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A r is toph a n e s a n d t h e p oe t ic s
of c om pe t i t ion
Athenian comic drama was written for performance at festivals
honoring the god Dionysos. Through dramatic action and open
discourse, poets sought to engage their rivals and impress the audience, all in an effort to obtain victory in the competitions. This
book uses that competitive performance context as an interpretive
framework within which to understand the thematic interests shaping the plots and poetic quality of Aristophanes’ plays in particular,
and of Old Comedy in general. Studying five individual plays from
the Aristophanic corpus as well as fragments of other comic poets, it
reveals the competitive poetics distinctive to each. It also traces thematic connections with other poetic traditions, especially epic, lyric,
and tragedy, and thereby seeks to place competitive poetics within
broader trends in Greek literature.
z ac h a r y p. bi l e s is Assistant Professor of Classics at Franklin
and Marshall College, Pennsylvania.

A r is toph a n e s a n d
t h e Poe t ic s of
Com pe t i t ion
Z ac h a ry P. Bi l e s
Franklin & Marshall College

c a mbr idge u ni v er sit y pr e ss
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© Zachary P. Biles 2011
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First published 2011
Printed in the United Kingdom at the University Press, Cambridge
A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication data
Biles, Zachary P., 1968–
Aristophanes and the poetics of competition / Zachary P. Biles.
p.â•… cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn 978-0-521-76407-0 (hardback)
1.╇ Aristophanes–Criticism and interpretation.â•… 2.╇ Greek drama
(Comedy)–History and criticism.â•…I.╇Title.
pa3879.b355â•… 2010
882′.01–dc22
2010038969
i s b n 978-0-521-76407-0 Hardback
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or will remain, accurate or appropriate.
For Jill, Hannah and Zoe
Χαρίτεσσιν ὁμοĩαι
Contents
Acknowledgments
List of abbreviations
page viii
x
Introduction:€proagon
1
1From Thamyris to Aristophanes:€the
competitive poetics of the comic parabasis
12
2 The competitive partnership of
Aristophanes and Dikaiopolis in Acharnians
56
3 Aristophanes’ poetic tropaion:€competitive
didaskalia and contest records in Knights
97
4Intertextual biography in the rivalry
of Cratinus and Aristophanes
134
5 Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
167
6Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
211
Bibliography
General index
Index of passages
257
280
285
vii
Acknowledgments
This book originated as a doctoral dissertation on Aristophanes’ Wasps
�written under the direction of John Gibert. Though the study has undergone many changes since then, with regard to both the scope of the inquiry
and the methods of interpretation applied, the warm enthusiasm and careful guidance Professor Gibert then offered have had an enduring effect.
The present expansion of that study took shape primarily while I was a
fellow at the Center for Hellenic Studies in 2004–5, where work was made
easy by the excellent library as well as by the no less excellent company of
the CHS director, Gregory Nagy, staff, and other fellows, above all Marc
Domingo Gygax and Julius Rocca. At Franklin and Marshall College,
the friendship and encouragement of my colleagues, especially Shawn
O’Bryhim, buoyed me through work on the final chapters, and then the
long process of revision and preparation of the final manuscript€– toward
this latter Judith Chien was indispensable in her daily assistance in resolving various queries of style and format. Of the many colleagues I have had
at other institutions, I single out the late Steven Lowenstam; apart from
showing great generosity in his advice and criticism during my early contemplation of this project, his passion for teaching and learning made a
deep impression on me at a critical point in my career. Ralph Rosen read
an early draft of the first chapter and, as I have come to appreciate in him,
helped me see problems in an entirely different light.
Many thanks to the editors at Cambridge University Press, Michael
Sharp, Laura Morris and Joanna Breeze, as well as my copyeditor, Nigel
Hope, for their expert assistance and guidance through every stage of production. Special thanks are owed to the two referees for the Press for the
obvious care with which they examined the manuscript; their good judgment and considered remarks saved me from pursuing several fruitless
paths and alerted me to insights I had not fully appreciated. Needless to
say, readers should not hold them accountable for any remaining oversights and errors. Of the two referees, Douglas Olson revealed his identity
viii
Acknowledgments
ix
and later offered to play a more active role in the revisions; the book has
benefitted immensely from his scrutiny of the entire manuscript on matters great and small. For his generosity and diligence he has my warmest
thanks.
To my wife and daughters I owe the greatest debt of gratitude for tolerating my absence and distraction over the years while working on this
book, and bringing me much joy in life when I was not.
Abbreviations
ARVâ•›2
J. D. Beazley, Attic Red-Figure Vase-Painters, 2nd edn.
(Oxford 1963)
D–KH. Diels and W. Kranz, Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker,
vols. i–iii, 6th edn. (Berlin 1951–2)
FGrHistF. Jacoby, Fragmente der griechischen Historiker (Berlin and
Leiden 1923–58)
GP J. D. Denniston, The Greek Particles, 2nd edn., rev. K. J.
Dover (Oxford 1954)
IG
Inscriptiones Graecae (Berlin 1873–)
K–AR. Kassel and C. Austin, Poetae Comici Graeci, vols, i, ii,
iii/2, iv, v, vi/1, vii, viii (Berlin 1983–)
Koster
W. J. W. Koster, Scholia in Aristophanem, Pars I:€fasc. IA.
Prolegomena de comoedia (Groningen 1975)
LIMC
Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae (Zurich and
Munich 1981–)
LSJH. G. Liddell and R. Scott, A Greek–English Lexicon,
9th edn., rev. H. Stuart-Jones (Oxford, 1940; suppl. 1968,
1996)
M–WR. Merkelbach and M. L. West (eds.), Hesiodi:€Fragmenta
Selecta, 3rd edn. (Oxford 1990)
PAA
J. S. Traill, Persons of Ancient Athens (Toronto 1994–)
PMGD. L. Page (ed.), Poetae Melici Graeci (Oxford 1962)
RE Real-Encyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft
(Stuttgart 1893–1970; Munich, 1972–)
SEG
Supplementum Epigraphicum Graecum
TrGF
B. Snell, R. Kannicht, and S. Radt (eds.), Tragicorum
Graecorum Fragmenta, vols. i–v (Göttingen 1971–2009)
WestM. L. West (ed.), Iambi et Elegi Graeci, vols. i–ii, 2nd edn
(Oxford 1989–92)
x
List of abbreviations
xi
References to ancient authors and works are according to abbreviations
in LSJ. Abbreviations for periodicals follow L’Année Philologique, except
where a more commonly used form is preferred and will be obvious (e.g.,
AJP instead of AJPh).
Introduction: proagon
How dramatic poetry came to be associated with Dionysos and his
�festivals is a complicated question with no clear answer. What is certain is
that by the time our evidence allows us to speak of tragedy and comedy as
well-defined and distinct literary genres, they are included in a program of
direct competition at Dionysian festivals. It would appear that the poetic
agon was to some degree responsible for putting the genres on the cultural map, even if their cultic significance and literary antecedents go back
well before this. For tragedy, official recognition came in the later part of
the sixth century;1 for comedy we can be more precise:€the first victory
belonged to the all-but-forgotten Chionides in 486.2 Thereafter, Dionysian
competitions were the occasion for dramatic production in Athens, so
that by the time Aristophanes began writing comedies the genre had been
embedded in an agonistic context for about sixty years. Regardless of comedy’s form and character when Chionides practiced it, over the course of
the fifth century the constant subjection of the productions to direct competition must have fostered experimentation and adaptation by individual
poets. What we know as comedy through Aristophanes is thus likely quite
distinct from its earlier form, though any assessment of the genre’s development must leave room for the dynamic of innovation operating through
the re-expression of a tradition.3
On early dates of tragic production, see Scullion (2002).
Suda (χ 318 = Chionides test. 1) reports Chionides’ victory eight years before the Persian Wars, and
this can be accommodated to fit the inscriptional evidence of IG II2 2325 (Victors List), on which
the five earliest names have been lost ahead of Magnes, who was certainly victorious in 472 (IG II2
2318.8) and achieved eleven victories in total; see Olson (2007) 382–4 for discussion.
3
Cf. Redfield (1990); Mastromarco (1998). Aristotle (Po. 1449 a37– b9) gives the impression that
comedy’s form antedated in some respects the genre’s official inclusion in the contests, but
also assumes that it did not amount to much before then, especially since it was only with
Crates that real plots supposedly evolved. For genre as a moving target, see Mastronarde
(1999–2000).
1
2
1
2
Introduction
The importance of direct competition for the development of Athenian
drama has long been recognized, particularly in the case of comedy.4 For
the most part, however, scholarly inquiry has been directed toward literary historical concerns, with interest in the comic corpus lying primarily in the comic poets’ frequent references to the festival context, which
are accordingly mined to reconstruct festival programs, regulations, production histories, and the like.5 Considerably less effort has been made to
understand the plays as competitive pieces in their own right. This study
accordingly endeavors to use our knowledge of the competitive context to
derive a framework for interpreting the plays themselves. While the discussion keeps one foot grounded in particulars of festival arrangements
and makes use of whatever relevant details about rival poets and their
work can be assembled, it is essentially literary-critical. Hence identifying allusions to the competitive background in the plays is only a first
step toward demonstrating connections between the performance context and competitive themes that inform extended passages, whole plays,
and various structural elements of the genre. The competitive poetics that
emerges from this approach draws attention to ways in which the plays
can be treated as creative responses to the competitions, designed above
all else to help a poet realize his immediate objective of agonistic success
over his rivals at the Lenaia or City Dionysia. In short, I argue that festival
agonistics provide an underlying logic for the overall thematic design of
individual plays, and that by analysis of them we can recover an important
strand of the plays’ meaning for the poets and their audiences.
An approach that pays attention to the interweaving of agonistic
themes begins to capture the implications of Aristophanes’ description
of dramatic performances at the Dionysia as “choral provocations” (Nu.
312 χορῶν ἐρεθίσματα). This may strike us as a bold characterization,
but it appears less idiosyncratic in light of Plato’s reference to “contests
of choruses” (Lg. 834e ἅμιλλαι χορῶν). The premium these passages place
on the idea of Dionysian performances as confrontations between rival
choruses€– and by extension, between rival poets, actors and choregoi€–
is explained further by Thucydides’ distinction between his own history
as a possession for all time and an agōnisma composed for an immediate Â�audience: κτῆμά τε ἐς αἰεὶ μᾶλλον ἢ ἀγώνισμα ἐς τὸ παραχρῆμα
In large part because of comedy’s habit of referring overtly to its performative context and interests. A passage like E. HF 673–7, as discussed by Martin (2007) 54, suggests that a similar effect
could be achieved in tragedy. For a more systematic analysis of competitive structures in tragedy,
see Larmour (1999); Barker (2009).
5
Above all, Pickard-Cambridge (1968); Csapo and Slater (1994).
4
Introduction
3
ἀκούειν ξύγκειται (Th. 1.22.4). Thucydides is concerned with historical
writing. But even if with the word agōnisma he does not have in mind contests at the dramatic festivals,6 it is enough that he treats the phenomenon
as typifying a set of compositional objectives applicable to any competitive
undertaking. In contrast with his own concern for a sophisticated reading
audience, for Thucydides the agon, as a cultural paradigm, crystallizes the
notion of audience reception in an extreme form, entailing an inescapable
demand for authors to anticipate and orchestrate a popular response. As a
natural consequence of this, an agōnisma is uniquely bound to an immediate audience (ἐς τὸ παραχρῆμα ἀκούειν). That idea has a corollary in
Aristophanes’ reflections on the mechanisms of the agon in Wasps, where
he complains that responsibility for the failure of the original Clouds lies
with those in the audience who were incapable of recognizing the play’s
comic and artistic virtues in the brief time the contest allowed (1048 τοĩς
μὴ γνοῦσιν παραχρῆμα; cf. 1045 ὑπὸ τοῦ μὴ γνῶναι καθαρῶς).7 Unlike
Aristophanes, who at one point shows himself grappling for a paradigm
upon which he and his audience can agree (V. 54–66), Thucydides makes
no attempt to situate his work between the two poles of literary taste, and
embraces the risk of failing to gain wide favor.8 While the terms in which
the two authors carry out their discussions become clearer by comparison,
in the end the historian and the competitive poet thus part company, the
latter bound to confront his rivals and appeal to his audience’s tastes and
expectations.
Although our limited access to the work of Aristophanes’ predecessors,
rivals, and successors prevents us from fully appreciating the impact this
dynamic atmosphere of competitive performance had on the steady shaping of comedy, his testimony about his own supposed superiority over
other poets assures us of the central role competition played in the genre’s
development. The theme of Aristophanes’ incomparable significance for
the comic stage is repeatedly encountered in his plays, and will likewise be
taken up and examined again and again in this study. But it is perhaps in
the parabasis of Peace, performed at the City Dionysia in 421 (Pax Hyp.
III), that the poet is most eloquent in identifying literary innovation as
the distinguishing characteristic of what he offers the comic stage. The
It is usually supposed that he is referring to sophistic debates:€Morrison (2006) 180.
Compare Cratinus’ comments in fr. 360. In the Mytilenian Debate, Cleon likewise offers pointed
remarks about the Athenians’ agonistic habits and underscores the pressure on an audience to be
intellectually agile (Th. 3.38.6).
8
“The lack of a story-telling element will perhaps make my account less pleasurable” (Th. 1.22.4).
Cf. Finley (1968) 44–5 and Gentili (1988) 169, who places Thucydides in “the vanguard of the new
book culture.”
6
7
4
Introduction
engagement with his rivals is pronounced in this passage, beginning with
the bold claim that, while other poets should be beaten for daring to extol
themselves in a parabasis, Aristophanes must be allowed this indulgence,
since he is the finest and most renowned of them all (734–8). The chorus
go on to explain:
For, in the first place, he was the only person to stop his rivals
from incessantly ridiculing rags and waging war on lice,
and the first to strip of rights and drive into exile that Herakles
who kneaded dough and was constantly starving,
fleeing, deceiving, and being intentionally beaten.
And he did away with the slaves they always brought out crying€– all for this,
so that a fellow-slave could mock his blows and then ask,
“You poor thing, what happened to your skin? Did a bristle-whip attack
your sides in full force and lay waste the landscape of your back?”
Stripping away such rubbish and filth and low buffoonery,
he created a lofty art for us and set in place the stones for a towering craft
with grand words and notions and with jokes not commonly traded.
Nor did he ridicule your average breed of men and women,
but with a sort of Heraklean temper he assailed the greatest individuals,
striding through the rancid odors of hides and the mire of hostile threats …
(Peace 739–53)
The evidence Aristophanes offers in support of his claim to be the most
admirable poet of his genre gives the impression that he single-�handedly
rescued comic poetry from the morass of trite routines relentlessly brought
back on stage by his feckless rivals.9 Where they had been content to
work within a range of received material€– rags, vermin, Herakles, and
slaves€ – Aristophanes is a poetic visionary who ennobled the genre by,
among other triumphs, introducing a loftier form of discourse and attacking major figures such as Cleon, as he goes on to assert in the sequel to
these remarks (754–60). Needless to say, the discussion is carried out in
exaggerated terms and is full of the customary distortions, which is itself
only another indication of how the agon shaped the poet’s discourse about
himself and his genre. Still, the basic mechanism for the transformation of
a genre, on which Aristophanes’ contentions appear to be based, is not in
itself unbelievable:€individual poets offer their own innovations in place of
or alongside familiar features, and fellow poets take those innovations up
His rivals’ contrasting lack of innovation may be hinted at in the parabasis’ opening verses, in
which the chorus entrust their stage props to attendants and urge them to stay on watch against
the thieves that lurk around the stage (729–31); cf. Olson (1998) 729–31n. Not surprisingly, other
comic poets were similarly interested in the merits of innovation and tradition; see Sommerstein
(1992) 17–19.
9
Introduction
5
and help establish them as part of a repertoire.10 Stripped of its self-serving
tendencies, the picture Aristophanes paints is in accord with Aristotle’s
summary account of the adaptations and experiments by individual tragic
poets.11
In many instances, Aristophanes’ agonistic rhetoric relies on metaphors and expressions from other competitive contexts. Thus the implication of poetic engagement between rivals encoded in the passage quoted
above becomes more conspicuous when Aristophanes’ leading claim in
Pax 739, τοὺς ἀντιπάλους μόνος ἀνθρώπων κατέπαυσεν, is compared
to the inscribed vaunt of a certain Sostratos for his “countless victories”
in the pankration, the summary of which is rounded off in the final verse
with:€ [πα]ύσας δ᾿ ἀντι[πάλους π]λ[εĩσ]τα ἐκράτεις ἀμαχεί.12 On the
assumption that Aristophanes is only our first witness to this agonistic
idiom and did not himself coin it, his assertion becomes more robust by
situating rivalry in the Theater within a broader cultural paradigm of
competition, casting the poet as a stereotypical victor performing familiar
agonistic gestures.
As chance would have it, Aristophanes’ remarks can be placed in a livelier and more immediate framework of agonistic posturing and competitive
exchange thanks to the remark of a scholiast on Peace 749, who points out
the similarity between Aristophanes’ account of his daring labors of literary reform and a description of Aeschylus’ role in the transformation of tragedy drawn from a comedy by Aristophanes’ older rival Pherecrates:€ὅστις
<γ᾿> αὐτοĩς παρέδωκα τέχνην μεγάλην ἐξοικοδομήσας.13 The language
at certain points is close enough to suggest conscious borrowing (Pax 749
τέχνην μεγάλην … οἰκοδομήσας ≈ Pherecr. fr. 100 τέχνην μεγάλην …
ἐξοικοδομήσας), and the odds of Pherecrates’ description being the earlier
of the two are better than fifty–fifty, given the relative chronology of the
poets’ careers and because a description of a tragic poet is more likely to
have generated such lofty imagery.14 In that case, Aristophanes perhaps
not only adopts the language of Pherecrates’ description but alludes to
the circumstances in which it was delivered, for the wording of fr. 100
makes it clear that Aeschylus is speaking and is thus performing a gloating
Cf. Emerson (1889); Heath (1990).
Po. 1449a7–31; cf. Else (1957) 153–4. The historical basis of Aristotle’s summary is not beyond dispute; see Lefkowitz (1984) 152–3.
12
Hansen (1989) no. 811; from Sicyon, 356 bc.
13
∑VΓLh Pax 749a (= Pherecr. fr. 100), identifying the verse as from Krapataloi.
14
Geissler (1925) 39; cf. O’Sullivan (1992) 15. Pherecrates’ earliest recorded victories belong to the
early 430s at the City Dionysia (IG II2 2325.56) and mid- to late 430s at the Lenaia (IG II2 2325.122).
10
11
6
Introduction
encomium of himself in the very manner of Aristophanes in his play (esp.
Pax 734–8). The difference is that, whereas Aeschylus’ vaunt comes from
beyond the grave and in comparison with his poetic successors,15 the vitality of Aristophanes’ rebuke derives from his positioning against active
rivals in the context of a poetic competition. And although we do not
know if Pherecrates was among the competitors at the Dionysia of 421,
Aristophanes’ allusion to him may have a point in any case; with Cratinus
apparently out of the way by now (Pax 700–3), Pherecrates must have
ranked among the most experienced poets still competing on the comic
stage.16 Accordingly, one of the more striking images Aristophanes deploys
in his declaration of what distinguishes him from the other comic poets is
predicated on an idea first presented to the audience by one of his rivals,
and the passage’s effect in delivery in the Theater of Dionysos is only fully
appreciated when those associations are restored.
No doubt many other instances where the dynamic of agonistic
interplay underpins the relationship of Aristophanic comedies with those
of his rivals can no longer be detected because of the limited evidence at
our disposal. The essays in The Rivals of Aristophanes17 offered a muchneeded corrective for the study of Attic comedy, by attempting to
reconstruct the broader literary and intellectual framework within which
Aristophanes operated and from which he must have benefitted. The most
far-reaching outcome of those contributions is the possibility of greater
access to the genre by a path that does not necessarily begin and end
with the one poet from whom we have complete plays. Even incremental
advances of our knowledge in this direction have the potential to reshape
our understanding.18 But the reality of the situation is that we will never
achieve anything close to a reconstruction of the rich atmosphere of
engagement between individual poets that the contests helped establish
as central to the Athenians’ experience of comedy. Because I am interested
primarily in how agonistic readings can help discover unified meaning in
15
16
17
18
The intertextual relationship of these passages with Ra. 1004–5 (see Dover (1993) ad loc.) is discussed in Chapter 6.
See Krapataloi test. i and fr. 86 for other indications that the plot had an Underworld element. In
Pherecr. fr. 100, παρέδωκα implies that bequeathal of Aeschylus’ literary estate is at issue.
Pax Hyp. III. Acceptance of Luppe’s (1972) theory of five contestants, rather than the three regularly mentioned in the hypotheses (most recently, Storey (2002)â•›), introduces doubt into assessments based on this information. In any event, Pherecrates was active until at least the Lenaia of
420 (Pl. Prt. 327d; Ath. 218d = Agrioi test. i and ii; Geissler (1925) 42).
Harvey and Wilkins (2000).
The work of I. C. Storey, on Eupolis in particular, deserves special mention in this regard; cf.
Kyriakidi (2007). Bakola (2008) and (2010) promises further results in assessing Cratinus’ poetry
and poetics. This last appeared while my book was in press.
Introduction
7
the relationship of a discrete comment within a play to the play’s broader
themes, I concentrate on Aristophanes first and foremost. To do the same
with fragmentary plays is, with few exceptions (see below), impossible,
at least if the circularity of allowing interpretation of a few fragments to
guide our reconstruction of entire plays is to be avoided. Nonetheless,
I take every opportunity to show how thoughts and expressions in
Aristophanes’ plays are reflected in fragmentarily preserved authors,
both on a general level and especially where self-conscious and direct
contact between poets can be surmised and has real implications for
how we interpret a passage or play. If this approach risks missing the cue
for scholarly inquiry provided by recent work illuminating the poetry
of Aristophanes’ individual rivals, I nonetheless maintain that applying
the fragmentary evidence in a cautious way to buttress our analysis of
Aristophanes is crucial for placing his plays in their original festival
milieu and opening up their agonistic dimensions.
An example discussed in more detail in Chapter 4 illustrates the persistent pressure and influence exerted on Aristophanes by his rivals, at
both the micro- and macroscopic level, such that attention to such factors
becomes a precondition for a meaningful understanding of the play as a
whole. In the parabasis of Wasps (1049–50), the chorus offer the following
comments on behalf of their poet:
ὁ δὲ ποιητὴς οὐδὲν χείρων παρὰ τοĩσι σοφοĩς νενóμισται,
εἰ παρελαύνων τοὺς ἀντιπάλους τὴν ἐπίνοιαν ξυνέτριψεν.
But the poet is considered no less worthy among the sophoi
if in driving past his rivals he crashed his idea.
Here τοĩσι σοφοĩς presents the segment of the audience Aristophanes
hoped to appeal to most,19 while the corresponding form of his poetry
is designated appropriately in the second verse€– with a para prosdokian
that emphasizes the metaphor’s rhetorical purpose€– by the intellectualizing τὴν ἐπίνοιαν.20 Motivating the choice of metaphor is its intersection
with the theme of festival competition, so that, as in the Peace parabasis,
Aristophanes’ identity as poet is projected against the backdrop of rivalry
in the Theater.21 But the implications go beyond a momentary portrayal
Though, as Hubbard (1991) 116 points out, ultimately Aristophanes wishes full support from the
audience.
20
At Eq. 539 it is Crates’ “most clever ideas” (ἀστειοτάτας ἐπινοίας) that allowed him to win the
audience’s favor. Edwards (1990) 156 n. 6 comments on Aristophanes’ use of such terms; cf. Ruffell
(2002) 147–8.
21
For the athletic terminology used here, see Taillardat (1962) 338 n. 4 (on παρελαύνειν) and 434;
Campagner (2001) 81 and 255–6.
19
8
Introduction
of himself as a competitive poet. The term ἐπίνοιαν recalls διανοίας, used
shortly before to refer to Clouds (1044), and the connection is reinforced by
concentration on the sophoi, to whom, Aristophanes tells us (Nu. 518–27),
Clouds was supposed to be especially appealing. In his tireless effort to
distinguish himself from his rivals, therefore, Aristophanes took his literary daring with Clouds too far and, by recklessly exceeding the bounds of
what was, in retrospect, agonistically prudent, succeeded only in crashing his “idea” and losing the contest. The shadow of his agonistic undoing underpins Aristophanes’ entire poetic identity as it is presented in this
parabasis (V. 1015–17). But even that falls short of capturing the full extent
of the competitive background’s influence on Wasps, for the parabasis
only provides a full disclosure of circumstances underlying remarks made
in the prologue (54–66) about the positioning of the play at a safer midpoint between the opposed poles of traditional humor and a more sophisticated and adventurous form of comedy, typified first and foremost by
Aristophanes’ own previous productions.22 Wasps itself is thus characterized from the outset as an act of poetic retrenchment, undertaken in direct response to conditions that prevailed in the comic competitions since
the City Dionysia of 423, when Clouds was defeated by Cratinus’ Pytine.
Once again, it is by a rare stroke of good fortune that we know enough
about those circumstances and the plot of Pytine to be in a position to
trace the intertextual relationship of Wasps to Cratinus’ play, which is the
form Aristophanes’ agonistic response for the Lenaia of 422 takes.23
As these examples indicate, overt references to the competitive context
often provide the clearest guidance for interpretation of a play’s agonistic poetics. Metatheatrical and metapoetic passages accordingly figure
prominently in the discussions that follow. Among these, the comic
parabasis has pride of place, and its competitive underpinnings are the
subject of Chapter 1, which attempts to locate this structure alongside
competitive modes of discourse reaching back to the earliest surviving
traditions in Greek poetry. I argue that antecedents and comparative
The suggestion by Storey (2003a) that this passage refers to the entries for the Lenaia of 422
(Wasps, Proagon, Presbeis:€V. Hyp. I. 32–4), while attractive, strikes me as unlikely, given the clear
implication that the passage responds to the failure of Clouds (accepted also by Storey (2003a)
285) and characterizes Wasps against the backdrop of Aristophanes’ career efforts, i.e., V. 61 referring to the extensive mockery of Euripides in Acharnians and V. 62–3 referring to the abuse of
Cleon at the center of Knights. Rhetorically too, it makes little sense for Aristophanes to assure
the audience that they will not get a Cleon play again, if the very point of the discussion is to present Wasps (alluded to in V. 62–3 according to Storey’s hypothesis) beside the other entries in the
contest. See the analysis of this passage’s rhetorical structure by Paduano (1974) 18–19.
23
Biles (2002), re-presented here as Chapter 4; Ruffell (2002).
22
Introduction
9
models for Aristophanes’ competitive poetics are not confined by the
literary genre in which he worked. Instead, his response to agonistic
conditions and (to the extent we can generalize from the fragmentary
evidence) that of other comic poets is best understood within a broader
cultural framework of competitive ethics. Indeed, for the sake of this
discussion it may be most profitable to think of Aristophanes not as a
comic poet, but as a competitive poet working in a comic mode. Thus
considered, the problem admits a breadth of evidence that helps shed
light on the literary and social conditions from which Aristophanes’
competitive poetics emerged.
Examining the parabasis as a mechanism of the competitions is of considerable importance for the chapters on individual plays that follow. But
alongside this objective is one of identifying ways Aristophanes increasingly manages to integrate the competitive maneuvering betokened by the
parabasis with the fantasy of his plays’ dramatic action. Although that
shift in paradigms can be observed already in 411 with Lysistrata,24 the play
I have selected to illustrate it in Chapter 6 is Frogs. The play’s more ambitious tackling of that objective operates through the interaction between
features of Dionysos’ katabasis in the first half and the poetic agon of the
tragic poets in the second half, from which a sense of Aristophanes’ agonistic posturing for the Lenaia of 405 is produced even without an “appearance” by the poet in the parabasis.
My study is thus delimited at one end by a discussion of the comic
poet’s most unambiguous resource for engaging rivals and eliciting the
framing festival context, and at the other by the fullest dramatic expression of those ideals. The chapters in between focus on various other aspects
of Aristophanes’ competitive poetics. Chapter 2, on Acharnians, addresses
the merging of the poet’s competitive biography with the similarly agonistic experience of his hero, Dikaiopolis, giving particular attention to the
metapoetic signals generated by themes of festival celebration and festival competition in the dramatic plot. That convergence of identities and
of the agonistic narratives connected to them undergirds the remaining
chapters.
24
In this play Aristophanes replaced the typical parabasis with a double syzygy featuring split choruses (614–705) bantering against one another in each structural segment in a way that epitomizes
in dramatic terms the poet’s own description of “choral provocations” at the Dionysian festivals
(Nu. 311–12). In particular, 614–15 and 636–7, which introduce each half-chorus’ first display, are
modeled on the katakeleusmos of the epirrhematic agon and thereby intensify the antagonistic
nature of the performance.
10
Introduction
Chapters 3 and 4 examine Aristophanes’ most important rivalry during
the initial phase of his career, with Cratinus. Chapter 3, on Knights, treats
the comedy’s interaction with the phenomenon of victory commemoration
and record-keeping at the festivals. Reestablishing the place of these “paraliterary” contributions to the festival ambience, as the Athenians experienced it, reveals Aristophanes’ epinikian25 commentary on his victory over
the veteran poet at the previous Lenaia and clarifies the rhetorical use he
makes of this outcome to frame his encounter with Cratinus at the Lenaia
of 424.
Chapter 4 elaborates on this rivalry, exploring the intertextual responses
(alluded to above) between Aristophanes and Cratinus in the sequence of
plays represented by Knights, Pytine, and Wasps. Pytine is the centrepiece
for my study; not only can we reconstruct the play’s dramatic action and
thematic interests to an extent approached nowhere else in the corpus of
comic fragments, but we can also place the significance of those themes
definitively in relation to Aristophanes’ agonistic career. The dynamic of
competitive response and adaptation that defines the relation of this play
with the two Aristophanic comedies produced before and after it provides
the clearest indication of what is missing from our understanding of other
comedies of the period.
The place of Clouds, discussed in Chapter 5, within Aristophanes’ competitive career is more ambiguous; the original play belongs squarely
within his rivalry with Cratinus (it was placed third in competition with
Pytine at the City Dionysia of 423), but the surviving version represents
Aristophanes’ revisionary efforts some years later. My discussion focusses
on the idea of revision as recontestation unifying the surviving Clouds and
emphasizes the play’s agonistic positioning against the new rivals in the
second phase of Aristophanes’ career. While attempts to identify features
of the original and revision are at times unavoidable and in a few cases
crucial for our understanding, they also serve a more holistic objective of
showing how the play in the form we have it makes agonistic sense as a
work of the 410s.
Along with considerations based on the different insights provided by
the chosen plays, the other factor affecting my selection of primary texts
is access to sufficient supporting didaskalic and related information about
the conditions of an individual play’s original performance to allow us
Throughout I use “epinician” in its familiar application to victory songs by Simonides, Pindar,
Bacchylides, and victory epigrams, and “epinikian” for the broader ambience of victory celebration and commemoration.
25
Introduction
11
to effectively recontextualize the comedies as “agōnismata intended for an
immediate audience.” Although we rarely find ourselves in the informed
position we are in with Knights, Pytine, and Wasps, the fundamental objective of all my chapters is to show how Aristophanes’ comedies “worked” in
their agonistic setting.26
26
On a practical note, for the text of the plays and hypotheses I cite the individual Oxford editions
where available, or (when noted) N. G. Wilson’s OCT. All dates are bc, unless otherwise indicated. Unless otherwise indicated, translations of Greek passages are my own.
Ch apter 1
From Thamyris to Aristophanes: The competitive
poetics of the comic parabasis
In the description of Nestor’s contingents in the Iliadic Catalogue of Ships, the
geographical locale of Dorion provides the opportunity for a minor departure
from the theme at hand:€it was here that the Muses encountered the Thracian
poet Thamyris (Il. 2.594–600), who had boasted that he could defeat anyone,
even the goddesses of poetry themselves, if they competed in singing against
him. The outcome was in some ways predictable:€in anger, the Muses made
Thamyris blind or dumb,1 deprived him of his wondrous song, and made
him forget the art of kithara-playing. Thamyris’ punishment, in other words,
reverses the typical encounter in which the Muses bestow their gifts personally upon an aspiring poet-musician. Within the Iliad, his situation stands in
stark contrast with Homer’s own thriving relationship with the Muses, on
prominent display in the Catalogue itself, with its own elaborate invocation
(Il. 2.484–93) that enables the singer to overcome the difficulty his material
poses.2 As Andrew Ford in particular has noted, Thamyris provides a kind
of aitiology for poetic agonism, and in this sense the story might imply that
formal poetic competitions extended back well before Homer’s own time.3
At the very least, we can say that Thamyris in Homer signifies the trajectory
for what became a dominant social ambience for poetic performance in the
seventh and sixth centuries, as formal programs of poetic competition were
established at festivals in cities and cult places throughout Greece.4 Between
the middle of the fifth century and the early fourth, Thamyris was the subject
For the longstanding debate about whether pēron refers to blindness or another form of maiming,
see Whallon (1964); Brillante (1991) 431–2 (both with further bibliography). Blindness is specified
by Hesiod (fr. 65 M–W), and this became the standard interpretation later on. For blindness as a
motif in myths of divine punishment, see Buxton (1980).
2
Thamyris is opposed more generally to the idealizing poets of the Homeric poems, who perform
alone in the tranquility of the feast (e.g., Demodocus, who performs his second song in Od. 8
(esp. 367–9) as a way of soothing the antagonism resulting from the athletic rivalry of the young
Phaeacians with Odysseus).
3
Ford (1992) 96–7; cf. Schadewaldt (1959) 64; Maehler (1963) 16; Barker (1995), esp. 258–60.
4
See in general Herington (1985) 3–40, 161–6. For the variety of competitions in Athens, see
Osborne (1993).
1
12
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
13
of a tragedy by Sophocles (with the lead role supposedly played by Sophocles
himself), a comedy by Antiphanes, and very likely a dithyramb, and was the
subject of ten surviving Attic vase paintings, whose treatment of him suggests that his myth had developed well beyond the scope of his early Homeric
appearance.5 Perhaps the most intriguing evidence, however, for the way the
tradition concerning him resonated for the tragic and comic poets comes
from the parabasis of Aristophanes’ Knights (Lenaia 424), where the chorus,
midway through their review of the career successes and failures of Cratinus
(Eq. 526–36), offer the following description of their rival:
νυνὶ δ᾿ ὑμεĩς αὐτὸν ὁρῶντες παραληροῦντ᾿ οὐκ ἐλεεĩτε,
ἐκπιπτουσῶν τῶν ἠλέκτρων καὶ τοῦ τóνου οὐκέτ᾿ ἐνóντος
τῶν θ᾿ ἁρμονιῶν διαχασκουσῶν (Knights 531–3)
But now when you see him making a fool of himself, you feel no pity,
though his pegs have popped out, and he’s all out of tune,
and his joints are agape.
Ancient commentators understood the passage to be referring to a bed
(klinē), but most modern scholars believe that it is best explained as a
metaphorical comparison of Cratinus to a lyre that has fallen to pieces.6
The terms τóνος and ἁρμονίαι certainly suit a musical instrument, even
if the ἢλεκτροι are more difficult to identify. But the lyre’s broken condition is the metaphor’s most significant detail, and it is here that it recalls
Thamyris.7 Whereas Homer had the Muses punish Thamyris by causing
him to forget his skill at playing the kithara, by the fifth century that
element of the tale had developed further:€Thamyris’ lyre was destroyed in
the process of his undoing. The scene is preserved on an Attic hydria and
was vividly described in Sophocles’ Thamyris:8
ῥηγνὺς χρυσóδετον κέρας,
ῥηγνὺς ἁρμονίαν χορδοτóνου λύρας
(S. fr. 244 Radt)
S. frr. 236a–45, Vit. Soph. par. 5 Radt (cf. Trendall and Webster (1971) 4 and Wilson (2009));
Antiph. fr. 104. For a possible dithyramb, based on vase painting evidence, see Froning (1971)
82–3. [E.] Rh. 915–25, together with some of the evidence from the vases (esp. LIMC s.v. Mousai
92, with Apollo perhaps acting as judge), suggests that one noteworthy development of the myth
was a fuller treatment of Thamyris’ encounter with the Muses in a formal contest; cf. Weiler (1974)
66–72:€Cillo (1993).
6
∑VEΓ3ΘM Eq. 532. See especially Winnington-Ingram (1988) 257–9; Imperio (2004) 203–7. The
attempt by Perusino (1982a) to reconcile the images is unsuccessful.
7
Bowie (1993) 65 n. 86, noticed the connection with Thamyris based on the broken lyre, but without commenting on the general relevance of the myth for the parabasis.
8
LIMC s.v. Thamyris 16 (440–420 bc). Pausanias could see the same scene represented in
Polygnotus’ mural at Delphi (10.30.8) and in a sculpted monument on Mount Helikon (9.30.2).
5
14
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
breaking the gold-bound horn,
breaking the harmony of the string-stretched lyre.
Cratinus’ lost tension/tuning (τοῦ τóνου) and gaping joints (τῶν
ἁρμονιῶν) in Knights thus find an obvious counterpart in Thamyris’
destruction of the joined structure (ἁρμονίαν) of his “chord-stretched
lyre” (χορδοτóνου λύρας) as Sophocles described it.9 In this light,
the reduction of Cratinus’ powerful comic voice to senseless chatter (παραληροῦντ’, Eq. 531, cf. 536) brings to mind Homer’s tale of
how Thamyris lost his gift of song at the hands of the Muses (ἀοιδὴν
θεσπεσίην ἀφέλοντο, Il. 2.599–600).
Although these correspondences are suggestive, an even more compelling reason for believing that Aristophanes is drawing a comparison
between his older rival and the mythical Thamyris lies in the circumstances of Aristophanes’ own career and their connection to the Knights
parabasis. Cratinus had established his reputation in the dramatic competitions long before Aristophanes’ debut with Banqueters in 427, and
was certainly the most successful poet on the comic stage in this period.
But at the Lenaia of 425, Aristophanes’ Acharnians took first place over
Cratinus’ Storm-Tossed, and a young poet of the next generation overcame
the greatest one of the last. The Knights parabasis celebrates that victory
by pointedly including Cratinus among some of the great comic poets of
yesteryear, Magnes and Crates (Eq. 520–5, 537–40), and simultaneously
represents an escalation of Aristophanes’ competitive antagonism with
him (already apparent at Ach. 848–53, 1173), by suggesting none too subtly
that the same results will obtain in the present festival, where Cratinus
was once again staging a play.10 Like the fallen Thamyris, in the estimation of Aristophanes’ chorus Cratinus is past the apex of his competitive
career and can no longer be regarded as a threat. So too, just as Thamyris’
competitive undoing was directly connected with his fall from favor with
the Muses, in Knights Aristophanes sees Cratinus’ ruin€– and thus his own
success€– as dependent on the favor of a newly fashioned female embodiment of patronage for the production of comic poetry, Komoidodidaskalia
(Eq. 515–17). The ideas Aristophanes’ theater dominatrix embodies are
of the utmost importance for understanding the organizing principle of
this parabasis, for alongside Aristophanes’ pride in effecting the agonistic
undoing of his most significant competitor, his acknowledgement through
Plutarch (Mor. 455d), to whom we owe the fragment, makes it clear that Thamyris destroyed his
own lyre in a fit of madness presumably brought upon him by the Muses.
10
Ach. Hyp. I. 32–3. For further discussion, see Biles (2001); Olson (2007) 21–2; below Ch. 3.
╇ 9
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
15
her of a dynamic atmosphere of uncertainty and change at the festival
competitions is the ostensible cause of concern for the future of his own
career (esp. Eq. 541–5).
The preceding is offered as preparation for my attempt in the rest of this
chapter to show that the ideals and tensions Thamyris’ myth expressed
have a fundamental connection with the Old Comic parabasis, so that
the allusion to him in Knights is far from coincidental. As noted already,
the fact that Thamyris appears in Homer, with the implications of formal poetic competition in his tradition well enough established that they
can be activated in a highly abbreviated and allusive manner, assures us
that such competitions were already prevalent at that time.11 Through
Thamyris, early Greek poets grafted a culturally pervasive nexus of attitudes and behaviors related to formal agonistic encounters onto the phenomenon of poetic performance. The ambivalent status of a competitive
poet, emphatically presented even in Homer’s brief account, indicates that
one factor shaping the tradition’s development was an interest in exploring and criticizing the agonistic ethos as Thamyris came to epitomize it.
Thamyris thus represents a deep layer in the evidence for the development
of agonistic poetry:€by carefully examining Homer’s account of him, we
can recover an archetypal dilemma that impinges on competitive selfassertion and that in particular shaped the parabatic ethos of the comic
poets. This conceptual framework in turn suggests a new explanation for
the term parabainein itself, one that invests the term with an implicit recollection of Thamyris’ “moment” and is similarly conditioned by the sense
of moral ambiguity attached to competitive pride and self-assertion. Thus
explained, the comic parabasis can be seen to serve a deeply embedded
function not just of poetic performance but of agonistic performance generally in Greek society. Whatever the parabasis’ origin and early significance for the development of Greek Comedy, by Aristophanes’ time the
structure was adapted to a purpose competitive poets had been striving to
accommodate for centuries.12
Indeed, Thamyris’ very name, as Nagy (1979) 311, observes, “seems to be the embodiment of the
social context for poetic competition”; the root thamyris/thamyrizō (“social/political gathering, to
gather/bring together”) reflects the semantic refinement of agōn/agō from “assembly” generally to
the specific sense of gathering at a contest. Cf. West (1999) 375–6; Wilson (2009). See the uses of
ἀγών at Od. 8.200, 258–60.
12
Bowie (1982) 27–8, summarizes scholarship on the origins and development of the parabasis, and
sensibly points to the intractability of the debate. For more recent discussion, see Hubbard (1991)
23–40; Imperio (2004) 11–22. Even if the parabasis represents an original kernel of Greek comedy,
we can hardly assume that it was static in form or function.
11
16
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
T h a m y r i s a n d t h e p oe t ic i z i ng
of c om pe t i t i v e r i t ua l s
Homer’s account of Thamyris is one of the insertions of tangential material through which the poet enlivens his astounding, if relentless recitation
of the Greek contingents in the Catalogue of Ships:
καὶ Πτελεὸν καὶ ῞Ελος καὶ Δώριον, ἔνθά τε Μοῦσαι
ἀντóμεναι Θάμυριν τὸν Θρήϊκα παῦσαν ἀοιδῆς,
Οἰχαλίηθεν ἰóντα παρ᾿ Εὐρύτου Οἰχαλιῆος
στεῦτο γὰρ εὐχóμενος νικησέμεν, εἴ περ ἂν αὐταὶ
Μοῦσαι ἀείδοιεν, κοῦραι Διὸς αἰγιóχοιο
αἱ δὲ χολωσάμεναι πηρὸν θέσαν, αὐτὰρ ἀοιδὴν
θεσπεσίην ἀφέλοντο καὶ ἐκλέλαθον κιθαριστύ (Iliad 2.594–600)
… and Pteleos, Helos and Dorion, where the Muses
encountered Thracian Thamyris and deprived him of his song
as he departed from Oechalia, from Oechalian Eurytos.
For he boasted and claimed that he would be victorious, if even the Muses
themselves, daughters of aegis-wielding Zeus, should sing.
But in anger they made him blind, took away his divine song
and made him forget his art of kithara-playing.
The details of this encounter remain obscure. But that the situation leading up to Thamyris’ demise, only alluded to by Homer, involved a competition between human poets is implied by the formulation of his vaunt:€“he
would be victorious, even if the Muses themselves were to sing” (εἴ περ
ἂν€… ἀείδοιεν, Il. 2.597–8).13 The Muses seem to be mentioned only as a
rhetorical threat and do not represent Thamyris’ immediate or intended
opponents; that they respond to his challenge and step up to face him14
is an unintended consequence of his boast. Hence the recoverable background for Thamyris’ mishap, whether inherited by Homer or invented
by him, is a self-assertive performance against at least one poetic rival that
reached its pitch with a foolish remark. The possibility that Thamyris’
provocation of the Muses served as a functional precursor of the parabasis
becomes more compelling once the myth’s significance has been elucidated by two further considerations.
In its formal structure and ethical implications, Thamyris’ myth bears
a striking resemblance to the account of Eurytos offered by Odysseus at
Odyssey 8.221–8:
Schadewaldt (1959) 64 n. 8.
ἀντóμεναι, Il. 2.595; the word marks adversarial encounters in Homer, especially when constructed with the dative (e.g., Il. 15.697–8).
13
14
Thamyris and the poeticizing of competitive rituals
17
τῶν δ᾿ ἄλλων ἐμέ φημι πολὺ προφερέστερον εἶναι,
ὅσσοι νῦν βροτοί εἰσιν ἐπὶ χθονὶ σĩτον ἔδοντες.
ἀνδράσι δὲ προτέροισιν ἐριζέμεν οὐκ ἐθελήσω,
οὔθ᾿ Ἡρακλῆΐ οὔτ᾿ Εὐρύτῳ Οἰχαλιῆϊ,
οἵ ῥα καὶ ἀθανάτοισιν ἐρίζεσκον περὶ τóξων.
τῷ ῥα καὶ αἶψ᾿ ἔθανεν μέγας Εὔρυτος, οὐδ᾿ ἐπὶ γῆρας
ἵκετ᾿ ἐνὶ μεγάροισι˙ χολωσάμενος γὰρ ̓Απóλλων
ἔκτανεν, οὕνεκά μιν προκαλίζετο τοξάζεσθαι.
I declare that I am far superior to the others,
as many mortals as now eat bread upon the earth.
But I decline to compete with the men of old,
with Herakles or Eurytos of Oichalia,
who rivaled the very gods in their skill with the bow.
Indeed, mighty Eurytos met a sudden end, nor
did he reach old age in his halls; for in anger Apollo
killed him, because he had challenged him to compete with the bow.
The accounts share a point of direct contact:€Thamyris’ misfortune took
place soon after he departed from the halls of the same Eurytos of Oichalia
(Il. 2.596).15 That coincidence is accompanied by a more significant one, for
the main components of the Oichalian king’s agonistic experience form
a virtual doublet with that of Thamyris.16 Eurytos’ challenge to the god
of the bow has a parallel in the singer’s competitive zeal, which likewise
encouraged him to exalt himself so far that he assailed the superiority of
the very divinities under whose patronage all poets excel. Eurytos’ formal
challenge to Apollo (προκαλίζετο, Od. 8.228) is echoed in Thamyris’ challenge to poetic competition, which is likewise characterized as an assertive
act of speech:€στεῦτο γὰρ εὐχóμενος νικησέμεν.17 Both myths articulate
concerns about human excellence and the threat that self-confidence will
give way to the folly that stirs divine retribution. More important is how
that paradigm fits within the context of Odysseus’ story.
Odysseus offers the example of Eurytos’ miscalculation as the capping remark of his own challenge to the young Phaeacians, but especially Laodamas and Euryalos, who had conspired to engage him in
their athletic competitions. They succeed in this through a sequence of
formal speeches directed at Odysseus; Laodamas first offers a mildly
taunting invitation (8.145–51), then follows it up with an openly abusive
Ford (1992) 98–9, is a fine discussion of the relationship between the two myths. Martin (1989)
229–30, hypothesizes that Thamyris represents a Herakles tradition centered on Oichalia.
16
E. Ba. 337–40 applies the same pattern to the Aktaion myth.
17
Compare the mock-heroic challenge to compete in dining in Euphanes fr. 1, with commentary in
Olson (2007) 288–9.
15
18
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
provocation (8.158–64).18 The weary hero at last responds with a berating
reply (8.165–85), before angrily casting a discus far beyond all the others
(8.186–98). The freshly victorious Odysseus then makes his own lengthy
and aggressively self-assertive speech, in which he proclaims his victory
(8.202–3), extends an offer to compete in other events with anyone who
wishes (8.204–13), and dwells on the past accomplishments that assure his
victory in nearly any sport (8.214–20, 229). In this scene Odysseus emerges
as the new champion, in some respects exchanging roles with Laodamas
as he behaved moments earlier. But Odysseus’ proud claims, unlike those
of his youthful rival, are marked by a distinct tone of restraint. His anger
over Laodamas’ insults notwithstanding, Odysseus is tactful enough not
to threaten his relationship with his host by competing with him in an
athletic contest (8.207–11).19 Similarly, in his more general boasts of physical ability Odysseus observes limitations in the claims he makes. Of the
men he knows personally, he would not compete against Philoktetes with
the bow (8.219–20); nor would he compete with men of former generations, most notably Herakles and Eurytos (8.223–5), the latter of whom
stands out for special treatment because of his untimely demise at Apollo’s
hands.
In the outcome, Eurytos’ status is ambivalent; he is as much admired for
his mastery of the bow as he is condemned for the egregiousness of his final
boast, and Odysseus’ point is less a matter of avoiding comparison of his
own skill to Eurytos’ than of avoiding his folly in rivaling those superior
to himself. The mythical paradigm thus serves to temper Odysseus’ eagerness to outshine his rivals, and it does so at the moment when Odysseus
engages in self-assertive posturing of a sort that might lead a less cautious
rival to repeat Eurytos’ miscalculation. How much light this can shed on
Thamyris is a matter of speculation, though the similarities of structure
and thought in the episodes encourage the attempt, as I argue below. But
Thamyris too certainly stirs admiration as well as admonition, and it is difficult to resist interpreting his episode in light of Homer’s emphatic tribute
to the Muses’ poetic authority, with which his Catalogue of Ships began
(Il. 2.484–93).20 What I wish to emphasize for the moment is how the
The progressively more hostile tone of Laodamas’ speeches is registered by Odysseus’ κερτομέοντες
in 153 (on the verb, see Lloyd (2004)) and νείκεσέ τ᾿ ἄντην in 158.
19
Evidently rivals could be expected to act in a way that would not easily support friendship.
Here the experience of Tydeus may be instructive (Il. 4.385–98):€his athletic victories over the
Kadmeians while their guest resulted in bitter anger and an attempt on his life.
20
Implicit rivalry between Homer and the tradition or mode of poetry represented by Thamyris is
suggested by Martin (1989) 229–30; Ford (1992) 97; Wilson (2009). Scodel (2004) has salutary
remarks on agonistic readings of Homer.
18
Thamyris and the poeticizing of competitive rituals
19
model of Eurytos both represents agonistic speech and structures agonistic discourse by a competitor who recalls his paradigm, for boastful speech
between rivals is likewise at the heart of Homer’s recollection of Thamyris,
as a second consideration makes clearer.
The verb that encapsulates Thamyris’ challenge, εὔχομαι, emphasizes
the agonistic context of his vaunt. Leonard Muellner has shown that
εὔχομαι€ – “to say (proudly, accurately, contentiously)”€ – was carefully
adapted in epic language to suit the verbal exchanges that are a regular feature of the stylized encounters between heroes on the battlefield.21 A heroic
duel is initiated when two adversaries step forward to take a prominent
position ahead of the undifferentiated mass of the armies.22 This performative gesture alone can signal a challenge as effectively as what follows,
when one hero offers a direct provocation by “calling out” (προκαλίζομαι/
προκαλέω) another.23 From here the two engage in a verbal exchange,
in which they assert their identities by rehearsing their pedigrees, heroic
exploits, and even relevant mythical background€– all in order to establish themselves as worthy adversaries.24 As Muellner argues, in addition to
being the appropriate term for describing these encounters, εὔχομαι could
itself articulate the superiority of a hero over his adversary.25 A slain enemy
is accordingly an εὖχος for the victor, and becomes fodder for any subsequent performance of euchomai speeches.26 As Richard Martin’s analysis
of the verbal strategies that operate within such performances makes clear,
this verbal dueling is only slightly less essential to the conflicts between
heroes than the physical battles themselves.27
Although εὔχομαι appears nowhere in Odysseus’ antagonistic encounter with the Phaeacian youths, the sequence of speeches between him and
Laodamas nicely fits the paradigm of such exchanges, with Odysseus’
final challenge representing the capping assertion of what Muellner
calls the death-euchomai formula, i.e., a gloating speech delivered over a
Muellner (1976) 78 for the definition. On the structure of Homeric battle-scenes, see Fenik
(1968).
22
E.g., Il. 3.16 προμάχιζεν ̓Αλέξανδρος, 22 ἐρχóμενον προπάροιθεν ὁμίλου μακρὰ βιβάντα, 31
ἐν προμάχοισι φανέντα (note Paris’ reversal of the gesture at 36–7); 6.120 ἐς μέσον ἀμφοτέρων
συνίτην μεμαῶτε μάχεσθαι, 125 πολὺ προβέβηκας ἁπάντων. Cf. 20.178, 196–7.
23
E.g., Il. 3.19–20, 432–3; 7.50–1; 13.809.
24
Cf. Edwards (1987) 201–6.
25
Muellner (1976), with examples of the capping effect of assertions expressed by euchomai
on pp.€ 76–7. Cf. p. 93:€ “When a hero εὔχεται, he says the most significant fact he can about
himself.”
26
E.g., Il. 5.652–4; 7.81; 11.443–5; 16.623–5. See also Muellner (1976) 92–3, with discussion of the
dovetailing of euchomai speeches from one conflict to the next.
27
Martin (1989) passim; for a succinct analysis of dueling speeches, see his treatment of the Diomedes
and Glaukos scene on pp. 126–30.
21
20
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
fallen rival.28 The Phaeacian example is also interesting for how it transfers ideals of physical strength and agility in military encounters to the
more controlled setting of an athletic contest.29 In a sense Thamyris completes this process by presenting an euchomai challenge in a contest that
is no longer about physical prowess at all, but about intellectual superiority. Nonetheless, the verb imports into this setting all the implications of
rivalry and self-assertion through speech that it has in the military context
where the formula originates; indeed, Muellner includes the use of εὔχομαι
in the Thamyris episode among his death-euchomai passages.30 The styling of the encounter in Homer’s rendering of the Thamyris tradition thus
produces a startling effect via the introduction of the loaded term εὔχομαι
into a new setting, where such dire antagonism was unexpected, and the
self-conscious poetic maneuver this implies requires further scrutiny.
In Homer’s account of Thamyris, the use of euchomai to portray an
Â�assertive act of speech is taken over somewhat by the construction στεῦτο …
νικησέμεν, i.e., “he vowed/threatened that he would be victorious.”31 It
is reasonable to suppose that this phrase and euchomai are intended to
strengthen one another and to amplify the tone of unrestrained presumption in Thamyris’ challenge. But this was the meaning euchomai itself
had acquired as a marked expression for making a bold utterance,32 and
this instance of euchomai fits into none of the formulaic combinations
Muellner identifies and distinguishes between, based on the secular use
of the verb in boasts and its sacral sense “pray.” In its appearance here the
term is formulaically equivocal, and the ambiguity may go deeper:€divinities (the Muses) are at hand, and an activation of euchomai in its sacral
sense should be considered.33
Prayer, specifically to the Muses, was an important element of Greek
poetry and especially early Greek poetry, notably in poetic openings.
Jenny Clay makes this point well:€“Formally, an invocation is a subspecies
Muellner (1976) 93 n. 37, 97. In general, the Odyssey provides fewer examples of the euchomai
formula, in part because of the difference of subject matter. But note the emphasis on formal challenge and public discourse in these speeches:€8.142 αὐτὸς νῦν προκάλεσσαι ἰὼν καὶ
πέφραδε μῦθον (Martin (1989) 12, identifies muthos as the marked word for speech that signifies
performance-Â�type speech-acts), 144 στῆ ῥ̓ ἐς μέσσον ἰὼν καὶ ̓Οδυσσῆα προσέειπε.
29
The emphasis in Laodamas’ first speech on kleos as it may be gained through athletic enterprises
(8.147–8) allows the formal agon to stand as a partial replacement for military encounters.
30
Muellner (1976) 97.
31
Compare Hektor’s threats, as reported by Odysseus, to destroy the Greek ships and devastate the
army (Il. 9.237–43).
32
This instance is accordingly not comparable to the pairing of euchomai with more regular verbs of
saying (e.g., φημί¸ ηὔδα), since in these cases euchomai provides new and additional force.
33
At Il. 19.100 the fact that Zeus is the speaker addressing the gods determines the secular meaning
against the use of the identical formula in sacral contexts elsewhere; see Muellner (1976) 93–4.
28
Thamyris and the poeticizing of competitive rituals
21
of prayer, which can be defined as a respectful verbal communication
between men and gods.”34 For the Greeks, every poetic endeavor was the
product of a poet’s partnership with the Muses, and the invocation at the
start of a performance amounted to a sacred utterance that established
communication with the goddesses and resulted in divinely inspired song.35
Nor was the Muses’ authority over poetry, enlisted through prayer, diminished in the case of agonistic performance. Within a sequence of dialogues
structured on the model of a rhapsodic contest, Plato’s Hermocrates bids
Critias to begin his speech-performance only after calling upon Apollo
Paion and the Muses (Criti. 108c). Critias himself adds a special invocation to the Muses’ mother Mnemosyne (Criti. 108c–d), in the hope that
he will gain the approval of their audience (τῷδε╯τῷ╯θεάτρῳ).36 The
Muses’ authority over poetic contests is asserted even more directly by
Corinna in the Contest of Helikon and Kithairon (PMG 654.19–22). Finally,
Aristophanes draws attention to their role in the contest between Aeschylus
and Euripides in Frogs, where after Dionysos expresses his wish to judge
the contest mousikōtata (i.e., in a way most suiting the Muses), he directs
the chorus to accompany his offering with a song to the goddesses (Ra.
871–4),37 and their response (Ra. 875–84) takes the form of an invocational
prayer that summons the Muses as the appropriate authorities on such
occasions.38 Within this scene, each poet is allowed to pray to the specific
deities who will support his performance (885–94). That these formalities
are observed in no other epirrhematic agon39 may be taken as a sign that
they are a feature added by Aristophanes because he thought them likely
to evoke the festival atmosphere of poetic competition.
Clay (1983) 9–10. For prayer-openings, see Race (1992) 28–32; for the kletic prayer opening
Hesiod’s Works and Days, see Clay (2003) 76–7, with bibliography.
35
Solon fr.13.2 West2 makes the association explicit:€Μοῦσαι Πιερίδες¸ κλῦτέ μοι εὐχομένῳ; so too
Simon. fr. 11.20–2 West 2, Pi. N. 9.53–5, frr. 70a. 13–15, 70b. 25–6. Thus, according to Aristotle (Po.
1456b15–18), Protagoras criticized Homer for beginning the Iliad with an imperatival command to
the Muses when he should have been praying.
36
On the contest structure, see Nagy (2002) 53–69. Note the emphasis on gaining victory and demonstrating bravery in Hermocrates’ comment to Critias.
37
Note 874 ὑπᾴσατε = “sing in accompaniment”; the song is a corollary of Dionysos’ offering
and prayer (see Dover (1993) 65). Forms of euchomai at 872, 885, 889, 891. In Ar. fr. 348 the chorus express the poet’s confidence as their didaskalos that they can dispense with summoning
(ἀνακαλεῖν … βοᾶν ἐς χορóν) the Muses and Graces, since they are already present, which
in a parabatic context is probably tantamount to asserting either that the goddesses have lined
up to support Aristophanes’ chorus in the competition or that the audience is their functional
equivalent.
38
The same assumption is involved in Meineke’s reconstruction of Phrynichus’ Muses; see test. ii
K–A.
39
Similar prayers for fair judging precede the domestic trial in V. 860–90 (not a comic agon), which
again points to social context rather than a formal comic poetic structure as determining the
prayers.
34
22
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
If these points tell us anything about the cultural ideals at stake in the
Thamyris episode, something important has taken place for the understanding of competitive poetic performances. Thamyris’ fall from divine favor hinges on a display of agonistic pride at the moment when he
should have shown humility by recognizing the Muses’ superiority, so as
to gain their assistance in performing his song. Although the contextual
triggers implied by the evidence considered above have independent validity, Thamyris’ violation of the poet–Muse relationship is expressed by
the alternation of euchomai from one potential meaning to another.40 In
effect, the self-assertive application of the term makes Homer’s audience
aware of the absence of the term in its religious sense, which is crucial to
the context.41 Under the influence of rivalry and competition, Thamyris
loses all sense of humility, and his religious feeling about his craft becomes
a self-destructive violation:€prayer is transformed into mortal defiance of
the gods.42 All of this merely emphasizes the myth’s interest in the fractured relationship between Thamyris and the Muses stemming from his
competitive identity.
C om pe t i t i v e p oe t ic s i n t h e A rc h a ic Pe r iod
At the moment when a competitor in any endeavor asserts his excellence
and superiority, he treads close to the bounds of what is socially and religiously tolerable and risks offending those who witness his performance,
be they gods or mortals. Praise, especially self-praise, can easily become
unpalatable; when embarked upon indelicately, the Greeks saw it as likely
to arouse divine jealousy followed by divine retribution.43 In Odysseus’
“parabatic” assertions in the athletic contest on Scheria, the example of
Eurytos functions as a negative paradigm for what can happen when a
Cf. Biles (forthcoming) for these ideas as they apply to a victory epigram.
Even Thamyris’ reported boast, “even if the Muses themselves should sing,” only misapplies the
invocational language of Homer’s own poetic opening, ἄειδε¸ θεά (Il. 1.1; cf. Od. 1.1).
42
A comparable effect can be observed in a fifth-century vase representation of the Thamyris myth
(LIMC s.v. Mousa/ai 92 = ARVâ•›2 1171,1):€Thamyris’ mother Argiope is at an altar on which stand
nine figurines, apparently representing the Muses themselves. (For the figure as Argiope, see
Trendall and Webster (1971) 4; Brillante (1991) 439, and Wilson (2009) argue for a Muse.) Thus
the idea of religious prayer to the Muses is still essential to the account, and the fact that appropriate behavior toward them is demonstrated by someone other than the poet only emphasizes
the enormity of what Thamyris has done.
43
Praise of any sort was a sensitive matter, as Bundy (1986) 75–6, and Kurke (1991) 208–24, demonstrate for the poetics of praise in Pindar (e.g., O. 2.95–100; 9.38–9; P. 10.4, 17–30; N. 7.61–76;
I. 7.39–44; fr. 171 (Bowra); cf. A. Ag. 468–70, 782–9; S. Ai. 758–77; El. 566–72; E. Or. 1161–2; IA
977–80; Gorg. 82 B 6, p. 285 lines 11–13; 11a (par. 32) D–K; Th. 2.35.2; Aeschin. 3.141; D. 18.128.
Similarly, Ibycus (PMG 310) speaks of getting honor among men from sins against the gods. See
the general remarks of Lloyd-Jones (1971) 56–7; Dover (1974) 232–5.
40
41
Competitive poetics in the Archaic Period
23
competitor goes too far in self-praise, and Odysseus is careful to avoid
making the same mistake. Sensitivity about these matters only sharpened
as time went on; by the Classical Period euchomai in the Homeric sense
of boasting speech is replaced by terms built on kompos, the implication
being that such performances are all noise and little substance.44 An anecdote about the fourth-century tragedian Astydamas is indicative of the
problem. In commemoration of a victory, Astydamas was granted the
privilege of setting up a statue of himself in the Theater; but the honor
was immediately revoked when the council discovered that the epigram
he produced gloated in the accomplishment.45 Tact was essential in such
situations, as is clear in Hesiod and Alcman, who offer different solutions
to the problem of engaging in competitive self-assertion while managing
not to alienate the Muses as Thamyris did.
Hesiod is the earliest self-acknowledged competitive poet, and the
hymn to the Muses with which his Theogony opens is remarkable for
the way it pays respect to the traditional divine patrons of song through
extended invocation, even as it proclaims Hesiod’s own poetic virtuosity.
Shortly after the opening invocation, Hesiod not only identifies himself
by name (22), establishing himself as author and performer, but offers
an elaborate account of his credentials. The express purpose of this act
of poetic self-assertion is to argue for his uniquely favored relationship
with the Muses, as demonstrated by their advice (24–9), their gift of a
sceptre (30–1), and above all the voice of song with which they inspired
him (31–4).46 For it is not only under their authority that Hesiod performs; as we soon learn, the poem he is on the point of unveiling is the
earthly counterpart of a song the Muses themselves perform on Olympus
(43–51 ~ 104–7). That song has already been received favorably by its divine audience (36–7, 40–3, 51), a point that has the protreptic effect of
determining the human audience’s no less positive response to Hesiod’s
own performance.47 Noticeably the Theogony itself is incorporated within
Only rarely in tragedy does the root εὐχ- signify boasts as opposed to prayer; for the replacement
of the former idea by κομπ-, e.g., [A.] PV 360–1; S. Ai. 770, 1122; E. Alc. 324, 497; Hipp. 978; HF
148, 981; Tr. 478; Hel. 393; cf. Ba. 339–40; S. Ph. 842 (which caps the activation of competitive
ideals in 838 and 841). In Aeschylus’ Seven Against Thebes, the central exchange between Eteokles
and the messenger who reports the speeches of the invaders adapts the idea of euchomai-speeches,
in that the excesses of the Argive kompoi are exposed via comparison with the defending army’s
restraint and respect for the gods; see Hutchinson (1985) 391n.
45
Paus. Attic. σ 6 Erbse = Astydamas II, TrGF 60 T2a and b.
46
See Griffith (1983a) 47–50.
47
A similar effect seems to have been sought in an amphora of the mid-sixth century (British
Museum, B 260) that shows on one side Apollo playing the kithara, and on the other a human
kitharist, who is a virtual double of the god in pose and so, it would seem, in musical ability; cf.
Shapiro (1992) 65–6.
44
24
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
the biography Hesiod composes for himself, so that poet and poem are
validated in the same instant. And as will be seen later, this convergence
of the poet’s fictional identity with the themes of his poem lies at the
heart of the Old Comic parabasis.
Hesiod’s auto-allusion in the Theogony is all the more significant if, as
West in particular has argued, this is the poem referred to at Works and
Days 654–9.48 In that passage, Hesiod recounts how he competed successfully in the funeral games of Amphidamas in Khalkis, after which
he dedicated his prize tripod to the Muses on Mount Helikon where,
he says, they first introduced him to song.49 The inferred connection
between this account and the Theogony appears sound, since the dedication emphasizes the Muses’ connection with Mt. Helikon and Hesiod’s
encounter with them there, both of which are central points of the poet’s
autobiography in the Theogony. Nor does it require much imagination
to appreciate how Hesiod’s poeticized autobiographical account might
have served him in the funeral contest. By asserting the divine perfection of his singing ability and establishing his individual identity in
implicit contrast with his rivals, the account scripts a performance of
“Hesiod” on the heels of the moment he came before the audience to
perform.50 Given the self-assertive function of the Theogony’s opening, it
is not surprising that signs of Hesiod’s competitive stance against other
poets have been detected within the autobiography in the Theogony.51 But
what is most noteworthy is the contrast between Thamyris’ behavior and
that of Hesiod, who is careful to coordinate a robust assertion of his own
poetic excellence with a resounding commendation of the Muses’ overwhelming authority. This tact helps explain why, upon achieving a poetic
victory, he acknowledged his debt to the goddesses by dedicating his
West (1966) 43–5; cf. Clay (2003) 47.
The boasting quality of the passage is brought out by comparison to Homeric language:€see West
(1978) 656n.
50
Morrison (2007) 58–9 explains Hesiod’s use of biography as a mechanism for preserving authorship in later reperformances by other poets. But the self-introductory effect makes good performative sense for Hesiod himself, given that he has travelled abroad from Boiotia to an audience in
Khalkis, which may have been beyond the range of his reputation. For bards and local audiences,
see Stehle (1997) 173–5. Compare also the promotion of the poet’s identity and excellence in the
Hymn to Apollo:€at the choral contests in honor of Apollo (149–50), the Delian maidens who perform choruses will conspire with the poet to help his songs gain preeminence as belonging to the
sweetest of singers (165–73). Thus in mid-performance the poet already claims to have the support
of a representative group of the local audience. Cf. Stehle (1997) 184; Burkert (1987a) 54.
51
Between individual poets by Neitzel (1980); between regional and panhellenic tradition by Nagy
(1990b) 45; cf. Rosen (1990). In defense of his own self-praise, Aelius Aristides (28.21 Keil) adduced
the example of Hesiod’s poetic assertion in Theogony, describing it as “an encomium of Hesiod
himself within the hymn in honor of the goddesses.”
48
49
Competitive poetics in the Archaic Period
25
prize tripod to them.52 But Hesiod’s actions simultaneously reveal that
one effect of agonistic pressures in poetic performance was to encourage poets to develop strategies for drawing attention to themselves, in
increasing contrast with the veil of anonymity the Homeric songs envisage through the tradition of Muse-inspired poetry. Hesiod relies on the
conventions of invocation, but adapts and refines them to suit a new
social context, in which poets performed with greater frequency, as formal competitions were established throughout Greece.53
Alcman is more forthright in acknowledging the counterbalancing
forces of agonistic pride and a sense of restraint in moments of poetic selfassertion. His Partheneion (PMG 1) opens with a mythological treatment,
which gives way in the second half to the chorus’ presentation of themselves both as a unified group of girls and in relation to two of their individual members, Agido and the chorus-leader Hagesichora. Though the
interpretation of nearly every verse of the poem is subject to debate, the
vivid self-presentation of the chorus and their leaders fits an agonistic performance context.54 In the second-to-last stanza before the papyrus breaks
off (78–91), the chorus ask the gods to receive their prayers,55 placing the
fulfillment of their performance in divine hands (83–4 [σι]ῶν γὰρ ἄνα
| καὶ τέλος) and hoping especially to provide pleasure (88 Fανδάνην) to
Aotis, presumably because winning the goddess’ approval is tantamount
to having a successful performance.56 Their respect for divine authority
is reasserted in the final stanza where, after apparently reaffirming their
trust in Hagesichora’s leadership and offering her their obedience, they
maintain that their own (or possibly the chorus-leader’s) ability to sing is
inferior to that of the Sirens, since the Sirens are gods:57
Similarly, when the Ithacan bard Phemius attempts to save his own life by impressing the enraged
Odysseus with his poetic worth, he asserts that he is self-taught (αὐτοδίδακτος δ᾿ εἰμί, Od.
22.347), but adds that a god supplies him with the themes of his songs. Cf. Ford (1992) 32–3, with
bibliography; interpreted differently by Thalmann (1984) 126–7.
53
Seaford (1977–8) 85–7, discusses agonistic features of Pratinas’ Hyporchema (PMG 708) that can
likewise be viewed as antecedents of the comic parabasis.
54
See in general Page (1951) 52–7; Herington (1985) 21.
55
Esp. 82–4; for the supplement [εὐχάς] in 82, see Page (1951) 8; Calame (1983) 341–2; Pavese (1992)
87–91.
56
On the problem of identifying the goddess, see Calame (1983) 343; Cyrino (2004). Allusion to
competitive success in 87–9 is assumed by Pavese (1992) 88–9. For the sentiment as it may depend
on agonistic considerations, compare the prayer for victory at Ar. Ra. 390–3.
57
In 96 it is unclear whether the chorus or their leader is the subject supplied by ἁ δὲ (see Pavese
(1992) 92–3), or if this is a different subject altogether which would replace the negative adverb
supplemented in 97 (see West (1967) 11). Still, the passage is an attempt to express humility compared to divine singers.
52
26
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
ἁ δὲ τᾶν Σηρην[ί]δων
ἀοιδοτέρα μ[ὲν οὐχί,
σιαὶ γάρ, ἀντ[ὶ δ᾿ ἕνδεκα
(Alcman PMG 1.96–8)
But she is not
more melodious than the Sirens,
for they are divine, but against eleven …
The caution the chorus register here is somewhat at odds with the exuberance for their leader they express earlier and the positive consequences they
insist her partnership will have for their performance.58 Indeed, in contrast
with their refusal to engage in rivalry with the Sirens, immediately afterward, in the final lines of the papyrus, the chorus appear to claim superiority over other choruses of young people, comparing their own song to a
swan’s (98–101).
The text is difficult to interpret at this point, and this final consideration cannot be asserted with confidence. Even so, the effort by Alcman’s
chorus to establish where their rivalry lies is not a fortuitous theme at
this moment. On the one hand, the acknowledgment of divine superiority over mortals continues ideas found in the previous stanza, applying to their own performance the moral drawn from the mythological
paradigm in the first half of the poem:€“there is such a thing as divine
vengeance” (36 σιῶν τίσις) and “mortals should not attempt to fly to
Olympos” (16). Furthermore, although the Sirens’ powers of song are
ample in their own right and adequately express the ideal of performance to which a chorus might aspire,59 the significance of the adjective
based on their name used in this passage may be clarified by Alcman’s
conflation of Muses with Sirens in another fragment:€ἁ Μῶσα κέκλαγ᾿
ἁ λίγηα Σηρήν.60 According to Aelius Aristides, this verse comes from
the beginning of a poem, where it was no doubt part of an invocational
overture and represented the poet’s affirmation of his dependence on
the Muses. Such an identification would be perfectly appropriate for
the reference to the Serenides in fr. 1; even if certainty on this point is
not possible, it is obvious that in that poem as well the Sirens stand as
positive emblems of poetic ability and the chorus is eager not to overstate their abilities and risk offending divine figures of song. Their concern, in other words, acknowledges a situation where the recollection of
The chorus’ remarks are at times self-deprecating, which Most (1982) 92 interprets as an apotropaic maneuver aimed at holding off divine anger.
59
See Pucci ([1979] 1998) 7.
60
PMG 30 = 86 Calame; cf. West (1967) 13; Calame (1983) 347.
58
Competitive poetics in the Archaic Period
27
Thamyris’ experience could serve as a cautionary reminder for poets in
the same way that the story of Eurytos curbed Odysseus’ challenge in
the athletic competition.
Once the moral ambiguity of self-assertion is taken into account,
Homer’s account of Thamyris’ pride and punishment can be seen to have
an affinity with a divine institution described by Hesiod:
καὶ Μοίρας καὶ Κῆρας ἐγείνατο νηλεοποίνους,
αἵ τ᾿ ἀνδρῶν τε θεῶν τε παραιβασίας ἐφέπουσιν,
οὐδέ ποτε λήγουσι θεαὶ δεινοĩο χóλοιο,
πρίν γ᾿ ἀπὸ τῷ δώωσι κακὴν ὄπιν, ὅστις ἁμάρτῃ.
(Theogony 217, 220–2)
and she bore the Moirai and the cruel Keres,
who pursue the transgressions of men and gods,
nor do the goddesses ever give up their terrible wrath
until they give harsh punishment to anyone who sins.
As Hesiod presents the situation, Thamyris’ insult to the Muses and the
pattern of behavior it represents can be regarded as a variety of parabasia.
The moral framework is much the same, even if in Thamyris’ case it is the
deities directly concerned, the Muses, who vent their anger, rather than
the Moirai and Keres, acting as a higher authority for delivering such
punishment.61 By engaging in vigorous self-praise, Thamyris, unlike other
figures discussed above, “overstepped” ethical and religious constraints
and paid dearly for it.62 The close association between Hesiod’s term parabasia and transgression is what interests me here through its applicability
to what Thamyris signifies as a figure of aitiological importance for the
poetic agon. What I hope to show, is that these implications have a direct bearing on the conception of parabasia that Aristophanes and his fellow comic poets were operating under when they confronted their rivals
before the audience at the Dionysian festivals.63 I begin with an examination of some of the ways the parabasis, as we find it in Aristophanes
and the comic fragments, reveals its integral connection to poetic rivalry
and takes a place alongside other competitive structures of the dramatic
festivals.
Hesiod’s establishment of the Moirai in this special capacity is necessary because the order thus
established can then pertain to divinities as well as humans.
62
A. Ag. 789 δίκην παραβάντες, with Fraenkel (1950) ad loc., is striking because the immediate context focuses on the chorus’ problem of getting their welcome of Agamemnon right.
63
The framework can be observed in Ar. Clouds, where Strepsiades’ gloating encomium of his own
achievement (1201–11) sets up his divine punishment when the Clouds ultimately reassert the
place of the traditional gods (1454–61); cf. Macleod (1981).
61
28
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
T h e pa r a b a s i s a n d t h e p oe t ic s
of s e l f -a s s e r t ion
In an Aristophanic comedy, the parabasis usually comes at a central point,
when the actors have left the stage and the chorus is alone in the orchestra.
This element of the performance has attracted attention since at least the
time of the Alexandrian Library, for one reason above all others:€the vivid
representation of the poet often contained in the astrophic first half, called
the “anapests” in Aristophanes, after its usual meter in his plays.64 During
the parabasis, the chorus speak for the poet, turning directly toward the
audience to address matters including poetry and politics. These passages are entertainingly informative in their ostensible biographies of the
poet but are by no means fortuitous or incidental. In an important study,
Gregory Sifakis examined the thematic patterns of the parabases and
argued that their unifying principle was the comic poets’ attempt to persuade the audience to favor them in the contest.65 The point of everything
said about a poet is to assert the excellence of his plays, the soundness of
his political advice, and his moral integrity, and by contrast to expose the
shortcomings of his rivals; and these stage biographies accordingly often
end with an appeal for audience support.66
While other factors may have contributed to the assertive “I” of
Aristophanes’ authorial voice in the parabasis, the feature is explained
with some economy by appealing to the agonistic ethos firmly embedded
in Greek society by the time of the earliest surviving literature, as argued
above.67 My guiding interest in what follows is to view the parabasis in
functional terms and reveal it as a mechanism of the agon.68 To this end, I
first examine the way a parabasis activates the personality, or better put, a
personality of the poet to make him a participant in the play’s performance
and declare his interests in the competitive stakes of the festival program.
I then argue that an understanding of how these objectives are reached
can be shaped further by recognizing the formal implications of the term
parabainein in the formula for introducing the poet’s appearance in the
parabasis, and compare the evidence for the tragic proagon to show that
In addition to the parabasis of the revised Clouds (in eupolideans), the comic fragments show
that poets used many different meters; cf. Whittaker (1935) 188–90; Sifakis (1971) 34–5; Imperio
(2004) 6.
65
The important themes are categorized by Sifakis (1971) 38–40, cf. 60.
66
Eq. 544–50; Nu. 560–2; V. 1051–9; Pax 765–74.
67
See in general Dover (1974) 229–34; Poliakoff (2001); Barker (2009) esp. 1–28.
68
Cf. Hubbard (1991) 32–3, though his programmatic statements in this regard receive limited elaboration in his discussions of the plays.
64
The parabasis and the poetics of self-assertion
29
the performance of the poet’s identity had an acknowledged place in the
events leading up to the competitions at the Athenian dramatic festivals.
Given the parabasis’ engagement with biographical details, a general
statement of my understanding of the poet’s personality as it emerges there
is in order. Because the stage biographies offered in surviving parabases
are exaggerated caricatures filled with unbelievable claims, one tendency
in modern criticism has been to treat them as pure poetic fictions.69 Our
appreciation of these passages has been deepened by considering how the
poet’s bantering and often pretentious tone enlivens the performance by
interjecting elements of fantasy while adapting literary tradition; but this
approach primarily addresses mode and does not necessarily bring us
closer to understanding what motivated the poet’s appearance in the first
place. If the imaginative quality of parabatic stage-biographies means that
we cannot naively treat them as true-to-life portraits, we are not therefore
compelled to reduce the notion of authorial persona to a literary trope
with no bearing on real contextual considerations.70
Significant progress in this regard was made by Angus Bowie and
Thomas Hubbard, who showed that the poet’s parabatic personality is
invested with characteristics that pick up on themes and developments in
the surrounding dramatic action, allowing the parabasis to interact with
the rest of the play.71 This approach reveals the parabasis to be an interpretive focal point with considerable relevance to the experience of seeing and
understanding a comedy in performance. Bowie’s and Hubbard’s identification of converging themes in the parabasis and the comedy as a whole
can be redirected to show that the fictionality of the poet’s “biography”
was directly relevant to the poetic agon. A poet does not address himself
to the audience with the immediate purpose of simply explaining his play
to them.72 Rather, in the process of asserting himself publicly he simultaneously draws out particular themes and features of his drama. His persona
is conflated with characteristics of his play, and the parabasis achieves its
E.g., Whitman (1964) 22; Harriott (1986) 25; Goldhill (1991) 196–201; and with greater literary
nuance, Rosen (1988) 2–3 and 59–82. The problem has received new attention by Platter (2007)
94–8, and especially Major (2006), whose focus on parabatic alazoneia can easily be brought into
harmony with the view taken here. The question of authorial voice lies at the heart of the ambitious treatment of satirical poetry in Rosen (2007).
70
Morrison (2007), esp. 30–2, helpfully adopts the notion of “quasi-biography” in discussing the
role of poets/narrators in Archaic Greek poetry.
71
Bowie (1982); Hubbard (1991).
72
At any rate this rationale still fails to explain the emphasis on the poet himself, since choral songs
in tragedy provide interpretive guidance by offering mythological paradigms and other directives
without divesting the chorus of their dramatic identity.
69
30
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
most profound form of competitive self-assertion by showcasing the individual comedy with which he is competing. In the revised Clouds (esp.
520–36), for instance, the trials and tribulations of the original play at
the City Dionysia merge easily with the experiences of the poet. Thus the
qualities of sophia and sōphrosynē that are key to the discussion in this
parabasis are as important, rhetorically speaking, to the identity of the
poet as they are to the comedy itself, and it is these qualities that are supposed to win him the audience’s support. So too on a more general level,
thematic resonances in a comic hero’s plight and the agonistic challenge
of the poet allow poet and hero to highlight one another’s struggles and
become intertwined, since in a real sense the poet’s success at the festival
agon is bound up with that of his hero.73
The best example, however, of this cross-framing of dramatic plot and
authorial persona for competitive ends of which we know, comes not
from a play by Aristophanes, but from one by his older rival Cratinus.74
In response to the abuse he received in Aristophanes’ parabasis of 424 (Eq.
526–36), the veteran poet returned to the Theater in 423 with Pytine. In
this play Cratinus took what may have been an unprecedented step, casting himself as the hero in a plot that reestablished his superiority as a comic
poet in advance, as it turned out, of his actual victory at the �festival.75 In
doing so, moreover, Cratinus pointedly usurped the very themes and ideas
Aristophanes used to malign him€– intoxication, (lack of) poetic inspiration, failed sexual relationships, personified genre€– and developed them
toward his own redemption. Pytine thus took its point of departure from
the parabasis of another poet, but transformed an anticipated parabatic
rebuttal into the dramatic core of the play.76
With Pytine Cratinus seems to have charted the farthest boundaries
of the scope a poet’s stage biography offered for creative embellishment.77
Although the degree of historicity in these biographies will always elude
Cf. Bowie (1982) 29; Olson (1996) 144–5; Rosen (2007) 80–1. Even outside the parabasis we sometimes find overt gestures that help us think of the poet as we witness the actions of his comic hero
(e.g., Ach. 497–503; V. 650–1). The conflation of the comic hero’s agon and the poet’s is discussed
in more detail in Chapter 2.
74
Cf. Wright (2007) 424–5, for a metatheatrical interpretation of Cratinus’ Dionysalexandros.
75
Nu. Hyp. II; cf. Biles (2002); Ruffell (2002).
76
From Cratin. fr. 213 we gather that Pytine called attention to Cratinus’ rivalry with Aristophanes,
whether in a parabasis or elsewhere.
77
This idea is developed by Rosen (2000). Even if several vase-representations are not connected
with Cratinus’ self-portrayal in Pytine, as some believe (Taplin (1993) 43–4; Bowie (1995) 116 n. 12,
121 n. 42), these still tend to confirm the degree to which Cratinus has transformed himself into a
recognizable comic type.
73
The parabasis and the poetics of self-assertion
31
us, in what follows I attempt to disentangle and to some extent set aside
strict issues of fact and fiction, by conceding that “the poet” is an identity that must itself be performed. I do not mean this in an abstract and
condition-free sense,78 for the literary complexity a poet’s stage biography
begets through its relationship with his play can be situated within the
organizing and originating principle Sifakis identified in the poetic agon.
To take again the most striking example known to us, Cratinus’ elaborate imaginary biography in Pytine was grounded in the real conditions of
performance at a dramatic contest. His creative masterpiece of the poetic
persona can only be appreciated fully when recognized for what it is:€an
intensification of his own competitive poetics in the final stages of a long,
successful career in the Theater, inspired by heated rivalry with a popular new poet.79 So too, Pytine demonstrates the suitability of treating this
phenomenon as biography, rather than autobiography, since the persona
might be as much a product of what rivals said as what an individual poet
wished to proclaim about himself.80
The example of Cratinus in Pytine probably represents an expansion of
the poetic resources available for parabatic exchange, and is thus important for the way it lays bare the ideals that underpin the parabasis itself.
In an only slightly more poetically restrained way, the Aristophanic parabasis likewise situates the play’s fantasies within the immediate reality
of the performance, by treating them as manifestations and attributes
of the figure who may be regarded as the chief competitor at a dramatic
�performance.81 The perceived need for a poet to perform his identity in
this atmosphere prompted and probably went a long way toward justifying the gross exaggerations and downright lies he fixed on himself when
obliged to �confront his rivals. Rather than focusing attention solely on
the biography as fictionalized through incorporation within a literary
creation, therefore, I suggest that we should consider how the play itself
is grounded in a “Â�reality” experienced by a figure the audience knows
actually exists as the poet. The parabasis is tantamount to a speech-act
that instantiates the idea of “poet” in connection with his play within
As in (e.g.) Goldhill (1991) 200–1.
