5–6 2.4.9 2.5.4

411, 431 629 625–626 621 393–394, 396 394 395 25–26, 35 n.58, 604, 605–606 87 n.18 427 635–636 47 626 340

244 n.44 244 n.46 326 n.9 204 73 185 n.8, 281 n.24 402 n.65

  Index of Sources 2.7.5 3.4.4 3.9.2 3.10.7 3.12.6

389 207 n.29 206 n.26 110 n.28 246 n.55

Apollonius of Rhodes Argonautica 2.506–507 201 n.4 3.120 190 Apollophanes fr.7

420 n.47

Apuleius Metamorphoses 2.4

207 n.28

Aratus Phenomena 634–646

204

Archippus fr. 23 PCG fr. 47 PCG

631 87 n.18

Archedicus fr. 3 PCG

636–637

Aristonicus Scholia on the Iliad 187a 1–2 221 n.89 Aristophanes Acharnians 1 179–181 447 507–508 575 822 Assembly Women 184 903 Birds 100 1287

106 n.9 416 n.33 40–41 364 375 418 375 375 41 375

Clouds 394 417 534–536 553–554 1052–1055 1107–1110 1158–1160 1353–1390 1357–1358 1371–1372 Frogs 52–53 79ff. 151–153 549–578 558 659–667 798–804 911 ff. 919–920 924–926 925 928–930 939–944 943 944 961–963 962 963 1004–1005 1021 1029 1030–1036 1042–1055 1059–1060 1069–1071 1083–1088 1109–1118 1111–1114 1114 1119–1197 1119–1245 1120–1121 1180 1205 1206–1208

375 284 n.27 42 481–482 290 n.49 371 371 44 44 42, 63 43 240 n.28 44 396–402 386, 394 50–53 54, 57n.14 150 148 551, 555, 559 556 551–552, 555, 559 551 44 134 552 553 184, 556 549 557 42 45 n.17 84 n.4 550, 559 290 n.49 290 n.49 71–72 44 52 n.4 557 70 69 n.21 70 70 65–66

Index of Sources  

1210 1213 1218 1226 1233 1238 1241 1245 1246–1248 1249–1250 1261–1262 1296–1303 1329–1330 1364–1367 1365 1370–1377 1407–1410 Knights 526–528 535 537 537–540 556–557 954 1250–1254 Lysistrata 67–68 158 464–466 619 677–678 785 ff. 893 Peace 76–77 531–534 749–750 1265–1304 Wasps 60 1476ff. 179–186 495 500–502 580 751 1346

70 66, 70 66, 70 70 70 70 70 70 69 56–57 56 55 559 n.33 58 58 n.14 57 58 34 n.54 284 n.27 359 n.24 34 n.55 261 375 261 n.10 484 46 n.23 488 n.23 220 n.87 220 206 n.26 198 41 43 549, 559 45 398 42 345 620 220 n.87 42 490 409 n.8

Women at the Thesmophoria 33 360 134–135 41, 150 390–391 41 395 577 735–737 488 n.23 765 41 846–946 457–460, 469–471 904–912 458 947–1000 457 1001–1135 460–468, 471–475 1059–1063 41 fr. 46 PCG 491 fr. 50 PCG 491 fr. 53 PCG 486, 487, 489, 490, 495–496, 497 fr. 54 PCG 492 fr. 55 PCG 486, 487 fr. 56 PCG 486 fr. 57 PCG 483, 486, 487, 497 fr. 58 PCG 481, 483, 485, 493 fr. 59 PCG 481, 482, 483 fr. 156 PCG 130–144, 416 n.35 fr. 157 PCG 133 n.15 fr. 158 PCG 134–135, 139 fr. 159 PCG 133, 138 fr. 160 PCG 134, 139 fr. 161 PCG 133 n.15, 134, 139 fr. 162 PCG 134, 139 fr. 163 PCG 133, 138 fr. 164 PCG 133 n.16 fr. 165 PCG 133 n.16 fr. 167 PCG 133 n.15 fr. 172 PCG 133 n.16 fr. 173 PCG 133 n.16 fr. 174 PCG 133 n.16 fr. 177 PCG 135 fr. 178 PCG 134, 139 fr. 179 PCG 135 fr. 183 PCG 133 n.16 fr. 189 PCG 133 n.16 fr. 284 PCG 400 n.57 fr. 332 PCG 222 n.93 fr. 344 PCG 220 fr. 358 PCG 414 n.28 fr. 370 PCG 417 n.39 fr. 402 PCG 635

  Index of Sources fr. 506 PCG fr. 507 PCG fr. 545 PCG fr. 595 PCG fr. 590 PCG fr. 616 PCG fr. 696 PCG fr. 900 PCG fr. 938 [dub.] PCG fr. 941 [dub.] PCG fr. 969 [dub.] PCG

43 429 n.79 341, 344 44 482 495 n.52 42 372–373, 376 369–370, 376 370–372, 376 373–376, 376

Aristophanes of Byzantium On the Pinakes of Callimachus frr. 368–369 Slater 240 n.31 Aristophon fr. 3 PCG fr. 5 PCG

415 430

Aristotle Eudemian Ethics 1233b 19–20 264 n.23 Generation of Animals 768b 29–33 284 n.29 773b 25ff. 220 History of Animals 572a 10 219–220 Nicomachean Ethics 1108b 3–5 264 n.23 1115a 4– 1117b 22 263 n.19 Poetics 1448a 30–40 682 n.85 1449a 11, 145–146, 549 1449b 354, 682 1450b 31–1451a6 3 n.3 1451b 7 354 1453b 22–26 26 n.24 1455a 22–1456a32 27 n.32 1456a 27, 28, 64–65, 520 1459a 16–23 3 n.3 Politics 1260a 19–24 263 n.19 Rhetoric 2.6.18 217 1387b 22–1388a 24 264 n.23