Cf. Zanetto (2006) 313. Cf. Rosen (2007) 251–5, for the potentially different responses to “the
poet” in original and subsequent contexts.
80
Here the relationship of Ar. fr. 488 and Cratin. fr. 342 may be important for what they suggest
about the elaboration of Aristophanes’ identity as sophos-poet.
81
Even allowing for the status of the choregos in the production; Wilson (2000). An instance like
Alcm. PMG 39 allows us to suppose that the impulse to insert oneself within a choral performance by others had long been felt by poets quite likely within a competitive context (thus the
emphasis on his own inventiveness); cf. Hes. Th. 22–34; hAp. 166–76.
78
79
32
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
the competitive ambience of festival celebration, and the play is thereby
fixed in a specific time and place and transformed into a kind of personal
poetry.
Themes of competitive self-assertion abound not only in Aristophanes
but in comic fragments that either seem to originate in parabases or are
at least “parabatic” in the sense that they take up matters of immediate
interest to the poet and the performance of his play. In one case, Cratinus
berates the audience for failing to give his plays the reception they deserve
(fr. 360); in another, Eupolis deplores their preference for foreign poets over
their own regional stock€– doubtless meaning Eupolis himself (fr.€392).82
The same poet had a chorus shout to the audience to wake up and cast the
rubbish of the earlier performances from their eyes (fr. 205).83 Meanwhile,
Aristophanes used the metaphor of wine to analyze Athenian tastes for
poetry, with his own style presumably represented by the mild-bodied,
flowery vintage currently most pleasing to the audience’s palate (fr. 688).
In all these cases we can detect efforts to advance poetic programs through
imaginative verbal strategies, often with open or implied comparisons to
competitors.84 Such examples show how the poets became involved in
the performance, fulfilling the role of rivals with paradoxically playful
seriousness.
Storey (2003b) 300–3, proposes that this was an antepirrhema of a comic agon representing
Eupolis and another comic poet (Aristophanes?) as contestants, but his reasoning is liable to a
number of objections. Although the defensive position adopted is appropriate for an epirrhematic agon, a defensive response on poetic themes is also at home in a parabasis; the parabases
of Acharnians (ἀποκρίνασθαι at Ach. 632 is tantamount to ἀπολογεῖσθαι), Knights, Clouds,
and Wasps are all defenses in their own way. Storey also points to the problem of referring σῷ
λóγῳ to the audience, since we might expect the plural possessive adjective. The speaker clearly
addresses himself to the audience as plural “you” five times in the first three lines and twice
in the final two, making it clear that the addressee is plural. The argument represented by σῷ
λóγῳ that is being criticized, namely preferring foreign poets, is associated with this same
group in 3 and 7–8, so that no difference of position necessitating reference to a third party can
be detected. And since this plural group is addressed throughout, were another contestant’s
argument being referred to for the audience addressed to consider, we should find not “according to your (sing.) argument” but “according to his argument.” Compare Nu. 1043–5, 1058–62.
Perhaps the shift in number was less disruptive if the phrase in question had an idiomatic
quality.
83
On Eup. fr. 205, Storey (2003b) 212, opts for tragic poets as the object of criticism, which is possible, although not necessarily on the grounds he suggests (Ra. 1005, 1497). The key evidence in
favor of this argument is λῆρον in the second verse, a term perfectly suited to the comic abuse of
rivals, as is shown by Eq. 531 (παραληροῦντ᾿), 536 (ληρεῖν), both of which concentrate on Cratinus,
whose response in Pytine may be evident in fr. 208, where the same verb appears in a context in
which comic composition is certainly at issue; cf. Biles (2002) 187–8, Olson (2007) 84. O’Sullivan
(1992) 112–20 discusses the broader application of this term in literary criticism as it applied to
both poets and orators in the fifth century.
84
For the branding of comic poetry by individual poets, see Bakola (2008). On the rivalry of
Eupolis and Aristophanes, see Kyriakidi (2007).
82
Poet, chorus and parabatic formula
33
P oe t, c horus a n d pa r a b at ic f or m u l a
The connection between parabasis and competitive self-assertion becomes
clearer when we examine how the poets refer to the parabasis itself. Though
the word is not attested as a technical literary term until the Alexandrian
period at the earliest,85 the verbal cognate parabainein occurs five times in
Old Comedy in connection with this part of the performance:
1. Acharnians 628–9:
ἐξ οὗ γε χοροĩσιν ἐφέστηκεν τρυγικοĩς ὁ διδάσκαλος ἡμῶν,
οὔπω παρέβη πρὸς τὸ θέατρον λέξων ὡς δεξιóς ἐστιν.
From the time our producer took charge of comic choruses,
he never once came before the audience to say how clever he is.
2. Knights 507–9:
εἰ μέν τις ἀνὴρ τῶν ἀρχαίων κωμῳδοδιδάσκαλος ἡμᾶς
ἠνάγκαζεν λέξοντας ἔπη πρὸς τὸ θέατρον παραβῆναι,
οὐκ ἂν φαύλως ἔτυχεν τούτου˙ νῦν δ᾿ ἄξιóς ἐσθ᾿ ὁ ποητής . . .
If any of the old-time comic producers had tried to force us
to come forward in order to address the audience,
he’d hardly have succeeded at this. As it is, our poet is deserving.
3. Peace 734–5:
χρῆν μὲν τύπτειν τοὺς ῥαβδούχους, εἴ τις κωμῳδοποητὴς
αὑτὸν ἐπῄνει πρὸς τὸ θέατρον παραβὰς ἐν τοĩς ἀναπαίστοις.
The rod-bearers ought to beat any comic poet who
comes before the audience and praises himself in the anapests.
4. Plato Comicus fr. 99:
εἰ μὲν μὴ λίαν < ∪ ∪ — > ὦνδρες, ἠναγκαζóμην
στρέψαι δεῦρ᾿, οὐκ ἂν παρέβην εἰς λέξιν τοιάνδ᾿ ἐπῶν.
Gentlemen, if I had not been so compelled to come here,
I’d never have come forward to deliver such a speech of words.
5. Thesmophoriazusae 785:
ἡμεĩς τοίνυν ἡμᾶς αὐτὰς εὖ λέξωμεν παραβᾶσαι.
Let us then come forward in order to praise ourselves.
This assumes that discussions such as Σ VΓLh Pax 734b ultimately derive from Hellenistic scholars;
cf. Imperio (2004) 8. For differing judgments on what these passages can tell us about the significance of the term parabasis, see Händel (1963) 92–7; Sifakis (1971) 61–3; Gilula (1997).
85
34
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
In all these examples parabainein is complemented either by a verb of
speaking or, in the case of Plato Comicus, by a prepositional phrase (εἰς
λέξιν τοιάνδ᾿ ἐπῶν) that expresses this as a purpose.86 In three cases (Ach.,
Pax, Th.) the kind of speech appropriate for this moment is specifically
prescribed:€praise, or really self-praise.87 Although various interpretations
of the term parabainein have been offered, the most widely accepted is that
the chorus “steps” forward, emphasizing the extradramatic character of
this part of the play, in which they communicate directly with the audience.88 I will attempt to revise or at least complicate this meaning toward
the end of this chapter. For the moment, I concentrate on one aspect of
the use of the verb that suggests a close connection between the action
envisioned and the self-praise tied to the conditions of competitive performance and the identity of the poet there.
Although we may speak generally of the parabasis as a choral performance, in most of the examples cited above the chorus use parabainein to
describe what the poet is doing by having the chorus perform the piece.89
In three cases the poet himself is the subject of the verb (Ach. 629; Pax 735;
Pl. Com. fr. 99), and in a fourth (Eq. 507–8) the chorus function as an
extension of the poet and his wish to bring himself before the audience.90
Only at Th. 785 does the chorus describe itself as independently parabasai;
Cf. Imperio (2004) 10. Thus Sifakis (1971) 65–6 is probably wrong to argue that parabainein itself
can mean “to come forward by way of digression to speak to the Theater.” For Plato’s idiom, see
Mastronarde (1994) 194–5n., with close parallels at E. Med. 932; Ph. 771.
87
ἐπῄνει, Pax 735, cf. 738; εὖ λέξωμεν, Th. 785; implied at Ach. 629 by ὡς δεξιóς ἐστιν. Cf. Eq. 565,
595, where the same objective of offering praise justifies both epirrhemes.
88
E.g., Hubbard (1991) 28; cf. Σ VΓLh Pax 734b. A sixth instance of the formula can perhaps be
detected in Eup. fr. 192.157 (Marikas), where the ancient commentator’s lemma πρὸς τὸ θέατρον
points to a parabasis (Storey (2003b) 207), in which case (given examples 1–3 above) a form of
παραβαίνειν might have appeared nearby. Moreover, the preceding lemma (λύω λέσχας), also
apparently from the beginning of the parabasis to judge from the attached comment, may set
out the objective of the chorus’ parabatic discourse, i.e., to put an end to (worthless) gossip about
their poet (see, however, Pl. Com. fr. 244). Observe the hostility against other (comic) poets in fr.
205 (also likely to be from the start of the parabasis in Marikas (anapests; cf. above, n. 82)), where
their inconsequential nonesense (αὐθημερινὸν ποιητῶν λῆρον) perhaps reflects λέσχας and is to
be replaced by Eupolis’ view of things.
89
Cf. Händel (1963) 96. This distinction lies at the heart of Gilula (1997), esp. 141–2, who argues that
the poet actually appeared on stage to perform these passages. As will be seen, I am sympathetic
to the emphasis this puts on the verb, but believe that the poet’s presence remains imaginary.
90
Gilula (1997) 140, rejects the metaphorical interpretation of the Knights passage (cf. Slater (2002)
75–6); but the passage implies that the chorus can take over the act of parabainein, while the shift
between the poet’s will and the chorus’ may be Aristophanes’ way of playing with the convention
of parabatic impersonation. Similarly in Acharnians, Aristophanes’ previous avoidance of parabainein (628–9) implies a contrast with appearances by other poets (so Gilula, 140), but the more
important contrast is with the Acharnians parabasis (630–2), in which the chorus now make up for
Aristophanes’ previous reticence.
86
Poet, chorus and parabatic formula
35
but that is because this parabasis is devoted not to the poet but to the chorus’ own self-praise, as they make clear in the same breath.91
To say, as Hubbard does, for example, that parabainein was used by
Aristophanes “specifically to describe the action of the chorus in turning
around to face the audience instead of the stage,” thus does no justice to
the evidence at our disposal. The peculiar use of the verb in the passages
discussed above suggests instead that the vital point of a comic parabasis is
the arrival of the poet on stage, notionally or through dramatic impersonation by his chorus. By inserting within the audience’s experience of the
performance a dramatic presence of the poet before the Theater, a parabasis establishes him as the poiētēs who masterminds everything that goes
on on-stage.92 The words of praise for him are thus self-praise (esp. Pax 735
αὑτὸν ἐπῄνει), so that both in establishing the poet as a participant in the
contest and in performing his praise of himself, the parabasis becomes a
true provocation from a poet to one or more rivals.93
Considerable evidence suggests that the comic poets engaged in specific dialogues in their plays€– most often doubtless in the parabases€– to
assert their own superiority or malign their rivals.94 Indeed, the idea of
poetic exchange seems implicit in the very way the term parabainein is
Cf. Sifakis (1971) 63. The Clouds parabasis (518–19) opens without reference to parabainein and
focusses instead on the purpose of verbal discourse (κατερῶ πρὸς ὑμᾶς), since the poet’s arrival
before the audience is adequately signaled when the chorus speak as him in the first-person singular. Hence, ὦ θεώμενοι .â•›.â•›. κατερῶ πρὸς ὑμᾶς here is the dramatic equivalent of the parabatic
formula παραβαίνειν πρὸς τὸ θέατρον in three of the passages cited above (Ach. 629; Eq. 508;
Pax 735; cf. στρέψαι δεῦρ᾿ in Pl. Com. fr. 99), and the poet’s first-person address in Clouds fully
realizes what is elsewhere metaphorical. Other examples of first-person address in the comic fragments suggest that Clouds was not unique in this respect:€aside from Pl. Com. fr. 99, cf. Ach.
659–64; Pax 754–74; Ar. frr. 30–1; Cratin. frr. 211; 251; Eup. frr. 89; 392; Pl. Com. frr. 106–7;
Metag. fr. 15. A shift from first-person singular to third-person singular occurs in Pherecr. fr. 102.
Ar. fr. 264 (anapestic tetrameter) discusses how choruses once danced with food in their arms;
Athenaeus’ introduction (᾿Αριστοφάνης … γράφων καὶ αὐτὸς καὶ λέγων) might be taken to
mean that Aristophanes both wrote and spoke (via the chorus) these verses.
92
To speculate further, the close connection between the poet and the defining action of the performance in a parabasis may represent a vestige from the early period of dramatic performance,
when poets were not just composers but members of the chorus; cf. MacDowell (1971) 299;
Hubbard (1991) 19.
93
At a point where he is almost certainly thinking about the comic parabasis, Aelius Aristides
(28.95–7 Keil) treats it as characteristic of comic poets to follow up the assertions of their poetic
virtues with a challenge to their rivals to do better.
94
Aristophanes’ ridicule of Cratinus in Acharnians (425) and Knights (424) prompted Cratinus to
respond in his Pytine (fr. 213) of 423 by asserting that Aristophanes had pirated material from
Eupolis. Cf. Cratin. fr. 342 and Ar. fr. 488, which are treated as a dialogue in Σ Pl. Ap. 19c (= Ar.
test. 3); see O’Sullivan (2006). Aristophanes’ charge of plagiarism against Eupolis (Nu. 553–6)
received a response from Eupolis (fr. 89), and in these cases the charges went beyond naming the
poets to include the plays involved, Knights and Marikas; cf. Storey (2003b) 278–97; Kyriakidi
(2007) 154–71. Other fragments of interest (not all necessarily from parabases):€Cratin. fr. 360;
91
36
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
used in these passages. At the same time that poets introduce their parabatic appearance in the contest, they make it clear that the performance of
their own identity must be understood in relation to parabatic assertions
by other poets, or even that it depends on them for its justification. I begin
with Plato Comicus fr. 99:
εἰ μὲν μὴ λίαν .… ὦνδρες, ἠναγκαζóμην
στρέψαι δεῦρ᾿, οὐκ ἂν παρέβην εἰς λέξιν τοιάνδ᾿ ἐπῶν.
The theme and content of this passage would be equally fitting for a
response within the epirrhematic agon,95 but the scholiast assures us that it
comes from the parabasis. That view is supported by the use in the second
line of the verb παρέβην. In a parabatic context, the first-person singular readily suggests the poet, and though the lacuna in line 1 may conceal an explanation of where the constraint upon him to make this speech
originates,96 it is worth considering whether we are meant to understand
Plato’s comments as an obligatory reply to his rivals. In that case, his parabasis contextualizes itself performatively within an envisioned sequence
of parabases by different poets.97 One poet’s parabatic challenge demands
a response by others, and the compulsion becomes greater when personal
abuse is involved.98 This interpretation finds support in the Aristophanic
passage that prompted the scholiast to cite Plato Comicus:
χρῆν μὲν τύπτειν τοὺς ῥαβδούχους, εἴ τις κωμῳδοποητὴς
αὑτὸν ἐπῄνει πρὸς τὸ θέατρον παραβὰς ἐν τοĩς ἀναπαίστοις.
εἰ δ᾿ οὖν εἰκóς τινα τιμῆσαι, θύγατερ Διóς, ὅστις ἄριστος
κωμῳδοδιδάσκαλος ἀνθρώπων καὶ κλεινóτατος γεγένηται,
ἄξιος εἶναί φησ᾿ εὐλογίας μεγάλης ὁ διδάσκαλος ἡμῶν.
(Peace 734–8)
Pherecr. frr. 102; 204; Ar. frr. 346; 348; 688; Eup. frr. 173; 228 (perhaps in eupolideans; see K–A
ad loc. and Storey (2003a) 229); 205; 392; Lysipp. fr. 4; Metag. fr. 15. Cratin. Dionysalexandros
test. 1.6–9 seems to refer to a parabasis “about the poets” (thus Körte):€ Olson (2007) 88–9;
cf.€Revermann (1997) 199 n. 9; Bakola (2005) 46 n. 3.
95
Compare Aeschylus’ explanation of reluctance to compete with Euripides at Ra. 867, where Dover
notes the appropriateness of the gesture in public contexts.
96
Kaibel, accepting Meineke’s supplement ὑπὸ τοῦδ᾿ (see K–A ad loc.), suggested that the compulsion was upon the chorus from their poet. Although Eq. 507–9 might at first seem a suitable
comparandum, there the first-person plural is used and the point is to set the chorus in opposition to rival poets, whereas they are in perfect harmony (Eq. 510) with their own, which is all we
should expect of a performance he has scripted. Tension with a chorus is referred to only in the
case of other poets (e.g., Cratin. fr. 17 and Call. Com. fr. 17, where in addition the despised poets
are tragic).
97
For parabatic intertextuality as a reflection of audience competence, see Revermann (2006b) 118.
98
Aeschines 1.193 presents the strategy of not maligning his opponents by name (οὐδενὸς ἐγὼ
ὀνομαστὶ μνησθήσομαι), since that would only justify their decision to come forward and defend
themselves (see further below).
Poet, chorus and parabatic formula
37
The rod-bearers ought to beat any comic poet who
comes before the Theater and praises himself in the anapests.
But if, daughter of Zeus, it is right to praise the man who
is the best and most famous comic producer of all,
our poet says that he deserves great praise indeed.
Despite their reluctance to tolerate any poet’s self-praise, Aristophanes’
chorus justify their parabasis by pointing to his undeniable excellence
in contrast to the dubious credentials of others who might attempt to
do the same.99 This declaration, in other words, begs to be understood
in relation to the way Aristophanes’ rivals presented themselves in the
Theater, meaning that the parabasis was in essence an occasion for
comic poets to carry out exchanges with one another, styling themselves
in competition for the prize. That objective is underscored in the Peace
parabasis by the assertion of Aristophanes’ literary significance in the
remarks that follow (739–53) and above all by the way he coopts (749)
for himself Aeschylus’ self-promotion in Pherecrates’ Krapataloi:€ὅστις
<γ᾿> αὐτοĩς παρέδωκα τέχνην μεγάλην ἐξοικοδομήσας (fr. 100). The
striking feature in Aristophanes’ redeployment of the image, as noted
above,100 is the distinction between Aeschylus’ comparison between
himself and later tragedians who are his successors and Aristophanes’
between himself and living rivals. To press that distinction further, in
fr. 100 Aeschylus seems to refer to the other tragedians in the third
person (αὐτοĩς), and thereby emphasizes the temporal and physical distance between himself and them; ἡμĩν in Pax 749 is parallel to this, but
asserts Aristophanes’ influence on comedy as it is performed at the City
Dionysia of 421.101
The convention was there to overturn. Aristophanes’ announced decision to at last confront his audience through a parabasis in Acharnians
and proclaim “how clever he is” is justified by a reference to the way some
people have abused his name in public (Ach. 630–2). The perpetrators of
this alleged conspiracy of slander are identified vaguely at the beginning
of the parabasis as the poet’s enemies (Ach. 630 ὑπὸ τῶν ἐχθρῶν); only at
the end (Ach. 659) is Cleon brought forward as the chief antagonist. That
Their conviction of the poet’s superlative status is strengthened by an apparent invocation of a
Muse (736 θύγατερ Διóς) to certify their judgment; cf. Olson (2002) ad loc.
100
See above, pp. 5–6.
101
Blaydes’ suggestion ὑμῖν (accepted now in Wilson’s text) may be correct, and though reference
to the audience seems natural enough, in fact to this point in the parabasis they have only been
referred to in the third person (732; contrast 759); any room in the ambiguity of that expression
for a reference to rival poets is appropriate, given Aristophanes’ castigation of them in the lines
immediately before.
╇ 99
38
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
revelation, however, seems intended to come as a surprise,102 while the
audience’s initial interpretation of the meaning of “enemies” would have
been conditioned by their experience of parabases in earlier comedies.
Given the emphasis on Aristophanes’ identity as a comic poet in the opening section, these unidentified figures are most easily understood to be his
rivals in the Theater.103 His defense thus plays off the audience’s anticipation of the abuse and criticism poets regularly hurled at one another in
their parabases, only to direct attention to a different class of enemy at the
final moment.
So too in the opening of the Knights parabasis, the chorus willingly
takes up the poet’s cause while rejecting any thought of performing for
another poet, claiming that they do this for Aristophanes only because he
deserves their praise on several counts:
εἰ μέν τις ἀνὴρ τῶν ἀρχαίων κωμῳδοδιδάσκαλος ἡμᾶς
ἠνάγκαζεν λέξοντας ἔπη πρὸς τὸ θέατρον παραβῆναι,
οὐκ ἂν φαύλως ἔτυχεν τούτου νῦν δ᾿ ἄξιóς ἐσθ᾿ ὁ ποητής,
ὅτι τοὺς αὐτοὺς ἡμĩν μισεĩ τολμᾷ τε λέγειν τὰ δίκαια,
καὶ γενναίως πρὸς τὸν Τυφῶ χωρεĩ καὶ τὴν ἐριώλην.
ἃ δὲ θαυμάζειν ὑμῶν φησιν πολλοὺς αὐτῷ προσιóντας
καὶ βασανίζειν, ὡς οὐχὶ πάλαι χορὸν αἰτοίη καθ᾿ ἑαυτóν,
ἡμᾶς ὑμĩν ἐκέλευε φράσαι περὶ τούτου. φησὶ γὰρ ἁνὴρ
οὐχ ὑπ᾿ ἀνοίας τοῦτο πεπονθὼς διατρίβειν, ἀλλὰ νομίζων
κωμῳδοδιδασκαλίαν εἶναι χαλεπώτατον ἔργον ἁπάντων
(Knights 507–16)
If any of the old-time comic producers had tried to force us
to come forward to address the Theater,
he’d hardly have succeeded in this. As it is, our poet is deserving,
since he hates the same people we do and dares to say what is right,
and he nobly closes in against the Typhoon and whirlwind.
As to the point which, he says, many of you have been wondering about,
asking him directly why he did not long ago request a chorus on his own,
he urges us to explain this to you. For the man says that it was not
due to folly that he delayed this way, but because he considered
comic production the most difficult task there is.
The intended surprise effect is marked also by the sudden shift to the first-person singular of
Aristophanes’ voice (Ach. 660–4). On Cleon and Aristophanes’ second comedy Babylonians,
which is in the background here, see Chapter 2.
103
For echthros used thus elsewhere in the comedies, cf. Eq. 528, 589–90 (discussed in Chapter 3). It
goes without saying that rival poets might dwell on the public scandal that arose from Cleon’s
charges and implicitly become the latter’s allies.
102
Poet, chorus and parabatic formula
39
It is striking that the chorus’ hatred for Cleon (here represented as the
Typhoon, 511), which in many ways represents the core interest of Knights,
is conflated with the personality of the poet. Already the latter emerges
as a figure who can draw together his play’s themes as well as its performers and fit them within his ever expanding personality. At the same time,
the chorus’ preference for Aristophanes cannot help but suggest that he is
to be distinguished from his hopeless rivals, making a comparison with
other poets unavoidable. The emphasis on old poets in the opening line
(Eq. 507) accordingly receives specific explanation halfway through the
anapests, when the youthful Aristophanes’ older rival Cratinus€– competing in this contest€– is placed between Magnes and Crates (Eq. 526–36),
who were already dead or retired. All three are treated as belonging to the
distant past (esp. Eq. 519), and Aristophanes thus portrays his immediate
competitor as someone on whom no chorus would willingly hang their
hopes of victory.104
The chorus’ speech is ostensibly a defense of their poet in response to
concern among the Athenians as to why Aristophanes does not produce
his plays himself, but finds other men to fulfill what might reasonably
have been considered the poet’s responsibility. Whether Athenians generally were talking about Aristophanes’ professional arrangements is impossible to know; that rival poets criticized him on this score is certain. In
reporting on Aristophanes’ early use of producers€– the ostensible subject
of the Knights parabasis€– the ancient Life cites Aristonymus and Ameipsias
as mocking him on this account.105 It is hard to avoid concluding that the
talk in Athens to which the chorus of knights alludes was instigated or at
least fanned by what Aristophanes’ rivals said in their own parabases.106
Indeed, since the argument in Knights soon targets Cratinus as its principal object of professional antagonism, it is tempting to identify him as one
The internal logic of the theme of old poets argues against the belief of Sifakis (1971) 61–2, that
this passage and the verses from Peace cited above prove that the parabasis is of no great antiquity.
Hubbard (1991) 24, notes that the surviving fragments provide no secure evidence for parabases
before Cratinus, but since there is little evidence for this period in any case, this is not decisive.
105
Life of Aristophanes (= test. 1.7–10); cf. Σ Pl. Ap. 19c (= Ar. test. 3.9–10), which adds Sannyrion’s
ridicule. The same class of charges seems to lie behind Pl. Com. frr. 106–7; cf. Biles (1999).
Curiously, the insult used in these cases involved a proverb connected with Herakles’ birth on
the fourth day of the month and his later subservience to Eurystheus; in the parabasis of Wasps
Aristophanes discusses his career, beginning with his use of directors, before portraying himself
as a true Herakles, an arrangement that might be a response to abuse from his rivals using the
same proverb (e.g., test. 3.9–11). Cf. Starkie (1897) on 1030; for a different interpretation of the
evidence, Mastromarco (1989); Halliwell (1989).
106
Ameipsias was active during the early part of Aristophanes’ career (Nu. Hyp. II Dover), and
though Aristonymus and Sannyrion are later, they may be recycling a theme of ridicule that had
become generic, as Plato Comicus perhaps indicates (see previous n.).
104
40
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
of those who belittled Aristophanes for poetic immaturity. That hypothesis gives further point to the castigation of “ancient directors of comedy”
with which the passage begins, and might imply or anticipate a competitively defensive position adopted by Cratinus after his defeat at the hands
of the upstart tyro in 425.107
The self-referential commentary the comedies provide on the performance of the parabasis characterizes this as a virtual face-to-face confrontation of rival poets before the audience. One poet’s notional presence is
correlated with and even justified by the appearances of his rivals, whose
efforts to outbid one another by praising themselves and their own work
form the substance of these passages. Since these were scripted performances, dialogues on specific points could only evolve over a series of
festivals,108 but the basic point remains that parabases attained their greatest significance when rival poets’ assertions were considered in relation to
one another over the course of a single festival.109
Pa r a b a s i s a n d proag on: €p oe t ic s e l f -a s s e r t ion
at t h e Dion y s i a n f e s t i va l s
Once we appreciate that the defining act of parabainein involves the poets
themselves, and thus that the parabasis is not so much about the chorus’
orientation with respect to the dramatic performance and the audience
as about the poet and his participation in the competitive production, we
are in a better position to understand the larger function of the parabasis
within the poetic agon. The competitive poetics of the parabasis come into
fuller view when considered in relation to another elusive element of the
Dionysian festival, the proagon.
The proagon took place sometime shortly before the dramatic performances. The evidence for the event is sparse and raises as many questions as
it answers, but on some points it provides a model that may help explain
Fr. 213 suggests that in Pytine Cratinus found a different tactic for exposing Aristophanes’ lack
of creative independence, presumably in response to the defeat of his Satyrs by Knights the year
before (Eq. Hyp. II).
108
But see Storey (2003a) 287–8.
109
On this point, Sifakis offers the interesting suggestion that the poetic form of the anapests
(tetrameters + pnigos) derives from the similar structure in the epirrhematic agon which is duplicated for the sake of each participant in the contest. On this basis Sifakis proposes that with the
parabasis the full form of responding epirrhemata was realized in the performance of parabases
by other poets. Gelzer (1960) 205, admits that the pnigos may have come to the parabasis via the
comic agon. For development in the parabasis form in Aristophanes’ plays, see Imperio (2004)
14–20.
107
Parabasis and proagon
41
the function of the parabasis. The most detailed account is found in a
scholiast on Aeschines.110
προαγών˙ ἐγίγνετο πρὸ τῶν μεγάλων Διονυσίων ἡμέραις ὀλίγαις ἔμπροσθεν
ἐν τῷ Ὠιδείῳ καλουμένῳ τῶν τραγῳδῶν ἀγὼν καὶ ἐπίδειξις ὧν μέλλουσι
δραμάτων ἀγωνίζεσθαι ἐν τῷ θεάτρῳ, δι᾿ ὃ ἑτοίμως προαγὼν καλεĩται. εἰσίασι
δὲ δίχα προσώπων οἱ ὑποκριταὶ γυμνοί.
proagon:€A few days before the Great Dionysia in the so-called Odeion a contest
of the tragic poets took place and a demonstration of those plays with which they
intended to compete in the Theater; on this account it is aptly called the proagon.
The actors enter “naked,” without masks.
The most significant element of this notice for our purposes is the appearance of the tragic poets, who made a public demonstration (ἐπίδειξις) of their
plays, accompanied by their actors.111 Exactly what this presentation consisted
of is impossible to say, but it is worth noting that the scholiast characterizes
the event as a contest (ἀγών). Although his assessment has been questioned,
and a formal agon is almost certainly not in question, his interpretation
has the merit of being consistent with the use of proagon and its cognates
elsewhere,112 and at the least, the name implies an interest in coordinating the
event directly with the festival’s competitive program.113 The general nature of
this connection can be understood through Socrates’ allusion to the proagon
in which Agathon participated a few days before the Lenaian victory that
provides the historical backdrop for Plato’s Symposium (194a–b).
ἐπιλήσμων μεντἂν εἴην, ὦ ᾿Αγάθων, εἰπεĩν τὸν Σωκράτη, εἰ ἰδὼν τὴν σὴν
ἀνδρείαν καὶ μεγαλοφροσύνην ἀναβαίνοντος ἐπὶ τὸν ὀκρίβαντα μετὰ τῶν
ὑποκριτῶν, καὶ βλέψαντος ἐναντία τοσούτῳ θεάτρῳ, μέλλοντος ἐπιδείξεσθαι
σαυτοῦ λóγους, καὶ οὐδ᾿ ὁπωστιοῦν ἐκπλαγέντος, νῦν οἰηθείην σε
θορυβήσεσθαι ἕνεκα ἡμῶν ὀλίγων ἀνθρώπων.
“I would be forgetful indeed, Agathon,” said Socrates, “if after witnessing your
bravery and self-confidence as you mounted the platform with your actors and
then looked out against so large an audience, prepared to make a display of your
words with no sign of fear, I should think that you would now be shaken by a
small group like us.”
Σ in Ctes. 67; cf. Σ VΓLh V. 1109a. See also Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 63, 67–8; Csapo and Slater
(1994) 109–10.
111
For the additional presence of the chorus, see Life of Euripides (= test. IA.11). See Miller (1997)
232–5, for the function of the Periclean Odeion.
112
Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 67, suggests that the scholiast has simply misinterpreted the word
proagōn, but it is likely that he knows more about this event than he has taken the time to report.
On the meaning “contest beforehand” and the like, see LSJ προαγών¸ προαγωνίζομαι, etc.
113
For possible comparative evidence for competitions in advance of competitions, involving the
same contestants as at the agon proper, see IG XII ix 189 (Eretria); Nagy (2002) 39–40, 48–50.
110
42
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
Socrates’ recollection evokes a mood of self-assertion at this event; the
emphasis is equally on Agathon’s bravery and self-confidence in stepping before the audience, and on his lack of fear in presenting his play
(μέλλοντος ἐπιδείξεσθαι σαυτοῦ λóγους).114 Though the broader context
of Agathon’s appearance must be reconstructed, the description seems to
imply that a general atmosphere of rivalry predominated at the proagon.
The essential consideration is that Agathon is making this public display
alongside his competitors at the festival; it is in this implied confrontation that his andreia and his ability to keep any sign of fear in check resonate. Peter Wilson is surely right to observe that Socrates’ description
makes the proagon sound like “an opportunity for a kind of inflated selfpromotion.”115 Moreover, David Sider has shown that the Symposium is
itself structured as a kind of Dionysian competition, and it must accordingly be relevant that the proagon is recalled just before the culminating performances of Agathon and Socrates.116 Indeed, Agathon interprets
Socrates’ feigned trepidation over his own performance as a competitive
strategy aimed at making his most significant rival€– Agathon himself€–
lose confidence before the audience, as he refers to their philosophical
gathering (194a). The verbal parrying of the two men in advance of their
actual performances reactivates the competition between them over sophia
that was introduced earlier in the dialogue.117 Although the evidence for
the proagon is limited, therefore, it teases us with hints of the event’s agonistic function within the festival.
It is tempting to assume that the proagon included both tragic and
comic poets, but the evidence points to the tragedians alone. The scholiast on Aeschines mentions only tragic poets in connection with the
festival of the City Dionysia, in the course of elucidating a reference
that provides no motivation for such specificity; the Symposium refers to
On the question of whether this phrase refers to the poet’s words at the proagon or to the performance of his play later on, see Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 67; Dover (1980) ad loc. Van Erp
Taalman Kip (1990) 127–9 may be correct to propose that the expression conflates Agathon’s
performance at the festival (proagon or agon) with his performance in the philosophical
discussion.
115
Wilson (2000) 96.
116
Sider (1980). Socrates activates this parallel in the immediate context by commenting that
Eryximachos has already completed his competitive performance (ἠγώνισαι, 194a).
117
Smp. 175d–e, where Socrates compliments the poet for his knowledge, while Agathon responds
that Dionysos will soon judge them with regard to sophia (175e). When Dionysos appears in the
form of Alcibiades (Sider (1980) 55), he binds Agathon’s head with tainiai for his poetic victory
the day before (212e–213b), but then shares them with Socrates to acknowledge him as victor in
this and every philosophical performance (213d–e). For the relationship between this scene and
epinikia iconography, see Biles (2007).
114
Parabasis and proagon
43
a tragic poet;118 and Aristophanes’ Proagon is described by one ancient
authority as having featured Euripides in particular.119 This might be a
matter of a gap in the admittedly sparse evidence for the event.120 Still,
the way the programs of the City Dionysia and the Lenaia were constructed indicates that “equal treatment” of genres was not a consideration, and thus we probably ought to accept that the evidence for the
proagon is accurate. Since tragic plots were typically based on myth,
after all, there was little risk of deflating the overall effect of the performances by promoting a play in advance, whereas comedy depended
on surprise at many levels for its effect.121 More important, tragedy seems
to have avoided the overt self-referentiality on which comedy thrived
and frequently used to draw attention to the agonistic interests of the
performance.122 The proagon thus supplied an opportune moment for
tragic poets to present themselves to the audience, to engage one another
either directly or by implication, and to display the merits of their plays,
whereas the comic poets internalized this aspect of the competition,
making it a formal part of the performance either by inventing the parabasis expressly for this purpose or by adapting an older form to suit the
demands of increased agonistic pressures.
The parabasis and proagon share important features with regard to their
function within the contest. Whatever else occurred at a proagon, it was
certainly the sole formal occasion for tragic poets to participate personally
in the competitions. The exact nature of the epideixis and logoi presented
must remain obscure, but it is safe to say that recitations of passages from
The victory by Agathon recalled in the Symposium is linked to the Lenaia of 416 by Athenaeus
(5.217a = TrGF 39 T 1), but Sider (1980) 43–7 points out that Plato treats the performance as
though it were at the City Dionysia. The association with the City Dionysia in the Aeschines
scholion may simply reflect its origin or special significance in that festival, where tragic poets
dominated the agons with three competitors and full tetralogies.
119
ΣVLh V. 61c (= Proagon test. iv): οὐ μóνον ἐν τούτῳ τῷ δράματι¸ ὡς εἴρηται¸ εἰσῆκται οὕτως
Εὐριπίδης¸ ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐν τῷ Προαγῶνι καὶ ἐν τοῖς ̓Αχαρνεῦσιν.
120
Mazon (1908) 267, adduces ΣRVM Nu. 312a as evidence that comedy was included, but the wording is vague since the supposed reference to the proagon follows clear reference to the poetic
competitions themselves. Sommerstein (2002) 9 suggests that the proagon helped stabilize titles
of plays after the middle of the fifth century; the evidence he collects for tragedy perhaps supports this conclusion, but the increasing instability of comic titles he observes (pp. 7–8) would
appear to indicate that the comic poets were not involved.
121
Cf. Antiph. fr. 189, with Olson (2007) 172–3. On Aristotle’s mixed testimony on this point (Po.
1451b23–6), see Revermann (2006b) 99–100. Revermann (2006a) 170, who thinks of the proagon as “an opportunity to create a playbill,” is open to the possibility of comic participation at
the proagon, but points out that much of comedy’s effect depended on surprise at the time of
performance.
122
Bain (1975) and Taplin (1986). This is not to say that rivalries between tragic poets could not
operate implicitly through their differing treatments of a shared body of mythical material.
118
44
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
the plays themselves were not involved.123 Of the two terms, expideixis suggests a formal speech, so that the proagon may have been an opportunity to
draw attention to virtues and innovations especially deserving of the audience’s attention.124 Socrates’ emphatic phrasing μέλλοντος ἐπιδείξεσθαι
σαυτοῦ λóγους invests the display with a tone of proprietary authority
that places the poet’s imprimatur on the upcoming performance. In this,
as in other ways, the proagon would have been a performance not unlike
the comic parabasis, and may even have allowed poets to express rivalry
with one another.125 Both proagon and parabasis were extra-dramatic performances, with the stripping away of the dramatic illusion that exposes
the chorus and the poet to the audience in the parabasis parallel to the
appearance of uncostumed actors and chorus at the poet’s side at the proagon.126 Indeed, the appearance of the tragic poet with his chorus at the
proagon can be compared to the full structure of a parabasis, in which the
comic poet’s appearance in the anapests is followed by the chorus’ selfpresentation to the audience in the epirrhematic syzygy. So too, on any
understanding of the tragic proagon, it was like the parabasis in combining the assertive self-presentation of the poet€– now personally instead of
by representation through the chorus€– with a display of his play’s themes.
The focus on the poet and the parity on this point comes out well in
Socrates’ description of Agathon mounting the podium (ἀναβαίνοντος)
and looking out at the Theater (194b ἐναντία τοσούτῳ θεάτρῳ), recalling
the comic poets’ παραβαίνειν πρὸς τὸ θέατρον.127 Like the parabasis, the
Against this early thesis, see the sensible remarks of van Erp Taalman Kip (1990) 123–5. Mazon
(1908) 266–7, reasons that only the poet and the title were announced, but such a minimalist
view would not seem to justify a special event of the sort Socrates envisions in the Symposium.
124
The use of ἐπιδεικνύναι in Ar. fr. 719 is a fine example and is all the more important for the present discussion if correctly attributed to the parabasis of the lost Thesmophoriazusae (fr. 348);
see K–A ad loc. At Pl. La. 183b the verb is likewise applied to the public activity of tragic poets,
though within a general comparison with men who supposedly teach military science.
125
Two anecdotes in the ancient tradition support this view. Plutarch’s account of Sophocles’ debut
competition against Aeschylus (Cim. 8.7–9) envisions the audience heatedly divided in their
support of the two poets already at the moment when the judges were selected and the generals
entered the Theater, which is to say before the plays were produced; Pickard-Cambridge (1968)
95–6. The competitive mood in support of a new poet is explicable if the proagon served to
establish their rivalry. At the end of his career in 406, Sophocles used the proagon as an opportunity to acknowledge the absence of his most significant rival Euripides after his death (Life of
Euripides = test. IA.11).
126
Whether or not the chorus stripped during the parabasis, a metadramatic explanation of their
costume and identity is sometimes included in the performance (esp. Ach. 627; V. 1071–4; Pax
729–32). Cf. Sifakis (1971) 103–8; Hubbard (1991) 28. The claim that the actors appeared “naked”
at the proagon is taken literally by Bassi (1995) 20–2, but δίχα προσώπων points to a theatrical
definition.
127
Ach. 629; Eq. 508; Pax 735; cf. Poll. 4.111.
123
Parabasis and proagon
45
proagon brings forward the person responsible for the words the actors
and chorus perform, engaging his identity as the one who unifies all other
identities involved in the dramatic production, both performed and at the
level of imaginative creativity.128
The similarities between the proagon€– the general function of which
relative to the contests is not in doubt, however dimly understood its details
may be€– and the parabasis supports the notion that the latter served a parallel purpose in the agon. The experience the Athenian audience had of
witnessing tragic poets present themselves, their actors, and their plays in
a formal context within the festival program makes it easier to believe that
they treated the sequential appearances of comic poets in their parabases
as a similarly motivated sub-performance. Beyond this, whether and how
parabasis and proagon influenced or responded to one another is not easily
ascertained.129 Surely comic poets adopted a different tone and exhibited
other qualities whose uniqueness we are in no position to determine. Still,
their parabases fulfilled what the proagon shows was a noteworthy ritual in the Athenian dramatic competitions. By stepping forward to speak
about himself and his poetry, a poet of either genre formally signaled the
adversarial stance he adopted toward other poets in the presence of the
citizens, who were the communal judges of the performances.130
That the tragic proagon was the antecedent in this scenario seems likely,
given comedy’s habit for literary predation and the particular association
of the proagon with the City Dionysia, where tragedy was introduced earlier than comedy and probably remained the dominant genre. But while I
endorse the likelihood of meaningful contact and influence between the
two, I do not mean to suggest that the parabasis depends in an essential
way on the proagon for its genesis or for the Athenians’ ability to comprehend it.131 Rather, both performances only structured more formally
Cf. Wilson (2000) 96, who suggests further that the choregos was present at the proagon,
although explicit evidence for his role there is lacking.
The fourth-century tragic poet Astydamas may have experimented by inserting parabatic
material in a satyr-play (Astydamas II TrGF 60 F 4); see Bain (1975) 24–5; Sutton (1980) 82–3;
Revermann (2006a) 279, noting that Athenaeus may have misassigned a comic fragment.
130
The moment when a competitor stepped up to initiate his performance is the subject of an alabastron of the late sixth or early fifth century (Harvard 1977.216.2397):€a kithara-player mounts
the bema with his left foot suspended above it and his right foot still on the ground.
131
The so-called “chorēgoi vase,” showing a tragic and a comic figure being scrutinized by figures
identified as chorēgoi, might be based on a comedy that took this association as its premise. For
the possibility that the vase shows a proagon with tragedy and comedy presented, see Taplin
(1993) 65–6; Wilson (2000) 345 n. 208, 378–9 n. 213. If the vase portrays a comic plot, on the
other hand, the fantastic representation of a competition between genres perhaps extended to
the presence of comedy at the proagon.
128
129
46
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
older modes of competitive self-presentation, allowing them to be treated
synchronically as separate manifestations of deeply embedded rituals of
competitive display, hearkening back to ideas articulated originally in the
Thamyris myth.
C om ic
par abasia
Before considering some points in favor of modifying the usual understanding of comic parabasia in this final section, I wish to address the
limitations of the current definition of the parabasis as a dramatic act of
“stepping out.” As noted above, the use of the word to refer to a structural component of comedy depends on Hellenistic scholarly work on
Old Comedy.132 The term is clearly derived from the poets’ own use of the
verb parabainein, but the interpretive tradition becomes misleading when
it treats the act of comic parabasia as a choral performance, rather than
remaining true to the evidence of the original texts, in which the term creates an impression of authorial presence.133 My priority is to make better
sense of the semantic implications of the verb when the comic poets adopt
it in this context; and it is accordingly worth noting that, if we set aside
the instances where parabainein is used by the comic poets themselves,
the assumed definition “stepping forward” is unattested in Classical or
earlier sources.134 I nonetheless believe that we can attach this basic meaning to the verb, but not in the straightforward sense in which it has been
assumed.
The use of parabainein in parabases undoubtedly implies that the poet,
through his chorus, comes forward to stand before the Theater. But that
Cf. Händel (1963) 94–5; Gilula (1997) 131–2; Imperio (2004) 8.
See for example the definition provided by Hephaestion in his περὶ Ποιημάτων (8 p. 72
Consbruch):€καλεῖται δὲ παράβασις¸ ἐπειδὴ εἰσελθóντες εἰς τὸ θέατρον καὶ ἀντιπρóσωποι
ἀλλήλοις στάντες οἱ χορευταὶ παρέβαινον καὶ εἰς τὸ θέατρον ἀποβλέποντες ἔλεγóν τινα. At
times the literary critical term actually supplies a definition for the verb:€e.g., Σ VEΓΘM Eq. 508b
παραβῆναι˙ τῇ παραβάσει χρήσασθαι. Because of their derivative treatment, I consider irrelevant the late examples adduced by Sifakis (1971) 64–5, to import a digressive aspect to the meaning of parabainein. As Sifakis (1971) 62, points out (cf. Händel (1963) 96), however, some ancient
scholars applied the term specifically to the “anapestic” portion of the choral performance in
which the poet was represented, and not to the syzygy that followed.
134
The attempt by Händel (1963) 95 to stabilize the meaning of parabainein by reference to V. 1528
is not conclusive, since the closural sequence of the play is metapoetically framed through the
model of festival agonistics in Philocleon’s competition with tragic performers. The scene effectively asserts the comedy’s agonistic status in its final moments, and Aristophanes’ choice of diction is likely dependent on parabatic interests (see Chapter 4). Note that doubt over the meaning
and appropriateness of the term here has led several modern editors to adopt Blaydes’ περίβαινε
(Van Leeuwen (1909); Sommerstein (1983); N. G. Wilson (2007a)). Cf. MacDowell (1971) ad loc.
132
133
Comic parabasia
47
sense of the verb can be refined through comparison to Attic idiom. To
describe the act of stepping forward to speak before an assembled audience€ – a familiar occasion in the democratic polis€ – a fifth-century
Athenian had a well-established expression at his disposal:€παρελθεĩν +
verb of speaking.135 Most notably, in Thucydides this combination is
almost formulaic for introducing speakers at assemblies, and instances that
include a prepositional phrase to define the assembly in question make
the comparison to the formula for introducing comic parabasia even more
striking:€e.g., ἐς τὸν δῆμον παρελθóντες .â•›.â•›. οὐκ ἔφασαν (Th. 5.45.4).136
Aristophanes was familiar enough with this formula to use it appropriately
when one of the female speakers introduces herself at the women’s assembly in Thesmophoriazusae (443):€ὀλίγων ἕνεκα καὐτὴ παρῆλθον ῥημάτων.
Likewise Eupolis uses the expression when referring to Pericles’ power of
speech and superlative ability to sway his audience.137
Confirmation of the relationship between the verbs and their overlapping contextual significance is found in The Contest of Homer and
Hesiod, a work that has been connected with the fourth-century rhetorician Alkidamas and may depend on an even older tradition.138 Alkidamas
describes the moment when Hesiod and Homer approach one another to
initiate their poetic duel as follows:
ἀμφοτέρων δὲ τῶν ποιητῶν θαυμαστῶς ἀγωνισαμένων νικῆσαί φασι τὸν
Ἡσίοδον τὸν τρóπον τοῦτον προελθóντα γὰρ εἰς τὸ μέσον πυνθάνεσθαι τοῦ
Ὁμήρου καθ̓ ἓν ἕκαστον, τὸν δὲ ῞Ομηρον ἀποκρίνεσθαι.
(lines 70–4 Allen)
Although both poets competed spectacularly, they say that Hesiod won the contest in the following way:€stepping forward into the middle, he examined Homer
point by point, and Homer answered him.
The agon the two men engage in is a flight of fancy, but its significance
for our purposes is not diminished by that fact, since it reflects how a
E.g., Hdt. 8.80.2, 81.1; Th. 1.72.2, 73.1; 2.59.3; 3.36.6, 44.1; 6.8.4, 15.5; X. HG 7.1.12; Ap. 11; Lys.
25.14; 31.16; D. 7.20; Ex. 44.1; Aeschin. 1.193; 2.47; 3.2; Thphr. Char. 21.11; 26.2. Cf. Radermacher
(1916) 593–4, who does not observe the relationship with this idiom.
136
Cf. X. HG 1.7.11 παρῆλθε δέ τις εἰς τὴν ἐκκλησίαν φάσκων; Pl. Alc. I 105a–b εἰς τὸν ᾿Αθηναίων
δῆμον παρέλθῃς … παρελθὼν οὖν ἐνδείξεσθαι; Aeschin. 3.95 παρελθὼν εἰς τὴν ἐκκλησίαν
λóγους διεξῆλθε. Though of much later date, Plutarch’s description of Kimon coming with the
other generals before the Theater to perform the customary libations demonstrates the point
well:€παρελθὼν εἰς τὸ θέατρον (Cim. 8.7).
137
Eup. fr. 102.1–3:€κράτιστος οὗτος ἐγένετ᾿ ἀνθρώπων λέγειν· | ὁπóτε παρέλθοι <δ᾿>¸ ὥσπερ
ἁγαθοὶ δρομῆς¸ | ἐκ δέκα ποδῶν ᾕρει λέγων τοὺς ῥήτορας. For the sympathetic tone in this
assessment of Pericles, see Schwarze (1971) 132–5; Storey (2003b) 134. Cf. παρελήλυθα in Eup.
Autolykos test. iii.
138
See O’Sullivan (1992) 63–6, for an overview of the debate.
135
48
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
rhetorician of the Classical Period conceived of a poetic contest.139 For the
moment when Hesiod confronts Homer, the later manuscript tradition,
represented in the citation above, offers προελθóντα; but a third-century
bc papyrus, much closer to the time of Alkidamas, reads παρελθóν[τα.140
If the papyrus text is preferred, the rhetorician used the familiar and
probably more authentic Athenian expression for describing the moment
when a speaker came before an audience.141 And although coming forward in a public arena implied live debate, Alkidamas’ use of the term
concentrates on a situation where individual adversaries face one another
directly. The same implication underlies Eupolis’ description of Pericles’
rivalry with other speakers, while Aischines 1.193 similarly assumes that
speaking scathingly of his adversaries by name will justify their making a formal response on the pretext that “they would not have come
forward (παρῆλθον), had someone not mentioned them by name.”142 The
prefix παρα- thus seems to suggest not simply coming forward, but the
establishment of an emphatic presence; it is associated with contexts in
which an individual asserts opinions before an audience and overcomes
or forestalls opposing views. These points suggest why the term and the
situation it referred to might have been appropriated by comic poets to
describe parabatic confrontations, especially if other poets in their parabases shared Aristophanes’ penchant for taking on the persona of an
adviser in political debates.143
Although Alkidamas extended the rhetorical term parelthein to poets,
the comic poets themselves did not do so. The passages discussed above
(Thesm. 443; Eup. fr. 102) show that they knew the common formula with
parelthein but self-consciously adapted it when referring to themselves in
parabases in order, we may suppose, to simultaneously compare and distinguish their addresses to the audience from those made by speakers on
Ford (2002) 274–7 treats the account as a “heroic model” of poetic competition, corresponding
to the earliest form. The emphatic location of the encounter “in the middle” of the gathering
reflects the Homeric description of such agonistic meetings as a focal point in a larger communal gathering:€Il. 6.120, Od. 8.144; cf. the dispute represented on the shield of Achilles (Il.
18.497–508, esp. 506–8).
140
P. Petrie 01 25, lines 5–6 (= A in Allen’s edition of the Certamen). For a reconstruction of the
papyrus, see Mahaffy (1975) 72.
141
The Atticist Pollux also resorts to the phrase ὁ χορὸς παρελθὼν λέγῃ (4.111) to define “parabasis” for his readers.
142
Aeschines further specifies that such a claim will form the opening remarks of the speech
(ταύτην ἀρχὴν τοῦ λóγου).
143
E.g., Cratin. fr. 52; Telecl. fr. 2; Ar. Ra. 686–7; Eup. fr. 316. Sommerstein (1992) 28–30, however,
suggests that civic benefaction might have been an exclusively Aristophanic claim; cf. Bakola
(2008) 4–7.
139
Comic parabasia
49
other public occasions.144 The comic poets made this exchange, moreover,
with enough consistency that the substituted verb proved handy in supplying a specialized term for Hellenistic commentators to use when referring
to this moment in a dramatic performance. It is noteworthy€– and surprising€– in that case that the comic poets selected a term that, following
Hesiod’s lead, otherwise served almost exclusively to convey the negative
aspect of stepping over/beyond, namely “transgression,” whether of laws,
oaths, or divine prerogatives generally.145 Indeed, the same Classical authors
who use παρελθεĩν in the formula for audience address have παραβαίνειν
only in this negative sense, suggesting that the semantic ranges of the
terms were well-defined and separate by their time.146 Thus, if the context
and overall formular comparison of Athenian idiom tweak the meaning
of παραβαίνειν toward “step forward (in order to speak),” the verb itself,
in its familiar sense, strains against this interpretation and adds a further
dimension by investing the action it describes with moral ambiguity.147
Parabainein in Old Comedy thus has a complex semantic force. The
notion of coming forward to speak, via the connection with parelthein,
implies an emphatic presence in a public gathering, and entails both selfassertion and an expectation of antagonism. In this sense, parabainein
underscores the central concern of a comic parabasis:€to place the poet in
the foreground of the performance, where he can rehearse the arguments
and opinions he has mustered to support his claim to the prize. The generally observed substitution of -bainein for€-elthein, on the other hand, was a
The technical use of anabainein and katabainein for theater directions (Gardiner (1978)) may
have facilitated the comic poets’ development of this new term.
The Homeric meaning “stand beside” as a comrade in combat (Il. 11.522; 13.708) survives into the
Classical period in the cognate παραβάτης. The other metaphorical uses of the verb in the sense
“omit” (S. Tr. 499; cf. D. 18.211) and “escape notice” (E. Hec. 704) are found in lyric and seem to
be poetic adaptations; they are accordingly of little help in establishing the word’s primary fifthcentury association, and in any case do not fit the sense in parabases. (In Hecuba, the point may
not be so much “forgetting” as that Hecuba now realizes that her vision of Polydorus’ ghost did
not lead her astray.)
146
E.g., Gorg. 82 B 11a (par. 17) D–K; Th. 2.71.4; 3.11.2; Antipho 6.5; Lys. 1.26; X. Mem. 4.4.13; Pl.
Cri. 52e; D. 18.165; 21.10 (Law of Euegoros); Aeschin. 3.70; IG II2.111.27–42 (for the ambitious
phrasing of the latter, see Dover (1981) = (1987–8) vol. i, 37–9). Antipho 5.11–12 and D. 37.37,
where parelthein is used in the restricted sense assigned to parabainein, are of interest, but substitution in the opposite direction is what would be remarkable; that point is demonstrated by
Antipho 6.21 (ἔλεξε … ἀναβὰς εἰς τὴν ἡλιαίαν), where the formula for audience address using a
βαίνω compound is evident, but with παρα- avoided (cf. Pl. Smp. 194b of the proagon (discussed
above)â•–).
147
A parallel for the ambiguity suggested here appears at E. Med. 382:€δóμους ὑπερβαίνουσα καὶ
τεχνωμένη. In the immediate sense, Medea describes the act of entering the royal house (thus
Mastronarde (2002) 382n., citing Barrett (1964) 782–3 for such idioms), but in context and as
constrained by the second participle an audience could take the verb in its transgressive sense
(LSJ s.v. ὑπερβαίνω I.2) to denote Medea’s anticipated crime.
144
145
50
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
self-conscious modification that introduced a dissonant semantic strand.
By correlating their self-assertion with the idea of transgression, the comic
poets unabashedly prepared their audience for the grandiose claims to follow. The verb playfully signaled the tone of excessive overconfidence so
often apparent in the poets’ representations of themselves and their poetry
in comparison with the work of their rivals, in their efforts to secure the
audience’s favor.148 This understanding of parabainein has implications
for how we interpret the parabases themselves. But what may be most
interesting is the possibility that through verbal manipulation of the term
parabainein comic poets carefully constructed the terms on which their
self-styled performances should be interpreted. It is here, I suggest, that we
can recognize the enduring influence of the ideas the Thamyris tradition
had come to epitomize; for it was in him that a paradigm existed for excessive confidence in the course of an agonistic challenge leading to ruin.
Such a performance automatically tests boundaries and risks arousing
criticism and censure, whether in the shape of divine retribution or more
immediately, in the case of Old Comedy, through rejection by the audience and the judges in the Theater. Though the assimilation was implicit
and not necessarily a matter of deliberate emulation of Thamyris,149 with
a parabasis, comic poets reenacted the situation in which Thamyris found
himself, and so courted the risk of going too far in their own agonistic
challenges.
An explicit example of this understanding of comic parabasia may be
provided by Aristophanes himself, if Dwora Gilula has correctly explained
a passage in Birds.150 At a point where the chorus have suddenly become
interested in the advice Peisetairos can offer, his distrust in their temper
prompts him to extract a formal truce:
ΧΟ.
ΠE.
ΧΟ.
διατίθεμαι ᾿γώ.
κατóμοσóν νυν ταῦτά μοι.
ὄμνυμ᾿ ἐπὶ τούτοις, πᾶσι νικᾶν τοĩς κριταĩς
καὶ τοĩς θεαταĩς πᾶσιν.
Compare Hipp. Ep. 17, lines 150–1; philoneikia and hatred of one another driving people to transgress the laws of truth (θεσμοὺς ἀληθείης παραβεβήκασι). Dover’s remarks (1974, 30) on the
parabasis speak to this point:€“[T]here existed a traditional role€– the role of an angry, minatory
moralizer, a lone individual setting himself up against the majority€– into which a man addressing an Athenian audience was permitted to step, and … the adoption of this role commonly
created a greater distance between strict public attitudes and easy-going private behavior than
might be the case in some other cultures.”
149
Apart from Eq. 532–3, as argued at the start of this chapter.
150
Gilula (1994); cf. Imperio (2004) 9 n. 18, and for the way this passage fits within theatrical selfconsciousness in Aristophanes generally, Muecke (1977), esp. 58.
148
Comic parabasia
ΠE.
ΧΟ.
ἔσται ταυταγί.
εἰ δὲ παραβαίην, ἑνὶ κριτῇ νικᾶν μóνον. 51
(Birds 444–7)
Cho.: I agree.
Peis.: Then swear to it for me.
Cho.:I swear on these conditions:€that I win with the support of all the judges
and all the spectators€–
Peis.: So it shall be.
Cho.: but if I parabaiēn, that I win by one judge only.
As Gilula notes, the passage is not a parabasis but is “parabatic,” in the
sense that it disrupts the dramatic illusion and takes on metapoetic significance when the chorus discusses the reception of their performance and
their hope of winning the contest. The difference, between victory or …
victory, as Aristophanes confidently sees it, hinges on the term παραβαίην
(447). On the level of the plot, this refers to transgression of the terms
agreed to by the parties.151 But, Gilula argues, on the level of competitive performance, already activated by the chorus’ initial oath in 445–6,
the word simultaneously provides a metapoetic reference that renders the
performance of a self-assertive speech in support of the performance at
the agon the specific transgressive act that will dissolve the agreement.
Through its parabatic quality, the chorus’ confident assertion of their
play’s superiority and anticipated victory in the competition reflects the
brazen self-assurance that pervades the poet’s act of parabasia. In a sense,
they break their oath at the same time they take it.
Gilula’s observations are largely limited to the term parabainein itself and
assume that the verb’s established association with a particular moment in
a comic performance could facilitate this exchange of ideas. But the point
can be developed further, since the wording of the chorus’ offer of terms
of peace also reflects what they do later in the play, when they turn toward
the audience and perform a parabasis syzygy, not in explicit connection
with the poet but in their own character, as is usual in reduced parabases.152
In the second epirrhema (1102–17) the chorus refer again to their desire for
victory, playing off the concern that attended their earlier oath by boldly
confronting the judges and cajoling them with a mix of bribes and threats
to award them the victory they supposedly deserve. In a play that lacks the
usual parabatic appearance of the poet, Aristophanes clearly intended this
The notion of parabasia becomes closely associated with treaties and covenants because these
regularly prescribed oaths use the gods as witnesses and protectors; thus breaking such an agreement was tantamount to disregarding the gods. See E. Med. 492–5.
152
But see V. 1284–91.
151
52
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
epirrhema to serve the purpose of the anapests.153 That the chorus now take
on the task of lobbying for their comedy only emphasizes the connection
with their earlier promise not to parabainein. But by emphatically recollecting their previous plea to the judges in this parabasis, the chorus flaunt
their earlier oath in its metapoetic formulation. The oath is thus twice broken, and the parabasis epirrhema becomes an act of transgression.
For our purposes, the most important consideration is that the oathscene establishes an equivalence between transgression and poetic selfassertion. If there were independent evidence that parabainein had the
colorless sense “step forward,” we might conclude that Aristophanes
allowed two distinct meanings of the verb to collide for comic effect. As
this cannot be asserted with any confidence, it may rather be that the poet
here unpacks the connection of comic parabainein with the verb’s primary
association as it operated in the formula for audience address. At the very
least, the easy exchange of ideas via use of the term parabainein in the chorus’ oath suggests that the negative aspect of the verb was available to the
Athenian audience when they heard a poet announce his intention of confronting them to engage in shameless self-praise. It is doubtful that comic
poets could have successfully divested the verb of its narrow and firmly
established semantic range; more likely they revelled in the ambiguity the
word offered in the way Aristophanes appears to do in Birds.
In the surviving parabases, an abiding acknowledgment of the negative
dimension of comic parabasia in the sense described above is apparent in
the way such performances are treated as something in which the poet
or his chorus would prefer not to engage, but which has become necessary.154 At Acharnians 628–9, the poet claims that he has never performed
an act of parabasia in order “to proclaim how clever he is,” and would not
do so now if his enemies were not busy maligning him publicly. At Peace
734–5, on the other hand, the chorus argue that any poet€– other than
Aristophanes, of course€– should be beaten for performing an act of parabasia, as though physical punishment were the appropriate response to
aggressive posturing and outrageous self-aggrandizing claims.155 The reasons offered in these examples may be specious; their effect is to plead for
the audience’s indulgence, so as to create space for the poet to say things
about himself that would be unpalatable under normal circumstances.
Cf. Totaro (2000) 168–9. A very similar passage appears in the revised Clouds (1115–30).
That comic poets shared topoi with oratory in expressing these ideas (see Dover (1974) 23–33) is
no obstacle.
155
Cf. the compulsion on a chorus by poets to perform parabases in Eq. 507–9, and the reluctant
manner in which Plato Comicus (fr. 99) performs “such a speech of words.”
153
154
Comic parabasia
53
That standard of judgment is particularly evident in the parabasis of
Clouds, where Aristophanes builds his personality around discretion
and sōphrosynē, perhaps in order to counteract the mood of vigorous and
shameless self-�promotion that overshadows his humility and exposes it as
affectation.156 For after establishing a mild-mannered persona in the first
half of the Clouds parabasis, in the second half he sheds this disguise and
boldly asserts his superiority over all rivals (549–59) and ends by cajoling
the audience to support him (560–2). By adopting such discordant qualities of character, the poet dodges back and forth over the line that distinguishes acceptable from potentially reprehensible behavior.
But the ethical and religious framework within which comic parabasia operates becomes most conspicuous when these passages are considered together with the syzygy that follows. Parabasis odes usually take
the Olympian gods as their theme and amount to prayers, invocations,
or hymns that establish (or perhaps reestablish) a congenial relationship
between poet and gods that might otherwise be put at risk by his excessive
encomium of his talents when he confronts his rivals before the audience.157
We should probably think of these prayers as not just helping to define the
chorus’ identity, but as ensuring that the performers will not alienate the
deities most inclined to lend them support.158 The combination of anapests
and odes thus fulfills differently the pattern in Hesiod and the other poets
discussed above, who combine assertions of poetic worth with a firm sense
of respect for their divine patrons. In this light, the frequency with which
parabasis odes address the Muses should be taken into account,159 for this
suggests that the parabasis took over much of the work of facilitating divine patronage accomplished in earlier poetry by formal invocations.
On this aspect of Aristophanic parabases, cf. Hubbard (1991) 150.
For the traditional nature of parabasis odes, see Fraenkel (1962) 191–215; Sifakis (1971) 55–9.
The odes of the Clouds parabasis (563–74, 595–606) are especially striking in this regard, since
their invocation of numerous Olympians occurs within a play that to this point has rejected the
authority of the traditional gods, though it is also true that their traditional odes prefigure the
chorus’ final reversal of attitude (1454–61); see Segal (1969) 171; Bierl (2004) 16.
158
Hence the emphasis on victory at, e.g., Eq. 586–94. In an Athenian dedication for a poetic victory (IG I3 833bis (c. 480 bc); see Ch. 3) the poet acknowledges the part prayer played in fulfilling
his competitive objectives. The prayers to Nike at the end of some Euripidean plays (Ph.; Hipp.;
IT; Or.), though suspect (Barrett (1964) 417–18; Mastronarde (1994) 645), show the same interest; cf. hHom. 6.19–20; Alcm. PMG 1.82–4; Men. Sam. 735–7. The facilitation of harmony with
gods is helped further by the fact that a meaningful connection often exists between the chorus’
identity and the specific gods invoked:€e.g., “the Acharnian Muse” (Ach. 665–6); Poseidon, “the
god of horses” (Eq. 551–3). For parabasis odes and the process of choral self-presentation, see
Hubbard (1991) 21.
159
Ach. 665–6; Pax 775–80; Av. 737; Ra. 674–5; cf. Cratin. fr. 237; Ar. fr. 348.
156
157
54
From Thamyris to Aristophanes
In its full form, the parabasis harmonizes the poet’s agonistic temper
with a sense of respect for the boundaries that distinguish humility and
arrogance, human and divine. It responds to the same fundamental and
enduring Greek ethical dilemma as that within which the Thamyris myth
located poetic agonism. If the comic parabasis can be viewed as related or
in some sense derived from the ritualized provocations Thamyris’ boast
represents, it is still remarkable for the way it embraced this mode of discourse and developed into a poetic sub-performance the boasting and
self-praise that were among the activities most likely to shatter the distinctions Thamyris’ story helped define. Humor provided the comic poets a
degree of license unavailable in other contexts, and enabled this received
and socially constructed performance to take an extreme form.160 But by
self-consciously deprecating its own performance, the parabasis responds
to the perception that a poet who stepped forward to engage in public
contest risked overreaching with his ambitions and accompanying claims
of superiority.
In closing, I return to where I began, with the place of Thamyris in the
parabasis of Knights. The broken lyre borrowed from the tradition about
him makes an essential contribution to the overall interest of the passage in
the embarrassment of defeat at a poetic competition. Through this image
Aristophanes articulates his rivalry with Cratinus and gloats on his recent
victory over the veteran poet. Indeed, Aristophanes epitomizes this tradition further through the bold step of transforming his rival into the actual
instrument whose destruction came to symbolize the end of Thamyris’
competitive career. But the central features of the portrait of Thamyris
are just as applicable to the other poets mentioned in the passage, Magnes
and Crates, or to any competitor, for that matter, who by passing from
preeminence to disgrace in the course of his career confirmed Thamyris’
essential experience. The same applies to Aristophanes himself. By casting
his recently defeated rival in the role of Thamyris, he implicitly expresses
the same pride in victory that ruined the mythical poet, ensuring that he
in turn might someday become Thamyris when, like the mythical poet in
his relationship with the Muses, he lost the favor of Komoidodidaskalia.
Concern for this eventuality is supposedly what motivated Aristophanes’
hesitation, which is the basis for the rhetorical position taken throughout this parabasis (515–19). But restraint plays against the poet’s decision
to assert himself more boldly in the competitions. His hatred and daring
Sommerstein (2005) 171, offers related comments on comedy’s unique ability to flirt with disaster from the gods.
160
Comic parabasia
55
(510 μισεĩ τολμᾷ τε) are what win him the support of his chorus, who
thus consent to parabainein for him but not for older “has-beens,” like
the soon-to-be-mentioned Cratinus. That confidence becomes even more
conspicuous in light of the fact that only after his victory at the Lenaia
in 425 did Aristophanes decide to take on the role of theatrical didaskalos (513). Here again, the parabasis fulfills its purpose of competitive selfassertion behind the mask of humility. Through contradictions of tone
and purpose, the Knights parabasis draws out the tension between discretion and an impulse toward daring self-assertion that was a natural expression of philoneikia, following a pattern established long ago in the tale of
Thamyris.
ch apter 2
The competitive partnership of Aristophanes
and Dikaiopolis in Acharnians
Among the things for which Pericles congratulates his fellow Athenians
in his funeral oration is the number of festivals they celebrated during the
year. With contests and sacrifices (Th. 2.38 ἀγῶσι μέν γε καὶ θυσίαις), he
says, these occasions provided a pleasure (τέρψις) that momentarily banished day-to-day hardships (τὸ λυπηρόν).1 During the cold, rainy months
of winter, the various Dionysian festivals that extended from December
through March must have been a major source of communal and personal
joy. Although in the case of the dramatic contests the terpsis to which
Pericles alludes may have derived from the audience’s simple enjoyment
of the individual productions, it is also certain that the Athenians were
invested in the outcome of the competitions themselves. Plato condemns
the kind of “theatrocracy” that came to dominate the poetic agon,2 and
Plutarch recalls an occasion when the audience was heatedly divided in
their support of Aeschylus and the young Sophocles, leading the presiding archon, in a moment of administrative inspiration, to adapt festival
protocol by replacing the normal ten judges with the ten generals in order
to lend authority to a decision that would inevitably meet with disapproval
from a large segment of the audience.3
Aristophanes would not disappoint his audience’s festive expectations
at the Lenaia of 425, where comedy appears to have been the privileged
�genre.4 Acharnians caters fully to Athenian pride in the festival celebrations, by including within its plot not one but two festivals of Dionysos,
the Rural Dionysia and the Anthesteria.5 In this play Aristophanes draws
specific advantages from the ideals of communal joy and communal
Osborne (1993) shows how accurate Pericles’ representation of the full festival calendar was.
Lg. 659a–c, 700c–701a; cf. Wallace (1997).
3
Cim. 8.7–9.
4
At the Lenaia the tragic performances had a reduced program:€two poets with only two plays
apiece; cf. Haigh (1907) 27–8; Allen (1938) 38; Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 40–1, 107.
5
See especially Habash (1995). Ham (2004) argues less convincingly for a sequence of five Dionysian
festivals.
1
2
56
Competitive partnership
57
repose, highlighted by Pericles’ remarks, to increase the emotional impact
on the audience of his hero’s objective of establishing a state of festival-like
peace in his own life at least, if not in the polis and throughout Greece.
Bundled together with the Aristophanic vision of festival celebration, as
in Pericles’ comments in Thucydides, is the pleasure of witnessing competitions, and both festival representations include agonistic elements that
resonate with Aristophanes’ own competitive endeavor.
In Acharnians Aristophanes allows Dikaiopolis’ experience to overlap
and emphasize his own experience in the poetic agon. The identification
of the poet with his hero is one of the play’s most striking features, and
many critics have attempted to make sense of this coincidence of voices by
charting the specific ways and extent to which Aristophanes identifies with
or distinguishes himself from Dikaiopolis.6 Attention to Aristophanes’
competitive poetics provides a different way of looking at these problems.
The interplay of personalities in the characterization of Dikaiopolis can
be viewed as an extension of the treatment of the poet’s personality in
the parabasis discussed in Chapter 1. The parabasis creates an identity for
the poet that achieves the objective of competitive self-assertion by fancifully rendering aspects of his plays as attributes of an authorial persona. A
reverse process of identification is apparent in the characterization of the
comic hero, whereby the sequence of antagonism, formal contest, victory,
and celebration that regularly structure comic plots elicits a competitive
paradigm shared by hero and poet. The play thus implicitly effects its own
victory by anticipating that outcome through the dramatic action. The
possibilities for interplay of personas along agonistic lines increase with
the degree of identification between poet and comic hero, and Acharnians
is exceptional in this regard, for the extensive identification of poet and
protagonist allows us to view Aristophanes and Dikaiopolis as, in effect,
synagōnistai or “joint-competitors.”
I begin with some notes of warning. As in the case of the parabasis, here
again we must not be lured into thinking of Dikaiopolis or any comic
hero as identifiable with the historical Aristophanes. Whether in a parabasis or through his hero, Aristophanes creates a persona that represents
the poet as he sees fit to portray himself for the sake of an individual play
in the dramatic competition. Thus there may be some truth to the extreme
position that “there is no reason why a playwright should not invent a hero
6
Especially important contributions in this discussion are Bowie (1982) 29–32; Foley (1988);
Goldhill (1991) 188–96; Hubbard (1991) 45–53. The hypothesis that Aristophanes played the part
of Dikaiopolis in performance, revived most recently by Sutton (1988) (cf. Slater (2002) 56–7),
remains an intriguing possibility but cannot be supported by any evidence; cf. Olson (1990a).
58
Competitive partnership
whose attitudes and behaviour he abhors.”7 Certainly a comic hero can
get away with things no real person could dream of doing, though the
Athenians were probably like us in being able to love a rogue, in the right
circumstances and if he was effectively portrayed in a dramatic work of
fiction. But in practice, a poet’s considerations about his hero must have
involved, on an important level, the question of audience reception, and
it is a safe assumption that he reduced his chances of agonistic success by
presenting a protagonist who was repulsive in essential ways.8 One thinks
immediately of the role Strepsiades’ scheme and personality may have
played in the defeat of the original Clouds. The old man’s selfish objective
of escaping his debts is hard to embrace; more to the point, it is utterly
rejected within the course of the play.9 Creating a hero who is an abject
rascal and a failure to boot was a daring literary enterprise, but evidently
did little to assure access to Nike’s chariot.
We are in a different situation with Dikaiopolis’ peace which, although
self-serving, stems from the rest of the city’s refusal “properly” to assess the
relative benefits of peace and war, and is harmonized with victory at both
the level of the plot and in how the plot looks outward to the Lenaia contest. My discussion will trace points of convergence between the personas
of Aristophanes and Dikaiopolis. Many of these have been observed by
others; my goal is to show how they are coordinated around the theme of
dramatic competition, whereby the hero’s achievement paves the way for
the framing contest at the dramatic festivals. The agon is the uniting principle, and the competitive poetics thus achieved represents Aristophanes’
effort to meet the challenge of contending against his rivals to honor
Dionysos at his festival.
Di k a iop ol i s a n d t h e p ol i t ic s
of Ru r a l Dion y s i a
The reflection of festival performance in Acharnians, channelled through
its hero, is presented to the audience with the opening monologue, in
which Dikaiopolis recounts his joys and troubles:
Olson (2002) xlvii.
Cf. Dover (1974) 18–19. Rosen (2008) 145–6 and 159 remarks on how “badness” presented through
characters in a play can complicate and potentially create tension between a poet and his audience;
Arist. Rh. 1416a 28–35 is a striking example. Henderson (1993a) 309–10, considers these points in
connection with the political ideals of Old Comedy.
9
Cf. Hubbard (1991) 111–12. I argue for important differences between the two versions of Clouds in
Chapter 5, but Strepsiades’ essential comic project and characterization were probably much the
same in the original play.
7
8
Dikaiopolis and the politics of Rural Dionysia
ἐγὦδ᾿ ἐφ᾿ ᾧ γε τὸ κέαρ ηὐφράνθην ἰδών,
τοĩς πέντε ταλάντοις οἷς Κλέων ἐξήμεσεν.
ταῦθ᾿ ὡς ἐγανώθην¸ καὶ φιλῶ τοὺς ἱππέας
διὰ τοῦτο τοὔργον ἄξιον γὰρ Ἑλλάδι.
ἀλλ᾿ ὠδυνήθην ἕτερον αὖ τραγῳδικόν,
ὅτε δὴ ᾿κεχήνη προσδοκῶν τὸν Αἰσχύλον,
ὁ δ᾿ ἀνεĩπεν¸ “εἴσαγ᾿ ὦ Θέογνι τὸν χορόν”.
πῶς τοῦτ᾿ ἔσεισέ μου δοκεĩς τὴν καρδίαν;
ἀλλ᾿ ἕτερον ἥσθην¸ ἡνίκ᾿ ἐπὶ Μόσχῳ ποτὲ
Δεξίθεος εἰσῆλθ᾿ ᾀσόμενος Βοιώτιον.
τῆτες δ᾿ ἀπέθανον καὶ διεστράφην ἰδών,
ὅτε δὴ παρέκυψε Χαĩρις ἐπὶ τὸν ὄρθιον.
59
(Acharnians 5–16)
I know what I rejoiced in my heart at seeing:
the five talents Cleon vomited up.
How I enjoyed that, and I love the knights
for this deed! For it is worthy of Greece.
But then I suffered another tragic misfortune,
when I sat there stupidly expecting Aeschylus,
and the herald cried, “Theognis, bring your chorus on!”
How do you imagine this shook my heart?
But I rejoiced, on the other hand, when once, following Moschus,
Dexitheos entered to sing a Boiotian tune.
But this year I died of torture looking on,
when Chairis popped out for the soprano.
After these remarks, Dikaiopolis identifies the war with Sparta as the
source of his immediate troubles. But his introductory reminiscences
of joys and pains focus on the Theater.10 Tragedy is recalled in how his
anticipation of Aeschylus was soured by the herald’s call for Theognis
to take the stage.11 A similar pattern of pleasure turned to pain is apparent in the case of citharody, as the fond recollection of Dexitheos gave
way to Chairis “this year.” Dikaiopolis’ reflections may also focus attention on Aristophanes’ own Dionysian genre, if the vignette about Cleon
recalls a scene or scenario from Babylonians, staged at the previous City
Dionysia 12€– in which case it is probably no coincidence that comedy is
the only genre that the hero remembers bringing him any undiluted pleasure, or that the comedy alluded to with such approbation and enthusiasm
belongs to Aristophanes. Already, Dikaiopolis is preparing the audience to
Cf. Hubbard (1991) 41–2; Slater (2002) 44–5; Pretagostini (2003).
Cf. Ach. 139–40, where Dikaiopolis marks time by the season of Theognis’ theatrical career.
12
See Olson (2002) 6–8n.; Pretagostini (2003) 95–6, both with further bibliography.
10
11
60
Competitive partnership
give this new play a favorable reception. He is a creature of the Theater, but
above all he is Aristophanes’ creature.
What Dikaiopolis says about his own pleasures and calamities fits
within a broader framework of nostalgia for the past. His ultimate focus is
on the current political situation (19 ὡς νῦν), and the resulting misfortunes
are contrasted in place and time with the life he enjoyed before the war
in his tranquil deme in the Attic countryside (esp. 32–6). The contrasts
articulated in his wistfulness are prefigured in his literary exempla:€that
of citharody sets the memory of Dexitheos “at some point” in the past
against the discouraging appearance of Chairis “this year.”13 Similarly
Dikaiopolis’ thwarted expectation of Aeschylus in his “tragic” misfortune implicitly compares the high standards achieved by the legendary
tragedian with the underwhelming Theognis of the present. Exactly what
situation Dikaiopolis is referring to in his expectation of Aeschylus is a
matter of debate. The scholiast refers to an Athenian decree passed after
Aeschylus’ death that awarded a chorus to anyone wishing to stage one of
his plays, and this explanation has been widely accepted by modern scholars, who posit restagings of Aeschylus at the City Dionysia.14 I have argued
elsewhere that this tradition rests on questionable authority and is likely to
have been generated by interpretations of this and other comic passages.15
My own understanding of this passage assumes that dramatic characterization of Dikaiopolis is the crucial point:€ his expectation of Aeschylus
presents him as a traditionally minded, elderly Athenian,16 with the further implication that his preference for the countryside has kept him from
witnessing putative advances in tragic entertainment in recent decades.
The expectation of Aeschylean restagings may even have had a specific resonance with the countryside, namely at the Rural Dionysia; for it is generally assumed that reperformances of plays were a feature of these festivals,
As Olson (2002) 13–14n. explains, probably a reference to contests in citharody at the Great
Panathenaia, the implication being that the performance by Dexitheos recalled here took place
no earlier than 430. Dikaiopolis implies in 17 (cf. 1–3) that his memories come from throughout
his life.
14
Del Corno (1956); Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 86, 100; Slater (1990) 394; Di Marco (1992); Dover
(1993) 23; Csapo and Slater (1994) 3; Mastromarco (1997) 545–8; Pretagostini (2003) 96–100;
Revermann (2006a) 19–20, 72–3.
15
Biles (2006–7). See, however, Nervegna (2007) 15–18; the approach of Lech (2008) does little to solidify faith in this tradition, especially since the crucial witness (Ra. 1021–2) to a supposed revival of A. Th. between 411 and 405 is clearly in reference to the original production by
Aeschylus himself.
16
Cf. Olson (2002) 10–11n. It is not necessarily the case that this interpretation is only comprehensible in light of Dikaiopolis’ comments in the second part of his opening monologue; certainly
his advanced age, in addition perhaps to his rustic orientation, would have been evident from his
costume.
13
Dikaiopolis and the politics of Rural Dionysia
61
and we would expect that a fondness for Aeschylus kept him alive on such
occasions.17
That interpretation is speculative; but it has the merit of tying in to
what is soon established as the chief source of correspondences in the identities of Dikaiopolis and Aristophanes. No sooner does Dikaiopolis taste
the last of the three spondai that Amphitheos brings to him at the end
of the prologue, than he cries out in approbation, “Oh, Dionysia!” (195).
By comic synecdoche, Dikaiopolis catches the scent not of Dionysos in
his metonymic relation to wine, but of the celebration of dramatic festivals in the god’s honor.18 His festivals are equated with “spondai on land
and sea” (194–5),19 and there may be some contextual justification for this
view of things, since the performances at the City Dionysia, at least, were
preceded by libations to Dionysos performed by the ten generals.20 After
accepting these libations, Dikaiopolis immediately vows to make the first
demonstration of his peace through a celebration of the Rural Dionysia
(201–2).
Following the hostile entry of the Acharnians in the parodos (204–36),
Dikaiopolis reappears on stage ready to initiate a private celebration of the
Rural Dionysia to match his private truce, organizing the phallic pompē
with which the festival began.21 Dramatically, this procession establishes
a return to the countryside, which had been Dikaiopolis’ wish since his
opening monologue (32–6). Thematically, it has important consequences
for the identity of Dikaiopolis and the characterization of his conflicts.
Aristotle famously sought the origins of comedy in phallic processions in
the demes (Po. 1449a 10–13);22 thus in one sense Dikaiopolis’ actions signify the genesis of comedy itself, and his determination to renew the celebration after a seven-year hiatus€ – since the war began (266–7)€– takes
on the emblematic status of reinvigorating life in the countryside first
and foremost by reinstituting comedy as a foil to war.23 Among the roles
Indeed, the influence of Aeschylus in drama of the second half of the fifth century may depend
on these reperformances, rather than on reading texts or stagings at city festivals.
For the wine metaphor, see Newiger (1957) 52–3; Taillardat (1962) 372; Edmunds (1980) 5–6;
Reckford (1987) 167–8; Bowie (1995) 123–5.
19
Contrast Lamachus’ later proclamation of war “with ships and footsoldiers” (622).
20
Plu. Cim. 8.7–9. For the significance of this element of the festival, see Goldhill (1990) 100–1,
although Rhodes (2003) offers a critique of his emphasis on “democratic” rather than “polis” ideals. An amphora of wine played a part in the rituals of the Rural Dionysia (Plu. Mor. 527d).
21
For the procession as a feature of the Rural Dionysia, see Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 42–3; Habash
(1995) 561–2; Jones (2004) 145–7.
22
For recent discussion of this and other theories for comedy’s origins as reflected in visual art, see
Rusten (2006a).
23
As Taaffe (1993) 27, comments, Dikaiopolis imitates “in miniature and in parody, the beginnings
of the dramatic genre in which he exists.” For connections between Dikaiopolis’ song and the
17
18
62
Competitive partnership
Dikaiopolis plays in organizing this festival, most notably he becomes a
poet-performer when he leads the iambic song that accompanies the procession (263–79).24
Regardless of whether Aristotle was right about the origins of comedy, during the Classical period the Rural Dionysia were an occasion for
dramatic performance. Our knowledge of these celebrations consists primarily of fragmentary inscriptions from choregic monuments and official
regulations. The picture that emerges is of a festival that in most respects
replicated on a smaller scale the dramatic festivals in the city, featuring€– doubtless with different arrangements in different demes€– tragedy,
comedy, and dithyramb in the usual format of formal contests.25 These performances must have included restagings of plays already produced at the
city festivals, though there is no reason to believe that new plays were not
sometimes included.26 Indeed, efforts have recently been made to reverse
the long-held view of these festivals as a parochial affair, by emphasizing
the scant but clear evidence that performances included some of the best
talent of the day.27 Most compelling is a choregic inscription from Eleusis,
which must be connected with the Rural Dionysia there and not the City
Dionysia, and which implies that Sophocles and Aristophanes acted as
didaskaloi at the deme’s dramatic festival.28 That scenario in turn makes
it impossible entirely to disregard Aelian’s claim (VH 2.13) that Socrates
was not above attending the Rural Dionysia in Piraeus when Euripides
produced tragedies there. Although we might still conclude that the city
festivals had a cherished position in the festival calendar, because they consistently offered productions of the highest calibre and were an occasion
for much active celebration of polis culture and ideology, Rural Dionysia
must have afforded average citizens throughout Attika in Aristophanes’
day an important opportunity to experience drama.29
Dikaiopolis’ recourse to this festival as a means of celebrating his
peace thus activates an atmosphere rich in opportunities for metapoetic
phallic song cited by Semos of Delos (PMG 851), see Bierl (2001) 300–61. Phallic processions also
took place at the City Dionysia; see Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 62; Csapo and Slater (1994) 104,
106; Pütz (2007) 125–7.