1387b 28–1388a 7 265 n.24 1408a 24 546 n.4 [Aristotle] Athenian Constitution 53.1 118 n.69 56.6 118 n.69 Asclepiades of Tragilus fr. 16 FGrH 12 73 Athenaeus The Deipnosophists 1.3a 2.49a–d 2.51b 2.56d 2.58c 2.63d 2.71e 3.100 3.111d 3.119f 4.174a 5.216c–d 6.222c 6.223d 6.224b 6.227e 6.228b 6.241e 6.247–248 7.276a 8.336d 8.362b 9.369c 9.373a 9.407d 9.408b–409a 10.411b–412b 10.412d–f 10.413c 10.413f–14c 10.417b 10.428f 10.453c–e 11.467a

86 n.14 337–341 370 n.3 369 338 n.5 388 648–649 338 n.5 370 n.3 613 618 281 n.24 604 607–608 617–642 633 634 487 n.22 358 n.21 241 n.35 603 n.3 344 359 369 609 340 n.9 277 277 280 278 n.11 277 551 n.16 241 n.35 77 n.36

Index of Sources  

11.496a 12.3.5 12.551a 13.16.11 13.45.39 15.667b

252 228 n.107 130 218 n.76 220 n.83 385 n.17

Aulus Gellius Attic Nights 15.20 17.4.3

289 n.39 252 n.83

Bacchylides 1.158 2.10 2.13 3.63–71 5.187–189 4.16 4.3 6.14 11.17–21 11.87–88 fr. 10 Maehler

260 260 267 n.31 265 n.26 265 n.26 260 267 n.31 267 n.31 270 371 506

Callias fr. 36 PCG

425

Callimachus Hymns 2.90ff. 5.106–107 5.107–118 5.110 5.113–114 fr. 1, 1–6 Pfeiffer frr. 429–453 Pfeiffer fr. 451 Pfeiffer

201 n.5 508 n.21 207 203 209 n.37 74–75 240 n.29 241 n.34

Cicero Letters to Atticus 6.1 118 n.64 On the Nature of the Gods 3.59–60 190

Clement of Alexandria Stromateis 2.5.24.4 675 5.14.118.1 676 6.2.5 676 6.20.3 121 Conon Narrations 28

244 n.44

Crates fr. 6 PCG fr. 21 PCG fr. 33 PCG fr. 37 PCG fr. 38 PCG

362 429 362 412 362

Cratinus fr. 6 PCG fr. 39 PCG fr. 40 PCG fr. 41 PCG fr. 42 PCG fr. 43 PCG fr. 44 PCG fr. 45 PCG fr. 48 PCG fr. 49 PCG fr. 50 PCG fr. 77 PCG fr. 78 PCG fr. 108 PCG fr. 114 PCG fr. 115 PCG fr. 117 PCG fr. 118 PCG fr. 121 PCG fr. 143 PCG fr. 193 PCG fr. 194 PCG fr. *195 PCG fr. 196 PCG fr. 197 PCG fr. 199 PCG fr. 200 PCG fr. 202 PCG

122 30–34 30–34, 108 30–34, 108–109 30–34 30–34 30–34 30–34 109 30–34 30–34 413, 416, 424 424 360 111, 112 112 112 n.43 112 112 n.40 115 120 120 120 120 121, 122 122 123 123

  Index of Sources fr. 208 PCG fr. 209 PCG fr. 281 PCG fr. 334 PCG fr. 360 PCG fr. 372 PCG fr. 406 PCG fr. 460 PCG fr. 490 PCG fr. 492 PCG

122 122 588 343 576–577, 580 573–598 414 414, 416 424 410, 431

Critias fr.2 fr.19 frr.22–25

236, 252 236, 253 253

Cypria fr.10 Bernabé fr.11 Bernabé

110 110 n.30

Demetrius On Style 169

276 n.3

Dinarchus 1.41–43

614 n.23

Dio Chrysostom 7.81–82 7.97–102 9.10–13 17.7 17.8–11 29.8–10 43.22 52

529–530 527–528 284 n.27 539 533–534, 535–536 262 n.16 582 150

Diogenes Laertius 1.55–56 1.56 2.121–125 2.134 3.60–62, 64 6.27

284 n.27 288 n.37 239 n.23 242 n.35 239 n.23 284 n.27

Diodorus of Sicily 4.9.6 4.12.3–8 4.39.2 4.81.2 4.81.3–5 5.83 9.2.5 12.9.5–6

185–186 402 n.65 185–186 201 n.4 207 n.29, 209 244 n.44 284 n.27 278 n.7

Diomedes Art of Grammar 3.10.9

280 n.15

Dionysius of Halicarnassus Letter to Gnaeus Pompeius 4.2 118 n.65 Diphilus fr. 31 PCG fr. 32 PCG fr. 67 PCG fr. 74 PCG

633–634 87 n.18, 630 623–624 87 n.18

Ennius Alexander fr. 19 Jocelyn/15 Manuwald

259 n.3

Ephippus fr. 2 PCG fr. 3 PCG fr. 5 PCG

410, 430 401 401

Epicharmus fr. 6 PCG fr. 8 PCG fr. 11 PCG fr. 60 PCG fr. 68 PCG fr. 97 PCG fr. 98 PCG fr. 99 PCG fr. 136 PCG fr. 147 PCG fr. 161 PCG fr. 165 PCG fr. 166 PCG

388 674 669 674 344 321–333 321–333 326–327 667–668 337–350 673 674 675, 683–684

Index of Sources  

fr. 167 PCG fr. 212 PCG fr. 213 PCG fr. 214 PCG fr. 218 PCG fr. 230 PCG fr. 236 PCG fr. [255] PCG fr. [257] PCG fr. [258] PCG

676 n.66 667 669 667, 683, 684 675 677 665 n.17 675, 684 676–677 676

Eratosthenes Catasterismi (Epitome) 110 n.32 25, 30b Olivieri Eriphus fr. 6 PCG

411, 429–430

Eubulus fr. 6 PCG fr. 26 PCG fr. 53 PCG fr. 67 PCG fr. 82 PCG fr. 87 PCG fr. 97 PCG fr. 119 PCG

388, 396 87 n.18 386 n.20, 411 87 n.18 220 n.83 429 392 n.34 340

Eupolis fr. 129 PCG fr. 147 PCG fr. 149 PCG fr. 150 PCG fr. 151 PCG fr. 154 PCG fr. 155 PCG fr. 160 PCG fr. 214 PCG fr. *244 PCG fr. 246 PCG fr. 247 PCG fr. 256 PCG fr. 326 PCG fr. 385 PCG fr. 390 PCG

284 n.27 420 420 420 421 421 421 637–642 417 422 422 422 422 559 n.33 414, 416 424

Euripides Alcestis 476–567 401 615–625 174 747–825 401 866 490 1069 218 n.78 Andromache 765 260 n.7 1047–1069 259 n.3 1070–1165 259 n.3 Bacchae 26–31 224 n.98 337–339 227 n.105 337–341 206–207, 508 n.21 660–774 259 n.3 1147 268 1150–1152 262 n.15 1161 268 Children of Heracles 25 260 n.7 784–866 259 n.3 863–866 262 n.15 Cyclops 149 218 n.78 150 218 n.78 155 218 n.78 315–346 282 n.25 395 371 559 218 n.78 Electra 163 260 n.10 227 260 n.7 315–318 304 n.9 367–385 262 386–388 284 n.28, 288 n.37 404–407 530–531 413–416 531 426–431 529 524–529 293 n.58 614 260 n.10, 293 n.58 688 371 751–760 259 n.3 761–858 259 n.3 781–782 293 n.58 824–825 293 n.58 859–865 293 n.58

  Index of Sources 865 880–885 998–1003 1174 Hecabe 1–2 13–14 254–257 291–292 328–331 375 574 660 762 824–825 1119–1201 1129 Helen 190 501–502 906–912 1034 1512–1618 1617–1618 Hercules 335 408–418 475 610–613 680–681 701–706 712 959–962 1003–1006 1046 1353 Hippolytus 10 13 19 108–112 135–140 219–222 230 275–277 307 345

270 293 n.58 304 n.9 293 n.58 131 79 303 303 303 218 n.78 270 267 222 n.91 303 303 312 207 n.30 312 41 41 259 n.3 262 n.15 260 n.10 202 n.9 262 248 n.64 270 269 269 268 215 n.63 268 218 n.78 202 n.9 205 n.24 205 n.23 491 487 n.21 486 490 487 n.21 202 n.9 489

351 375–376 534 581 612 675–677 806–807 953–954 1153–1254 1174 1201–1202 1238–1239 Ion 1143–1145 1203 Iphigenia in Aulis 423 944 952–954 959–960 Iphigenia in Tauris 12 204–207 1173–1174 1284–1419 Medea 10–15 45 214–266 301 534–544 554 579–585 591–592 720–724 765 1116–1117 1121–1230 1224–1230 1282–1292 1329–1335 1339–1340 Orestes 844–851 852–956 917–922 924

202 n.9 489 190 202 n.9 46, 489 489 270 43–44 259 n.3 491 491 489 202 n.9 218 n.78 218 n.78 218 n.73 312 228 n.108 260 n.10 222 n.91 312, 315 n.36 259 n.3 308 270 307 260 n.7 308 308 308 307 308 268 259 n.3 259 n.3 262 n.15 308 308 308 259 n.3 259 n.3 262 260 n.10

Index of Sources  

1110–1114 1305 1349–1352 1370–1371 1374 1384–1385 1395–1397 1426–1436 1478–1482 1500–1502 1507 Phoenician Women 132–141 214–219 239–249 438–440 446–637 528–530 531–540 536 858 1374 1509–1513 Suppliants 315 433–455 726–730 913–915 1066–1263 Trojan Women 353 474 475–478 748 764 784 927–928 937 987 994–995 1022–1028 1107–1109 1168–1170 1223 fr. 42 TrGF 5 fr. 54 TrGF 5 fr. 61b TrGF 5

304 n.9 362 n.38 313 313 313 313 313 304 n.9 313 262 n.15 313 310 n.28 312 312 541–542 178 539–540 532–533 538 n.11 260 n.10 268 309 n.19 260 n.10 315 262 n.15 262 n.17 259 n.3 267 304 n.9 309 n.18 304 n.9 312 267 304 n.9 267 261 304 304 304 n.9 304 n.9, 503 267 260 n.6 261–263 311