24
Cf. Edmunds (1980) 6; Slater (2002) 49, discusses the metatheatrical aspects of this scene.
25
Jones (2004) 142–52, attempts to reconstruct a generic program of events for the Rural Dionysia.
26
Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 52. Slater (2002) 54, strangely dismisses the phenomenon of reperformance in the fifth century.
27
Above all, Csapo (2004); cf. Revermann (2006a) 67–70; (2006b) 112.
28
IG I3 970. The successive synchoregia attested in the inscription cannot refer to the City Dionysia,
since this arrangement lasted for only a single year, 405 bc. Cf. Capps (1943) 5–8; Csapo (2004)
59–60.
29
Csapo (2004) 57–66, assembles the evidence.
Dikaiopolis and the politics of Rural Dionysia
63
associations with the performance of Acharnians itself at the Lenaia, and
for developing the coincidence of identities between poet and hero. The
festival ambience thus elicited extends far beyond Dikaiopolis’ initial procession, to create a frame for all the action leading up to the parabasis.
Most importantly, this includes the idea around which these scenes are
oriented, Dikaiopolis’ restaging of a play by Euripides. The extensive,
even blatant metatheater developed throughout the hero’s encounter with
the chorus is appropriately generated by the very situation toward which
Dikaiopolis emphatically directed the play’s action the moment he took
up his spondai. Although the connection between Dikaiopolis’ Rural
Dionysia and his eventual “performance” seems obvious, discussions of
these scenes generally imply that the celebration breaks off and is forgotten once the Acharnians burst on the scene.30 But several considerations
suggest a broader influence of the Rural Dionysia on the plot than has
previously been remarked.
As others have noted, Acharnians makes rapid shifts of time and
place:€ the Athenian Assembly in the prologue (city); Dikaiopolis’ deme
of Cholleidai for the Rural Dionysia afterward (countryside and midwinter); a visit to Euripides’ house (city?); Dikaiopolis’ marketplace after the
parabasis (countryside); and finally celebrations of the Anthesteria at the
end of the play (city? and early spring).31 This is a dizzying sequence; yet
all the transitions are clearly articulated by what characters say and do
on stage. Between the parodos (204–36) and the chorus’ first encounter
with Dikaiopolis (280–3), Aristophanes’ hero emphatically establishes
the festival ambience with the procession scene, during which the chorus
somewhat awkwardly wait in the wings. Indeed, the chorus unwittingly
become complicit in Dikaiopolis’ celebration, as they initially heed his call
for holy silence and clear the way for his procession (237–41). Dikaiopolis
subsequently flees to Euripides; but he obviously returns afterward to the
“place” where he left the chorus. Non-verbal evidence should also be taken
into account. In addition to the props specifically alluded to (esp. 242–4),
the procession-scene doubtless included additional costume-items, including a garland.32 How many of these physical tokens of the festival remained
E.g., Slater (2002) 48–9, who is otherwise perceptive in picking up on metatheatrical cues.
E.g., Fisher (1993) 32–3; differently, Belknap (1934).
32
See (e.g.) the representations of characters dressed for celebration in Green and Handley (1995)
figs. 29, 31. Stone (1984) 404–7, discusses change of costume as an indication of change of fortune in Aristophanes, but without reference to this scene. For the general problem of accounting
for extratextual contributions to the performance, see Revermann (2006a) 62–5. Dikaiopolis’
absence from the stage during the parodos serves the practical purpose of allowing the actors to
organize themselves for the elaborate staging of the procession.
30
31
64
Competitive partnership
on stage thereafter is impossible to say, but Dikaiopolis himself has no
time to change costume until the Euripides scene, and must remain in festival attire.33 It is a reasonable premise, therefore, that the scenes following
the parodos continue to operate under the sign of his Rural Dionysia.
Aristophanes’ choice of identity for his chorus may also be closely connected with the Rural Dionysian background. The choice has long been
explained through reference to Thucydides, from whom we learn that
Acharnae was the chief target of Spartan devastation during their first
invasion of Attika, and that the effect of this on the residents of the deme
was to sharpen their temper for revenge as they watched the destruction
of their fields from within the city walls (2.19–21). There is no denying
the importance of that background for Aristophanes’ play;34 yet neither
he nor his fellow Athenians had read Thucydides, but relied instead on
their own sense of what the Acharnians’ identity contributed to the play.
As befits a deme that made up the entire inland trittys of the tribe whose
hero, Oineus (“Wine-man”), was descended from Dionysos, Acharnae had
important connections with the Rural Dionysia.35 Inscriptional evidence
points to contests in tragedy, comedy, and dithyramb, to which may now
be added a theater unearthed in recent excavations.36 Although the evidence currently available does not certify such performances in Acharnae
before the early fourth century, inscriptional testimony generally appears
well after the date when dramatic festivals can be surmised to have taken
place anywhere based on other considerations, most notably the presence
of theaters.37 Two considerations support the likelihood that Acharnae
not only had a Rural Dionysia from an early point, but a significant one.
As Nicholas Jones has argued, Rural Dionysia were not celebrated by all
demes, but seem to have been organized on the basis of considerations of
population and geographic distribution.38 Acharnae is by far the largest
deme in Attika,39 and the absence of a Rural Dionysia there would leave a
284 suggests that Dikaiopolis’ chutra, used for the ritual, survives the Acharnians’ onslaught,
though Olson (2002) 280–3n. is surely right in having the other members of the procession flee
the stage as the chorus attack.
34
See Bowie (1993) 40–1.
35
Traill (1975) table VI. Note that no other deme from Oineis is known to have hosted a Rural
Dionysia. Ikarion, another deme with mythical associations with Dionysos and wine, is among
the earliest known to have celebrated a Rural Dionysia; see Jones (2004) 133.
36
IG II2 3092; 3106; SEG XLIII 26.
37
See Csapo (2004) 65. Jones (2004) 128–9, 140, underscores the connection of theaters with dramatic contests in the demes.
38
Jones (2004) 139–41, with map on 137; the considerations are obvious, funds, human resources,
audience (which would include visitors).
39
Bouleutic quota of 22. Cf. Th. 2.19.2, 20.4; Traill (1975) 65–7.
33
Dikaiopolis and the politics of Rural Dionysia
65
very large region of Attika without any celebration of this festival. Though
some circularity of reasoning is unavoidable, therefore, Acharnians itself
arguably amounts to proof that the deme celebrated a Rural Dionysia, by
implicating the Acharnians in a plot driven initially by a Rural Dionysian
frame.
Certain details in the play can be taken to indicate that Aristophanes
used Acharnae’s association with Rural Dionysia for dramatic effect.
Dikaiopolis asserts his intention of celebrating the Rural Dionysia as a
pointed retort to the threat of Acharnian resistance:
ταύτας δέχομαι καὶ σπένδομαι κἀκπίομαι
χαίρειν κελεύων πολλὰ τοὺς ᾿Αχαρνέας.
ἐγὼ δὲ πολέμου καὶ κακῶν ἀπαλλαγεὶς
ἄξω τὰ κατ᾿ ἀγροὺς εἰσιὼν Διονύσια.
(Acharnians 199–202)
I accept these, and I pour libations and drink them off,
telling the Acharnians to piss off.
Putting an end to the misfortunes of war,
I will go inside and celebrate the Rural Dionysia.
His festival is an expression of his disregard for the Acharnians and
amounts to a direct, open challenge to them. So too, the Acharnians’
commitment to war is predicated not simply on the destruction of their
land and property, but on the specific attack on the production of grapes
and by implication wine (183 τῶν ἀμπέλων τετμημένων; cf. 232/3); it is
only appropriate, therefore, that they envision their revenge on the enemy
through the metaphor of a vine-stake piercing the invaders’ ankles (229–32
κοὐκ ἀνήσω πρὶν ἂν σχοĩνος αὐτοĩσιν ἀντεμπαγῶ | <καὶ σκόλοψ> ὀξὺς
ὀδυνηρὸς ἐπίκωπος).40 These associations of Acharnae with viticulture
come alongside Dikaiopolis’ initiation of his Rural Dionysia and resonate
with the festival ambience. The Acharnians’ anger thus has a specifically
Dionysian ring to it, and their fixation on agricultural devastation, while
explicable on historical grounds, has the emotional effect of concentrating
attention on the war’s disruption€– indeed obliteration€– of the agrarian
ideals that were core concerns of the Rural Dionysia.41 It is easy to understand why Dikaiopolis’ festival would ignite the Acharnians’ anger, given
that they had presumably been unable to celebrate their own festival with
the same freedom or resources as before the war€– that is, if they had been
See Olson (2002) 229–33n. The metaphor anticipates Lamachus’ injury (1178).
Cf. Jones (2004) 125–7.
40
41
66
Competitive partnership
able to celebrate it at all.42 Jones actually proposes a Rural Dionysia in the
deme of Cholleidai on the sole basis of Dikaiopolis’ celebration, although
this would make it the smallest Attic deme to host the festival.43 We might
thus do better to take Dikaiopolis’ decision to celebrate the Rural Dionysia
for what it appears to be in the play:€an element of sheer comic fantasy
whereby the hero co-opts for himself a festival once hosted in grand fashion by the very demesmen who now rush out to confront him. Needless to
say, on this interpretation Aristophanes’ engagement with issues of peace
and war through a Rural Dionysia becomes more pointed; so too, the very
matter of celebrating dramatic festivals becomes embedded in the antagonism at the heart of the plot.
What takes place as the action unfolds will have come as little surprise
to the original audience€– least of all the Acharnians€– for whom restagings of drama at Rural Dionysia were a familiar experience. The trajectory
of the conflict between Dikaiopolis and the Acharnians towards a performance of Euripides’ Telephos is initially established through allusion.
Dikaiopolis is already playing his part in the production when he tries to
calm the chorus by offering to speak with his head on a chopping block
(317–18), making concrete what is in Euripides’ play a metaphor (fr. 706).
When this plan fails, he seizes a charcoal-basket and threatens to kill it
(325–32), imitating what Euripides’ Telephos did with the infant Orestes.
An audience experienced in Rural Dionysia will have sensed the influence of the festival background on this “drama.” For those who missed
the hints of things to come, Dikaiopolis’ visit to Euripides sets out his dramatic enterprise more bluntly. By these maneuvers Dikaiopolis implicitly
redefines his conflict with the Acharnians as a dramatic contest, an effect
that becomes more apparent when we recognize what happens with the
agonistic structure of the comic plot at the same time.
The terms of the conflict have been amply presented in the parodos
and the exchange immediately after the chorus’ disruption of the procession (284–325), and with his initial Telephean borrowings Dikaiopolis
has managed to restrain the Acharnians. This is the point where a fullfledged epirrhematic agon, in which the disputants present their views and
a resolution is reached, ushering in the triumphant vision of the comic
hero, is expected. But Acharnians has no formal agon; instead, it offers
Dikaiopolis’ remark at 266–7 implies that he, at least, had not celebrated it since the war began;
cf. Olson (2002) 266–70n. Upon his return from exile, Alcibiades curried public favor by reinstituting the Eleusinian procession, held in abeyance because of the war (Xen. HG 1.4.20).
43
The bouleutic quota of Cholleidai is 2. The next smallest deme attested as celebrating a Rural
Dionysia, Kollytos (bouleutic quota 3, assuming Paiania is the larger “Lower” deme), was an
urban deme and could presumably depend on nearby resources; see Jones (2004) 141.
42
Dikaiopolis and the politics of Rural Dionysia
67
rudiments of agon structures in this vicinity.44 Above all, the chorus’ two
short songs at 358–65 and 385–92 have the feel of agon odes, particularly in
the way they close with couplets resembling katakeleusmoi, even including the break-off formula ἀλλά (364, 391) that regularly marks the transition from ode to katakeleusmos.45 More to the point, the chorus end
the second song by characterizing their encounter with Dikaiopolis as an
agon:€ὡς σκῆψιν ἁγὼν οὗτος οὐκ ἐνδέξεται (392 “Since this contest will
permit no delay”).46 Likewise, when Dikaiopolis is on the point of returning to the chorus for his culminating performance, he takes up their characterization of the conflict as an agon:€ἆρ᾿ οἶσθ᾿ ὅσον τὸν ἀγῶν᾿ ἀγωνιεĩ
τάχα¸ | μέλλων ὑπὲρ Λακεδαιμονίων ἀνδρῶν λέγειν; (481–2 “Do you know
how great is the contest you will soon contest, in speaking on behalf of
the Lakedaimonians?”).47 He imagines himself poised on the starting
line in a foot-race (483 “Go forward now, my Spirit. Here’s the starting
line”), but the terms for the competition suddenly shift when it turns
out that a draught of Euripides will prepare him for this particular challenge:€ἕστηκας;€οὐκ εἶ καταπιὼν Εὐριπίδην; (484 “You stand there? Will
you not go, having swallowed Euripides?”).48 The very notion of “drinking” Euripides expands on the equation of wine with the Dionysia (195,
201–2), but treats the notional offering to Dionysos at his festivals€– the
dramatic performances themselves€– as a libation as well.49
E.g., in the opening conflict between Dikaiopolis and the chorus at 280–346. For discussion,
Gelzer (1960) 157–8, 166–9; Pickard-Cambridge (1927) 299; Edmunds (1980) 8. Cf. Zielinski
(1887) 10–11; Quaglia (1998) 47, 50.
45
See esp. Eq. 761; V. 346, 379, 546; Nu. 959, 1351; Av. 460, 548; Lys. 484, 549; Ra. 905, 1004; cf. Gelzer
(1960) 80. Since the katakeleusmoi in Acharnians look ahead to Dikaiopolis’ arguments, I find the
comments of White (1912) 321–2, and Gelzer (1960) 159, uncompelling; indeed, the second ode
in Acharnians is comparable to other antodes in emphasizing the extravagant measures and ploys
the second contestant must undertake (e.g., V. 644–7; Nu. 1032–5; cf. Gelzer (1960) 76–7). Note
too that in typical fashion the katakeleusmoi establish the meter of the epirrhema, with the surprise substitution of iambic trimeter already looking ahead to the “tragic” monologue (PickardCambridge (1927) 299).
46
Though the term “agon” is a modern technical designation, it is consistent with Aristophanes’
characterization of this poetic structure through the chorus’ remarks in such odes. From agon
odes:€V. 533–5 ὁρᾷς γὰρ ὥς | σοι μέγας ἔστ̓ ἀγὼν <νῦν> | καὶ περὶ τῶν ἁπάντων; Nu. 957 ἐστὶν
ἀγὼν μέγιστος; cf. Ra. 882–4 νῦν γὰρ ἀγὼν σοφίας ὁ μέγας χω- | ρεῖ πρὸς ἔργον ἤδη. For the
modern designation of the comic form by Bergk, Zielinski, and others, see Gelzer (1960) 1–10; for
similar language in Euripides, see Lloyd (1992) 4–5.
47
Paratragic, to be sure (Rau (1967) 37–8), but not necessarily from Telephos; see Olson (2002)
480–2n., rejecting Starkie’s claim.
48
For the athletic metaphor, see Taillardat (1962) 337–8, who compares the image of balbides
adopted by Philocleon at the moment he begins his epirrhema in the agon (V. 548–9; cf. E. Med.
1245); Campagner (2001) 107–8.
49
Tentatively suggested by Bowie (1995) 123. Less convincing is Sommerstein’s (1980a, 484n.) suggestion that swallowing Euripides reflects the priming of fighting cocks by feeding them garlic.
44
68
Competitive partnership
It is now apparent why Dikaiopolis immediately rushes off to Euripides
upon hearing the chorus issue the challenge of an agon (393–4). As the
plot and formal comic structure seem to move toward the expected epirrhematic agon, the hero relies on the Dionysian atmosphere to redefine the
nature of the contest as a dramatic performance staged with competitive
stakes of the most dire kind during a celebration of the Rural Dionysia.50
Contextually speaking, with the Telephos stratagem Dikaiopolis hits
on a perfect solution. From these considerations it also emerges that
Aristophanes is not scattering fragments of poetic structures about without an underlying logic; instead, he manipulates generic expectations and
recalibrates the format in which the conflict is expected to take place, to
take full advantage of potentials latent within his plot. Nor are such subtle
effects inappropriate to Athenian comedy. This self-conscious shifting of
expectations along generic lines is exactly the kind of effect Aristophanes
and other poets could take advantage of, due to their audiences’ high
degree of competence at recognizing poetic structures such as the epirrhematic agon, which they acquired through regular attendance at dramatic
festivals, as well as through personal participation in dramatic choruses.51
Its purely comic potential aside, the scene at Euripides’ house lays bare
Dikaiopolis’ plan for the audience by highlighting his dramatic aspirations.52 In the course of the scene, Dikaiopolis secures the costumes
and props he needs for his performance, presenting the image€ – comically portrayed of course€ – of a potential producer. What he requires
are the rags of a specific play, as the definite article in his first request
shows:€ δός μοι ῥάκιόν τι τοῦ παλαιοῦ δράματος (415 “Give me a bit
of rag from that old play”). With “old play” Dikaiopolis clearly has in
mind a revival performance, and Olson’s comparison to the terminology
used in inscriptions for restagings at the City Dionysia may be apt.53 For
although “old plays” were only incorporated into the city program in
the fourth century, the assumption of restagings at the Rural Dionysia
might have introduced a categorical significance for the term long before.
Unfortunately Dikaiopolis cannot remember the title character’s name,
so the initial comic thrust is based on the fun of having Euripides rummage through the seemingly infinite number of costumes appropriate for
In this sense the chorus’ challenge/threat gives direction to Dikaiopolis’ intention of “costuming
himself ” as wretchedly as possible just before (383–4). It is also possible that Dikaiopolis’ idea
is anticipated by the chorus’ vaunt that, for all they care, he can fetch a cap from Hieronymus
(387–90), which is to say a prop from a tragic poet; see Slater (2002) 52.
51
Revermann (2006b), especially 112–14, for the points made here.
52
Cf. Muecke (1982a) 21–3.
53
Olson (2002) 414–5n.; IG II2 2318.202, 317; 2320.2.
50
Dikaiopolis and the politics of Rural Dionysia
69
a pitiful, beggarly identity (412–13).54 The implication that these are plays
with which Euripides himself once competed is brought to the audience’s
attention with his first attempt to come up with the right costume:€τὰ
ποĩα τρύχη; μῶν ἐν οἷς Οἰνεὺς ὁδὶ | ὁ δύσποτμος γεραιὸς ἠγωνίζετο;
(418–19 “Which tatters? Not those in which Oineus here, the wretched
old man, competed?”). It may not be purely coincidental that Euripides’
initial suggestion targets the eponymous hero of the Acharnians’ tribe,
and thereby connects them with tragic performance. The fact that the
character Oineus is envisioned as “competing” in the same sense the play
did at the festival makes a fitting response to Dikaiopolis’ comment just
before, that death will be his punishment for a poor performance, should
he speak badly (417 ἢν κακῶς λέξω). His own competition is likewise twofold:€by persuading the chorus as Telephos, he will not suffer a tragic end
and will also win his contest.
Through a similar conflation of internal and external contests,
Dikaiopolis explains that he must make a long speech to the chorus:€δεῖ
γάρ με λέξαι τῷ χορῷ ῥῆσιν μακράν (416). A defense-speech is implied on
one level; but given that Dikaiopolis casts himself in a dramatic exchange
between character and chorus, ῥῆσιν μακράν here smacks of a specific reference to a tragic monologue, as at Nu. 1371 and V. 580.55 Indeed, he soon
expands upon this explanation by telling Euripides, “I must be who I am,
but not appear to be; the audience must know who I am, but the chorus
must stand by like fools, so I can fuck them over with phraselets” (441–4).
This explanation seems to allude to the dimension of dramatic apatē that
Gorgias (fr. B 23 D–K) identified as the particular province of tragedy,
proclaiming a spectator who gives himself over to tragedy’s “deception”
wiser (σοφώτερος) than one who resists. In Dikaiopolis’ case, the mesmerizing effect of dramatic performance will extend no further than the
Acharnians, who by now are fully portrayed as a theater audience. And
Slater (2002) 52–5, speculates extensively about the fate of dramatic costumes after the initial performance, concluding (on the basis of little real evidence) that Euripides’ retention of costumes
went against standard practice and that the chief concern of the scene is to ridicule him for this.
Slater’s suspicion of Euripides is premised on his interpretation of Ach. 412, where ἔχεις is most
naturally taken to mean not “Why do you have (i.e., possess) the costumes?” but “Why do you
wear costumes?,” i.e., while composing tragedies; cf. Olson (2002) 412–13n. As Dikaiopolis’ comment in the next line shows, he is working under the notion of mimesis that Aristophanes would
later develop in the Agathon scene of Thesmophoriazusae (136–72; cf. Muecke (1982b) esp. 51–2;
Austin and Olson (2004) 148–72n.). Nor can Dikaiopolis’ comment at 412 register his surprise
and shock that Euripides “has” the costumes; it was for precisely this reason that Dikaiopolis
sought his help in the first place, thus ἐνσκευάσασθαι (384).
55
Looking ahead to Ach. 497–556. Cf. Dover (1968) 1371n.; Slater (2002) 55–6. Such self-conscious
use of ῥῆσις is perhaps evident already at A. Supp. 273–4; Ag. 1322.
54
70
Competitive partnership
although the scene focusses on costume and props for obvious comic
advantages, Dikaiopolis’ explanation demonstrates that he will come away
with more than that; a scholiast tells us that his words at 440–1 rework
Telephos’ own (fr. 698).56 No sooner does he don the costume than the
Telephean lines begin to flow from his tongue.57 Hence as Dikaiopolis
makes request after request (451 πολλῶν δεόμενος σκευαρίων), Euripides
can proclaim that he is being deprived of his entire tragedy (464 ἄνθρωπ᾿¸
ἀφαιρήσει με τὴν τραγῳδίαν)€– or rather all his plays (470 φροῦδά μοι τὰ
δράματα).58 In the end Dikaiopolis gets away with everything he needs to
carry off his performance€– minus the skandix (480).
T e l e pho s, B a b y l on i a ns a n d t h e h a z a r d s
of dr a m at ic pe r f or m a nc e
Returning to face the chorus, Dikaiopolis stands ready with his Telephos
costume within the ambience of dramatic performance at the Rural
Dionysia he created. True to expectation, his culminating defense of his
actions is sprinkled with citations and allusions to the text of Telephos
that complete the portrait of his contest as a dramatic performance.59
He accordingly begins by addressing the chorus as members of a theater audience:€ μή μοι φθονήσητ᾿¸ ἄνδρες οἱ θεώμενοι (497).60 This is a
deft maneuver, for despite their efforts to halt his celebrations of peace
at the Rural Dionysia, the chorus now become celebrants in a festival
that, from the moment Dikaiopolis caught the scent of the spondai, was
fundamental to his plan to restore tranquility in Attika and abroad.
Moreover, the self-defensive stance he takes before his attentive audience
invites comparison to the self-assertive address typical of comic poets
in parabases.61 That implication is reinforced by the continuation of his
opening comments, in which he speaks about the task of making trygoidia€– or comedy:
58
59
So again at 446 (= E. fr. 707); “Euripides” quotes from the play at 430 (= E. fr. 704).
Macleod (1974); (1980), suggests a visual connection between rolled costumes and book rolls.
Or, as Olson (2002) 464n. suggests for 464, “the art of tragedy”; cf. van Leeuwen (1901) 464n.
For the portions of Dikaiopolis’ speech that can be attributed to Telephos, see Rau (1967) 38–40;
Olson (2002) lviii–lix.
60
The address to the chorus as audience represents an important element of Aristophanes’ adaptation of what seem to have been the opening lines of Telephos’ defense (E. fr. 703):€ μή μοι
φθονήσητ᾿¸ ἄνδρες ̒Ελλήνων ἄκροι¸ | εἰ πτωχὸς ὢν τέτληκ᾿ ἐν ἐσθλοῖσιν λέγειν.
61
Nu. 518 ὦ θεώμενοι; V. 1016 μέμψασθαι γὰρ τοῖσι θεαταῖς ὁ ποιητὴς νῦν ἐπιθυμεῖ; Pax 732 ἡμεῖς δ᾿
αὖ τοῖσι θεαταῖς … εἴπωμεν; Eup. fr. 392 ἀλλ᾿ ἀκούετ᾿¸ ὦ θεαταί. Cf. Cratin. frr. 182; 360; Eup. fr.
205; Pl. Com. frr. 96; 99.
56
57
Telephos, Babylonians and the hazards of dramatic performance
μή μοι φθονήσητ᾿¸ ἄνδρες οἱ θεώμενοι,
εἰ πτωχὸς ὢν ἔπειτ᾿ ἐν ᾿Αθηναίοις λέγειν
μέλλω περὶ τῆς πόλεως¸ τρυγῳδίαν ποῶν
τὸ γὰρ δίκαιον οἶδε καὶ τρυγῳδία.
ἐγὼ δὲ λέξω δεινὰ μέν¸ δίκαια δέ
71
(Acharnians 499–501)
Don’t be angry at me, gentlemen of the audience,
if, though a beggar, I still intend to speak
about the city before the Athenians, while making a comedy.
For comedy too knows what is true.
And I shall say things unsettling but true.
This is not the first time Dikaiopolis has portrayed himself as a comic poet;
just before leaving for Euripides’ house, he referred to trouble he landed
in with Cleon as a result of his previous year’s comedy:€διὰ τὴν πέρυσι
κωμῳδίαν (378). According to a scholiast, these comments (cf. 502–3) refer
to a conflict Aristophanes became embroiled in following the production
of Babylonians in 426,62 when Cleon indicted him on charges of hubris
against the city for maligning Athenian democracy in the presence of the
allies at the City Dionysia. That this explanation derives from the scholiast’s interpretation of Acharnians itself is possible; but Dikaiopolis’ comments have an allusive character and sound too specific to be based on
nothing. It is thus probably safe to assume that Aristophanes is presenting
a version of events surrounding Babylonians, which affects how we make
sense of Dikaiopolis, the dramatic action of Acharnians, and Aristophanes’
relation to both.
Aristophanes’ voice intrudes forcefully within the performance at these
moments; but by pressing the rupturing effect unconditionally we risk
obscuring important elements in the characterization of the play’s hero
and his activities.63 Viewed differently, these allusions bring to the surface
the theatrical nature of Dikaiopolis’ endeavor as it is established by the
ΣREΓLh Ach. 378. Sommerstein (2004), discusses the evidence and the nature of the conflict
thoroughly; cf. Sommerstein (1980a) 32–3; Foley (1988) 33 nn. 3, 4; Hubbard (1991) 46 n. 18;
Mastromarco (1993) 344; MacDowell (1995) 42–5; Storey (1995) 7–11; Olson (2002) xxx–xxxi,
l–li; Martinelli Tempesta (2005). The general scenario of holding a poet personally and legally
responsible for his material appears to be genuine, if there is anything to Herodotus’ account of
Phrynichus being fined for his play The Fall of Miletus (Hdt. 6.21.2 = Phryn. test. 2). Rosen (1988)
63–4, adduces the model of psogos literature.
63
Contrast Slater (2002) 57–8. See especially, Foley (1988) 37–8; Hubbard (1991) 45–7; Goldhill
(1991) 188–96, for the challenge of disentangling the layers of reference, to which is sometimes
added the complication that Acharnians was produced not by Aristophanes but by Kallistratos.
But whether this arrangement masked Aristophanes’ authorship and responsibility is debatable;
see Zacher (1890) esp. 331–2; Dover (1963) = (1987–8) vol. i, 296; Halliwell (1980) 34–6, 42–4;
MacDowell (1982) 24–5; Olson (2007) 386.
62
72
Competitive partnership
Dionysian festival, his costume, and his adaptive reperformance. As was
argued above, Dikaiopolis’ opening address to his audience as spectators
is not completely disruptive, since he cast the chorus as the audience of
his dramatic apatē moments before (442–4).64 Likewise, his portrayal of
himself as a maker of trygoidia (499–500) is not purely dependent upon
Aristophanes. Although the term is used elsewhere by Aristophanes to refer
to comic poetry, etymologically the formation from τρύξ, meaning “new
wine,” coheres closely with Dikaiopolis’ experience on stage.65 It is he who
imbibes Euripides’ poetry as a Dionysian libation (484) in support of his
spondai, and who now blends tragedy and comedy, implied by the pun,
in his parodic and satiric restaging of Telephos. Thus aside from the Cleon
references, only the mention of the “agon at the Lenaia” (504) applies exclusively to Aristophanes. But even here the reference to the present performance at the festival sharpens our recognition that Dikaiopolis’ own agonistic
performance takes place during the Rural Dionysia and has been made to
conform with the prevailing milieu of dramatic competition by being substituted for an epirrhematic agon. The revelations about Aristophanes to
the audience are thus facilitated by the extensive similarities between his
hero’s situation and his own. The levels of contact, however, go further.
The sense of purpose with which Dikaiopolis has Euripides rifle through
his store of tragedies gives reason to believe that Telephos has a specific
purpose to serve. It is to this extent a revival with a point€– a reinterpretation of the original, inspired by circumstances some thirteen years after
the original production in 438.66 In the most immediate sense, Telephos’
rags and physical discomfort serve to make Dikaiopolis appear more pitiful (383–4); but Euripides has many such characters, as the scene at his
house demonstrates. In fact Telephos is important to Acharnians on many
levels.67 Most obviously, it helps Dikaiopolis meet the challenges of his
dramatic situation. Telephos’ success in freeing himself of the animosity
of the Greeks for defending his country against an invading army fits the
situation in which Dikaiopolis finds himself and the arguments he uses to
defend the Spartans (esp. 539–43). Telephos offers the model of a perceived
enemy speaking from a position of weakness to overturn misperceptions
about himself and establish his potential value to the community.
That earlier discussion was initiated (440–1) by a citation from Telephos (E. fr. 698).
Other instances of trygoidia at Ach. 628, 886; V. 650, 1537; fr. 156.9, with variations at Nu. 296; fr.
347; Eup. fr. 99.29. All of these are discussed by Taplin (1983), who defends the term’s origins in a
comic pun that perhaps began with Acharnians; cf. Edmunds (1980) 11; Edwards (1991) 159.
66
The date is provided by the ancient hypothesis to Alcestis (lines 16–18), which was performed
together with Telephos at the City Dionysia.
67
Cf. Foley (1988) 36–8.
64
65
Telephos, Babylonians and the hazards of dramatic performance
73
Helene Foley has argued that on a conceptual level the adaptation of
Telephos allows Aristophanes to set out for the Athenian audience his proclaimed comic objectives as they relate to tragedy and its perceived generic privilege of offering something akin to serious advice.68 In effect,
Dikaiopolis’ political arguments through Telephos assert and support comedy’s ability to say things that are disturbing for the city to hear but nonetheless true. Thus, in Simon Goldhill’s view, with this parody Aristophanes
“playfully recreates and renegotiates comedy’s license.”69 The trygoidia
that results from this mingling of genres is a centerpiece of Acharnians
itself. In addition, therefore, the defense Dikaiopolis offers for his own
decisions serves to support Acharnians in its public review at the festival.
This metapoetic effect may be seen as promotional, since it clarifies the
importance Aristophanes wishes to attach to his comedy; but it is also
defensive, because of the way Dikaiopolis’ performance is aligned with
the troubled history of Babylonians. Indeed, in some respects Dikaiopolis’
reperformance of Euripides’ play also reenacts Babylonians. The allusions
to that comedy’s performance link Dikaiopolis’ and Aristophanes’ theatrical experiences, but the implied identity of these performances may
extend to the level of content, if Babylonians also tackled the question of
culpability for the war, as fr. 84 seems to suggest.70
Aristophanes’ objective, however, is not simply to bring back on stage a
memory of his last comedy through a Euripidean revival, but to reperform
the broader implications of that comedy and its aftermath.71 Hence, upon
completing his trygic monologue, Dikaiopolis finds himself embroiled
in further troubles. The chorus is at first divided in its reception of his
performance (557–61).72 Those not immediately won over to Dikaiopolis’
Foley (1988) 39–43; cf. Edmunds (1980) 10–12; Olson (2002) lx–lxi. For the comparison between
comedy and tragedy implied by καί in Ach. 500, see Taplin (1983) 333. The seriousness of the
political advice Dikaiopolis and Aristophanic comedy offer is much debated; see especially
MacDowell (1983); Henderson (1990); (1993b); Fisher (1993); McGlew (2002); Olson (2002) xlviii–lii; Rossi (2003). I stake no claim in that argument, and concern myself only with the rhetoric
Aristophanes develops about his comic pretensions for the way it reflects back at Dikaiopolis and
creates dramatic meaning.
69
Goldhill (1991) 193–4 (quotation from 194).
70
ἢ δῶρ᾿ αἰτοῦντες ἀρχὴν πολέμου πορίσειεν μετὰ Πεισάνδρου. Cf. Olson (2002) xxix–xxx. For the
attempts to reconstruct anapests here and Bergk’s ascription to the parabasis, see Kassel–Austin.
71
Cf. Foley (1988) 37, 46, who believes, however, that Aristophanes’ reprise of Babylonians’ aftermath is confined mainly to the parabasis and that the poet ultimately separates himself from his
comic counterpart.
72
How they divide is open to interpretation:€two semichoruses or two individuals before a united
or similarly divided chorus? 564–5 and 571 support a single dissenter, and whether this individual
was balanced by another individual or stood out alone cannot be determined; cf. Olson (2002)
557–77n.
68
74
Competitive partnership
side question his€– and by extension Aristophanes’ and comedy’s€– right
to speak disturbing truths about the city (562) and, overwhelmed by
the potentially unsettling message to the audience (576–7), summon
Lamachus, whose very name makes him an ideal defender of the war.73
Now facing an important political leader upon the conclusion of his dramatic performance, Dikaiopolis finds himself in a situation that closely
resembles Aristophanes’ conflict with Cleon.
In the course of his confrontation with Lamachus, Dikaiopolis hurls
the kind of allegations of political corruption that seem to have been
an important feature of Babylonians, and Lamachus’ only response is to
invoke the democratic process (598 ἐχειροτόνησαν γάρ με; cf. 607) and
democracy itself (618 ὦ δημοκρατία¸ ταῦτα δῆτ̓ ἀνασχετά;). His principles seem high-minded and patriotic, but in context have a hollow ring that
resonates with Cleon’s effort to set himself up as a defender of democracy,
as the scholiast tells the story of the political aftermath of Babylonians.74
Much of what is said here has a striking similarity to the scholiast’s brief
summary of Babylonians’ satiric thrust, namely that Aristophanes “ridiculed the allotted and elected offices and Cleon” (ἐκωμῴδησε γὰρ τάς τε
κληρωτὰς καὶ χειροτονητὰς ἀρχὰς καὶ Κλέωνα). This similarity might be
explained by assuming that the scholiast used Acharnians to reconstruct
Babylonians; but against that interpretation, nothing in the Lamachusscene would seem to prompt a reader to connect this material independently with Babylonians, as opposed to suggesting a connection based on
familiarity with that play. Certainly Dikaiopolis’ accusations of chicanery and corruption among democratic officials benefiting from the war
have a counterpart in a scene from Babylonians, in which Dionysos is
coerced into giving his drinking-bowls to Athenian officials at a trial.75
In Acharnians the result is that charges are levelled against Dikaiopolis
for speaking harshly against the entire city (577), despite his cautionary
remarks moments before (515–16). Ultimately this and other gestures (esp.
502–12) aimed at deflecting the criticism of Cleon and his sympathizers in the audience concentrate our attention on Aristophanes’ troubles
stemming from his earlier comedy.76 Their significance for Acharnians
Cf. Edmunds (1980) 13–4; Reckford (1987) 166; Henderson (1990) 305–6; Moorton (1999) 35. For
Lamachus’ military career, see Olson (2002) 149–50.
74
ΣREΓLh Ach. 378:€ὁ Κλέων ἐγράψατο αὐτὸν ἀδικίας εἰς τοὺς πολíτας¸ ὡς εἰς ὕβριν τοῦ δήμου καὶ
τῆς βουλῆς ταῦτα πεποιηκότα.
75
Ar. fr. 75; cf. fr. 84. See MacDowell (1995) 30–4; Welsh (1983), for review and criticism of reconstructions of the play.
76
In particular, note how the attempt at self-exculpation depends by way of explanation (γάρ, 502)
on what Dikaiopolis–Aristophanes represents as an objective of trygoidia, namely to say things
73
Telephos, Babylonians and the hazards of dramatic performance
75
emerges when it becomes apparent that Aristophanes has set Dikaiopolis
up to step into the fire of public criticism he himself stumbled into with
Babylonians.
The agonistic tensions developed in this scene do not result in a fullblown agon at this point either. Instead, Dikaiopolis handily worsts his
opponent by exposing the selfish interests that determine his enthusiasm for the war, much as he attempted to do with the ambassadors
in the Assembly scene. For the moment, the adversaries agree to disagree:€ Lamachus goes off to wage eternal war on the Peloponnesians
by sea and land (620–2), while Dikaiopolis invites the same enemies
to initiate exclusive commercial relations with him (623–5). Although
Dikaiopolis’ restaging of Telephos ostensibly concluded with the allusion at the end of his monologue (555–6), in fact he continues to adapt
the tragedy during his confrontation with the Athenian general.77 Like
the chorus, Lamachus has been drawn into Dikaiopolis’ performance. With the conclusion of the encounter, the chorus qua audience
(442–3, 496) is in a position to offer their verdict; as the antagonists
leave the stage, they reunite and give a unanimous judgment in favor
of Dikaiopolis, proclaiming him “the victor with his words” (626 ἁνὴρ
νικᾷ τοĩσι λόγοισιν). Not only that, they assert that this represents the
opinion of the entire Athenian dēmos (626 τὸν δῆμον μεταπείθει). From
this point on Lamachus is a marginal figure,78 while the polis fully supports Dikaiopolis.
The spondai with which Dikaiopolis wins (627) are the libations of
wine that ensure peace, but that also encompass a cluster of ideas related
to the Dionysian festivals, among them dramatic production itself. The
hero thus leaves the stage as much a victor with his dramatic performance as in his political contest. In place of the din of initial objections to
his trygoidia, a victory proclamation rings out. In coordination with the
play’s political themes, that victory simultaneously redeems Aristophanes
from any suspicion left over from the previous year and paves the way for
further success with Acharnians. This objective is pressed in the parabasis that follows.
that are disturbing but true (501), which suggests that in Aristophanes’ mind this objective is
bound up with the threat posed by Cleon and is therefore likely also to stem from events of the
previous year.
77
Ach. 576–7, 577a = E. frr. 712; 712a. Cf. Handley and Rea (1957) 35; Rau (1967) 40–2; Webster
(1967) 46; Foley (1988) 38 n. 23. For the retention of Ach. 577a, see Olson (2002) ad loc.
78
Ultimately he is cast as the wounded and dejected Telephos (esp. 1178–81), as described in a messenger speech that closes with a final citation from Euripides’ play (1188 = E. fr. 705a).
76
Competitive partnership
A r i s t oph a n e s,
ach ar ni a ns
and
ba by loni a ns
The chorus’ award of victory to Dikaiopolis belongs to the kommation
and forms a segue to their concentration on Aristophanes in the parabasis,
where the poet is presented to the audience at the poetic agon. Of particular interest here is the extent to which the conflation of Dikaiopolis
and Aristophanes that redefines the play’s agonistic themes in theatrical
terms receives new emphasis. At the appropriate moment for Aristophanes
to assert himself in the Lenaian contest, he presents the audience with
a stage biography that bears a striking resemblance to that of his hero.79
More than in any other comedy, the parabasis of Acharnians conjures an
image of “Aristophanes” that embodies the poetic creation in which it
appears. Accordingly, if the poet captures his audience with his stage biography, he will more likely participate in the victory Dikaiopolis achieved
at the moment he was ushered off stage. The parabasis’ competitive poetics
merges the individual contests of the poet and his hero toward achieving a
common victory.
In preparation for the parabasis, the chorus set the tone for the poet’s
“appearance” by encouraging one another to strip off their garments,
adopting from the palaistra the athlete’s practice of stripping before
entering a contest.80 Under this agonistic metaphor, they explain that
their poet is breaking with his past habit of not coming forward in a
parabasis to proclaim to the Theater how clever he is:€οὔπω παρέβη πρὸς
τὸ θέατρον λέξων ὡς δεξιός ἐστιν (629).81 Once this gesture of competitive self-assertion has been invoked, the poet’s identity overshadows that
of the chorus. As typically in a parabasis, Aristophanes attempts to persuade the audience that he deserves their support in the contest. To this
end we hear that he is the greatest poet (644 τὸν ποιητὴν τὸν ἄριστον),
whom the Athenian allies will crowd to see at the Dionysia (643–4),82
Modern discussions of this feature of the play are all indebted to Bowie (1982); cf. Reckford (1987)
189–90.
80
Thus the scholia; cf. Campagner (2001) 84–5. The scholiasts’ interpretation gains support from
the verb ἐπίωμεν (627), which is commonly used for hostile encounters; cf. Ra. 897 (with Dover’s
note), where the chorus use it to urge on the contest between Aeschylus and Euripides. For the
question of choral stripping, see Sifakis (1971) 102–8, who also points out the instances of choral
stripping in agon scenes. Zielinski’s hypothesis (cf. Olson (2002) 627n.) of a vestigial element
wherein the chorus stripped to perform an epilogue that was transferred to the parabasis is highly
speculative.
81
This should not be taken naively as proof that Aristophanes’ earlier plays did not include parabatic eulogies of the poet, as Sifakis (1971) 63–4, and Hubbard (1991) 49, assume.
82
A hint perhaps that Aristophanes had plans for a play at the City Dionysia of that year; cf. Russo
(1994) 24.
79
Aristophanes, Acharnians and Babylonians
77
and that the fame of his daring has spread far and wide (646 αὐτοῦ περὶ
τῆς τόλμης ἤδη πόρρω κλέος ἥκει). As a result, he has even stirred the
admiration of the Persian King, who estimates the value of his comic
abuse as only marginally less than that of the Athenian fleet (646–51).
Indeed, the Spartans are eager to snatch him away as a prize (652–4),
but the Athenians should hold on to him at all costs and cherish him,
since he still has many fine, useful things to teach them through his
plays (655–8). In line with these claims, “Aristophanes” twice asserts his
direct responsibility for countless benefits to the Athenians (633 πολλῶν
ἀγαθῶν αἴτιος ὑμĩν ὁ ποητής, cf. 641). The rhetorical point is easy to
see:€ by demonstrating what he has done for them, he simultaneously
argues for reciprocation on the audience’s part. At the moment, this
means support for his comedy.83
Within this broad agonistic bid for the audience’s favor comes a more
specific point of departure. Aristophanes’ reason for speaking plainly about
his virtues as a comic poet is that he has been attacked by his enemies,84
and as a result, he is compelled to defend himself now (630–2). On the
basis of other parabatic encounters between poets, the natural expectation
at this point is that these vague “enemies” are abusive rival poets,85 but
in the closing pnigos all is made clear. The defense is actually directed
against Cleon, who is urged to continue his attack:€ πρὸς ταῦτα Κλέων
καὶ παλαμάσθω | καὶ πᾶν ἐπ̓ ἐμοὶ τεκταινέσθω (659–60).86 With dramatic
flair, the chorus here and for the remainder of the pnigos switch from a
third-person report of the poet’s defense to the first-person singular of the
poet himself, whose personality bursts on stage at a dramatic climax in the
parabatic performance.87 This assimilation of dramatic voice with the poet
has already happened twice with Dikaiopolis, in both cases in connection
with Aristophanes’ protestations against Cleon.
Although “responsible for” (αἴτιος) may be correct in both places, the manuscripts have “deserving of ” (ἄξιος) at 633, which is preferred by Sommerstein (1980a) and Henderson (1998). Olson
(2002) favors Bentley’s emendation at 633. Correct or not, the transmitted alternation between
the two terms nicely illustrates what is surely the rhetorical point of the parabasis, namely to win
the audience’s support. Although Aristophanes’ need to defend himself against charges of abusing the city (630–1) might seem to support αἴτιος in both places (so Olson), this interest dovetails
with the interest of guiding the audience to a proper appreciation of the clever poet (629) and the
consideration that depends on it.
84
Cf. Hubbard (1991) 49–50.
85
For this interpretation, see above, pp. 37–8.
86
As he appears to have done; see Storey (1995).
87
Cf. 299–302, where the chorus also abuse Cleon, though in that case there is no overt shift of
speaking perspective. Hubbard (1991) 53, suggests that the perspective of the first person in the
parabasis is choral, which seems unlikely.
83
78
Competitive partnership
Although this recollection of Dikaiopolis’ close relation to the poet
comes at the end of the passage, points of overlapping interest, both general and specific, can be found throughout Aristophanes’ parabatic appearance.88 Cast in a similarly defensive mode, the specific charges to which he
responds€– ridiculing the city and committing hubris against the dēmos
(631)€– have already been introduced in Dikaiopolis’ defense (515–16), as
well as in the accusations hurled at him after his agonistic performance
(577). Both poet and hero rail against the Athenians’ penchant for being
taken in by deceptive speakers (370–4, 634–40). Aristophanes claims to
have counteracted this problem with regard to xenikoi logoi and embassies
from the allies, while Dikaiopolis’ unheeded effort to expose duplicitous
speakers in the Assembly finally succeeds with his exposure of Lamachus’
weak arguments (598, 607) and misleading slogans (618). Concern about
the allies and their tribute is mentioned and the problem resolved by both
speakers (505–6, 643).
Dikaiopolis’ fanatical dedication to peace is reflected more ambiguously
in the poet’s self-aggrandizing claims. The Persian King has allegedly recognized a crucial military asset in Aristophanes’ potential as an advisor
(650–1), in consequence of which the Spartans are making overtures of
peace. Their stated terms (653 ἀπαιτοῦσιν) are the restoration of Aigina to
its former status, but the poet has astutely recognized their real purpose
(thus φροντίζουσ̓, 654) of gaining possession of his person. Most scholars
believe that with these comments Aristophanes pointedly distinguishes
himself from his hero, by advising the Athenians to reject Sparta’s offers of
peace and tacitly endorsing a continuation of the war.89 It is attractive to
think that Aristophanes corrects any misimpressions the audience might
have, in order to render himself more appealing in his agonistic posturing
during the parabasis. But it is not easy to believe that Aristophanes€– or
rather “Aristophanes”€– delivers these lines with a straight face. In his (vain)
glory he imagines himself to have achieved international fame, even to the
point of becoming a central bargaining chip in a clandestine scenario of
88
See Bowie (1982) 30–1.
E.g., Heath (1987) 19; Hubbard (1991) 52; Fisher (1993) 38–9. Even Olson (2002) xlvii, whose
general criticism of arguments adduced to portray Dikaiopolis negatively (xliii–v) matches my
position, accepts the apparent implications of this passage for Aristophanes’ limited identification with Dikaiopolis. Murray (1933) 34–5, simply ignores the passage in his effort to make
Aristophanes, through Dikaiopolis, a pacifist in the modern sense. I am in closest agreement with
Foley’s understanding (1988, 37) that Aristophanes promises victory by advising Athens to make
an advantageous peace; cf. Carey (1993) 256–7. Moorton (1999) 43–6, draws a distinction between
war on the flimsy grounds of the Megarian Decree and the more meaningful goal of protecting
Athens’ naval empire (Aigina); this strikes me as overly complicated.
89
Aristophanes, Acharnians and Babylonians
79
inter-polis negotiations.90 Never mind that his supposed value as a military asset plays out unexpectedly, with the Spartans actually demanding
peace (652–4); more ludicrously still, the poet inserts himself as a casus
belli on the model of the kind of petty kidnapping that sparked the war
in Dikaiopolis’ fanciful account (524–31). For whatever else Aristophanes
may imply about his relation to Aigina, one scholiast correctly underscores
the vital point for the immediate context, by explaining that the island
will provide a convenient position from which the enemy can snatch (654
ἀφέλωνται) the poet for themselves.91 The startlingly reductive implication is that if the Athenians need a good pretext for war, they need look
no farther than the poet “standing” before them. This patently preposterous assertion trivializes the outbreak of the war as much as anything
Dikaiopolis said.92 However we interpret its finer points, the passage is
so thoroughly undercut by irony and hyperbole that a literal reading will
not do.93
Notably, the Persian King admires Aristophanes for his ability to abuse
the Athenians (649 εἴποι κακὰ πολλά), a role that in the context of the present play implies criticizing the reasons they are at war in the first place.
This point is underscored by the similarity of the Persian King’s assessment to what “Aristophanes” says through Dikaiopolis at the beginning
of his defense against charges of abusing the city (503 τὴν πόλιν κακῶς
λέγω). The difference is that Aristophanes embraces that dubious role, on
the strength, it would seem, of how Dikaiopolis championed his cause
before the parabasis. Speaking now with complete confidence, he states
that he has many good lessons for the audience (656). None of these has an
explicit connection with military preparations; all that can be said is that
Aristophanes rejects the flattery, bribery, chicanery, and villainy (657–8)
The Spartan demands made on Aigina’s behalf seem to refer to the lead-up to the outbreak of war
(see Kagan (1974) 82–3; Olson (2002) 652–4n.). In that case, Aristophanes is reinterpreting for
his own advantage in the parabasis a set of circumstances whose outcome was long past; serious
assessment of current policy is not at issue. See, however, Worthington (1987).
91
ΣR Ach. 654a:€ἐγγὺς αὐτῶν λάβωσιν. Speculation about Aristophanes’ connection with the island
through property or lineage goes back to ΣEΓLh Ach. 654b and is probably the basis for the claim in
ΣREΓLh Ach. 378 that Cleon levelled a charge of xenia against him. Pace Heath (1987) 19, in 655 (ἀλλ̓
ὑμεῖς τοι μήποτ̓ ἀφῆσθ̓) the unstated object is most naturally taken as the poet rather than the
island.
92
It begins to look as if the poet rejects the Spartan proposal not so much in meaningful contradiction with the theme of his play, but because it will cause him personal inconvenience. This understanding would be emphasized by the possibility that Aristophanes had a personal attachment
to Aigina, whether hereditary or through the possession of land there. (Sommerstein (1980a)
654n.€is sensibly skeptical; bibliography and discussion in Imperio (2004) 135–7); cf. Bowie (1982)
40. Hubbard (1991) 52, detects a claim of Aristophanes’ loyalty to Athens.
93
Cf. Harriott (1986) 35–6.
90
80
Competitive partnership
associated with the play’s warmongers. If this comedy€– and the same may
have been true of Babylonians€– lives up to its hyperbolic claim of “teaching” anything (655–6), it is the simple notion that peace is desirable, even
if it cannot be achieved along the lines of Dikaiopolis’ fantastic plan.94 It is
not necessarily the position in favor of peace, then, that is undercut by an
earnest rattling of swords in the parabasis; rather, the proposition of war
continues to be subjected to humorous distortion and criticism, with the
decision between peace and war€– i.e., the conflict that Dikaiopolis stirs
up€– bound up in the identity of the poet himself and his relationship with
his fellow Athenians.
The coordination of Aristophanes’ putative instruction of the city with
Dikaiopolis’ endeavors is reinforced by an underlying theme of justice, built
into Dikaiopolis’ very name,95 that emphasizes the overlapping efforts of
poet and hero.96 This is also the criterion by which the hero asks that his
arguments be judged (317), and the same aspiration toward justice inspires
his adoption of a tragic disguise (500–1). So too, it is this quality that initially
wins him the chorus’ support (560–1). For his part, Aristophanes claims in
the parabasis to be admired by the allies for telling the Athenians the truth
(645 εἰπεĩν ἐν ̓Αθηναίοις τὰ δίκαια), and insists that justice is one of comedy’s
objectives (655 κωμῳδήσει τὰ δίκαια). Aristophanes’ remarks closely resemble what Dikaiopolis said at the start of his performance about daring to
speak the truth (δίκαια, 501) in the Athenians’ presence (498 ἐν ̓Αθηναίοις
λέγειν). Dikaiopolis only pointed out how Athenians love hearing themselves and their city eulogized, regardless of whether what is said is “just or
unjust,” i.e., “true or false” (370–3); Aristophanes provides specific examples
of how he has improved the city by rooting out false flattery (632–41). While
his comments thus amplify Dikaiopolis’ remarks about saying “shocking
things that are true” (501), he presses the point further, by arguing more
cogently that speaking well of the city is the real danger, whereas “saying
bad things” (649), which is to say criticizing the Athenians, has an improving effect. These remarks pave the way for the pnigos, in which Aristophanes
threatens that justice will be his ally in his struggle against the likes of
Cleon (661–2 τὸ δίκαιον | ξύμμαχον ἔσται). Far from being a political malefactor because of plays like Babylonians and Acharnians, in the parabasis
Aristophanes provides exaggerated proof that he behaves properly toward
Cf. Reckford (1987) 162–71. Olson (2002) xlix–lii, demonstrates that serious lessons are not central to Acharnians; rather the play offers average Athenian citizens the appealing vision that they
are not responsible for the trouble the city is in.
95
On Dikaiopolis’ name, see Russo (1994) 34; Edmunds (1980) 1 n. 2; Olson (1992) 307.
96
See especially Perusino (1986) 25–30.
94
Aristophanes, Acharnians and Babylonians
81
Athens.97 Unlike Cleon, he will never be found to be “a coward and pervert
with regard to the city” (662–4). In this respect, Dikaiopolis’ name, understood in the sense “just toward the city,” epitomizes the image of himself as
poet that Aristophanes is at pains to create in the parabasis.
Finally, the idea of trygoidia, so central to Dikaiopolis’ performance, is recalled in the parabasis in the chorus’ initial introduction of
Aristophanes:€ἐξ οὗ γε χοροĩσιν ἐφέστηκεν τρυγικοĩς ὁ διδάσκαλος ἡμῶν
(628). In claiming the role of didaskalos, Aristophanes is slightly misrepresenting the situation, since Acharnians, like his earlier comedies, was produced by someone else. But this small white lie is advantageous, because
it effectively recalls the role Dikaiopolis claimed for himself in producing
his trygedy during his Rural Dionysia.98 It is therefore fitting that, like
Dikaiopolis defending himself before his audience, Aristophanes brings
his defensive address before the Lenaian audience to a conclusion with an
adaptation from Euripides (659–64). Although our sources for the fragment only identify the passage by author, it is hard to resist Bergk’s suggestion that it was drawn once again from Telephos.99 In that case, beyond the
overlap in aspects of character, Dikaiopolis’ trygic and Aristophanes’ parabatic performance align the same literary intertexts:€Telephos, Babylonians,
and Acharnians itself. For although many points in the parabatic discussion relate to preceding scenes of Acharnians, the defensive rhetorical position Aristophanes adopts, as well as points of actual detail, certainly reflect
Babylonians. Thus his claims about the allies and their tribute (642–5) both
recall and refute arguments Cleon made against Babylonians (502–7), and
on the level of content, it is widely assumed that Aristophanes’ assertion
that he has shown the allies the practical effect of democratic rule (642)
directs the audience’s thoughts to the plot of his previous year’s play.100 So
too, while the reference to the Persian King (646–51) recalls the prologue
of Acharnians (65–125), it may also have a connection with Babylonians, if
that play’s chorus was portrayed as Persian subjects.101
Cf. Hubbard (1991) 50–1.
I assume that the reference is to the poet Aristophanes (cf. Olson (2002) ad loc.) and not to
Kallistratos; for discussion, see Halliwell (1980); MacDowell (1982); Hubbard (1991) 227–30.
╇ 99
E. fr. 918. Rau (1967) 187, does not adopt the attribution to Telephos. Further Telephean elements
in the parabasis are Aristophanes’ overall defensive posture and his promise to be of use to his
fellow Athenians in the war, much as Telephos would help the Achaeans; cf. Foley (1988) 38 n. 19;
Bowie (1982) 31–2; (1993) 28.
100
Imperio (2004) 131–2; cf. Norwood (1930) 6–7; Forrest (1975) 20–2; Welsh (1983) 139–40; Imperio
(1991) 158–60, for the assumption that details in the Acharnians parabasis refer to Babylonians.
Sidwell (1994) 84 and 98–100, is not persuasive in arguing against this position and offering
Eupolis’ Poleis in place of Aristophanes’ play.
101
Welsh (1983) 142–5, argues for a chorus of actual Persian slaves.
╇ 97
╇ 98
82
Competitive partnership
The convergence of these multiple points of reference is of the utmost significance for the relationship of Aristophanes’ appearance in the parabasis
to the actions of his comic hero. We have seen that Dikaiopolis’ daring
opposition to the Acharnians is introduced with references to Babylonians
and Cleon, where the ostensible purpose of putting to rest any concern
that a similarly scathing treatment of the city might be attempted again
is finally undercut when Dikaiopolis’ performance results in the same
political shock that followed the earlier play. In support of that renewed
outcome, in the pnigos Aristophanes unveils his continued loathing for
the demagogue and challenges him to attempt further hostilities against
the city’s most outstandingly just poet. Whether or not this was Cleon’s
immediate objective, his formal public criticism of Babylonians must have
brought into question the poet’s nascent professional reputation. Thus on
one level, the parabasis defense serves to clear Aristophanes’ name of any
residual taint.102
Even so, it is remarkable how much Aristophanes seems to use
Babylonians as poetic capital in arguing for the appropriateness of victory for Acharnians. This relationship makes more sense if we assume that
Babylonians took the prize, an assumption consistent with the inscriptional
evidence.103 Aristophanes’ claims to international fame on the merits of
Babylonians are also easily interpreted as extravagant assertions grounded
in a victory with the play.104 It is also difficult to believe that Cleon would
have taken any action, had Babylonians not received the public validation
a victory represented.105 Indeed, Aristophanes’ criticisms of the Athenians
for making hasty decisions (630 ταχυβούλοις) and then reversing them
(632 μεταβούλους), which are part of his vindication of Babylonians, imply
a change of heart about the play connected with a victory turned sour
by Cleon’s public castigation.106 Just as important, in that case, the recollection of Babylonians through the trygoidia of Telephos within the frame
of Dionysian dramatic competition allows Aristophanes to reestablish
the success and appeal of his comic vision by having his hero reclaim
the victory originally awarded his previous year’s comedy. Dikaiopolis
and Aristophanes thus unite to continue the program established by
104
105
106
102
103
Cf. Perusino (1986) 23.
IG II2 2325.58; cf. Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 85–6; Olson (2007) 385–6.
Pace Russo (1994) 24.
So too Foley (1988) 38 n. 20.
Compare Cratin. fr. 360. Reference to recent historical events (e.g., van Leeuwen (1901) 630–2n.;
Rogers (1910) 630n.) is helpful only inasmuch as it presents the Athenian reputation that
Aristophanes here transfers to his own poetic concerns; cf. Olson (2002) 630–1n.
From synagōnistai to sympotai
83
Babylonians and reward the audience with another play whose mockery of
Athenian politics was likely to leave the Cleons in the audience dismayed.
Acharnians rides on the coat-tails of the earlier victory; so it is that, following a typical pattern, the scenes after the parabasis elicit Aristophanes’
prospective celebration of victory through the celebrations of Dikaiopolis.
F rom
sy nagōnista i
to
sympotai
Following up on the plan he devised as he left the stage before the parabasis, when he next enters Dikaiopolis busies himself with establishing a private market, and opens its doors to Athens’ enemies (719–28).
Customers from Megara and Boiotia are quick to arrive, and eagerly trade
on terms that are most beneficial to Dikaiopolis, who accumulates a veritable storehouse of delicacies.107 In an Aristophanic comedy, the natural
destination for such goods is a feast, and they are soon converted toward
this purpose, as themes of revelry dominate the final scenes. A new festive
context is also supplied, as the calendar leaps ahead to the Choes, during
the Dionysian Anthesteria (960–2, 1000–2).108 As with the Rural Dionysia
of the first half of the play, here too the festival has a metapoetic purpose.
The charged celebratory atmosphere toward which the action is directed
reflects Dikaiopolis’ success, but at the same time a steady correlation of
agonistic and revelry themes with aspects of the Lenaian agon at which
Acharnians was performed allows the play to anticipate the celebrations
that, with luck, will crown Aristophanes’ victory.109 The poet and his hero
thus shift from synagonistai to sympotai.
It seems to have been expected, if not actually required, that the choregos who sponsored the winning play would follow up a victory in the
Theater with a celebratory banquet for the members of his troupe.110 An
epinikia feast of this sort forms the historical context of the banquet in
Plato’s Symposium, which is set on the evening after the official victory feast
in honor of the tragic poet Agathon’s victory at the Lenaia in 416 (173a) but
is clearly envisioned as an extension of those celebrations. A central feature
of the epinikia was the offering of sacrifices to Dionysos in thanks for the
For the economic logic of the plot, see Olson (1991). Compton-Engle (1999) 370–2, interprets
Dikaiopolis’ display of culinary skills as a feature of his transition from a simple man of the
country to an urban swindler.
108
Habash (1995) 567–74, discusses points of contact between Acharnians and the Anthesteria.
109
Calame (2004) provides a useful overview of the celebration scenes in Aristophanes and their
relation to the dramatic contests.
110
Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 89; Wilson (2000) 102–3; Biles (2007).
107
84
Competitive partnership
victory.111 At heart it was thus a solemn religious occasion, but this in no
way precluded vigorous revelry and fine dining.112 In Agathon’s case, the
celebration was so intense that at the second gathering, on the night of
the Symposium, no one could stomach any further drinking, and accordingly wine and the flutegirl€– which must have featured prominently the
night before€– are declined in favor of intellectual entertainment (176a–e).
Likewise, it was the tumultuousness of the gathering (τὸν ὄχλον) that
made Socrates “flee” (διέφυγον) the official victory celebration (174a), and
the group apparently swelled far beyond the poet and chorus, included in
the description at Smp. 173a, which thus almost certainly amounts to an
abbreviated list of those involved.113 In many ways, the epinikia mirrored
the appearance of the poet and his cast at the proagon, and as at the initial
public moment of competitive engagement, so at the final public assertion
of victory the actors as well as the chorus probably appeared along with
the poet.114
The trajectory for the plot of Acharnians in the direction of epinikia is
established already during the exchange with the Boiotian merchant. As
Dikaiopolis begins to assemble the delicacies that will make up his banquet, the treasured Kopaic eel is given special treatment:€“Dearest and longmissed, you have come, much-desired by the trygic choruses!” (885–6). The
term trygoidikoi reminds us of the discussion of trygoidia that preceded the
restaging of Telephos (497–501), so that Dikaiopolis here shifts back to his
role of dramatic producer/performer. The correlation with the earlier performance is further emphasized by the correspondence of the Kopaic eels’
absence from Athenian tables with the rupture in the celebration of the
Rural Dionysia, both six years past (266–7, 890), and Dikaiopolis accordingly has us think of the delicacy as an especially appropriate reward for
his earlier victory. At the same time, his emphasis on the trygic chorus
This forms the simple description at Smp. 173a τὰ ἐπινίκια ἔθυεν αὐτός τε καὶ οἱ χορευταί, which
serves to cue the reader to the relevant context.
Cf. Nu. 339 (with scholia and Dover (1968) ad loc.), where the splendor of the occasion more
easily fits a special feast than a choregos’ ongoing maintenance of the chorus during the training
period (so Olson (2002) 1154–5n.), even granting Plu. Mor. 349a, which seems aimed at an exaggerated contrast.
113
Above all, it is surprising that Plato does not mention the choregos, who must have been a central figure during the celebration. An anecdote on Ion of Chios (Ath. 1.3f; Σ V Pax 835–37a = Ion
test. 3 Snell) reports that in recognition of his victory at the dramatic competitions he offered a
jar of wine to every Athenian; this suggests the widest, albeit extreme, limit of inclusion in festivities surrounding poetic victory. For recent discussion of this anecdote, see Stevens (2007).
Wilson (2007) 272–3, presents a very different picture of the epinikia.
114
The chorus is stipulated at the proagon in the Life of Euripides (= test. IA.11), the actors at Smp.
194b.
111
112
From synagōnistai to sympotai
85
suggests that his acquisition of delicacies for a feast is working toward not
just his own celebration, but that of the entire cast of Acharnians.115 In this
respect, we are likewise reminded of Aristophanes, who in the parabasis
claimed that he directed trygic choruses (628 χοροĩσιν ἐφέστηκεν τρυγικοĩς
ὁ διδάσκαλος ἡμῶν). The note of solidarity between poet-director and
chorus in the parabasis coincides with Dikaiopolis’ sentiment. Indeed, his
prospect of sharing in a feast with the chorus is extradramatic in a similarly parabatic way, since he looks beyond the immediate circumstance of
the plot, in which his feast€– to match his peace€– is treated as a personal
achievement, to a time when he and the chorus will dine together in celebratory fashion.116
Dikaiopolis’ presaging of dramatic victory plays out within the celebrations of the Choes festival. This festival once again hurls the action
into a Dionysian frame, and as with the Rural Dionysia earlier, so here
emphasis falls on the agonistic element.117 The focus of the festival was the
opening and tasting of the new vintage on the first day (Pithoigia), with
the high point coming in the consumption of wine on the second day
(Choes), which featured a contest in drinking wine from chous-�pitchers,
after which the festival was named.118 In Acharnians, once the Herald
announces the drinking contest, to be celebrated “according to ancestral
custom” (1000–2), all Dikaiopolis’ efforts are redirected toward the event
and the banquets associated with the agonistic portion of the Anthesteria.
He also receives an invitation to celebrate the festival at the house of the
priest of Dionysos (1085–94), where we can detect another instance of an
epinikia celebration mapped onto the celebrations within the play. The
finery, entertainment, and culinary delicacies catalogued by the priest’s
servant are one consideration,119 but the more important element is the
simple fact that the invitation is issued by Dionysos’ priest. Although we
might expect the priest to preside at the Anthesteria, the only official role
noted in our sources for the Choes belonged to the archon basileus, who
As van Leeuwen (1901) observes, the effect is to draw a distinction between the prospects of
a feast for the cast of Acharnians and that of the production led by Antimachus (1150–61), on
which see below.
116
Aristophanes achieves a similar effect in other plays. Compare Pax 1020–2:€Trygaios has the
sacrificial sheep taken inside, commenting that the animal “will be saved for the choregos.” The
same explanation may apply to Ar. fr. 448:€ἀτταγᾶς ἥδιστον ἕψειν ἐν ἐπινικίοις κρέας.
117
Cf. Pütz (2007) 16.
118
Accounts of the festival in Deubner (1932) 93–123; Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 1–25; Parke (1977)
107–24; Burkert (1983) 213–26; (1985) 237–42; Hamilton (1992); Robertson (1993).
119
Hence Dikaiopolis’ delicacies will at best add a bit of extra lustre to the splendid banquet that
awaits him and the other guests. Cf. Habash (1995) 572–3, and at greater length Pütz (2007)
4–13.
115
86
Competitive partnership
presided over the drinking contest held at the Thesmotheteion.120 The
priest of Dionysos may in fact have been relieved of some of his major
duties during the Choes, when all the city’s temples were closed, with the
exception of the Dionysian sanctuary in the Marshes, which was open
only on this one day each year, when the priestess presided.121 Richard
Hamilton accordingly concludes, “the only surprise [sc. with respect to
the Choes], then, in the Acharnians is that it is the priest of Dionysos who
has issued the invitation.” But the sacrifices to Dionysos that occurred at
the epinikia might easily have demanded that the priest, whose involvement in the dramatic festivals is betokened by the fact that he enjoyed
the privilege of prohedria in the Theater,122 be on hand to preside during
the final stage of the festival. This is the implication of a passage in Frogs
where the actor playing Dionysos looks forward to celebrating with the
real priest of Dionysos after the performance:€“Priest, protect me so I can
be your drinking companion!”123 The actor in Frogs only wishes to feast
with the priest at the victory celebration; Dikaiopolis gets to fulfill this
desire within the performance.
The increasing concentration on the play’s anticipated victory through
the Choes theme reaches its climax in the final scene. Following the paratragic messenger’s report of Lamachus’ wounding in battle and imminent return (1174–89), the hero and his rival appear on stage to perform a
responsive dialogue, in which the consequences of their individual contests are juxtaposed. Lamachus enters (1190–7) supported by attendants
(1214–5, 1222) and crying in pain from his wounds, while Dikaiopolis
(1198–1203) uses the same cry to express his elation as he somehow holds
on to his chous while fondling a pair of prostitutes who steady him against
the effects of the wine.124 Dikaiopolis proclaims his victory for draining his
pitcher first:€τὸν γὰρ χοᾶ πρῶτος ἐκπέπωκα (1203). After being awarded
one victory for his performance at the Rural Dionysia, he adds another for
his achievements during the Anthesteria.
This meeting only lasts long enough for the hero to expose Lamachus’
predicament as fitting a different festival than the Choes (1210–3), before
the two men again go their separate ways. In a closing contrast, Lamachus
Ach. 1224; Plu. Mor. 613b; cf. Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 10; Burkert (1983) 219; Hamilton (1992)
13; Robertson (1993) 216–17.
121
Ath. 10.437b–e; cf. Burkert (1983) 219, 232–3; Hamilton (1992) 23; Robertson (1993) 209–10.
122
Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 268–9.
123
Ra. 297 with Dover (1993); cf. Slater (2002) 187.
124
For the balanced staging of the two entrances, emphasized by the responsive nature of the dialogue, see Olson (2002) 1190, 1198nn. On the missing lines 1202 and 1206 (identified by Bergk
and Bothe respectively), which are needed to fill out the structure, see Olson (2002) 1202–3n.
120
From synagōnistai to sympotai
87
is carried off to a physician (1222–3), while Dikaiopolis asks to be carried
aloft on the shoulders of those around him in victorious fashion. He looks
forward to a night of sexual pleasure (1216–17, 1220–1), but first makes
his way to retrieve the prize announced earlier by the Herald:€ ὡς τοὺς
κριτάς με φέρετε. ποῦ ᾿στιν ὁ βασιλεύς; | ἀπόδοτέ μοι τὸν ἀσκόν (1224–5).
Although the archon basileus is generally assumed to have played a role
at the Choes (see above), there is no other evidence for a panel of official
judges at the drinking contest.125 At the Lenaian festival where Acharnians
was performed, on the other hand, both the archon basileus and the judges
were involved in the organization, management, and outcome of the contests, so that Dikaiopolis’ demand for the prize operates as much for the
play as for his performance in the drinking contest.126 His assertion is the
more emphatic because the archon basileus sat prominently at the front of
the Theater, and the judges likely did as well, since they were not only a
symbolic focal point of the agon, but had to perform pivotal culminating
duties as a group in the administration of their oaths and the casting of
their votes.127
Although we can never be certain about stage action, in this case the
identification of the poetic agon with the contest of the play’s hero relies
heavily on the prominence granted celebrities of the festival through seating arrangements in the Theater; consideration of the latter may thus
help reconstruct the closing action. Surely the pointed contrast between
Dikaiopolis and Lamachus was maintained in their exits. Lamachus
is picked up and carried off stage by his attendants (1214–15, 1222–3). If
Dikaiopolis’ request to be carried off (1224) was also converted into stage
Slater (2002) 65, argues against the archon’s role because Ach. 1224 is our only early evidence
and the accuracy of Aristophanes’ representation may have been compromised by his wish to
conflate this contest and the Lenaia. Still, the accounts for the contest emphasize the archon’s
role in organizing the contest and awarding the prize (Ath. 10.437c–d; cf. the tyrant Dionysios’
assumption of this role at Ath. 10.437b), and Plu. Mor. 1.613b places the official contest in the
Thesmotheteion, which associates the contest with the archons ([Arist.] Ath. 3.5); cf. Deubner
(1932) 96; Robertson (1993) 215–16. Hamilton (1992) 13 n. 23, accepts the detail of the judges for
the Choes.
126
Amply commented on in the notes of van Leeuwen (1901); Rennie (1909); Starkie (1909); Rogers
(1910); Sommerstein (1980a); Olson (2002); cf. Foley (1988) 39; Brockmann (2002) 270; Slater
(2002) 65. I suspect a similar ploy lies behind Ar. fr. 130:€“Who can tell me where Dionysos’ precinct is, where the Mormo-Goblins are hung on display?” (transl. Henderson, whose assignment
of both lines to a single speaker is preferable to dividing them as K–A do); for the dedication of
masks, see Green (1982).
127
Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 268, for the archons; Wilson (2000) 99, for the judges. The principal
passages for making sense of the judging process are discussed by Pickard-Cambridge (1968)
95–7; cf. Marshall and van Willigenburg (2004). Compare the panel of judges representing the
dramatic contests at the Rural Dionysia on the calendar frieze from Hagios Eleutheros; Deubner
(1932) 138, 248–54.
125
88
Competitive partnership
action, perhaps the chorus gathered in front of the raised stage to allow
him to mount their shoulders, and then matched his request by marching through the orchestra toward the judges, at which point someone
seated near the front tossed the hero a wineskin.128 In doing this, the chorus imitate the periagermos, a post-competition ritual in which the victor
was carried on the shoulders of his companions, presented to the public,
and adorned with tainiai.129 The bold agonistic claim generated by these
maneuvers may have been supported by an exodus format proposed by
Martin Revermann,130 in which a procession through the eastern parodos
gave force to the mood of victory and celebration, so often in evidence
in the closural sequence of Aristophanic plays, by connecting the staged
festivities with the notion of dramatic victory made tangible in the choregic monuments along the Street of Tripods toward which the chorus and
hero proceed. If that is true in the case of Dikaiopolis’ departure, the exodus becomes a true victory procession; the choice of staging emphatically
situates the performance of Acharnians within the context of Dionysian
festival competition and brings the fortunes of the internal agon into
harmony with the poet’s hopes for the external agon. One final consideration supports this reading. After his reference and perhaps gesture to the
judges and archon in the Theater, Dikaiopolis holds his empty chous aloft
and shouts out the ritual cry of Herakles’ Olympic victory€ – τήνελλα¸
καλλίνικος! (1227).131 These words then form a refrain for the exodos procession, in which the chorus similarly commend Dikaiopolis’ victory and
amplify his exaltation as they lead him off stage.132 The agonistic pedigree
of the exclamation reinforces Dikaiopolis’ identity as a victor in formal
competition; more to the point, as the hero and the chorus process off
stage, they seem destined to initiate the promised epinikia celebration.
On this understanding, Aristophanes invokes the epinikia in these scenes
as a means of asserting his play’s claim on the prize. The comedy thus continues the effort of the parabasis and earlier scenes to work toward its own
victory. Peter Wilson has taken much the same view of developments in
A handy suggestion by Olson (2002) 1224–5n.
Pl. R. 621c–d; Eratosth. FGrH 241 F 14; D. Chr. Or. 9.14; Photius and Suda s.v. περιαγειρόμενοι;
cf. Slater (1984) 246 n. 30; Valavanis (1990) 354–5; Csapo (forthcoming).
130
Revermann (2006a) 114–18; cf. Wilson (2007) 284, who refrains from adopting this exodus format for Acharnians because of his overall doubts about Dikaiopolis’ victory (see below).
131
Σ Pi. O. 9.1–3; cf. Eq. 1254; Av. 1764–5; E. Med. 44–5; HF 180 with Bond (1981). According to
ΣRVEΓ Av. 1764, Archilochus (fr. 324 West2) sang this in celebration of his own victory with a
Hymn to Demeter. Cf. Dunbar (1995) 1764–5n.; Olson (2002) 1227n.
132
Bowie (1993) 38–9, is less optimistic about Dikaiopolis’ invitation to the chorus; cf. Wilson
(2007) 276–7.
128
129
From synagōnistai to sympotai
89
the second half of Acharnians, but sees Aristophanes’ hailing of triumph
undermined and scrutinized by implications in the plot:€ “[F]or all the
efforts of nikē to perform her usual task of bridging, and to naturalize the
transition from comic vision to comedic prize, in some important cases
the thrust of comic self-consciousness is deliberately to undermine those
efforts and to expose their mechanics.”133 Thus for Wilson the Kopaic eelscene, for example, emphasizes Dikaiopolis’ megalomaniacal self-interest
as revealed in the fact that the chorus are left outside his feasting within
the play. But that interpretation misses the significance of Dikaiopolis’
meta-agonistic claim about the eels, which looks beyond the performance
and the individualized roles assigned according to the plot, and focusses
instead on the united celebration of a shared victory.134 In this sense, the
vision of a victory celebration transcends any momentary deprivation
the chorus experience in their dramatic character. The same understanding applies to the chorus’ response to Dikaiopolis’ final request to usher
him off with cries of victory:€τήνελλα δῆτ’¸ εἴπερ καλεĩς γ’¸ ὦ πρέσβυ¸
καλλίνικος (1228). Where Wilson sees the chorus hesitating, in doubt about
Dikaiopolis’ sincerity in proposing to share his victory with them now, it
may rather be that their comment is confidently self-conscious and signals
the moment at which they start to move beyond their dramatic role and
shift toward their epinikian identity.135 In other words, as the chorus take
up the victory cry in response to Dikaiopolis, they initiate the communal
celebration of victory that Wilson denies ever takes place.136 This mood of
(over)confident anticipation is exactly what we expect when something as
central to the effort of dramatic performance as victory in the contest is in
question, and it may be too much to think that Aristophanes systematically undermined that endeavor.137
Wilson’s view of the treatment of victory in Acharnians relies heavily on
emphasizing the dubious nature of Dikaiopolis’ achievement.138 Most of
Wilson (2007) (quotation from 270–1).
Wilson’s characterization (2007, 272) of the epinikia as ideologically questionable because of its
exclusiveness would undermine the happy picture in Dikaiopolis’ claim; as pointed out already,
however, the passage on which this assumption rests (Smp. 173a) almost certainly provides an
abbreviated list of those involved at the epinikia when it mentions the poet and the chorus
alone.
135
Olson (2002) 1228n., takes the particles in this line as expressing confidence; cf. his note on
307–8, where read GP 487–8.
136
Wilson (2007) 277–8.
137
Compare Av. 444–50; Ec. 1154–62. Cf. Wilson (2007) 278, noting that distinctions between
contests for productions and for lead actors may have limited the effect of Dikaiopolis’ quest for
individual victory at the expense of the chorus.
138
Wilson (2007) 271.
133
134
90
Competitive partnership
the tenets on which this view is based have been countered with reasonable arguments, which do not require restatement here.139 Even the claim
that the gloomy nature of the Choes itself, with its aitiology in Orestes’
pollution from matricide and its eerie practice of dining separately and in
silence, brings out Dikaiopolis’ dark nature no longer carries much conviction.140 The most thorough and systematic analysis of the literary and
iconographic evidence for the Choes finds the joyful picture in Acharnians
closer to reality than the disturbing picture the aitiology might suggest.141
That Aristophanes is harnessing the Choes backdrop toward an anticipated victory and not to undermine it, is made most clear by the chorus’
final song, performed as Dikaiopolis and Lamachus go off to their separate battles (1143–73).
Although not a syzygy in form, this song is parabatic in some formal
aspects and especially in content, since it reflects on matters of theater production and poetic rivalry at the festivals.142 The chief interest is with the
celebration of epinikia. The song amounts to a curse directed against a certain Antimachus, who remains obscure for us but was presumably readily
identifiable to the original audience.143 We learn that he served as choregos
at a recent Lenaia and cheated his chorus of the expected celebratory feast
after their performance (1154–5). In exactly what sense this is true is uncertain, though the likeliest explanation is that he failed to follow through on
See especially MacDowell (1983); Carey (1993) 247–8; Brockmann (2002); Olson (2002) xliii–iv.
My discussion of the parabasis adds to these by arguing against the supposed disjunction of
Aristophanes from Dikaiopolis on the issue of peace and war. While it is true that the chorus’
change of heart before the parabasis leaves them in the position of having to watch with envy as
Dikaiopolis enjoys the fruits of his enterprise, their enthusiasm and admiration for his celebration never flags (836–59, 971–99). The dramatic function of the instances in which the chorus
reveal their wish to partake in Dikaiopolis’ celebrations (1008–10, 1044–6) is to project to the
audience a communal recognition of the alluring prospect of peace. It is also common after the
parabasis for the chorus either to be swept along in the success of the hero (e.g., Wasps) or to lose
their distinctive and active role in the action (e.g., Knights). The latter applies to Acharnians,
inasmuch as after the parabasis the chorus become little more than supporters of Dikaiopolis
with no particular local identity.
140
For that portrait of the festival, see esp. Burkert (1983) 213–26; (1985) 237–42. For its application
to Dikaiopolis, see esp. Bowie (1993) 27–44; Fisher (1993) 41–4; (2000) 364; Wilson (2007) 272.
141
Hamilton (1992), esp. 26–7, 61–2, 118–19, 123. Hamilton (24–5) traces the abundant testimonia
characterizing the festival through Orestes’ experience back to Euripides (IT 947–60), who he
argues has distorted the picture for dramatic purposes. The conclusions of Robertson (1993) esp.
198, are much the same. Cf. Edmunds (1980) 23; Habash (1995) 568–9; Brockmann (2002) 271;
Pütz (2007) 13–19.
142
Sommerstein (1980a) 1143n.; Totaro (2000) 15–17; Slater (2002) 64.
143
Further identifying information surely lies behind the corrupt verses 1150–1. Moulton (1981)
22–4, emphasizes the ambiguity of the personal references as they relate to the plot. Wilson’s
suggestion (2000, 319–20 n. 93) that Antimachus may be fictive seems unlikely, given the specificity of his attributes and activities in this passage.
139
From synagōnistai to sympotai
91
a victory with the expected largesse.144 In that case, whatever Antimachus’
relationship to Aristophanes€– sponsor of a rival performance or brazen
choregos of one of Aristophanes’ own plays145€ – this action sets him in
opposition to the ideal of an epinikion celebrated by all the performers
that Dikaiopolis looked ahead to earlier. Antimachus is an aberration, an
abomination to the victory celebration.
The sense in which Antimachus becomes an enemy to this and all
choruses is enhanced by his very name, which is placed in the emphatic
opening position of the song and connects him with Lamachus and everything Lamachus represents, most notably the supposition that war forbids
feasting and celebration.146 In fact, the chorus did much to articulate and
reject Lamachus’ outlook earlier, when they excoriated Polemos for disrupting feasts and extolled Diallage for her bountiful harvest (977–99).147
The punishment prescribed for Antimachus is therefore highly appropriate:€his own feast will be stolen by a dog (1156–61). In a way reminiscent
of Dikaiopolis preventing Lamachus from feasting during the Choes celebration, the chorus in their turn bar Antimachus from enjoying feasts in
the epinikia frame.148 In addition to repaying the offender in kind, the
chorus’ minatory wish operates to their future advantage, by ensuring that
they will not be deprived of their rightful share in the victory celebration that will, with any luck, follow their current performance in a Lenaia
competition.149
With their minds already directed toward the victory celebration after
the festival, the chorus’ second curse forms a natural progression. In
the antistrophe (1162–73) they pray that the same choregos, while coming home in the dark, may be attacked by a robber. Their ill wishes continue:€while reaching for a rock with which to defend himself, Antimachus
Wilson (2007) 276 n. 69, may be right to defend the reading in R (ἀπέκλεισε δείπνων, 1155). Cf.
Olson (2002) ad loc.
145
Russo (1994) 14–15, proposes Aristophanes’ own entry in the Lenaian competition in 426.
Dover’s (1963 = 1987–88 vol. i, 303) counter-suggestion that the chorus in this ode speak in a
generic way for all Lenaian choruses is challenged by Halliwell (1980) 44–5, who defends Russo’s
thesis. The matter is beyond certain resolution.
146
Cf. Hubbard (1991) 42.
147
Cf. Taillardat (1962) 364–5. See the chorus’ equating of Lamachus with war at Ach. 1080:€ἰὼ
στράτευμα πολεμολαμαχαϊκόν.
148
Wilson (2007) 275–6, sees instead the chorus responding to the misery Lamachus finds himself in with a memory of their own exclusion from celebratory feasts. But the sympathy for
Lamachus assumed by this interpretation is out of place and character, since the chorus clearly
taunt Lamachus for his deprivation in the opening verses of this song (1143–9); note their harping on “you” (= Lamachus) versus “him” (= Dikaiopolis).
149
Wilson (2000) 348 n. 247, similarly treats the context for the punishment as a victory feast.
Curses and threats are used to secure victory at Nu. 1115–30; Av. 1102–17; Pherecr. fr. 102.
144
92
Competitive partnership
will mistakenly grasp a freshly deposited turd and hurl it, missing his
assailant but striking … Cratinus. Although the scholia assert that this
is not the Cratinus who was competing in the same contest, this is surely
wrong, since the identification is all but guaranteed by the theatrical interest of the song and the concentration on poetic victory as reflected in the
epinikia theme.150 I will return to Cratinus shortly; for the moment it is
enough to observe how the chorus situate their performance and thoughts
about epinikia within the agonistic milieu of the Lenaia. Let us consider
the contribution of the Choes to this scenario.