fr. 61d TrGF 5 258–261 fr.62 TrGF 5 260 n.6 fr. 62a TrGF 5 263–266 fr. 62d TrGF 5 266–271, 305 frr. 117–122 TrGF 5 461–478 fr. 219.1 TrGF 5 260 n.10 fr. 223.19–23 TrGF 5 269 fr. 228 TrGF 5 312 fr. 237 TrGF 5 262 fr. 244.1 TrGF 5 260 n.7 fr. 261.2 TrGF 5 260 n.7 fr. 282 TrGF 5 260–261, 270, 275– 295 fr. 283 TrGF 5 281 fr. 284 TrGF 5 281 fr. 360 TrGF 5 260 n.10 fr. 370 TrGF 5 270 fr. 428 TrGF 5 228, 229 n.109 fr. 430 TrGF 5 229 n.109 fr. 434 TrGF 5 229 n.109 217 fr. 457 TrGF 5 fr. 530 TrGF 5 371–372 fr. 540a TrGF 5 342 n.17 fr. 580 TrGF 52 30 n.46 fr. 581 TrGF 52 30 n.46 fr. 661 TrGF 52 278 n.10 frr. 673–674 TrGF 52 237, 242 n.36, 249, 251 fr. 771 TrGF 52 312 fr. 807 TrGF 52 495 n.52 fr. 817 TrGF 52 492 n.43 fr. 868 TrGF 52 247 n.59 fr. 910 TrGF 52 247 n.59 fr. 912 TrGF 52 247 n.59 fr. 913 TrGF 52 247 n.59 fr. 964 TrGF 52 247 n.59 fr.inc. 972.2 TrGF 52 260 n.7 [Euripides] Rhesus 306–308 383–385

310 n.28 310 n.28

Eustathius On Iliad 641.57 677.12ff.

193 409 n.7

  Index of Sources On Odyssey 3.350 5.64

577, 585, 592 575, 589

Favorinus On Exile 20.3–4

537

Galen Commentary on Hippocrates’ Epidemics 3.2.4 91 n.34 Gorgias Helen 9 16 18

555 n.25 554 558

Hermippus fr. 32 PCG fr. 57 PCG fr. 86 PCG

417 410, 431 424

Herodotus 1.8.3 1.137.2 3.154 ff. 5.27.2 6.138.20–24 6.21.2 9.33 9.81

222 315 n.36 331 362 192 145 289 346

Hesiod Catalogue of Women 441 n.11 fr. 23b MW3 fr. 64 MW3 280 fr. 67 MW3 280 fr. 148a MW3 205 frr. 215–217 MW3 201 fr. 217 MW3 207, 227 n.106 Theogony 86–92 294 n.64 201 190 975–977 201

Hesychius α 1695 α 3410 α 5716 ε 2515 ε 4933 θ 104.5 θ 106.1 θ 166 κ 404 κ 2851 κ 3138 λ 1041 π 513 s.v. ἁιδοφοῖται s.v. πῶλος

576 n.7 389 587–588 648 594 611 n.11 611 n.11 575 593 n.52 411 n.17 370 421 n.54 574 132 n.8 220 n.83

Hippias D–K 86 B6

45 n.17

Hippocrates Airs, Waters, and Places 20 410 n.9 Aphorisms 1.3 284 n.29 Homer Iliad 1.37–38 1.90 1.399–400 1.538 1.550 2.557 2.658 2.732 3.337 3.363 4.89 4.92 5.133 5.226 5.370 5.453 5.886 6.60 6.206

244 n.45 76 n.34 444 n.17 76 n.34 76 n.34 76 n.34 76 n.34 76 n.34 552 372 76 n.34 76 n.34 76 n.34 76 n.34 76 n.34 76 n.34 76 n.34 76 n.34 76 n.34

Index of Sources  

7.364 8.202 9.372–372 9.447 10.205–212 10.277–295 11.624–627 16.364 21.483–484 23.683 24.212–213 24.759 Odyssey 3.279–280 4.244–258 5.118–124 5.144 5.168 9.71 9.79 11.172–173 11.198–199 14.482 15.410–411 17.580 18.107 19.394–395 19.407–408 20.348

76 n.34 76 n.34 218 n.73 492 n.43 325 n.9 328 244 n.46 76 n.34 204 n.18 221 n.89 305 n.11 204 204 n.16 322–324 204 325 n.9 325 n.9 372 325 n.9 204 n.16 204 n.16 221 n.89 204 n.16 76 n.34 76 n.34 280 280 195

Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite 7–33 209 n.39 45–46 209 n.39 81–142 209 n.39 155–156 218–219 Horace Carmina 1.25.14 2.13.37 4.1.10 Satires 1.4.1 1.4.62

220 n.82 441 112 n.40 105 n.1 459

Hyginus Fables 180 181 201 Poetic Astronomy 2.8

207 n.29, 209 n.40 207 n.29 281 n.21 111 n.38, 112

Inscriptions IG I3 969 IG I3 970 IG II22325e 50–52 IG II2 2363 IG II2 3091 IG II2 3207 IG II3 4352 SEG XXXII 450

247 n.62 247 n.62 357 n.14 250 247 n.62 611 n.13 581 638

Isocrates 4.1–2 9.13–15 15.250

284 n.27 246 n.55 284 n.27

Lactantius Commentary on Statius, Thebaid 2.222 163 6.290–291 163 Leuco fr. 5 PCG

418

Little Iliad arg. 1. 15–17 Bernabé fr.6 Bernabé fr.7 Bernabé [Longinus] On the Sublime 15.3

323 n.3 323 n.3 323 n.3

84 n.4

Lucian Anacharsis 25 262 n.16 36 262 n.16 Dialogues of the Dead 6.1 246 n.55

  Index of Sources 11.2 246 n.55 13.3 246 n.55 Dialogues of the Gods 16.2 207 n.29 Lycurgus Against Leocrates 12.51

260 n.10

Lysias 13.32, 55

579

Menander Aspis 407 Dyskolos 860–863 Epitrepontes 322–329 760–768 Georgos 35–38 Heros 84 Samia 15–16 163–164 324–326 498–500 582 fr. 7 PCG fr. 70 PCG fr. 116 PCG fr. 327 PCG fr. 435 PCG fr. 496 PCG fr. 680 PCG fr. 722 PCG

530 n.5 659–660 87 n.18 87 n.18 198 87 n.18 657 658 221 n.90 648–649 649 650, 660 539