Antimachus’ nocturnal assailant is identified merely as a drunken and
raving Orestes (1166–8). That there was an actual Orestes in Athens who
fit this description is unlikely;151 the reference seems instead to be to the
mythological figure, whose madness after he murdered his mother could
be treated as paradigmatic, and who could be thought of as wandering
about Athens during the Choes festival. The traditional feasts at separate tables that were a defining characteristic of the Choes were explained
in mythology by Orestes’ appearance in Athens at this time of year with
the pollution of his crime still on him, necessitating the expedient of a
banquet in which the participants avoided contact with their guest.152
The individual drinking pitchers were an element of this practice, and
the drinking contest itself a direct corollary.153 Orestes’ violent nocturnal debauchery represents well the aftermath of this celebration when, as
Aristophanes’ frog-chorus describe it, “the drunken crowd staggers in procession to their sacred precinct (i.e., the marshes) at the sacred festival of
pots” (Ra. 211–19).154 Hence Orestes’ madness and his drunkenness in this
Van Leeuwen (1901) 1150–5n., and Olson (2002) 1171–3n., speculate that Antimachus might have
been Cratinus’ own choregos, in which case the envisioned scene adds insult to injury. Sidwell
(1994) 107–9 sees a complex relationship between this song and a more expansive paracomic
treatment of Eupolis and Cratinus in Acharnians.
151
This suggestion by Dunbar (1995) 712n., is refuted by Olson (2002) 1166–8n.
152
These negative implications must also be weighed against the fact that the festival served to
reintegrate Orestes into society, as it does for Dikaiopolis as well; cf. Habash (1995) 569 n. 36.
153
The antiquity of the contest is suggested, at least, by the herald’s announcement in
Acharnians:€“drink the choes pitchers at the sound of the trumpet, according to tradition” (κατὰ
τὰ πάτρια, 1000). Cf. Burkert (1983) 219–20. Hamilton (1992) 24 suggests that the silence was
simply a matter of the contestants drinking quickly in the contest, i.e., not engaging in discussion and other forms of verbal entertainment that typically accompanied the consumption of
wine. Note too that by nature and definition an agon (“public gathering”) is a communal event.
154
The Festival of Pots or Chytroi was the third day of the Anthesteria and properly began on the
evening of the Choes; cf. Burkert (1983) 215, 232, though Hamilton (1992) 42–50, believes that
Choes and Chytroi belonged to a single day. The event referred to in Frogs is the dedication of
wreathed choes after the contest:€Hamilton (1992) 46; Robertson (1993) 210. Thus Sommerstein
(1996a) 218–19n., is probably wrong to refer to the actual day after the Choes, nor for that matter
must κραιπαλόκωμος mean a hangover rather than the intense drinking that precedes and leads
150
From synagōnistai to sympotai
93
song are both explained by the foundation myth of the Choes festival currently dominating the dramatic action. Hence too, even within the song
itself the context of poetic victory celebration is united with that of the
Choes festival, making it even easier to connect ideas in the song with
developments in the dramatic plot. In the song it is the hero of the festival who appears suddenly out of the darkness to assist both the chorus,
by attacking Antimachus, and Aristophanes, by prompting the delivery
of a well-timed insult to his poetic rival Cratinus. From the perspective of
Aristophanes and his chorus, therefore, Orestes plays a very positive role.155
Those associations carry over to the main plot in the scene that follows,
when Dikaiopolis reappears, drunk and disorderly, holding his chous, and
leaning on two prostitutes, the counterpart for Orestes’ paradigmatic revel
following the feast and likewise striving for the play’s victory.156
The convergence of Choes with epinikia in the final sequence may be
pressed even further. This “ideal” of a drunken reveller supported by
attendants after the Choes was associated with Dionysos himself:€several chous-pitchers represent him staggering, supported by a satyr, with
other miniature satyrs attending him (e.g., carrying his chous).157 As
Dionysos is apparently in the same state as the human revellers of the
Choes, it makes sense for this iconography to have been generated in
the context of the festival; but it appears that by the final decades of the
fifth century this representation of the god had been imported into the
iconography of epinikia, in scenes showing Dionysos’ arrival at the victory celebration.158 In this context the scene represents the ideal of the
patron deity himself recognizing the dramatic troupe’s victory, while
his drunkenness projects onto him the intense revelry engaged in by the
victors during the epinikia celebration. To the extent that Dikaiopolis’
final appearance replicates this iconography, the visual cue helps the
audience align the Choes victory with the dramatic victory he claims for
Acharnians. Through its applicability to both Choes and dramatic festival, the image facilitates the play’s final and most important Dionysian
155
156
157
158
to a hangover. The latter might be more appropriate here, since the second element of the compound envisions active revelling; at any rate, during a three-day festival in which drinking began
on the first day, it is safe to say that a hangover could be experienced at any number of points.
Contrast Fisher (1993) 43–4.
Bowie (1993) 37, considers a comparison of Orestes with both Dikaiopolis and Lamachus, the
latter based on the Athenian general’s heroic defense of his city as it reflects the mythical figure’s
defense of Argos.
LIMC s.v. Dionysos nos. 382–3; cf. 321. The child-satyrs in these representations are consistent
with the emphasis on children in Choes iconography; cf. Hamilton (1992) 84–5, 88–90, 105.
Biles (2007). To the material presented there, add the third-century choregic monument of
Karistios on Delos; see Wilson (2000) 293. Cf. Csapo (forthcoming) for choregic iconography.
94
Competitive partnership
transition from Anthesteria to the Lenaia of 425. And, of course, the
implications of Dikaiopolis’ embodiment of Dionysos in his epinikian
epiphany become more conspicuous alongside the other tokens of dramatic victory incorporated into the closural sequence, most of all the
assumed processional movement toward the victory monuments beyond
the eastern parodos.
A r i s t oph a n e s a n d C r at i n us
In the Antimachus song, Cratinus receives special emphasis through the
placement of his name in the final position. The two theatrical targets
thus stand as bookends to the choral interlude,159 and literally create a
frame of poetic agonism for the song. Cratinus’ misfortune thus comes
as the culminating insult, making for even more effective mockery,
since the chorus’ invective is redirected to him at the last minute and
the unflattering image of a rival poet smeared with excrement endures
in the audience’s mind, undiluted by further commentary. Cratinus had
already been reviled in an earlier choral song (848–53), in fact, where he
was included among the villains to be excluded from Dikaiopolis’ market. Cratinus assumes a similar position of prominence there, through
the disproportionate number of lines devoted to him in comparison
with the other individuals the chorus target. Among the cheap shots
Aristophanes directs against his rival is the claim that he is too hasty
with respect to mousikē (851), which should probably be interpreted in
the fuller sense “poetry” and not simply “music.”â•›160 With Sommerstein’s
translation, “over-hasty in composition,” the point is that Cratinus’ comedies are unpolished and by implication undeserving of the audience’s
approval.161 Hence the “mud slinging” in these two passages functions as
a true provocation that openly invests the dramatic performance with the
competitive stakes involved in theatrical production.
With his experience and record of success, Cratinus surely represented
the greatest challenge to Aristophanes or any other poet competing in this
period. We can perhaps take the measure of his stature in the festival competitions from the fact that Aristophanes’ abuse is concentrated on him
alone, whereas Eupolis, his other rival at this festival (Ach. Hyp. I. 33–4),
Cf. Hubbard (1991) 42.
Cf. Olson (2002) 851n. ΣREΓLh Ach. 849a again fails to correctly identify Cratinus as Aristophanes’
rival, apparently misled by the description to posit a lyric poet by that name (Rennie (1909) 216);
Starkie (1909) 174–5, and Rogers (1910) 130–1, follow him into error.
161
Contrast Cratinus’ own claim in fr. 255; cf. Sommerstein (1992) 19.
159
160
Aristophanes and Cratinus
95
escapes notice entirely.162 That silence is the more perplexing, since Eupolis
had been victorious at the Lenaia in at least one of the last few years.163
Perhaps some camaraderie had developed between the two younger poets
in facing the old guard,164 but that explanation amounts to much the same
point:€in the 420s no single poet could be placed on the same agonistic
footing as Cratinus.
We can, I think, see Aristophanes connecting his antagonism with
Cratinus in the choral songs discussed above with Dikaiopolis’ antagonism with Lamachus. This is most explicit in the earlier song, as the fruits
of Dikaiopolis’ internal victory denied to Lamachus extend beyond the
dramatic situation to overlap with Aristophanes’ professional rivalry, by
excluding Cratinus from the market as well. The relationship is more complex in the Antimachus song, where the encounter between the choregos
and Cratinus comically adapts the diction and formulaic action of a typical Homeric battle scene (1171–2 ἐπᾴξειεν … τὸν μάρμαρον).165 This epic
coloring fuses the parabatic song with the preceding scene, by continuing the epic arming-scene parodied there, as Lamachus and Dikaiopolis
prepare for battle (1143 ἐπὶ στρατιάν).166 The self-serving irony is that
Antimachus wounds Aristophanes’ own rival in this encounter. Cratinus’
injury and disgrace on this scatological battlefield come just in time to
forecast Lamachus’ equally pathetic and inglorious misfortune:€ he is
pierced by a vine-stake and hits his head on a rock as he falls into a ditch
(1178–81). It is entirely fitting that the advocate of war should be punished
by the very stakes that were the object of Polemos’ violence (984).167 But
the bathetic event hardly suits the highly charged, mock-tragic language
of the messenger’s report, so that the comic juxtaposition of registers in a
battle-description continues from the account of Cratinus.168
For us, the important point is that the fate of Aristophanes’ rival is linked
with that of Dikaiopolis’ chief antagonist. The intra- and Â�extra-dramatic
The theory of Bowie (1988) that Dikaiopolis is recognized as Eupolis is refuted by Parker (1991);
cf. Olson (1991) 200 n. 3, Storey (1993b) 388–92, Kyriakidi (2007) 130–6. Bowie’s position is the
starting point for a more encompassing theory of paracomedy in Sidwell (1993); (1994); (1995).
163
IG II2 2325.126; cf. Storey (2003b) 62–3; Rusten (2006b) 25; Olson (2007) 387.
164
Biles (2001); Olson (2007) 21–2. The theories of collaboration between Aristophanes and Eupolis
are discussed by Storey (2003b) 279–88; Kyriakidi (2007) 154–71.
165
Specifically Il. 4.491–2; 15.430–4; see Borthwick (1967) 412–13; Olson (2002) 1171–3n.
166
For the epic parody and agonistic structures in this scene, see Harriott (1979); Palumbo Stracca
(1996); Porter (2004); cf. Collins (2004) 3–29, on stichomythia and agonistics.
167
And at the same time, cast in the role of Telephos:€Foley (1988) 39.
168
Similarly, Moulton (1981) 24. παλίνορρον in 1179 is a Homeric hapax legomenon; see Olson
(2002) ad loc., who (1178n.) further suggests that χάρακι and τάφρον initially bring to mind an
Iliadic context, until 1186 makes it clear that an irrigation channel is meant.
162
96
Competitive partnership
agonistic frames thus fully converge as the play strikes its triumphal tones
in the closing sequence, making clear Aristophanes’ hope that his hero will
be the instrument of his own celebration over his enemies in the Theater.
Through this performatively self-conscious effect, the play situates itself
in the Lenaian contest, and therein lies the most profound objective of
Aristophanes’ effort throughout this play to align Dikaiopolis’ agonistic challenges with his own. This understanding has other, wider implications. The rich interplay of agonistic themes in the relation of poet to
hero is surely a response to the intense competitive atmosphere in which
Aristophanes’ career began. Dikaiopolis is a testament of the degree to
which agonistic pressures could be translated into a competitive poetics. Although we catch glimpses of what Dikaiopolis represents in this
regard, no other single character so fully instantiates the poetic agon, at
least in Aristophanes. Instead, the most conspicuous elaboration on what
Aristophanes achieved with Dikaiopolis was produced by his chief rival
of this period, in Pytine with the story of “Cratinus” and the revitalization of his faltering relationship with “Comedy.” Within the otherwise
rough outlines of what can be made of the play, it is clear that this poetic
stroke of genius was the result of Cratinus’ rivalry with Aristophanes. That
rivalry is the subject of the next two chapters.
chapter 3
Aristophanes’ poetic tropaion: Competitive
didaskalia and contest records in Knights
To later readers of Old Comedy, the Lenaia of 425, at which Acharnians
was produced, must have seemed a remarkable occasion. Competing were
the three poets who eventually became the undisputed triumvirate of
fifth-century comedy:€Cratinus, Eupolis, and Aristophanes (Ach. Hyp. I.
32–4). Cratinus, whose career was now most likely entering its fourth decade, was undoubtedly the preeminent comic poet of his generation, with
eight of his nine career victories probably behind him at this point.1 His
preeminent position would soon be claimed, however, by two younger
rivals. Eupolis debuted in 429 and within a few years was victorious at
the Lenaia, possibly in 426, the year before Acharnians was performed.2
Aristophanes produced his first play in 427 and almost certainly won his
first contest one year later, at the City Dionysia in 426 with Babylonians.3
IG II2 2325.50, 121 (= Cratin. test. 5 and 6; cf. test. 1); cf. Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 112–13. His victory with Pytine at the City Dionysia in 423 (Nu. Hyp. II) must have been his last.
2
He would add six more victories during the course of his career; Suda ε 3657 (= Eup. test. 1)
records Eupolis’ seven career victories, three of them Lenaian (IG II2 2325.126 = Eup. test. 12). If
Phrynichus’ first victory, which appears two lines ahead of Eupolis in IG II2 2325, belongs to either
429 or 428 (Anon. De com., Prolegomena III, page 9 lines 33–5 Koster = Eup. test. 2), Eupolis’
must belong to 427 or 426, ahead of Aristophanes’ victory in 425; see Geissler (1925) 12; Storey
(2003b) 63; Olson (2007) 387–8. Rusten (2006b) rightly questions some of the assumptions of a
narrow chronology, though suspicion of Olympiad dates (provided for Phrynichos’ debut by Sud.
φ 763 = Phryn. test. 1, giving πς᾿ = 436–432 bc; see ap. crit. K–A) is not entirely unfounded (e.g.,
Prolegomena XXXa–b Koster = Ar. test. 2; V. Hyp. I. 32), and it also makes sense that when Anon.
De com. III singles out Eupolis’ role as didaskalos, he does so because it marked the beginning of
his career (made clear in discussing Aristophanes’ debut in the next paragraph, ἐδίδαξε δὲ πρῶτος;
cf. the support for that conclusion in Eup. frr. 259, 260, 267, as noted by Rusten (2006b) n. 18), in
which case the synchronization of this event with Phrynichus as didaskalos (ἐφ οὗ καὶ Φρύνιχος)
to suggest the start of his career too is a reasonable, if not entirely certain, interpretation of the
evidence. However, resolution of the contradiction in Suda and Anon. De com. can be reached by
assuming the latter refers to Phrynichus’ first victory:€cf. Biles (2009).
3
The supplement of Aristophanes’ name at IG II2 2325.58 (= Ar. test. 20) to represent a victory at
the City Dionysia of 426 is widely accepted (e.g., Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 85–6; Sommerstein
(2001) 219; Olson (2007) 385), and is consistent with the reflections of Babylonians in Acharnians
(above, pp. 82–3). See Olson (2007) 385–6, for arguments against both Gilula (1989a), who favors
supplementing Aristomenes’ name, and Wilhelm (1906) 20, 112, who argued for Aristophanes’
plays being registered under his didaskaloi Kallistratos and Philonides.
1
97
98
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
In short, the comic agon at the Lenaia of 425 brought together the finest talent of the period, and we can only imagine the mixed feelings of
excitement and trepidation with which Aristophanes awaited the competition, and his sense of accomplishment when Acharnians was awarded
the prize.
The importance of Aristophanes’ victory with Acharnians for his identity
as a competitive poet can be measured by an examination of Knights, the
play with which he returned to the Lenaia in 424. In both a thematic and
formal sense, Knights is the most agonistic of the surviving Aristophanic
comedies. From nearly the moment the Paphlagonian and the Sausageseller encounter one another, the action consists of a heated, visceral
antagonism that, rather than coming to a dramatic culmination and conclusion in a single formal agon, is merely articulated by this arrangement
at two separate points (303–456, 756–940) within a larger struggle that is
not fully resolved until near the end of the play (1248–63).4 This intensely
antagonistic quality has been viewed as a symptom of Aristophanes’ deep
antipathy for Cleon (represented by the Paphlagonian).5 I concentrate
instead on how the dominant poetic mode of challenge and confrontation reflects rivalry between comic poets. Above all, the agonistic underpinnings of Knights are revealed in its parabasis. Composed as a tribute
to Aristophanes’ accomplishment the previous year, the Knights parabasis
unconditionally hails Cratinus off the stage and instates Aristophanes
himself as the heir apparent to the glories of poetic competition. The competitive assertions in the parabasis coincide with the introduction of the
poet to the audience as no longer simply an author, but for the first time
a full-fledged komoidodidaskalos, “director,” as well. These disclosures do
more than explain details in the playwright’s professional career; by connecting concern about the task of directing plays with a desire to earn a
victory, Aristophanes’ self-presentation helps define him as a competitive
poet. Additional contributions to that effort are made by the use of language and ideals drawn from victory commemoration and record-keeping
at the festival, which convert the parabasis into a kind of literary tropaion
for the victory of Acharnians.6
Cf. Brock (1986) 24–5. See Gelzer (1960) 161–2, for the continuation of the contest in later scenes.
E.g., Dover (1972) 99–100; MacDowell (1995) 107–12.
6
Similarly metapoetic readings of Knights are those of Hubbard (1991) 67–71, who discusses the
simultaneously humble and foul character of the Sausage-seller as it reflects the comic poet himself and the profane and abusive nature of his genre, and Ruffell (2002) 148–55, who concentrates
on how Knights appropriates and extends Cratinean poetic modes.
4
5
Victors coming and going
99
V ic t or s c om i ng a n d g oi ng
The competitive interest of Knights is emphasized by a thematic frame
formed by the verses that introduce and close the anapests. Like several
other Aristophanic parabases, that of Knights begins with a short lyric
kommation, which prepares for the parabasis proper by orchestrating
the characters’ departure from the stage and creating a thematic bridge
between the plot and the issues taken up in the parabasis.7 The chorus offer
vigorous support to the Sausage-seller as he dashes after the Paphlagonian
to continue their dispute before the Athenian Council, and their remarks
culminate in a short prayer for his successful return:
καὶ νικήσας
αὖθις ἐκεĩθεν πάλιν ὡς ἡμᾶς
ἔλθοις στεφάνοις κατάπαστος.
(Knights 500–2)
And after you win a victory,
may you then return to us again
from there sprinkled with garlands.
If matters go as they wish, the Sausage-seller will come back victorious,
decked with garlands as a token of his success. Victory garlands were a
potent symbol of agonistic success in many contexts, including the
Theater itself, where they were ceremoniously awarded to victorious poets
at the agon’s culminating moment.8 The framing context of dramatic performance brings this particular association into prominence, especially
because the chorus is introducing the part of the play that had become
the centerpiece for the poets’ competitive acts of self-assertion. Not surprisingly, therefore, the association with garlands is emphasized again
when the chorus draws attention to the withered state of the garlands on
Cratinus’ head that commemorate his earlier victories:€στέφανον μὲν ἔχων
αὖον,€… διὰ τὰς προτέρας νίκας (534–5). This amounts to a not very subtle
way of reminding the audience of Cratinus’ recent defeat, and implies by
contrast the freshness of Aristophanes’ victory and accompanying crown.9
This aspect of the parabasis’ intertextual relationship with the plot is described by Hubbard (1991)
17–18, with detailed discussions for each play in the individual chapters.
8
Their significance in this regard is emphasized in an epinician epigram (AP 13.28) composed for a
victorious tribe in dithyramb, which contains a moving vision of the performers’ heads so adorned
(Page (1981) 11–15); cf. the Delphic victory inscription in Hansen (1989) no. 811.4. Although debate
in the Council does not belong in the category of formal agons, on remarkable occasions speakers were honored “as athletes” for their advice (e.g., Th. 4.121.1; Plu. Per. 28.4); see Blech (1982)
109–62, esp. 113.
9
Cf. Sommerstein (1981) 172; Biles (2002) 180; Imperio (2004) 209.
7
100
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
The vision of the Sausage-seller’s glorious return to the stage is thus similar
to the present reappearance of Aristophanes, whose person and persona
the chorus is about to summon through the metaphoric performance of
his identity in the parabasis. As the dramatic character departs, therefore,
the prayer for his return creates a fitting entrance and reintroduction of
the victorious poet to the Theater.10
As the anapests close, the chorus’ thoughts turn to Aristophanes’
own exit from the Theater at the end of the festival, and they encourage
the audience to stir up a foam of water and send him off with a salute
of eleven oars. The metaphor has never been convincingly explained, but
even if its original application and significance remain obscure, in context
it clearly betokens a victory with Knights at the festival.11 The audience’s
worthy applause (547 θόρυβον χρηστόν), which the rowing metaphor
prefigures, will be particularly suited to the agon underway at the Lenaia
(547 Ληναΐτην)12 and will thus allow the poet to depart happily (548 ἀπίῃ
χαίρων). The initial wish in the kommation for the Sausage-seller to go
happily and succeed in the way the chorus wishes (498–9 ἴθι χαίρων, καὶ
πράξειας | κατὰ νοῦν τὸν ἐμόν) is thus recast at the close of the anapests,
now explicitly for Aristophanes’ benefit.13 That wish is accompanied by
the closing image of the poet’s gleaming forehead (550 φαιδρὸς λάμποντι
μετώπῳ), a vision that brings to mind the color of a fresh victory crown.14
Victories acquired in the past and anticipated in the future thus enclose
the anapests and align Aristophanes’ and the Sausage-seller’s objectives.
They also establish a theme that is central to what lies between.
C om ic di da s k a l i a a n d t h e t r a i n i ng
of a c om pe t i t i v e p oe t
The main discussion of the Knights parabasis is prompted by a question
that, we are to suppose, has come to Aristophanes from undisclosed
Cf. van Leeuwen (1900) 502n.
Cf. e.g., Rogers (1910) 547–50n. Whereas modern interpreters attempt to explain the number by
referring to the theatrical context (see Sommerstein (1981) 173; Gilula (1989b); Hubbard (1990); N.
G. Wilson (2007b) 51), the scholia seem to be fishing for an explanation based on the assumption
that some kind of naval command is involved. Lech (2009) offers the likeliest solution, by referring to parallel details in accounts of Phormio’s naval victories.
12
Russo (1994) 78–9 believes that Aristophanes’ adjective builds specifically on Λήναιον, i.e., a
Lenaion theater. The theory of a separate theater, on which cf. Slater (1986), has not gained much
favor.
13
For the explicit verbal link with the parabasis’ opening prayer, see Hubbard (1991) 77.
14
The glowing aura of the victor is movingly described by Pindar at P. 8.95–7; van Leeuwen (1900)
549n. believed that Eq. 550 was a quotation from a higher poetic register. A joke was also available
10
11
Comic didaskalia and the training of a competitive poet
101
members of the audience:€Why did he not ask for a chorus in his own
name long ago (512–14)? Most likely Aristophanes belonged to a minority
of poets who did not customarily direct their own plays,15 and his decision
to begin doing so in 424 must have demanded explanation. The question€–
whether feigned or real we cannot know€– allows the chorus to discuss the
nature of komoidodidaskalia as a reason for Aristophanes’ decision to enter
this final poetic challenge only with Knights. As they argue in his defense,
this is the most difficult task of all and one that is rarely rewarded:
φησὶ γὰρ ἁνὴρ
οὐχ ὑπ᾿ ἀνοίας τοῦτο πεπονθὼς διατρίβειν, ἀλλὰ νομίζων
κωμῳδοδιδασκαλίαν εἶναι χαλεπώτατον ἔργον ἁπάντων˙
πολλῶν γὰρ δὴ πειρασάντων αὐτὴν ὀλίγοις χαρίσασθαι.
(Knights 514–17)
For the man says
that it was not through folly that he delayed �regarding
â•… this, but because he believes
that komoidodidaskalia is the most difficult task there is,
since she gives her favors to only a few of her many suitors.
The term komoidodidaskalia is generally translated “directing a comic
chorus” and in recent decades the Knights parabasis has been discussed along with passages in the parabases of Clouds (esp. 528–32) and
Wasps (esp. 1018–22) for what they can tell us about the early stages of
Aristophanes’ career in relation to the broader range of duties and skills
that went into a comic production along with writing a script.16 But there
is a limit to how much komoidodidaskalia, understood in this restricted
sense, can help in interpreting the anapests. Above all, Aristophanes only
hits on the idea of professional development in the two-and-a-half lines
toward the end of the passage in which he summarizes the stages of his
professional education through the metaphor of a sailor’s ascent from the
oar to the tiller (541–4). The metaphor is never ruptured, so that although
to those members of the audience who recalled that Aristophanes’ head gleamed as a result of his
baldness; Rogers (1910) 547–50n.; Reckford (1987) 125; Olson (1998) 773–4n.
Cf. Sommerstein (1992) 15–17; Revermann (2006a) 18.
16
Mastromarco (1979); Halliwell (1980); (1989); MacDowell (1982); (1995) 34–41; Perusino (1982b);
(1986) 37–57; Gilula (1989b). Playful irony is surely involved in Aristophanes’ comments, but we
know of at least one other case where a new director found the transition from poiētēs to didaskalos
anything but smooth:€Eratosthenes reports that Plato Comicus was successful as long as he produced plays through others, but when he acted as didaskalos for the first time with Rhabdouchoi,
was soundly defeated (POxy. 2737.44–51 = Ar. fr. 590 and Pl. Com. test. 7); cf. Rosen (1989); Biles
(1999). Clearly the problems of directing for Plato are likewise reducible to agonistic concerns.
15
102
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
its stated interest is to elucidate the challenges of directing a chorus,
no explicit mention is made of any didaskalic duty the poet learned to
perform.17 One point deserves consideration:€after Aristophanes reached
this professional apex and was awarded the prize for his efforts (Eq. Hyp.
II. 21), he continued using directors throughout his career, beginning
with Clouds the next year.18 The stage biography offered for him here
is thus best understood as€– like all parabases€– an exercise in purposeful distortion, intended to increase the poet’s chance of victory in the
contest.19 In Chapter 1 I suggested that the specific “question” to which
Aristophanes responds had its basis in the parabatic accusations of rival
poets, who took the liberty of interpreting his reliance on directors as
a sign of inexperience or, even worse, incompetence. On this understanding, that komoidodidaskalia was the most challenging aspect of the
comic craft and that Aristophanes has arrived at some ideal moment of
consummation is a bit of calculated subterfuge and exaggeration, meant
to rebuff this criticism of his earlier productions. The concentration on
komoidodidaskalia thus cannot be separated from agonistic considerations, as is again clear when we bear in mind how the term is defined
by the longer passage that falls between the initial mention of it and the
closing naval metaphor.
The way the topic of directing is introduced in 515–17 prepares for a
discussion focussed on festival agonistics. What Aristophanes means by
claiming to be “favored” by a personified komoidodidaskalia is explained
in the lines that follow:20
ὑμᾶς τε πάλαι διαγιγνώσκων ἐπετείους τὴν φύσιν ὄντας
καὶ τοὺς προτέρους τῶν ποιητῶν ἅμα τῷ γήρᾳ προδιδόντας
(Knights 518–19)
He also recognized long ago that you were annual in nature,
and that you betrayed the poets of the past when they grew old.
Some of the possibilities are discussed by Perusino (1986) 39; MacDowell (1982) 25, restated in
(1995) 39–41; cf. Revermann (2006a) passim.
Anon. De com., Prolegomena III, page 9 lines 39–40 Koster = Ar. test. 4; cf. Wilhelm (1906) 111;
Olson (1998) xxiii n. 4. For other known instances when Aristophanes used a director, see V. Hyp.
I. 33–4; Av. Hyp. I. 8–9; Lys. Hyp. I. 33–4; Ra. Hyp. I. 37–8; cf. Pl. Hyp. III. 3–7. Aristophanes’
own career thus suggests that a more complex situation lay behind his decisions about directing
than the simplistic picture presented in the Knights parabasis.
19
Cf. Sifakis (1971) 40; Harriott (1986) 25; Reckford (1987) 125; and Chapter 1.
20
For the sexual metaphor (recognized already by Σ VEΓΘMLh Eq. 517a), see Dindorf (1837) 321; van
Leeuwen (1900) 97; Henderson (1975) 158, 160; Biles (2002) 184–5.
17
18
Comic didaskalia and the training of a competitive poet
103
Komoidodidaskalia is thus conflated with the audience, whose whimsical
nature matches that of Aristophanes’ chosen mistress of the Theater.21 This
relationship defines the central problem of the parabasis as a director’s
ability to obtain a successful outcome at the festival, for as elsewhere in
Aristophanes and the comic fragments, gaining the audience’s approval is
tantamount to winning the contest.22 That implication was adumbrated
in the kommation, through the chorus’ address to the audience as “experienced (506 πειραθέντες) in their own right with every kind of Muse,”
which similarly places them in an authoritative position where poetry is
concerned.23 This initial captatio benevolentiae must thus be understood
for how it operates within the dynamics of festival competition.
A demonstration of these points follows, as the chorus offer evidence
of the supposed difficulty of comic production; the emphasis is on contest outcomes and what they suggest about the relationship between poet
and audience. In a review of the careers of Magnes, Cratinus, and Crates
(520–40), the chorus pays equal attention to successes and failures, all to
show how poets are “betrayed” at the end of their careers by the audience
(518–19).24 Aristophanes explains his own delay (541 διέτριβεν ἀεί) by reference to his predecessors’ experiences and his fear that he may share their
fate (541 ταῦτ᾿ ὀρρωδῶν), returning to the point with which he began
(515 διατρίβειν). His familiarity with the vicissitudes of the comic competitions encouraged him to prolong his career as poet and directorial assistant until he was prepared to compete on his own, an experience he alludes
to briefly through the naval metaphor (541–4). But even here, where we
seem to catch a glimpse of Aristophanes’ assumption of specific duties,
the metaphor’s purpose is consistent with the parabasis’ rhetorical development of the idea of komoidodidaskalia. As I observed already, the naval
metaphor for acquiring directorial duties gives way to a second one (546),
in which the chorus asks the audience to support the poet in the contest. The trajectory of the imagery accordingly lends force to the point
acknowledged throughout, that any estimation of how a man had carried
out his didaskalic duties depended on how his play fared in the contest.25
Similarly at Ec. 1161–2 whimsical judgments in the Theater are compared with the fickle behavior
of hetairai.
22
E.g., Cratin. fr. 360; Ar. Av. 445–6; Eup. fr. 392; and later Pl. Lg. 659a–c, 700c–701a; cf. PickardCambridge (1968) 97–8; Wallace (1997); Csapo and Slater (1994) 286–305.
23
On the thematic connection between πειραθέντες (506) and πειρασάντων (517), see Imperio
(2004) 176.
24
Cf. Ruffell (2002) 142. Contrast Harriott (1986) 22:€“that section [i.e., 520–40] … was (somewhat
illogically) attached to the rest.”
25
See Reckford (1987) 136.
21
104
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
The parabasis’ focus on victory and defeat in connection with audience
reception goes hand-in-hand with its presentation of the agon as a battleground where rival poets engaged in intense rivalries. The introduction
of Magnes establishes the association. Following standard military practice, Magnes set up victory monuments (521 ἔστησε τροπαĩα) for choruses that struggled against one another (521 χορῶν τῶν ἀντιπάλων). As
Angus Bowie observes, tropaion is not used of poetic victory monuments;
it belongs to the world of military enterprise, and Aristophanes appears
to be making the hyperbolic suggestion that the same brutality could be
observed in dramatic competition.26 This suggestion is taken further in the
description of Cratinus’ floruit, where the poet makes his appearance as a
torrent of rushing water that tears away everything in its path, including
(with a final para prosdokian that ruptures the metaphor) his enemies (528
τοὺς ἐχθρούς).27 While recent opinion has inclined toward seeing this as
an acknowledgment of the bitter personal attacks that became Cratinus’
literary trademark,28 the organizing interest of the parabasis as it has just
been articulated through the example of Magnes’ poetic battles makes it
more natural to take these enemies as Cratinus’ rivals in the Dionysian
competitions.29 In that case, this passage may supply an explanation for
the sharpening of antagonistic banter between rival poets as it depended
specifically on Cratinus’ literary style. Certainly these points have a natural complement in what follows, when Cratinus’ own victories with his
plays are brought to the audience’s attention (535 διὰ τὰς προτέρας νίκας).
Additional militaristic coloring in the recollection of Cratinus’ theatrical
conflicts can be detected in the image of a raging stream, which adapts a
metaphor borrowed from Homeric descriptions of heroes on the battlefield.30 Finally, Crates is said to have kept up his courage in a Theater
dominated by the audience’s vacillating anger and abuse (537 ὀργὰς ὑμῶν
Bowie (1993) 64. The phrase στῆσαι τροπαῖον is common in military contexts (e.g., Gorg. 82 B 6,
p. 286 lines 9–10 D–K; Th. 5.12; X. HG 1.4.23).
27
Cf. Silk (2000) 143, for a fuller discussion of the metaphor.
28
Perusino (1982a) 149; Mastromarco (1998) 30; Rosen (1988) 39–40; Ruffell (2002) 143–4; cf.
Pretagostini (1982); Sifakis (2006) 25–6.
29
Compare echthroi at 590 (discussed below), which betokens the same conflation of military conflict and poetic rivalry; cf. van Leeuwen (1900) 528n.; Lai (1997) 147. Of the two Cratinean quotations offered in 529–30, the first is admittedly vaguely political; the second is clearly an address to
or about poets and may reflect Cratinus’ own competitive posturing.
30
Il. 5.87–94, 11.492–7; cf. 16.384–93; for water metaphors in Homeric battle scenes, see Fenno
(2005). The image was adopted by Cratinus the following year in Pytine (fr. 198), almost certainly in connection with his own poetry; cf. Rosen (2000) 29–31, who (following Σ VEΓ3ΘLh Eq.
526a) suggests that the metaphor in both Knights and Pytine may depend on an earlier Cratinean
model. Hubbard (1991) 74 n. 35, imports a negative implication into Aristophanes’ river metaphor
based on Hellenistic and Roman evidence.
26
Comic didaskalia and the training of a competitive poet
105
ἠνέσχετο καὶ στυφελιγμούς) and to have held out like a stranded soldier
(540 μόνος ἀντήρκει), though with mixed results.31
Here, as often in Aristophanes, the pleasure of the poetry is in the contradictions and ironies that emerge when a passage is considered carefully.
There is a definite tension between the persona of a retiring and respectful neophyte, which Aristophanes adopts for this theater season, and the
subversive message the parabasis half-heartedly conceals.32 Like Magnes
and Crates, Cratinus is presented as a poet whose days of favor with the
audience are in the past, despite the fact that he was competing at this
very Lenaia.33 Of the three poets mentioned, Aristophanes directs his most
abusive mockery and ridicule at Cratinus, as is immediately apparent in
the disproportionate number of lines devoted to his biography:34
εἶτα Κρατίνου μεμνημένος, ὃς πολλῷ ῥεύσας ποτ᾿ ἐπαίνῳ
διὰ τῶν ἀφελῶν πεδίων ἔρρει, καὶ τῆς στάσεως παρασύρων
ἐφόρει τὰς δρῦς καὶ τὰς πλατάνους καὶ τοὺς ἐχθροὺς προθελύμνους
ᾆσαι δ᾿ οὐκ ἦν ἐν συμποσίῳ πλὴν “Δωροĩ συκοπέδιλε,”
καὶ “τέκτονες εὐπαλάμων ὕμνων˙” οὕτως ἤνθησεν ἐκεĩνος.
νυνὶ δ̓ ὑμεĩς αὐτὸν ὁρῶντες παραληροῦντ̓ οὐκ ἐλεεĩτε,
ἐκπιπτουσῶν τῶν ἠλέκτρων καὶ τοῦ τόνου οὐκέτ̓ ἐνόντος
τῶν θ’ ἁρμονιῶν διαχασκουσῶν˙ ἀλλὰ γέρων ὢν περιέρρει,
ὥσπερ Κοννᾶς, “στέφανον μὲν ἔχων αὖον, δίψῃ δ᾿ ἀπολωλώς”,
ὃν χρῆν διὰ τὰς προτέρας νίκας πίνειν ἐν τῷ πρυτανείῳ,
καὶ μὴ ληρεĩν, ἀλλὰ θεᾶσθαι λιπαρὸν παρὰ τῷ Διονύσῳ.
(Knights 526–36)
Next he recalled Cratinus, who once �overflowed with
â•… abundant applause,
and flooded the naïve fields, sweeping from their place oak trees,
â•… plane trees,
and his enemies, and carrying them off, roots and all.
At symposia it was impossible to sing anything but
â•… “Goddess of Bribery, shod in figwood,”
I accept the paradosis μόνος as driving home the sense in which the poets stand alone against
the audience; for the emendations μόνον (Sommerstein) and μόλις (van Leeuwen, Wilson), see
N. G. Wilson (2007b) 50. For ἀνταρκέω in a military context, cf. Th. 7.15.1. Crates’ meager victuals (538) might also depend on a military context, namely the notoriously meager rations soldiers lived on (e.g., Eq. 600; Pax 1129; and esp. Ach. 1095–1142). On Eq. 538 and Crates’ career,
see below.
32
Cf. Harriott (1986) 23; Hubbard (1991) 74–5; Biles (2002) 177–80; Ruffell (2002) 144–8.
33
Eq. Hyp. II. 21–2.
34
While the professional biographies offered for Magnes and Crates are colorful and humorous,
nothing in either compares to the abuse heaped on Cratinus. The attempt by Hubbard (1991)
75–6 to extend the caustic mode to all three biographies is thus unpersuasive, though he effectively points out the logical transition from blaming the audience to showing poets falling short.
31
106
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
and “Fashioners of handy songs,” so great was his flowering.
But now you feel no pity, though you see him driveling,
with his pegs falling out, his tuning gone,
and his joints coming unglued. In his old age he wanders aimlessly,
just like Konnas, “with a withered garland on his head, and dying of thirst,”
whereas on account of his past victories he ought to drink
â•… in the Prytaneion,
and, instead of driveling, watch the performances in a seat of honor
â•… beside Dionysos.
The eleven lines reserved for Cratinus have a diptych structure, in which
the first five, temporalized by “once” (526 ποτε) and past tense verbs (527
ἔρρει, 528 ἐφόρει, 529 ἦν, 530 ἤνθησεν), set the accomplishments and honors
summarized therein squarely in the realm of theater history.35 The final
six lines, governed by an initial “now” (531 νυνί) that introduces present
tense verbs (531 ἐλεεĩτε, 533 περιέρρει),36 dwell instead on Cratinus’ present decrepitude. Wandering about in a state of utter disarray (532–3) and
babbling unintelligibly (531 παραληροῦντ᾿, 536 ληρεĩν), he has become a
theatrical embarrassment, his only token of artistic merit the withered garland (534 στέφανον . . . αὖον) he wears in recognition of victories that are,
sadly, a feature of the past (535 διὰ τὰς προτέρας νίκας).37 Still, the blame
really falls on the Athenians, for not having taken measures to secure him
an alternative livelihood and a place in the Theater where he can watch
performances (536 θεᾶσθαι)€– rather than participating in them.38
These are harsh remarks, but consistent with the parabasis’ definition
of poetic didaskalia based on theater competition and the rivalry of poets
for the audience’s favor. They also make an important contribution to
the presentation of Aristophanes as an emerging professional. By making
Cratinus a target of his antagonistic mockery, Aristophanes shows himself ready to become a competitive didaskalos not only by accumulated
technical experience, but by temperament as well.39 An explanation for the
dismissive attitude toward Cratinus is not far to seek:€the fall from poetic
For ποτε, compare Ach. 13, where the word similarly activates memory of performance history.
In 535, χρῆν πίνειν is an unfulfilled obligation with present force.
37
Contrast the gleaming victory crowns (λιπαρῶν στεφάνων) for the victories recalled by
Bacchylides (1.157–8), and the gleaming hair (λιπαρὰν ἔθειραν) of performers crowned for victory
in AP 13.28.4. Cratinus takes on this effulgent quality after retiring from competition and taking
a seat in the audience (536); again contrast Aristophanes at 550.
38
The image of a broken lyre (532–3) reinforces these points by recalling the tradition of Thamyris
as a mythological paradigm for competitive poetry and the agonistic disgrace he suffered at the
hands of the Muses; see above, pp. 13–15.
39
Thus Hubbard (1991) 71–2, interprets the Knights parabasis as Aristophanes’ unveiling of himself
as an iambic blame poet.
35
36
Comic didaskalia and the training of a competitive poet
107
grace in question is surely the defeat of his Cheimazomenoi by Acharnians
at the previous Lenaia. We should nonetheless not lose sight of the Lenaia
of 424, since the public humiliation heaped on Aristophanes’ rival the
previous year had implications for the present competition, in which
Cratinus was competing again. Defaming a rival is part of a strategy to
influence the audience’s appraisal of the competitors and secure a favorable outcome once again.40 I have already considered how Aristophanes
pleads for a fresh victory in the pnigos, by encouraging the audience to lift
him to victory with Knights on the swell of their oar-strokes. That wave of
applause expands water imagery associated earlier with Cratinus’ acclaim
in the Theater (526), but deploys it in support of Aristophanes’ anticipated
victory over his older rival.
Broached as an immediate concern in the conclusion of the anapests,
the ongoing struggle to which Aristophanes alludes is also reflected in
both parabasis odes.41 The summons of Poseidon to the chorus’ side (559
δεῦρ᾿ ἔλθ’ εἰς χορόν) in the first ode serves to muster divine support for their
performance, since Poseidon’s fondness for all things pertaining to horses
(551–3), and above all the competition of charioteers (556–7 μειρακίων θ᾿
ἅμιλλα λαμ- | πρυνομένων ἐν ἅρμασιν), provides a good reason for him to
favor Aristophanes’ knight-chorus in their contest.42 The agonistic interests are more pronounced in the second ode:
Ὦ πολιοῦχε Παλλάς, ὦ
τῆς ἱερωτάτης ἁπασῶν πολέμῳ τε καὶ ποιηταĩς δυνάμει θ᾿ ὑπερφερούσης μεδέουσα χώρας,
δεῦρ᾿ ἀφικοῦ λαβοῦσα τὴν
ἐν στρατιαĩς τε καὶ μάχαις
ἡμετέραν ξυνεργὸν
Νίκην, ἣ χορικῶν 43 ἐστὶν ἑταίρα
τοĩς τ᾿ ἐχθροĩσι μεθ᾿ ἡμῶν στασιάζει.
νῦν οὖν δεῦρο φάνηθι. δεĩ
γὰρ τοĩς ἀνδράσι τοĩσδε πάσῃ τέχνῃ πορίσαι σε νίκην, εἴπερ ποτέ, καὶ νῦν.
585
590
(Knights 581–94)
Cf. Ach. 849–53, 1164–73.╇╅ 41╇ Cf. Fraenkel (1962) 195.
Cf. Hubbard (1991) 80, and for other agonistic resonances in this passage, Campagner (2001)
70–1.
43
This is the paradosis and apparently what the scholiasts read. N. G. Wilson (2007b) 51, argues for
Willamowitz’s Χαρίτων, but acknowledges that “a word is needed which indicates the divinity’s
good will towards the poet and his chorus.” Indeed, the adjective is perhaps most naturally taken
40
42
108
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
Pallas, Guardian of the City,
keeper of the holiest of all lands
and one preeminent in war,
poets, and power€–
join us here, bringing with you
Nike, our compatriot
in expeditions and battles,
the companioness of choruses,
who supports our cause against our enemies.
So then appear now! For,
if ever in the past, now too
you must by all means
bestow victory on these men.
This passage puts more explicitly the comparison of comic rivalry to
battle presented in the anapests. Now references to war and poetry are
boldly intertwined (583–4 πολέμῳ τε καὶ ποιη- | ταĩς δυνάμει θ᾿) in a
prayer for Athena to bring Nike to make the chorus victorious (592–4
τοĩς ἀνδράσι τοĩσδε … πορίσαι σε νί- | κην).44 While the demonstrative
τοĩσδε is ambiguous, making it impossible to pin down a single referent for the remark, the chorus’ desire for divine support is prominent.45
In the lines leading up to this prayer, Nike was identified as their close
ally (588 ἡμετέραν ξυνεργόν) and companion (589 χορικῶν … ἑταίρα).
The association may be generic,46 but a close affiliation between Nike
and Aristophanes’ chorus can be treated more seriously as a result of
the favor Aristophanes’ play was shown the year before.47 In addition
to supporting the chorus’ competitive undertakings, as a hetaira Nike
recalls the personification of komoidodidaskalia as a sexually desirable
female (516–17), whose favors poets compete for in the manner of a fickle
courtesan. This makes a nice complement to the earlier metaphor, in
which poetic victory ultimately replaced sexual activity as the objective.
As companion to the chorus, Nike is imagined fighting alongside them
against their enemies (590 τοĩς τ᾿ ἐχθροĩσι). Earlier in the parabasis, echthroi referred to the rivals Cratinus defeated when he was preeminent on
to refer to the chorus themselves, as the relative clause builds on Nike’s support of them stated
just before and after, and plays off expressions like τῶν τραγικῶν χορῶν (Ar. fr. 156.9). For the
fondness for€–ικος suffixes, see N. G. Wilson (2007b) 50–1.
44
Cf. Zimmermann (1985–7) 207.
45
For the ambiguity of expression, see Reckford (1987) 391; Hubbard (1991) 81.
46
Compare CIA ii. (3) 1298, lines 2–3:€καὶ Νίκῃ τοιάδε δῶρα πρέπει¸ ἣν πάρεδρον Βρομίῳ κλεινοῖς
ἐν ἀγῶσι τεχνιτῶν κτλ.
47
In this light, the traditional language of prayer in the final line (εἴπερ ποτέ¸ καὶ νῦν, 594) has a
literal force.
Inscribing poetic victory
109
the comic stage (528). His change of fortunes is now complete, since he
must himself be included among the vanquished echthroi of the recently
victorious Aristophanes.
I ns c r i bi ng p oe t ic v ic t or y
Through its concentration on dramatic agonistics, the Knights parabasis
achieves a sort of documentary status for the history of comic production
in Athens. This is true for its sweeping appraisal of the careers of former
poets as a way of defining komoidodidaskalia, but especially for what it
records about the rivalry between Cratinus and Aristophanes, and the latter’s sense that his ascendancy in the Theater is now established. This facet
of the connection between komoidodidaskalia and festival agonistics is
not accidental. On the one hand, Aristophanes activates the specific phenomenon of victory monuments, while on the other he handles information about the dramatic festivals in a way that suggests he is adapting the
model of contest records in developing his antagonistic rhetoric against his
chief rival. The Knights parabasis becomes an epinikian performance in its
own right, hewing to the model of a victory monument in poetic form and
announcing Cratinus’ defeat to the public at large, with promises of fresh
victories in the future.48
Even in their diminished state, the Athenian monuments reveal that
considerable interest and expense was lavished on commemorating and
advertising victories in the poetic contests. Most of our evidence is for
monuments dedicated by choregoi, but evidence for poetic accomplishments is not altogether lacking.49 IG I3 833bis, a partially preserved inscription of an early fifth–century monument from the Athenian Acropolis,50
is an important example of an individual poet displaying his accomplishments to public view:
[νικέ]σας hό[δε πρõ]τον Ἀθένεσ[ιν χο]ρõι ἀνδρõ[ν]
[€– ◡◡]τâ•›â•›ς σοφ[ίες] τόνδ᾿ ἀνέθε[κ]εν hόρον
[εὐχσ]άμενο[ς· π]λείστοις δὲ [χ]οροῖς ἔχσο κατὰ φῦ[λα]
[ἀνδ]ρõν νι[κâ•›â•›]σαί φεσι π[ερ]ὶ τρίποδος.
The connection between epinician poetry and the dedication of victory monuments is explored
in Steiner (1993); (1998); O’Sullivan (2003).
49
For recent discussion of choregic monuments, see Wilson (2000), esp. 199–262; Vierneisel and
Scholl (2002); cf. Podlecki (1981) 97–8; Biles (2007) 27–32; Csapo (forthcoming).
50
Dated variously from 500 to 470:€Peppas-Delmousou (1971) 55–6; Peek (1974); Hansen (1983) no.
270; IG I3. I follow Peppas-Delmousou for the supplements in the first line, as explained in Biles
(forthcoming); cf. Hansen (1983) no. 270.
48
110
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
this man [having been victorious first] with a chorus of men at Athens
dedicated this marker of his wisdom
having made a vow; he claims to have won with the most choruses
(in competition) for a tripod elsewhere throughout the tribes of men.
The inscription identifies the monument as a marker (horos) for the poet’s
agonistic success in the men’s dithyramb, and the third line places this
event within his accumulation of career victories. Although the poet’s
name is lost, it most likely appeared on a separate stone atop the surviving one, where it claimed the reader’s immediate attention.51 On a general
level, the monument’s importance lies in how it illustrates an early interest in victory commemoration and personal prestige as a feature of poetic
competition in Athens.52 But the verbal features the inscription shares with
the parabasis of Knights also help situate the Aristophanic passage within
the social milieu of festival agonistics. The elements of comparison involve
Aristophanes’ description of Magnes at 521:
ὃς πλεĩστα χορῶν τῶν ἀντιπάλων νίκης ἔστησε τροπαĩα
who set up the most trophies of victories over competing choruses.
In both descriptions, the dedicatory verb (ἔστησε and ἀνέθεκεν) is followed immediately by the monument type (τροπαĩα and hόρον), which
is itself specified by a dependent genitive in an emphatic position ahead
of the two other elements (νίκης and σοφίες).53 So too, both descriptions
stipulate that their victories are poetic (χορῶν τῶν ἀντιπάλων and χορõι
ἀνδρõν).54 After the lacuna at the beginning of the second verse,55 the first
legible words, τâ•›â•›ς σοφ[ίες], bring to mind the longstanding association
of wisdom with poetry.56 Indeed, Aristophanes himself describes the
I.e., in an extra-metrical announcement before the epigram:€Peek (1974) 199–200, citing ARV2
1581. Others attempt to restore it in the opening lacuna:€ Gallavotti (1975) 165–71:€ Simonides;
IG I3:€ Diagoras of Melos; Podlecki (1981) 100:€ Bacchiadas of Sikyon. Less likely still, PeppasDelmousou (1971) 59 believes the name stood at the beginning of the final line.
52
The practice can be traced back to the earliest self-proclaimed competitive poet, Hesiod, who
dedicated his prize tripod to the Muses (Op. 654–9); see Griffith (1983a) 62; Stein (1990) 46–7;
Papalexandrou (2005) 12.
53
Martin (2007) 59–60, explains the genitive of the inscription as stipulating contents, in relation
to a commemoration in poetic form.
54
For Aristophanes’ genitive (χορῶν τῶν ἀντιπάλων) of the defeated adversaries, compare Hansen
(1989) no. 794.8:€καὶ σῶν οὐδείς πω στῆσε τρόπαια χερῶν, recalling Herakles’ remarks on his
heroic achievements at S. Tr. 1102.
55
Podlecki (1981) 100–1 suggests νικȏν here rather than in the opening lacuna, but the consecutive
enjambment of participle that results in lines 2 and 3 is stylistically offensive; [οἰκεί]ες, suggested
by Peek (1974) 200, may be right.
56
Podlecki (1981) 101; Griffith (1990) 188–90.
51
Inscribing poetic victory
111
competition between Aeschylus and Euripides in Frogs as a “contest of
wisdom” (882 ἀγὼν σοφίας), making exceptional sophia the quality that
distinguishes a poet and earns him victory.57 A similar relationship is
operative in the inscription and is reinforced by the final two verses, in
which the poet provides a firmer demonstration of his sophia by enlisting his accumulated victories on top of his single Athenian one.58 A further element of comparison is evident at this point, in the deployment of
superlative elements to maximize the impression the poets’ accomplishments make on their audiences.59 Aristophanes’ claim that Magnes won
the most victories (πλεĩστα) is echoed in the anonymous poet’s claim to
have won with the most choruses (πλείστοις χοροĩς), to which he adds the
grandiloquent phrase “among the races of men” (κατὰ φῦλα ἀνδρõν).60
The monument’s assertive message is thus projected to the world at large,
an effect carried further by designating it as a horos, as if the stone establishes a proprietary boundary to serve as a reference point for competitors
who might emulate the achievement.61
See Dover (1993) 10–14. Compare also Nu. 955–8 and more importantly Nu. 520, where
Aristophanes hopes to win the contest and so be considered sophos. A female figure is identified
as Sophia by an inscription on an Attic vase (Athens, NM 19636, ARVâ•›2 1328) that shows Orpheus
and Thamyris performing in the company of Apollo and the Muses. Philippaki (1988) 93, interprets the scene as a kind of symphony; but a competition between the two poets seems more
likely, in which case Sophia (not otherwise attested as the name of a Muse; see Philippaki (1988)
91) might embody the prize.
58
Similarly in a choregic epigram (AP 13.28) the Akamantid tribe places its latest victory alongside its numerous (1 πολλάκι) victories in the past; see Wilson (2000) 122. Compare Hieron’s
third (τρίτον) equestrian victory, which enabled Bacchylides to make the superlative claim for his
Delphian record (4.4, 14–16).
59
For similar language in epinician poetry, see Bundy (1986) 46 n. 35; Maehler (2004) 105–6; cf.
Slater (2004) 148 n. 7. The unlikely situation described by Plutarch (Nic. 3), that Nikias “won
numerous times when he served as choregos, and was never defeated” (ἐνίκησε γὰρ πολλάκις
χορηγήσας¸ ἐλείφθη δὲ οὐδέποτε) in the Dionysian competitions, might itself originate with
Nikias’ tripod dedications, which Plutarch is considering at this point.
60
Peek (1974); Podlecki (1981) 100; and especially Wilson (2000) 217, emphasize the distinction
between victory in Athens and victories elsewhere (thus ἔχσο in line 3); the wider projection of
the announcement is also consistent with patterns of expression in victory commemoration:€e.g.,
Pi. O. 13.112–13, where the victories of the patron’s family “throughout all Greece” are beyond
human powers to reckon; N. 6.25–7, where Alkimidas’ house is “guardian of more victory crowns
in boxing than any house in the heart of all Greece”; cf. B. 8.19–25; IG V 1.1564a (Hansen (1989)
no. 820); AP 13.16.
61
Compare IG V 1.213 (Hansen (1983) no. 378):€“Damon dedicated (this) to Athena Guardian of
the City, having been victorious more than anyone now alive.” The idea of monuments stirring
competition was familiar enough that Sophocles could treat the matter humorously in Silenos’
antagonism with his sons:€ τοιοῦ[δ]ε πατρός¸ ὦ κάκιστα θηρίων¸ | οὗ πόλλ’ ἐφ’ ἥβης μνήματ’
ἀνδρείας ὕπο | κ[ε]ῖται παρ’ οἴκοις νυμφικοῖς ἠσκημένα (fr. 314.153–5); cf. Krumeich, Pechstein,
and Seidensticker (1999) 299 n. 34. Cf. Gallavotti (1975) 170 and Martin (2007) 43–5 and 58, for
the multiple ideas expressed by horos in the inscription.
57
112
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
That the resonances between Aristophanes’ description of Magnes’ victories and the anonymous poet’s inscription are not coincidental becomes
clearer when the inscribed epitaph of a certain Nikobolos (IG II2 6004) is
considered. The final verses express grief at Nikobolos’ departure to the
land of the dead, but the opening verse confidently establishes the mark he
will leave on the world by adducing the monuments to his aretē that have
been set up in Greece:
σῆς ἀρετῆς ἔστηκεν ἐν Ἑλλάδι πλεĩστα τρόπαια
For your aretē there stand in Greece the most trophies.
The epigram introduces elements of victory commemoration within the
funerary context, although because the realm in which Nikobolos displayed his excellence is left unspecified, it is impossible to say whether the
monuments alluded to actually existed or if the epigram’s author is invoking the idea in a figurative way.62 In either event, however, he is drawing
on a recognizable paradigm. As in Aristophanes’ description of Magnes,
Nikobolos’ monuments are identified as trophies (τρόπαια), and a dependent genitive (σῆς ἀρετῆς) defines their significance more narrowly. Finally,
the same hyperbolic claim of superiority is achieved by describing the
monuments as “the most” (πλεĩστα), an effect enhanced by adducing the
widely encompassing geographical boundaries of the Hellenic world.63
It is tempting to imagine Aristophanes wandering about the city
and studying dedications, and perhaps a similar monument existed for
Magnes.64 But my point in making these comparisons is to suggest that the
Knights parabasis interacts with a familiar habit of commemorating victories of all sorts. The monument for the anonymous poet adduced above
was found on the Acropolis, where it competed for space with numerous
other monuments commemorating victories, public and private, that collectively expressed the esteem in which the Athenians held Nike and show
how important it was for individuals to proclaim their successes.65 The
ideas from the ambience of festival competition activated in the Knights
parabasis were thus in all likelihood easily recognized by the audience and
helped shape their interpretation of the passage’s treatment of theater history. The lapidary quality Aristophanes imports lends gravity to his review
of contest outcomes. More importantly, by conspicuously borrowing from
Cf. Tsagalis (2008) 66.╇╅ 63╇ See above, n. 60.
Cf. Athenaeus’ description (8.351e–f) of the citharodist Stratonicus’ tropaion, which he set up in
the Asklepieion over “those playing the cithara poorly.”
65
Above all, with the dedication of the temple to Athena Nike in 425/4. For victory as an organizing
theme of sculpture and dedications on the Acropolis, see generally Hurwit (1999) 230–2.
62
64
Inscribing poetic victory
113
this cluster of ideals and linguistic patterns in his opening description of
Magnes, Aristophanes provides additional grounds for his own understanding of comic didaskalia and underscores the central role agonistic
considerations played in shaping his identity as a competitive poet.
Even when understood within the milieu of victory commemoration,
the fullness of interest the Knights parabasis displays in details pertaining
to the festival’s history is remarkable. Far from restricting itself to acknowledging Aristophanes’ defeat of Cratinus, the passage situates that victory
within a broader sweep of events that extend well beyond Aristophanes’
career. The audience is presented with an epitomized history of competition
on the comic stage for most of the fifth century. Nor does Aristophanes’
ambitious treatment of information pertaining to the Dionysia refer only
to his own and other poets’ victories. Instead, it attains its most profound effect by drawing attention to the way the careers of other poets
supposedly trailed off into obscurity. In other words, Aristophanes’ poetic
tropaion is most keen to commemorate agonistic failure,66 alerting us to
his creative independence as he humorously manipulates ideals associated
with victory monuments publicly to disgrace an active rival. At the same
time, the broad scope of the passage’s interests€– stretching over more than
half a century€– indicates a specific resource influencing how Aristophanes
composed this passage. Epinician inscriptions and epinician poetry often
invoke festival records by tabulating victories and in some cases reiterating
a herald’s announcements at a contest.67 Similarly in the Knights parabasis,
several features suggest that official records for the Dionysia contributed
to Aristophanes’ treatment of the festival’s agonistic history.
By the beginning of the fifth century, the dramatic contests at the
City Dionysia were well-established, regularly celebrated, and carefully regulated by state officials.68 The archons entrusted with a festival’s
The reversed emphasis is most conspicuous in his summary of Crates’ career:€“sometimes failing,
sometimes not” (540).
E.g., IG I3 893; AP 6.213, 13.14, 19, 28; “Simonides” 28 Page (with Page (1981) 241–3; Gallavotti
(1975) 168–9, Wilson (2000) 369 n. 70). Note also the Attic red-figure vase in Bulgaria (ARV2
1044, 9, LIMC s.v. Nike, 352) showing the kitharode Alkimachos approached by the embodied
festivals in which he was victorious; Hölscher (1967) 176 with Table 16.8; Webster (1972) 49; Blech
(1982) 179; Shapiro (1992) 57. Maehler’s comments (2004, 106) are apt:€“However much poets of
victory odes and epigrams might have liked to lavish superlatives on their clients, they had to
keep to the truth, as such claims were easily verifiable from the victory list.” Cf. Hubbard (2004)
76–7; and on the relation to the herald’s original announcement, see Nisetich (1975); Day (1989);
Kurke (1998) 142–9; Steiner (1993) 168; (1998) 134.
68
Comedy was added to the program in 486 (Suda χ 318 = Chionides test. 1; Olson (2007) 383–4),
and the Lenaian contests were organized c. 445–440 (however, see Rusten (2006b) and Luppe
(2007)).
66
67
114
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
organization underwent a formal examination into their conduct after the
celebrations came to a close, and it is probably in connection with these
responsibilities that records were kept for the entries and outcomes at the
competitions.69 Our evidence for this record-keeping comes from much
later and includes the remains of two inscribed monuments that date to
sometime after the middle of the fourth century BC, and the first quarter
of the third, respectively, but display information apparently going back
to the very beginning of the contests.70 In addition, we have several fragments of Aristotle’s Didaskaliai and the title of his Nikai Dionysiakai, both
of which apparently dealt with contest information in some detail.71 The
information preserved in this material included the archon year, choregos,
poet, title of play, and place taken, and, as James Sickinger has argued, the
fullness and accuracy of detail can only be explained on the thesis that
systematic records for the contests were maintained.72
We can say little else about where the theatrical records were kept, how
they were assembled, and whether they were accessible to the public or
were the subject of earlier public monuments.73 All the same, Aristophanes
seems to anticipate Aristotle in recognizing the festival records as the single most important witness to the history of the comic competitions. His
The administrative uses of the records are explored by Sickinger (1999) 45–7. The Law of Euegoros
(D. 21.10) identifies one point of business at the post-festival review as being to hear complaints
concerning the processions or the contests, making it reasonable to suppose that an official
record of the contests had to be produced for verification. Cf. Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 68–70;
MacDowell (1990) 13–16.
70
IG II2 2318 (the Fasti); 2319–24 (the Didaskaliai); 2325 (the Victors List). For introductions to
these, see Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 70–4, 101–20; Mette (1977); Csapo and Slater (1994) 39–43;
Olson (2007) 379–91; for more detailed descriptions, see Wilhelm (1906); Capps (1943). For the
date of the records’ earliest entries, see West (1989); Sickinger (1999) 43–4, with bibliography;
Scullion (2002). For the Roman didaskalic inscriptions, see below.
71
Aristotle’s work was a resource for Alexandrian scholars and was most likely a model for the later
inscriptions:€Körte (1906) 395–7; Pfeiffer (1968) 81. Aristotle must still have depended on earlier records; although we know that he used choregic dedications as a documentary source (Pol.
1341a35–6; cf. Plu. Them. 5.4), these monuments could not provide all the information needed
to compile the later lists, most significantly defeats; cf. Sickinger (1999) 45. The fragments of
Aristotle’s Didaskaliai are nos. 618–30 Rose.
72
Sickinger (1999) 41–7; cf. Pritchett (1996) 38. That official records existed has been widely
assumed:€Reisch (1903) cols. 395–6; Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 70; West (1989); Wilson (2000)
214.
73
For these and other problems in the study of records and archives in Athens, see Thomas (1992)
132–44 and passim. But many of Thomas’ cautionary remarks are of questionable relevance for the
festival records, since the fullness of the records witnessed in the later monuments suggests that
this information was not dealt with casually. If, as Thomas proposes for some official documents,
the various archons were allowed to dispose of the didaskalic records as they wished, it would
hardly have been possible for Aristotle to collect them so much later on. Sickinger (1999) 45, suggests that the outcomes were posted on white-boards, as was sometimes the case with athletic
victories.
69
Inscribing poetic victory
115
parabasis masquerades as a well-informed discussion based on the records,
in which he adduces and manipulates information to drive home his central interest of registering his own place in an agonistic history of the
Theater.74
The primary subject of the parabasis is clearly the Dionysian festivals’
remote past. As the anapests open, the chorus distance themselves from
“ancient” poet-directors (507 τις ἀνὴρ τῶν ἀρχαίων κωμῳδοδιδάσκαλος),
and then redirect their thoughts to a previous generation of comic
poets when they initiate the main discussion (519 τοὺς προτέρους τῶν
ποιητῶν). From the information available to him, Aristophanes has
deduced (518 διαγιγνώσκων) a historical pattern, namely that the audience betray poets in their old age. As I have already argued, “betrayal”
as Aristophanes means it here blames the audience for the failure of
individual poets to secure a victory, and this framing interest in contest
outcomes is constantly reasserted in the review of the three poets’ victories and losses. Magnes’ many victories (521) are superseded by the disgrace of being rejected (525 ἐξεβλήθη) in the contests.75 The initial swell of
applause for Cratinus (526) is transformed into recollections of victories
now long past (535 τὰς προτέρας νίκας). Crates’ mixed record of victories and defeats concludes the discussion:€τοτὲ μὲν πίπτων, τοτὲ δ᾿ οὐχί
(540).76 The term used to describe the whimsical nature of the audience’s
support similarly directs attention to the practice of keeping a record
for the festival contests; ἐπετείους (518), “yearly,” gives an impression of
changing favor that is adequately explained by the annual register of a
contest record.77 Finally, the second element in the name of Aristophanes’
theatrical dominatrix, Komoido-didaskalia, may bring with it the specific
This does not necessarily undermine explanations of the historical nature of the Knights parabasis
based on literary critical interest and different comic styles of specific poets (Neil (1901) 81; Rosen
(1988) 38; Ruffell (2002) 147–8), but provides a didaskalic framework within which those comments are made. I find Aristophanes’ comments in this regard vague, apart from what he implies
for Cratinus; see below nn. 83 and 85.
75
Compare the terminology used of Aristophanes’ defeat with Clouds in the didaskalic information
provided by Hyp. II. 3 Dover:€᾿Αριστοφάνης ἀπορριφθεὶς παραλόγως κτλ.
76
Here πίπτων is parallel with ἐξεβλήθη of Magnes in 525.
77
Van Leeuwen (1900) ad loc., thinks instead of botanical metaphors (the scholiast thinks of birds),
which is consistent with the implication of changefulness (i.e., “lasting only a year”; cf. Ach. 630,
632). But surely in the context of a discourse on the festival celebrations the term also carries
its better attested meaning “repeated every year,” used (e.g.) of collecting tribute (Hdt. 5.49.6)
and celebrating festivals (Hdt. 6.105.3); cf. Pi. I. 4.67. Slater (2002) 184, identifies a similarly
playful allusion to the festival’s annual celebration at Ra. 16–18. Compare how the poet of AP
13.28 invokes “the Dionysiac Seasons” (Ὧραι … αἱ Διονυσιάδες) to recall the Akamantid tribe’s
previous victories from the contest record. The expression in Aristophanes involves a humorous
paradox, because epeteious looks simultaneously to the audience’s inconsistency and the festival’s
regularity.
74
116
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
sense the term acquired in a theater vocabulary. As Pickard-Cambridge
observes, Aristotle’s Didaskaliai “no doubt took its title from the official
language of the festival,”78 and the title of Cratinus’ Didaskaliai points in
the same direction, especially since (as will be argued in Chapter 4) the
comedy almost certainly focussed on themes of dramatic production and
contest outcomes.79
In short, Aristophanes is interested in the essential information of contest records. He also takes it for granted that his audience will believe that
he has accurate information about the competition records of the three
poets he discusses, while implying an ability to examine them carefully
enough to compare their careers to one another. By moving chronologically with regard both to the poets’ individual careers and their general
relation to one another, his discussion provides a summary view of the
history of comic competition. This point has been obscured by a popular
interpretation of the parabasis, which suggests that Aristophanes forcefully wedged Cratinus between the long dead Magnes and Crates, who
was surely retired and perhaps dead himself by this time, to heighten the
depiction of him as a true “has been.”80 While the motive this interpretation attributes to Aristophanes is correct, it is inaccurate to say that he
acted with complete neglect for the true chronology. The first column of
the Victors List for the City Dionysia explains his arrangement:81
[ΧΙΟΝΙΔΗΣ] ___
___
.… . 9.… Σ Ι
___
[ΜΑΓΝΗ]Σ ΔΙ .… 7 … Σ Ι
[ΑΛΚΙΜΕ]ΝΗ[Σ] Ι
…6…ΣΙ
[ΕΥΦΡΟΝ]ΙΟΣ Ι (487/6)
(c. 480)
(459/8)
Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 71.
At first glance, the contrast between plural didaskaliai (with a quasi-technical sense of “productions” and so “records of productions”) in Cratinus and Aristotle, and Aristophanes’ singular,
might seem to preclude this interpretation. But even as Aristophanes creates a single female personification, in her relationship to the many competitions of Dionysia past, as well as her fluctuating attitudes at yearly celebrations, she represents a similar plurality.
80
Sommerstein (1981) 171; Hubbard (1991) 74–5; Biles (2002) 178; Ruffell (2002) 143 (acknowledging
that “the chronological sequence is superficially followed”). My interpretation here expands on
Biles (2001) 198.
81
IG II2 2325.39–53. The text presented here is based on Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 112, and Olson
(2007) 382–3.
78
79
Inscribing poetic victory
[ΕΚΦΑΝ]ΤΙΔΗΣ ΙΙΙΙ
[ΚΡΑΤΙ]ΝΟΣ ΠΙ
[ΔΙΟΠ]ΕΙΘΗΣ ΙΙ
[ΚΡΑ]ΤΗΣ ΙΙΙ [ΚΑΛΛΙΑ]Σ ΙΙ 117
(451/50)
(447/6)
The inscription provides a relative chronology for the comic poets based
on when they were first victorious at the festival; Aristophanes’ order is
consistent with this presentation as well as with the chronology in the
later scholarly tradition, which probably depended on the didaskalic tradition originating with Aristotle.82 In that case, the force of eita (526) at the
beginning of the discussion of Cratinus may be as much temporal as rhetorical, since it emphasizes the chronological organization of Aristophanes’
thoughts that is essential to his discussion of the poets’ individual careers.
By dealing with the poets’ records separately, according to a temporal
scheme, Aristophanes at best generalizes about individual rivalries and
competitive encounters at particular moments within their careers (most
notably at 521 and 528), so that we seem to be presented with data for the
competitive outcomes viewed retrospectively and with some emotional
detachment. Indeed, it is left for the audience to deduce that the poets
succeeded one another when a younger rival defeated his predecessor.83
Evidence for a similar way of viewing these poets’ careers is available in
a Roman monumental inscription for the history of Athenian drama,84
in which the careers of the playwrights are presented discretely and in
rough chronological order, with individual plays, going back well into
the fifth century, collected and organized according to festival, place (1st
through 5th), and then date. One of the larger fragments (IG XIV 1097),
for instance, picks up at the end of Kallias’ career with his fourth- and
fifth-place finishes, and continues with Lysippos’ didaskaliai, beginning
Anon. De com., Prolegomena III, p. 7 lines 12–13 Koster = Crates test. 2a.4–5. From Σ VEΓΘM Eq.
537a (= Crates test. 3) and Anon. De com., Prolegomena III, p. 8 lines 26–7 Koster (= Crates test.
2a.5–6), we learn that Crates began his career as an actor for Cratinus, before becoming a poet in
his own right.
83
But see Ruffell (2002), who attempts to bring out the sense of rivalry between the three poets
that produced the succession. Ruffell 143, understands Eq. 525 to mean that Magnes “fell short”
(ἀπελείφθη) in comparison with the new mode of comic abuse (i.e., τοῦ σκώπτειν) represented by
Cratinus (cf. Sommerstein (1992) 24–5); I take this to mean that Magnes lost his abusive edge in
his final years (note that Aristotle considered pointed mockery to be a traditional feature of Attic
comedy, Po. 1449b5–8). Ruffell likewise understands Aristophanes to be pitting Crates against
Cratinus in a conflict of styles (see his translation, p. 147), when in fact the point emphasized, as
in the case of the other poets, is Crates’ struggle against the audience’s tendencies (Eq. 537).
84
For fifth-century comedy, IG XIV 1097; 1098a; cf. Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 120–2; Csapo and
Slater (1994) 43. Other fragments are discussed by Morretti (1960).
82
118
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
with his first victory at the City Dionysia. The reporting is fuller than in
the Victors List, and resembles what Aristophanes purports to present, by
allowing the reader to gauge the relation of victories and defeats within
each poet’s career. The evidence of IG II2 2318–25 demonstrates that from
an early point contest information was analyzed and presented in different
ways, to draw attention to specific elements of the contests. Aristophanes
anticipates this type of analysis (again 518 διαγιγνώσκων) and shows that
the organizing rationale of the Roman monument could already be contemplated in looking back over the fifth century.
That Aristophanes was familiar with some details of the career of
Cratinus and perhaps Crates is to be expected. But the same cannot be
said of Magnes, whose career likely ended well before he was born and who
would therefore be accessible to a young poet of the 420s only through
formal inquiry. Precisely in the case of Magnes, however, further signs of
record-keeping attract attention.85 Aristophanes says that Magnes won the
most victories in the comic competitions (521), and I argued above that his
superlative pleista is based on phrasing in commemorative inscriptions and
epinician poetry. Whereas we cannot check the accuracy of the anonymous poet’s claim in IG I3 833bis, we do know that Magnes won eleven times
at the Dionysia, a total that in fact appears to be the “most”;86 so far as we
can tell, only Cratinus approached his record, with nine career victories.
In the course of learning this detail about Magnes, Aristophanes may also
have found out which of his plays were successful. That, at least, is how
one ancient scholar understood him; the scholia on line 522 report that
behind the five participles describing productions that earned Magnes
praise in the Theater are the titles of five comedies. Of these, only Lydoi is
confirmed by other sources (frr. 3–4). But far from disproving the scholiast’s interpretation, this correspondence may strengthen his explanation,
since so little of Magnes’ poetry has been preserved.87 The emphasis on
Ruffell (2002) 143, states that “the chorus’ remarks about Magnes himself are vague and do not
seem to use or anticipate substantive knowledge of his oeuvre or its end.” This is true only if we
expect to find evidence of literary quality and comic style, instead of didaskalic detail.
86
The notice of Magnes’ eleven victories in Anon. De com., Prolegomena III, p. 8 line 18 Koster =
Magnes test. 3.5 allows with near certainty the supplement of Magnes’ name for a poet with that
number of victories listed in IG II2 2325.50 (quoted above) for the early period of comic competition at the City Dionysia.
87
Eight fragments and four independently confirmed titles survive for what must have been rather
more than eleven plays, even on a very optimistic rate of success. Σ VEΓΘMLh Eq. 522a gives the titles
Barbiton Players, Birds, Lydoi, Psenas, and Frogs. We should keep in mind that such information
was readily available to ancient scholars, who had other resources besides the plays themselves
from which to learn titles of an author’s works. Kassel–Austin accept the scholiast’s interpretation. Spyropoulos (1975) rejects it (cf. Sommerstein (1981) 522–3n.); but the proposed alternative
85
Inscribing poetic victory
119
victories and defeats, the chronological patterning, and the attempt to
register titles make it look as though Aristophanes is self-consciously creating the impression of a literary transcript of a contest record.
But as the coercive rhetoric of the parabasis suggests, Aristophanes had
no interest in producing a contest record that was neutral in its accuracy, only one that cast him in as favorable a light as possible. For his purposes, this meant making Cratinus appear an unworthy competitor, and
the strategy he adopted was to emphasize his rival’s age and imply that he
was unfit to compete in the late 420s. To this end, the selection of Crates
was of the utmost importance. Crates was an unlikely candidate for inclusion in the Knights parabasis on two counts.88 With only three victories
to his name, he was in a different category altogether from Magnes, with
eleven, and Cratinus, who likely had eight when Knights was performed.89
Aristotle attached importance to the way Crates constructed plots (Po.
1449b8–9 καθόλου ποιεĩν λόγους καὶ μύθους), but this is different from
Aristophanes’ interest in this parabasis.90 Aristophanes has noticeably the
least to say about Crates and may even draw attention to his modest output
with ἀπὸ σμικρᾶς δαπάνης (538).91 It is also difficult to imagine that with so
few plays, his three victories created any pattern of the type Aristophanes
initially claims (519) to have observed in all three careers. When he reaches
the final discussion, however, he makes no attempt to make Crates’ career
fit this pattern; rather “sometimes failing, sometimes not” (540) implies
a career that did not fall into neat halves, as is suggested for the other
two poets.92 Optimistically, we might assume that Aristophanes remained
of references to acting roles makes little sense in this parabasis, where the interest is in producing
plays not in performing as an actor in them. The contest for actors was never part of the festivals
as Magnes experienced them, and was therefore presumably without a reliable form of documentation; cf. Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 124–5. In further support of the scholiast’s interpretation,
Aristophanes employs a comparable strategy of allusion in his discussion of Cratinus, where
instead of hinting at titles, he cites verses from comedies treated as representative of Cratinus’
competitive successes early in his career (Eq. 529–30); cf. Geissler (1925) 24. The two quotations
are apparently attributed to the same play by Σ VEΓ3ΘM Eq. 530a, though there is confusion in the
sources between Eumenides and Euneidai (see K–A).
88
On the false impression of Crates’ dominance and significant place in the Aristophanic annals of
theater competition, see Ruffell (2002) 143, 147.
89
See above, n. 1.
90
Though see Ruffell (2002) 147–8, for an attempt to connect Aristophanes’ ἐπινοίας (Eq. 539) with
Arist. Po. 1449b5–9.
91
The ancient biographical tradition assigned seven or eight plays to Crates (test. 1, 2, 4); Kassel–
Austin have 11 titles, several of them disputed. Sommerstein (1981) 538n., understands the “small
cost” as a reference to Crates’ putative avoidance of elaborate costuming.
92
Aristophanes could have maintained an impression of continuity by reversing the emphasis to
(e.g.) “sometimes winning, sometimes not.” We must take his word that Magnes’ rate of success
declined markedly toward the end of his career; certainly Aristophanes is eager to create this
120
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
faithful to the record of a checkered career he found attested for Crates.
Nonetheless, since Crates does not fit the stated parameters of the parabasis’ argument, we would do better to look for a different explanation.
The attraction of Crates as the third poet, I suggest, was that he began
his career after Cratinus, but ended it early enough to be regarded as one
of the proteroi.93 Since his first victory was in 450 (Jerome makes him clarus
in that year) and he composed a relatively small number of plays, most
likely his accomplishments were only a memory in 425. Moreover, Crates’
certain absence from the Lenaian Victors List suggests that his career did
not overlap with the organization of dramatic competitions at that festival sometime in the 440s long enough for him to leave a mark there.
Aristophanes’ selection was thus made with studious care to imply that
entire generations of poets had come and gone since Cratinus entered the
competitions, making it all the easier to see him as a relic of the past.
Further light can be shed on Aristophanes’ strategy by considering the
poets he did not include. Telecleides, with eight victories attested in the
inscriptions, was in one sense a more logical successor to Cratinus, given
the parabasis’ interest in competitive success and defeat. But Aristophanes
overlooked him, presumably because he was still active in the Theater.94
Once we see how Aristophanes operated, the full force of his representation of Cratinus is revealed. He did not have to create a chronology for
the theater wholesale to relegate his defeated rival to the past. Rather, he
attended with a distorting lens to what the records showed and presented
a “reality” far more insulting than any flight of pure poetic fancy could
be. With Aristophanes’ victory the Dionysian Seasons have marched on,
leaving Cratinus in the past. Meanwhile, the persona of a cautious student
of comic drama takes on a new level of meaning, as we are made to believe
that his training has led to serious research into the contests’ history.
impression through repetition (520 ἅμα ταῖς πολιαῖς κατιούσαις, 524 ἐπὶ γήρως¸ οὐ γὰρ ἐφ̓ ἥβης,
525 πρεσβύτης). In Cratinus’ case, the contrasting discussions of “then” and “now” maintain this
pattern (cf. 533 γέρων ὢν περιέρρει), and the withered crown and reference to “former victories”
create an impression of a current slump. Here the Victors List may be of help, since the first of
Cratinus’ three Lenaian victories came soon after that contest was established (he is fourth in
that list). But since the date for the institution of the competition (c.445–440) is derived by working back through the list (see Olson (2007) 387–8; Rusten (2006b)), it is difficult to say how early
this was and where Cratinus’ other Lenaian victories fell. The odds are against a victory during
the four years previous to Knights, if Phrynichus, Myrtilus, Eupolis, and Aristophanes must be fit
into the years 429–425:€see above n. 2.
93
Cf. Biles (2001) 196–7; Ruffell (2002) 143.
94
Telecleides’ first victory belongs to the mid- to late-440s (see Olson (2007) 384–5), and his eight
victories might easily have extended into the 420s, especially if a date of c.440 for the inauguration of comic contests at the Lenaia (where he won five times) is considered. Apseudeis, which
may belong to Telecleides, dates to the 420s:€Geissler (1925) 29–30.
Political and poetic succession
121
A major irony in our evidence for Old Comedy is that we know less
about Aristophanes’ record in the contests than we do about other poets
whose work survives only through chance citations and tattered papyri.
He belongs in the Victors List for the Lenaia at a point where a column
breaks off, while in the City Dionysia list the second half of his name is
restored. We thus do not know how many times he took the prize at either
contest, and cannot say to what degree his favor among later readers was
shared by contemporary audiences. As I have argued, the Knights parabasis is presented as a document of poetic agonism that simultaneously
assaults an active rival, proclaims Aristophanes’ own merits on the basis of
his victory with Acharnians, and activates the practice of commemoration
and record-keeping to inscribe that victory in poetic form for all of Athens
to see. The poeticizing of these ideas in Knights extends further, through
the interaction of the parabasis with the dramatic plot.
P ol i t ic a l a n d p oe t ic s uc c e s s ion
Connections between Aristophanes’ self-presentation and major themes
in the plot of Knights have long been noted. In the scheme presented in
the parabasis, Aristophanes stands as the last of four comic poets struggling with their rivals to secure the favor of an audience whose unreliability
offers no guarantee that anyone will enjoy the glories of dramatic victory
for long. The succession at whose end Aristophanes places himself transfers to the Theater the paradigm of political succession already presented
in the Paphlagonian’s oracle in the opening scene (128–43), where it was
prophesied that the Sausage-seller would ascend to power after three consecutive sellers of other wares€– a hemp merchant, a sheep merchant, and
a tanner (i.e., Cleon).95 Within the broadly framed parallel provided by the
succession theme, a more specific point of comparison lies in the vicissitudes of political leadership that underlie the plot (40–70). Demos’ fickle
attitude toward rival demagogues is instrumental here; the idea drives the
action and especially its agonistic element, as the two rivals try repeatedly
to curry favor with him (esp. 873–4, 942–71, 1097–1101). In his characteristic ambivalence, Demos closely resembles the Theater audience described
in the parabasis,96 an identification that finds better support in the reality
that, as representative gatherings of the dēmos, the Assembly and Theater
Hubbard (1991) 77–8; Bowie (1993) 63–6; Slater (2002) 77. That a portrait mask of the demagogue
was involved (Eq. 230–2), seems unlikely:€Dover (1967) and Olson (1999) with bibliography; in
general, Stone (1984) 31–8.
96
Harriott (1986) 21.
95
122
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
were in rhetorical and ideological terms one and the same.97 In the festival contests, representatives of each of the ten political tribes that made up
the Athenian dēmos were impaneled as judges; similarly, Demos is officially
instated as judge of the competition between the Paphlagonian and the
Sausage-seller (746–9) at the very point when their antagonism becomes
more rigidly structured through the poetic form of the epirrhematic agon
(756–940).
The victory toward which the plot of Knights is accordingly directed is
a matter of mutual interest for the Sausage-seller and Aristophanes, as the
kommation makes clear (see above), and combines with other points of
contact in Aristophanes’ stage biography that€– as typically in a parabasis€–
stabilize the dramatic performance by treating it as a feature of the poet’s
identity.98 The chorus’ support for the Sausage-seller in his battle with the
Paphlagonian (e.g., 225–9, 240–6, 453–60) is now presented as a basis for
their support for Aristophanes as well, since he has the same enemies they
do and nobly closes in against the typhoon that is Cleon (509–11).99 That
observation has wider implications as well. The chorus’ assertions about
their poet’s bravery in facing this storm (511), their description of his thorough nautical training (541–4), and their request for a naval-style victory
(546–7) all serve to link the Aristophanes presenting this play with a pervasive metaphor of the larger plot, which envisions Cleon/the Paphlagonian
as a storm threatening the ship of state, in whose defense the Sausage-seller
is similarly buffeted.100 The framing parallel of the succession theme casts
Aristophanes and the Sausage-seller as both opposing an established order€–
the former against the older poets,101 the latter against the entrenched domination of Cleon and his predecessors. By contrast, therefore, youthfulness
becomes an identifying feature for both:€ Aristophanes as a young poet
reflects the youthful status of the Sausage-seller.102 Because of their youthfulness and inexperience, both the Sausage-seller (178–9, 182, 211–12, 222–4)
and Aristophanes (513–16, 541, 545) express uncertainty about their ability
See especially Henderson (1990) 285–7, though as Sommerstein (1998) argues, their collective
temperament and political persuasion may have been different; cf. Heath (1997) 237–8.
╇ 98
For the points made below, cf. Solomos (1974) 99–101; Hubbard (1991) 77–8.
╇ 99
For Cleon as storm, cf. Σ VEΓΘMLh Eq. 511b and V. 1033.
100
Especially 430–41, 756–62. See Edmunds (1987) 5–16, for a systematic analysis of the disturbance
metaphor and Cleon in Knights.
101
See especially 507, 519, 541–4. For conflict between old and new poets during the 420s, cf. Russo
(1994) 19–20; Gelzer (1970) 1407; Biles (2001); Olson (2007) 21–2:€see, however, the reservations
of Rusten (2006b).
102
Above all, Eq. 611; cf. the Sausage-seller’s worry about “becoming a man” at 178–9, 1254–5. His
youthful identity may have been emphasized by the structure of a rite of passage (Bowie (1993)
52), as well as by his mask; see Stone (1984) 41, on masks of younger men.
╇ 97
Political and poetic succession
123
to succeed in the struggles into which they have been thrust, and again the
chorus’ role as ally is instrumental to the success of both. In short, the playwright and his character are engaged in overlapping struggles to weather
the threats of political and poetic rivals.
These correspondences are complemented by another set of parallels
that connect Cleon and Cratinus.103 As noted above, Cleon is consistently likened to an elemental force of destruction that cows his rivals into
submission (845 ἁπαξάπαντας τοὺς ἐμοὺς ἐχθροὺς ἐπιστομίζειν); indeed,
he threatens to wash the Sausage-seller away in just this manner as he
comes on stage in preparation for the contest before Demos, “driving up
a towering wave and causing destructive confusion, as though he will
swallow me up” (692–3 ὠθῶν κολόκυμα καὶ ταράττων καὶ κυκῶν, | ὡς δὴ
καταπιόμενός με). In the description of comic poets in the parabasis, those
qualities are transferred to Cratinus, who bursts into the description as a
raging torrent that similarly sweeps away all natural obstacles and human
rivals (526–8).104 More overtly still, in their comments during the initial
stages of antagonism between the Paphlagonian and the Sausage-seller,
the chorus slip easily between their shared hatred for Cleon and their disgust for Cratinus:
εἴ σε μὴ μισῶ, γενοίμην ἐν Κρατίνου κῴδιον
καὶ διδασκοίμην προᾴδειν Μορσίμου τραγῳδίᾳ.
(Knights 400–1)
If I don’t hate you, may I become a blanket in Cratinus’ house
and be trained to sing in a tragedy by Morsimus.
With these remarks, the chorus noticeably fluctuate between their dramatic role and their extradramatic identity as a group of choreutai trained
for a dramatic competition, as the reference to Morsimus makes clear.105
With Cratinus implicated in the conflict with Cleon that structures the
contest of the dramatic plot, the internal and external agons are now intertwined. Accordingly, this maneuver pointedly reinforces “Demosthenes”’
attempt just before this to enlist the Theater audience (225–8 καὶ τῶν
θεατῶν ὅστις ἐστὶ δεξιός) among the allies the Sausage-seller can rely on in
his attempt to bring Cleon down.106 Aristophanes is here already looking
Sidwell (1995) 71, 78, speculates that there may actually have been a well-known association
between Cratinus and Cleon.
104
At Eq. 137 Cleon is specifically portrayed as a river in spate; cf. Ach. 381; V. 1034.
105
Slater (2002) 73.
106
Cf. Rosen (2007) 81–2. For the identification of the two slaves of the prologue as Demosthenes
and Nikias, see Dover (1959) and Sommerstein (1980b); criticism of this position in Henderson
(2003).
103
124
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
past his plot and mustering the support he will need to win the poetic
competition; it is the dexioi whom he identifies as his special constituency
in the Theater, both in earlier (Ach. 629) and subsequent parabases (Nu.
521, 527; V. 1059, cf. 65–6).107 Not surprisingly, his reputation in this regard
became fodder for Cratinus’ mockery of his younger rival:
τίς δὲ σύ; κομψός τις ἔροιτο θεατής,
ὑπολεπτολόγος, γνωμιδιώκτης, εὐριπιδαριστοφανίζων108
(Cratin. fr. 342)
Who are you?, some clever spectator might ask,
a super-subtle, idea-chasing, euripid-aristophanizer.
Content and meter (anapests) suggest a parabasis, leaving little doubt that
the fragment preserves a glimpse of Cratinus’ rejoinders to Aristophanes’
agonistic posturing.109 The criticism obviously belongs to the mid- to late420s, when the two poets were competing against one another in the
Theater, and it has been suggested that the lines are from Pytine (423).110
They might just as well, however, be part of a challenge issued against
Knights. The most remarkable feature of the fragment, after all€– and the
one on which Cratinus must have calculated his audience would seize€–
is the conflation of Euripides with Aristophanes, which surely refers to
Acharnians, making the most likely date for Cratinus’ remarks the Lenaia
of 424, when he had the chance to respond to the altered situation in the
Theater with Satyrs.111 In that case, as Aristophanes used the parabasis in
Knights to respond to criticism of his poetic immaturity, Cratinus shifted
to a new point of weakness, characterizing his rival as overly intellectual
and out of touch with popular tastes.112
In its immediate context, the chorus’ extension of their hatred of Cleon
to Cratinus in 400–1 must have been understood as a reflex of competition that grafted festival rivalries onto the dramatic plot. Our understanding of the way these passages in Knights relate to one another may
be enhanced by the comment of a scholiast, who suggests that the point
of mocking Cratinus’ blanket in 400 is to introduce criticism of the aged
Cf. Dover (1968) 148n.; (1993) 13–14.
For a comma at the end of the first verse, see Conti Bizzarro (1999) 96 and Olson (2007) 110; K–A
print a period.
109
Whittaker (1935) 188.
110
See K–A ad loc.; Ruffell (2002) 160.
111
No fragments of the play survive.
112
Aristophanes apparently replies in fr. 488. O’Sullivan (2006) suggests Cratin. fr. 342 postdates
421, based primarily on a possible intertextual relationship with Pax 42–7; the direction of influence could be reversed, with different implications for interpretation.
107
108
Political and poetic succession
125
poet’s dissolute state caused by overindulgence in wine, a point taken
up in elaborate and scathing detail in the parabasis.113 The connections
identified by the scholiast could not be fully appreciated by the audience
until they heard the later passage, though some evidence suggests that
Aristophanes’ criticisms of his rival distorted features of a preexisting stage
biography crafted by Cratinus himself.114 In favor of the scholiast’s general interpretation, however, the conflation of hatred (400 μισῶ) for Cleon
and Cratinus is amplified in the parabasis, when the chorus proclaim their
commitment to Aristophanes based on their hostility to the same people
(510 ὅτι τοὺς αὐτοὺς ἡμĩν μισεĩ).115 Recalling this bond is a fitting prelude to
a passage whose most far-reaching objective is to articulate Aristophanes’
rivalry with the same veteran poet. The metapoetics of hatred thus operates squarely in support of the Sausage-seller, Aristophanes, and in the last
instance of Knights itself.116
As in Acharnians, so too in Knights the objective of defeating Cratinus
is worked out in later scenes, in advance of the vote in the Theater. When
the Sausage-seller returns after the parabasis, the chorus greets him,
ὦ φίλτατ̓ ἀνδρῶν καὶ νεανικώτατε (611); the final adjective, “most youthful,” helps strengthen the identification with Aristophanes, who had just
been presented to the audience as a relative neophyte in the dramatic
competitions. In addition, the audience may hear a pun on νικ- roots that
transfers the parabasis’ concentration on poetic victory over to the main
plot. Certainly the chorus immediately express anxiety about the outcome
of the Sausage-seller’s contest in the Boule (614):€πῶς τὸ πρᾶγμ̓ ἠγωνίσω;
The Sausage-seller replies with his own νικ- pun, by renaming himself
Nikoboulos (615), thus realizing the chorus’ prayers for victory in the kommation (500–2). With this first success behind him, in the second half of
the play he faces a greater show-down with the Paphlagonian in the presence of Demos himself.
ΣVEΓ3ΘM Eq. 400. Ruffell (2002) 145, questions the scholiast’s interpretation.
Biles (2002), and Chapter 4; Bakola (2008) 12–15.
115
In a play driven by venomous acrimony, it is surprising that the verb μισεῖν does not appear more
often. The only other appearance of the word before the parabasis (used one final time at 767) is
in the passage discussed above, where Demosthenes uses shared hatred (μισοῦντες αὐτόν, 226)
to muster stage characters and then the audience as allies in support of the play’s grand design
against Cleon.
116
Other elements that may point to the conflation of Cratinus and Cleon are the reflection of
Cleon’s enjoyment of prohedria in the Theater (702–4) and meals in the prytaneion (709, 766) in
the “honors” sarcastically proposed for Cratinus (535–6), as well as the recollection of Cratinus
qua broken lyre (532–3) in Aristophanes’ mockery of Cleon’s failed training in lyre-playing
(985–96). Cf. the mocking pun on δῶρον in 996 and in the Cratinean quotation at 529.
113
114
126
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
We may pass over most of these scenes and pick matters up with the
curious lyric exchange between Demos and the chorus toward the end
of the play (1111–50), where the idea of fickleness, on which the association between Demos and Theater audience in the parabasis was based,
is recalled and set in the foreground. Up to this point, Demos consistently appears foolish and easily misled. But now he suddenly claims
that his gullibility is only a façade, describing how he purposefully fattens up politicians so long as they suit his needs. The oracles notwithstanding, here the pleasure Demos derives from his relationship with
the demagogues is his exclusive prerogative (1125 αὐτός τε γὰρ ἥδομαι);
meanwhile the succession in leadership is a result of his decision to
devote himself to only one leader at a time (1127–8 βούλομαι | τρέφειν
ἕνα προστάτην). The passage has been interpreted as either redeeming
Demos’ character or endowing him with a ruthless quality as unsettling
as anything suggested about the demagogues up to this point.117 One
unmistakable result, however, is that Demos places himself decisively
in control of the spectacles of political competition and prepares to
deal with the rivals for his attention with as much self-interest as the
audience deals with comic poets. Indeed, his plan to turn the tables
(1141–50) recalls the audience’s betrayal of poets (519 προδιδόντας) once
they cease to serve a purpose.
Immediately after this revelation, the final stage of the competition
begins, as the rivals attempt to win Demos’ favor by offering him various
delicacies (1151–1204). This juncture allows the plot to take advantage of a
thematic equation of food and politics that has been operative throughout
the play, above all in the Sausage-seller’s account of his victory over Cleon
in the Council.118 The ridiculous maneuvers the Sausage-seller and Cleon
put themselves through to win Demos overall bear a close resemblance to
revelations made in the parabasis about the lengths to which poets go to
keep themselves in the audience’s good graces. Magnes, for instance, never
tired of undergoing theriomorphic transmutations to keep the audience’s
favor (522–3), but ultimately fell afoul of them when he ran short of comic
inspiration (525 τοῦ σκώπτειν ἀπελείφθη). In the final round of competition, the Sausage-seller and Cleon more closely resemble Crates, who from
his modest cupboard did all he could to respond to the audience’s hunger (538–9):€ὃς ἀπὸ σμικρᾶς δαπάνης ὑμᾶς ἀριστίζων ἀπέπεμπεν, | ἀπὸ
See Landfester (1967) 68–73; Brock (1986) 22–6; Hesk (2000) 248–56; Harder (1997); Reinders
(1995), who summarizes earlier positions.
118
645–82; cf. 280–3, 353–8, 715, 778, 813–16, 1007–9, 1031–4, 1100–2. Cf. Brock (1986) 19; Hubbard
(1991) 69.
117
Political and poetic succession
127
κραμβοτάτου στόματος μάττων ἀστειοτάτας ἐπινοίας.119 The worlds of
political and theatrical competition presented in the play operate on the
premise of immediate gratification, with the appeal to Demos’ appetites
reflected in the parabasis, where the demanding audience is constantly
reminded that the poets’ efforts all take their bearing from them (518 ὑμᾶς,
522 ὑμĩν, 531 ὑμεĩς, 537 ὑμῶν).
With the stakes of the dramatic plot thus becoming closely aligned with
the dramatic agon as it was presented earlier, it is fitting that Demos’ chief
concern in searching for a means of finally settling the contest, is to do so
in a way that will make the audience think that he has judged wisely:
τῷ δῆτ̓ ἂν ὑμᾶς χρησάμενος τεκμηρίῳ
δόξαιμι κρίνειν τοĩς θεαταĩσιν σοφῶς;
(Knights 1209–10)
Using what proof would I seem
to the audience to judge you wisely?
One effect of this gesture, as Niall Slater observes, is to point the way
toward a broader identification between the audience and Demos in the
final scenes.120 In particular, by pressing his identification with the dēmos
in its theatrical aspect, Demos encourages the audience to view the outcome of the contest as commensurate with its own response to the play’s
performance. As in the appeal for the clever audience (δεξιός:€228, 233) to
become allies in the performance at the start of the conflict, likewise here
at the end emphasis falls on their appreciation of Aristophanic “cleverness”
(1210 σοφῶς). The terms of the decision entail a final recollection of Crates’
experience in the Theater, since giving the audience all one has is agreed
to be the surest sign that a contestant deserves to win. The Sausage-seller’s
empty hamper, in contrast with the delicacies the Paphlagonian hoarded
for himself, proves his generosity and earns him Demos’ favor (1211–28).
The scene now moves quickly to an end, but not before the Paphlagonian
is deprived of the crown he wore in token of his place of honor in Demos’
affections:
οἴμοι, πέπρακται τοῦ θεοῦ τὸ θέσφατον.
κυλίνδετ̓ εἴσω τόνδε τὸν δυσδαίμονα.
ὦ στέφανε, χαίρων ἄπιθι˙ καί σ̓ ἄκων ἐγὼ
λείπω˙ σὲ δ̓ ἄλλος τις λαβὼν κεκτήσεται,
κλέπτης μὲν οὐκ ἂν μᾶλλον, εὐτυχὴς δ̓ ἴσως.
(Knights 1248–52)
Reckford (1987) 127; Hubbard (1991) 77–8; Bowie (1993) 65.╇╅
119
╇ Slater (2002) 80.
120
128
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
Alas, the god’s will has been done.
Roll me within, in all my ruin.
Farewell, garland! It is against my wishes
that I leave you. Another shall take you into his possession,
no greater thief, but perhaps more fortunate.
The Paphlagonian’s cries are punctuated by tragic parodies, which lend a
charged tone to this culminating moment and disrupt the dramatic illusion as he asks to be “wheeled off stage” on the ekkyklēma.121 His crown
is now ceremoniously transferred to the Sausage-seller’s head (1227–8),
and its agonistic significance is reinforced when its new wearer immediately offers it to “Hellenic Zeus” as a victory dedication (1253 σὸν τὸ
νικητήριον).122 That gesture of gratitude for divine assistance in the contest is followed by the Sausage-seller being hailed as the new victor (1254):€
ὦ χαĩρε, καλλίνικε.123
The bold appeal to the audience in Demos’ attempt in 1209–10 to
fuse his judgment with the reception of Aristophanes’ play at the Lenaia
establishes a feeling of camaraderie between skēnē and theatron, such that
the audience becomes complicit in the Sausage-seller’s enterprise. That
effect is taken further in the sequence that follows the second parabasis
(1264–1315). The actors enter for the last time under a proclamation by the
Sausage-seller (known as Agorakritos since 1257) to observe holy silence
(1316 εὐφημεĩν χρὴ καὶ στόμα κλῄειν), which forecasts an atmosphere of
religious festival celebration to frame the final glorification of the victory
over the Paphlagonian.124 In closing his proclamation, the Sausage-seller
goes further in drawing the audience into the mood of exultation for what
he has accomplished on stage (1316–18):€χ ρὴ … ἐπὶ καιναĩσιν δ̓ εὐτυχίαισιν
παιωνίζειν τὸ θέατρον. While the paian-song he requests is connected
with healing and in this sense ties together nicely with the healing and
salvation the Sausage-seller is about to bring to Demos (1321–36), paeans
also marked the successful outcome of major undertakings and thus had
associations with victory.125 Internally, the requested paean reinforces the
1249 = E. Bellerophon fr. 311; 1250–2 = E. Alc. 177–82.
Sommerstein (1981) 1253n., explains Aristophanes’ choice of the Doric form of the adjective
(̒Ελλάνιε) by reference to Zeus’ cult-title on Aegina and Aristophanes’ possible connection to
that island (cf. Ach. 652–4).
123
It makes no difference to this interpretation whether 1254–6 are delivered by “Demosthenes” (as
in RV; Sommerstein (1981) ad loc.) or by the coryphaeus, as argued by Russo (1994) 86–7.
124
Hence the chorus’ expectation (1320) of streets filled with the smoke of public sacrifices. On
εὐφημεῖν:€Sommerstein (1981) 1317n.; cf. Ach. 237 with Olson (2002); Av. 959 with Dunbar (1995);
Ra. 354 with Dover (1993).
125
Already at Il. 22.391–4 with Richardson (1993); cf. Pl. Criti. 108c. The association is particularly strong in Aristophanes’ closing formula, e.g., Av. 1764–5 (with Dunbar (1995)â•–), where the
121
122
Political and poetic succession
129
Sausage-seller’s immediately preceding victory, but its position at the end
of his proclamation gives “the audience” special emphasis. By forcefully
extending the festive mood beyond the stage, the request orchestrates
acclamation directed towards victory in the Theater, initiating the process
of converting the hero’s success to Aristophanes’ own advantage in the
Lenaia competition. The emphasis on novelty with καιναĩσιν in 1318 may
thus be significant, since the term fits within Aristophanes’ claims for the
merits of his poetry.126
In coordination with these epinikian themes, the final scene also concerns itself with the disposition of the vanquished Paphlagonian, whose
days in the limelight are over. He will now take up the Sausage-seller’s
trade at the city gates and spend his days in a drunken stupor, abusing
whores and drinking run-off from the baths (1397–1401). This image of a
disgraced former rival, who has been dispossessed of power and influence,
leaving him an object of public loathing rather than admiration, bears
a more than passing resemblance to the description of Cratinus in the
parabasis. With his fall from public favor in the Theater, Cratinus too has
become dissolute and despised, babbling unintelligibly (531 παραληροῦντ̓;
cf. 536) as he wanders aimlessly about the city (533 περιέρρει), a washed-up
symposiast dying of thirst (534 δίψῃ δ̓ ἀπολωλώς).127 By an exquisite irony,
in the final verses of the play (1404–5) the Sausage-seller is invited to dine
in the Prytaneion in a seat of honor, something tauntingly suggested as
an appropriate reward for Cratinus’ poetic services (535).128 On the face of
it, the latter’s “honorific” reward of a reserved seat beside Dionysos (536)
is less degrading than what lies in store for the Paphlagonian, but no less
offensive in view of the insult it delivers. Both adversaries are unequivocally retired from active competition and removed from consideration,
the Paphlagonian to a marginal wasteland away from public business,
Cratinus to the fringes of theatrical activity.
Many commentators have been uneasy with the ending of Knights,
because it lacks the boisterous celebration of plays such as Acharnians. The
point is not without interest for the present discussion, since my emphasis
is on how Aristophanes (and presumably other poets) took advantage of
call for a paean is followed by the victor’s cry τήνελλα καλλίνικος; similarly at Lys. 1291–3, with
Henderson (1987). Cf. Sommerstein (1981) 1318n.
126
Especially Nu. 545–8:€V. 1044, 1052–3; cf. Zanetto (2006) 319.
127
The emphasis on Cleon’s abusive tongue (1400 λοιδορήσεται) provides a further point of comparison to Cratinus’ vitriolic brand of comedy.
128
The scholia on 1405 take εἰς τὴν ἕδραν as a final reference to Cleon’s prohedria; cf. MacDowell
(1995) 105. See the Sausage-seller’s wish (703–4) to see the Paphlagonian removed from his seat of
honor at the front of the Theater and moved to the very back row.
130
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
the culminating celebratory mood to bridge the performance with the prospective epinikian celebration. There may be some merit, for instance, to
the theory that traditional celebratory hymns, with which the play originally ended, were not authored by Aristophanes and therefore not transmitted in the manuscript tradition.129 But the preceding discussion has drawn
attention to triumphal elements in the closing movements, most notably
in the award of a victory crown to the Sausage-seller and the mood of
exultation introduced by the frame of festival celebration. With the latter
we perhaps see Aristophanes’ tentative adaptation of the closing epinikian
movement of Acharnians based on a celebration of the Choes contest€– a
maneuver that may have been recommended by the success of that play.
Comparison to Acharnians may thus help draw Aristophanes’ deployment
of epinikian elements in Knights into sharper relief.
The victor’s cry€ – ὦ χαĩρε, καλλίνικε (1254)€ – that goes up as the
Sausage-seller receives his crown is reminiscent of the more extensive
use Aristophanes made of Archilochus’ epinikian song in the triumphal
exodus of Dikaiopolis (Ach. 1227–34).130 A more blatant connection
with the previous year’s comedy is the introduction of the thirty-year
spondai, which the Sausage-seller hands over to Demos in the final scene
(1388–95).131 This is an unexpected turn, the more so because Knights has
not been a peace play as such up to this point.132 The synoptic recollection of Acharnians is acutely felt, because as in that play (esp. Ach.
201–2) the spondai are connected with a return to the countryside
(1394–5 εἰς τοὺς ἀγροὺς | αὐτὰς ἰέναι λαβόντα). Demos’ response in
1390–1 (ὦ Ζεῦ πολυτίμηθ᾿, ὡς καλαί πρὸς τῶν θεῶν, | ἔξεστιν αὐτῶν
κατατριακοντουτίσαι;) makes it clear that the spondai were represented
on stage as attractive females, who introduce the prospect of sexual pleasure as a feature of victory, already familiar from Dikaiopolis’ appearance for the finale supported by two prostitutes (Ach. 1199–1201, 1216–17,
1220–1).133 Most significant of all is the handling of the exodus, as it can
be reconstructed from the final five lines:134
Van Leeuwen (1900) 239; Sommerstein (1981) 220. Rogers (1910) 199, suggests that Aristophanes
did not wish to enliven the “funereal procession” marking the Paphlagonian’s demise with a
jubilant performance. More boldly still, Russo (1994) 84, imagines a parade-like scene drawing
attention to Aristophanes himself.
130
Similarly at Av. 1765.
131
Cf. van Leeuwen (1900) 1388n.; MacDowell (1995) 105.
132
See, however, 794–6, 805–8, which likewise smack of situations treated in Acharnians.
133
Estimates for the number of female spondai on stage range from thirty (scholia ad loc.) to one
(Russo (1994) 83–4); cf. Rogers (1910) 1388n.; Sommerstein (1981) 1389n.
134
See Revermann (2006a) 117–18.
129
Political and poetic succession
καί σ̓ ἀντὶ τούτων εἰς τὸ πρυτανεĩον καλῶ
εἰς τὴν ἕδραν θ̓, ἵν᾽ ἐκεĩνος ἧσθ̓ ό φαρμακός.
ἕπου δὲ ταυτηνὶ λαβὼν τὴν βατραχίδα˙
κἀκεĩνον ἐκφερέτω τις ὡς ἐπὶ τὴν τέχνην,
ἵν̓ ἴδωσιν αὐτόν, οἷς ἐλωβᾶθ̓, οἱ ξένοι.
131
(Knights 1404–8)
For these services I invite you to the Prytaneion,
to the seat in which this pharmakos used to sit.
Come along, taking this frog-green cloak.
As for him€– let someone escort him to his trade,
so that the foreigners he abused can see him.
Demos here emphasizes the reversed positions of the Sausage-seller and
the Paphlagonian by pointing to their contrasting destinations after
the performance. This juxtaposition is reminiscent of the treatment of
Dikaiopolis and Lamachus at the end of Acharnians, where emphasis likewise falls on the honors accruing to the hero and the disgrace of the fallen
general. In that case I hypothesized contrasting exits, with the victorious
Dikaiopolis carried aloft through the eastern parodos toward the Street of
Tripods beyond the Theater. A contrasting departure appears to be envisioned in Knights as well, since the Sausage-seller accompanies Demos,
while an unidentified figure (1407 τις) leads the Paphlagonian off stage.
In Knights we can be more certain that the Sausage-seller and Demos
walk together toward the victory monuments, since this was the most direct route to the heart of the city in the Agora and the Prytaneion. The
Prytaneion is repeatedly associated in the play with luxurious dining,135
and the audience will have been in little doubt about the implications of
the direction of their departure: Demos and the Sausage-seller are on their
way to a celebratory feast.
In short, while the epinikian resonances are muted and in some instances
left only partially developed in comparison with the daringly metatheatrical ending of Acharnians, they nonetheless make an unmistakable contribution to the closing of Knights. In one respect at least, the play’s finale can
be regarded as a brilliant competitive tactic:€whereas Acharnians revelled
in Dikaiopolis’ personal victory, Knights makes it clear that the victory
belongs to both the hero and Demos. The acclamation for the Sausageseller, which largely takes place before the second parabasis, merges in the
final scene with a greater celebration for the rejuvenated Demos; his follies
when he was deceived by past advisors cannot be forgotten (1337–57), but
135
╇ 167, 280–1, 535, 709, 766.
132
Aristophanes' poetic tropation
the future looks bright for him€– which is to say, for the audience itself.136
It is difficult not to believe that Aristophanes is trying to ingratiate himself to the Athenians; certainly this closing vision of harmony between the
hero and Demos offers a final analogy with the parabasis, by presenting
the conditions for victory at the dramatic competitions in the struggle to
earn popular appeal.
knights
i n p oe t ic m e mor y
Aristophanes himself may provide the most useful commentary on how
the political conflict at the heart of Knights is reducible to objectives having to do primarily with the poetic contest, for the assault on Cleon in
the play became a staple of his self-congratulatory rhetoric in subsequent
years. Already in Clouds at the next City Dionysia, he complains that the
Athenians followed up their acclaim for his play almost immediately by
reelecting the demagogue to the generalship (Nu. 581–7).137 Nonetheless,
Aristophanes repeatedly refers to the attack on Cleon in Knights as his finest moment (Nu. 549–50; V. 1029–37; Pax 751–60),138 and one in which he
was sufficiently successful at taking the demagogue down that no repeat
effort was necessary (Nu. 550; V. 62–3). It is possible that Aristophanes
identified the success of his attack on Cleon in less tangible matters of
political leadership that we cannot identify.139 Still, the disparity between
the apparent historical reality and his assertions in his stage-biographies
is hard to ignore, and a more convincing solution is desirable. All the
instances where Aristophanes touts his victory over Cleon belong to passages where he is attempting, first and foremost, to impress the audience
with his poetic credentials, as they depend on both pure novelty (Nu.
545–50; V. 62–3) and his efforts to win greater literary status for the comic
genre (V. 1025–30; Pax 748–52). So too, these passages invoke his rivalry
with other poets and his hopes for a fresh victory (Nu. 551–62; V. 1046–50;
Pax 739–49).140 What is important is thus the poetic capital Aristophanes
For the likelihood that Demos was actually restored to youth, see Olson (1990b).
The passage belongs to the original play of 423, while 545–62 (below) are from the revision:€Dover
(1968) 584n.
138
That he means Knights and not his less sustained or direct attacks on Cleon in Babylonians and
Acharnians is implied by V. 1029 ὅτε πρῶτον γ̓ ἦρξε διδάσκειν, referring to Eq. 512–16. Contrast
Hubbard (1991) 104, who does not distinguish between the play focusing on Cleon and passages
(in Wasps, Peace, Clouds II) that discuss that play.
139
Thus, e.g., MacDowell (1995) 112; cf. Henderson (1990) 298.
140
At Nu. 551–9 Aristophanes’ attack on Cleon is treated as the equivalent of other poets’ attacks
on Hyperbolus. Sommerstein (2000) analyzes Aristophanes’ demagogue-comedy in relation to
other poets.
136
137
Knights in poetic memory
133
claims to have acquired through Knights, and whether or not he had loftier ambitions, his reputation in the Theater depended on his victory with
that play at the Lenaia.141 The victory he proclaims over Cleon, in other
words, asserts in retrospect the identification between hero and poet that
was built into the competitive poetics of Knights.
141
See Heath (1997) 238–9, who addresses the asymmetry of politicians attacking politicians to
score political points, and comic poets attacking politicians to win a poetic contest.
Ch apter 4
Intertextual biography in the rivalry
of Cratinus and Aristophanes1
The slight against Cratinus through the theme of record-keeping argued
for in Chapter 3 may be more personal than I suggested, for a precedent
perhaps exists in one of Cratinus’ own plays. We have a single trochaic tetrameter from Didaskaliai, and although working with fragmentary plays
is always challenging,2 the title makes speculation tempting. Didaskaliai
incorporates a professional term for dramatic production, and it thus
appears that in this comedy Cratinus, like Aristophanes in the Knights
parabasis, reflected openly on matters pertaining to the production of his
plays. The content of the fragment provides further reason to believe that
this was so:
ὅτε σὺ τοὺς καλοὺς θριάμβους ἀναρύτουσ᾿ ἀπηχθάνου
(Cratinus fr. 38)
… when you were despised, though you ladled up fine dithyrambs
The addressee is apparently consoled for failing to impress in a poetic display. The term for poetry, thriamboi, is identified by Hesychius and other
ancient sources as equivalent to “dithyramb,” the choral genre originally associated with Dionysian worship.3 Given the report elsewhere that
Cratinus adopted this form in his comedies (fr. 20) in a passage where
ad€hominem abuse was in evidence, it is a reasonable conclusion that with
thriamboi he had in mind the vituperative comic mode for which he became
This chapter was originally published as:€Zachary P. Biles, “Intertextual Biography in the Rivalry of
Cratinus and Aristophanes,” American Journal of Philology 123:2 (2002), pp. 169–204. © 2002 The
Johns Hopkins University Press. It is reprinted with permission of The Johns Hopkins University
Press. Aside from changes made to integrate the discussion with its context in the present volume, the bibliography has been updated, the most important contributions being Ruffell (2002),
Sommerstein (2005), and Bakola (2008). Ruffell’s article appeared almost simultaneously with my
own; rather than drawing attention to points where our interpretations coincide, I limit my references to particular differences and to where his discussion offers further support for my own.
2
See the general comments of Dover (2000) and Arnott (2000).
3
Pickard-Cambridge (1927) 14–15.
1
134
Intertextual biography
135
notorious.4 Support for that position can be found in a lurking allusion
to Archilochus’ assertion about the connection between wine and dithyramb (fr. 120W2),5 since Cratinus cultivated a connection with Archilochus
as a feature of his poetic identity.6 Indeed, the metaphorical expression he
applies to poetic activity suggests “drawing up” verses in liquid form€– perhaps as water, but given the Dionysian associations activated by thriamboi,
more likely as wine.7 The simplest explanation is thus that Cratinus’ own
poetry and poetics are at issue in fr. 38, which accords with the sympathetic
tone that is struck, extending beyond mere commiseration to admiration
for the poetry in question (καλούς).8 The feminine participle (ἀναρύτουσ᾽)
suggests that the addressee is one of the Didaskaliai after whom the play is
named and who likely made up the chorus.9 We can accordingly conclude
that the individual Didaskaliai were personified comedies and that a review
of Cratinus’ own production history contributed to the play.10
This thesis suggests a comedy that was boldly metapoetic in its subject matter, though it is impossible to say how its themes translated into
dramatic action. But even from the little that can be surmised about the
play, several points of contact with the Knights parabasis are evident. The
verbal echo of the title in Aristophanes’ Komoidodidaskalia is the most
obvious but may simply be a matter of established theatrical vocabulary,
for (as suggested in the previous chapter) Cratinus’ title perhaps represents
an early appearance of the plural as it was used by Aristotle to describe
his work on records from the dramatic contests.11 That would still imply
that in this play Cratinus immersed himself in the technical theme of
Seaford (1977–8) 88–9, and Mendelsohn (1992) 107–12 discuss violence in dithyramb; for dithyramb generally, see Zimmermann (1992). Dobrov and Urios-Aparisi (1995) 164–74 discuss the
interaction of comedy and dithyramb within the shift to Middle Comedy.
╇ 5
ὡς Διωνύσου ἄνακτος καλὸν ἐξάρξαι μέλος | οἶδα διθύραμβον οἴνῳ συγκεραυνωθεὶς φρένας (discussed further below).
╇ 6
Rosen (1988) 37–58, and see below.
╇ 7
The verb is rare in its compound form; in the simplex it was sometimes used of wine (Pherecr. fr.
147, “they drew (ἢρυσαν) unmixed wine from a jar”; cf. Pl. Criti. 120a), while Plato Phdr. 253a uses
it metaphorically of drawing inspiration from a god (cf. Simon. PMG 577).
╇ 8
Though the comment could have been undercut in delivery by a tone of sarcasm.
╇ 9
This modifies suggestions by Kaibel and Kock (see K–A on fr. 38). To speculate further, the
address and identification of a single Didaskalia in the fragment might belong to an extended
parodos, similar to that at Av. 267–326 (cf. Eup. Poleis frr. 245–7; Storey (2003b) 217–18), where
the individual Didaskaliai were introduced as they entered. This would have allowed for a production review in dramatic form. On the basis of meter, Whittaker (1935) 188 suggests a parabasis
epirrhema, with Cratinus speaking.
10
Cf. Hall (2000) 410.
11
Cf. Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 71. The verbal similarity led Luppe (1967) 405 to suppose that the
title of Cratinus’ play is an apocryphal result of a scholiast’s citation of Aristotle’s own Didaskaliai.
But it is difficult to see why Aristotle would have cited poetry in that work, since it is generally
thought to have been little more than a transcription of contest records.
╇ 4
136
Intertextual biography
production history. But doubt on this point should not affect a more significant consideration, that Cratinus, like Aristophanes, emphasized contest outcomes. The speaker of this line, if not Cratinus himself, appears at
least sympathetic to his cause, by giving the thriamboi in question a favorable appraisal. By stating that this Didaskalia was despised, however, the
speaker surely means that she failed in competition. It is hard to miss the
tone of frustration, and the motif of personal rejection seems to develop
differently the idea of defeat as rejection in love in Knights. These considerations imply that Didaskaliai did not simply assert Cratinus’ domination
in the contests, but took a more ambivalent position toward the reception
of his work as determined by contest results as opposed to purely artistic
merit.12 Thus, aside from having in common with a play by Cratinus a
didaskalic review of some kind, Aristophanes’ parabasis may have found
common ground in an expression of his rival’s own growing frustration
with his audience’s disfavor.
That situation appears to be addressed in a fragment transmitted without a title, in which Cratinus more directly expresses his irritation at the
audience’s inability to appreciate his work until too late, after the festival
was over.
χαĩρ’¸ ὦ μέγ’ ἀχρειόγελως ὅμιλε¸ ταĩς ἐπίβδαις
τῆς ἡμετέρας σοφίας κριτὴς ἄριστε πάντων
εὐδαίμον’ ἔτικτέ σε μήτηρ ἰκρίων ψόφησις.
(Cratinus fr. 360)
Greetings spectators, whose laughter is completely useless,
the best of all judges of my wisdom€– in the days after the festival!
Blessed did your mother, the ruckus of the bleachers, bring you into
â•… the world.
Laughter, and specifically the timing of it within the festival, is the critical
point and assures us that comic poetry is at issue.13 Those considerations
lend the passage a parabatic quality enhanced by the reference to the judging process.14 Above all, the bitter tone resonates with what we have been
able to make out in the case of Didaskaliai; at the very least, an attitude of
competitive frustration directed toward the audience was pervasive in the
Though it is possible that a more favorable impression of Cratinean poetics was worked out in the
comedy.
13
Cf. Olson (2007) 108, noting that the audience’s misplaced laughter implies, “the jokes of our
poet’s rivals.”
14
The relevance of the passage for Cratinus’ poetic status and objectives may be evident in the
meter, which is modelled on Archilochus:€West (1982) 97. Whittaker (1935) 188 suggests that the
lines belong to a parabasis ode.
12
Intertextual biography
137
professional biography Cratinus offered in his comedies.15 As such, it was
recognizable as his own and likely to attract the attention of another poet
who could manipulate it in the insulting modes spawned by intense theatrical competition.
Although the chronological relationship between Knights and
Didaskaliai cannot be pinned down, the odds are in favor of Cratinus’
play being earlier, given that his career is generally thought to have been
near its end by 424.16 On that understanding, Knights’ intertextual relationship with Didaskaliai makes it a sequel to that play’s discussion and
continues its treatment of Cratinus’ competitive misfortunes, by registering his latest defeat, now at Aristophanes’ hands. Lack of evidence for
Didaskaliai prevents us from reconstructing specific ways in which the
audience’s response was shaped by this intertextuality, though it is safe to
say that their interpretation would have been enriched by familiarity with
the theatrical back-story.17
The intersection of stage biography and intertextuality that defines the
relationship between Didaskaliai and Knights can be situated within the
explanation Malcom Heath offered for charges of plagiarism between
comic poets, by positing a store of ideas that were recycled as quickly as
they were invented. As a result,
Anything put on stage in a comedy would become public property and be
absorbed into the repertoire, so that all comic poets contributed to it; and all
drew on it, although each would aim to give a new and original twist to the
material which he borrowed, so that the repertoire constantly evolved. If this was
so, then any poet could lay claim to originality … and any rival could make a
counterclaim of plagiarism.18
These remarks have important implications for the study of comedy, not
least in exposing the irony of assertions such as Antiphanes’ Poiesis fr. 189,
which overstates the generic distinctions between tragedy and comedy on
the score of originality.19 But beyond acknowledging the genre’s essentially
adaptive nature, Heath’s explanation suggests that allusiveness was built
Cf. Cratinus’ voicing of frustration in Boukoloi at being denied a chorus (fr. 20), and note his
claim of solidarity (based on the same form of embarrassment) with another great and agonistically successful poet, Sophocles, in the same play (fr. 17). That the alleged incidents were roughly
contemporary is not necessarily the case, as Geissler (1925) 24 assumes.
16
But see Mastromarco (2002), whose reconstruction assumes that Cratinus was active in 422 or
even 421.
17
It is possible that Aristophanes’ gesture of (affected) commiseration for his aging rival resembles
one feature of Didaskaliai, for he can be seen as taking on the attitude of the unidentified speaker
of fr. 38, all the while intending that impression to be undercut by the implications of Cratinus’
change of competitive fortunes as a statement on his own early successes.
18
Heath (1990) 152; cf. Storey (1993a) 383.╇╅ 19╇ Cf. Olson (2007) 172–3.
15
138
Intertextual biography
into it. There are few opportunities to test the insights that follow from
Heath’s proposition, but the example of Didaskaliai and Knights allows
us to identify one outlet for comedy’s penchant for exploiting intertextual
potentials within the shared repertoire, in the way rival playwrights developed antagonistic relationships by appropriating and distorting the poetic
identities offered in their comedies. Those insights can be further applied
to a sequence of plays that has attracted attention since antiquity as an
example of poets responding to one another.
In 423 Cratinus took the prize against Aristophanes’ Clouds with Pytine,
a play in which he boldly portrayed himself as the hero while borrowing
heavily from Aristophanes’ caricature of him in Knights the previous year.
While interest in the relationship between these plays has been renewed
in recent years, the convergence of issues pertaining to adaptation, intertextuality and rivalry has not been fully explored. Most important, the
thread of artistic borrowing and competitive response evident in Knights
and Pytine can be extended to include a stage autobiography of Cratinus
that both predates and inspired the image of him in Knights, on the one
hand, and elements of intertextuality between Pytine and Wasps that
can be viewed as defining Aristophanes’ play as a return challenge at the
Lenaia of 422, on the other. What follows thus modifies Heath’s model,
by identifying specific competitive motives driving comic intertextuality,20
and serves to demonstrate points made in Chapter 1 about how the comic
poets employed stage biography to assert their own superiority or malign
their rivals.
W i n e , p oe t r y a n d A rc h i l o c h us
i n C r at i n us’ bio g r a ph y
Commenting on the chorus’ elusive response to Cleon (“If I don’t despise you, may I become a blanket in Cratinus’ house!”), the scholiast on
Knights 400 writes:
ὡς ἐνουρητὴν δὲ καὶ μέθυσον διαβάλλει τὸν Κρατĩνον. ὁ δὲ Κρατĩνος καὶ αὐτὸς
ἀρχαίας κωμῳδίας ποιητής¸ πρεσβύτερος ̓Αριστοφάνους¸ τῶν εὐδοκίμων ἄγαν.
γενοίμην οὖν¸ φησίν¸ εἰς τὴν οἰκίαν Κρατίνου κῴδιον¸ ὥστε μου κατουρεĩν ἐκεĩνον¸
εἰ μή σε μισῶ. ὅπερ μοι δοκεĩ παροξυνθεὶς ἐκεĩνος¸ καίτοι τοῦ ἀγωνίζεσθαι
ἀποστὰς καὶ συγγράφειν¸ πάλιν γράφει δρᾶμα¸ τὴν Πυτίνην¸ εἰς αὑτόν τε καὶ τὴν
μέθην¸ οἰκονομίᾳ τε κεχρημένον τοιαύτῃ. τὴν Κωμῳδίαν ὁ Κρατĩνος ἐπλάσατο
αὑτοῦ εἶναι γυναĩκα καὶ ἀφίστασθαι τοῦ συνοικεσίου τοῦ σὺν αὐτῷ θέλειν¸ καὶ
╇ Cf. Harvey (2000) 112.
20
Wine, poetry and Archilochus in Cratinus’ biography
139
κακώσεως αὐτῷ δίκην λαγχάνειν¸ φίλους δὲ παρατυχόντας τοῦ Κρατίνου δεĩσθαι
μηδὲν προπετὲς ποιῆσαι καὶ τῆς ἔχθρας ἀνερωτᾶν τὴν αἰτίαν¸ τὴν δὲ μέμφεσθαι
αὐτῷ ὅτι μὴ κωμῳδοίη μηκέτι¸ σχολάζοι δὲ τῇ μέθῃ. (ΣVEΓ3ΘM Eq. 400a = Pytine
test. ii)21
Some errors about Cratinus’ retirement aside,22 the scholiast shows himself a reliable witness to the play by his knowledge of the plot and his
ability to cite the text in the portion of his commentary that follows (fr.
193). Thus, with the exception of treating the more fully developed caricature of Cratinus as a drunk in the Knights parabasis as the source of
inspiration for his self-portrayal in Pytine, modern scholars have generally
followed the scholiast’s characterization of Pytine as a redemption play,
however exaggerated the biographical representation may have been in
both plays. Two recent studies have raised objections to this understanding. Troubled by a feeling of allusiveness in the jokes about Cratinus in
Knights and Acharnians, Keith Sidwell hypothesizes a source for the audience’s familiarity with Cratinus’ life by arguing that his stage biography
was not an Aristophanic invention at all, but a recollection of one or more
earlier staged caricatures of Cratinus.23 Ralph Rosen is more concerned
with the phenomenon of self-portrayal itself, and argues that the “biography” of Cratinus in Pytine must be interpreted first and foremost in connection with literary motives.24 In particular, Rosen objects to the belief
that Pytine vindicated Cratinus, since what we know of the plot appears to
show him indulging in self-mockery by extending the caricature.
‘[Aristophanes] mocks Cratinus for being incontinent and a drunk. Cratinus was himself a poet
of Old Comedy, older than Aristophanes and among the most notable. [Aristophanes] means
then, “May I become a fleece in Cratinus’ house, so he can piss on me if I don’t hate you.” As a
result, it seems to me, [Cratinus] became outraged, and although he had given up competing
and composing, he again wrote a play, Pytine, which takes as its theme Cratinus himself and
his drunkenness according to the following scenario. Cratinus imagined that Comedy was his
own wife, but that she wanted to divorce him and registered a charge of mistreatment against
him. Some of Cratinus’ friends who showed up begged her not to do anything impetuous and
asked after the cause of her hatred. She blamed him because he no longer composed comedy, but
instead devoted his time to drinking.”
22
Cratinus competed in both 425 (Ach. Hyp. I. 38–9) and 424 (Eq. Hyp. II. 21–2) and therefore can
hardly be described as retired in 423. In this claim the scholiast is obviously working from his
reading of Pytine itself, according to his own summary.
23
Sidwell (1995) 59–64, arguing that Eupolis was ultimately responsible for the caricature. The theory of an earlier caricature of Cratinus by another poet is not objectionable in itself; cf. Storey
(1996); Rosen (2000) 36–7 nn. 13, 17. What strikes me as implausible is Sidwell’s subtle and extensive application of caricature comedy to the point of creating a new genre called “paracomedy,”
i.e., a “ventriloquial” comedy that features comedians presenting their own plays as though they
were the works of rivals (1995, n. 66). Such an approach would surely prove disadvantageous in
the competitions.
24
Rosen (2000) 23–39.
21
140
Intertextual biography
Fundamental objections undermine Sidwell’s theory in particular,25
but in combination the two theories shed light on important aspects of
the caricatures of Cratinus. Rather than turn the discussion away from
the poet’s genuine personal or professional interests, as Rosen proposes,
we must instead direct our attention to where they staked their greatest
claims, in assertions of professional superiority and maligning rivals. The
matrix from which the most salient aspects of the caricature derive may
actually be a self-presentation by Cratinus himself, if he created a fullfledged stage biography in his earlier parabases. As with Aristophanes’
biography, Cratinus likely aimed at defining his role as poet and advertising his special talents.
Setting aside for the moment the question of whether Cratinus in
Pytine attempted to overcome a negative portrayal or ironically indulged
in it, let us begin with the consensus that the image of Cratinus as a
drunk€ – whether derived from his historical biography or entirely fictional€– debuted on stage as mockery in plays by his competitors.26 Given
the evidence for rivalries, this is a reasonable position. But the premise
is itself open to doubt, when we recall that Cratinus consciously recognized a debt to Archilochus, who claimed poetic inspiration through wine
(fr.€120W2):27
ὡς Διωνύσου ἄνακτος καλὸν ἐξάρξαι μέλος
οἶδα διθύραμβον οἴνῳ συγκεραυνωθεὶς φρένας
I know how to initiate a fine song for Lord Dionysos,
a dithyramb, after my mind is thunderstruck with wine.
Platonius (Prolegomena II, p. 6 lines 1–2 Koster = Cratin. test. 17) refers
explicitly to Cratinus’ emulation of Archilochus (κατὰ τὰς ᾽Αριχιλόχου
ζηλώσεις) and implies a conscious choice and perhaps candid assertion
Lack of clear evidence is unsurprising, but Sidwell’s premise is liable to objections. On the issue
of familiarity with particulars of Cratinus’ life, Sidwell (1995) 59–62 fails to give full weight to the
poet’s celebrity status, with eight victories by this time (IG II2 2325.50, 121; Pickard-Cambridge
(1968) 112–13). Any notoriety attached to his name would certainly attract attention in the relatively small community of Athens, so that Aristophanes could mock him in the same subtle or
brutal way he could ridicule Euripides. For onomasti jokes, see Sommerstein (1996b) 329–30, who
identifies Cratinus as one of the “idols of the theatre” and who notes further (p. 329), “Casting
well-known people in a bad light was comedy’s business, just as it had once been the business of
iambic poetry”; cf. Halliwell (1993), and for further comment on Sidwell’s thesis, Totaro (1998);
Ruffell (2002) 139–40.
26
For what follows, contrast Ruffell (2002) 145–6.
27
In addition to Rosen (1988) 37–58, cf. Henderson (1975) 17–23; Degani (1988) and (1993); Zanetto
(2001).
25
Wine, poetry and Archilochus in Cratinus’ biography
141
on Cratinus’ part, while the plural suggests repeated instances.28 Later
authors also thought the image of drunken inspiration in the Archilochus
fragment central to both poets.29 Callimachus referred to “the proem of
winestruck Archilochus” (fr. 544 Pf.), while Horace recalled Cratinus’ dictum that the only good poetry is inspired by alcohol (Epist. 1.19.1–3), a
claim perhaps preserved in a Hellenistic epigram that purports to quote
the poet as saying:
ὕδωρ δὲ πίνων οὐδὲν ἂν τέκοις σοφόν
(Pytine fr. 203)
You could not produce anything sophisticated while drinking
â•… water.
Meier assigned this line to Pytine, and scholars have generally followed
him, since the words encapsulate what appear to be the play’s central
issues.30 But the Archilochean resonance would be appropriate anywhere
that Cratinus clarified his own poetics. Indeed, adopting the persona of
an indulgent drinker may have been only one aspect of Cratinus’ selfconscious effort to model his poetics upon those of Archilochus. Given
Platonius’ reference to his “emulations” of Archilochus, we might conclude that by using wine drinking as a metaphor for his poetry, Cratinus
attempted to impress the audience with how he infused comic humor
with iambic criticism, the very point of the Archilochean model according to Rosen. And although we cannot rule out other influences, the note
of praise in Horace and the epigram suggests an originally laudatory context, as if the association with alcohol belonged to Cratinus’ own declaration and was not filtered by criticism of the sort Aristophanes lobs at
him. After all, Horace intends the Cratinus image to stand as a paradigm
for himself, and intoxication is for him a positive metaphor for inspired
poetic talent.
This point is further conveyed by Hemsterhuis’ emendation:€ καὶ τὰ ̓Αρχιλόχου ζηλώσας; cf.
Conti Bizzarro (1999) 47, citing Kugelmeier. Archilochoi doubtless figured prominently in the
evidence for the relationship; see esp. Rosen (1988) 42–8; cf. Ruffell (2002) 146.
29
While a connection between wine and inspiration may have been familiar (e.g., Od. 14.462–66,
although note the ambivalent attitude there toward the looseness of tongue that accompanies
drink), the theme is especially prominent in traditions about Archilochus and Cratinus, even if
it is more generally invoked later; cf. Sperduti (1950) 222–3; Bowie (1995). The wine/inspiration
theme at Eq. 85–100 might itself be connected with Aristophanes’ treatment of Cratinus. Here
the association of slaves with drinking is stereotypical, while one slave’s aversion is significant; cf.
Sommerstein (1980b) 46–7.
30
See K–A vol. 4, 226–7. For a defense of Meier, see Rosen (2000) 33–4. Sens (forthcoming) argues
that the opening couplet of the epigram (AP 13.29), of which fr. 203 is the second line, most likely
only paraphrases a comment found in Cratinus, perhaps Pytine. Note the claim in line 3 regarding the opening couplet:€“Cratinus used to say this.”
28
142
Intertextual biography
The general theme of revelry is so familiar to comedy that, without overt
indications of a parabatic or programmatic statement, such passages cannot be confidently attributed to an assertion about Cratinus’ poetry.31 The
most compelling evidence may be fr. 38, adduced at the beginning of this
chapter, where the striking assimilation of Cratinean poetry with thriamboi emphasizes the genre of Dionysian hymn for which Archilochus’ claim
to intoxicated inspiration served as proem.32 That programmatic import
of Cratinus’ claim may be implicit in the liquid metaphor activated by
anarutein, as discussed above.33 A few fragments from Pytine also seem to
show that the Archilochean model made an important contribution to
that play. According to the scholiast on Peace 603, Cratinus borrowed a
verse from Archilochus in Pytine (fr. 211):
ὦ λιπερνῆτες πολĩται¸ τἀμὰ δὴ ξυνίετε
Oh motley citizens, pay attention to my words!
In Peace and again in Eupolis (fr. 392), this verse introduces a pointed argument and self-assertion, suggesting that in Pytine it similarly opened a persuasive or defensive speech in the agon or parabasis under the auspices of
Cratinus’ favorite literary model. In either location, Cratinus’ recollection
of Archilochus was probably connected with a discussion of his poetry, the
play’s central theme.34 Another connection with Archilochus is apparent
in Cratin. fr. 199.3–4:
ἐγᾦδα· συντρίψω γὰρ αὐτοῦ τοὺς χοᾶς
καὶ τοὺς καδίσκους συγκεραυνώσω σποδῶν
I know€– I’ll smash his drinking cups
and smite his wine jars with lightning.
E.g., frr. 252; 269; 299; 301; 319; 322; cf. fr. 182. My objection to Meier’s attribution of fr. 203 to
Pytine also applies to frr. 319 and 322.
32
Meineke (see K–A on Cratin. fr. 20) interprets Hesychius’ mention of a dithyramb in Boukoloi as
an allusion to a hostile song in which the poet reviled an archon for refusing him a chorus (fr. 17).
This supports my general argument, since it implies that the lexicographer’s terminology included
some notion of iambicism. The connection of dithyramb and intoxication is presented in several
additional sources:€Athen. 628a (= Archil. fr. 120W2), Φιλόχορος δέ φησιν ὡς οἱ παλαιοὶ οὐκ αἰεὶ
διθυραμβοῦσιν¸ ἀλλ̓ ὅταν σπένδωσι¸ τὸν μὲν Διόνυσον ἐν οἴνῳ καὶ μέθῃ¸ τὸν δ̓ ̓Απόλλωνα μεθ̓
ἡσυχίας καὶ τάξεως μέλποντες; Epich. fr. 131, οὐκ ἔστι διθύραμβος¸ ὅκχ̓ ὕδωρ πίņς.
33
Bakola (2008) 11–15, expands on the points made here by assuming that elements of Cratinus’
stage biography underlie Aristophanes’ criticisms of his rival at Ach. 848–9 and 1166–73 (contrast Biles (2002) 172 n. 7); she accordingly adds a gamos-theme to the constellation of features in
Cratinus’ biography and concludes that the image predated Knights.
34
Cf. Conti Bizzarro (1999) 48; Ruffell (2002) 175. In Eup. fr. 392 the Archilochus verse probably represents the opening of a parabasis that treats issues of poetry defensively; but see Storey
(2003b) 300–2, whose interpretation is liable to objections (above, p. 32).
31
Wine, poetry and Archilochus in Cratinus’ biography
143
These lines are obviously spoken by someone opposed to Cratinus’ excesses
and probably belong after an agon in which Cratinus came off worse
against Comedy. Smiting the poet’s wine casks with a thunderbolt represents an attempt to cure his affliction, and is more remarkable because it is
fantastic, and because the term sunkeraunoun is attested before Cratinus
only in the Archilochus proem cited above.35 The verses in Pytine nicely
turn the metaphorical assertion on its head by deflating its pretensions,
divesting it of its metaphorical sense and directing it against the very substance in which Archilochus and Cratinus indulged to put themselves in
a state of poetic inspiration. This kind of joke, in which one character
humorously overturns an earlier assertion by another, is standard comic
fare.36 More to the point, the format requires that the character Cratinus
had already brought up the ideal in its positive Archilochean form; that
is, if not fr. 203, then something with much the same claim to the positive
effects of alcohol is a premise for the action.
Once staged, a connection between wine drinking and Cratinus’
poetic claims in his poetic “biography” would have provided other poets
with a target perhaps too tempting to resist.37 As a result of his ongoing
engagement with Euripides onstage and his claim to a sophisticated kind
of poetry, after all, Aristophanes was ridiculed by his rivals for modeling himself on the tragic poet;38 and the tradition was so strong that the
falsehood was elevated to permanent status in the ancient biographical
tradition.39 All of this suggests that stage biography must be considered in
close connection with theatrical competition. Comic poets likely adopted
a persona in large part to advertise and support their literary aspirations,
and to justify their wish to win the contest. While there must always have
been exaggeration in such biographies, the details which poets developed
for purely comic effect must also have had some basis in features of an
individual poet’s comic style which the audience could identify. Likewise,
an intrinsic connection between stage biography and competition feeds
The only other classical attestation is E. Ba. 1103, where Diggle prefers Pierson’s συντριαινοῦσαι,
whereas Dodds accepted the transmitted reading based on Dionysos’ association with lightning
at Ba. 594–9 (cf. Seaford (1996) ad loc.; Zimmermann (1992) 21; and compare [A.] PV 362 with
Griffith (1983b)â•›).
36
MacDowell (1971) 989n. calls this the boomerang joke (e.g., V. 959 and 989, 1191 and 1383, 1411
and 1446; Nu. 225 and 1503, 828 and 1471). Cf. Miller (1944) 27–9 for more examples.
37
Ar. fr. 688 may be a case in point; see below, n. 80.
38
For this strand of Aristophanes’ poetic identity, see Bakola (2008) 8–10.
39
Cratin. fr. 342 and Ar. fr. 488. For the ancient biography, see Anon. De com., Prolegomena III,
p. 9 lines 36–7 Koster = Ar. test. 4. So too, Aristophanes’ boasts about bringing Cleon down, so
central to his poetic claims to public benefaction (V. 1029–37; Pax 751–61; Nu. 549–50), appear to
have been contested by at least one other poet (Pl. Com. fr. 115).
35
144
Intertextual biography
into ad hominem attacks on poetic rivals, as in the Knights parabasis, to
which I now turn.
C r at i n us a s dru n k i n
knights
Aristophanes’ criticisms in the Knights parabasis respond to Cratinus’ own
poetic biography. In Chapter 3 I argued that this parabasis as a competitive
maneuver aims to deflate a rival’s claims to superiority and with it his hope
for victory in the contest. In what follows, I suggest that Aristophanes’
goal was to reverse the stage biography Cratinus adopted, by subverting
his lofty image of comic inspiration and treating Cratinus’ self-proclaimed
reliance on wine as actual dependence. On a general level, we can detect
the line of influence from Archilochus to Aristophanes via Cratinus in the
way wine-drinking is linked to the notion of poetic inspiration throughout the parabasis, though Aristophanes repeatedly insists that overindulgence in alcohol detracts from a playwright’s general performance. These
jokes are developed in coordination with even more vicious criticism of a
literary kind, much of it dependent on the same tactic of reversing an idealized image of Cratinean poetry.
The ostensible purpose of the Knights parabasis is to demonstrate
Aristophanes’ cautious and respectful approach to comic production in
view of his audience’s fickle judging of theatrical contests (515–19, 541–5).40
He clarifies this point by citing three older poets the Athenians betrayed
despite their former popularity. On a primary level, Aristophanes seems
to commiserate with these veterans. But his supposed tribute is in fact a
scathing criticism of Cratinus’ waning comic inspiration.41 Aristophanes’
fear of failure in old age must be ironic so early in his career. Furthermore,
within the narrative Cratinus is presented in his “proper” place€– according to production history€– between Magnes and Crates, who were almost
certainly dead, so that, while asserting that Cratinus deserves respect and
honor in retirement, Aristophanes slyly imparts that his departure from
the stage is long overdue. But the real bite is in the fact that Cratinus was
competing in this very contest.
Aristophanes’ concentration on a specifically Archilochean Cratinus
leaves its mark in the opening lines of the description, in which he introduces the metaphor of a raging stream to describe Cratinus’ poetry (526–8).
Rosen argues that this pays tribute to Cratinus’ cultivation of the iambic
╇ This paragraph summarizes results from Chapter 3.
Cf. Hubbard (1991) 75–6; Luppe (2000a).
40
41
Cratinus as drunk in Knights
145
ethos in comedy,42 so that the indiscriminate violence with which he lays
waste everything in his path, including his enemies, represents the vigorous
language of Cratinus’ invective.43 An apparent proof of the argument for
an underlying Cratinean model is found in the scholion on the river metaphor (Σ VEΓ³ΘLh Eq. 526a = Cratin. fr. 198), which states that Aristophanes
was imitating things Cratinus said about himself. Since the scholiast goes
on to prove his point by citing lines from Pytine, it is generally supposed
that he had the direction of influence mixed up.44 But Pseudo-Longinus
also describes Archilochus’ forceful style through the metaphor of a raging
torrent,45 so perhaps the scholiast on Knights 526 is right after all.46
The argument that the Knights parabasis alludes to Cratinus’ poetic and
biographical claims can be strengthened by attention to the specific tactics
of Aristophanes’ criticism. At several points he refers directly to Cratinus’
poetry either by citation or allusion:47 lines 529 and 530 contain quotations
from Cratinus that demonstrate his popularity with the Athenians, while
in line 534 Cratinus’ unfortunate reveling is compared to Konnos, recalling a similar reference to Konnos in an unassigned fragment of Cratinus.48
These references allow us to appreciate the method behind Aristophanes’
intertextual borrowings. Where the ridicule is only latent, the first half of
the description of Cratinus pays him the greatest respect possible by quoting popular lines from his plays. But once Aristophanes begins to mock
his rival more directly at line 531, he manipulates his words to show that he
is no better than his comic targets.
Rosen (1988) 38–9; cf. Ruffell (2002) 144. See esp. Platon., Prolegomena II, p. 6–7 Koster = Cratin.
test. 17.
43
For τοὺς ἐχθρούς (528) referring to rival poets, see pp. 104, 108–9.
44
Rosen (2000) 30–1 attempts to explain the error by understanding fr. 198 as one of several
instances familiar to the ancient commentator. Though I tend to agree with this, we might in that
case expect an imperfect rather than an aorist verb. Cf. Bakola (2008) 14.
45
De Subl. 33.5 (cf. 32.4):€’Αρχιλόχου πολλὰ καὶ ἀνοικονόμητα παρασύροντος; cf. Rosen (1988) 39
n. 9, and see Biles (2006–2007) for how later literary critics mined comic texts for assessments
of Aeschylus. An echo of Archilochus at this point, if such it is, would lend further point to the
para prosdokian in tous echthrous (Eq. 528). While Rosen (2000) 31 in his analysis of the river
metaphor in Eq. 526–8 emphasizes the negative tone of Aristophanes’ allusion (contrast Rosen
(1988) 39–40), the comic peripeteia, which structures the broader context of Cratinus’ biography
in Knights, requires that the lines represent something Cratinus might like to hear said. An original laudatory context is further suggested by Homeric passages where the raging stream metaphor glorifies a hero’s behavior in battle (Il. 5.87–92; 11.492–7).
46
Note too that the wine/inspiration theme at Eq. 89 activates the imagery of gushing water, but
illogically in connection with uninspired water drinking; cf. Ra. 1005.
47
The same tactic holds true for his discussion of Magnes (Σ VEΓΘMLh Eq. 522a).
48
Fr. 349 = Σ VEΓ³ΘMLh Eq. 534a:€ἔσθιε καὶ σῇ γαστρὶ δίδου χάριν¸ ὄφρα σε λιμὸς ἐχθαίρῃ, Κοννᾶς δὲ
πολυστέφανός σε φιλήσ˙. Cf. Ruffell (2002) 146. For the identification of Konnos (PAA 581457 and
581470), see Sommerstein (1981) 534n.; K–A vol. 4, 292. If Eup. fr. 77 makes the same joke about
Konnos, the “wilted” garlands would appear to be Aristophanes’ own addition (see below).
42
146
Intertextual biography
These allusions establish a pattern of using Cratinus to ridicule Cratinus,
and only after the shift to more direct abuse does the theme of debauchery
become the focus of the biography. Just as Cratinus’ garlands are withered, he himself is ruined by thirst (534), which in context suggests an
insatiable longing for wine. Next Aristophanes blithely proposes that in
return for his earlier successes, his older rival should be awarded not free
meals (i.e., δειπνεĩν) but free drinks (535 πίνειν) in the Prytaneion. Finally,
at the comic competitions Cratinus is to have a seat in the Theater next to
Dionysos himself (536), which must be a backhanded compliment, given
that Dionysos’ metonymic relationship to wine was at least as strong as his
connection to the dramatic arts.49 In all of this, Aristophanes never mentions wine explicitly but achieves his portrayal of Cratinus as a drunkard
via an accretion of suggestive images, supporting the notion that he was
activating a biography already familiar to the audience.50 Taken together,
Aristophanes’ defamation of Cratinus refutes the older poet’s professional
claims through stage biography, no less as a celebration of his own victory
at the previous Lenaia than as a means of influencing the outcome of the
present competition.
R e f or m u l at i ng “C r at i n us” i n
py tine
In adapting an existing model in Pytine, Cratinus was merely repeating
on a grander scale what Aristophanes had done throughout the Knights
parabasis. Since the biography in Knights stitched together and elaborated
images already familiar from remarks Cratinus himself had made, a complex intertextual background involving contradictory attitudes toward
his professional biography underlies Pytine. My approach reinforces
the traditional view that the play was redemptive in nature. As such, it
amounted to a daring expansion of the resources available for carrying out
dialogues between rival playwrights within parabases, by openly investing the plot, beyond anything observed in Acharnians or Knights, with
Cratinus’ competitive rebuttal. However the poet presented himself along
the way, several details imply that the play culminated in a reassertion of
his Archilochean outlook.51
The closing image would be all the more amusing if Cratinus had proclaimed a unique relationship with the god in connection with the Archilochean motif:€Bakola (2008) 15.
50
On this point (as with Eq. 400) I agree with Sidwell (1995) 59.
51
Thus the reconstructions of Heath (1990) 151 and Sidwell (1995) 65, 70, for instance, go astray to
the extent that they believe that Cratinus’ cure was the telos of the plot. The ancient commentator’s
partial summary says nothing about how the domestic altercation was settled, nor does Plutarch’s
testimony (Quaest. Conv. 634d = Pytine test. iii) require that we adopt this interpretation.
49
Reformulating “Cratinus” in Pytine
147
The premise of Pytine can be easily set out, thanks to the partial
summary provided by the scholiast on Knights 400. The central idea
expands upon Aristophanes’ presentation of Cratinus’ indulgence in
drink:€his dissipation has had a detrimental effect on both his personal
and professional lives, conflated in the play by presenting Cratinus as
married to the personified Comedy.52 Tired of his neglect, Comedy
decides to divorce him, but is prevented from carrying through with
her plan by a chorus of Cratinus’ friends, who upon entering inquire
about the grounds of her complaint and urge her not to act precipitously.53 Comedy then launches into a formal denunciation in which
she complains that Cratinus no longer writes plays but instead idles
away his time in a stupor.54 Most likely this scene ushered in an agon, in
which Comedy and Cratinus argued their positions and the chorus of
friends judged.
The scholiast’s description of the historical Cratinus making an embittered (παροξυνθείς) return to dramatic competition has powerfully influenced modern commentators. We can accept the portrait with confidence
since several additional considerations confirm the redemptive strategy
implied therein. The scholiast on Knights 531 states that in response to
Aristophanes’ taunts, Cratinus composed Pytine and showed that he did
not “babble,” and also that in the play he reviled Aristophanes for plagiarizing Eupolis.55 This scholiast also assumes professional indignation
on Cratinus’ part and backs up his claim by referring to a passage from
Pytine, probably the parabasis, where Cratinus openly repaid Aristophanes
On this point Σ VEΓ³ΘM Eq. 400a agrees with fr. 194, which fits neatly with the tone of jealousy evident in the otherwise badly transmitted fr. 193.
53
Their formal entry represented the parodos (cf. Heath (1990) 150, following Runkel and Meineke),
but one wonders what characters would be recognized as friends of Cratinus; perhaps other poets
or symposiasts.
54
Kaibel (see K–A 4.219) thought that we should read τῇ Μέθῃ in Σ Eq. 400a and assume a second
personification to balance that of Comedy (cf. Heath (1990) 150; Rosen (2000) 26), based on the
possibility that the allegory in Pytine was the model for Lucian’s conflict with his wife Rhetoric
stemming from his flirtations with a boy Dialogus. But as far as we can tell, the metaphorical
treatment of wine in Pytine consisted of representing libations as young boys (frr. 195; 196); cf.
Olson (2007) 82.
55
Σ VEΓΘM Eq. 531a (= Cratin. fr. 213) ταῦτα ἀκούσας ὁ Κρατῖνος ἔγραψε τὴν Πυτίνην, δεικνὺς
ὅτι οὐκ ἐλήρεσεν ἐν ᾗ κακῶς λέγει τὸν Ἀριστοφάνην ὡς τὰ Εὐπόλιδος λέγοντα. This statement is usually connected with fr. 89 from Eupolis’ Baptai, where Eupolis claims to have coauthored Knights. Some scholars believe that Aristophanes and Eupolis collaborated early in
their careers; cf. Mastromarco (1979); Halliwell (1980) and (1989); Storey (1993a) 388, contra
MacDowell (1982), restated in (1995) 34–41. Sidwell (1993) explains the references via his notion
of paracomedy. Cratinus may even draw attention to his own peculation of ideas found in
Knights, since fr. 210 seems to look back to the ship maidens of Eq. 1300–15; cf. Heath (1990)
151; Sidwell (1995) 63 n. 27.
52
148
Intertextual biography
in kind.56 Even the scholiast’s term deiknus suggests a clear and perhaps
formal denunciation of Aristophanes, and the object of this demonstration, that is, ὅτι οὐκ ἐλήρεσεν, directly responds to Aristophanes’ portrayal
of Cratinus at Knights 531, 536.57 At any rate, the connection between the
introduction to this scholion and the citation from Pytine would be vague
unless one aim of Cratinus’ derision of Aristophanes was to demonstrate
that he retained his ability to offer sharp criticism. The hostile tone with
which the audience is addressed in fr. 211 (also probably from the parabasis) suggests that the poet also took them to task, presumably for failing
to appreciate the previous year’s play.58
The title Pytine itself alludes to Cratinus’ reassertion of his Archilochean
poetics in the face of a Muse who rejected his mode of inspiration.
Comedy’s complaint about her husband’s love of wine was given vivid justification (frr. 195; 196), and Cratinus may have temporarily admitted his
errors at one point (fr. 200):59
ἀτὰρ ἐννοοῦμαι δῆτα τὰς μοχθηρίας
τῆς † ἠλιθιότητος τῆς ἐμῆς
I do recognize the wickedness
of my foolishness.
It may be building on this admission that a male supporter of Comedy
comes up with a plan to destroy Cratinus’ drinking vessels (fr. 199):€60
πῶς τις αὐτὸν¸ πῶς τις ἂν
ἀπὸ τοῦ πότου παύσειε¸ τοῦ λίαν πότου;
ἐγᾦδα συντρίψω γὰρ αὐτοῦ τοὺς χοᾶς
καὶ τοὺς καδίσκους συγκεραυνώσω σποδῶν
If this fragment is correctly connected with Eup. fr. 89 (see previous note), Cratinus’ target
was specifically Knights; thus Sidwell (1995) 63 connects Cratinus fr. 213 with his theory that
Aristophanes’ caricature of Cratinus depended on Eupolis. Ancient scholars scoured Knights to
discover the source of Cratinus’ claim and that of Eup. fr. 89, and while certain passages were
identified as Eupolidean in inspiration (Σ VEΓ³ Eq. 1291), the caricature apparently was not; cf.
Sommerstein (1980b) 52–3; Storey (1993a) 385–7.
57
The idea comes up again in fr. 208 (see below).
58
In a play that took professional biography as its theme, it is hazardous to single out parabatic
material on the basis of content alone; but meter supports a place in the parabasis for fr. 211 (cf. fr.
210 with K–A; fr. 38 also shows Cratinus making biographical comments in trochaic tetrameters
(Whittaker (1935) 188)), as does the form of audience address (see n. 34). For the hostile tone of fr.
211, cf. Rosen (1988) 20.
59
Rosen (2000) 32 tentatively suggests that Comedy spoke these lines, but mochthērias implies a
degree of impropriety that goes beyond anything of which we can reasonably suspect her; cf.
Heath (1990) 151 and Sidwell (1995) 64, following Runkel.
60
Edmonds (1957) 88–9 (cf. Sidwell (1995) 59 n. 13) thought that Comedy was speaking, despite the
masculine participle in line 4. A reference to a broken vessel might lie behind fr. 202.
56
Reformulating “Cratinus” in Pytine
149
καὶ τἆλλα παντ̓ ἀγγεĩα τὰ περὶ τὸν πότον¸
κοὐδ̓ ὀξύβαφον οἰνηρὸν ἔτι κεκτήσεται.
How could one … how could one stop him
from his drinking€– his binge-drinking?
I know€– I’ll smash his chous-pitchers
and reduce his wine casks to ash with a bolt of lightning
along with all his other drinking paraphernalia,
and he won’t have even a saucer for his wine.
It is easy to see why some critics suppose that Cratinus was reinstated
as Comedy’s partner upon being cured of his addiction. But the unique
nature of a pytine argues against this interpretation. Hesychius describes
this as a species of wine flagon made not from clay but from woven fibers,
and the vessel in question is apparently referred to in fr. 201:61
ὄψει γὰρ αὐτὴν ἐντὸς οὐ πολλοῦ χρόνου
παρὰ τοĩσι δεσμώταισι καταπιττουμένην.
You will see it within a short time,
pitched and sealed by the inmates.
It would thus appear that the importance of the vessel was not simply
as a comprehensive symbol of Cratinus’ dissipation, but as a solution
to the threat in fr. 199. It seems contradictory, or at least unnecessarily
complicated, to suppose that Comedy or her supporters worried about
repairs to a damaged cup, as Kaibel thought. Rather, some arrangement
to obtain a flask that is notionally indestructible appears to be at issue;62
if so, the title looks not to the premise but to the outcome of the play,
and champions Cratinus’ poetic tastes in the face of vigorous opposition
to his methods.
We can further appreciate Cratinus’ creative response to Aristophanes
by examining a fundamental connection between Knights and Pytine. The
organizing principle of the Knights parabasis is Aristophanes’ ironic gripe
with the audience over their fickleness toward older poets. The three veteran comic playwrights are described as doing their utmost to maintain
their favored status:€Magnes acted every part imaginable (Eq. 522–5), while
Crates won the audience over with “little delicacies” (Eq. 538–9). This suggests any number of metaphors to illustrate the audience’s dominance in
Hsch. π 4486; cf. Ar. fr. 880. Hesychius’ additional comment that these vessels are made by prisoners secures the reference in fr. 201.
62
Cf. Sommerstein (2005) 164.
61
150
Intertextual biography
the public contests.63 But Aristophanes settles on the notion of poets pursuing the public almost as suitors, although suitors motivated primarily
by the opportunity for sexual conquest. He then personifies comedy as a
woman, in order to articulate more clearly his view about the relationship
between poet and audience (Eq. 515–17):
ἀλλὰ νομίζων
κωμῳδοδιδασκαλίαν εἶναι χαλεπώτατον ἔργον ἁπάντων·
πολλῶν γὰρ δὴ πειρασάντων αὐτὴν ὀλίγοις χαρίσασθαι.
… but considering
the training of a comic chorus to be the most difficult task of all.
For, while many have pursued her, she has favored only a few.
πειρᾶν and χαρίζεσθαι are double entendres that form reciprocal expressions in the language of sexual pursuit. The description of a comic poet’s
uncertainty at each festival thus amounts to an amusing situation consonant with the tenor of Old Comedy:€ “Although many try to get her
in bed, she obliges few.”64 Comedy’s own sexual promiscuity is brought
out immediately thereafter, when she is conflated with the image of the
fickle audience (518). But the initial image continues to influence the discussion that follows, for with the notion of sexual vigor playing a part in
a poet’s relative degree of success, it is no surprise that a youthful poet
like Aristophanes is more pleasing, while Comedy and the audience she
embodies have no use for someone older (Eq. 519, 524–5).
The swaggering Aristophanes must have intended this metaphor
to stand as an amusing explanation of his recent victories, while poking fun at Cratinus for his failing energies. But although Aristophanes’
Komoidodidaskalia may be discriminating in the sense that she is hard
to please, she is also little better than a courtesan who shares her favors
with anyone who strikes her fancy. By rendering the position of a successful poet through so unstable a relationship, Aristophanes left room for
Cratinus to make a potent reply in Pytine, by representing the personified
Comedy as his own wife. Cratinus’ response thus amounts to an assertion
that although the younger poet may enjoy some ephemeral pleasures with
E.g., Cratin. fr. 360; Av. 445–6 (with Dunbar’s note); Pl. Lg. 659a; 700c–701a; R. 492b:€cf. PickardCambridge (1968) 97–8, 272–3. For the Athenian audience, see Henderson (1990); Wallace (1997);
Sommerstein (1998); Slater (1999).
64
For these terms, cf. Henderson (1975) 158, 160. Aristophanes envisioned the same sort of relationship when talking about the Tragic Muse (Ra. 95, with Dover (1993) ad loc.), and Pherecrates (fr.
155) developed a lengthy scene in which Mousike complains of the various sexual maneuvers to
which she was forced to submit by a succession of bad poets; cf. Dobrov and Urios-Aparisi (1995);
Olson (2007) 182. On the development of this theme in comedy, see Sommerstein (2005).
63
Reformulating “Cratinus” in Pytine
151
Comedy, he himself has a long-standing legitimate claim on her affections
and obligations that can be demonstrated by his accumulated victories.65
Both poets thus adapt the metaphor to argue a special claim to poetic
inspiration in order to impress the Theater.66
Cratinus’ play dramatically enacted his return to popular favor and artistic preeminence, as the indications of ancient readers and the title suggest. The notion of an unappreciative audience is also operative in Pytine,
suggesting that the play interacted with the Knights parabasis more generally, for apart from responding to Aristophanes’ caricature of a doddering
rival, Cratinus’ unhappy marriage displays the challenges of competitive
presentation and represents metaphorically his two losses to Aristophanes.
On some level, therefore, Pytine explored the notion of popular appeal as a
necessary and frustrating aspect of public competition, making this a comeback play in many ways, and one that certainly had refuting Aristophanes’
claims as a central objective. And rather than assuming that the character
Cratinus in Pytine needed to be and was reformed, it makes better sense
to believe that these attempts failed and that he ultimately reformed the
Theater audience, embodied in Comedy, turning Aristophanes’ criticism in
Knights on its head. A Cratinus who gave way to a woman who embodied a
rival’s criticism would scarcely have generated the impression made on our
ancient readers of Pytine. After all, as Comedy’s husband Cratinus wielded
tremendous power over the genre,67 while an assertive attitude is in keeping
with his antagonistic relationship with the audience revealed in fr. 211 and
elsewhere.68 One advantage to this interpretation is that it allows us to see
Cratinus effectively exploiting the possibilities latent in portraying himself
as a comic hero. Although initially in need of reform himself, his comic
undertaking looks toward the reform of the Athenian audience, much like
the grandiose schemes of Aristophanic heroes, while his stubborn persistence in socially reprehensible behavior allows him to assert a defining principle of his own poetic claims.
Cf. Rosen (2000) 28; Ruffell (2002) 156. In Pytine sexual indiscretion characterizes Cratinus
rather than Comedy, though Cratinus apparently exchanged sexual yearnings for yearnings for
wine (frr. 193; 195; 196; 199; 202; 206).
66
Cf. Ar. fr. 348, where the chorus proclaim that invocation is unnecessary, since the Muses are
already with them, according to the poet.
67
Evidence for a husband’s heavy-handed reaction to a threatened divorce is available in the life of
Alcibiades, who snatched Hipparete out from under the nose of the archon before whom she had
appeared to register a divorce (And. 4.13–15; Isoc. 16.31; Plu. Alc. 8.1–5).
68
Fr. 360; cf. frr. 38; 395. Contrast Aristophanes’ more ambivalent criticism of his audience in the
revised parabasis of Clouds:€Hubbard (1991) 94–8.
65
152
Intertextual biography
As for what happened in the play following the point where the ancient
summary breaks off, critics often assume a scene in which Cratinus
received advice in composing a new play from Comedy herself, based on
two fragments that seem connected by the idea of dramatizing poetic
composition on stage:69
ληρεĩς ἔχων· γράφ̓ αὐτὸν
ἐν ἐπεισοδίῳ. γελοĩος ἔσται Κλεισθένης κυβεύων
† ἐν τῇ τοῦ κάλλους ἀκμῇ.
(Pytine fr. 208)
You keep driveling. Write him
into an episode. Kleisthenes will be a
laughing stock casting dice
in the acme of his beauty.
and
‘Υπέρβολον δ̓ ἀποσβέσας ἐν τοĩς λύχνοισι γράψον
(Pytine fr. 209)
Blow Hyperbolos out and write him in the lamp-market.
This situation has been interpreted as the recipe for absolute success with
which the play ended,70 but matters perhaps turned out differently. If the
fragments represent Comedy’s corrections, it appears that Cratinus’ temporarily more sober approach to composition fell short of expectations.
More particularly, he continued to babble (ληρεĩς ἔχων, fr. 208), and to this
extent provided justification for the very abuse Aristophanes had heaped
on him (Eq. 531, 536) and that Cratinus sought to counteract in Pytine,
according to the ancient testimonia.71 In fact, the scene these fragments are
thought to represent has all the makings of a familiar comic situation in
which one character is instructed by another, and the humor derives from
the student’s inability to achieve minimal standards and from the teacher’s
resulting frustration.72 Failing this way, Cratinus might have reaffirmed
Pieters (1946) 151 imagined Eupolis and Aristophanes conferring about poetic composition here
(cf. Sidwell (1993) 376–7; Zanetto (2006) 313–14), but this may be stretching speculation too far.
Perhaps the wax tablet referred to in fr. 217 belongs to this scene:€Cratinus jots down notes for a
comedy on his pinakion while Comedy looks over his shoulder and makes necessary corrections.
70
Heath (1990) 151. Olson (2007) 84 objects that ποιέω, not γράφω, is used for composing poetry
and concludes that a list of some sort is being drawn up in this scene; however, it may simply be
that the more prosaic expression looks to the earthy workshop scenario of this exchange. In any
event, Olson still assumes the envisioned list is connected with plans for a new play.
71
Ruffell (2002) 161–2 suggests that Cratinus addresses these lines to someone else (Aristophanes?);
in that case Cratinus has taken up Aristophanes’ specific criticism and directed it against his own
adversary.
72
E.g., V. 1122–64, 1299–1325; Nu. 627–790.
69
Reformulating “Cratinus” in Pytine
153
his poetic stance along the lines of fr. 203 toward the end of the play, upon
returning to his old habits,73 while fr. 198 may mark the reaction of a witness to his renewed poetic effusions, which are all the more forceful for
having been held in check:
ἄναξ ῎Απολλον¸ τῶν ἐπῶν τοῦ ῥεύματος¸
καναχοῦσι πηγαί· δωδεκάκρουνον <τὸ> στόμα¸
̓Ιλισὸς ἐν τῇ φάρυγι· τί ἂν εἴποιμ’ <ἔτι>;
εἰ μὴ γὰρ ἐπιβύσει τις αὐτοῦ τὸ στόμα¸
ἅπαντα ταῦτα κατακλύσει ποιήμασιν.
Lord Apollo, what a surge of words!
The springs are thundering, his mouth has twelve streams,
the Ilisos is in his throat! What more can I say?
If someone doesn’t put a plug in his mouth,
he’ll flood everything here with his poetry!
With ποιήμασιν in final position lending dramatic effect, the cataclysm
of Cratinean poetry now returns in full spate.74 The passage operates on a
number of intertextual levels.75 Through its relation to Knights, it amounts
to a pointed rebuttal of Aristophanes’ ultimate charge that this well of
poetic inspiration had long since gone dry, since Cratinus returns to his
earlier state of poetic force, according to the appropriation of the image by
Aristophanes to describe his older rival’s success during the early stage of
his career.76 The image of stopping up Cratinus’ mouth in line 4 implies
metaphorically a jug,77 which, even in the immediate context of streams
and springs, must recall the overarching theme of a wine jar, whereby
the poet’s effusions are equated with and result from bibulousness. The
further intertextual burden of the passage will have contributed to this
interpretation, if (as was suggested above) in a preexisting Cratinean
stage biography the water/stream image sketched out a literary debt to
Norwood (1931) 116; cf. Ruffell (2002) 157–8.
As Heath (1990) 150 points out, poiēmasin suggests a point in the play where Cratinus’ poetic
inspiration is demonstrated, not where it is under fire by Comedy or the chorus; cf. Olson (2007)
86. It is also unlikely that the fragment belongs to Cratinus’ defense at the beginning of the play
(e.g., Sommerstein (2005) 164), since the premise there was his lack of poetic activity.
75
For the intertextual complexities of these passages, cf. Rosen (2000) 31–2, though he believes
that they preclude a positive assertion by Cratinus and instead reflect how he revelled in a rival’s
caricature.
76
Ruffell (2002) 158 emphasizes the way Cratinus inflates the Aristophanic passage. Bakola (2008)
14 draws attention to the idea of poetic inspiration in the water image. In a paper delivered at the
annual meeting of the APA in Dallas in December 1999, A. Fenton argued that Cratinus’ version
of the river motif redefines Aristophanes’ critical version in a positive light by associating the
stream with the public water sources of Athens.
77
Cf. Ach. 463.
73
74
154
Intertextual biography
Archilochus, of which the theme of inspiration through wine was part
and parcel. To this extent the only clue we have for a healthy poetic output
in Pytine is framed in terms that reflect Cratinus’ Archilochean stance.
Taken together, these points make it more likely that the passage reasserts
Cratinus’ Archilochean poetics than a poetics he adopted in the play only
reluctantly, after abandoning his own. Indeed, the Hellenistic epigram
from which fr. 203 is drawn may support this interpretation, since the
opening hexameter might likewise be based on a passage in Pytine:78
οἶνός τοι χαρίεντι πέλει ταχὺς ἵππος ἀοιδῷ
(AP 13.29.1)
Wine, you know, makes for a fast horse for a pleasing poet.