Metagenes fr. 14 PCG

412–413

Nicostratus fr. 29 PCG fr. 36 PCG

87 n.18 427

87 n.18 659 260 87 n.18 652 87 n.18

Nonnus Dionysiaca 5.93 5.287 5.287–551 5.290 5.412 ff. 5.512–519 10.337 33.180 44.283 ff. 48.277 Ovid Metamorphoses 3.131–259 3.141–142 3.256–315 11.301–317 The Art of Love 2.487–488

190 202 n.7 207 n.29 203 226 209 190 190 209 n.42 190

207 207 n.28 521 n.45 280 n.17 220 n.82

Palaephatus On Incredible Things 45.66–67 389–390 Papyri P.Herc. 433 III P.Herc. 433 IV 23–25 P.Herc. 1088 II P.Herc. 1088 V P.Herc. 1602 V P.Köln VI 245 P.Oxy. 1083& 2354 P.Oxy. 2078 P.Oxy. 2164 fr.1 P.Oxy. 2256 fr.9 a–b P.Oxy. 2429 P.Oxy. 2455 P.Oxy. 2455 fr.7 P.Oxy. 2455 fr.14 P.Oxy. 2456 P.Oxy. 2495 fr.37 P.Oxy. 2509 P.Oxy. 2737 P.Oxy. 3531 P.Oxy. 3650

448 440 n.8 448 445 445 328 293 236 n.5, 251 224 n.98 183–185 321–322 280 n.19 251 245 n.47, 251 251 339 207 n.31 482 251 257–259, 269

Index of Sources  

P.Oxy. 3652 P.Oxy. 3699 P.Oxy. 4546 P.Stras. 2342–2344

280 n.19 284 n.28 173 257

Pausanias 1.20.1 1.33.2–3, 7–8 4.28.7 5.18.12 6.6.5 6.11.2–9 6.14.5–8 6.15.3 8.2.4 9.38.5 10.14.2–4 10.17.3–4 10.30.5

350 n.31 110 n.31 331 198 278 n.7 278 n.7 278 n.7 278 n.7 201 n.4 226 244 n.44 201 n.4 210 n.4

Pherecrates fr. 42 PCG fr. 100 PCG fr. 159 PCG fr. 176 PCG

389 n.27 545 409, 430 413

Pherecydes fr. 9a 7–8

201 n.3

Philemon fr. 73

87 n.18

Philetaerus fr. 10 PCG

415

Philodemus On Piety 1. 519–530

248 n.67

Photius Lexicon α 1404 ε 1617 ι 95 λ 96 λ 273 μ 146

4803 594 585, 592 374–375 595 375 n.12

τ 195 s.v. ζῶμα

372 221

Phrynichus fr. 67 PCG

414

Pindar Isthmian 1.12 1.21 1.41–45 2.17 2.43 5.22–25 5.54 7.22 Nemean 2.22 3.19 3.20 3.40 4.16 7.17–33 8.20–34 11.5 11.13–16 Olympian 1.47–51 1.100 2.74 2.86 3.18 3.2 3.4 4.11 6.1–4 6.74–76 8.19–20 8.55 9.1–4 9.28 9.94 9.100 13.100 14.5–7 14.17

268 260 265 n.26 267 n.31 265 n.26 265 n.26 268 261 n.13 260 268 261 n.13 260 270 30 n.45 30 n.45 267 n.31 261 n.13 265 n.26 260 260 260 260 267 n.31 559 n.33 260 548 265 n.26 261 n.13 265 n.26 270 295 n.65 261 n.13 260 259 n.5 261 n.13 559 n.33

  Index of Sources Pythian 1.32–133 259 n.5, 268 1.37 260 1.81–86 265 n.26 2.88–92 265 n.26 3.71 265 n.26 5.106–107 270 6.7–18 548 8.57 260 9.1–70 201, 218 9.112–116 156 9.123–124 270 11.46 268 fr. 107 Bowra 220 n.83 fr. 137 186 fr. 169a 1–8 510–511 fr. 249a Snell–Maehler 388 n.26 Plato Apology 36d 6–9 37a 41a Cratylus 413d 7–414a 3 Gorgias 464c 483d 5–6 502c 507b 4–507c 7 523–524 Laches 196c 10–201b 5 Laws 661b–c 668b 6–7 690b 4–5 690c 1 795e 7 810e–811a 817b–d 832e 1 838c 917b–c Menexenus 245c–e

284 n.27 286 n.33 246 n.55 63 n.19 372 511 n.30 509 n.26 263 n.19 246 n.55 263 n.19 514 501 n.6 511 n.30 511 284 n.27 44 n.14 501 284 n.27 503 627 312

Phaedo 61e 2 Phaedrus 68c 5–69c 3 264b–c 264c Protagoras 264c 326a–b 339–347a Republic 332b–c 390e 5–391a 2 404a 5 410b 5 429a 8–430b 9 522d 568a 8–b2 Symposium 178b 219d Theaetetus 152e Plato Comicus fr. 46 PCG fr. 47 PCG fr. 48 PCG fr. 49 PCG fr. 61 PCG fr. 64 PCG fr. 106 PCG fr. 158 PCG fr. 183 PCG fr. 185 PCG fr. 188 PCG

509 n.26 263 n.19 54 3, 43 43 44 n.14 501 511–512 509 n.24 284 n.27 284 n.27 263 n.19 503 502 190 263 n.19 671

383, 385, 386, 387, 391, 392, 396 383, 385, 386 386 394, 396 428 425 410 425 425 428 488 n.23

Platonius On the Distinction Among Comedies II.29–31/49–52 113–115 Plutarch Agesilaus 20.1