If dependent on Cratinus’ claims, the “pleasing poet” surely alludes to
him in contrast with his rivals, while the comparison of wine to a horse
described specifically as “swift” introduces an agonistic metaphor.79 In
essence, then, Cratinus asserts that wine lies at the heart of his strategy for
victory in the poetic competition.80
On this reconstruction, Pytine culminated with Cratinus taunting
Aristophanes by enacting his return to comic productivity and inspiration through the very image Aristophanes used to preface his mockery
of the veteran poet (Eq. 526–8). The last laugh belonged to Cratinus, since
the judges could not resist the temptation to turn his comic fantasy into
reality by awarding him first place in the contest. Much effort has been
directed toward identifying the shortcomings of the original Clouds by
analyzing the surviving revision, but the best answer might be simply to
assume that the combination of agonistic response and comic fantasy in
Pytine outclassed Aristophanes’ entry.
T h e mode l of a pe r f e c t pl o t :€
wasps and py t i n e
Aristophanes’ reaction to the upset Cratinus staged at the City Dionysia
of 423 is well known, for the revised parabasis of Clouds responds directly to the defeat by chastising the audience for preferring feeble poets
Cf. K–A vol. 4, 227 and especially Sens (forthcoming) ad loc.
For horses in epinician contexts, e.g., Pi. O. 1.110; P. 11.46–8; N. 1.5–6; B. 3.4; Hansen (1983) nos.
302.3 (IG I3.1469.3), 379.
80
It may be no coincidence that a year later Aristophanes also had recourse to the metaphor
of �chariot-racing to describe the defeat of Clouds by Pytine (V. 1050); see below. In Ar. fr. 688
Aristophanes speaks of audience tastes through the metaphor of wine, in a way that smacks of agonistic Â�posturing; the “bitter wine” (= heavily iambic?) now out of style may be that of Cratinus.
78
79
The model of a perfect plot:€Wasps and Pytine
155
(Nu.€524–5).81 But this revision was still underway years after the event
and thus represents Aristophanes’ recollection rather than his immediate response.82 For that we must rely on Wasps, composed for the next
festival. In that play Aristophanes makes a public show of being upset
over the loss through his bitter reflections in both the parabasis (esp. V.
1015–17, 1043–7) and the prologue, where he reveals a plan to ensure better results this time around (V. 54–66).83 The most pointed comments
about the calamity of 423 reduce the situation to agonistic concerns; as
the chorus say, borrowing the quintessential agonistic metaphor of chariot racing, their poet “crashed his idea, while trying to drive past his
rivals” (V. 1050 τοὺς ἀντιπάλους). Wasps thus outwardly portrays itself
as a comeback play, much as Pytine had. Indeed, to some extent in both
Wasps and the revised Clouds Aristophanes can be seen borrowing from
his older rival by taking refuge in the persona of a misunderstood playwright at odds with his audience and complaining of his agonistic undoing. In light of Aristophanes’ harsh treatment of Cratinus in Knights and
his insistence that his competitors of 423 were not up to standard (Nu.
524–5), it is surprising that we hear no more about Cratinus in Wasps.84
The immediate explanation is that Cratinus did not participate at the
Lenaia of 422.85 But the competitive relationship between the poets influences the play in other ways.
As Pytine demonstrates, comic composition entailed borrowing and
adapting material gleaned from rivals. On the broadest level, poets worked
within a language of structural elements (e.g., parodos, agon, parabasis)
that could be reordered and manipulated to serve one individual’s particular dramatic design. But the repertoire of comic elements extended to more
specific material, such as tropes, joke routines and personal targets, all of
which could be adapted by successive poets in new situations.86 A useful frame to approach this phenomenon is provided by Gregory Dobrov’s
examination of comedy’s interaction with tragedy through what he calls
See esp. Hubbard (1991) 88–106; O’Regan (1992) 67–9, 133–9.
For the date of the Clouds revision, see Kopff (1990); Storey (1993b); Henderson (1993b).
83
The qualities of intelligence and sophistication Aristophanes attributes to the first Clouds in the
revised parabasis (esp. Nu. 520–7) are already evident in descriptions of the play in Wasps (1044,
1045, 1048, 1049, 1050, 1052–3, 1055, 1059). The prologue speech (V. 54–66) specifically promises to
abandon such lofty aspirations in favor of a form of entertainment supposedly better suited to the
audience’s tastes.
84
Cf. Ruffell (2002) 138.
85
V. Hyp. I.32–4; see MacDowell (1971) 122–3 and Slater (2002) 111–12 for the problems posed by
the wording of the didaskalic notice.
86
Much as Heath described in the passage cited at the outset. A clear example is the sequence of jokes
against the tragic actor Hegelochos (PAA 480380):€R a. 303–4; Sannyr. fr. 8; Strattis frr. 1; 63.
81
82
156
Intertextual biography
the theory of contrafact.87 Dobrov argues that Aristophanes borrowed
thematic elements from tragic models, rearranging and adapting them to
comment on and improve upon his model, while still creating a play that
could be considered original in its own right.
In its relation to Pytine, Wasps supplies an instance of this species of
intertextuality, but between comic poets. Here too the emphasis on competition is paramount, though in a more practical sense, since intracomic
intertextuality involves actual or potential rivals participating in a common event. A poet could adapt a rival’s material to find new potential in
a theme or situation, but he did so with knowledge of the audience’s reaction on a previous occasion,88 allowing intertextuality to serve a competitive interest. This feature has special point for Aristophanes in 422, since
his intertextual rationale reflects his desire to make a strong return to the
stage after the previous year’s misfortune.89 Comic intertextuality likewise
merges with poetic rivalry when it is treated as plagiarism and provides
grist for the mill of rivals searching for ways to assail a competitor.90 We
can now express more forcefully Heath’s comparison of comic rivalry to
antagonistic banter in the law courts:€far from suggesting a lack of seriousness in either venue, the comparison helps us appreciate the agonistic
context in which these taunts aimed at competitive advantage.91 In what
follows I lay out the pattern of intertextuality between Wasps and Pytine
and show how aspects of stage biography, competition and intertextuality
contribute to an interpretation of Wasps’ competitive poetics.
In the prologue of Wasps, Aristophanes reveals a new poetic program
devised in the aftermath of the failure of Clouds that playfully acknowledges his preoccupation with Cratinus. He hints that he is modeling
Dobrov (2001), esp. 16–17. Cf. Silk (1993) and (2000), who distinguishes paratragedy and parody
by arguing that Aristophanic paratragedy signifies a much greater artistic investment related to
the poet’s idiosyncratic definition of comedy.
88
Sidwell (1995) 69–77, esp. 70, sees Wasps’ intertextual relationship with Pytine as essentially parodic, not aimed at positive, independent poetic creation.
89
The possibility that Aristophanes had two plays produced at the Lenaia of 422 can be interpreted
in this light:€Hubbard (1991) 113–14.
90
For the many assertions of plagiarism in comic rivalry, see Halliwell (1989); Sommerstein (1992).
Aristophanes’ notorious claim at Nu. 553–5 that Eupolis’ Marikas “twisted” his own Knights and
adulterated it by adding extraneous material borrowed from Phrynichus is another clear instance
of competitive intertextuality. The thematic parallels are catalogued by Storey (1993a) 381–5 and
(2003b) 202–4, who diminishes the implication of rivalry by treating it as a topos; cf. Heath
(1990) 153.
91
Heath (1990) 152 says of the “system of ritualized insults” that “they are not meant to be believed,
but to make the other party lose face.” His term “ritualized” should not distract us from the aim
of such libel:€it was meant to be believed, at least to the point of affecting the outcome of legal and
poetic contests, even if it was exaggerated and drew upon familiar motifs. See Chapter 5.
87
The model of a perfect plot: Wasps and Pytine
157
himself more closely on his rivals, since the phortikē comedy to which
he partially concedes (V. 65–6) surely alludes to Cratinus, whom
Aristophanes refers to in the same ambiguous terms in the revised parabasis of Clouds (Nu. 524).92 That Aristophanes’ thoughts were on the poet
responsible for his stunning defeat perhaps explains why a few lines later
an imagined spectator identifies Philocleon’s malady as alcoholism, as
though the theme of sickness and rehabilitation to which the audience
is here introduced conjures up a play witnessed a year earlier.93 Even the
endearing picture of Philocleon’s manic attachment to the tools of his
trade in the lawcourts (V. 88–130) may reflect a similarly moving portrayal of Cratinus’ infatuation with the accoutrements of his habit, of
which we are offered glimpses in Pytine frr. 195, 199 and especially 202, if
Cratinus there describes the empty state of one of his beloved wine jars,
as Meineke thought. Certainly on the macroscopic level the theme of
rehabilitating the hero is central to both Pytine and Wasps. All matters of
plot and characterization derive from and serve this premise, and Wasps
appears to mirror the main sequence of developments in Pytine as we
know them from the ancient scholarly tradition and modern reconstructions of the play.
a.╇Domestic altercation arising from the
incorrigible behavior of a member of the
household; Cratinus’ drunkenness
(Σ Eq. 400; frr. 193, 194, 195, 196).
b.╇Initial attempt to remedy situation
(fails); Comedy’s threat of divorce
(Σ Eq. 400; fr. 194).
c.╇Choral parodos brings allies to the
beleaguered hero; Cratinus’ friends
�prevail upon Comedy to refrain from
legal divorce (Σ Eq. 400).
d.╇A ntagonist wins ensuing agon; Comedy
presumably wins and enlists the support
of Cratinus’ friends (Σ Eq. 400; fr. 199)
e.╇Hero repents in the face of �opposition:
Cratinus in fr. 200.
a.╇Philocleon’s philheliasticism
�leading to the conflict of father
and son.
b.╇Philocleon’s imprisonment by
Bdelycleon (136–229).
c.╇Philocleon’s friends and fellow
jurors try to free Philocleon and
then attack his jailers
(esp. 317– 462).
d.╇Bdelycleon wins and enlists the
support of the jurors (esp. 725–35).
e.╇Philocleon tacitly repents in
743–97.
Cf. Sidwell (1995) 69. For the prologue, cf. Paduano (1974) 18–19; Hubbard (1991) 117. For the
irony in Aristophanes’ use of phortikos, see Sommerstein (1990) 1218n.
93
Cf. Ruffell (2002) 162. For the sickness theme in Wasps, see Sidwell (1990). Cf. Konstan’s (1995,
16–17) identification of Philocleon’s obsession as a humor.
92
158
Intertextual biography
f.╇Second attempt to reform hero
with emphasis on hero’s malady
through props; entails at least in
part demolishing Cratinus’ drinking
paraphernalia (fr. 199; cf. fr. 202).
g.╇Reeducation of hero by his reformer;
Comedy assists Cratinus in comic
�
composition (frr. 208, 209).
h.╇Play culminates ironically in hero’s
rebellion against his reformer and
reaffirmation of his original nature;
Cratinus returns to poetic composition
through alcoholic inspiration.
f.╇The domestic trial scene
(798–1008).
g.╇Bdelycleon trains Philocleon in
manners of sophisticated society
(1122–264).
h.╇Philocleon emerges as even more
difficult to control, turning his
natural demeanor to a new context
(esp. 1450–61).
The overall movement of Wasps is strikingly similar to Pytine. Cratinus
offered Aristophanes a blueprint of a comic plot based on the rehabilitation theme, which Aristophanes adapted to a critical treatment of the law
courts. The plot was full of comic potential and had succeeded against
a play Aristophanes claims was his best, and competitive considerations
induced him to remake it.94 Two aspects of the relationship require more
detailed examination.
When Philocleon falls silent after being refuted in the agon, Bdelycleon
is agitated, and the chorus explain:€ “He has now come to understand,
and he counts all those instances as errors (hamartias) when he did not
obey you” (744–6). The scene represents an introspective moment for
Philocleon, who is forced to confront his shortcomings in a way reminiscent of Cratinus’ admission in fr. 200. Cratinus’ reformative experiences
in Pytine are recalled more vividly during the continuation of Philocleon’s
healing in the domestic trial, when the old man becomes numb and collapses upon hearing he has acquitted Labes (995). As the table illustrates,
Philocleon’s submission after the agon leading to his fantastic cure in the
trial is comparable to the stages of rehabilitation represented by Pytine frr.
199 and 200. In both plays this secondary expedient involves forcing the
hero to deny himself his previous pleasures€– Philocleon by acquitting a
defendant, Cratinus by seeing his symposiastic paraphernalia destroyed.
Cratinus’ cure was every bit as drastic, and Peace 700–3 might supply
details for the stage action surrounding his reaction:
Hubbard (1991) 126–37 prefers a dual intertextual structure for Wasps, based on Knights and
Clouds.
94
The model of a perfect plot: Wasps and Pytine
159
ΕΡ.
τί δαὶ Κρατĩνος ὁ σοφός; ἔστιν;
ΤΡ.
ἀπέθανεν¸
ὅθ̓ οἱ Λάκωνες ἐνέβαλον.
ΕΡ.
τί παθών;
ΤΡ.ὅ τι;
ὡρακιάσας· οὐ γὰρ ἐξηνέσχετο
ἰδὼν πίθον καταγνύμενον οἴνου πλέων.
h e r m .:
What about wise Cratinus? Is he alive?
t r yg.:
He died, when the Spartans invaded.
h e r m .:
What happened?
t r yg.:What€– he passed out. For he couldn’t stand seeing his
�brimming vat of wine smashed to pieces.
Whatever historical point is at issue in these lines,95 the scenario of doing
violence to wine casks surely takes us back to Pytine, as the scholia observe,
and specifically to fr. 199.96 In this instance, stage action draws further
attention to the recycled sequence of plot elements.
Of all the scenes in Wasps, the domestic trial is the most memorable
for its comic fantasy and its vivid appraisal of the courts, and may well
be the central idea from which everything else followed.97 But here too
Aristophanes seems to have adapted Cratinus, for in Pytine a mock trial
of sorts also made a significant contribution to the action. The wording
of the scholion on Knights 400 is rife with legal diction that gives some
indication of how the initial scenes were developed. In his description of
Comedy’s wish to end their marriage (ἀφίστασθαι τοῦ συνοικεσίου τοῦ
σὺν αὐτῷ), the scholiast represents the matter as divorce and more particularly as apoleipsis, whereby the wife initiated the process.98 In such a
See generally Olson (1998) 211–12, who draws attention to the reformulation of Cratinus’ “death”
of line 700 as “passing out” in 702.
96
Σ VΓ Pax 702d:€ὅτι φίλοινος ὁ Κρατῖνος¸ καὶ αὐτὸς ἐν τῇ Πυτίνῃ σαφῶς λέγει. Cf. Pieters (1946) 1;
Sidwell (1995) 59 n. 13. Since the last Spartan invasion took place in 425, Sidwell believes that the
reference must go back to a caricature in that period (contrast Harvey (1994) n. 38). But the reference to invading Spartans might simply represent how (for instance) in Pytine Cratinus abused
his friends for ransacking his belongings like an invading army; cf. Dworacki (1995) 119. (The
second clause of the scholiast’s comment may refer to the content of the Peace passage to which
it is appended, and not to the statement that Cratinus was fond of drink.) Mastromarco (2002)
argues for a reference to Cratinus’ Lakones (fr. 102), which he accordingly assumes was produced
in 422 at the City Dionysia.
97
Newiger (1957) 130 follows Wilamowitz in believing that the parody in the trial scene was the
“Keimzelle” of the comedy.
98
There are no attested occurrences of sunoikesion in the fifth century, but the verb sunoikein was
regularly used for marriage and may have been “the accepted term for living together in legitimate union” (Harrison (1968) 2). In any event, by the time of our scholiast sunoikesion may
have become the proper technical term:€Pap. Teb. 809.5 (ii bc) gives συνοικεσίου συγγραφή
95
160
Intertextual biography
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.99 Comedy was going out to do this, and the scholiast further implies the legal motif when he says that she obtained leave to bring a
formal suit against Cratinus for ill treatment, again using the appropriate
legalese (κακώσεως αὐτῷ δίκην λαγχάνειν).100 The scholiast’s details conform to Athenian divorce procedures,101 and his description is too unified
and its implications too extensive to be a product of his own imagination. Rather, the legal scenario must have been a feature of the play, and
Cratinus probably used it further to imply his privileged relationship to
and perhaps control over Comedy. The question is what came of these
threats once the chorus intervened.
Several fragments suggest that the debate in the agon took the form of
a domestic trial in place of the formal legal proceedings Comedy initially
threatened. From the scholiast it seems that the chorus of friends acted
as arbitrators; they inquired after the basis of Comedy’s accusation (τὴν
αἰτίαν might recall the legal theme), and she reported her reasons for faulting Cratinus. The portion of Comedy’s speech preserved by the same scholiast begins with a transitional phrase of the sort familiar from rhetorically
structured forensic speeches:102
ἀλλ̓ † ἐπαναστρέψαι βούλομαι εἰς † τὸν λόγον·
πρότερον ἐκεĩνος πρὸς ἑτέραν γυναĩκ̓ ἔχων
τὸν νοῦν¸ † κακὰς εἴποι πρὸς ἑτέραν¸ ἀλλ̓
ἅμα μὲν τὸ γῆρας¸ ἅμα δέ μοι δοκεĩ ∪ –
† οὐδέποτ̓ αὐτοῦ πρότερον
(Pytine fr. 193)
Translation is made difficult by the corruption, but the implication of the
scholiast’s prelude is that by logos Comedy means her formal argument.103
for divorce; cf. P.Oxy. 266.11. aphistasthai in the ancient summary of Pytine in the scholion to
Eq. 400 may then be taken in a technical sense for claims at law (e.g., D. 21.181; 35. 4).
99
For apoleipsis, cf. Harrison (1968) 40–4; Cohn-Haft (1995), esp. 4–7, 11–13.
100
[Arist.] Ath. 53.1 (with Rhodes (1981)â•›), 56.6.
101
Harrison (1968) 44, 112–13. Cf. Menander fr. 239:€t he wife or someone acting in her interest similarly threatens a suit of kakōsis, probably against the misogynist who gave the play its title and
who appears to have discussed his troubled marriage with another character (fr. 236); cf. Gomme
and Sandbach (1973) 700.
102
Luppe (1968) believes that the first verse belongs to the scholiast, not to Comedy. For the rhetorical structure of speeches, see Gagarin (1997) 18; for the use of rhetorical elements in the transitions of speeches in Aristophanes, see Murphy (1938), esp. 84–99.
103
Logos in this sense is not regular technical vocabulary, but for the effect compare E. Hec. 1196
and IT 1060; cf. Hec. 271, 824; Hipp. 292, 986; Tr. 906–10. Lloyd (1992) 34–6 identifies selfconscious allusion to the act of speaking as a feature of Euripides’ use of the forensic style in the
agon, and identifies the 420s as the period when “the courtroom was evoked most specifically
The model of a perfect plot: Wasps and Pytine
161
We can imagine that upon finishing a formal prelude, with fr. 193 she
introduced detailed arguments in favor of divorce in the main section of
her speech, including the objections to Cratinus’ behavior in frr. 194–5 and
perhaps 204.104 The narrative she embarks upon thus amounts to a summary of events in the diēgēsis of an actual forensic speech. That impression
is supported by the opening lines of fr. 193, since Comedy places these
events within a clear temporal scheme (πρότερον … ἅμα τὸ γῆρας) which
reveals that her aim was to contrast, much like Aristophanes in Knights,
Cratinus’ previous vitality as a poet and the failings of his later years.105
A fragment that almost certainly belongs to the same scene contains the
rhetorical topos whereby a defendant appealed to the jury by exposing his
accusers’ extravagant preparations:106
τὴν μὲν παρασκευὴν ἴσως γιγνώσκετε
(Pytine fr. 197)
I take it, you recognize (her) elaborate case.
As defendant, Cratinus must be the speaker, so his rebuttal both responds
to the forensic nature of Comedy’s speech and implies that his own speech
imitated formalities of litigation.107 Finally, Edmonds saw that fr. 207
might refer to a vote taken by the chorus at the end of the agon:108
ἀπὸ ποτέρου τὸν καῦνον ἀριθμήσεις;
From which one will you tally the vote?
In this case the troublesome term kaunos represents metaphorically the
verdict,109 while the situation points to the fully developed court scene
suggested by the other fragments. Thus the debate was not only a formal
104
105
106
107
108
109
by Euripides.” Fr. 194 is modelled on E. Hec. 284 (κἀγὼ γὰρ ἦ ποτ̓¸ ἀλλὰ νῦν οὐκ εἴμ̓ ἔτι), so
perhaps Cratinus recalled Hecuba in order to endow Comedy with the maximum pathos.
Cf. Sommerstein (2005) 164.
The temporal scheme can be compared to frr. 194 and 195, as well as to the scholiast’s most summary description of her speech (Σ Eq. 400a μὴ κωμῳδοίη μηκέτι¸ σχολάζοι δέ).
The scholiast also cites Andoc. 1.1; Lys. fr. 118 Carey (cf. 19.2); Aeschin. 3.1 (cf. 1.193). Cf. K–A vol.
4, 222; MacDowell (1962) 62; Dover (1974) 25–6; Heath (1990) 158 n. 18.
Clement’s comment might also indicate that Cratinus is speaking at this point:€ Κρατίνου ἐν
Πυτίνῃ εἰπόντος κτλ.
Edmonds (1957) 90. For the voting process, see MacDowell (1971) 142–3. A voting scene might
explain the transmitted reading (ἀπὸ προτέρου), that is, hysteron and proteron kadiskon, as at V. 987
and 991 (with MacDowell’s notes); cf. Phryn. Com. fr. 33. Even so, we expect the definite article.
Σ VΓ Pax 1081b, which cites this fragment, equates kaunos with klēros. But strictly speaking one
does not count a lottery, whereas here and at Ar. fr. 673 counting is involved. Pax 1081 is the only
passage that can be independently assessed, but there Aristophanes might simply intend kauniasai to represent the idea of chance in the process of drawing lots, while the basic idea applies
equally well to disputants awaiting the outcome of a vote. Olson (1998) 1081–2n. proposes that a
kaunos represents the outcome of a dice game like astragaloi.
162
Intertextual biography
exchange, as agons are by definition, but one that allowed the litigation
threatened by Comedy to play out in a private setting.
The fragments of Pytine only allow us to imagine how Comedy’s litigation lent the play thematic and dramatic unity, whereas Wasps demonstrates how a comic poet could turn a domestic setting into a courtroom.
Once Bdelycleon has created a courtroom in the house (805–59) and a
suitable crime has been detected (835–43), the trial follows regular procedures:€the jurors are summoned (891–2); the indictment is read aloud
(894–7); and the prosecution and defense present their cases (905–81).
As in Pytine, the parties accommodate their presentations to the forensic
arena using all the tricks of language and drama employed to win over
an Athenian jury:€blandishments and threats (915–16, 930, 950–1, 957–8),
slander (923, 970–2), dubious witnesses (936–9, 962–6) and weeping children (976–8). The culminating vote must have brought with it a strong
recollection of Pytine, as attention focussed on the voting urns brought on
earlier (854–5) and anticipation built over which side would win (984–94).
What is often viewed as the greatest moment of comic inspiration in
Wasps may thus have drawn heavily on a scene staged a year earlier by
a rival poet. Whereas in Pytine the agon and trial theme were probably
combined, Aristophanes distinguishes them in order to develop the scene
more fully in its own right and emphasize the satire.110 But his inspiration is bound up with what he saw a rival do on stage, and the notion is
made relevant to the trial scene in a way that draws further attention to its
genesis.
The assembling of the apparatus for a trial and the trial itself are separated by a choral interlude that serves primarily to emphasize the novelty
of these arrangements:€Bdelycleon has invented the domestic courtroom
(870–1 μηχανᾶται, 876 καινοτομοῦμεν), which is described as a new religious rite (876 τελετὴν καινήν) and a new order (886 νέαισιν ἀρχαĩς).
Within the plot, these assertions allude to Bdelycleon’s fantastic arrangements. But they also resonate with Aristophanes’ parabatic wish that originality be treated as the criterion for awarding prizes in the dramatic
contests (1051–4).111 Hence this choral section serves the poet’s competitive
advantage by drawing attention to his own comic genius. The passage is
more equivocal than that, however, since this assertion, while in one sense
masking the fact that Aristophanes is recycling Cratinus, also draws attention to this very feature. The irony is palpable and can be compared to how
╇ For the play’s satirical thrust, see especially Lenz (1980); Konstan (1995) 15–28; Olson (1996).
╇ For kainos in competitive assertions, cf. Bierl (2004) 3–5; Zanetto (2006) 319.
110
111
The model of a perfect plot: Wasps and Pytine
163
Cratinus badgered Aristophanes for plagiarism in the parabasis of Pytine
(fr. 213), but then revisited his rival’s personification of the ship maidens.112
Such banter situates intertextuality within the competitive framework,
since a rival was forced to witness his material being pirated and recast
to his disadvantage, while the perpetrator simultaneously proclaimed his
own creative independence.
These surface-level allusions and the correspondence between
Aristophanes and Bdelycleon in particular alert us to the poet’s compositional tactics and lay the groundwork for an interpretation of Wasps that
depends on such intertextuality. As more clearly in Pytine, so too in Wasps
the theme of rehabilitation extends beyond the stage fiction to encompass a putatively “historical” Aristophanes whose poetic ascendancy came
into question with the failure of Clouds. Authorial self-reference in Wasps
operates in two ways:€by invoking the notion of stage biography through a
recollection of themes in Pytine, and by presenting a set of characters and
scenarios that recall and allude to features of Aristophanes’ own professional biography. In this instance, then, intertextuality acts as a lens that
provides clarity and point of reference to the more elusive reflection of an
agonistic biography.
The identification of Bdelycleon with Aristophanes is brought about
in several ways.113 By his name alone, Bdelycleon embodies Aristophanes’
antipathy for Cleon as expressed in the parabasis (1029–37). Furthermore,
in the domestic trial Bdelycleon comes face to face with the demagogue
thinly disguised as Kuon (“the Dog”), while in the second parabasis
Aristophanes recalls his own legal dispute with Cleon.114 The play’s political and poetic themes converge when Bdelycleon assumes Aristophanes’
role as comic poet and healer of the city midway through the agon (650–1).
By posing as the poet and defending his aspirations in a forensic agon,
Bdelycleon also recalls Cratinus’ predicament in his dispute with Comedy.
Meanwhile in the parabasis Aristophanes reciprocates this gesture by portraying himself as the city’s healer and defender of fathers (1037–43), much
as Bdelycleon had.115 The association is carried one step further in the
Cratin. fr. 210 and Eq. 1300–15; cf. Heath (1990) 151; Sidwell (1995) 64. So too in Clouds
Aristophanes reproaches Eupolis for pilfering Knights (553–5) in a parabasis composed in eupolideans, immediately after claiming novelty (546–8) in the middle of a revised play; cf. Storey
(1993a) 382.
113
For these and additional points, see Olson (1996) 144–5.
114
V. 1284–91, with the notes of MacDowell (1971) 299 and Sommerstein (1983) 233–4; cf. Biles
(2006) 251–2. Aristophanes’ troubles with Cleon were already a familiar theme in his stage biography:€Ach. 377–82 (with Σ REΓLh Ach. 378), 502–8, 659–64; Sommerstein (1980a) 2–3.
115
Bdelycleon’s good service to his father is brought up again in the chorus’ ultimate praise of him
(1463–73), where Aristophanes is implied as well (Russo (1994) 123–4).
112
164
Intertextual biography
domestic trial, which casts Bdelycleon as the producer, stage-manager and
director of the unfolding legal drama€– a virtual komoidodidaskalos.116 In
this scene, Philocleon in turn plays the role of audience and effective judge
of a dramatic presentation. The old man had already cast himself in this
role during the agon, by characterizing legal disputes as theatrical events
that involve acting (552–7, 562), crying (564), storytelling (566), mockery
and laughter (566–7), as well as recitations of tragic scripts (579–80) and
exodos songs (581–2).117 As he sees it, these displays amount to flattery (563
θώπευμα) aimed at winning his vote, a view reminiscent of Aristophanes’
presentation of the fickle audience in Knights that is also implicit in the
Wasps parabasis.
Through a process of contextual conflation, the political satire of the
play is transformed into a criticism of the dramatic competitions themselves, in which similar corruption and mishandling of justice took place,
according to Aristophanes’ portrayal of his failure with Clouds.118 The
metatheater of the domestic trial points to the problem, for the producer can only obtain favorable results by manipulating his judge and audience to a verdict that goes against their will. Far from casting Bdelycleon
in a bad light, this manipulation strikes us, the objective second audience to Philocleon’s behavior, as legitimate, since we recognize the error
in supporting Cleon/Kuon.119 In this way, Aristophanes encourages the
Theater audience to perceive their culpability when they fail to properly
reward poets, and he makes his point easier for them to appreciate by
having the chorus warn against this very mistake in the kommation that
follows (1010–12) and then more directly in the parabasis proper with reference to Clouds (1045), and finally to Wasps itself (1051–9). Nonetheless,
this “functioning” courtroom reveals a recognition that in poetic competition contestants were under a similar obligation to appeal to the audience’s sensibilities, tastes, and expectations in an attempt to curry favor.
In his comic fantasy, Aristophanes could bring events to their proper conclusion. But his experience in the contests had demonstrated that it was
vain to trust the audience’s judgment (1044–50). Bdelycleon’s attempts to
Cf. Slater (2002) 91–3, 96.
Cf. Reckford (1987) 246; Hubbard (1991) 132. For a study of the law courts through the lens of
drama, see Hall (1995).
118
Cf. Olson (1996) 144, 146.
119
Cf. Olson (1996) 138–41, 148. Hubbard (1991) 133, 136 (cf. Reckford (1987) 253–5; Slater (2002)
101–2), in seeing Bdelycleon as a rival demagogue, overemphasizes his apparent change of attitude toward Cleon (V. 1219–27), since this allows Philocleon to demonstrate his antipathy for the
demagogue face to face. Newiger (1957) 130 points out the significance of the two names for the
trial.
116
117
The model of a perfect plot: Wasps and Pytine
165
introduce his father to sophisticated society in the second half of the play
accordingly meet with the same failure Aristophanes experienced when he
tried to impress his audience with an allegedly more sophisticated kind of
comedy in Clouds.
The play’s conclusion sees Philocleon so positively anti-Aristophanic, in
poetic terms, that he almost embodies Cratinus. Once suspicious of the
effects of alcohol (1252–5), Philocleon is filled with a craze for wine thanks
to Bdelycleon’s adjustments (1300, 1322, 1393, 1476).120 At the symposium he
proves an effective comedian in his own right, and his inspiration depends
on his bibulous state.121 His behavior also reveals a taste that in its marked
iambicism (1311–13) and hostility to sophisticated comedians (1315–18)
is notably Cratinean and generally contrary to Aristophanes’ assertions
about his own sophistication.122 This performance wins Philocleon the
applause of the company (1314),123 whose elevated social status (1256) perhaps demonstrates the depth of Aristophanes’ feeling of rejection, since it
was supposedly such people whose tastes he especially had in mind with
Clouds.124
Philocleon at the symposium thus embodies an implicit tension in
Aristophanic poetics.125 But the metatheatrical implications of the closing
scene emphasize Aristophanes’ effort to put Cratinean poetics to work for
his own advantage in the contest.126 Following his cry to Dionysos (1474),
which helps elicit the Lenaian frame, Xanthias’ revelation of Philocleon’s
desire to compete in a dancing contest (1476–81) sets the stage for the
finale.127 The protagonist immediately appears and demonstrates his
dancing abilities (1485–95); challenges his antagonists to come forward
Sidwell (1995) 70 suggests that in Philocleon’s descent into alcoholism Aristophanes consciously
reverses the healing of Cratinus in Pytine.
121
Purves (1997) 17–19 describes Philocleon’s shift as one from passive spectator to engaged actor in
the final scenes. McGlew (2004) 32 emphasizes the old man’s abusive behavior.
122
Like Philocleon here (V. 1315, 1317), Cratinus manifests a disdain for kompsoi, which he expresses
in connection with Aristophanes (fr. 342). Philocleon’s farting, beating, mockery, and such are
described by Xanthias as crude and ignorant behavior (V. 1320–1), a position that compares
closely with Aristophanes’ polemic against lowbrow humor in the Clouds parabasis (Nu. 538–43).
For Archilochean iambicism in Philocleon’s deployment of ainos tales in the play’s later scenes,
see Zanetto (2001) 68–71.
123
Note the metatheatrical coloring in Philocleon’s reference to the tragic poet Sthenelus (V. 1313)
and comedy (V. 1318).
124
V. 1048–9 and Nu. 520–4, and thus his feeling of betrayal at Nu. 525–6. Vaio (1971) 337, emphasizes the cultural significance of the symposiasts; differently Storey (1985).
125
In this sense, reconfiguring the poetic dilemma set before the audience in the prologue (V.
54–66).
126
On this scene as it focuses agonistic themes in the play, see Vaio (1971) 346–8. For the dancing,
see Borthwick (1967); MacCary (1979).
127
Note the agonistic framework established by 1479 οἷς Θέσπις ἠγωνίζετο; cf. Ach. 418–19.
120
166
Intertextual biography
(1497–1500); and threatens the sons of Karkinos individually with defeat
as they appear (1500–13), before going down to face them (1514 καταβατέον
γ̓ ἐπ̓ αὐτούς μοι) in anticipation of victory (1515 ἢν ἐγὼ κρατῶ).128 At
this point the chorus get the contest underway with an anapestic couplet
(1516–7) that in form, as in content, has affinities with the epirrhematic
agon’s katakeleusmos,129 whose purpose of urging on the contestants is
amplified by the run of archilocheans with which the play ends. A subtle
allusion to Cratinus’ archilochean poetics can perhaps be felt, particularly
because Cratinus had already availed himself of this metrical form, in at
least one passage in connection with his stage biography.130 Among their
comments in the closing verses, the chorus direct the antagonists’ attention to the audience, whose cries of awe the dancers must seek to elicit
(1526–7). The play’s closing sequence fuses the dramatic action with the
festival and emphasizes the poet’s interest in obtaining a victory, as the
protagonist on whom he has pinned his hopes of victory faces his stage
adversaries in formal competition before the Theater. In this way the poet
offers his play as a competitive display that takes its place beside the other
comedies in anticipation of the outcome of the Lenaian agon of 422. With
that in mind, in the final lines Aristophanes makes one more attempt to
impress the audience with the novelty of his creations:
τοῦτο γὰρ οὐδείς πω πάρος δέδρακεν¸
ὀρχούμενον ὅστις ἀπήλλαξεν χορὸν τρυγῳδῶν
(Wasps 1536–7)
For no one has ever done this before,
to take a comic chorus off-stage dancing.
Whether or not there is merit in this claim,131 Cratinus influenced the play
on a number of levels, and in returning to the Theater in 422 Aristophanes
acknowledged that in Knights he had spoken too soon in doubting his
rival’s qualities as a poet.
Philocleon’s predilection for the old tragedians Thespis (1479) and Phrynichus (1490) sets him at
odds with the new generation (esp. 1480–1), much as Cratinus represents old comic poets in the
Knights parabasis. Cf. Vaio (1971) 346–7; Slater (2002) 108–9.
129
MacCary (1979) 138; and for the general form Gelzer (1960) 80–3.
130
Fr. 360; see above n. 14.
131
See MacDowell (1971) and Sommerstein (1983) ad loc.; cf. Zimmermann (1985) vol. 2, 83. For the
choreography of the exodos, see Vaio (1971) 349–51.
128
Ch apter 5
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
The curious production history of Clouds claimed scholarly attention
already at the library in Alexandria. From an ancient hypothesis, we learn
that the play failed miserably at its first performance at the Dionysia of 423.1
Dismayed at this reverse, the same source reports, and convinced that his
audience had failed to appreciate the play’s merits, Aristophanes undertook
a revision in the hope of allowing them to correct their error. The play we
have is the revised version, and in its parabasis Aristophanes comments on
the circumstances that necessitated a second effort.2 Modern scholars have
been eager to determine the nature, date and extent of Aristophanes’ revisions for what they can tell us about the original play, only a few fragments
of which survive.3 Our clearest insight into these problems is provided by
another hypothesis (Hyp. I), which describes the second Clouds as “the
same as the former” (τοῦτο ταὐτóν ἐστι τῷ προτέρῳ),4 but then goes on
to describe changes affecting nearly every part of the play (καθóλου μὲν
οὖν σχεδὸν παρὰ πᾶν μέρος γεγενημένη <ἡ> διóρθωσις), with some passages (parabasis, agon of the Arguments, finale) identified as entirely new
to the revised play. While these considerations will affect the discussion at
some points, by and large this study will concern itself with the original
Hyp. II (hypotheses cited from Dover throughout). A third place is generally assumed on the basis
of the ancient hypothesis, though Luppe (1972) 53–75, argues for more than three comic poets at
the dramatic festivals, based on the number of comedies produced during the Peloponnesian War
years. For the possible relevance of Nu. Hyp. II to this argument, see Luppe (2000b).
2
The two versions are discussed in detail by Dover (1968) lxxx–xcviii. The denial of any biographical reality within parabases by Major (2006), esp. 142–3 (cf. McGlew (2004) 23), is hardly demonstrated by his test example, since Aristophanes’ dismay€– hyperbolically expressed, I concede€– at
the failure of the first Clouds in the revised parabasis and the parabasis of Wasps are confirmed by
the poet’s real decision to redeem the play by a second performance.
3
Frr. 392–401, amounting to barely five verses; references within the play date the revision to 419–
417 bc. See Kopff (1990); Storey (1993a); Henderson (1993b).
4
Although this remark presumably extends beyond matters of title and general theme, it is only
intended to connect the latter play with the former as a revision and is no basis for rejecting his
characterization of the relationship between the two in his more detailed comments.
1
167
168
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
Clouds only to the extent necessary to understand the circumstances of the
revision. Nor do I assume that our Clouds necessarily bears much resemblance to its predecessor.5 Rather, I approach the surviving play on the
assumption that it represents a literary unity€– or, to be more accurate,
that it was on its way toward literary unity, for the first Hypothesis also
tells us that the revision was left incomplete.6 Numerous elements of the
original Clouds are undoubtedly preserved in our play. But that should not
keep us from believing that they have been carefully adapted, rearranged,
and joined to new material, in the manner summarily described by this
hypothesis, to produce a play with its own integrity.
Emphasizing how the surviving Clouds distinguishes itself from the original helps characterize the play as an agōnisma of a special kind, in that
the competitive poetics of the revision focus on recontesting the original
outcome. That idea is raised first in the parabasis, which openly announces
itself as part of the second play, and becomes a point of departure for a
more general interpretation, as the framework of recontestation is articulated through the play’s overall thematic movement. This understanding of the revised Clouds’ agonistic positioning has implications for how
we resolve another problem in the history and interpretation of the play,
which was never performed at a major Athenian festival. Thanks to a blunder by Callimachus, who criticized the didaskaliai when he mistook the
entry for the original Clouds as referring to the surviving comedy, we have
Eratosthenes’ testimony that only a single didaskalic entry for the play
existed.7 The revised Clouds thus posed a challenge for classification, and
Callimachus’ search for it in the contest records, however clumsily carried
out, reflects an attempt to regularize its history.8 But while Callimachus’
Overall similarity between the two versions is defended by, among others, Reckford (1987) 394;
Storey (1993b) 78–81; Sommerstein (1997a) 280–1. The opposite view is taken by Russo (1994)
97–109; Tarrant (1991); cf. Casanova (2000a) 21–2, (2000b) 373 with further bibliography.
╇ 6
The hypothesis’ wording is, διεσκεύασται δὲ ἐπὶ μέρους¸ ὡς ἂν δὴ ἀναδιδάξαι μὲν αὐτὸ τοῦ ποιητοῦ
προθυμηθέντος¸ οὐκέτι δὲ τοῦτο δι᾽ ἥνποτε αἰτίαν ποιήσαντος. Although Dover (1968) lxxxii–
lxxxiii, understands ἐπὶ μέρους to mean “in details,” the logic of the sentence seems to demand “it
has been revised in part” (i.e., incompletely), since only this understanding could serve as a basis
for the author’s inference that the revised play was never performed, given that no didaskalic evidence (see below) is adduced at any point in the discussion. Be that as it may, the internal evidence
for the revision’s incomplete state proves the point, as Dover (1968), esp. xciv–viii, makes clear.
Fabrini (1975) nonetheless argues that the play can be performed as transmitted.
╇ 7
Σâ•›E Nu. 553:€ Clouds appeared two years before Eupolis’ Marikas in the didaskaliai, which
Callimachus took to be impossible, since Eupolis’ play is referred to at Nu. 553.
╇ 8
Hyp. II goes further by creating a production history for the revised play in the archonship of
Ameinias, when it supposedly fared even worse; see Casanova (2000a) 22–3 for an attempt to
explain this evidence. As will be seen, I am not persuaded by Dover’s explanation ((1968) xcviii;
cf. Wilamowitz (1921) 170, Boruchowitsch (1973), Hubbard (1991) 53 n. 34.) that Aristophanes
intended the revision for a reading audience. A sophisticated reading audience would presumably have been the group most likely to admire Clouds in its original form, at least according to
╇ 5
Revision as recontestation
169
effort was fruitless, his intuition was on the mark. The indications of the
text imply that a dramatic instantiation in the Theater of Dionysos was
envisioned,9 with the revisions geared toward the normal conditions of
festival agonistics.
R e v i s ion a s r e c on t e s tat ion
The failure of the original Clouds and its subsequent revision raises an
important consideration for Greek literature in general. Within a literary
culture highly dependent on performance, where textuality per se may have
had only limited significance, it is hard to imagine how revision operated,
at least in the sense in which we are accustomed to think of it. For epic,
the importance of the oral tradition allows us to hypothesize generations
of poetic adaptations, as well as changes during repeat performances by
an individual poet, as he recognized unexploited features in his material
or gained greater mastery over technical aspects of his craft. In effect, each
performance was a revision of inherited material, although not necessarily in an overt sense. On the contrary, the notion of Muse-inspired poetry
suppresses this aspect of a poem’s “history,” by allowing the poet to present his song as always new and freshly composed.10 Thus the performance
culture that lay at the heart of early Greek literature, both in the formation
and perhaps the later transmission of a poetic tradition,11 itself granted
this literature a degree of fluidity that prevented the idea of revision from
taking on any distinct and significant meaning. What circumstances of
poetic performance, then, allowed a firmer notion of revision to come into
being? Some indication is available in what is perhaps the earliest and most
notorious example in Greek literature.12
Aristophanes’ presentation of the matter. Harris (1989) 114, puts the level of literacy in Athens
during the fifth century at 5–10%. The figures are speculative, and Thomas (1989) 19–24 is right to
emphasize various kinds of literacy; but in any case a reading audience probably represented the
smallest segment of the population. See Slater (1996) for the representation of literacy in comedy.
Dover’s comments are the starting point for Rosen’s (1997) discussion of the Clouds parabasis as
overtly self-conscious of its textuality following the initial performance.
╇ 9
Russo (1994) 105. I am in general agreement with Revermann (2006a) 326–32, though we concentrate on different points.
10
For Homer’s tendency to elide any impression of a tradition by invoking the Muses, see Ford
(1992) 90–2; and especially Scodel (1996).
11
Herington (1985) 48–50, speculates that reperformance played an important role in the transmission of poetry well into the fifth century; cf. Nagy (2003). Recent work on Pindar emphasizes
reperformance contexts in the transmission of his poetry:€Currie (2004); Hubbard (2004).
12
Hesiod’s announcement at Op. 11–12 that there are two forms of Eris modifies his pronouncement at Th. 225–32; to this extent it is a form of revision and conforms to several points considered
in what follows, but is left out of account here because it is not aimed at reformulating the earlier
poem. See Scodel (1996) 72–9.
170
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
The tradition associated with Stesichorus tells us that when he treated
Helen scathingly in a song, she had her revenge by blinding him. To counteract this punishment, Stesichorus created a new version of his Helen,
which came to be known as the Palinode. In this poem he rejected his earlier traditional treatment of the myth and advanced in its place the idea that
only a likeness of Helen left Sparta, leaving the honor of the actual Helen
intact.13 Having reconciled himself to the goddess in this way, Stesichorus
regained his sight.14 Some of this biography may depend on fanciful interpretations, but the chances are good that it stems from direct knowledge
of Stesichorus’ poetry, since the tradition was firmly established by the
late fifth or early fourth century and well known, to judge from the way
Socrates refers to it (Pl. Phdr. 243b τὴν καλουμένην Παλινῳδίαν).15 At the
very least, therefore, the account provides insight into how Athenians in
the classical period could make sense of the literary situation in which
Stesichorus supposedly found himself.
The account assumes that Stesichorus’ first treatment of the myth was
viewed as an established poem that retained its essential form, content,
and meaning after the original performance. Thus what happened was not
simply a matter of bringing out the same poem with undisclosed adjustments made to compensate for dissatisfaction with an earlier version, but
a self-conscious and fully announced revision. We are free to speculate
about the textual status the original Helen attained through writing; but
how such revision operated in a performance culture is suggested by Plato’s
brief quotation from the Palinode (Stesich. PMG 192):
οὐκ ἔστ̓ ἔτυμος λóγος οὗτος¸
οὐδ̓ ἔβας ἐν νηυσὶν εὐσέλμοις¸
οὐδ̓ ἵκεο πέργαμα Τροίας.
Though Bassi (1993) argues that the Palinode offered a similarly negative assessment of Helen.
This basic outline is recoverable from the references to Stesichorus at Pl. Phdr. 243a–b and Isoc.
Hel. 64. Stesichorus’ recourse to the eid ōlon is treated in a Hellenistic commentary on the poems
(POxy. 2506 fr. 26 col. 1 = PMG 193; cf. Pl. R. 586c; Aristid. Or. 45.54), where note the emphasis
on Stesichorus’ novel adaptation:€οὕτως δὴ ἐκαινοποίησε τὰς ἱστορίας. The same scholion identifies two separate Palinodes based on Chamaeleon’s knowledge of two different openings:€see
Bowra (1963); Gentili (1988) 274–5; Hutchinson (2001) 116–17. It seems to me that duplication of
Palinodes may have resulted from taking the original for a revised poem (see Bowra (1963) 248, for
the abundant attestations for a single Palinode), since they probably took their title from Helen’s
name (the first so called at Ath. 3.81d; see PMG 187–9); cf. Podlecki (1971) 324–5, for a similar explanation, and 326, for the likelihood of similar titles. Socrates’ phrasing τὴν καλουμένην
Παλινῳδίαν sounds like an epithet used to distinguish the poems, like those commonly used to
distinguish tragic titles (Butrica (2001) 56–7).
15
Bassi (1993) 59, raises doubts about the validity of the tradition; but most scholars assume that the
main points of the account go back to Stesichorus.
13
14
Revision as recontestation
171
That account is not true;
you did not board the well-benched ships,
you did not reach the citadel of Troy.
In these verses Stesichorus summarily reperforms the earlier poem to
establish the point of departure for his fresh path.16 Once alerted to his
attempt at revision, the audience is expected to assent to the version presented in the new poem instead of the Helen with which they are assumed
to be familiar.17 Stesichorus apparently could not ignore the form in which
the poem had been established at its first performance. But he aimed, as
the name attributed to the revision suggests, to re-sing that poem in the
hope not just of substituting a different mythological account, but of turning the experience of the performance (viewed as a continuity between
earlier and later versions) toward a reverse outcome that would lead to the
restoration of his vision.18 Much more is at stake than the content of the
two poems.
The most striking and memorable detail of the story is the matter of
Stesichorus’ blinding and miraculous recovery.19 Although some readers
have been inclined to treat this as a real part of the poet’s medical history, more likely his elaborate narrative is a figurative representation of the
audience’s response to his original poem.20 On this reading, by announcing the revisionary purpose of his Palinode, Stesichorus assures his audience that he will improve upon his original poem to gain their approval
now. It is conceivable that he introduced the tale of his recovery into the
poem as a way of determining that outcome; but his true healing would be
accomplished only when his new Helen got a favorable response from the
Cf. Bowra (1961) 112, and esp. (1963) 246, on the force of αὖτε in the first line quoted in PMG
193.9–10; this interpretation is supported by the analysis of the deictic adjective by Beecroft
(2006) 51–2.
17
Thus Scodel (1996) 62:€ “[W]hen a speaker corrects what he has said before, on another
Â�occasion,€… there must be a previous relationship with the audience, since they must understand
what is being corrected.”
18
Isocrates’ phrase ἀρχóμενος τῆς ᾠδῆς for the original offense can thus be understood either as
the summary reperformance in the Palinode or from the perspective of the Palinode as a return
to or continuation of the original performance. Note the emphatic connection Isocrates makes
between the re-singing and the restoration of his sight:€ τὴν καλουμένην παλινῳδίαν ἐποίησε¸
πάλιν αὐτὸν εἰς τὴν αὐτὴν φύσιν κατέστησεν.
19
See Sider (1989) 423, who favors a dramatic presentation of the blindness and recovery within
a single poem. But Isocrates Hel. 64 seems to envision a clear sequence of two poems with the
blinding falling in between.
20
Cf. Bowra (1934) 116; (1961) 111; Davison (1968) 207; Gentili (1988) 126; Griffith (1990) 199. The
interests of a specific (regional) audience might find support in the belief of Nagy (1990b) 421–3,
that Stesichorus represents local rather than Panhellenic traditions; cf. Beecroft (2006). Bowra
(1934) and Burkert (1987a) 51, argue for a Spartan audience.
16
172
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
audience. Thus, although a poem got him into trouble and a poem would
get him out of it, Stesichorus’ final objective was to erase the public memory of his disgrace.21
We do not know what setting or settings Stesichorus’ poetry was composed for. His epic themes and language, and the length of the poems,
suggest formal occasions such as religious festivals. That conclusion might
also explain the sense of public humiliation configured in religious terms
to which he appears to respond. Because Stesichorus was active during
the period when such festivals were being established throughout much of
the Greek world, we can probably assume that he was no stranger to the
poetic competitions that were increasingly included in festival programs.22
Indeed, the latter consideration might provide a clue to Stesichorus’ choice
of malady, since comparison to Thamyris, the archaic paradigm of a
competitive poet, seems inescapable.23 Still, even if some agonistic posturing can be detected in Stesichorus’ account through its relation to the
Thamyris tradition, he made a critical adaptation,24 by suggesting a remedy for poetic blindness through an act of poetic revision that returns him
to the good graces of the deity and, we may gather, his audience.
Although the preceding conclusions can be no more than tentative,
adducing the poetic agon as a contributing factor to the formation of a
full-fledged notion of revision is supported by both general and specific
considerations. On the general level, a public gathering allowed for a community-wide response at an event that promoted the sense of a poem taking a definitive form, produced for a particular place and time. Moreover,
the formal decision as to the relative merits of the performances, even
when not accompanied by a strong feeling of communal disapprobation
Thus Socrates prides himself at going beyond Stesichorus in offering his own palinode before he is
punished:€γυμνῇ τῇ κεφαλῇ καὶ οὐχ ὥσπερ τóτε ὑπ᾽ αἰσχύνης ἐγκεκαλυμμένος (Pl. Phdr. 243b).
22
The suitability of Stesichorus’ poetry to performance at festival contests is unaffected by the question of whether it was choral or monodic, on which see West (1971) 307–9; D’Alfonso (1994)
63–78. Herington (1985) 17–20, assumes that Stesichorus belongs to a tradition of agonistic festival performances in kitharody; cf. Herodotus’ (1.23–4) description of Arion’s tour of Italy and
Sicily to accumulate wealth (i.e., prizes) in Periander’s time. If there is anything to the theory of
Bowra (1934) about a Spartan connection, the Karneia is a possible context.
23
Il. 2.594–600 is less clear on the punishment, making Thamyris πηρóς, “maimed” (perhaps of
sight) or “dumb”; but the tradition of his blinding was already known to Hesiod (fr. 65). The
Muses’ mixed gift of song together with blindness (of Demodocus at Od. 8.62–4) may depend on
a shared idea, but is developed differently; cf. Woodbury (1967) 172–4; Thalmann (1984) 133; Bassi
(1993) 54 n. 6. That Helen deprives Stesichorus of his sight is no impediment since, alongside favor
by the Muses, victory in the agon coincides with the favor shown by the deity honored at the festival:€hHom. 6.19–20 (Aphrodite); Ar. Ra. 385a–93 (Demeter).
24
This is the point Socrates emphasizes:€ ἔστιν δὲ τοῖς ἁμαρτάνουσι περὶ μυθολογίαν καθαρμὸς
ἀρχαῖος¸ ὃν ῞Ομηρος μὲν οὐκ ᾔσθετο¸ Στησίχορος δέ (Pl. Phdr. 243a).
21
Revision as recontestation
173
(as Stesichorus’ account implies for his case), must have left a defeated
poet in no doubt as to the shortcomings of his work in the form in which
he had presented it. More specific support is available in the fact that the
phenomenon of revision became prevalent in later competitions, in particular through restagings at the dramatic festivals in Athens.
In the case of Athenian drama, we must distinguish between the
two forms second performances took at the major festivals. On the one
hand, tradition has it that Aeschylus’ plays were restaged already in the
fifth century, although only after his death (Life of Aeschylus = test. 1.12
Radt; cf. test. 72–7). A similar but more restricted privilege was granted
to Aristophanes with the reperformance of Frogs (Hyp. 1c Dover) not long
after its original Lenaian victory in 405. Although I have doubts about
the Aeschylus tradition,25 it is clear in these instances that reperformance
represented a public honor predicated on the popularity and success of the
poet or play(s) in the original contests, so that the agon provided a mechanism for canonization.26 That treatment contrasted sharply with the other
paradigm for reperformance, when a poet resubmitted to the agon a play
that was originally defeated, in the hope of obtaining a better verdict.27 In
this case revision is tantamount to recontestation; it acknowledges defeat
and perhaps embarrassment, but attempts, as in Stesichorus’ case, to confront that stigma and achieve a happier outcome. We can probably assume
that instances in which a poet felt his play had not been as well received as
it deserved were as numerous as the number of poets who failed to take the
prize each year.28 Thus the decision actually to revise a play within a competitive framework required that a poet have a peculiar attachment to the
theme or substance of his play, since he must otherwise have stood a better
chance by making a fresh start.29 Because the privilege of reperformance
Biles (2006–2007).
Though ancient sources provided vastly different figures (70–90) for the number of plays
Aeschylus produced, with 13 victories his rate of success (between 58% and 74%, assuming that
four plays were performed per festival) was extraordinary. In the fourth century the restaging
of old plays was formally institutionalized within the festival program for comedy and tragedy,
but as a separate category and probably not (at least initially) in competitive format. Whether
the restagings of Aeschylus and Aristophanes were excluded from competition is less clear. See
Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 72, 86; Csapo and Slater (1994) 42; Revermann (2006a) 19–20, 72–4;
Nervegna (2007) 15–18.
27
Ancient discussions of revision by Galen (XV p. 424 Kühn) and Athenaeus (9.374a–b) rely exclusively on illustrations from Athenian drama; indeed, the source anecdote for Athenaeus clearly
recognized revision in the event of defeat as a common phenomenon in the Theater of Dionysos.
Cf. Revermann (2006a) 330–1.
28
D. 21.18 is perhaps indicative of many a defeated poet’s certainty that he deserved the prize.
29
Thus at Th. 847–8 Aristophanes imagines Euripides as so ashamed of the “frigidity” of his
Palamedes, which perhaps reflects the play’s failure in the competition (Ael. VH 2.8 = E. Palamedes
test. iia Kannicht; cf. Austin and Olson (2004) 847–8n.), that he prefers not to be reminded of it.
25
26
174
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
appears to have been a special honor in the fifth century, the normal
expectation and demand was probably for new plays at the major festivals,
meaning that a poet engaging in competitive revision was obliged on that
count alone to offer something substantially different.30
Several cases where comic poets revised their plays with an eye toward
another competition can be identified,31 but the most helpful example is
Euripides’ Hippolytus plays. The problem of the relation between these
plays was a source of much speculation among ancient scholars, who
sought connections between them and Euripides’ own domestic troubles.
Those imaginings aside, the basic framework of revision for an improved
agonistic outcome can be extracted from the ancient hypothesis, whose
author apparently had access to both plays and could speak of one as a
revision of the other.32 The notice assumes that the Hippolytus recorded in
didaskalic records for the year 428 was preceded by another Hippolytus play
whose entry in the records showed that it had failed to take the prize.33
In the case of tragedy, the standard recycling of mythical material
might imply that repeated treatments of the same theme do not mean
that a play was revised in a narrow sense.34 But Barrett observes in his discussion of the Hippolytus plays that it is rare for a tragedian to compose
As noted above, on a straightforward interpretation Nu. Hyp. I supports this approach with the
notice that “the revision has affected nearly every part of the play.” Antiph. fr. 189 could be taken
as a rationale for allowing comic poets (versus tragic poets) to get away with returning to the stage
with reworked plays.
31
Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 100–1; cf. Butrica (2001) 54–5. Telecleides’ apparent recontestation of
his Sterroi (thus ἀν[εδίδαξε in IG XIV 1098a = test. 5) earned him only third place; see Geissler
(1925) 15; Csapo and Slater (1994) 12–13. Butrica (2001) 62–70 argues for a relationship of recontestation in Aristophanes’ two Thesmophoriazusae plays, though see Austin and Olson (2004) lxxxviii–ix. Revision of a play rather than simply homonymous titles is suggested for Aristophanes’
Peace plays by the wording of Pax Hyp. II:€καὶ σποράδην δέ τινα ποιήματα παρατίθεται¸ ἅπερ ἐν
τῇ νῦν φερομένῃ οὐκ ἔστιν.
32
Thus διώρθωται in this account. Whether he identified the original correctly is a different question:€see Gibert (1997), esp. 92 n. 28, for the point made below; cf. Cropp (2005).
33
Ancient scholars distinguished between the two plays with the epithets καλυπτóμενος (Poll. 9.50;
Σâ•›KEAG Theocr. 2.10b/c Wendel = E. Hipp. A´ test. iv Kannicht) and στεφανίας (Hyp. 26–8 Barrett;
cf. Stob. 4.44.34); these have been explained as having to do with peculiarities of dramatic action
in the plays (Barrett (1964) 37; Roisman (1999)), but they may instead reflect the losing and so
“disgraced” original play and the “crowned” victorious revision. Note Socrates’ apparent implication that Stesichorus composed his Palinode ὑπ᾽ αἰσχύνης ἐγκεκαλυμμένος (Pl. Phdr. 243b).
On the dubious origins of the epithets in transmitted tragic titles, see Gibert (1997) 87–8. Why
Euripides chose to return to the same theme is impossible to say; he may have felt the disgrace
more acutely than on other occasions when he was defeated, or perhaps he thought this segment
of the myth had especially rich potential for his view of the tragic. But none of these possibilities
affect our interpretation of the evidence we have.
34
If titles originated with the poet (see Kaimio (2000); Sommerstein (2002)), the decision to retain
one could itself have major implications for how an audience anticipated and responded to the
second play.
30
Revision as recontestation
175
two plays on the same segment of a myth.35 For a tragic poet to return
to the same theme may thus have been tantamount to a revision of his
original attempt. To put these observations in a competitive framework,
tragic poets may have been inclined to revisit themes only if they had been
less than successful with the origial play;36 in effect, a poet could only
challenge his own achievement when he reworked a theme with which
he had already been successful in the contests.37 Thus the implication of
the ancient hypothesis that one Hippolytus stands in a direct relationship
to the other is not refuted by the partial summary of the lost play, which
points to a markedly different handling of the material.38 Revision may
very well take a strikingly new path, when it is understood as recontestation based on the model of a palinode like Stesichorus’ second departure on the theme of Helen. Euripides may not have composed his new
Hippolytus with the script of the other lying before him, but he must have
taken what he learned from the first performance and applied it to producing a new play on the theme. His initial failure will have given him
a range of considerations€– some perhaps quite specific€– to contemplate
and adjust for.39 With a general knowledge of a previous play in place,
he had at his disposal the potent device of intertextuality, which could
be utilized to highlight differences between versions with an eye toward
agonistic advantage;40 for whatever form this effort took, there can be no
doubt that in reattempting the myth on the tragic stage he set his sights
on winning the competition this time. Thus even in the absence of reliable evidence for Euripides’ methods and motivations for reworking the
theme, the Hippolytus plays (and other similar instances) can be treated as
critical revision in the sense of recontestation.
As will become evident in the discussion of Clouds that follows, recontestation was to the fore of Aristophanes’ mind as he revised the play for
a major dramatic festival. Unless he was certain of his ability to identify a
See Barrett (1964) 13, 10–45, for the evidence for the two plays; cf. Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 99.
In many cases where identical ancient titles are likely (e.g., Sophocles’ Oedipus and Philoctetes
plays), the plays treated different segments of the myth; see Sommerstein (2002) 3–4.
36
The greater frequency of repeat themes in Euripides thus goes along with his general lack of success in the Theater.
37
Understood in this way, the notion of competition carries with it the impulse toward creating a
definitive treatment of a theme on the tragic stage; hence Euripides’ perceived competition with
Aeschylus when he produced an Electra-play (El. 518–37, cf. A. Ch. 166–210).
38
Hutchinson (2004); Revermann (2006a) 75.
39
One thinks of the story that Euripides changed the first line of his Melanippe for a later performance in response to earlier cries of disapproval (Plu. Mor. 756b–c = E. fr. 480).
40
Hutchinson (2004) 22–3, 26–8, identifies a number of possible points of intertextuality between
the two Hippolytus plays before applying the concept to homonymous plays generally.
35
176
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
few specific problems in the original script or performance, he would have
been foolish to present the audience with much the same play as had failed
disastrously (by his own account) and expect to carry away the prize.41 In
contemplating a return to the Theater with Clouds, Aristophanes was very
much in Stesichorus’ position.
A r i s t oph a n e s’
c l o u d s -pa l i node
As often in the surviving comedies, the parabasis of the revised Clouds
provides an opportunity for Aristophanes to make daring claims about
himself and his poetry before the Athenians and their allies.42 Even in this
general way, the parabasis conforms with the general use of the form as
it had been developed for agonistic purposes in the Theater. Though one
ancient source (Hyp. I; cf. Σ↜ENMRs Nu. 520) informs us that this part of
the play belongs to the revision, we hardly need this prompting, since the
matter of the play’s performance history is central to the discussion (Nu.
518–35):
ὦ θεώμενοι¸ κατερῶ πρὸς ὑμᾶς ἐλευθέρως
τἀληθῆ¸ νὴ τὸν Διóνυσον τὸν ἐκθρέψαντά με.
οὕτω νικήσαιμί τ̓ ἐγὼ καὶ νομιζοίμην σοφὸς
ὡς ὑμᾶς ἡγούμενος εἶναι θεατὰς δεξιοὺς
καὶ ταύτην σοφώτατ̓ ἔχειν τῶν ἐμῶν κωμῳδιῶν
πρώτους ἠξίωσ̓ ἀναγεῦσ̓ ὑμᾶς¸ ἣ παρέσχε μοι
ἔργον πλεĩστον εἶτ᾽ ἀνεχώρουν ὑπ᾽ ἀνδρῶν φορτικῶν
ἡττηθεὶς οὐκ ἄξιος ὤν. ταῦτ᾽ οὖν ὑμĩν μέμφομαι
τοĩς σοφοĩς¸ ὧν οὕνεκ̓ ἐγὼ ταῦτ̓ ἐπραγματευóμην.
ἀλλ̓ οὐδ̓ ὣς ὑμῶν ποθ̓ ἑκὼν προδώσω τοὺς δεξιούς.
ἐξ ὅτου γὰρ ἐνθάδ̓ ὑπ᾽ ἀνδρῶν¸ οὓς ἡδὺ καὶ λέγειν¸
ὁ σώφρων τε χὠ καταπύγων ἄριστ̓ ἠκουσάτην¸
κἀγώ¸ παρθένος γὰρ ἔτ̓ ἦν κοὐκ ἐξῆν πώ μοι τεκεĩν¸ ἐξέθηκα¸ παĩς δ̓ ἑτέρα τις λαβοῦσ᾽ ἀνείλετο¸
ὑμεĩς δ̓ ἐξεθρέψατε γενναίως κἀπαιδεύσατε¸
ἐκ τούτου μοι πιστὰ παρ᾽ ὑμῶν γνώμης ἔσθ᾽ ὅρκια.
νῦν οὖν ᾽Ηλέκτραν κατ᾽ ἐκείνην ἥδ᾽ ἡ κωμῳδία
ζητοῦσ᾽ ἦλθ᾽¸ ἤν που ᾽πιτύχῃ θεαταĩς οὕτω σοφοĩς.
520
525
530
535
That the revised play was never performed is immaterial, since Aristophanes will have recognized
from the start what he was up against. Even if we suppose that he undertook the revisions for a
performance at another venue such as the Rural Dionysia, this too will have meant recontestation; IG II2 3090 points to the agonistic format and suggests that Sophocles and Aristophanes
participated as directors (hence ἐδίδασκεν). Cf. Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 47–8; Csapo (2004)
59–60.
42
When I speak of the revised play in performance in what follows, I do so merely for convenience’s
sake.
41
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
177
Spectators, I will speak the truth to you frankly,
by Dionysos the god who made me what I am.
As I hope to win and be deemed wise,
I believed that you were a clever audience
and that of all my comedies this one has the most
â•… sophisticated humor;
thus I thought you deserved the first taste of it, a play that
cost me much effort. But I retreated, undeservedly defeated
by vulgar men. This is my complaint, therefore, against you
the wise, for whose sake I expended all these efforts.
But even so, I will never willingly betray
the intelligent among your ranks.
For from the time when, in this very place and from men it is
â•… sweet even to mention,
my virtuous and perverted boys received the highest acclaim
– but since I was still a maiden and could not give birth,
I exposed it, and another girl took it up for herself,
while you nourished it nobly and reared it€–
from that time I have had sworn pledges of good taste from you.
So now the present comedy has come, like the well-known Electra
searching to find, perhaps, spectators who are similarly wise.
This passage purports to summarize the unfortunate outcome of the
original production. Aristophanes wastes no time in blaming the audience
for this outcome and presents the current revision almost as a necessity, due
to his unwillingness to let them miss out on such rare entertainment. The
mode of self-assertion throughout this passage is familiar, but an important difference is immediately felt. The chorus do not come as an emissary
of the poet, who is referred to in the third person. Instead, Aristophanes
has cast his chorus as himself, so that their claims come as though from
the poet’s own mouth.43 Although this happens occasionally in other
plays,44 only here does the chorus drop their dramatic persona to assume
Aristophanes’ voice for the entire “anapestic” section.45 Given my suggestion in Chapter 1 that a connection exists between poetic Â�self-assertion in
References in the first person occur at 518, 519, 520, 522, 523, 524, 525, 526, 527, 530, 531, 533.
The chorus speak as Aristophanes in the first person also in the antepirrhema of the second parabasis of Wasps (1284–91), and switch from third to first person midway through the parabases
of Acharnians (659–64) and Peace (754–74); cf. Hubbard (1991) 149. Unlike in Clouds, however,
these changes to the first person occur at the moment Cleon becomes the target of Aristophanes’
invective and thus serve to intensify the poet’s polemical opposition to the demagogue. The same
is true at the points where Dikaiopolis speaks as Aristophanes in the first person (Ach. 377–82,
501–2).
45
These are eupolideans, which may be significant for interpreting the criticism of Eupolis at
553–5:€Perusino (1986) 18–19; Fisher (1984) 156–7; Storey (2003b) 388; Kyriakidi (2007) 149–50.
43
44
178
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
the parabasis and the conventions of self-assertion in agonistic displays,
the full realization of the poet’s authorial presence in the revised parabasis
may be evidence that on this occasion he planned to step up his usual
level of personal competitive engagement. Certainly this impersonation
enhances the tone of authorial presence and suits Aristophanes’ intent,
proclaimed in the opening couplet, to offer plain comments to the audience.46 Whatever remarks follow, the audience is to take them as a personal confrontation with the poet.
To lend force to his denunciatory zeal, Aristophanes follows the usual
practice of supplying an oath:€“by Dionysos, who brought me up” (519). As
often, the choice of deity has implications for the speaker’s character and
emphasizes the immediate context.47 Here Aristophanes’ invocation of the
god of the Theater draws attention to the festival context, where Dionysos’
presence was required and his priest occupied a prominent seat at the
front of the Theater.48 The poet’s ability to depend on Dionysos is given
a personal explanation through the striking claim that he was brought
up by the god. It thus emerges clearly from the opening remarks that in
the parabasis Aristophanes aimed at portraying himself as a dramatic poet
according to the norms of festival celebration. Throughout the passage,
in fact, the theatrical context is never allowed to recede from the foreground. The opening words address the audience as visual witnesses to the
play (518 ὦ θεώμενοι), and thereafter their role as spectators is repeatedly
alluded to either directly (521, 535) or by implication (525–6, 532–3).49 Nor
are these references limited to the intended performance of the revised
play; the original performance of 423 (523–5) and that of Banqueters in
427 (528–33) figure prominently as well. Mention of the audience’s loving
nurturing of Aristophanes’ first play (532 ἐξεθρέψατε) recalls Aristophanes’
own upbringing by the god of the Theater (519 ἐκθρέψαντα), so that a
theme of theatrical performance unites the discussion of the three plays
κατερῶ, especially in combination with τἀληθῆ, is emphatic, communicating a declaration
or even a denunciation; see LSJ s.v. κατερέω, which cites this passage for the definition “to tell
plainly.”
47
Thus he also swears by Dionysos in support of Clouds at V. 1046–7.
48
See Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 268, and for the location of the cult-statue in the Theater, Csapo
and Slater (1994) 105; cf. Eq. 536; Ra. 297. At Delos a statue of Dionysos (4th c.) was enthroned at
the front of the Theater; cf. Cole (1993) 31 n. 48. The prominence granted Zeus as the deity named
first in the parabasis odes (563–5) is matched by that of Dionysos as the last-named (603–6).
49
Revermann (2006a) 327, concedes that these might simply be conventions that Aristophanes
abided by even when composing for a reading audience. In that case, the poet would be highly
formulaic in his approach to composition, although we might expect a difference in audiences
to be among the points to which he was most sensitive and ready to respond, humorously or
otherwise.
46
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
179
and suggests a continuity in the poet’s professional activity as he appears
before the audience now. In 528, moreover, ἐνθάδε (“here”) implies continuity of physical space for the performances of Banqueters and the revised
Clouds in the Theater of Dionysos.50 That emphasis goes along with the
rhetorical assumption, which lies at the heart of Aristophanes’ criticism,
that the audience of the present play is the same as the one that witnessed
the original Clouds and Banqueters.51 Thus it returns in the familiar guise
of Electra to the place where everything began (534–5), hoping to find a
more receptive audience (535 ἤν που ᾽πιτύχῃ θεαταĩς).52
The point of establishing this theatrical pedigree is, as always, to urge
the audience to support the revised Clouds. In the case of each play referred
to, the poet’s competitive interests make a critical contribution to his discussion. His account of the production history of the original Clouds in
521–5 ends by registering his consternation at the defeat he suffered at the
hands of worthless competitors (524 ἀνδρῶν φορτικῶν).53 It is this very
mishap (implied by οὐκ ἄξιος ὤν, 525) he hopes to correct by invoking the
example of Banqueters, his first comedy. Here, by contrast, the audience
displayed good taste in supporting his play (532) and helping it make a
respectable showing (529 ἄριστ᾽ ἠκουσάτην). But in this case Aristophanes
has misrepresented his play’s production history somewhat, for a scholion on 529 reports that Banqueters only took second place. As others have
observed, the educational theme shared by Clouds and Banqueters perhaps
motivated Aristophanes to refer to the earlier play here.54 But this does not
For ἐνθάδε meaning “in the Theater,” see Dover (1968) ad loc. The suggestion of Halliwell (1980)
42–3, and MacDowell (1982) 23, that a reference to a small group of private supporters before the
festival is intended in 528–9 is unconvincing, since although both scholars argue for a temporal
sequence in the three events described in 528–32, there are no temporal markers in the text. (For
the use of such markers for linked events, e.g., Nu. 524, 553, 557, 558.) It is more natural to understand 530–2 as interjected details for the event described in 528–9 (cf. E. Med. 935–7; Lys. 2.5)
with the resulting delay necessitating the strongly resumptive ἐκ τούτου (533). An explanation
for the details is at hand:€since Aristophanes did not produce Banqueters himself, he may have
felt it worth reminding the audience that his theatrical service to Athens began well before his
own request for a chorus (as also at V. 1018–22). A reference to an exclusive and anonymous group
could only have confused the audience and leaves the crucial point of reception in the Theater
(see below) to be established by the lively but imprecise metaphor of 532. Cf. Perusino (1986)
54–5.
51
Cf. Olson (1994) 34 n. 10. A similar tendency to address past and present gatherings as one and
the same can be observed in oratory (e.g., Th. 2.61.1–2; D. 21.18); cf. Sommerstein (1998) 48–9.
52
Newiger (1961) believes that the reference implies a recent restaging of Aeschylus’ play.
53
Following the suggestion of ΣRENA Nu. 524c, Perusino (1986) 54 n. 57, questions whether the men
referred to here are the audience or judges. But they can scarcely be anyone other than the competitors, who are the only ones who can really be described as defeating Aristophanes; see below.
For Aristophanes’ use of the term to refer to rival poets, see Sommerstein (1990) 1218n.
54
Newiger (1961) 423; Hubbard (1991) 92–3, with bibliography.
50
180
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
entirely explain why he presented the performance in a more favorable
light than the facts warranted. Some interpretive burden can be assumed
to rest on the claim of agonistic success, and Aristophanes’ point can be
appreciated by considering the end toward which the discussion is carried. The audience’s assessment of his first play provided him with sure
tokens of their fine judgment (533 πιστὰ γνώμης ὅρκια), and he hopes to
find these same tokens in their possession again, at the moment of Clouds’
second production (534–5). On the one hand, his distortion of the contest
outcome encourages the audience to throw their support behind a play
whose general theme they are allowed to think they favored at a previous
contest. But the temporal expression ἐξ ὅτου … ἐκ τούτου (528, 533) is not
restricted to a single moment; rather, it establishes an initial point in a
longer period of time, during which Aristophanes could consistently rely
on the audience’s gnōmai. Although no explanation will get us past the
playful dishonesty of implying victory where there was none, the poet’s
more modest second place with Banqueters lays the groundwork for the
string of successes that followed, in all likelihood already with Babylonians
and certainly with Acharnians and Knights.55 In this respect the discussion
in the revised Clouds is consistent with Aristophanes’ more ample review
of his career in Wasps (1018–47), where Clouds likewise stood out as a stunning reverse at the end of a period in which he was appreciated for his
dedication to public service. Here in the revised parabasis he strives to present himself as someone who has been a continuous favorite in the Theater
from the moment of his first performance.
Taking this maneuver as part of an agonistic strategy makes sense in
light of how the concerns expressed in the parabasis about theater production and audience reception serve the interest of a victory with the
revised Clouds. In the opening lines of the parabasis, Aristophanes proclaims a wish “to gain a victory and be considered wise” (520). Through
this unequivocal announcement of his intent to recontest the play’s reception, Aristophanes’ identity as a competitive poet is placed squarely before
the audience. The constraints of this identity prompt his confession that
any claim he has to sophia depends on the outcome of the envisioned contest. This is a remarkable comment, the implications of which are easily
missed. Whereas it would be reasonable for any poet to claim sophia as a
traditional attribute of his craft,56 Aristophanes casts himself in an agon
Cf. Hackforth (1938) 6 n. 2; Newiger (1961) 424. For the evidence for a victory with Babylonians at
the City Dionysia of 426, see above, pp. 82–3.
56
Aristophanes’ claim at Ach. 629 to be dexios should be understood in this light. For the varieties of
sophia at stake in poetic claims, see Griffith (1990) 188–90.
55
Aristophanes and the new rivals of the 410s
181
for this title. In defining his relationship with sophia so ambiguously as it
depends on contest outcomes, he shares something with the competing
Arguments of the agon (955–8) and with Aeschylus and Euripides in Frogs
(882–4). The overall logic of the parabasis spells this out more completely,
by suggesting that the exceptional sophia latent in a play like Clouds (522)
requires an audience of the same quality (521, 526–7, 535), in order that
their judgment (533) can bestow this title on the poet (520). The machinery of the agon is such that play and, in the last instance, poet only gain
full recognition of their exceptional merit at the moment the audience
gives its support toward victory in the contest.57 When treated as a quality
that depends on an agonistic outcome, poetic sophia is transient and can
no longer be taken for granted as a gift of the Muses, but must instead
be reestablished at each festival competition. Of course, by remarking
on these points in the first place and especially in connection with the
defeat of the original Clouds, Aristophanes casts himself as having lost
sophia. The terms have been exchanged, in other words, but the sense in
which his poetic credentials have been undermined by his earlier performance has much in common with the predicament in which Stesichorus
found himself. Nonetheless, as we might also surmise in Stesichorus’ case,
Aristophanes’ willingness to resubmit a revised play to the rigors of festival
competition can itself be taken to reflect confidence in agonistic performance as a mechanism for determining literary excellence.
A r i s t oph a n e s a n d t h e n e w r i va l s of t h e 4 10 s
With its rhetorical emphasis firmly directed toward poetic victory, the discussion of the three plays in the revised parabasis offers blunt testimony
for a literary culture defined by the competitive interests of immediate
production. The same considerations can be detected in Aristophanes’
treatment of his competitors. Because so much energy is directed toward
conjuring up the poet’s bitter resentment over the reception of the original
play, it comes as a surprise that we hear nothing specific about the rival
poets who defeated Clouds. No mention is made of them by name, and
Aristophanes drops the subject after branding them with a conventional
term of loathing (524 φορτικῶν).58 Later in the parabasis, however, when he
speaks about the poetic virtues that distinguish him from his competitors,
For Aristophanes’ treatment of audience and judges, see below.
For reasons that will become clear below, I do not accept the theory of Sidwell (1995) 66–8, that
the parabasis is ventriloquial comedy impersonating Cratinus.
57
58
182
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
he mentions several of them by name. This identification of specific targets
goes hand-in-hand with an escalation in the vigor of the literary insult
(Nu. 545–59):
κἀγὼ μὲν τοιοῦτος ἀνὴρ ὢν ποητὴς οὐ κομῶ¸
οὐδ᾽ ὑμᾶς ζητῶ ᾽ξαπατᾶν δὶς καὶ τρὶς ταὔτ᾽ εἰσάγων¸
ἀλλ᾽ αἰεὶ καινὰς ἰδέας εἰσφέρων σοφίζομαι
οὐδὲν ἀλλήλαισιν ὁμοίας καὶ πάσας δεξιάς.
ὃς μέγιστον ὄντα Κλέων᾽ ἔπαισ᾽ εἰς τὴν γαστέρα
κοὐκ ἐτóλμησ᾽ αὖθις ἐπεμπηδῆσ᾽ αὐτῷ κειμένῳ. οὗτοι δ᾽¸ ὡς ἅπαξ παρέδωκεν λαβὴν Ὑπέρβολος¸
τοῦτον δείλαιον κολετρῶσ᾽ ἀεὶ καὶ τὴν μητέρα.
Εὔπολις μὲν τὸν Μαρικᾶν πρώτιστον παρείλκυσεν
ἐκστρέψας τοὺς ἡμετέρους Ἱππέας κακὸς κακῶς¸
προσθεὶς αὐτῷ γραῦν μεθύσην τοῦ κóρδακος οὕνεχ᾽¸ ἣν
Φρύνιχος πάλαι πεπóηχ᾽¸ ἣν τὸ κῆτος ἤσθιεν.
εἶθ᾽ ῞Ερμιππος αὖθις ἐποίησεν εἰς Ὑπέρβολον¸
ἅλλοι τ᾽ ἤδη πάντες ἐρείδουσιν εἰς Ὑπέρβολον¸
τὰς εἰκοὺς τῶν ἐγχέλεων τὰς ἐμὰς μιμούμενοι.
545
550
555
And despite being such a man, I don’t wear my hair long,
nor do I try to deceive you by twice or thrice producing
â•… the same things;
rather, I always think up ways to introduce new ideas,
utterly unlike one another and all of them clever.
It is I who punched Cleon in his belly at his height
but was not so crude as to leap on him again once he was down.
But these others, from the moment Hyperbolos gave them a hold,
they keep trampling the wretch over and over, along
â•… with his mother.
Eupolis started it when he brought out his Marikas,
making a travesty of our Knights€– the bastard!€–
and fixing a drunken hag to it, all because of the kordax;
Phrynichus created her long ago, the one a sea-monster tried to eat.
Then Hermippus in turn aimed his poetry at Hyperbolos,
and now all the others press hard on Hyperbolos,
in imitation of my eel similes.
Here again, Aristophanes’ posture is that of a poet whose reputation must
be proved in comparison with his rivals. He wishes his audience to appreciate the creativity and originality he claims is fundamental to his literary
principles. The nameless οὗτοι who represent the competition, by contrast,
are mere masters of repetition (551–2). When he comes to mentioning
poets by name, Eupolis turns out to have pillaged Aristophanes’ own literary achievement of attacking Cleon in Knights, and worse still, ruined it in
Aristophanes and the new rivals of the 410s
183
the process, by adding the stale comic routine of the kordax. Even that was
only stolen from a play by Phrynichus, in which the unfortunate routine
received its just literary deserts when the actor performing the dance was
threatened with destruction.59 After Eupolis, Hermippus and “the rest”€–
which would appear to include Plato, who produced Hyperbolos in the early
410s60€– kept recycling the same attack on Hyperbolos, consciously imitating the eel metaphor in Knights.61 In one sense, Aristophanes’ distinguishing claim of originality loses force through the fact that Clouds is a revised
play, which the audience is assumed to have seen performed before.62 In
any event, Aristophanes manages to present these considerations in a way
that still redounds to his credit. For the point developed most fully is that
all these poets have recognized his ingenuity and, far from producing
their own material, have shamelessly combined his own literary property
with trite borrowings from elsewhere and aimed the result at insignificant
targets.63 There is thus a certain comically self-serving logic available in
defense of restaging Clouds, in that other poets have demonstrated by their
own literary peculation that Aristophanes’ comedies are worth taking up
again. Indeed, from the picture offered here, in Aristophanes’ opinion the
comic stage was stagnating through the predictability of a mode of humor
he claims to have pioneered. The time was ripe for a new old play.
See Dover (1968) 556n., for the conative force of ἤσθιεν. On πάλαι with the perfect πεπóηκε,
Dover suggests that a play, once written, continues to circulate as a text; the idea may be instead
that a comic routine, once hit upon, is adopted by other poets, as Aristophanes’ discussion
goes to prove. Phrynichus is admittedly targeted for other reasons than pilfering of the demagogue theme, but he is clearly caught up in the ridicule and maligned by association (contrast
Sommerstein (1990) 439); Aristophanes makes it sound as if he belongs to the theatrical past,
when in fact his career began only a few years before Aristophanes’ and he had likely earned his
first Dionysian victory very recently:€cf. IG II2 2325.61, where he follows Aristophanes, Eupolis,
and Kantharos. His first Lenaian victory may have been as recent as 429 or 428:€IG II2 2325.124;
see Geissler (1925) 12; Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 112–13; Rusten (2006b).
60
See Geissler (1925) 49–50; K–A vol. 7.505; Casanova (1995) 108–9. Although Sommerstein (2000)
438–9 may be right to say that Aristophanes “downgrades” Plato’s importance, the fact that
Plato’s play took its title from the demagogue may have made the reference transparent and tantamount to a competitive slight (i.e., closer to the possibility Sommerstein proposes farther along
in his discussion).
61
Eq. 864–7. On the metaphor’s contribution to the play’s organizing theme of disruption, see
Newiger (1957) 27–30; Edmunds (1987).
62
Alternatively, these claims may imply that Aristophanes’ revision of the play was quite substantial, thus Casanova (2000a) 24. For the irony here, see Hubbard (1991) 103–5, and especially
Fisher (1984) 156, though Aristophanes’ self-ridicule is easily overemphasized, since references like
that to repeated attacks on Cleon and Hyperbolos concern in the first instance plays like Knights
and Marikas, in which they were a central theme. Topical and discrete ridicule of individuals, as
at Nu. 589–94, hardly belongs in the same category. Cf. Henderson (1990) 298.
63
Cf. Edwards (1990) 145–6. A similar charge of mining his plays is perhaps levelled against Eupolis
by Aristophanes in fr. 58:€cf. Storey (1990) 22; (1993) 74. The rivalry between Aristophanes and
Eupolis is discussed more extensively in Storey (2003b) 278–303; Kyriakidi (2007).