284 n.27

Index of Sources  

Moralia 79b 550 297d–e 244 n.44 336b 667 n.24 528e 218 732f 42 n.9 748–771 84 n.4 879f 249 n.73 Nicias 29.2–3 63 On Affection for Offspring 497b–c 541 On the Sign of Socrates 12 288 n.37 Philopoemen 3.2–5 284 n.27 Phocion 30.6 364 Solon 20.4 118 n.73 [Plutarch] Lives of the Ten Orators 839c 218 n.74 841f. 90 n.30 Pollux Onomasticon 2.88 4.121 4.141.5 4.186 6.83 7.51.5–52.1 7.152 10.111 10.178

361 n.32 596 226 649 339 221 372 280 n.15 280 n.15

Porphyry of Tyre Life of Plotinus 24

680

Proverbia Coisliniana 23 390 Prodicus fr. 2 PCG

219, 222

Sappho fr. 166 Voigt fr. 198a–b Voigt

110 n.28 190

Scholia [Aesch.] Prometheus Bound 453 Ar. Frogs 1026 Ar. Knights 400a Ar. Plutus 953c–d Ar. Wasps 1221 Ar. Women at the Thesmophoria 395 Eur. Andromache 445 Eur. Hecabe 13 Eur. Orestes 872 Eur. Phoenician Women 1116 Lycophr. v 88 Pind. Isthmian 8.57b Soph. Ajax 286 Sextus Empiricus Against the Professors 9.54 253 Simonides fr. 542 PMG fr. 543 PMG fr. 575 PMG Sophocles Ajax 98 286–287 440 465 815–865 844 961–962 1250–1252 1291–1292 Antigone 203 332–375 1001–1002 1005

501 507 190

171 371 171 260 n.10 169–171 218 n.78 197 294 n.62 312 225 n.100 312 301 n.3 218 n.78

162 66 116–117 364 412–413 576 n.7, 577 241 n.34 79 163 72 n.27 110 n.28 445 n.19 370

  Index of Sources Electra 5 452 485 680–763 685 1300 Oedipus Tyrannus 799 947 Philoctetes 118 442 444 841 859 Women of Trachis 248–257 260–269 1101 fr. 14 TrGF 4 fr. 56 TrGF 4 fr. 88 TrGF 4 fr. 149 TrGF 4 fr. 183 TrGF 4 frr. 269–295 TrGF 4 fr. 371 TrGF 4 fr. 447 TrGF 4 fr. 474 TrGF 4 frr. 517–521 TrGF 4 fr. 587 TrGF 4 fr. 589 TrGF 4 fr. **1030 TrGF 4 Stesichorus fr. 97 Finglass fr. 285 Finglass Stobaeus Anthology 1.1.11 1.6.9 2.31.19 3.16.14 3.23.4 3.29.45–46 4.1.27

72 222 n.93 371 259 261 197

4.12.6 4.15b.25 4.29.10 4.29.53

657 652 654 67

Strabo 1.2.30

412 n.19

225 n.100 225 n.100

Strattis fr. 49 PCG

425

295 n.65 225 n.100 225 n.100 260 n.10 197

Suda α 295 α 1694 α 2952 ει 324 ι 275 κ 1874 κ 1878 s.v. Εὐφορίων s.v. Νέστωρ s.v. Πώγων

576 n.7 371 575, 589 361 576 n.9, 577–578 370 n.3 370 n.3 212 n.53 75 361 n. 36

Theocritus Idylls 13.1–2

190

Theognis 33–36 West 77–78 West 436–438 West

512 513 513

178 n.11 207–208

Theopompus fr. 18 PCG fr. 61 PCG fr. 78 PCG fr. 105 PCG

426 412–413 426 426

650 655, 659 654 658–659 656 653, 659 418

Thucydides 1.27 2.17.3 2.46.1 2.65.9 2.97 5.79.4 6.16.2 7.29.4–5

33 n.53 584 n.35 260 n.10 546 n.4 302 n.5 193 289 n.41 302 n.5

395 n.41 401 n.63 218 n.78 502 310 540–543 282 n.25 310 72 n.25 51, 53 n.8 517 n.38 219 n.81 310 302 n.5 306 293

Index of Sources  

7.30.3 8.93.1

302 n.5 579

Timaeus fr. 122 PCG

Georgics 3.266–283 4.315–558

220 n.82 201 n.4

218

Timocles fr. 1 PCG fr. 6 PCG fr. 7 PCG fr. 8.16–19 PCG fr. 8–19 PCG fr. 12 PCG fr. 16 PCG fr. 17 PCG fr. 18 PCG fr. 23 PCG fr. 24 PCG

431 n.86 87 n.18, 605 610 286 n.33 605 608 613 n.18 614 612 613 606–607

Xenarchus fr. 7 PCG fr. 11 PCG

624–625 427

Xenophanes fr. 2 West

285–287

Tyrtaeus fr. 12 West

284–285

Tzetzes Chiliades 8.435–453 8.452–453

281 n.20, 293 n.59 280 n.15

Varro fr. 298 Funaioli

252 n.83

Vergil Ciris 134

190

Xenophon Anabasis 7.3.21–22 Cyropaedia 6.18 8.3.13 Hellenica 5.2.7 7.4.31 Memorabilia 2.1.21–22 3.12.1 4.4.19–20 On Hunting 1.2.7 Symposium 2.17