59
184
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
Were we less well-informed about the entries at the City Dionysia of
423, we might assume that Aristophanes’ competitors included the poets
named in this passage. In its remarkable specificity (including not just
names of poets but also titles of plays), insulting tenor, and sheer number of targets, this is among his most ambitious attacks on his rivals.64 If
we ask why Eupolis, Phrynichus, Hermippus and Plato are attacked so
mercilessly, while the real culprits, Cratinus and Ameipsias, are all but
left out of account (i.e., the phortikoi of 524), a reasonable explanation
may be agonistic currency.65 The passage just cited is crucial evidence in
dating Aristophanes’ revision of Clouds, since it provides a terminus post
quem of a year or two after the sequence of plays reviled, beginning with
Eupolis’ Marikas of 421.66 Accordingly, Aristophanes might have viewed
any of these four active poets as potential rivals at the competition where
he hoped to produce his revised Clouds. By assuming a theatrical presence,
whether real or potential, this explanation gives point to the demonstrative οὗτοι in 551, by allowing the word to function almost as a gesture
that activates the idea of engagement between rivals within the poetic
agon.67 Moreover, all four men were established poets with victories under
their belts, making them worthy of ridicule for the threat they posed in
any contest in the early 410s.68 The same cannot be said of Cratinus, who
had surely died or given up competing after his victory with Pytine. And
while Ameipsias continued to compete for many years to come, he did not
take the prize either with his Connus in 423 or (as it seems) in the period
The abuse of Cratinus in Eq. 525–36 and the presentation of Aristophanes’ literary reforms in
Pax 736–64 are both remarkable; but the first is directed against only one rival, while the second
is not specific about its targets (which did not stop ancient scholars, e.g., on 740 and 741, from
attempting to identify them). The prologue of Frogs (see below) takes on multiple targets, but is
both more succinct and less acerbic.
65
Here I disagree with Platter (2007) 104–5. On komodoumenoi, see Sommerstein (1996b), esp.
329–30, 349 (on abuse of other comic poets). Sommerstein (1996b) 329 n. 13, suggests that comic
poets avoid abusing comic but not tragic actors, based on the likelihood that they would probably
have to collaborate with the former at some point; the poet’s self interest with respect to the production of his plays at competitions thus guides his decisions about theatrical abuse.
66
Callimachus must have found Marikas entered in the didaskaliai for the year 421 (ΣE Nu. 553) at
the Lenaia, since Eupolis competed against Peace with Flatterers at the City Dionysia (Pax Hyp.
III). Cf. Casanova (1995) 109–10.
67
Cf. Pax 729–31, with Olson (1998) ad loc.
68
See Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 112–13, for their place in the List of Victors. Plato too was almost
certainly victorious at the Lenaia by this time; POxy. 2737.44–51 (= Pl. Com test. 7) suggests
victories (with others directing his plays) prior to Rhabdouchoi, and frr. 106–7 (from Peisander)
comment on those arrangements; cf. Sommerstein (2000) 447 n. 21. His first victory at the City
Dionysia came later (IG II2 2325.63). The fact that Aristophanes is gauging the prospects for competition with these poets severely reduces the chance that the revision was planned for a festival
outside Athens, as Revermann (2006a) 331, suggests.
64
Aristophanes and the new rivals of the 410s
185
leading up to the Clouds’ revision.69 In short, he was not worthy of insult
at the moment of Aristophanes’ intended return with Clouds, since abusing him would have been tantamount to assigning him importance he
had not earned. Among the paradoxes of competitive rhetoric is the tendency to regard those most capable of winning a contest as least deserving
victory.70
The general validity of this analysis receives support when we look
ahead to the end of the fifth century. The cast of characters against whom
Aristophanes directs literary insults changes in 405 with Frogs. Here a different cadre of poets is attacked:€Phrynichus, Lykis, and Ameipsias (Ra.
13–15). Ameipsias had by now become a worthy adversary; the veteran
Phrynichus was competing against Frogs with his Muses; and Lykis too
may have entered the List of Victors for the City Dionysia by this date.71
The emerging pattern of Aristophanes’ competitive strategy of literary
insult can be appreciated in another way by considering his treatment of
Cratinus, who was abused aggressively in 425 (Ach. 848–53, 1168–73) and
424 (Eq. 400, 526–36), when he was competing directly against Acharnians
(Hyp. I) and Knights (Hyp. II). But by the time of Frogs, Cratinus is treated
with professional respect, to the point of allowing him an honorific association with Dionysos through the epithet taurophagos (Ra. 357),72 perhaps in
connection with the play’s retrospective treatment of the masters of Attic
drama.73
By concentrating on active and considerable rivals in the revised parabasis of Clouds, Aristophanes reveals that he had come far enough with
his revisions of the play to begin thinking in specific terms about the
likely competition at an upcoming festival. Indeed, he may be referring to the other four poets set to participate in an impending five-poet
His first victory at the City Dionysia (IG II2 2325.62) may have been in competition against Birds
in 414 (Av. Hyp. I; cf. Dunbar (1995) 1), while his first Lenaian victory belongs later in the fifth
century (IG II2 2325.133); see Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 112–13.
70
A point implicit in Emerson (1889).
71
In the List of Victors for the City Dionysia, Lykis (IG II2 2325.65) appears three places after
Ameipsias’ victory of no later than 414:€Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 112. Phrynichus placed second
with Muses (Ra. Hyp. I (c) Dover); Σ VMEΘBarb Ra. 13b claims that Aristophanes’ charges were not
supported by anything in Phrynichus’ plays.
72
On this epithet, see Dover (1993) ad loc.
73
The mention of Cratinus at Pax 700–3 is less easy to assess, but if Sommerstein (1996b) 334 (cf.
Sommerstein (2005) 164) is right to place it in the class of men who receive favorable mention,
we have a startling change in Aristophanes’ handling of his most prestigious rival of the 420s
that coincides with the moment Cratinus seemingly ceased to be active. To be sure, the evident
mockery, which depends on the earlier representations of Cratinus in comedy (see Chapter 4), is
mitigated by the commendatory epithet sophos, while his supposed death in response to a Spartan
invasion is itself presented as one of the misfortunes the war brought upon Athens.
69
186
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
competition,74 although in that case we would have to assume a drastic
change of plan between the time he was awarded a chorus by the archon
and his production of a different comedy in place of the revised Clouds.
In either event, consideration of his future rivals outweighed any wish to
attack the competitors who most deserved abuse, from the perspective of
the original play.75 This shift in competitive focus is worth attending to.
Modern readers of Old Comedy tend to play down mockery among rival
poets as playful, ritualistic, and ironic.76 This is true up to a point. But
anyone familiar with the American electoral process today knows that
lies and distortion can be an effective tactic for diminishing an opponent’s public support, even when the charges are revealed to be false later
on. Comic poets, by contrast, had only to secure the “suspicion” of the
audience against their rivals for a few hours or days at most, depending
on the arrangement of the festival. By laughing along with Aristophanes’
distorting mockery of his rivals, the audience implicates itself in his competitive perspective and takes on his disdain of other poets as their own.
Even if the strategy is only marginally advantageous, once such poetic
challenges€– above all, in the parabasis€– became conventional, a poet had
little choice but to throw himself wholeheartedly into fabricating attacks
and rebuttals; to remain silent was not so much a sign of taking the moral
high ground as an admission that one was unfit to compete.77
Given that the revised Clouds was never staged or even completed, it
is striking that Aristophanes thought so carefully about and gave priority to establishing the play’s agonistic positioning well in advance of
actual production. This might suggest that the challenge to be issued to
Clouds’ new rivals was not simply literary veneer, but made a more essential contribution to the play. Indeed, the substitution of eupolideans for
“Aristophanic” anapests can be seen in this light, as establishing the new
focus of his antagonism against his most significant rival.78 At the very
As S. Douglas Olson suggests to me per litteras. This assumes Luppe’s (1972) arguments in favor of
five rather than three contestants at the festivals, as the hypotheses suggest; see, however, Storey
(2002).
75
This contrasts with the deeply embedded response to Cratinus’ victory in Wasps (Chapter 4).
76
Fisher (1984) 157, for example, describes the criticism of Eupolis in Clouds as “simply conventional
playful rivalry” and suggests that “Aristophanes’ sallies here must be regarded as typical exaggeration and misrepresentation for comic effect.” Rosen (1988); (2000), treats authorial persona more
systematically as a poetic construct.
77
Aristophanes’ comments on his supposed encounter with Cleon (V. 1284–91) are illuminating
on this point:€by taking his abuse, Aristophanes becomes an object of laughter for the onlookers,
who for lack (apparently) of a comic rebuttal can only assume that the poet has come to terms
with the demagogue.
78
Ar. fr. 58 (Anagyros) is the most direct evidence we have for Aristophanes’ growing antagonism
with Eupolis in this period; cf. Storey (2003b) 293, Kyriakidi (2007) 179.
74
A warning to the judges
187
least, the space and energy allotted to creating this tour de force of poetic
abuse, which entails Aristophanes’ effort to remain current in choosing his
poetic targets, provides the strongest argument against theories of a reading audience and in favor of viewing the revised Clouds as intended for
competition. No “possession for all time,” in Thucydides’ words (1.22.4),
the play is an agōnisma designed for a specific moment in the history of
Athenian festival competition against the rivals of the second phase of
Aristophanes’ career in the early 410s.
A wa r n i ng t o t h e j u d g e s
The appeal for audience acceptance and the bold assertion of competitive interests that lie at the heart of the revised parabasis and help define
Aristophanes’ strategy for recontesting the original reception of Clouds are
developed further in the second parabasis. Here Aristophanes’ chorus directly confront the contest judges and appeal for a favorable outcome (Nu.
1113–30):
χωρεĩτέ νυν. οἶμαι δὲ σοὶ
ταῦτα μεταμελήσειν.
τοὺς κριτὰς ἃ κερδανοῦσιν¸ ἤν τι τóνδε τὸν χορὸν ὠφελῶσ᾽ ἐκ τῶν δικαίων¸ βουλóμεσθ᾽ ἡμεĩς φράσαι.
πρῶτα μὲν γάρ¸ ἢν νεᾶν βούλησθ᾽ ἐν ὥρᾳ τοὺς ἀγρούς¸
ὕσομεν πρώτοισιν ὑμĩν¸ τοĩσι δ᾽ ἄλλοις ὕστερον.
εἶτα τὸν καρπὸν τεκούσας ἀμπέλους φυλάξομεν¸
ὥστε μήτ᾽ αὐχμὸν πιέζειν μήτ᾽ ἄγαν ἐπομβρίαν. ἢν δ᾽ ἀτιμάσῃ τις ἡμᾶς θνητὸς ὢν οὔσας θεάς¸
προσεχέτω τὸν νοῦν πρὸς ἡμῶν οἷα πείσεται κακά¸
λαμβάνων οὔτ᾽ οἶνον οὔτ᾽ ἄλλ᾽ οὐδὲν ἐκ τοῦ χωρίου.
ἡνίκ᾽ ἂν γὰρ αἵ τ᾽ ἐλαĩαι βλαστάνωσ᾽ αἵ τ᾽ ἄμπελοι¸
ἀποκεκóψονται. τοιαύταις σφενδóναις παιήσομεν. ἢν δὲ πλινθεύοντ᾽ ἴδωμεν¸ ὕσομεν καὶ τοῦ τέγους
τὸν κέραμον αὐτοῦ χαλάζαις στρογγύλαις συντρίψομεν.
κἂν γαμῇ ποτ᾽ αὐτὸς ἢ τῶν ξυγγενῶν ἢ τῶν φίλων¸
ὕσομεν τὴν νύκτα πᾶσαν¸ ὥστ᾽ ἴσως βουλήσεται
κἂν ἐν Αἰγύπτῳ τυχεĩν ὢν μᾶλλον ἢ κρĩναι κακῶς. Depart now! But I believe
you’ll regret these things.
We wish to tell the judges how they will benefit
if they lend some just support to this chorus.
In the first place, if you want to plough your fields in season,
we’ll rain on you first and only afterward on the others.
1115
1120
1125
1130
188
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
So too we’ll guard your grapevines as they produce their fruit,
so they’re not pressed by drought or too much rain.
But if anyone dishonors us€– he a mortal, us gods€–
let him clearly understand what misfortunes he’ll suffer at our hands,
getting neither wine nor anything else from his land.
For whenever his olive trees and vines begin to sprout,
they’ll be sheared off€– that’s the sort of missiles we’ll cast!
And if we see him making bricks, we’ll produce a downpour and
demolish his roof tiles with over-sized hailstones.
Should he himself marry, or one of his relatives or his friends,
we’ll rain all night, so that he’ll probably wish
to find himself even in Egypt rather than miscast his vote.
Without setting aside their costume, the chorus approach the judges with
temptations if they support the play, but threats if they fail to award them
first place. All the natural phenomena brought to bear on the judges’
decision derive from the chorus’ character as clouds and emphasize their
divine status. In this respect the passage is fanciful and entertaining, but
it also activates procedures of the contest by focusing on the men most
responsible for the outcome of the agon.79 As Aristophanes shifts his attention from audience to judges in the sequence of the play’s two parabases,
he abandons his normal practice of treating the audience in its entirety as
having sole authority over his play’s success. To some extent, this attention
to the entire Theater was understandable, since we gather from a number of sources that one of the judges’ greatest challenges was to account
for audience response.80 Aristophanes’ attention to the Theater can also be
explained as reflecting the democratic ideology of the festivals, according
to which the judges represented the dēmos, their very selection rooted in
the ten tribal divisions of the polis.81 In this representative capacity, the
judges had a significant responsibility, and a number of procedures were
put in place to ensure fairness and impartiality:€several rounds of lottery in
the judging process, the administration of oaths to judge fairly, and public
Note the chorus’ emphatic reference to the Dionysian competitions during the parodos (311–13).
E.g., Eq 546–50; Av. 445–6. The influence an audience might have on the way the judges cast
their votes seems to underlie Cratinus’ (fr. 360) identification of audience disturbances in the
bleachers with the judges. A similar observation inspired Plato’s complaints in the next century
(Lg. 659a–c, 700c–701a) and applies to Ion’s account of his victories and failures (Ion 535d–e).
Anecdotes purporting to record difficult decisions in the dramatic contests highlight instances
where the audience’s support was either keenly divided (Plu. Cim. 8.7–9:€t he contest of Sophocles
and Aeschylus that necessitated the presiding archon’s last-minute substitution of the ten generals for the ten judges) or their preference was ignored by the judges (Ael. VH 2.13 = Ar. test.
32.23–5:€the reception of Clouds). On the interaction of audience and judges, see Wallace (1997).
81
Rhodes (2003) emphasizes polis ethics over specifically Athenian democratic ideology.
79
80
A warning to the judges
189
scrutiny into the management of the festival.82 Instances in which the process was compromised assure us that stringent measures were needed.83
Still, even as Aristophanes reminds the judges of their responsibilities, he
humorously co-opts the process through the underlying assumption that
an honest vote means a vote cast in his favor, while any deviation from this
will result in immediate punishment.84 Though this humorously parabatic
mode could be counted on to generate good feeling in the audience, there
is also an edge to the passage. By recalling how the dramatic entries are
judged, the parabasis directs the audience’s attention toward a select group
in their midst, activating the process of public scrutiny that constrained
the judges even before they carried out their duties.85 Among the thousands
of citizens and visitors gathered to witness the contests, the laughter of ten
individuals€– their identities known at this point86€– may have been forced
during the recitation of these verses, as they were prompted to reflect upon
their responsibilities, for some evidence suggests that formal charges could
be brought against the judges, presumably during the official review of the
festival proceedings that immediately followed the celebration.87
The modern tendency is to attribute this passage to the original play.88
In support of this, no mention is made of this parabasis in the ancient
hypothesis (Hyp. I), which identifies the major parts of the play that were
introduced for the revision:€parabasis, agon of the two Arguments, and
burning of the phrontistērion.89 Even so, the hypothesis cannot be regarded
as definitive proof of the matter, since it purports only to summarize
the problem and catalogue some of the major structural changes.90 The
The evidence for the judging process is discussed in Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 95–9; Csapo and
Slater (1994) 157–65; Jedrkiewicz (1996) 90–4; Wilson (2000) 98–102; Marshall and Willigenburg
(2004). Emphasis on the judges’ duties is already apparent in Od. 8.258–60.
83
Above all, Meidias’ undermining of Demosthenes’ choregia (D. 21); see Wilson (2000) 156–68.
84
Cf. Wilson (2000) 101.
85
In this way the passage counters the tendency, observed by Slater (1999) 361–2, to knit the audience together.
86
D. 21.17–18; Plu. Cim. 8.7–9. The judges would also have been more visible if they had official
seats, as seems likely:€Csapo and Slater (1994) 158.
87
Aeschin. 3.232, referring to the performance of cyclic choruses. Cf. Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 98;
Wilson (2000) 99.
88
For a brief review of opinions among nineteenth-century scholars, see Starkie (1911) 246–7;
Totaro (2000) 7. That interpretation is shared by Gelzer (1960) 147; Sommerstein (1982) 4 n.10;
and implicitly Dover (1968) lxxxvi:€“Heliodorus therefore observed that between 1114 and 1115
there were five lyric kola in his text of the first version but nothing in his text of the revised
version.”
89
The hypothesis says only “parabasis of the chorus,” which is naturally taken to refer to the main
parabasis.
90
Thus αὐτίκα:€see Emonds (1941) 284; Tarrant (1991) 158; Russo (1994) 106; Casanova (2000a) 23.
Dover (1968) lxxxiv, translates it as “actually.”
82
190
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
primary function of any hypothesis is to provide readers with a concise
orientation to a play’s characters, plot, and production history, and the
opening remark (“this play is the same as the previous one”) shows that
this one was written from and for the perspective of an individual already
familiar with the original Clouds, probably through the immediately preceding hypothesis in an ancient collection.91
More promising evidence seems to come from a scholion (ΣBarbRs
Nu.€ 1115a), which informs us that at least one other important ancient
scholar, probably Heliodorus, offered a more complete discussion of the
revision in connection with a commentary on the original play.92
Parabasis:€In the parabasis the Chorus is not treated as a comic character. Space
(τóπος) of five cola that should be treated as missing (ἐλλειπóντων). It is not
surprising that this should have happened; the question has been discussed [sc.
in my commentary] on the first Clouds. The speeches [sic] outset after the space
belong to the chorus and are addressed to the judges, definitely in the manner of
a parabasis (παραβατικώτεραι). (trans. Dover (1968) lxxxvi)
According to Heliodorus, the kommation of 1113–14 introduces an abbreviated version of what was intended to be a much longer lyric passage. As
the reference to a commentary on the original play implies, the explanation for the missing lines has to do with the relationship of the revision
to the original. At first glance, it is tempting to understand from the reference to the chorus’ plea to the judges in the epirrhema that Heliodorus
attributed 1115–30 to the original play, as Piero Totaro argues.93 On the
principle offered at the outset, that position needs modification, since if a
choral song has been subtracted from the original parabasis, Aristophanes
made a conscious editorial decision to retain the epirrhema for its contribution to the newly conceived play. If this warning to the judges is recycled,
it still takes on additional significance for the revised play, as it further
affirms Aristophanes’ vigorous assertion of the undeservedness of his earlier defeat. In this sense if no other, the epirrhema does very much belong to
the revision, since it lays bare, without apology or disguise, the immediate
interest of recontesting the play’s original reception. For this parabasis only
makes sense in connection with the poetic competitions, and we would
accordingly expect it to be among the first passages removed from the play
Cf. Dover (1968) lxxxvii, for the organization of ancient hypotheses in collections independent of
the plays.
On the identification of Heliodorus, see Holwerda (1958) 39; Dover (1968) lxxxvi; reservations
are expressed by Holwerda (1967) 266. On Heliodorus’ metrical work generally, see Parker (1997)
95–6. For my argument, it is less important which ancient scholar is responsible for the note.
93
Totaro (2000) 7–8, 64.
91
92
A warning to the judges
191
if the revision was undertaken with a view to literary publication. A more
judicious treatment of Heliodorus’ testimony, however, suggests that the
evidence is equivocal at best and can be explained in a way consistent with
the view that this epirrhema was composed for the revision.
Heliodorus’ explanation is not all we might like it to be; among other
things, he is unhelpful on the question of how he knows the length of the
missing ode.94 He felt justified in his brevity, because he could refer a reader
with questions to a different discussion, where problems having to do with
the revision were apparently treated more systematically. But by summarizing his results, he has left us with something that may be “profoundly
misleading,” to quote Dover on the problems of compressed scholia.95 As
typically in ancient metrical analyses, Heliodorus’ attention is focussed on
the overall metrical structure of a parabatic syzygy, with whose complete
form he was familiar.96 By contrast, the subject of the epirrhema interests him only to the extent that it can be enlisted in support of his identification of a parabasis:€παραβατικώτεραι.97 Heliodorus’ comment may
therefore not have been cued by identical verses in both plays. Rather, he
may have identified a passage in the revised play that suggested an incomplete parabasis syzygy, after which he went to the original play, where a
fully composed specimen existed with epirrhema and ode€– i.e., an ode of
the number of cola specified in his surviving comment.98 On this explanation, his summary statement implies that the second parabasis of the original play contained a longer ode(s), but says nothing about whether the
epirrhema(ta) there was the same or different from the one in the revised
play. For Heliodorus, the revised play posed little mystery; he had both
versions and had dealt with the problem in detail elsewhere, but was at
this moment commenting on what was before him in the revised play, in
which context he was under no obligation to point out every deviation
Holwerda (1958) 40, proposed that Heliodorus offered a five-colon ode on the basis of general observation; but no such theory is forthcoming from the scholia (e.g., ΣEΓ Ach. 626a and b
(Triclinius); Σ VEΓΘ Eq. 498a; Σ VEΓΘ Eq. 1264a; ΣRs Nu. 510b; ΣLh Av. 1058d).
95
Dover (1977) = (1987–88) vol. ii, 207. Erbse (1969) 35–6, took the vagueness of the note as grounds
for rejecting its value as evidence altogether.
96
E.g., ΣEΓ3 Ach. 971a (see Dover (1968) lxxxvi) and especially Σ V V. 1283e (Heliodorus named); cf.
White (1912) 314.
97
The comparative form of the adjective is not used elsewhere in the scholia and perhaps suggests a
more tentative identification of the passage’s structural form due to its reduction to a single epirrhema. Compare Σ ΓAld V. 1265b, where the word is used to identify the rupture of dramatic plot
when (as the scholiast thought) Aristophanes refers to himself in the first person at the beginning
of the second parabasis.
98
There is thus no need to assume, with Dover (1968) lxxxvi; Casanova (2000a) 28, that 1113–14
cued him to the appropriate point in the original play’s kommation.
94
192
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
from the original unless it impinged on questions of metrical form.99 His
choice of words to describe the missing ode supports that interpretation,
since ἐλλειπóντων means not “deleted/lost/missing” but “wanting,” in the
sense of a structure or passage that does not attain its expected full form.100
What Heliodorus observed, in other words, is that the short kommation
in 1113–14 did not live up to expectation, and suggested an incompletely
revised parabasis.
Further light is shed on the problem by comparing Heliodorus’ inquiry
into an antode missing, except for some indecipherable traces, from the
second parabasis of Wasps (1265–91).101 His comment there indicates that
ancient scholars attempted to recover the missing song from available copies of the play, but that he himself supposed them lost during the earliest
stage of transmission; he thus concedes ignorance about the content (τίνα),
but could still gauge the metrical form (τὸν ἀριθμóν) of what had been lost
(here appropriately φθαρέντα), presumably based on the ode’s surviving
partner. In the case of Clouds, he knew where to find the “missing” song€–
he had in fact commented on it!€– but decided not to reincorporate it in
the revised play. We must assume that he either left a lacuna in the text, in
deference to Aristophanes’ general wishes as he had become familiar with
them through his study of the revision, or that he did so because he could
judge for himself that the original ode no longer suited the epirrhema of
the revised play. The second possibility is more likely, especially since on
the first possibility we would have to assume that Heliodorus’ restraint
was repeated by other ancient scholars.
The preceding discussion is only intended to show that Heliodorus’
comment is not as straightforward as has sometimes been assumed;
alternative interpretations are possible, with different implications
for the place of the surviving epirrhema within the textual history of
Clouds. Without his fuller explanation, Heliodorus’ testimony is of little value in resolving the problem, and any effort to carry the discussion
In ΣENMRs Nu. 520, for instance, the reason for pointing out the revised state of the main parabasis lies in the difference of meter, anapests vs. eupolideans.
100
Compare ἐκλέλοιπεν in Σ VEBarbRsNp Nu. 889a (discussed further below) and especially ἐλλιπής
ΣLhAld Pax 729c of the parabasis syzygy not having its expected complement of two epirrhemata. The use of the term in this sense expands on its common application to elliptical expressions:€Dickey (2007) 119. Compare Σ (rec.) Pi. O. 6, lines 15–17.
101
Σ V V. 1283e:€῾Ηλιóδωρος·€μετὰ τὸν στίχον τὸν “γλωττοποιεῖν εἰς τὰ πορνεῖ᾽ εἰσιóνθ᾽ ἑκάστοτε” εἰσὶ
τóποι ἑπτὰ ἔχοντες στιγμὰς καὶ ἀλóγους¸ ὦν ἐκ προχείρου μὲν εὗρεῖν τὸν λóγον οὐκ ἔστιν:€τὰ δὲ
τοιαῦτα πολλάκις εἶπον.€“ὑπολαμβάνω¸ ὅτι ἐν τοῖς πρώτοις ἀντιγράφοις φθαρέντα ††¸ ὅτι μὲν
τοσαῦτα ἦν τὸν ἀριθμóν¸ γνωσθῆναι¸ οὐ μήν¸ τίνα.” For μὲν .â•›.â•›. οὐ μήν¸ see Denniston GP 334–5.
On the missing ode, see MacDowell (1971) 298–9; Totaro (2000) 8–9 and 83. On the corruption
in the scholion, see White (1912) 411; Allen (1929) 28; Holwerda (1967) 261–3.
╇ 99
A warning to the judges
193
further depends on other considerations, several of which point to later
composition.
If Aristophanes revised the epirrhema but not the ode, his approach
to revising the play at this point would be consistent with what we find
elsewhere in the text.102 Another missing choral song was identified in
antiquity just before the entry of the two Arguments at 889.103 In this
case, we can be almost certain that a new choral passage was intended to
accompany the agon, which the ancient summary (Hyp. I) informs us was
new to the revised play.104 If the same approach is assumed for the opening
to the second parabasis, we may hypothesize that the rejection of material from the original second parabasis was necessitated by a disjunction
in theme between the two plays. This implies significant changes to the
text in the vicinity of 1115, although it is unclear whether those changes
affected what came before or after this point, or both. That the revisions
were made out of consideration for what precedes is a natural conclusion,
given that we know there was a new agon. To judge from other examples
in Aristophanes, however, the odes of second parabases do not typically
depend on the dramatic action surrounding them, but develop themes of
interest primarily to the parabasis and create a structurally and thematically discrete element.105 Indeed, more drastic changes to the parabasis itself
See Wilamowitz (1921) 172.
Σ VERs Nu. 889d:€“The choral song is not attested (οὐ κεῖται; cf. Dickey (2007) 243), and instead
‘χοροῦ’ (i.e., choral song) is written in the center.” Revermann (2006a) 215–16, adducing
Σ VEBarbRsNp Nu. 889c (on the Arguments brought on as fighting cocks), theorizes that a new song
had been composed but was lost by the time of Σ889d. I am inclined to think that the “χοροῦ”
found by ancient scholars goes back to Aristophanes (Wilamowitz, cited by Dover, xciii n. 1). I
thus prefer Dover’s explanation of Σ889c (reflecting staging or choral description of the original
play), if we understand that the new agon capitalizes on a memorable image in the descriptive
language originally used for the education offered by Socrates (e.g., something expanding on the
idea in Nu. 112–15). But a scholion to 847 may simply have been mistakenly associated with the
agon:€Casanova (2000a) 28–9.
104
An argument from silence is far from decisive, but the absence of any indication, Heliodoran or
otherwise, about the form, theme, or length of the choral ode might be due to the fact that there
was no obvious point of comparison between the two plays here and no ode from the original
that could be identified as “missing.” Note that the metrical analysis of Σ VERs Nu. 889d shows
signs of Heliodoran authorship (ἐν εἰσθέσει (text restored, Holwerda); cf. Holwerda (1958) 39;
Dover (1968) lxxxvi), but reveals no attempt to identify the missing ode (μέλος δὲ τοῦ χοροῦ οὐ
κεῖται). Dover (1972) 99€– “It looks as if Aristophanes has removed the song but has not written a
substitute” (emphasis mine)€– is already pressing for an interpretation that is not necessarily correct, since if this agon is entirely new, there was no choral part introducing it to delete.
105
Compare Ach. 971–99 (if regarded as a second parabasis; see Totaro (2000) 13–15 with bibliography); Eq. 1264–1315; V. 1265–91 (where the second ode is lost); Pax 1127–90; Av. 1058–1117. Even
in Peace and Birds, where the second parabases do not break completely from the plays’ major
themes, the odes are first and foremost linked with the epirrhemata. Compare too the valediction at Ach. 1143–9, which performs the same function as Nu. 1113–14, preparing the way for a
choral song structurally and thematically distinct from what precedes.
102
103
194
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
can probably be assumed on the basis of its larger structural incompleteness, since we miss the full composition of ode, epirrhema, antode, and
antepirrhema, which represents Aristophanes’ normal practice for second
parabases, especially in the early plays.106 We may thus tentatively conclude that the second parabasis was itself a work in progress when the larger project of revision was abandoned.107 As at 889, the lyric passage was
to be composed only after Aristophanes had given attention to the epirrhema that would follow it and provide the major theme for this parabasis,
namely, the warning to the judges.
Attention to the passage’s themes and to their place in Aristophanes’
broader professional career provides further reason to assign it to the revision. On general grounds, it makes sense that a second parabasis composed
for performance in 423 would need to be replaced, since in other early
plays the personal invective in these segments is often highly �topical.108
Aristophanes has perhaps only partially fulfilled generic expectations by
now offering a passage of milder and more generalized abuse of the panel
of judges. In the other plays from 425–421, Aristophanes is quite willing
to make his desire for victory known, but he does so by creating elaborate and fanciful discussions to support his agonistic bid. In none of these
parabases is there even a mention of the judges;109 instead, as noted above,
Aristophanes consistently treats the audience as exclusively responsible for
his victory or defeat. It seems reasonable to ask whether he had any motivation to dispense with this nicety of expression to pressure the judges more
directly at the City Dionysia of 423, and the answer, with Aristophanes
himself as witness, is “No.” As he represents his fortunes in the Clouds
parabasis, as well as in that of Wasps, from Banqueters on his reputation
and competitive success were only growing, a picture confirmed by the evidence of victories in at least the two and probably three years immediately
preceding the original Clouds. It is hard to believe that a poet who could
describe himself as having sure tokens of the audience’s good judgment
See the references in the previous note. In the main parabasis we find reduced syzygies in Pax (no
epirrhemata) and Th. (single ode and epirrhema); cf. Hubbard (1991) 157–8, for development in
Aristophanes’ use of the form.
107
Observations such as these may have contributed to the assessment in Hypothesis I that the revision was never completed. Cf. Casanova (2000a) 20; but see Fabrini (1975) 4–5. On the phrase
ἐπὶ μέρους in the first line of Hypothesis I, see above, n. 6.
108
Ach. 1150–73; Eq. 1263–1315; V. 1265–91.
109
The only instance outside of a parabasis bears this interpretation out:€at Ach. 1224, Dikaiopolis
demands to be taken before the judges and awarded the prize for the Choes contest. Although
this is part of Aristophanes’ identification with his hero (see Chapter 2), the reference is indirect
and maintains a comfortable distance via the difference of festival and the incorporation within
the play’s fantastic scenario.
106
A warning to the judges
195
in this phase of his career (533 μοι πιστὰ παρ᾽ ὑμῶν γνώμης ἔσθ᾽ ὅρκια)
would have felt a need to adopt the desperate agonistic strategy represented by the second parabasis. For although the passage is humorously
self-serving in the usual way, in effect Aristophanes adds his own voice
in support of the official mechanisms put in place to assure fairness and
impartiality in determining a victor. In short, it is easier to see how he
might think the gnōmai of audience and judges alike were in need of
attention after 423.
The passage is for the most part lacking in clues as to time and context,
but the rewards and punishments held out for the judges are bound on
either end by expressions that betray a lack of confidence in them and may
provide further insight as to the occasion. The judges will be rewarded if
they support the chorus “in accord with justice” (1115–16 ἐκ τῶν δικαίων).
So too, the cosmological destruction to be visited upon them in the event
of the play’s defeat will make them wish to be anywhere else rather than
“to judge badly” (1130 κρĩναι κακῶς). Taken together, these statements are
a fitting corollary to Aristophanes’ feeling that his defeat was undeserved
(525 οὐκ ἄξιος ὤν) and, if we add the evidence from Wasps, was tantamount
to an act of injustice (V. 1017 ἀδικεĩσθαι; 1044 καταπρούδοτε) stemming
from the audience’s inability to form pure judgments (V. 1045 ὑπὸ τοῦ
μὴ γνῶναι καθαρῶς). Acting justly and impartially was an essential part
of any judge’s task and was accordingly emphasized in the oaths taken
at the dramatic festivals, as we learn from an allusion by Pherecrates.110
Comparison to a comment made by Aischines is also helpful:€ καὶ τοὺς
μὲν κριτὰς τοὺς ἐκ τῶν Διονυσίων ἐὰν μὴ δικαίως τοὺς κυκλίους χοροὺς
κρίνωσι ζημιοῦτε (3.232). If we assume that these passages recall the wording of the judges’ oath, Aristophanes’ warning is more effective because
it resonates with the terms the judges committed themselves to at the
moment they assumed their duties. The pointed reference to the oath
becomes more conspicuous when compared to what the poet says to the
judges in the second parabasis of Birds, a passage clearly modelled on the
epirrhema of the revised Clouds.111 Instead of assertive calls for the judges
to act justly, we now find the comparatively bland expressions “to judge”
and “to not judge” (1103 ἢν κρίνωσιν ἡμᾶς, 1114; ἢν δὲ μὴ κρίνητε) in favor
Pherecr. fr. 102:€τοῖς δὲ κριταῖς | τοῖς νυνὶ κρίνουσι λέγω¸ | μὴ ᾽πιορκεῖν μηδ᾽ ἀδίκως | κρίνειν¸ ἢ νὴ
τὸν φίλιον | μῦθον εἰς ὑμᾶς ἕτερον | Φερεκράτης λέξει πολὺ τού- | του κακηγορίστερον. Cf. Ec.
1159–60 with Ussher (1973) and the version of the oath preserved in the second hypothesis to D.
Against Meidias (sec. 4):€τῷ καλῶς ᾄσαντι δοῦναι τὴν νίκην. Cf. Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 97;
Csapo and Slater (1994) 158.
111
Cf. Dunbar (1995) 576; Totaro (2000) 168.
110
196
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
of Aristophanes’ play. The distinction may seem slight, but it is less so once
the main parabasis has established Clouds’ troubled past as a major component affecting the audience’s experience of the new play. In that case, in
directing a sharp glance at the judges Aristophanes resembles Pherecrates
in one further way; for, as Olson observes, the second half of fr. 102 makes
it clear that his current threats (τοĩς δὲ κριταĩς τοĩς νυνὶ κρίνουσι) were preceded by bitter remarks about the outcome at a previous festival, where he
had, he felt, been undeservedly slighted.112
These implications were not lost on ancient readers. Several scholia
commenting on the reception of the original Clouds express considerable
prejudice against the judges. The didaskalic records, of course, showed
that the play had been soundly defeated; but the remarks suggest some
“knowledge” of professional delinquency. In correcting Aristophanes’
memory about Banqueters, a scholion on Clouds 529 matter-of-factly states
that with this play “he was actually judged second.”113 Such sober criticism is what we expect, but the language becomes less objective when
Aristophanes’ experience at the contests with Clouds is discussed; ΣVΓLhAld
V. 1045a says “judged falsely” (παρεκρίνατε) as does ΣVLhAld V. 1050b, where
the allegation is specifically directed against the judges (παρακριθεὶς ὑπὸ
τῶν κριτῶν).114 So swayed were ancient commentators by a sense of the
judges’ culpability in the Clouds debacle, that when faced with an obvious reference to Aristophanes’ “worthless” rivals at the City Dionysia of
423 (Nu. 524–5 ὑπ᾽ ἀνδρῶν φορτικῶν ἡττηθείς), they likewise pointed the
finger at the judges, no doubt under the influence of the charge of wrongdoing that follows (Nu. 525 οὐκ ἄξιος ὤν).115 We should perhaps understand Aelian’s account (VH 2.13) of the audience’s boisterous approval for
Clouds and accompanying demand that the judges “write no other name
than that of Aristophanes” on their voting tablets in connection with these
implied allegations of foul play. The anecdote is certainly apocryphal, but
not necessarily of Aelian’s making; more likely it belongs to a scholarly
tradition on Clouds that emphasized the judges’ wrongdoing and filled
out the picture by imagining an audience at odds with the judges.116 Who
Olson (2007) 112. The attempt to make this business personal is clear from the reference to
Pherecrates by name.
113
δεύτερος δὲ ἐκρίθη:€ΣREMNp Nu. 529b.
114
Less fraught with allegations of injustice, but still emotionally prejudiced, are the uses of
ἀποκρίνειν (“rejected”) in Σ VΓAld V. 1012 and Nu. Hyp. II (ap. crit. line 3).
115
The case of Plato Comicus may represent another instance of a poet’s colorful description of production history infiltrating didascalic descriptions by ancient scholars:€Biles (1999).
116
E.g., Plu. Cim. 8.7–9. On the Aelian passage, see Jedrkiewicz (1996) 86–7, who notes that Aelian
may have had knowledge of the details of the judging process.
112
A warning to the judges
197
gave them this idea? Most likely Aristophanes; the clues are all there in his
embittered recollections of the event in Wasps and the revised Clouds. But
in these passages Aristophanes’ complaints are, as so often, brought against
the collective audience, and ancient scholars’ emphasis on the judges represents their own initiative. But their interpretation makes better sense, if
they could point to a passage in the revised play that had obviously been
composed for the reperformance, and in which Aristophanes’ warning to
the judges could be interpreted as reflecting his disgruntlement over the
events of 423.
The negative background that appears to have inspired the address to
the judges in Clouds can be appreciated in one further way. Although on
the present interpretation the epirrhema of the revised Clouds was never
performed, its central idea was put to good use soon thereafter for the
confrontation with the judges in the second parabasis of Birds.117 The similarities between the two passages are striking, but on a few points they
are quite distinct. As in Clouds, the passage in Birds is structured around
distinct bribes and threats. Of the later comedy’s sixteen lines, however,
twelve (1102–13) are devoted to enumerating ways in which the judges will
profit in the event of a favorable outcome for Aristophanes, and the briefly
rehearsed threats (1114–17) are tacked on more for the sake of balance than
anything else. In Clouds, the distribution is almost the exact opposite:€the
emphasis is on the second section, where ten of the sixteen lines are dedicated to warning the judges against dishonoring the chorus and making
a bad decision. In this shift of emphasis, we perhaps see a difference in
Aristophanes’ outlook as he thought about a play that had already been
“misjudged” once and one whose future was as yet untainted by agonistic
misfortune.
At the same time, the emphasis on the chorus’ retributive character has
implications for broader developments in the plot. The chorus’ ability to
punish its enemies is first hinted at in the syzygy of the main parabasis
(esp. Nu. 591–4, 623–6), in which they recommend punishing Cleon and
Hyperbolos, and is then elaborated upon, although still darkly, in a choral
song before the second agon (1303–20).118 The assault on Cleon is undoubtedly drawn from the original play, though, as will be discussed below,
Aristophanes redeploys the passage to clarify ideas having to do with the
Ar. fr. 322 (Heroes) has some points in common, in that the chorus reveals its control of the audience’s experience of “good and bad things.”
118
The characterization of the chorus is adumbrated by the two-verse kommation of the second parabasis (1113–14; on σοί referring to Strepsiades here, see Dover (1968) ad loc.), while Pheidippides
himself was able to see that nothing good would come of Strepsiades’ plan (865).
117
198
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
revision.119 The real significance of the chorus’ retributive character for the
dramatic action only becomes apparent at the end of the play, when they
suddenly turn on Strepsiades and own up to their cruelty as part of a plan
to punish him for his ponēria (1452–61). For events on stage, the crucial
point of this revelation is that it ushers in the final act of vengeance, as the
phrontistērion is destroyed.120 If the conception of the chorus in the second
parabasis is of a piece with the finale, the implications of the notice in
Hypothesis I that the final scene is a feature of the revised play cannot be
lightly brushed aside.
If by this interpretation we risk losing a portion of the original Clouds,
we have gained much in our ability to understand the revised version,
where the new epirrhema is far more remarkable. Although the second
parabasis is entertaining and interesting in other ways, as a poetic structure it was never indispensable to the main plot or the agon, which so
defined the function of the main parabasis. Under the additional competitive pressure introduced by the prospect of resubmitting Clouds to scrutiny
at a formal agon, Aristophanes adapted the second parabasis to suit that
context better. Taken in connection with the project of recontesting the
original outcome, the passage shows Aristophanes engaging more closely
with the system of management at the dramatic contests by directing
attention to the judges. He does this with the imagination and humor we
expect, but delivers a critical message nonetheless.121 At the same time, by
granting the judges a position of prominence within the play, the passage
stands as poetic testimony to the centrality of the dramatic competitions
for the development of the comic genre. Whereas in Chapter 1 we had to
reconstruct the shaping of the main parabasis under agonistic pressures,
if the relationship of Aristophanes’ warning to the judges is connected
with the revision, it represents a conspicuous example of a competitive
poetics determining the use to which traditional Old Comic structures
were put. The role Aristophanes assigned to the second parabasis in the
At least the epirrhema (575–94) on Cleon belongs to the original. In any event, this provides little
basis for thinking that this aspect of the chorus’ character was meaningfully developed in the
original play, since the Athenians themselves (591–4), rather than the chorus, are to carry out the
punishment.
120
See Totaro (2000) 66, and especially Segal (1969), although his sense that the original Clouds
followed this basic conception never overcomes the fact that these forebodings come to fruition
only in the final scene.
121
The kommation’s prediction (whether it belongs to the original or revision) of Strepsiades’
changed attitude over his plan (1113–14) also hints at the regret the judges are to feel over the
play’s original defeat.
119
Dramatizing recontestation:€second efforts in Clouds
199
recontestation of Clouds becomes more conspicuous when the thematic
developments that take place around it are taken into account.
Dr a m at i z i ng r e c on t e s tat ion:€
s e c on d e f f or t s i n c l o u d s
The dramatic action and thematic design of the revised Clouds resonate
with Aristophanes’ professional concerns over revision and recontestation.
Specifically, the notion of second attempts and, more importantly, the pattern of initial failures overcome are woven into the play’s thematic fabric,
highlighting the objectives laid out in the parabasis.122 Correspondences
between Aristophanes’ assertions about the play and the plot thus facilitate an interpretation that depends on the idea of revision. Whether these
points were developed for the revision is impossible to say. But it is noteworthy that most examples involve the second half of the play, where the
ancient hypothesis informs us that Aristophanes’ revisions were most drastic, and to that evidence we may tentatively add the second parabasis.123
A useful starting point for this discussion is the first epirrhema of the
main parabasis (575–94). Here, as typically in such passages, the chorus
continue the address to the audience begun in the “anapests,” but turn
away from the poet and take up matters more relevant to them as clouds.
In one respect these concerns are not much different. Like the poet, who
complained of the audience’s failure to appreciate his original play’s merits
fully, the chorus complain of the Athenians’ unwillingness to recognize
them as deities, and chastise them for missing the opportunity to benefit from the guidance they offer via cosmological phenomena. As proof,
they complain that when Cleon was elected general there were storms and
lunar and solar eclipses,124 which should have convinced the Athenians not
to put this man in a position of power (581–6). Still, the clouds assert, matters can be set right if Cleon is convicted of embezzlement and punished
appropriately (591–4).
The reference to Cleon’s generalship in 424/3 makes it clear that this
passage was inspired by material in the first version of the play.125 It has
been argued that had the revision been completed, Aristophanes would
A similar thematic may be evident in Euripides’ Hippolytus; see Knox (1952) = (1983) 313.
Tarrant (1991) 158–9, takes the self-referential comments in the parabasis to mean that “the first
five hundred lines of the play had been largely the same.”
124
See Dover (1968) 584n., for the inaccuracy of these claims.
125
As noted by ΣEM Nu. 581.
122
123
200
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
have withdrawn any reference to someone who died in 422.126 There are
nonetheless signs that the passage has been tailored to fit with themes
introduced for Aristophanes’ address to the audience in what precedes.
Most notably, the opening address to the spectators as sophōtatoi (575) corresponds with the wisdom-theme Aristophanes appears to have developed
for his commentary on the audience’s reception of the first Clouds.127 So
too, the chorus’ wish to censure the Athenians for wrongs supposedly
done them (576) accords well with the shocked tone of the poet’s response
to his initial failure. But even if we cannot unravel the strands of original
composition and subsequent revision in this passage completely, these
lines certainly bring into sharper relief a theme of the utmost importance
for the revised play.128 The opportunity the clouds’ return to the Theater
provides the Athenians to put right their error of electing Cleon general by
punishing him at his euthynai (591–2) is parallel to Aristophanes’ aim of
reproducing Clouds to let the audience correct their initial (mis)judgment
of it.129 As Hubbard comments, “there is an important sense in which the
Clouds become emblematic of the Clouds.”130 The play’s reperformance
will become another occasion when the gods let matters turn out for the
best, even after the city has fallen into error (587–9, 593–4). In this light,
within the parabasis as a whole the retention of original material demonstrates that, even after changes in the revision are taken into account, this
play should still be seen as a direct descendant of the Clouds of 423. The
jarring disparity produced by the temporal dimensions of new and old
material helps orchestrate this effect, by putting beyond doubt the assertion that this is the same play returning in the hope of a better outcome.
All of this goes to show that the implications of Aristophanes’ comments
about revision and recontestation extend beyond the “anapests,” and, just
as importantly, that meaning specific to the revised play is created from the
Dover (1968) lxxxi–ii; Sommerstein (1997a) 276; Casanova (2000a) 30–1. Storey (1993b) 79–81
attempts to demonstrate overall similarity between the plays by identifying a significant number
of comic targets in the revised play as komoidoumenoi of the late 420s. But a target of this period
could easily have continued to attract attention in the early 410s as well, since (as Storey himself
observes) many figures had a long shelf-life for comic abuse; cf. Halliwell (1993), esp. 329–30.
Assigning a narrow range of dates based on only a few bits of evidence, most of which cannot
be dated independently (Aristophanes’ plays being the exception), also has the potential to skew
interpretation.
127
Nu. 517, 520, 521, 522, 526–7, 535, 547–8, 561–2; cf. V. 65–6, 1049–50, which refer to Clouds.
128
Here and below I follow Hubbard (1991) 109–10, who believes further that the antepirrhema was
composed for the revision.
129
Cf. V. 1044–7, which contribute to this “history” of the revision.
130
Hubbard (1991) 109. Contrast Whitman (1964) 121, who sees the epirrhema as “an ill-adjusted
mingling of earlier and later passages.”
126
Dramatizing recontestation: second efforts in Clouds
201
way material from the original was redeployed. The reflection of the play’s
rejection and return extends beyond the characterization of the chorus.
In a sense, the very beginning of the revised Clouds depends on a revision, since even before the prologue ends a second attempt is introduced
that will be developed over the course of the play. Strepsiades’ initial plan,
which promises to set the play’s comic idea in place, is to escape the debts
that are crushing him thanks to his son’s passion for horses, by sending
Pheidippides to the phontistērion to learn to refute any legal actions taken
by his father’s creditors (75–118). The plan fails even before it is embarked
upon, however, because Pheidippides refuses to have anything to do with
Socrates and his school. Strepsiades is accordingly forced to adapt his plan
and enroll in the phrontistērion himself (126–32). Thus the comic idea that
drives the plot does not follow from a single assertion of the central character’s will, but is a pointed modification of an original plan.131 As Strepsiades
says, he has fallen, but he will not stay down (126), and his determination
to persevere will be matched by that of the poet (525–35; cf. V. 1049–50).
The rest of the first half of the play treats Strepsiades’ arrival and reception
at the phrontistērion (133–217), with everything proceeding according to
his modified plan. But matters take a sudden turn after the parabasis, and
a sequence of reversals and accompanying revisions of action seem to take
their cue from Aristophanes’ own comments in the parabasis.
After Strepsiades fails to grasp Socrates’ lessons and his ineptitude
becomes apparent (627–780),132 Socrates expels him from the school
(781–90). The old man now finds himself in the same desperate situation as in the opening scene and must change plans again (791–2).133
On the chorus’ advice (793–803), he decides to return home and force
Pheidippides to enter the phrontistērion. Dover observes that the chorus’
inquiry as to whether Strepsiades has a son (794–6) would make more
sense if Pheidippides had not appeared in the prologue, meaning that this
inconsistency might have to do with the incomplete state of the revision.134
But this is not necessarily a poetic faux pas, since the recapitulation of the
prologue generates meaning for themes central to the revision. Although
Pheidippides is as disgusted with the idea as he was before (829–33, 840,
844–6, 852–3, 865), he nonetheless now gives in, so that in this second
effort Strepsiades is both successful and able to follow through with the
Contrast, for example, Dikaiopolis, who foresees resistance in the assembly to his pleas for peace
(Ach. 37–42) and hatches an entirely new plan using the spondai to assert his original position.
132
Their dramatic function is to confirm what Socrates had already determined for himself by the
time he returns to the stage after the parabasis (627–31); cf. Russo (1994) 114–15.
133
Dover (1972) 102.╇╅ 134╇ Dover (1968) xcv.
131
202
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
plan he conceived at the outset. In short, from this point on the play enacts
a virtual palinode of itself, as we see what would have happened, had the
prologue taken the alternate turn.
Although we do not witness Pheidippides’ education, the scene in
which Strepsiades returns to fetch him from Socrates (1145–77) makes it
clear that, unlike his father, he proved a highly capable student. Oddly,
however, Pheidippides’ success with regard to the original plan is demonstrated by Strepsiades’ own encounters with two of his creditors (1214–
1302). Now the old man is able to apply the lessons of the phrontistērion
in a way he could not when he was a student himself.135 The contradiction is all the more apparent because at one point Strepsiades relies on
the lesson of the kneading trough to expose the ignorance of his creditor (1245–58),136 when only a short while earlier he was unable to recall
this aspect of Socrates’ teaching and was expelled as a result (785–90).
Alerted by these contradictions, some scholars have identified the scene
showing Strepsiades overcoming his enemies as part of the first Clouds,
and assume that he originally came closer to attaining the triumph typical of Aristophanic heroes.137 But as regards the new play, these inconsistencies only make us realize more acutely that matters have turned out
remarkably well€– or so it seems at this point€– in Strepsiades’ second
attempt.
These scenes are framed by a pair of agons. As in other plays in which
the agon serves as an imaginative reflection on the poetic competitions
(see Chapter 2), in Clouds the agons seem to allude to the unique circumstances of Aristophanes’ revision of the play, both in the way they
recall and expand on themes from the parabasis, and in how they interact
with one another. The contribution of these scenes to the interpretation
of the revision is especially important because Hypothesis I tells us that
Aristophanes made full-scale changes to the first agon, between the two
Arguments (ἃ δὲ ὁλοσχερῆ τῆς διασκευῆς τοιαῦτα ὄντα τετύχηκεν … καὶ
ὅπου ὁ δίκαιος λóγος πρὸς τὸν ἄδικον λαλεĩ), which should probably be
Deployment of actors may be a factor, if the actor playing Pheippides was to play the part of the
Second Creditor, though in that case the effort to keep the fourth actor’s part to a minimum
comes at some cost to other considerations.
136
Hubbard (1991) 99, describes Strepsiades’ use of his newly acquired knowledge as a “wretchedly
ignorant travesty of Socratic sophia,” but even if true, this characterization does little to counteract the impression that the old man succeeds in his objective.
137
Gelzer (1960) 146–7; Tarrant (1991) 174–5; MacDowell (1995) 144–9; cf. Bowie (1993) 108–9.
Sommerstein (1997a) 277–9, argues that one of Aristophanes’ changes for the revision was to
make Strepsiades more culpable for his actions, based on his stage presence during and after the
first agon; but see Casanova (2000) 27–8.
135
Dramatizing recontestation: second efforts in Clouds
203
taken to mean that it was new to the revised play.138 Indeed, Clouds is the
only comedy in the corpus that contains two fully realized agons, each
with its own resolution and accompanying shift in dramatic action.139 On
a formal level, then, the revised play embraces the idea of recontestation in
its sequenced deployment of these poetic structures.
As has also been observed, the two agons are so similar in their structure and themes that the second amounts to a repeat demonstration of the
points set out in the first, with the opposing embodiments of educational
ideals now played by father and son.140 With this change, the generational
conflict represented abstractly in the first agon is expressed in concrete
terms within an actual household. By attacking his father and then confidently asserting his ability to defend his actions in speech (1321–43),
Pheidippides reaches the height of immorality espoused by the Worse
Argument just before (esp. 1075–82). Meanwhile, Strepsiades’ preference
for Simonides and Aeschylus and his rejection of Euripides (1354–74)
align him with the Better Argument,141 who boasts of his influence on
the Marathon generation (985–6) and asserts a preference for traditional
poets at the same time that he rejects the musical innovations of later artists (966–72). This new conflict between father and son puts a stop to the
celebrations of the momentarily successful hero and foils any expectations
according to the typical structure of a comic plot. To a large extent, this
second agon is necessitated by the outcome of the first, in which the Worse
Argument soundly refutes the Better. For while the audience could reasonably be counted on to respond to Strepsiades’ preposterous wish to escape
his debts with a mixture of shock, amusement, awe and envy,142 when the
victory of the Worse Argument so liberates Pheidippides from any sense of
moral or social responsibility that he dares to beat his father, it is obvious
Dover (1968) lxxxiii–iv; Russo (1994) 100–4; MacDowell (1995) 143–4; Casanova (2000b) 373–4.
Gelzer (1960) 145, assumes that the second agon is also largely new, since it clearly depends on the
ideas and outcome of the first. The suggestion by Sommerstein (1982) 4 n. 9, that only the opening dispute (Nu. 889–948) between the two Arguments is meant, seems unlikely.
139
Double agons are also found in Knights, Wasps, and Birds. In these cases, however, the initial
agon merely continues the expository purpose of a prologue and parodos, without fulfilling the
critical function of an agon, by supplying a dramatic and thematic highpoint through a confrontation of competing viewpoints that is worked out by a formal exchange and whose outcome
determines the direction of all subsequent action. On distinctions between the two kinds of
agons, see Gelzer (1960) 46–7, 56–7.
140
Gelzer (1960) 88–91, provides a structural analysis of the two agons. For a more detailed comparison, see Dover (1968) 247–8, who comments that “the parallelism of structure between the
two contests emphasizes the extent to which Pheidippides has emerged from his education a replica of Wrong.”
141
At Ra. 1013–17 Aeschylus is likewise treated as a representative of the previous generation.
142
Cf. Whitman (1964) 121–2.
138
204
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
that matters have turned out for the worse.143 Ultimately, the second agon
follows its predecessor so precisely that by the end of Pheidippides’ arguments in favor of father-beating, Strepsiades is ready to accept his son’s
position and allow this immoral doctrine to win again, until at the last
moment Pheidippides’ promise to subject his mother to the same treatment brings the old man to his senses (1440–51). Only now is he ready to
accept the chorus’ advice in support of more traditional values (1452–66),
whereupon he sets out to destroy Socrates and the phrontistērion. Much
like the palinode of the prologue, then, the second agon allows the play to
renegotiate the path it took as a result of the first agon, so that the original
outcome is recontested in a literal sense. Strepsiades’ recourse to brute
force is a desperate response to his son’s arguments,144 but at least corrects
the disastrous state of affairs the first agon produced.
In addition to responding to each other, the two agons draw attention to
ideas already introduced in the parabasis in connection with Aristophanes’
efforts to re-present his play. On the most general level, the paradox of the
Worse Argument defeating the Better neatly reflects Aristophanes’ feeling
of astonishment that his own exceptional play was ranked behind those
of run-of-the-mill competitors (524).145 There are also more specific points
of contact. Midway through Aristophanes’ poetic defense of Clouds in the
parabasis, he invites the audience to inspect the play, treating it as though
it were a young woman standing before them (537–44). Everything they
see is intended to demonstrate that she is “modest” (537 ὡς δὲ σώφρων ἐστὶ
φύσει σκέψασθ᾽; cf. 529), allowing Aristophanes to enlist the fundamental
ideal of sōphrosynē in his comedy’s defense.146 In poetic terms, this means
a play free of the contaminating features of lowbrow humor (538–43):€no
Cf. MacDowell (1995) 147. At 911–12 Worse glories in being called a father-beater by his adversary. Mistreatment of parents was a serious crime, punishable by loss of civic rights ([Arist.] Ath.
56.6).
144
Hubbard (1991) 112; MacDowell (1995) 144. Based on the attribution in Σ Pl. Ax. 367b of the
surviving line 1417 to the original Clouds, Casanova (2000a) 30, assumes that the endings of the
two plays were not much different; but even assuming that this is not a case of misattribution by
an ancient reader (see Dover (1968) lxxxix–xc), the sentiment of the passage is proverbial and its
placement and implication could have been quite different in the original. K–A, unlike Meineke
and Kock, are unconvinced by the scholiast’s citation.
145
O’Regan (1992) 69, argues instead that the failure of the first Clouds upsets the model of a weaker
discourse that is able to become the stronger, by supposing that the play’s proclaimed linguistic
brilliance associates it with the weaker discourse. But see below.
146
In general, see North (1966), esp. 97–9, who places the ideal as Aristophanes presents it within
broader trends; cf. Rademaker (2005) 226–9. Cf. O’Regan (1992) 70–1, whose understanding of
how the sōphrosynē theme connects parabasis and agons is based on the supposition that these
lines refer to the original Clouds; she also presumes to know much more than we do about the
earlier play.
143
Dramatizing recontestation: second efforts in Clouds
205
phalluses, bald-jokes, lewd dancing, beating-scenes, torches or shouting.
Aristophanes’ play thus lives up to a conception of sōphrosynē€– mutatis
mutandis€– as defined, for instance, by Plato, for whom the ideal is to demonstrate self-control against the allurement of base desires and pleasures
(R. 430e). Although instances where “immodest” comic tropes contribute
to the humor of Clouds in the first half of the play suggest to some that
many in the audience might take the comments in the parabasis as purely
ironic,147 the implications of this passage were perhaps more critical for
how the audience responded to scenes after the parabasis. By locating his
poetic concerns in relation to a stark ethical paradigm in the parabasis,
Aristophanes provides his audience with a standard of judgment that is
increasingly undermined as the performance continues, since the discriminating impulse that is the basis for his description of the revised Clouds,
“standing” before the audience now,148 is entangled in the conflicts of the
second half of the play. Above all, the Clouds’ touted ethico-poetic orientation becomes a point of emphasis in the two agons and their consequences
in the form they take in the revised play.
In the choral song that introduces the first agon, the contest is described
in terms that recall the poetic agon that underpins Aristophanes’ discussion in the parabasis. In the latter, the poet hopes to win in order to
be considered sophos by a dexios audience and with a play whose comic
material is sophōtata (520–2). Similarly, the agon of the two Arguments is
described as a competition over sophia that is of the greatest consequence
not just for the chorus but, they claim, for their friends (955–8). With
this final comment, the chorus situates the impending contest within the
Theater audience Aristophanes appealed to in the parabasis. Accordingly,
in the same choral passage the two contestants, although later shown to
be of different persuasions, are both presented as representatives of the
kind of intellectual activity that might appeal to Aristophanes’ sophos
audience. Trusting in their clever arguments and ideas (τὼ πισύνω | τοĩς
περιδεξίοισιν | λóγοισι καὶ φροντίσι καὶ | γνωμοτύποις μερίμναις), they
will demonstrate who is the better speaker (949–54). In the lead-up to
their formal contest, it looks as if the Worse Argument will have important
similarities to Aristophanes, since he too lays claim to novelty of approach
Murphy (1972); Fisher (1984) 152; Murray (1987); Hubbard (1991) 98–9; Olson (1994) 32, though
some of the examples are speculative:€e.g., at 58 Strepsiades threatens to beat his slave, but without taking action; none of the jokes about Socrates’ appearance (146–7, 171–3) necessarily implies
baldness (see Dover (1968) xxxii); a kordax at 439–56 (proposed by Hubbard) is only a guess.
148
Thus the force of ἥδε ἡ κωμῳδία in 534, which prefigures the play’s “presence” in preparation for
Aristophanes’ description of it in 537–44. Cf. Olson (1994) 34.
147
206
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
(896, 943–4; cf. 545–8).149 But by a shift in the expected paradigm, sophistication as novelty is equated with much of what Aristophanes objects to,
while the more traditional perspective of the Better Argument is aligned
with the rarefied poetics espoused in the parabasis.150
In this contest of wisdom, the Better Argument defends the ideals of
the play as it is characterized in the parabasis. Renowned for his noble
virtues (959 ἤθεσι χρηστοĩς), the Better Argument is encouraged by the
chorus to describe his own physis (960 τὴν σαυτοῦ φύσιν εἰπέ); in this
way his self-presentation follows the model established in the parabasis,
where Aristophanes put his comedy on display and invited the audience to
admire its physis (537 ὡς δὲ σώφρων ἐστὶ φύσει σκέψασθ᾽).151 Not surprisingly, therefore, sōphrosynē stands out as a defining principle of the Better
Argument’s educational curriculum (Nu. 961–2):152
λέξω τοίνυν τὴν ἀρχαίαν παιδείαν ὡς διέκειτο¸
ὅτ᾽ ἐγὼ τὰ δίκαια λέγων ἤνθουν καὶ σωφροσύνη ᾽νενóμιστο.
Therefore, I shall describe the old form of education as it was
when I flourished by speaking the truth, and sōphrosynē prevailed.
His emphasis on this virtue is corroborated by the chorus, who in their
response to his speech praise “the sweet flower of modesty blooming on his
words” (1026–7 ὡς ἡδύ σου τοĩσι λóγοις | σῶφρον ἔπεστιν ἄνθος).153 The
major points made in illustration of the Better Argument’s education are
examples of modesty and self-control, virtues that preserve “the harmony
handed down from generations past” (968), protect a good reputation
(997), and keep one in the company of equally circumspect companions
(1006 μετὰ σώφρονος ἡλικιώτου). Drawing limits is important for both
the poetic and educational form of sōphrosynē. Thus the Better Argument’s
epideixis is punctuated by two sections in which he fervently defends his
position with a run of interdictions on behalf of proper behavior (977–83;
994–9), which in their tone and rhetorical effect are reminiscent of the
poetic proscriptions that defined the sōphrosynē attributed to Clouds in the
parabasis. Thus, like the circumspect poet who abjures the spectacle of
Cf. Bowie (1993) 132–3, who however neglects the implications of the sōphrosynē theme.
Edwards (1990), esp. 153–5, attends closely to these contradictions; cf. Noël (2000).
151
In both cases physis looks toward the inherently positive qualities of their characters. Rosen (1997)
409, suggests that the term reflects the notion of the play’s enduring physical existence beyond its
theatrical performance as a text.
152
The applicability of these comments to Aristophanes’ poetics is augmented by τὰ δίκαια λέγων,
which recalls the poet’s claims at Ach. 655, 661–2; cf. 500–1.
153
Cf. Bowie (1993) 110. Segal (1969) 171–4 discusses the chorus’ alignment with the Better
Argument.
149
150
Dramatizing recontestation: second efforts in Clouds
207
phalluses on stage in defense of the revised play, the Better Argument’s
curriculum encourages students to have a modest-sized phallus (1014),
which they are to keep out of the sight of others (973–4), even to the point
of wiping away any impression it might leave in the sand (975–6).154
By contrast, the Worse Argument rails against all discretion (1060–74).
Better accuses him of endorsing a lengthy “decree” (1019 ψήφισμα)155
and allowing his students to apply oil to draw attention to their genitals
(977–8), charges that are scarcely refuted in Worse’s response, since he
encourages students to use their phallus any way they like, regardless of
the consequences (1076–85). For him, physis represents not good birth and
rearing, which one can proudly display, but base impulses that are held in
check by social constraints (1078). With his mixed-up perspective on what
is praiseworthy and what is disgraceful (1020–1), the Worse Argument
refuses to acknowledge any humiliation in being publicly punished for
sexual escapades (1079–86); with the present audience, after all, he would
be in good company (1096–1100). The victory of the Worse Argument also
leads to further atrocities against the discriminating ethico-poetic values
attributed to the play by the poet. Strepsiades is now able to indulge in
hybris himself, when he drives off the second creditor with a goad (1297–
1300), in complete disregard of social convention and in pointed contradiction to the poetic principles laid down in the parabasis, where it is said that
no old man beating his fellow actor is featured in the present play (541–2).
More beatings follow and more lurk beyond them, as Strepsiades reaps the
harvest of his new ethic, when his relationship with Pheidippides turns
violent, and the boy promises to beat his mother as well in the future.156
Physical violence thus threatens to take over the stage action as it replaces
all other forms of social interaction when the legitimacy of beating in its
most disturbing form is made a point of detailed critical discussion in the
second agon.
The vision of Clouds held up to the audience in the parabasis has been
severely challenged by later developments, thanks to the outcome of
the newly composed first agon. Even so, Strepsiades’ surprise rejection
of Pheidippides€ – and by implication, of the Worse Argument he represents€– allows the play to realign itself with the Better Argument and
As Papageorgiou (2004) argues, far from undermining the position of the Better Argument, his
homoerotic references serve instead to activate (comically) an important social context in which
the ideal of sōphrosynē operated. Contrast Dover (1968) 977n. (a memorable note).
155
For the para prosdokian in place of “penis” after the list of physical attributes, see Dover (1968)
and Sommerstein (1982) ad loc.
156
Cf. Bowie (1993) 131–2.
154
208
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
prepares the way for a return to the poetic virtues of the parabasis. At
this moment, the chorus openly condemn Strepsiades’ infatuation with
criminal behavior; their strongly termed abjuration against ponēria (1455
πονηρὰ πράγματα; 1459 πονηρῶν ὄντ᾽ ἐραστὴν πραγμάτων) picks up
on the rejection of base jokes in the parabasis (542 πονηρὰ σκώμματα).
This revelation returns Strepsiades to a healthy respect for the traditional
gods (1461, 1468–80), with whose help he formulates a plan to destroy the
phrontistērion (1478–85) in order to put an end to its corrupting influence.
Thus the clouds’ ability to exact vengeance, applied to the reception of
the play in the revised second parabasis, is realized in the new finale amid
the torches and cries of pain (1490–3) that were likewise rejected in the
main parabasis (543). Strepsiades’ dream of the phrontistērion goes up in
the smoke of traditional comic topoi.157 There is irony here, but also some
justice, as the forms of poetic dissolution become the means of punishing
the advocates of social upheaval.
S om e c onc l us ions
The idea that Aristophanes’ revision of Clouds aimed at toning down the
sophisticated humor of the original play to make it more appealing to a
popular audience has had its advocates over the years.158 Some justification
for that understanding can be found in his remarks in the prologue of
Wasps the next year (54–66), which reflect a kind of poetic crisis the poet
found himself in as a result of his failure and suggest that charting a middle course between excessively low- and high-brow humor was now his
central objective. Thomas Hubbard has argued that Aristophanes’ plan for
the surviving Clouds along these lines is laid bare in the parabasis, where
the sōphrosynē proclaimed is characteristic of the original play alone and
makes the audience more aware of the difference of tone between it and
the “debased” revision.159 The philological arguments on which Hubbard’s
literal reading of the parabasis is based do not stand up to criticism.160 Still,
his general premise€– that Aristophanes’ critical thinking about the distinguishing characteristics of the revised play relative to the original formed
part of the new play’s thematic fabric€– makes sense when the paradigm
of a palinode is applied, and may be reflected in the patterned interaction
As noted already in Σ VEM Nu. 543a. Cf. Lys. 1216–20 for the comic trope of torches in stage
violence.
158
See, for instance, the references in Whitman (1964) 133 n. 40; O’Regan (1992) 130–1, 138–9.
159
Hubbard (1986); (1991) 91–8. O’Regan (1992), esp. 136–9, elaborates on Hubbard’s thesis.
160
Olson (1994).
157
Some conclusions
209
between the parabasis and the agons. While the high-water mark of sophospoetry supposedly achieved by the first Clouds looms in the background as
a constant point of reflection, the dynamic interplay between sophia and
sōphrosynē€– in poetry, as in ethics€– is circumscribed by the encoded poetics of the revised Clouds itself as an organizing component for the play’s
distinctive thematization of revision and recontestation.
Mirroring the narrative of the original Clouds’ defeat in the parabasis
(520–5), the first agon sees the defeat of Aristophanes’ poetics as they have
been recast in ethical terms (537–44), and leads to the infusion of mainstream comic elements supposedly left out by his more discriminating
taste. But the outcome of the second agon raises the possibility of a reversed
outcome. Here a straightforward reaffirmation of Aristophanes’ alleged
poetic ideals in their pure form is not at stake. The Worse Argument represents a union of two opposed extremes; his avant-garde intellectualism
unleashes behavior that is the antithesis of sophistication when measured
by Aristophanes’ poetic standards. As such, he simultaneously represents
both extreme positions set out and admonished against in the prologue
of Wasps in response to the failure of Clouds. If the first Clouds helped
solidify Aristophanes’ reputation as a sophisticated poet€– something that
probably carried with it the implication of being a bit too refined (hence
the self-criticism entailed in λίαν μέγα at V. 56)€– in recontesting his “most
sophisticated” play (Nu. 522; cf. V. 1044–7), he is at pains to show that he
is not so far out of balance. He willingly puts on the mask of intellectual
pretension in the revised parabasis, but he adds to it a quality that did
not lend itself as easily to the negative interpretation Cratinus apparently
offered the audience to discredit his young rival’s sophisticated brand of
comedy.161 For what triumphs in the end is something more sensible:€still
sophos, but not hollowly so, since it is combined with the good judgment
that comes from being sōphrōn as well.162 In this respect, the handling of
the two agons in the revised play is coordinated with the new parabasis to
bring out a modification in the stage persona of “intellectual poet” that
had attached itself to Aristophanes, through both his own efforts and
Cratin. fr. 342; this snub against intellectual pretension becomes more relevant if it belongs to
Pytine or later (O’Sullivan (2006)), but see above, p. 124, for the possibility that it amounts to
Cratinus’ response in Satyrs to his loss to Acharnians, which is included among Aristophanes’
program of sophisticated comedy at V. 61 (contrast Storey (2003a) 286–7, taking this last passage
to refer to Aristophanes’ Proagon).
162
On the wordplay, see Hubbard (1991) 95–6. But I agree with Olson (1994) 36, that sōphrosynē is
emphatically associated with the play as it stands before the intended audience of the revised play.
A similar rebuttal to charges of empty and dangerous intellectualism is found in the Mytilenian
Debate, in which Diodotos invokes sōphrosynē (Th. 3.42.5, 43.5, 44.1) to counter Cleon’s objections. For these attributes in encomia, see Dover (1974) 66–9.
161
210
Aristophanes’ Clouds-palinode
those of his rivals. Dramatic plot works together with the moment of competitive self-assertion in which Aristophanes proclaims his effort to recontest the earlier poetic agon. These points would have come across more
easily, if the final destruction of the phrontistērion had been added to the
revised play as a way of dispelling the impression, which a more ambiguous outcome in the original play had allowed to settle in the popular
mind, that Aristophanes was himself a keen advocate of the lessons taught
in that place.163 If that is correct even on a general level, Aristophanes’ situation bears more than a passing resemblance to that of Stesichorus in the
Palinode tradition. In composing his Clouds palinode, he takes up the very
theme he thought had created a rift between him and his audience, and
attempts to handle it in a way that will be more to their liking and thereby
restore their support of him in the agon.
163
╇ See especially Whitman (1964) 136–7; MacDowell (1995) 146–8.
ch apter 6
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
In previous chapters, I have attempted to identify the mark the poetic
agon left on Aristophanes’ comedies, not only by examining stray remarks
that directly invoke this feature of Athenian dramatic performance, but
by identifying themes deeply woven into the poetic fabric of the plays that
resonate with their competitive background. This relationship is made
more explicit in Frogs, in which an actual poetic contest forms the culminating sequence of events on which the outcome hinges. Performed at the
Lenaia of 405, Frogs responds to the general state of crisis in which Athens
found itself. The war against Sparta and her allies was going badly, for
Athens’ dwindling resources were impeding its ability to carry out military objectives. Adding gloom was the literary crisis that befell the city
with the deaths first of Euripides and then of Sophocles. Although their
degree of competitive success was very different, both men had been fixtures of the dramatic festivals for half a century. In an effort to articulate
the significance of the “desperate” cultural situation occasioned by their
deaths, in the first half of Frogs Aristophanes has the god of the Theater
himself, Dionysos, attempt to save Athenian tragedy by descending to
Hades to rescue Euripides. In the second half of the play, a change of plan
is forced upon the god, who no sooner arrives in Hades than his services
are required to decide whether Aeschylus or Euripides is the better poet.
Dionysos is accordingly installed as judge in a poetic agon whose stakes
are ultimately made to fit his original plan, since the victor will return
with him to Athens. An appropriately comic surprise obtains when, quite
contrary to his initial intention, Dionysos awards victory to Aeschylus.
Although originally conceived as a dubious act of theft, Dionysos’ retrieval
of a poet ends up taking place under the aegis of communal celebration
and with full acknowledgement of his theatrical authority. Moreover, the
problems introduced at the outset are resolved through the most legitimate form of selection possible, the poetic agon.
211
212
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
The discussion of Frogs that follows addresses the contribution of this
agon to the play in three ways. First, I argue that the thematic contribution of the agon is not restricted to the second half of the play, as is often
supposed, and that rather than marking a shift in overall conception, the
contest of Euripides and Aeschylus is a natural, if surprising, elaboration
of ideas established in the first half of the play.1 Second, I consider the way
the contest itself reflects back to the Athenians their own behavior and
attitudes as spectators and critics of dramatic poetry tasked with determining which poet best represents the ideals and interests of their city.
Finally, I attempt to understand Aristophanes’ investment in the poetic
agon of Aeschylus and Euripides through its implications for the Lenaia
contest in which he himself was competing.
Dion y s o s, g od of t h e T h e at e r
Like several other Aristophanic plays, Frogs opens with a scene that revels in comedy’s playful awareness of being performed before an audience.
Dionysos and Xanthias make their way on stage, the former wearing the
costume of Herakles atop his own traditional outfit, the latter riding a
donkey and carrying his master’s baggage on his shoulders. Xanthias is
the first to speak, and he wastes no time in raising a problem of direct relevance to the performance of their play (Ra. 1–2):
Master, may I say one of the usual things (τῶν εἰωθóτων)
the spectators (οἱ θεώμενοι) always laugh at?
With his concern for the audience’s reception of their performance,
Xanthias brings the roles of actors and spectators into the foreground, but
also addresses a concern that must have occupied Aristophanes and every
other poet again and again as they composed their plays.2 The process
of composition presented a series of critical decisions about what would
and would not find approval in the Theater. With this metapoetic theme
introduced, the dialogue between Dionysos and Xanthias follows a process of critical elimination, as Xanthias repeatedly shows his eagerness
to perform something from the established repertoire of comic routines
Though my understanding is ultimately quite different, Habash (2002) finds a similar unity in
Frogs based on roles Dionysos plays that are drawn from his own dramatic festivals.
2
Cf. Murray (1987) 150. Sommerstein (1996a) 157, emphasizes their identity as actors, while Slater
(2002) 184, sees audience and performer in Dionysos and Xanthias respectively. I simply point
out that actors do not decide what they will perform, but (generally speaking) only carry out the
wishes of the poet, whose task must therefore be emphasized; thus the references to rival poets at
13–14. Cf. Baier (2002) 191–2.
1
Dionysos, god of the Theater
213
based on physical discomfort, and Dionysos negates this impulse before
the slave can put his ideas into action. “I’m hard pressed” (3), “I’m being
crushed” (5), “I’m going to shit myself” (8), and “I’m going to fart” (10)
are all rejected. And no wonder, given Dionysos’ violent responses to the
tropes, which are bile (4), induce vomiting (11), and cause him to age at an
unnaturally rapid rate (18).
This scene is most often treated as another instance of Aristophanes
professing not to use the same loathsome comic routines he in fact falls
back on time and time again.3 This irony is part of the fun, but, as in any
literary tradition, one objective of Aristophanes’ deployment of familiar
material is to breathe new life into it.4 The humor of the Frogs prologue
depends on the avowedly sophisticated position Dionysos takes relative
to a subject which would strike many as unworthy of critical discussion.
In enforcing his discriminating tastes, moreover, Dionysos must resort to
the forbidden lexicon to silence his slave and delineate the dramatic possibilities available to them.5 At a more profound level, the scene involves
transforming comic tropes that rely on stage business and physical humor
into a witty discussion:€comic ergon becomes comic logos. The resulting
collision of high and low follows a reliable recipe for evoking the audience’s laughter, but the dialogue also presents elements of characterization
that are of central importance for the action that follows.
The Dionysos of this play€– who proclaims his identity soon enough (22),
although his costume may have made it apparent from the beginning6€– is
first and foremost the god of the Theater. Although at the moment he is, in
collusion with Xanthias, concerned for the experience of the audience (2 οἱ
θεώμενοι) as the poet anticipates it, he does not typically consider matters
from this side of the orchestra, but is himself a spectator at the performances (16 ὡς ἐγὼ θεώμενος). Indeed, his complaint that the stale routines
Xanthias favors result in him leaving the festival feeling more than one
year older (18) looks to his annual arrival in Athens to witness the competitions held in his honor.7 His status as festival honorand and divine patron
of the dramatic competitions renders Dionysos an ideal spectator, capable of holding deeply felt opinions on matters of performance€– the fruit,
See especially Hubbard (1991) 201; Slater (2002) 184.
Cf. Redfield (1990).
5
Their physical positions work toward the same objective:€ by walking himself and allowing
Xanthias to ride on the donkey (21–4), Dionysos keeps his slave from getting into a state of discomfort which might produce the kind of comic remarks he despises.
6
Herakles’ remarks at 45–7 make it clear that Dionysos’ traditional attire is imperfectly concealed.
7
For the implication “leaving the Theater” in ἀπέρχομαι in 18, see van Leeuwen (1896) ad loc.;
Slater (2002) 184.
3
4
214
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
we may gather, of long experience. In short, Dionysos is a stereotypical
theater-goer, since, however much his excessive sophistication makes him
an unwitting object of laughter, his pronouncements to Xanthias serve to
establish this persona. And in his disapproval of the hackneyed, implying a pretentious claim to a higher standard of entertainment, Dionysos
expresses opinions remarkably similar to those Aristophanes takes up elsewhere in his self-positioning against his rivals.8 Not surprisingly, therefore,
the god’s critical remarks are set in a competitive framework that likewise
reflects the poet’s perspective, as he denounces the kinds of performances
Aristophanes’ current rivals could be counted on to bring before the audience (13–14).9 Having the god of Athenian drama assert a preference for
Aristophanic comedy is a cheeky, though effective agonistic maneuver
with which to begin a play.
The opening dialogue thus situates the performance of Frogs within a
competitive atmosphere of which critical responses by the audience form
an essential component. It also brings Dionysos forward as a figure who
embodies the experience of drama in Athens.10 For the moment, this
aspect of Dionysos’ character is developed in connection with comedy
alone. But tragic drama soon receives attention as well, and with this shift
in genre the play’s central problem is presented. Only now is Dionysos’
initial seriousness shown to have a basis in the gravity of his enterprise. In
response to Herakles’ mockery of his mixed-up costume, Dionysos first
alludes to the desperate state of tragic drama by recalling how he was reading Euripides’ Andromeda when he was struck with longing for the nowdead poet (52–4). But reading good tragedy is cold comfort in comparison
to experiencing it on stage, as Dionysos knows. Thus it is that, prompted
by his longing, he has resolved to fetch Euripides back from Hades, adopting the costume of Herakles to guarantee his success in following in the
hero’s footsteps.11 A longing has set Dionysos in action, but his reasoning is not as irrational and emotional as this might suggest.12 For as he
E.g., Nu. 537–44; V. 56–61; Pax 739–51. Contrast Heiden (1991) 97.
Of the poets named, only Phrynichus was competing at the Lenaia of 405 (Hyp. I (c) Dover), but
Lykis and Ameipsias were both active in this period (see above, p. 185). Σ VMEΘBarb Ra. 13b found no
confirmation of Aristophanes’ allegations about Phrynichus.
10
Cf. Bierl (1991) 30; Slater (2002) 184. In his representative status, Dionysos can be compared to
Demos in Knights.
11
Although an indication of sophistication, Dionysos’ reading of tragedy is clearly a point of frustration for him. The implications of this are discussed below.
12
Lada-Richards (1999) 218–19, puts too fine a point on it by making selfishness the critical element
of Dionysos’ pothos for Euripides; aside from Dionysos already being established as representative of the theater community, his pothos is parallel to and ultimately connected with Athens’
city-wide pothos for Alcibiades (1424–5); cf. Sfyroeras (2008) 309–10. Intense longing for what
╇ 8
╇ 9
Dionysos, god of the Theater
215
explains, the current state of tragic drama has left him in need of a dexios
poet (71):€the good ones are no more, and those still alive are rotten (72).13
Dionysos’ decision to act is based on a sweeping evaluation of poets that
builds on his characterization in his dialogue with Xanthias. Among the
worthy are Sophocles (76–7), Agathon (83–5) and of course Euripides; few
Athenians would likely challenge this general assessment.14 Of the poets
Dionysos condemns, the sad state of the evidence€– arguably supported
by the very fact that they have been forgotten€– leaves us no choice but to
accept his judgment on Xenokles (86) and Pythangelos (87). What he says
of Sophocles’ son Iophon is of more interest.
To Herakles’ objection that Iophon is still alive, Dionysos readily admits
that he is “the only good thing left” (73–4). But there is room for hesitation, since the god has not determined beyond a shade of doubt that such
is actually the case (75). Consideration of Iophon is lost for the moment
in Herakles’ suggestion that Dionysos bring back Sophocles as clear and
away the best poet (76–7). It is this obvious objection that Iophon ultimately serves to forestall:€the verdict is still out on him (78–9), because it
remains to be seen whether he can do respectable work without his father’s
help. If Iophon proves a worthy heir to Sophocles’ poetic legacy, the blow
to drama occasioned by the latter’s death will be softened. The argument
breaks down upon reflection, but it distracts the audience long enough to
justify concentrating on Euripides as the poet of choice.15 For the characterization of Dionysos as god of the Theater, the important point is
that he has not yet really tested Iophon. With κωδωνίσω (79), Dionysos
implies a careful personal evaluation of the poet’s artistic ability;16 until
Iophon is found to “ring true,” there is a chance he will fall into the category of deplorable poets who cannot produce a real grape harvest (92)
and represent shrines for Muses fit only for swallows (93). In a word, such
poets are a disgrace to the profession (93 λωβηταὶ τέχνης) and disappear
13
14
15
16
is gone is all that need be implied (cf. Sfyroeras (2008) 302–3, who probably overemphasizes the
feminizing aspect of this term), and is given focus through the playful use of a funerary idiom in
Herakles’ response at 67; see also 84–5 with n. 26 below.
His remarks adapt a Euripidean line (fr. 565.2).
The view of Habash (2002) 10–11, who draws attention mainly to the buffoonish aspects of
Dionysos’ remarks, founders on this point, since comic though Dionysos may be, his critical
selections are on target.
Thus it was not simply a matter of tactfully dismissing Iophon, as Dover (1993) on 78–9 seems to
suggest. Note the further reason for passing over Sophocles in 80–2; Aristophanes addresses the
problem again once the agon is afoot (786–94). See Stevens (1955) 236. Gelzer (1960) 28–30, and
Hooker (1980) argue that Sophocles’ death required changes in Aristophanes’ plan for his play.
For the image, see Taillardat (1962) 148–9. Dionysos’ metaphor anticipates the false-coinage
metaphor of the parabasis (723).
216
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
from the stage after one brief, unseemly dalliance with tragedy (94–5),
whereas what Dionysos needs is someone “productive” (96 γóνιμον) who
can manage a memorable expression (97 ῥῆμα γενναĩον) that challenges
expectations (99 παρακεκινδυνευμένον).17
A good deal of what Dionysos says in this scene is humorous,18 but
nearly all of it solidifies the characterization of him as a creature of the
Theater, whose deepest concerns are bound to the vitality of the institution. As in the opening scene with Xanthias, Dionysos comes across as
a critical spectator of dramatic poetry, of enough intellectual pretension
to carry copies of plays with him when he is away from the Theater, and
familiar enough with current poets to be able to rate their abilities. Many
in the audience might question the choice of Euripides over Sophocles,
and some, like Herakles (103–6), might even feel disgust at Dionysos’
Euripidean quotations.19 But to be fair, Dionysos seems tacitly to admit
Sophocles’ superiority; his choice of Euripides depends not just on a sense
of his poetic merits, but on the fact that Sophocles’ legacy may already be
secure (i.e. via the career of Iophon), while the dubious nature of Dionysos’
plan also calls for a reliably shady accomplice (80–2).20 Where matters of
poetry are concerned, Dionysos is confident about his tastes and opinions,
as also about how to formulate his plan, and he therefore asks Herakles
kindly not to occupy his mind (105).21
As noted above, Dionysos’ intention of “testing” Iophon’s poetic ability
is especially important for the force it lends to the portrayal of him as an
authoritative literary critic. But with this claim he also draws within his
sphere of personal responsibility and expertise the process of communal
examination that would in reality be carried out in the Theater by representative judges under the scrutiny of the entire audience. Drama in the
fullest sense of its context and significance for the audience is mapped
onto Dionysos as a microcosm of this activity, and the association of his
See Denniston (1927) for Aristophanes’ possible deployment of technical literary critical terminology here and throughout the play.