339–340 198 178 372 581 219, 222 284 n.27 315 n.36 206 n.26 284 n.27

General Index Actaeon 201–233 Aelius Aristides 583, 670–671, 685 Aeschylus 10, 11, 13, 14, 22, 26, 28–30, 40–47, 54–56, 58, 69–70, 72, 83–84, 87, 89–92, 97, 98, 100–101, 133–134, 139, 145–151, 155–157, 165–166, 168, 183–184, 189–192, 194, 196, 201–203, 206, 208–223, 225–229, 237, 239, 244, 291, 312–313, 315, 342, 355, 357, 364, 437–428, 440–442, 444–445, 448– 449, 464, 503–505, 507–510, 515–517, 520–523, 545–567, 597 Agathon 41, 46, 65, 134–135, 139, 361, 505, 510 agon 26, 54, 58, 106, 108, 121–123, 178, 260–261, 263, 265–266, 304, 353, 358 Alexis 87, 387, 419, 427–428, 609, 614– 615, 621–622, 626–628, 630, 632, 639–640, 655, 673 Apollo 51, 77, 201, 204–205, 209, 218, 226, 244–245, 346, 387, 444, 508, 517, 522–523, 565, 596, 611 Apollodorus 72–74, 204–205, 246, 326, 389, 527, 614, 664–665, 672, 674, 676, 680 Aristophanes 8–11, 13–14, 22–25, 30–31, 33–35, 39-45, 49–54, 59, 66, 68, 70– 71, 91–92, 94, 105, 114–117, 121–123, 129–130, 132, 135–136, 138–143, 148, 150, 184, 203, 206, 212, 220, 236, 239– 243, 246–247, 290, 301, 305, 341–342, 344, 353, 355–357, 359, 364, 369–373, 375–376, 380–382, 396, 398, 400, 407, 414, 453–454, 457, 460–461, 481– 493, 495–496, 505,510, 545–555, 557– 559, 561–564, 567–568, 576–577, 579– 580, 582, 587, 590, 593–594, 613, 635 Aristotle 11, 26, 43, 54, 64–65, 87, 145– 146, 150–151, 217–220, 223, 241, 322, 353–355, 520, 546, 549, 554, 557, 588, 663–664, 674, 682–683, 685 Artemis 190, 202–214, 217, 225–229, 243–244, 488, 507–508, 517 https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110621693-037

Athenaeus 15, 23–24, 76, 79, 93, 98–99, 130, 138, 143, 149, 241, 250, 252–253, 277–280, 284–285, 288, 322, 326– 327, 337–341, 344–345, 350, 356–357, 359, 369–370, 383–384, 388, 410, 527–528, 551, 603–609, 611–613, 615, 617–620, 625, 630–631, 633–635, 637–638, 641–642, 647–649, 664, 671–674, 677–678, 680, 684–685 Athens 15, 23, 26, 33, 43, 53–54, 60, 88– 90, 98, 131, 170, 205, 212, 238, 241, 243–245, 249, 265, 271, 290, 315, 354– 356, 358–359, 361–365, 384, 392, 407, 420, 422–423, 430, 492, 497, 557, 562, 564, 575–576, 581, 587, 589, 595, 597– 598, 611, 613, 623, 627, 634, 638, 640– 641, 664, 674, 676, 680, 682 athletic 11, 257–265, 267–268, 270–271, 277–279, 283–284, 286–295, 385 Attic Stelae from the Eleusinion 343 barbarians 12, 299–300, 302–315, 413, 422, 425–426, 428–429, 431, 462 book-reading 39–40, 43–44, 53, 95, 97, 276, 279, 453, 547, 562, 667 Borges, Jorge Luis 379 Callimachus 201, 203, 207, 210, 240– 241, 243, 664, 676 Cedeides 347–349 Chrysippus 535, 667–668, 685 Cinesias 131–132, 135–138 Clement of Alexandria 168, 250, 666, 673–677, 681, 683–685 Corinth 306, 308, 349, 386, 411–412, 430, 633–634 Crates 13, 111, 353–363, 365–366, 412, 415, 419, 429, 673 Cratinus 10, 14, 30–34, 45,105–106, 109, 111, 113–124, 132, 343, 353, 357, 381, 391, 400, 410, 412–414, 419, 424, 573, 575–581, 583, 585–591, 593, 595, 597 Critias 11, 96, 101, 235–243, 246–253, 277 Demosthenes 98, 365, 593, 608–609, 614–615, 641

  Genreral Index Derrida, Jacques 4 Dio Chrysostom 14, 84, 150, 262, 284, 527–543, 546, 550, 553, 582 Diogenes Laertius 545, 669, 678–680, 685 Dionysus 13, 23, 31–34, 42–43, 50–53, 55, 69–70, 107–109, 134, 137, 147, 150, 203, 207–210, 224–226, 246–247, 291, 396–399, 427, 441, 455, 457, 521, 574– 576, 579, 581, 584–586, 590, 592–593, 595–598 education 21, 23–24, 45, 83, 178, 290, 501, 514–516, 523, 557, 665-666, 673, 682 Eliot, T.S. 379–381 emotions 33, 264–265, 547, 516, 562 Epicharmus 12, 15, 239, 321–325, 327, 331–332, 344, 663, 666–668, 670–671, 673–675, 677, 680, 683 epinician 11–12, 258-261, 263, 265–267, 270–271, 289 Euripides 7–8, 10–12, 14, 22–23, 26–29, 31–33, 35, 40–44, 46–47, 54–56, 63, 65–66, 69–71, 79–80, 83–92, 95–102, 131, 134–135, 148, 165–168, 173–175, 177–179, 190, 202, 205–206, 208–210, 212, 215, 217–218, 225–229, 235–253, 257, 259–263, 265–267, 269–271, 275– 281, 284–295, 301–306, 308, 310–315, 342, 400, 437–438, 440–441, 446, 453–454, 456–461, 463–468, 472, 485–493, 495–498, 502–503, 505, 508, 510, 514, 523, 528–532, 534, 536, 539– 543, 547, 549, 551–553, 555–560, 564– 567, 651, 666, 673, 676–677 Eusebius 357, 681, 684–685, 687 Eustathius 369, 373–374, 376, 390, 573, 575, 585–586, 589–592, 610 Favorinus 537-538 Guardi, Francesco 64 Herodotus 145, 166, 222, 289, 331, 346, 359, 580 Hesiod 34, 45-46, 73, 112, 201, 205–207, 216, 225, 227, 280, 294, 338-339, 343, 399–400, 440–442, 446, 506–508, 522, 666 Iamblichus 681–682, 684–685

Julian 595, 682–685 Homer 27–28, 31, 33, 45, 75–77, 110, 114, 148 160, 193, 204, 209, 246, 280, 294, 325, 332-333, 372–374, 444, 504, 507, 509, 535, 546, 549, 551–555, 557–559, 562, 589, 621, 666, 677 –Iliad 27–28, 75–77, 147–148, 161, 204, 305, 322–324, 329, 522, 554, 557 –Odyssey 27–28, 75–77, 114, 160, 280, 322–323, 325, 415, 532, 562, 585, 589, 592, 610, 650 Lasus of Hermione 77 Lenaea 40, 236, 357, 364–365, 483, 575, 593–597 Lipogram 75–78 Lycurgus of Athens 85, 90–92, 150, 241, 260, 579, 581–582, 584, 611 the Lykaon Painter 210–216 Lyssa 211–215, 225, 226 Meletus 55, 131–132, 135–138 Menander 8, 15, 23–25, 46, 87, 113, 221, 260, 380–381, 407, 492, 531, 539, 647–656, 660 narrative 5, 10, 12, 14–15, 23, 27, 61-66, 68–72, 75, 78, 80, 113, 123, 143, 146– 147, 161, 237–238, 250–251, 257, 276, 278, 281, 289, 332, 391, 438, 445, 531– 532, 547, 565, 597, 604, 606–607, 615 Nestor of Laranda 75–78 Pannini, Giovanni 64, 71 parabasis 31, 32, 106, 114, 117, 120–121, 289, 353, 421, 481–483, 493, 549, 576, 589 paratragedy (paratragodia) 14, 39-41, 47, 87, 136, 276, 332, 453–455, 468,486, 488, 496 parodos 27, 32, 106, 119–121, 159, 245– 246, 461 parody 13, 14, 39–40, 42, 45–47, 68, 69, 114, 121–122, 132, 137, 236, 301, 332, 371, 375, 422, 427–428, 453–454, 457, 461, 467–468, 481, 486–491, 493, 495–497, 553, 555, 557, 567, 605 Philodemus 14, 248–249, 437–438, 440–442, 444–449

General Index  

Photius 24, 93, 186, 192, 221, 363, 370, 376, 422, 482–483, 550, 573, 577, 585– 587, 590–595, 670 Phrynichus Arabius 655, 663, 685 Phrynichus Comicus 45, 355, 414, 428 Phrynichus Tragicus 35, 42, 55, 145, 150, 202, 226, 359 Pindar 77, 156, 157, 201, 218, 260, 265, 268, 388, 399, 445, 504, 508, 510–511, 514, 548–549, 559 Plato Comicus 132, 138, 238, 355, 362– 363, 382–383, 385, 392–394, 396, 410, 419, 425, 428–431, 580 Plato, philosopher 3, 14, 44, 54, 238, 294, 312, 341, 501–503, 505, 508–516, 518, 520–523, 529, 535, 546, 554, 557, 559, 562, 668-673, 679–680, 683, 685 Plutarch 42, 62, 93, 99, 218, 248–250, 253, 364, 527, 541–542, 546, 550, 557, 666–669, 673, 684–685 Poe, Edgar Allan 78 Pollux 24, 93, 221, 226, 227, 280, 339, 361, 363, 370, 373, 491, 587, 596, 649, 663, 685 Porphyry of Tyre 680, 684–685 Pythagoreans 664, 676, 678, 680–681, 683–684 reperformance 23, 64, 88–90, 211–213, 280, 554 Roman drama 92, 95, 174, 328 Sannyrion 131–132, 135–138 Schlegel, August 155, 159–161 Schlegel, Friedrich 4 Semele 11, 202, 206–210, 213, 216–217, 223–226, 228, 438, 505, 508, 520–521,

Sextus Empiricus 236, 248, 253, 677, 685 Simonides 63, 446, 510–514, 519, 545, 557 Sophocles 7–8, 10, 21-22, 26–29, 41, 43–44, 46, 51-53, 65, 83–84, 86–92, 95, 97–101, 145, 165–166, 168–172, 179, 202, 211–212, 218, 222, 237–241, 247, 293, 301–302, 305, 310, 312, 371, 437–438, 491, 502, 505, 510, 517, 528, 532, 539–543, 545, 550–552, 561–562, 674 Stesichorus 27, 178, 206–208, 213, 332– 333, 440–441, 508, 510 Stobaeus 15, 67-68, 93, 250–251, 253, 495, 532, 539, 541–542, 647–648, 650– 653, 655–656, 660, 663, 665, 685 Syracuse 333, 342, 346, 669, 679 Theodoret of Cyrrhus 683-685 Theognis 67–68, 510, 512–514 Timocles 15, 87, 284, 286, 419, 604– 609, 612–615 Triphiodorus 75–78 tripod 12, 337–342, 344–350 Ulpian of Tyre 338, 341, 575, 582–583, 609, 612–613, 673 Xenakis, Iannis 14, 545–548, 561–568 Xenophanes of Colophon 278–279, 285– 287, 291–292, 294, 664, 674 Zeus 11, 34, 41, 73, 110–112, 131, 159, 170, 183–186, 189–192, 195, 201, 205, 207–215, 224–229, 285, 360, 382–383, 388, 390, 393, 396–397, 440–445, 447, 461, 491, 505–508, 516–517, 521, 553, 586, 607, 629, 634, 650, 666