18
Note especially his less than accurate rendition of what Dionysos himself represents as being
among the more memorable of Euripides’ parakekinduneumena (Ra. 101–2 ~ Hipp. 612).
19
Trusting Herakles’ judgment (see e.g., Bowie (1993) 238; Habash (2002) 10), it may be argued,
hardly puts us in the company of a reliable critic, since his expertise is in the realm of food (62–5),
as Dionysos is quick to remind him (107). Moreover, Herakles’ associations with lowbrow humor
(e.g., Cratin. fr. 346; V. 60; Pax 741) cannot be overlooked; cf. Olson (2007) 40–1. Padilla (1992),
esp. 366–7, 375–7, argues that Herakles’ tastes anticipate the judgment in favor of Aeschylus.
Dover (1993) 10, is more balanced.
20
As Bierl (1991) 33, observes, Dionysos’ plan bears some resemblance to the intrigue-plots of
Euripides’ later plays; cf. Padilla (1992) 362–3, Sfyroeras (2008).
21
Predictably using Euripidean ideas to express himself; see Dover (1993) ad loc.
17
Dionysos, god of the Theater
217
divine patronage and the implications of the festive experience of tragedy
for the polis remain intact, despite modern assertions that Aristophanes’
Dionysos, in his initial appearance at least, divorces theater from the
community.22 On general grounds, it would have been unnatural for
Athenians to dissociate dramatic literature from the life of their city; their
experience of drama was limited to communal festive gatherings in honor
of Dionysos, whose presence boded well for the city’s continuing prosperity according to the logic of cult.23 For this basic assumption to be overturned by Dionysos’ objectives would require emphatic signals, whereas
numerous details rather reinforce the impression that the relationship
between god, drama, and city is operative from the start of Aristophanes’
play. Far from demonstrating his selfish motivations, Dionysos’ personal
consultation of the text of Andromeda underscores his dissatisfaction
with reading tragedy rather than experiencing the work of a living poet.
That understanding follows naturally from the emphasis he puts on his
usual experience of comedy as a spectator during his annual visits to the
festival (16–18), by which he portrays himself as a typical member of the
audience. The implication that Dionysos wants poetry on stage is put in
its communal and civic context by his criticism of contemporary tragic
poets. His objection that they receive one chorus and then disappear (94
χορὸν λάβῃ) alludes to the official democratic procedures, by which a
poet applied to the relevant archon for the privilege of public performance at a state sponsored festival;24 Dionysos’ criticism is that they do
so only once, whereas tragedy needs poets who obtain choruses again
and again, which is to say that the remedy looks toward a revitalization
of the regular conditions of production.25 Moreover, whereas mention of
the tragic “chorus” already highlights the performative essence of tragedy, it also concentrates on the contribution citizen choruses, working
cooperatively and in unison, made to a dramatic production. Thus the
machinery of civic involvement in tragic drama€ – as organizers, sponsors, performers and spectators€– is fully affirmed by Dionysos’ remarks,
and his Athenocentric attitude is evidenced further by what he says of
Agathon, whose departure from the city (83–4) renders him as good as
Above all, Segal (1961), whose understanding informs later discussions, e.g., Lada-Richards
(1999), esp. 216–19. Edmonds (2004) 120–3 likewise focusses on the identification of Dionysos
and the city.
23
Cf. Spineto (2005) 227–8; Goldhill (1990).
24
See the notes of van Leeuwen (1896); Dover (1993); Sommerstein (1996a); cf. Pickard-Cambridge
(1968) 84.
25
Hence too, the implicit acknowledgement of Sophocles’ superiority, i.e., as a star of the dramatic
competitions.
22
218
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
dead in Dionysos’ reckoning.26 Taken together, these passages demonstrate that Dionysos’ concern and the comic claim underlying the plot,
namely that tragedy is on the wane€– is in fact completely moribund€–
is based on his experience of performances in the Theater, during the
festivals, in Athens. Dionysos’ “personal” quest is accordingly symbolic
shorthand for a community crisis, and his future enjoyment of tragedy is
closely linked to the festive experience of the Athenians.
Dionysos’ associations as theater-god, theater-audience and theatercritic, brought out in the opening scenes, become important in the second
half of the play when the god judges the poetic agon in Hades. Charles
Segal thus made an important contribution when he identified Dionysos’
character as a unifying element in the play, in response to criticism that
viewed Frogs as thematically divided by the parabasis and to that extent
incoherent. For Segal, the aspect of Dionysos that binds the play together
is the notion of character development, “how the rather timorous and
almost despicable figure of the first part of the play can serve as arbiter in
a contest of the gravest consequences at its end.”27 But Segal’s portrayal of
a buffoonish Dionysos in the first half all but ignores the treatment of the
god as idealized spectator and concentrates on how he appears during his
katabasis.28 This is thus an unbalanced approach to the god’s character,
since it fails to take account of the opening of the play, in which Dionysos
asserts his identity, and attaches special significance to a moment when
the god is not fully in character and his identity is stretched to the limits, a point impressed on the audience in an appropriately theatrical way
by Dionysos’ ridiculously failed attempt to assume Herakles’ identity
through dramatic impersonation.29 As I argue below, far from developing
significantly, when he reenters after the parabasis Dionysos falls back into
character and reclaims the associations he initially displayed.
The agon nonetheless comes as a surprise, and its outcome represents an
important change, insofar as Dionysos abandons his original predilection
for Euripides and favors Aeschylus instead. This change of plan depends on
As Dover (1993) observes, ποθεινὸς τοῖς φίλοις (84) applies to Agathon a familiar description of
the dead; cf. the pun in 85. For Euripides’ supposed sojourn in Macedon, see Scullion (2003). Cf.
Wilson (2000) 279–302, for evidence of the chorēgia beyond Athens.
27
Segal (1961) 208. For a recent alternative effort to find unity, see Albuquerque (2003).
28
Apart from the moment where Dionysos makes his selection of Aeschylus (which comes rather as
a surprise), there is no real difference in Dionysos’ behavior as theater-critic between the opening
scenes and the agon. In both scenes he vacillates between foolishness and seriousness. See Segal
(1961) 214, and for his behavior in the agon, Lada-Richards (1999) 280–3.
29
See Konstan (1995) 66–7; Habash (2002) 2–4. Edmonds (2004) esp. 113–17, offers a critique of the
focus by Segal and others on initiation patterns in Frogs.
26
A Dionysian katabasis:€the Eleusinia transformed
219
Dionysos’ response to events in the second half of the play. But the very fact
that the poetic agon introduces a twist into the god’s plans draws attention to a further facet of his theatrical character. At the beginning of the
play, Dionysos represents not just the Athenian audience but specifically the
audience of the final years of the fifth century.30 He is the sum of theatrical experience in Athens, but in the sense of the tragic genre’s evolution.
This helps account for his special attachment to Euripides, who must have
been widely regarded as among the most innovative of recent tragedians,
and who from the perspective of Aristophanic comedy had symbolized
contemporary tragedy for the last two decades.31 Dionysos’ conversations
with Xanthias and Herakles show that, other than Euripides, only “modern” poets figure in his thoughts about drama. The distorted reflection of
the audience witnessing Frogs performed thus comes into sharper focus as
Dionysos presents a caricatured image of their moment in theater history.
Thus portrayed, he sets himself a task that is relatively straightforward in
conception, if daunting in its fulfillment:€to rescue from Hades the poet
who most fully and notoriously embodies contemporary tragedy. Dionysos’
willingness to undertake a heroic task at odds with his own abilities (hence
the Herakles costume) testifies in comic terms to both the immensity of the
crisis to which he is responding and his commitment to the continued vitality of the Theater. Absent from his thinking, however, and held in reserve
by Aristophanes until its proper dramatic moment, is Dionysos’ fantastic
realization that visiting Hades will result in a choice of poets of far greater
depth than his (over)developed critical tastes allowed him to consider in the
light of day. This outcome depends on Dionysos’ miscalculation of the type
of adventure he is in for, as becomes clear in the course of his journey.
A Dion y s i a n k a t a b a s i s :€
t h e E l eus i n i a t r a nsf or m e d
Many efforts have been made to identify political and cultic themes introduced during Dionysos’ descent to the Underworld that anticipate and
thereby connect these scenes with developments in the second half of the
play.32 The scenes are also encoded with a different cultural paradigm, one
Cf. Bierl (1991) 29–30; contrast Lada-Richards (1999) 223.
Thus Dionysos’ remark on Euripides’ adventurous mode of thought (99).
For political interpretations, see especially Vaio (1985) and Bierl (1991); for cult and ritual, Segal
(1961) 208–17; Whitman (1964) 232–3; Reckford (1987) 408; Moorton (1989); Padilla (1992); Bowie
(1993) 228–53; Konstan (1995) 61–74; Lada-Richards (1999), esp. 45–122. For the katabasis theme
in comedy generally, see Melero and Martí (2000).
30
31
32
220
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
directly relevant to the ideas activated by Dionysos’ characterization in the
opening scenes, and that points toward the fruition of these ideas in the
poetic competition. Several features of the katabasis already show signs of
its being structured as a journey to an imagined theater of the dead, where
Dionysos will experience the sort of spectacle expected in that venue. His
fixation on Euripides prevents him from conceiving any possibility other
than that he will steal that poet away. But alongside details that correlate
his travels with a journey to the dramatic festivals, Dionysos’ encounters
with the choruses of frogs and initiates introduce themes of a poetic past,
bringing his concentration on modern drama into question early on and
setting the stage for a poet like Aeschylus to emerge.
The first point has been ably discussed by Niall Slater,33 who suggests
that Herakles’ house should be identified with the hero’s shrine near
the Diomeian Gate, while the chorus of frogs (211–19) plots Dionysos’
path along the Ilissos River until he reaches his shrine ἐν Λίμναις, where a
Lenaian theater was located.34 Even if we disregard this final suggestion,
several further details argue in favor of Slater’s general interpretation. To
gain entrance to the Underworld, Herakles explains (136–41), Dionysos
will need to make a voyage by sea on Charon’s boat for a fee of two obols,
which the god duly hands over when his crossing is complete (270). As
Slater and others point out, this doubles Charon’s traditional fee, but was
the cost of admission to the Theater, according to Demosthenes.35 Charon’s
summons to those waiting their turn to be ferried across the river may also
activate a backdrop of festival experience:€“Who’s for a rest from troubles
and cares? Who’s for the Field of Forgetting?” (185–6 τίς εἰς ἀναπαύλας ἐκ
κακῶν καὶ πραγμάτων; | τίς εἰς τὸ Λήθης πεδίον;). This rosy description
stands in stark contrast to the image of death in the continuation of this
announcement (186–7),36 and Charon’s optimism comes close to Pericles’
characterization of Athenian festivals as affording “many opportunities for
escape from troubles (τῶν πóνων πλείστας ἀναπαύλας) through contests
and sacrifices, the pleasure of which banishes the hardship of their daily
lives” (Th. 2.38.1).37
Slater (2002) 185–7.
In these points Slater depends on Hooker (1960) on the Athenian geography in Frogs and his own
argument for a Lenaian theater in Slater (1986).
35
D. 18.28; cf. Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 265–6; Csapo and Slater (1994) 287–8. The connection
with this passage is discussed by Rogers (1919) 140n.; Whitman (1964) 235; Hubbard (1991) 201;
Sommerstein (1996a) 168; Slater (2002) 185. For possible broader implications of the entrance fee
and festival experience, see Sommerstein (1997b) 66–7; Wilson (1997) 97–8.
36
See Dover (1993) 214–15.
37
Closely related ideas are connected with Dionysos:€esp. E. Ba. 278–85, 376–85. Bowie (1993) 235 n.
40, and Lada-Richards (1999) 87, see a forward reference to Eleusinian initiation.
33
34
A Dionysian katabasis:€the Eleusinia transformed
221
Dionysos’ reasons for consulting Herakles (108–15) are more noteworthy in light of Charon’s description:€to find out what xenoi are there,
as well as about the harbors, bakers, brothels, springs, streets and accommodations. The heroic nature of its attendant dangers notwithstanding,
Dionysos treats the journey as an excursion to an unfamiliar city, where he
envisions having his needs and desires met by the local inhabitants. In this
his experience is comparable to that of the visitors who came to Athens
each spring to celebrate the City Dionysia,38 and the notion of xenia thus
activated was likewise fundamental to the worship of Dionysos at the festival.39 Certainly the preliminary event, known as the eisagōgē (“leading
in”), reenacted his mythical arrival in Attica by way of Thebes as a foreign
god, in preparation for his reception and the installation of his cult image
in the Theater.40 The contribution of these elements to Dionysos’ katabasis
would be more pronounced, if the City Dionysia were firmly connected
with vase representations of a Dionysian procession in which the god is
drawn along seated in a ship-cart,41 since the latter provide a likely solution for the staging of Dionysos’ crossing of the Styx in Charon’s boat.42 At
the least, this adaptation of cult iconography for the god’s nautical travels
from abroad to portray his arrival in Hades shows Aristophanes reorganizing familiar aspects of Dionysian cult and festival celebration to suit an
alter-aspect of the god and his myths as they can be made to apply to his
comically imagined descent into the land of the dead.43
Jay-Robert (2000) 25–6, takes a different view. For tourism and the Dionysia, see Casson (1994)
80–2, 87–91, where the present passage figures in a discussion of a traveler’s experience. For the
international character of the City Dionysia, see Ach. 502–6; Goldhill (1990). Even the Rural
Dionysia may have depended on tourism from beyond the individual deme; Jones (2004) 141–2,
152–7.
39
That the reception of Dionysos with the rite of xenismos was an integral and original element
of the City Dionysia is argued by Sourvinou-Inwood (1994); (2003) 67–140; cf. Spineto (2005)
221–2.
40
Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 59–63; Parke (1977) 126–8. A further point of contact with Dionysian
myth is implied with the supposition of the ancient hypothesis (Hyp. I (b) Dover) that Herakles’
home places the opening scene in Thebes; in that case, the starting point of Dionysos’ journey in
Frogs and in the foundation myth of the City Dionysia were the same.
41
LIMC s.v. Dionysos nos. 827–9. Most recently, Steinhart (2004) 94–5, argues for the City
Dionysia; for the Anthesteria, see Deubner (1932) 102–3:€Parke (1977) 109; cf. Pickard-Cambridge
(1968) 12–13:€Burkert (1983) 201 n. 26. In 1480 Pluto offers to entertain poet and god at a feast that
represents an epinikia celebration before the god “sails away” (πρὶν ἀποπλεῖν), their ostensible
destination being Athens and the Dionysian festivals; cf. Biles (2007) 35 n. 92.
42
Reckford (1987) 409–10; Bierl (1991) 37; Dover (1993) 212–13; Habash (2002) 6; Slater (2002) 186.
Marshall (1996) 257–9, considers the staging based on available theatrical devices. Wilson (1974)
argues for Aristophanes’ dependence on Dionysos’ involvement in a rowing scene in Eupolis’
Taxiarchs; cf. Allison (1983) 11–13.
43
Cf. Lada-Richards (1999) 14, 62–4.
38
222
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
Any ambivalence in the associations discussed above is dispelled by
the metatheatrical implications of what happens next. No sooner does
Dionysos pay the fee to enter this land of pleasure and disembark, than
he rejoins Xanthias and asks if they are in the place Herakles mentioned
(145–51), where all the criminals and other villains are found. As they
gaze out at the Theater, they confirm their arrival (273–6).44 The audience become the denizens of the Underworld; better put, the denizens of
the Underworld are already in their seats and awaiting a performance.45
Dionysos’ fictional journey has intersected with the one that brought the
audience to the Theater, and in due course a poetic agon will also take
place on stage.
In the preceding examples, a cluster of ideas and images associated
with Dionysos are loosely (re)configured at the imaginary level of the plot.
Aristophanes’ portrayal of the chorus of Eleusinian initiates depends on a
similar effect. The choice of identity for this chorus is adequately explained
by their association with death and life after death, and by the humorous
extension of these ideas to Dionysos’ project of bringing a dead poet back
to the world of the living. But although the Eleusinian Mysteries provided
the primary model,46 other elements from Dionysian and Orphic cult
have been incorporated to create what Lada-Richards describes as “the literary remolding of a ritual fusion.”47 The audience thus see the dead cast
in a world defined only by the breadth of popular Greek notions about
death, in order to evoke an appropriately funereal backdrop for the plot.
Exactitude in the representation of religious cult for its own sake is not
Aristophanes’ concern, but rather how these elements could be combined
to create meaning for his play.48 To appreciate his creative distortion of
this material, the best comparison is perhaps the characterization of the
phrontistērion in Clouds, where Aristophanes likewise borrows the cultural paradigm of mystery cult, but modifies it, in this case to construct a
humorous version of sophistic education.49 Eleusinian ideas undoubtedly
Slater (2002) 187.
The conflation is felt again at 771–6, where the villains of the Underworld support Euripides.
46
See especially Graf (1974) 40–50; Bowie (1993) 228–30. Tucker (1904) and Hooker (1960) seek
a connection with the Lesser Mysteries. Byl (2000) examines the evidence for the Eleusinian
Mysteries throughout the Aristophanic corpus.
47
Lada-Richards (1999) 49–50; cf. Horn (1970) 121–2; Zimmermann (1985–7) vol. 1, pp. 123–4;
Bowie (1993) 230–4.
48
See Sommerstein (1996a) on 319 and 320, who rightly points out that the threat of punishment for
revealing central tenets of the mysteries limited Aristophanes’ treatment.
49
Byl (1980); Marianetti (1992) 41–75. So too in Thesmophoriazusae the cult setting on the Pnyx
results in the comically envisioned political operation of the festival; see esp. Th. 295–311 with
Austin and Olson (2004).
44
45
A Dionysian katabasis:€the Eleusinia transformed
223
inform the scene in Frogs and create their own meaning for the play,50 but
the appurtenances of cult worship again offer a framework from which to
generate a distinct comic prototype. Among the elements infused into the
Eleusinian framework, features drawn from the ambience of Dionysian
festival celebration make a significant contribution.
During the parodos, the chorus focus attention almost exclusively on
Iakchos, the god of the Eleusinian procession, rather than on Demeter or
Persephone.51 It is generally agreed that Dionysos was associated with Iakchos;
he could be referred to as such, and the connection was supported by the
Dionysiac atmosphere that dominated the Eleusinian procession.52 In this
respect the overwhelming impression created by the parodos is that this celebration of the Mysteries is first and foremost in honor of Dionysos himself,
with emphasis on his connection to choral performance.53 Although in strict
cultic terms their identities may have remained distinct,54 for my purposes the
important point is that in a comically imagined Eleusinian land of the dead
Iakchos stood ready to hand as a counterpart of Dionysos and Dionysiac celebration. That approach makes sense in light of what the initiates do in Frogs.
Reenacting the procession in preparation for the rites at Eleusis makes little sense for the initiates once they are in Hades;55 Aristophanes takes the
more public aspect of the cult to secure associations with an afterlife, but the
chorus’ specific activity might instead be formulated on the cult’s protreptic
assertion that even in death initiates enjoyed many of the pleasures available
to them in life. Hence Pindar speaks of initiates busy with horses, athletics,
games and music, and goes on to refer to perpetual sacrifices burning on
the altars of the gods.56 This description of a rich life of continued athletic,
intellectual and religious pursuits is reflected in Herakles’ description of the
initiates’ “bright” afterlife (154–7); the sound of flutes, fragrant groves, blessed
bands of worshippers and the clapping of hands attest to an enviable afterlife,
See especially Bowie (1993) 228–53.
Demeter is addressed directly at 385–93 (cf. 440–7), and Persephone may lie behind the appeal
to a goddess as “the Savior” at 377–82, though Athena may be intended instead; cf. Dover (1993)
378n. Otherwise, the procession focuses on Iakchos from beginning to end; cf. Radermacher
(1954) 184.
52
S. Ant. 1152, cf. 1119–21; in the cultic summons of Dionysos to the Lenaia he was addressed as
“Semele’s son, wealth-giving Iakchos” (ΣRVEΘBarb Ra. 479c). On these connections, see Deubner
(1932) 125; Graf (1974) 51–8; Burkert (1983) 279; Clinton (1992) 64–7; Bowie (1993) 232–3, and
233–4 for Dionysian coloring in the procession.
53
326, 331–2, 334–6, 345, 351–3, 396–7, 398–9, 403, 407–8, 413.
54
Clinton (1992) 66.
55
Their completed initiation is directly acknowledged at 158 and 318; cf. Dover (1993) 61. Hooker
(1960) draws a different conclusion from this observation.
56
Pi. frr. 129–31 Maehler, and compare the description in Plu. fr. 178 Sandbach; cf. Burkert (1987b)
91–2; Bowie (1993) 231.
50
51
224
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
by portraying them in a state of festival celebration, something Herakles’
comparative “as here” (155 ὥσπερ ἐνθάδε) perhaps helps establish by referring
to the Lenaian festival. Moreover, while the auloi and even the clapping have
a place at the dramatic festivals, there is a distinctly Dionysian ring to thiasoi, and the initiates accordingly describe themselves as thiasōtai (327) in the
parodos as they invoke the Dionysian Iakchos.57
Apart from revealing the Dionysian characterization of the chorus,
these points suggest that strict recourse to features of Eleusinian initiation
to explain the chorus’ activity may be an overly determined approach, as
opposed to allowing their Eleusinian identity to serve as a basis for the
joys that await the initiated in the afterlife. The Dionysian resonances
gain force as the parodos continues, and concentrate on the poetic and
even dramatic nature of the chorus’ activity, with the implication that,
in this comic Underworld, theater is associated with Dionysos in his
Eleusinian identity and is to be experienced within a fancifully modified Eleusinian frame of festive pleasures.58 This impression is created at
several points in the initiates’ procession, but is presented most forcefully in the chorus-leader’s prorrhēsis (354–71).59 Although the passage
is often treated as a relocated parabasis because of its poetic form (anapestic tetrameter) and some points of subject matter,60 the chorus-leader
speaks in character throughout, without hinting at either the identity
of Aristophanes or the reception of the play in its immediate agonistic circumstances. Literary critique, political advice and personal abuse
are the proper substance of a parabasis,61 but they are only parabatic
when they express something positive about Aristophanes and his play.62
On the centrality of the aulos to the City Dionysia, see Nu. 311–13 and Wilson (1999) 75–8, further
comments in Wilson (2004) 272–7; for the thiasos, Dover (1993) 156n. The audience’s applause is
memorably referred to in Cratin. fr. 360. Sommerstein (1996a) 157n., explains the present passage by referring to Lys. 1318–19 (κρóτον χορωφελήταν, a hapax) for the sense “to help the dance
along,” i.e., of bystanders keeping the beat. But a meta-competitive force would be appropriate
in these closing lines, i.e., applause that helps the chorus win the contest; thus the krotos at Pl. R.
492b; Lg. 700c; Men. Sam. 735; Ael. VH 2.13 = Ar. test. 32.23–5.
58
Somewhat differently Lada-Richards (1999) 224–5. My claim is not that of Tierney (1935), who
believes that the parodos faithfully represents an authentic pompē of the Lenaia. In conflating
the Eleusinian Mysteries with Dionysian dramatic festivals, Aristophanes may have been helped
by the fact that Eleusis hosted one of the more important Dionysia outside of Athens, important
enough that Aristophanes and Sophocles seem to have staged plays there (IG I3 970).
59
Cf. e.g., Baier (2002) 202–3. Compare Medea’s tweaking of the prorrhēsis formula:€ E. Med.
1053–5.
60
Whitman (1964) 230–1; Strauss (1966) 246; Horn (1970) 137; Zimmermann (1985–7) vol. 1, 125;
Reckford (1987) 415–17; Dover (1993) 239; Dobrov (2001) 149–50. Absence of anapests in the
actual parabasis is taken to support the interpretation; see further below.
61
Zimmermann (1985–7) vol. 1, 125.
62
Sifakis (1971) 40:€“The object of the eulogy of the poet, which is what [anapests and pnigos] are, is
clearly to gain victory in the dramatic contest.”
57
A Dionysian katabasis:€the Eleusinia transformed
225
To the extent that the prorrhēsis of Frogs advances the agenda of any
poet, it is that of one who had long since departed from the stage, a
point I will return to momentarily. Parabatic coloring is thus all that
can be fairly attributed to this passage, the primary purpose of which
is exposition of the plot by further establishing the chorus’ identity and
present activity for the audience.63 By fulfilling the cultic function of
enjoining holy silence and warding off those unfit to witness or participate in the chorus’ ritual activities, the chorus-leader qua hierophant
thus offers clear insights into the nature of the envisioned celebration
and its significance for Aristophanes’ play.64
The prorrhēsis begins by emphasizing the notion of choral performance.
The celebrants are unified in their identity as a chorus of performers (354
τοĩς ἡμετέροισι χοροĩσιν) in sacred rites of the noble Muses (356 γενναίων
ὄργια Μουσῶν). The orgia automatically bring to mind the Eleusinian
background,65 but their grounding in mousikē connects them with an ambience focused primarily on poetic performance. Much the same effect is
achieved by forbidding those “who have not seen or danced” (356 μήτ̓ εἶδεν
μήτ᾿ ἐχóρευσεν) to participate in the rites; the visual emphasis of the first
term seems to allude to the revelations that were central to the process of
initiation into the cult,66 while the latter again places these within a frame
of choral performance. Some limited and mostly late evidence implies that
ritual dance contributed to the Eleusinian program,67 although it is surely
a mischaracterization to believe that it was so prominent in the initiatory
rites that they could be thought of as a primary venue for witnessing choral poetry in performance. On the other hand, the organizing logic of
the Frogs passage repeatedly connects elements drawn from Eleusinian
worship to dramatic performances at the Dionysia.68 Those implications
emerge more fully in the comment that follows the focus on chorality in
the opening verses (Ra. 357):
μηδὲ Κρατίνου τοῦ ταυροφάγου γλώττης Βακχεĩâ•›̓ ἐτελέσθη
nor been “initiated” into the Bacchic rites of Cratinus the
â•… Bull-eater’s tongue.
As recognized by Hubbard (1991) 205, although he too treats the passage as a reconfigured
parabasis.
64
Rosen (2007) 29–32, similarly discusses the conflation of ritual and comic mockery in this
passage.
65
See hCer. 476–8:€ὄργια … σεμνά, with Richardson (1974) 474–6n.
66
hCer. 480 ὄλβιος ὃς τάδ᾿ ὄπωπεν (cf. δεῖξε at 474), with Richardson (1974) 314.
67
Discussed by Lada-Richards (1999) 99–100; Hardie (2004), esp. 14–21; cf. Richardson (1974)
214–15.
68
Cf. Zimmermann (1985–7) vol. 1, 124–5, who focusses on the parabatic blend.
63
226
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
Here ἐτελέσθη is unmistakably drawn from the mystic frame, but the
projection of these themes onto the ambience of dramatic performance
in a Dionysian frame, through the transference of Dionysos’ epithets
(ταυροφάγου, Βακχεĩα)69 onto the great comic poet of the previous
generation, is likewise unmistakable. The image of Cratinus’ vigorous
tongue fits awkwardly in the Eleusinian context, in which refraining
from open discourse was a fundamental concern (hCer. 478–9); and when
an interdiction against careless speech is offered in the next line (358 ἢ
βωμολóχοις ἔπεσιν χαίρει μὴ ̓ν καιρῷ τοῦτο ποιοῦσιν), it has the ring of
Aristophanes’ criticism of comic triviality and recalls Dionysos’ opening
repudiation of the theatrical atrocities of his poetic rivals.70 It is perhaps
in the spirit of comic abuse that the chorus-leader next inveighs against
various dubious political activities (359–65). But the stalwart defense of
Athens’ interests throughout this section may also evoke the rituals of
polis identity and communality that featured at the City Dionysia.71 In
any event, the discussion soon returns to themes drawn from the dramatic festivals, when the ban from the chorus’ celebrations is extended
to anyone who defiled Hekate’s offerings while singing along with cyclic
choruses (366 κυκλίοισι χοροĩσν ὑπᾴδων). Mockery of the dithyrambic
poet Kinesias is certain, since the same ridicule is directed against him
at Ec. 329–30, so that elements of the dramatic festivals are again intertwined with the Eleusinia, activated here by mention of Hekate.72 The
passage is rounded out with a final assertion of the Dionysian context
(Ra. 367–8):
ἢ τοὺς μισθοὺς τῶν ποιητῶν ῥήτωρ ὢν εἶτ᾿ ἀποτρώγει¸
κωμῳδηθεὶς ἐν ταĩς πατρίοις τελεταĩς ταĩς τοῦ Διονύσου
or who, as a politician, tried to nibble away at the poets’ wages,
having been ridiculed in the ancestral rites of Dionysos.
Now the rites are explicitly said to belong to the god of the Theater in
his capacity as patron of poets, a point likewise made clear by the reference to comedy’s privilege of abusing politicians, which the chorus-leader
thus vindicates. Indeed, the defense of the poets’ state wages implies that
For taurophagos, see S. fr. 668; cf. Dover (1993) 357n., for the association of bulls with Dionysos.
Cf. Hubbard (1991) 204.
Goldhill (1990) 104–5; Cole (1993) 29; Rhodes (2003). Cf. Pluto’s parting injunction to Aeschylus
to save “our city” (1500–1).
72
On the identification of Kinesias, see Dover (1993) 366n. For Hekate’s association with Eleusinian
myth and cult, see hCer. 24–5, 438–40, with Richardson (1974) 155–7.
69
70
71
A Dionysian katabasis:€the Eleusinia transformed
227
the organization of performances in Hades operates much as it does in
Athens.
The prorrhēsis thus seeks to create an audience for the initiates’ sacred
celebration that not only enjoys theatrical and musical entertainment,
but views this activity with awe and devotion filtered through the reverence the chorus derive from their Eleusinian identity. Mention of
Muses, Dionysos, poets and poetry€– especially comedy, but also dithyramb€– shows the lengths to which Aristophanes has gone to characterize
the initiates’ activity as distinctly poetic and dramatic, and implies that a
chthonic counterpart of the dramatic festivals is afoot in their experience
of a blessed afterlife.73 In due course, therefore, Dionysos joins the procession himself (414–15), when the chorus perform the kind of ritualized
abuse (416–30) that occurred in Dionysiac processions and became a core
feature of the comic genre, referred to prominently in the recollection of
Cratinus just before.74 Once again, the Eleusinia offer a point of comparison for this mockery in the gephyrismos, with the difference that in Frogs it
is the chorus who perform the abusive song, rather than bystanders ridiculing members of the procession.75
Others have attempted to explain this aggregation of competing ritual and performative contexts by dissecting the initiates’ parodos into
moments when the chorus perform in character as initiates and others
when they speak in the mildly disruptive manner typical of comedy,
reflecting on their performance as a chorus at the Lenaia.76 But the interweaving of the two frames throughout the parodos, and especially in the
prorrhēsis, militates against this approach, since the effect seems rather to
be to join them into a novel comic composite. Indeed, the example that
Even the torchlight procession of the Eleusinia (Ra. 340–4, 350) has its counterpart in the eisagōgē
of the City Dionysia:€IG II2 1006.12–13; see Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 60; Csapo and Slater (1994)
111.
74
Dionysos’ unification with the procession is marked by his implied acknowledgment (414–15) of
the chorus’ summons of him through Iakchos just before (398–413), by their invitation to him
(416; cf. Dover (1993) ad loc.), and by the extension of the chorus’ song (416–30) in their dialogue
with Dionysos (431–9). For ritual abuse and Dionysiac processions, see Pickard-Cambridge (1968)
36; Cole (1993) 32–3.
75
For the relationship to the gephyrismos, see Reckford (1987) 411; Bowie (1993) 239–40; LadaRichards (1999) 98; Rosen (2007) 30–1; cf. Henderson (1975) 16–17. The difference between the
chorus’ activity and the gephyrismos is noted by Radermacher (1954) 203; Baier (2002) 201–2.
The ability of this song to bring comic paradigms to mind is harder to ignore in light of its close
resemblance, in theme and form, to a passage in Eupolis’ Demes (fr. 99.1–22); cf. Dover (1993)
247–8; Storey (2003b) 142–3. Fraenkel (1962) 201–4, argues that both passages reflect a traditional
comic form.
76
See Foucart (1914) 336; Zimmermann (1985–7) vol. 1, 124–5; Dover (1993) 58–60. For more general
discussion, see Muecke (1977); Bierl (2001) 37–64.
73
228
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
best exemplifies the shifting choral perspective bears this understanding
out. In their song to Demeter (385–93), the chorus characterize the goddess as a patron of choral performance particularly associated with humor
(389 γέλοια; 392 σκώψαντα), before finally praying for her support toward
victory (392–3 νι- | κήσαντα ταινιοῦσθαι). Although a plea by the performers for a victory at the Lenaia is heard in these remarks,77 the maneuver does not work through jarring discontinuity with the dramatic fiction
but by comparison with it, since choral victory is perfectly appropriate
for a chorus looking forward to the species of celebration forecast by the
prorrhēsis. This understanding is in turn borne out by later developments,
when Aeschylus and Euripides meet in competition and offer comparable
prayers for victory (885–94). At this moment, Aeschylus likewise prays to
Demeter and asks to be worthy of her mysteries. His phrasing τῶν σῶν
ἄξιον μυστηρίων (887) is an unmistakable recollection of τῆς σῆς ἑορτῆς
ἀξίως (391) in the chorus’ prayer, bringing out again the parodos’ implication that dramatic performance operates within an Eleusinian frame.
Along with calibrating dramatic festival celebration to the Eleusinia,
Dionysos’ entry into the realm of mousikē below the earth demonstrates
the continuing vitality there of poets and poetry that had long since ceased
to be enjoyed in Athens. We will see in a moment that the initiates’ parodos makes an important contribution to articulating this idea. But the
process of creating an antiquated poetic landscape begins already with the
frog-chorus. Doubts have been raised about the purpose and contribution
the chorus in their minor amphibian role make to the play.78 The sensible
explanation, however, is that, as frogs, they recall and bring back to the
stage the distant past of comic poetry, when animal choruses appear to
have been a regular and perhaps defining feature of the genre.79
Thus Dover (1993) 58; for the ambiguity, see also Seel (1960) 132–3; Vaio (1985) 99. Even granting the importance of dance in the Eleusinia (Lada-Richards (1999) 99–100), no evidence suggests that the celebrations included a formal agon in choral performance. For agon, more loosely
defined, as part of a ritual pattern in mystic initiation, see Seaford (1981) 267–8.
78
For the question of whether or not the frog-chorus were even visible on stage, see especially
Allison (1983), Dover (1993) 56–7, Marshall (1996).
79
Reckford (1987) 410–12; Hubbard (1991) 202; Bierl (1991) 35; Dobrov (2001) 148–9; Baier (2002)
200. Sifakis (1971) 73–102, argues for the contribution of animal choruses to the early history of
comedy (for the frog-chorus, see 94) on the basis of a number of sixth and early fifth-century
vases showing choruses dressed as animals (none of them frogs). Rothwell (2007) 104–5, argues
for an early period (510–480 bc) when animal choruses thrived, and for a revival of these choruses
later in the fifth century. A more specific reference may be involved, since as Reckford points out,
Magnes apparently produced a comedy with a chorus of frogs; indeed, the passage to which we
owe this knowledge (Eq. 520–3) refers to two other animal choruses as well, and treats Magnes
as the most venerable early comic poet. The Knights passage with the scholion is our only source
77
A Dionysian katabasis: the Eleusinia transformed
229
The effect of recollecting comedy in its antiquated form through the
chorus’ theriomorphic identity is complemented by details of the frogs’
song. Its humorous undertones notwithstanding, the song contains archaisms (219b λαῶν), elements of hymnic invocation (215–16 ἣν ἀμφὶ Νυσήϊον
Διὸς Διóνυσον) and formal features of high poetry, especially choral lyric
(lyric alpha:€212–14, 231, 248; 1st-plural in€–μεσθα:€242, 248, 252, 258), and
elevated expression (247 βυθῷ; circumlocutions:€esp. 211, 212; rich compounds:€esp. 213, 218, 230, 245, 249) that lend the performance a marked
stateliness and further portray the frogs as representing ancient poetic traditions.80 These indications of the frogs’ significance only refine their general association with idealized mousikē established elsewhere in this scene.81
In preparing Dionysos for their performance, Charon is in no doubt about
the charm of their song; it is superlative in its beauty (205–6 μέλη κάλλιστα)
and stirs wonder (207 θαυμαστά). Moreover, the frogs themselves become
the chthonic counterpart of the swan (207 βατράχων κύκνων), alluding to
the bird’s place in choral metaphors and the like already in archaic poetry.82 In light of the approbation in Charon’s description, it is fitting that the
chorus identify the Muses, Pan and Apollo, gods whose associations with
mousikē are duly emphasized (229 εὔλυροι … 230 καλαμóφθογγα€… 232
φορμικτάς), among their chief admirers (229–34).83 As the frogs are thus
enfolded into a mythic scheme of divine prerogatives in music, Apollo’s
admiration is especially striking, because it stems from their role in nurturing the reeds that went into making the lyre (232–4) and accordingly
looks to the very genesis of music.84 Dionysos himself is among the deities
with whom the frogs claim to have a cherished relationship (211–19), and
of knowledge for Magnes’ Frogs and the other four titles (including Birds and Gall-flies); but the
emphasis on choruses in Eq. 521 and the resources for play-titles available to ancient scholars support the interpretation. Kallias too produced a Frogs in 431, according to a restored inscription
(IG XIV.1097.5–6 = Kallias test. 4). Schmid (1946) 334, noted that Aristophanes may have wanted
to evoke (in a mocking way) these older comedies with his choice of title.
80
This summarizes points treated in greater detail by Radermacher (1954) 171–2, and especially
Campbell (1984) 164–5, who argues that the elements said by Defradas (1969) and Zimmermann
(1985–7) vol. 1, 157–61, to bring to mind the New Music can largely be attributed to traditional
poetic forms. Nor would we expect the Dionysos of Frogs to disfavor at this point the very trends
that also influenced Euripides (and Aristophanes:€Zimmermann (1993)). See Silk (1980) 136–8, for
the mix of registers, and Wills (1969a) for Dionysos’ deflationary role in this exchange.
81
Cf. Rothwell (2007) 140–1.
82
Alc. PMG 1.100–1; hHom. 21.1–3; Pratin. PMG 708.5; cf. Av. 769–84 (where the gods’ awe is similarly recounted in 781) with Dunbar (1995).
83
Allison (1983) 10–11 draws attention to the aural emphasis of the description.
84
Interaction with the Hymn to Hermes (hMerc. 41–51) can be detected:€the donax features in the
description of the first lyre, as implied here by the epithet φορμικτάς (Ra. 232) in relation to the
establishment of Apollo as the god who controls it, and the allusion through ὑπολύριον (Ra. 233)
to the use of the reeds in constructing it.
230
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
he accordingly reiterates their proclaimed affiliation with music (240 ὦ
φιλῳδὸν γένος).85 The frogs’ association with Dionysos is through his precinct ἐν Λίμναις (219; cf. 211), used exclusively for the Anthesteria, which
was the most widespread of Dionysos’ festivals precisely because it was the
most ancient.86 Thus even in their connection to Dionysos, the frogs represent a deeply embedded layer of ritual activity.
Far from simply marking the physical geography of Dionysos’ descent
through the mires that separate Hades from the world above, the frogs’
performance is of a piece with the initiates’ celebration of the god’s poetic
rites in the strange but familiar form they take in the Underworld. During
his encounter with the frogs, Dionysos enters a surreal poetic landscape
where music and song emanate from the water in a primordial form.
Given the close association of the frogs, mousikē and Dionysos, it comes as
something of a surprise that the god offers a hostile response to the frogs’
song. Rather than assume that this response is aimed at a specific literary
target,87 we might instead consider how the antagonism communicates
the god’s own attachment to contemporary poetry, which was already presented as a defining feature of his character in the opening scenes. Seen
that way, the encounter already sets Dionysos’ fixed purpose in opposition to the possibilities that present themselves in Hades when Aeschylus
appears beside Euripides. Many of the features that give the frogs’ song
its stately, venerable feel€– archaisms, compounds, and elevated register€–
are essential to the representation of Aeschylus later on.88 Above all, his
supposed penchant for choral refrains, which Euripides relentlessly condemns (1264–77),89 recalls the repetitiveness of their song, while the memorable onomatopoeic effect of the latter has its counterpart in the vocal
imitation of Aeschylus’ lyre-parts that Euripides inserts within the older
tragedian’s lyrics (1284–95). Dionysos’ hostile encounter with the frogs,
moreover, ultimately takes the form of a musical contest, so that apart
Wills (1969a) 312, considers the address ironic in line with his overall treatment of the frogs’
performance as bathetic, despite what Charon says about it and the frogs’ proclaimed status.
Wills is not alone in his generally negative assessment of the frogs’ song; cf. Solomos (1974) 215;
Henderson (1975) 93.
86
Th. 2.15.4; D. 59.76. Cf. Burkert (1983) 213–14.
87
The “New Music,” according to Defradas (1969) and, by a complex (and unlikely) pun,
Aristophanes’ rival of 405, Phrynichus, according to Demand (1970); responses in Campbell
(1984) 164; Dover (1993) 56 n. 2.
88
E.g., 927–38, 961–6, 1004–5, 1056–60. Whitman (1964) 249, comments that the frogs’ song, like
Aeschylus’ poetry, has a positive didactic aspect in teaching Dionysos to row (203–6).
89
Cf. Dover (1993) 1264–77n., who also notes the contribution of refrains to the initiates’ song.
In introducing this discussion, Euripides sarcastically describes Aeschylus’ lyrics as θαυμαστά
(1261), redeploying Charon’s description of the frogs’ song at 207.
85
A Dionysian katabasis: the Eleusinia transformed
231
from anticipating the agonistic confrontation between old and new poetry
in the second half of the play, the miniature agon also projects onto the
god of the Theater himself the indomitable urge toward competition that
defined performances in his honor.90 In the absence of a clearly formulated
verbal criticism of the frogs’ song by Dionysos, the agon itself suffices to
show his disapproval, and this inherent connection between the poetic
agon and criticism is spelled out more fully in the second half of the play.
By being compelled to participate in such a competition and succeeding
in it, Dionysos may be forced to call on a deeper strength that helps him
as he proceeds on his “heroic” quest.91 More to the point, the scene begins
a process of revelation whereby the very nature of the ordeals Dionysos
endures is shown to fall squarely within his sphere of expertise.
The themes operative in the characterization of the frogs are given specific point in the entry of the chorus of initiates. As noted above, in the
prorrhēsis (357) Cratinus is not only treated with dignity and respect, but
is elevated in status to a kind of steward of Dionysos’ poetic rites in the
Underworld, to the point of being granted an epithet (taurophagos) that
virtually equates him with the god of the Theater. The nostalgia for the
great rival of Aristophanes’ early career is a poignant note, which must
be part of the point. But as far as the plot is concerned, the implication
is that, whereas Cratinus had probably been dead since the late 420s, his
influence on comic poetry is every bit as strong in Hades as it ever was
in Athens. The apparent logic of this is that new developments in poetry
only reach the Underworld when a poet dies.92 That understanding is confirmed by later revelations, since it is this very situation that comes to a
head with the disturbance in poetic tastes occasioned by Euripides’ arrival
and the consequent challenge to Aeschylus (758–78), whose place of honor
is jeopardized by the possibility that someone more skilled in their craft
has died (766–7). Accordingly, from their comically skewed perspective
on the chronology of tragic drama, the chorus later refer to Aeschylus as
the finest poet “up to this time” (1256 τῶν μέχρι νυνί). Among later readers,
The competitive nature of the encounter is emphasized especially at 258–60, 266; cf. Defradas
(1969) 36; Wills (1969a) 317. Dionysos’ claim to “take up” the frogs’ song (251 παρ᾿ ὑμῶν λαμβάνω)
also marks his formal entry into competition and seems to borrow from the language of rhapsodic competitive exchange, on which see Nagy (2002) 10–11; cf. Burgess (2004). Although the
nature of the competition between Dionysos and the frogs has been debated (esp. Wills (1969a)),
MacDowell (1972) 4–5, probably explains it best as a contest of duration (esp. 242–5, 258–60,
264–6). Habash (2002) 6, suggests that Dionysos becomes koryphaios of the frogs’ chorus.
91
Reckford (1987) 411.
92
The scathing remark about Kinesias (366) ruptures the chorus’ character, but is not necessarily
inconsistent with this view, since the idea may still be that a new-fangled musician has no place in
their celebrations. His offense can be compared to that of the present stock of tragic poets (95).
90
232
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
Cratinus would be identified as first (chronologically) in the triumvirate
of great comic poets. But Aristophanes’ own treatment of the history of
the comic competitions at Knights 526–36 underscores his role in Frogs
as defining the previous generation of comic poets, and consequently as
the last to depart for Hades.93 In this sense, he occupied a place in the
Athenian imagination comparable to that of Aeschylus for tragedy.
With the mention of Cratinus’ continuing domination, therefore,
Dionysos’ exclusive concentration in the prologue on poets belonging to
the most recent phase of dramatic poetry, both comic and tragic, is suddenly complicated by a greater range of choices that in due course impinge
upon his decision to undertake the katabasis.94 Even if mention of Cratinus’
domination of Dionysos’ comic rites in Hades was not enough to prompt
the audience to consider Aeschylus his natural tragic counterpart at this
point, thematic space is created for that development.95 Accordingly, similarities can be observed in the characterizations of the old comic and tragic
poets once Aeschylus appears. He too is initially compared to a bull (804);
and just as Cratinus somehow presides over the Bacchic rites at 357, so later
on the chorus speak of Aeschylus as the Bacchic lord (1259 τὸν Βακχεĩον
ἄνακτα). As noted above, Aeschylus is also associated with the rites of
Demeter (886–8) through the prayer he offers to the goddess that closely
resembles the initiates’ prayer to her for victory in the imagined contest of
her festival.96 Inasmuch as Aeschylus’ prayer emphasizes the mysteries (887
τῶν σῶν ἄξιον μυστηρίων) and elaborates on the prayer to the Muses that
Dionysos leads (871–85), a connection is made with Cratinus’ position in
the mysteries of the Muses (356 ὄργια Μουσῶν). That implication is the
basis for Aeschylus’ description of his poetic activity as “culling flowers
from the holy field of the Muses” (1300 λειμῶνα Μουσῶν ἱερὸν ὀφθείην
δρέπων), which brings into full conformity with poetic ideals a familiar image of mystery cult, and so elaborates on the interweaving of the
Eleusinian frame with Dionysian poetry introduced in the parodos.97
Aristophanes’ final quip against Cratinus at Eq. 535–6 is that he should take a seat of honor beside
Dionysos, which is similar to the honorific treatment of dead poets in Frogs.
Cf. Vaio (1985) 99.
95
Any sense in which Eupolis was recalled in Ra. 416–30, as another (more recently) deceased poet,
will have contributed to this impression; see Storey (2003b) 56–60, who settles on 411 as the date
of Eupolis’ death.
96
391–2 τῆς σῆς ἑορτῆς ἀξίως | παίσαντα καὶ σκώψαντα ~ 887 εἶναί με τῶν σῶν ἄξιον μυστηρίων.
97
The flowering fields are a recurring image in the presentation of the mysteries:€326–30, 352–3,
373–4, 448–9. Euripides’ poetry is a perversion of the Muses (1301–8), and ultimately he appears
rather as an enemy of what they represent (1493–5); cf. Lada-Richards (1999) 246–7.
93
94
The Underworld agon:€a new paradigm
233
To summarize, the katabasis takes Dionysos into a strange world.
But contrary to what he and the audience might have expected on the
basis of the Heraklean model, this world is eerily familiar for a god of
music and poetry, in both the funereal recasting of festival celebrations
in Dionysos’ honor and the primacy of poetry, music and dancing in the
activities of those with whom he comes in contact. These experiences
affirm Dionysos’ identity as god of the Theater as it was presented in the
opening scenes, and at the same time suggest that he is uniquely prepared to deal with the challenges his undertaking involves. To be sure, it
soon becomes apparent that, apart from Dionysos’ comically profitable
inability to play Herakles effectively, the role is more of a liability than
anything else, because of the trouble it lands him in with other residents
of the Underworld. When he gives up this costume once and for all and
is recognized as god of the Theater off-stage during the parabasis, he
finds himself in a position to carry on with his initial plan to retrieve a
poet, but in a way that depends on his personal strengths as ideal spectator. The nascent themes of poetry and dramatic festival come together
in the poetic agon when Aeschylus emerges€– surprisingly, but fittingly€–
from the depths of tragic poetry’s past and imposes himself in a way that
ultimately affects Dionysos’ plans.
T h e U n de rwor l d ag on:€a n e w pa r a dig m
One result of Aristophanes’ expansive treatment of the katabasis is that
the poetic contest, of which the epirrhematic agon is only part, takes up
the entire second half of the play. This structural shift, from the usual
appearance of the agon in the first half of the play with iambic scenes
demonstrating the hero’s success in the second half, has been noted by
others.98 But it should be apparent by now that the way the katabasis lays
the groundwork for the poetic agon makes taking this division as a sign
of the play’s lack of unity indefensible. Thus organized, the poetic contest
becomes the culminating experience of Frogs. Indeed, the expansive treatment of the confrontation between Euripides and Aeschylus, composed of
a pre-agon scene (830–94), a full epirrhematic agon (895–1098), similarly
combative iambic scenes (1099–1478), and a final grand exodus celebrating
Aeschylus’ victory (1479–1533), suggests Aristophanes’ interest in making
See esp. Hooker (1980). But as Gelzer (1991) rightly observes, the structural elements of comedy
were there for Aristophanes and other poets to use and manipulate to their own advantage, as
with the delayed double-agon of Clouds (Chapter 5).
98
234
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
this the play’s tour de force.99 The trajectory of the plot of Frogs thus pays
homage to the occasion on which it and other plays were presented to the
Athenians.
The momentous role the contest has in the play is adumbrated by how
it is introduced to the audience in the conversation between Xanthias and
Pluto’s slave immediately after the parabasis. Without their masters to
stop them, the two men delight in recalling comically stereotypical slave
behavior,100 but their reverie is cut short when an offstage uproar prompts
Xanthias to ask its cause. “It’s Aeschlyus and Euripides” (758) is the initial
brief reply, which is followed by a full account of recent developments in
the state of poetry in Hades. A matter of great importance and an immense
state of unrest was stirred up among the dead (759–60) when, in conformity with a law guaranteeing the preeminent representative of each technē
(763 τὸν ἄριστον ὄντα τῶν ἑαυτοῦ συντέχνων) a seat of honor beside
Pluto (761–7), Euripides no sooner arrived than he laid claim to the chair
of tragedy, which had been occupied by Aeschylus (768–70). Euripides
did not, however, act without justification, since his displays of talent (771
ἐπεδείκνυτο)101 to the lower elements of society in Hades left them stunned
with admiration for his “counter-arguments, twists, and dodges” (775)
and persuaded that he was the supreme poet (776 σοφώτατον). Euripides’
descent furnishes the theater world of Hades with a new form of entertainment that throws established tastes and opinions into question102
and raises an outcry to decide whether he or Aeschylus is wiser (779–80
ὁ δῆμος ἀνεβóα κρίσιν ποεĩν | ὁπóτερος εἴη τὴν τέχνην σοφώτερος). The
competing claims to superior status with regard to poetic sophia put the
conditions in place for the agon to do its work.103
Far from being simply a matter of Euripides’ impertinence, it is as if
all social harmony has been upset by the arrival of a new poet, with the
criminal and the well-to-do strata of the population pitted against each
other. This seems overblown, as poetic concerns are thrust onto the stage
of social and political dynamics, yet these may be exactly the terms in
which Athenians were prepared to think about such matters. The situation in Frogs is not unlike the one reported by Plutarch (Cim. 8.7–9)
Wilamowitz (1929) 471–2, believes that the poetic agon was Aristophanes’ original comic idea;
cf. Hooker (1980) 170, for various views on the question.
100
This ‘second’ prologue thus revisits the general theme of comic tropes from the opening dialogue
between Dionysos and Xanthias.
101
The imperfect suggests ongoing activity, in the midst of which Dionysos arrived in Hades.
102
Cf. the chorus’ praise for Aeschylus at 1254–6.
103
Cf. the role of the poetic agon in establishing Aristophanes’ claim to sophia in the Clouds parabasis (see above, pp. 180–1).
╇ 99
The Underworld agon:€a new paradigm
235
at the City Dionysia of 468, when Sophocles first competed against the
established champion of the tragic stage, Aeschylus. Then too, we are told,
ardent and evenly divided support for the two poets created discord in
the audience, leaving the presiding archon no choice but to install the ten
generals in the place of the regular judges to enhance the authority of the
krisis. Some details of this event were probably embellished as it became a
matter of legend.104 Nonetheless, if the tradition retains something of the
Athenians’ mindset in reflecting on their cultural past,105 its most remarkable feature is its emphasis on the social and political stakes that came
into play when poets who in some sense defined their ages came face to
face in a poetic contest. The story also reflects confidence in the ability of
the agon, as a social mechanism, to determine the relative merits of poets
and resolve the tensions such occasions brought to the surface. Such, at
least, is the resolution of Pluto, who immediately organizes a contest to
assess the abilities of Euripides and Aeschylus:€ἀγῶνα ποιεĩν αὐτίκα μάλα
καὶ κρίσιν | κἄλεγχον αὐτοĩν τῆς τέχνης (785–6). The urgency of the situation is expressed by αὐτίκα μάλα, implying that no delay can be tolerated, while the pleonasm κρίσιν κἄλεγχον likewise lends prominence to
the means of resolving tensions. With Sophocles’ absence from the contest
explained again (786–94), the remaining problem, as in Plutarch’s story,
is to find someone with the authority to decide between two important
poets (805). Here at last Dionysos enters the slave’s account:€this delicate
task was ultimately entrusted to him, on account of his experience with
the art (811 ὁτιὴ τῆς τέχνης ἔμπειρος ἦν). That Dionysos was enlisted only
after a failed search for men both wise enough and sufficiently knowledgeable about the “quality” (φύσεις) of poets to serve as judges (805–10) only
underscores his unique qualifications.106
Skepticism is often called for in addressing these situations:€Lefkowitz (1981); (1984). Knowledge
of the name of the archon (Apsephion) may imply reliance on documentary evidence. Ion of
Chios composed recollections of Aeschylus, Sophocles and Kimon (see Dover (1986) = (1987–8)
vol. ii, 7–9), on which Plutarch relied for Kimon’s biography:€Cim. 5.3; 9.1 (Ion, as a youth, visiting Kimon in Athens in c.465:€FGrHist 392 T 5); 16.8; Pericl. 5.3.
105
For the potential value of anecdotes based on a distinction between the “unrealistic” and
“untrue,” see Dover (1988) 47.
106
Here, the curious detail explaining Aeschylus’ rejection of the Athenians as judges, οὔτε γὰρ
᾿Αθηναίοισι σUνέβαιν᾿ Αἰσχύλος (807) may depend on the tradition of Aeschylus’ falling out with
the Athenians on account of his defeat by Sophocles as described by Plutarch and Vit. Aesch.
8 (= A. test. 1). Radermacher (1954) 259, rejects this possibility; but see van Leeuwen (1896);
Stanford (1962); Dover (1993). Sommerstein (1996a) 807n., bases his rejection of a connection on
the dubious historical accuracy of these traditions and on the assumption that the reference to
“Athenians” in the play is to Athenians of 405. But the former is not at issue, only whether tales
of Aeschylus’ life were already current, and the latter is not so clear-cut in light of the interplay of
past and present in the agon (see below). Certainly the explanation in 809–10 that Aeschylus did
104
236
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
In Hades, then, Dionysos discovers that this other world is in a state
of crisis the exact opposite of the one that has befallen Athens. Dionysos
set out on his quest because no good poets were left and the future of
his festivals seemed imperiled. But in the Underworld the recent arrival
of Euripides (not to mention Sophocles!) has resulted in a glut of such
men, and the only means of resolving the ensuing turmoil is a poetic contest. If we return to the question Segal thought could be answered only by
assuming development in Dionysos’ character during the katabasis€– How
can the god perform his assigned task in the second half of the play?€–
the answer need be no more complicated than that by a happy (but wellprepared-for) coincidence Dionysos gives up trying to be Herakles and
returns to what he knows best:€judging dramatic poets. The nature of the
enterprise changes, not the individual who carries it out.107 This outcome
is highlighted by the Underworld slave’s terse description of the credentials
that make Dionysos fit to decide the contest, τῆς τέχνης ἔμπειρος (811). In
addition to long experience, empeiros implies the expertise that comes from
making trial of something (πεĩρα). As such, the term recalls Dionysos’
rehearsal of the talents of various contemporary poets, but especially
Iophon, whose work Dionysos had yet to test (79 κωδωνίσω). The colorful
term Dionysos used earlier to describe his activity is in harmony with the
craft-metaphors now introduced to characterize the probing nature of the
impending contest (796–802).108 The second half of Frogs thus promises
to elaborate on what had already been presented as an essential element
of Dionysos’ character and interests, but places his literary critical skills
squarely within the cultural milieu of the poetic agon. With this turn of
events, Dionysos slips back easily into his authoritative position, as he first
takes charge of the situation by restraining the poets’ bickering and forcing them to adopt the more orderly style of exchange prescribed by the
epirrhematic agon (851–70), and then presides over the formal offerings
and prayers to the Muses that get the contest running (871–94).109 The god
of the Theater has returned.
not trust their (taking τἄλλα in 809 as still referring to the Athenians) judgment about poets is
easily accounted for by reference to contest-histories/traditions. For γνῶναι (809) in relation to
(mis)judging a contest, see V. 1045.
107
Cf. Radermacher (1954) 259. Thus Konstan (1995) 69, speaks of Dionysos having his identity
restored. This is not to say that Dionysos becomes less ridiculous, since he continues to play the
fool throughout, a fact that only becomes a problem if one looks for a meaningful change of
character; see Segal (1961) 214–15.
108
See especially Euripides’ promise “to test by rubbing” (802 βασανιεῖν); cf. Denniston (1927) 114.
109
Dover (1993) ad loc., sensibly explains mousik ōtata (873) by reference to “cultivated critics.”
But we should not miss the association with the goddesses that is made clear by what follows.
Corinna PMG 654.19–22 has the Muses officiate in the Contest of Helikon and Kithairon.
The Underworld agon:€a new paradigm
237
Details in the preparation for the confrontation of the poets add to this
effect by reflecting elements of the dramatic festivals. Dionysos’ prayer to
the Muses to guide the judging represents a version of the ritual offerings and judges’ oath that preceded the contests. In particular, ἀγῶνα
κρĩναι τóνδε (873) may recall the actual wording of the oath, although
comic liberty is taken in rounding out the allusion with the para prosdokian μουσικώτατα in place of (e.g.) δικαιότατα.110 So too, the pre-agon
scene leading up to the epirrhematic agon brings to mind the proagon, an
event reserved for the tragic poets to offer a public demonstration setting
the stage for their participation in the dramatic competition a few days
later.111 This component of the festival may be implied when Euripides is
said to have made an epideixis of his talents to the public (771); although
an allusion to sophistic displays may also be felt, the immediate contextual promptings would have made it just as easy to think of the epideixis
poets made before the City Dionysia.112 Certainly Euripides’ rivalry with
Aeschylus, which results in the agon, is tied directly to his epideictic performances, since it is on the strength of them that he attempts to seize the
tragic throne (777) and thereby communicates his agonistic challenge.113
In the Underworld the (recent) present and distant past suddenly stand
side by side. The result is a contest that explodes the assumptions of a
true agon, which exists only in the present, relying as it does on simultaneous performance and to this extent representing a single moment
in the diachronic phenomenon of a genre’s development.114 That notion
The terms of the oath can be postulated from Pherecr. fr. 102.3–4, μηδ᾿ ἀδίκως κρίνειν; Ar. Ec.
1160, κρίνειν τοὺς χοροὺς ὀρθῶς ἀεί; Aeschin. 3.232, καὶ τοὺς μὲν κριτὰς τοὺς ἐκ τῶν Διονυσίων ἐὰν
μὴ δικαίως τοὺς κυκλίους χοροὺς κρίνωσι ζημιοῦτε; cf. Ar. Nu. 1130 (above, pp. 195–6). Plu. Cim.
8.7 describes the generals, under the authority of the presiding archon, as performing “the customary libations” (τὰς νενομισμένας σπονδάς) in honor of Dionysos, just before the point when
the judges normally took their oaths; cf. Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 95–8; Goldhill (1990) 100–1.
111
For the proagon as a competitive structure parallel to the comic parabasis, see above, pp. 40–6.
Note Euripides’ appearance in Aristophanes’ play Proagon:Â€Σ VLhAld V. 61c (= Proagon test. iv).
112
See ἐπιδείξεσθαι and ἐπίδειξις of the proagon at Pl. Smp. 194b and Σ Aeschin. 3.67; cf. Pl. La.
183a–b. Note the emphasis on specific aspects of Euripidean poetry in 775. Woodbury (1986)
242, makes a case for a reference to sophistic displays here.
113
Sophocles communicates his own decision to stay out of the fray by stepping away from the
throne (790 ὑπεχώρησεν αὐτῷ τοῦ θρóνου). The contrast between his gesture and Euripides’
(777) confirms that Sophocles (rather than Aeschylus) is the subject in the second passage; see
Stevens (1955); Dover (1993) 288–9. Curiously, Sophocles’ modesty in this connection may have
been displayed at the most recent proagon (Vit. Eur. 1A.11 = S. test. 54). For the broader agonistic
associations of Sophocles as ἔφεδρος (792), see Campagner (2001) 151–2.
114
For reperformance of Aeschylean tragedy, see Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 86, though this tradition is likely apocryphal:€Biles (2006–2007). Even if the plays were performed, they were probably organized as a separate event, as with the wider institution of old tragedies and comedies in
the fourth century; but see Revermann (2006a) 72–4.
110
238
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
is underscored by Plutarch’s account of Sophocles’ first encounter with
Aeschylus, and is also the basis of Thucydides’ distinction (1.22.4) between
his own “possession for all time” and the apparently more familiar idea of
compositions intended for competitive performance before a momentary
audience (ἀγώνισμα ἐς τὸ παραχρῆμα ἀκούειν). In contrast, Dionysos’
uncanny experience allows the agon to be applied nearly as a theoretical
model of literary criticism that overcomes the restrictions imposed on it by
separation in time and space toward the evaluation of a long poetic tradition viewed as a synchronic event.115 In this respect, Frogs can be placed
beside the Contest of Homer and Hesiod as a piece of agonistically framed
literary criticism.116 In different ways, both works demonstrate the grasp
the poetic agon continued to have on the Greek intellectual experience in
evaluating poetic excellence, even when a more abstract literary appreciation of the authors involved is of primary concern. To facilitate this objective, these theoretical agons do not follow the usual format of a poetic
contest, in which dueling poets perform in turn and are judged only at
the end. Instead, the performances are dissected into discrete exchanges.
In Frogs especially, the all-important act of criticism is largely transferred
from the putative judge Dionysos and placed in the hands of the tragic
poets themselves, even if the task of making a final determination rests
with the god of the Theater. By critiquing one another’s art, Aeschylus and
Euripides reflect back at the audience the range of critical responses that
might contribute to their experience of viewing dramatic performances.117
Dionysos’ confidence notwithstanding, the poetic agon is bound to
have enormous consequences for him, because the peculiar nature of the
contest will force him to confront not just two great poets of tragic drama’s
past, but divergent aspects of his own tastes and sensibilities. From time
to time Dionysos acknowledges his long experience in the Theater. Thus
his original viewing of Myrmidons is implied in his recollection of how he
pondered€– incorrectly, it turns out€– the meaning of one of Aeschylus’
notoriously imaginative compounds (930–2).118 With greater implications, the god rejects Euripides’ criticism of the long silence maintained
On these points, see Nagy (1990b) 401–3. The discussion of material objects and language in
Frogs in Bassi (2005), esp. 15–17, emphasizes some of the ideas presented here.
116
For the relationship between Frogs and the Contest of Homer and Hesiod, see Cavalli (1999)
91–105; Rosen (2004). For the literary critical interests of Alcidamas as apparent in the Contest,
see O’Sullivan (1992), esp. 64–6.
117
On the intellectual range of Dionysos’ responses, see Harriott (1969) 157; Lada-Richards (1999)
281–3.
118
The same effect is produced by Dionysos’ recollection of the performance of Aeschylus’ Persians
(1028–9); cf. Rosen (2008) 152.
115
The Underworld agon:€a new paradigm
239
by Aeschylean characters, on the ground that he used to enjoy this no less
than he is pleased by the chattering of modern characters (916–17). In this
instance, Dionysos affirms the composite nature of his character relative to
developments in dramatic style and taste. He recalls his experience at the
original performance of Aeschylus’ play, but simultaneously presents himself as god of contemporary drama when, in response to Euripides’ rejoinder that he only liked Aeschylus because he was a fool, Dionysos accedes
to this judgment and replies, “So I think too” (918 κἀμαυτῷ δοκῶ). The
comment is buffoonish, but along with the humor is an acknowledgment
that his judgment then and now is distinct.119 More than anything else, the
self-critical examination of his changing tastes forces Dionysos to reconsider his original attachment to Euripides, in a way neither he nor any
other Athenian audience had been made to do before.
And Dionysos continues to carry the Athenians along in this self-critical
experience.120 Thus when he criticizes Aeschylus because his Seven Against
Thebes did not have its intended effect of rousing Athens to dedicate itself to
war, but instead made her enemies fight more bravely (1023–4), Aeschylus’
defense is that, “It was in your power to practice these things” (1025). Here
“you” (ὑμĩν) is plural and projects Dionysos’ failure to respond correctly to
this theatrical instruction onto the entire audience (1022 θεασάμενος πᾶς
… τις), implicating them in the city’s military failures.121 This fits with
other passages where Aristophanes equates the audience in Hades with the
Athenians in the Theater of Dionysos (esp. 783, 806–7, 1501), most notably
the antistrophe of the song that bridges the epirrhematic agon with the
continuing rounds of the contest (1109–18). Here the chorus encourage the
poets not to hold back in their efforts for fear of the audience’s lack of ability, and assure them that their own theater experience is long and predicated on critical sophistication.122 The audience (1110 τοĩς θεωμένοισιν, 1118
θεατῶν γ᾿ οὕνεχ᾿) is accordingly set beside Dionysos not only as witness
to the competition, but as judges, wherein they are portrayed as empeiroi in their own right. Indeed, the chorus emphasize that the audience is
“no longer” unequipped to make sophisticated evaluations (1112 ὡς οὐκέθ᾿
οὕτω ταῦτ̓ ἔχει), as though they have undergone the same evolution of
In discussing this passage, Habash (2002) 11–12, fails to distinguish between the temporal levels
and in particular mistranslates the imperfects of 916–17 as though they were present tense.
120
Cf. Kowzan (1983) 89–91.
121
Cf. Dover (1993) 1025n. Although this exchange is amusing, any assessment must be tempered by
the precariousness of Athens’ military affairs at the time. Frogs’ treatment of an audience’s ability
to interpret authorial intention is the focus of Rosen (2008).
122
On this passage, see Erbse (1975) 55, who understands ἐστρατευμένοι (1113) to refer to theatrical
veterans (so too Sommerstein (1996a) 1113n.); Woodbury (1976) 353, takes it more literally.
119
240
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
tastes that Dionysos has.123 As the play invites the Athenian audience
to consider the criteria they use to determine what poetry is truly great
against the expansive backdrop of their literary heritage,124 their identification with Dionysos merges the internal and external frames of poetic competition, an effect that becomes more pronounced as the agon continues.
T h e p oe t ’s pa r a b a s i s: €A r i s t oph a n e s
a n d t h e c on t e s t of A e s c h y lus a n d E u r i pi de s
A number of details in the characterization of the Frogs’ contest reflect
the dramatic festivals generally and (with the proagon) tragedy specifically. But another bears directly on comedy. The parabasis of Frogs is dedicated to direct political advice, the drift of which is that the Athenians
should offer a general amnesty to disenfranchised citizens to bring those
best able to lend strength and leadership to the polis back into the political
fold. The details of this advice affect our understanding of later developments and will be treated in due course; for the moment, we may consider
the place of this passage alongside other performances within the play.
Although parabatic in the sense that the chorus turn to face the audience
to offer them direct political counsel, the passage does not fully disrupt
the dramatic situation, since the chorus’ identity as initiates is maintained
throughout. In the first ode they refer to themselves as a holy chorus (674
χορῶν ἱερῶν), and they do so again more emphatically at the opening
of the epirrhema (686 τὸν ἱερὸν χορóν). In addition to reasserting their
identity from the parodos,125 the chorus’ parabatic entry seems actually to
continue their procession from the earlier passage. In their final song in
the parodos, they hale themselves off to the flowery meadows to continue
their choral activity (448–53), which is a central feature of their anticipated
rites of the Muses (356 ὄργια Μουσῶν … ἐχóρευσεν). When the chorus
reappear in the guise of initiates for the parabasis, the first ode begins with
an invocation of their Muse (674–6), inviting her to join their holy choruses and take pleasure in their song. Not only that, but the abusive parabasis odes directed against Kleophon (678–85) and Kleigenes (706–17)
Sommerstein (1996a) 1112n. Cf. Rosen (2008) 165, although his suggestion that 1109–18 look
specifically to a Euripidean portrayal of the audience does not fully account for the strophe just
before (1099–1108), which attributes sophistication, of the sort arguably at stake in the portrayal
of the audience in the antistrophe, to both poets.
124
Rosen (2006) 35, discusses this aspect of the play within a broader consideration of the part
“fans” played in establishing plays and poets as literary classics.
125
See esp. 327, 335–6, 370, 441. The notion of holiness pervades the language of the parodos:€349,
385, 447, 455.
123
The poet’s parabasis
241
show the chorus engaging in the same castigating mockery of recognizable Athenians they offered in the late stages of the parodos (416–30).126
And with its pointed political advice in the parabasis, the mystic chorus
only fulfill the expectation created in the prorrhēsis (359–65), that their
celebration is connected with Athens’ political life. In short, the parodos
and parabasis are closely associated via the identity and dramatic activity
of the chorus.127
This same dynamic of interconnecting choral performances extends to
the poetic contest, which is initiated formally when the chorus perform a
song that once again invokes the Muses in order to place the proceedings
under their authority alongside Dionysos. In the parabasis the Muse is
summoned to see (674–6 Μοῦσα … ἔλθ᾿ … ὀψομένη) the great gathering of people (676 τὸν πολὺν … λαῶν ὄχλον), a description with which
the chorus adopt the phrasing the frog-chorus used to describe the festival gathering for the Dionysian Anthesteria (219b λαῶν ὄχλος). In the
parabasis, the expression appropriately refers to the audience of the Lenaia
in preparation for a direct address. But by simultaneously enfolding the
gathered Athenians within the celebration of the chorus’ imagined rites, it
also looks ahead to the conflation of internal and external audiences during the poetic contest. Accordingly, phrasing similar to 674–6 reappears
in the chorus’ invocation of the Muses before the agon at 875–9:€ἁγναὶ
Μοῦσαι€… ἔλθετ᾿ ἐποψóμεναι δύναμιν. Since in its simplest form the poetic
contest is an agon of sophia (882–3),128 the tragic poets’ dynamis (879) relates
directly to the “myriad forms of wisdom” possessed by the audience of the
parabasis, on which their idealized community with the Muses is based
(676–8).129 This connection of the poetic contest with what preceded is
impressed on the audience one final time when, as noted above, Aeschylus’
prayer to Demeter for a successful performance in the contest (886–7)
picks up the wishes the chorus expressed in anticipation of Demeter’s festival (385–93), and the tragedian portrays himself as about to fulfill the
expectations of these very mysteries (887 τῶν σῶν … μυστηρίων).130 A
clearer statement of the contest’s relation to the initiates’ celebrations is
difficult to imagine. Through a kind of looping effect, then, the chorus’
Reckford (1987) 422, sees an attempt to recall comedy’s ritual origins in the parabasis’ abusive
odes.
127
But see the reservations of Dover (1993) 68–9.
128
This idea is repeatedly asserted:€780, 896, 1108, 1413, 1434, 1451, 1519. Cf. Dover (1993) 12–13.
129
The audience is described in the same terms at 1118 ὡς ὄντων σοφῶν.
130
Some reference to Aeschylus’ supposed biographical association with Eleusis (test. 8a–d) may be
involved (Stanford (1962) ad loc.), though the meaning these details generate for the play is most
important.
126
242
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
several performances in the parodos and parabasis establish and develop
themes of central importance for the poetic contest, which itself becomes
the culminating experience of the poetic rites presented within the play,
but also connects outward to include the Athenians at the Lenaia.
In form, the parabasis is abbreviated, amounting only to an epirrhematic syzygy; anapests are entirely lacking.131 The Frogs parabasis thus fails
to fulfill an important, even defining purpose of this sub-performance,
as discussed in Chapter 1, by providing no opportunity for authorial selfassertion. As noted, the prorrhēsis of the parodos is often said to take over
elements of the traditional anapests. But while parabatic explicitness can
be seen in the forceful articulation there of the contribution of Dionysian
festival celebration to the Eleusinian context, any impression of the poet’s
identity in connection with the play and the Lenaian contest of 405 is lacking. By this reckoning, the prorrhēsis falls short of the mark. Still, the grafting of parabatic elements onto the parodos reminds us that Aristophanes
had already experimented with modifications in the parabasis, one of his
objectives seemingly having been “to integrate the parabasis more closely
into the dramatic plot,” whereby competitive interests could be articulated
by the characters rather than through a blatant insertion of the poet’s personality.132 Thus in Frogs the missing anapests are compensated for, not
just by the prorrhēsis, but even more so through the interplay of parodos,
parabasis and poetic contest, and especially their external connection with
the historical contest in which the play was performed.
The epirrhematic agon, which formally initiates the contest between
Aeschylus and Euripides, presents poets asserting themselves in competition against rivals in a way easily compared to what is most at stake in the
performance of a comic parabasis. Each tragedian has the opportunity
to come before Dionysos and the audience to praise his own accomplishments and condemn the literary atrocities of his opponent. This is just
the kind of competitive exchange Sifakis envisioned when he hypothesized the notional completion of a responsive epirrhematic agon when one
comic poet’s parabatic assertions were met by the counter-assertions of his
rivals.133 The easy comparison between genres assumed by this explanation
Used by Aristophanes as a discrete structure for the second parabasis in earlier plays; Totaro
(2000) 5–9. The closest earlier parallel is the double-syzygy of the quarreling choruses at Lys.
614–705.
132
The quotation is adapted from Hubbard (1991) 157. Thus the feuding semi-choruses in the parabasis of Lysistrata (614–705) reflect direct competition between rival choruses; the chorus of
Thesmophoriazusae uses parabainein (785) as it praises itself (and thus the play’s central comic
idea) before the audience.
133
Sifakis (1971) 60.
131
The poet’s parabasis
243
appears more reasonable in light of similarities, as argued in Chapter 1,
between the comic parabasis and the tragic proagon, which the confrontation of Aeschylus and Euripides likewise brings to mind. Although these
comparisons deserve consideration in trying to establish the range of
meanings generated by this scene, the poetic contest of Frogs cannot be
taken as evidence for the actual genesis of the parabasis from epirrhematic
agon or proagon, since any comparison along these lines may be coincidence, given that the context of competitive performance was a source for
the play’s themes. But what can be shown is that Aristophanes takes full
advantage of the points of contact between the different agonistic performances that become conspicuous when his theme is poetic competition itself.134 By this means Aristophanes achieves the full integration of
parabasis with plot and, above all, invests the contest of the tragedians
with his own parabasis, so that the poetic agon within the play takes over
the structure by which a comic poet engages most directly in the festival
competition. The poet who performs Aristophanes’ parabasis is Aeschylus,
a fact that has implications for his eventual victory.135
In one respect, Aeschylus’ victory is predetermined by the order in
which the poets speak, since in Aristophanes’ plays the second speaker in
an epirrhematic agon regularly prevails. But this outcome also seems well
founded when the poets’ initial performances in the agon are analyzed
more closely. The tone and organization of the passages are different and
to a certain degree reverse the general pattern, observed by Gelzer, of evidence being set out in the epirrhema and argumentation toward a critical
refutation in the antepirrhema.136 Fulfilling his initial promise (907–8),
Euripides devotes nearly the first thirty verses of his epirrhema to a direct assault on his rival, as he accurately points out features of Aeschylean
stage technique (909–15) and diction (923–30) that may well have seemed
outdated in 405. The comic Euripides comes across as aggressive and
antagonistic, as suits the occasion. But by taking this negative tack he
Noted also by Bouvier (2004) 14, who believes, however, that any serious implications in the performance are undercut by its parodic nature.
135
Heiden (1991) also argues for Aristophanes’ self-promotion through the dramatic action, but
believes that it is achieved by an ironic treatment of both tragedians.
136
Gelzer (1960) 100–6. By this I mean that, partly under the influence of Euripides’ portrayal
as a sophistic rhetorician, his speech is more self-consciously argumentative; compare esp. the
Weaker Argument (Nu. 1036–7, 1043 ~ Ra. 908). In fact the two epirrhemata are remarkable for
the almost equal number of lines delivered by the main speaker in each, as also of interruptions
by interlocutors. In the agon of the two Arguments in Clouds and that in Wasps, the epirrhema
more clearly represents a unified speech presenting evidence, while the antepirrhema picks that
position apart through debate. By contrast, Aeschylus reestablishes his preeminence in response
to Euripides’ attack.
134
244
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
also seems more concerned with criticism than with demonstrating that
he has anything to contribute himself. Hence he only turns to his own
poetry when prompted by Aeschylus (936), and the vision he offers of it
is underwhelming. Instead of a compelling presentation of the distinctive features of Euripidean drama, what is said makes the younger tragedian appear trivial:€ he thinned down the tragic art by putting it on
a diet of light diction and verse (939–44); enlivened the dialogue and
made it more “democratic,” by allowing all manner of characters to speak
(945–52); and, above all, offered his audience useful lessons (959), chief
among them how to chatter (954–8) and manage their homes better
(959–61, 971–9). The descent of tragedy from the lofty and pretentious
(as Euripides portrays it) to a level of familiarity that suits the average
Athenian household is made complete by Dionysos’ helpful example in
the pnigos (980–91) of a typical citizen’s search for a jug, bowl, garlic and
other inconsequential domestic items upon entering his home. Any force
in Euripides’ self-presentation thus fizzles out in the irony of Dionysos’
capping remarks.137
Once Euripides has had his turn, in the second ode the chorus encourage and advise Aeschylus in preparation for his response, before urging
him to his task more directly in the katakeleusmos. A sudden shift of form
occurs at this point. Instead of mirroring the iambic katakeleusmos they
issued before Euripides’ speech, the chorus switch to anapestic tetrameters, establishing the meter in which Aeschylus’ entire speech is composed. One effect of this change is to maximize the sense of the two poets’
incompatibility. But the arrangement also sets Aeschylus’ self-Â�assertive
speech in the form Aristophanes preferred for his parabases, to the extent
that later scholars attached his name to the meter.138 This shift coincides
with another detail in the wording of the katakeleusmos that evokes
Aristophanes within Aeschylus’ self-presentation (Ra. 1004–5):
̓
ἀλλ᾿ ὦ πρῶτος τῶν â•›Ελλήνων πυργώσας ῥήματα σεμνὰ
καὶ κοσμήσας τραγικὸν λῆρον¸ θαρρῶν τὸν κρουνὸν ἀφίει.
Cf. Dover (1993) 980–8n. See Rosen (2008) 149–50 for irony in the audience’s response to this
passage.
138
Hephaistion, p. 25 lines 5–10 Consbruch; cf. Sifakis (1971) 67–8. Perusino (1968) 51–2 suggests
that when an agon is divided between anapests and iambs (e.g., Eq. 756–940; Nu. 949–1110), the
anapestic rhythm gives the passages a weight that signifies Aristophanes’ ideological leaning.
Knights is not the best example, since neither epirrhema really belongs to a single character; but
V. 546–728 (anapests in both halves) does not refute the interpretation (pace Dover (1993) 306).
Frogs reverses the order of Knights and Clouds in presenting anapests second. Cf. Revermann
(2006b) for the audience’s ability to take account of such subtle effects.
137
The poet’s parabasis
245
But, you who first of all Greeks built lofty towers of words
and adorned tragic chatter, take courage and send forth your flow!
This summons of Aeschylus to the agon describes him in terms that recall
Aristophanes’ description of his own distinguishing contributions to comedy, as he presented them in arguing for victory in the parabasis of Peace
sixteen years earlier (Pax 749–50):
ἐπóησε τέχνην μεγάλην ἡμĩν κἀπύργωσ̓ οἰκοδομήσας
ἔπεσιν μεγάλοις καὶ διανοίαις καὶ σκώμμασιν οὐκ ἀγοραίοις
He made our art great, and after �laying down foundations built towers
with grand words and ideas and jokes of uncommon kind.
There are further complexities in this apparent modeling of “Aeschylus”
on Aristophanes’ own self-portrait, since the description in Peace might
itself have been inspired by how Aeschylus was remembered in Athens, as
has been assumed on the basis of a line from Pherecrates’ Krapataloi, in
which Aeschylus describes himself in comparable terms (fr. 100):139
ὅστις <γ᾿> αὐτοĩς παρέδωκα τέχνην μεγάλην ἐξοικοδομήσας
(I) who handed it (i.e. tragedy) down to them after building it up
â•… into a great art.
Nonetheless, Aristophanes’ deployment of the description in 405 bc
shows signs of being filtered through his peculiar rendition of 421:€τέχνην
μεγάλην ἐξοικοδομήσας in Pherecrates explains τέχνην μεγάλην …
οἰκοδομήσας in Peace; but κἀπύργωσ᾿ in Peace produces πυργώσας in
Frogs.140 On this understanding, with Frogs Aristophanes is in a position
to recall his own erstwhile, boldly undertaken self-comparison to the tragedian.141 At the same time, memorable literary claims taken on loan and
incorporated into Aristophanes’ parabatic repertoire are again reinvested
in Aeschylus, as the tragedian prepares to confront his poetic rival. Hence,
the praise returns to its original beneficiary, but it does so in response to
the contextual prompting of poetic agonism that induced Aristophanes to
adopt the claim for himself.
If one allows for differences occasioned by the shift in dramatic presentation from monologue to dialogue, Aeschylus’ act of poetic self-assertion
Aeschylus is identified as the speaker by Σ VΓLh Pax 749a, who quotes this verse. Geissler (1925)
39, assumes that Pherecrates’ description is earlier than Peace. Meineke detected a reference to
Aeschylus, based on similar metaphors, in Pl. Com. fr. 69; see K–A ad loc.
140
Similarly, perhaps, Pax 750 ἔπεσιν μεγάλοις ~ Ra. 1004â•›pήματα
῾
σεμνά.
141
Cf. Schmid (1946) 104; Garriga (1996–7) 42.
139
246
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
approximates a typical Aristophanic parabasis, even to the point of employing specific parabatic strategies. From a general rhetorical perspective,
Euripides’ aggressively insulting challenge immediately puts Aeschylus
on the defensive, and he therefore begins his performance by acknowledging the compulsion upon him to speak despite his own preferences
(1006–7). Aeschylus’ position thus resembles that of Aristophanes, who
often begins his parabases by addressing the circumstances that make an
act of self-assertion necessary, and who often enough portrays the address
as a defensive response to his rivals’ assaults on his poetic credentials (esp.
Ach. 630–2; Eq. 512–16; V. 1015–17; cf. Pl. Com. fr. 99). In contrast with the
less focussed structure of Euripides’ performance, after Aeschylus expresses
his resentment at having to face his opponent at all, he begins by asking
Euripides a pointed question that introduces the theme that underpins
the older tragedian’s entire speech:€that a poet’s central role is to educate
the city and make its citizens better (1008–10).142 His speech thus has the
cogency and thematic unity of an Aristophanic parabasis in arguing the
poet’s case before the audience, and the point on which his remarks concentrate appears all the more worthy of consideration because both poets
agree to it. Once the theme is introduced, Aeschylus sets out to show how
he maintained this standard while Euripides departed from it (1010–17).
In support of this, he offers three points. First, his service to the city is
illustrated by the moral lessons available in plays such as Seven Against
Thebes (1021) and Persians (1026).143 In rehearsing the social merits of his
plays, Aeschylus’ agonistic strategy can be compared to Aristophanes’
parabatic maneuver of adducing his earlier comedies to demonstrate the
advantages that accrued to the city as a result of them.144 Next, Aeschylus
broadens the discussion to show how his didactic program conforms to the
respected traditions of Greek poetry, and places himself beside the greatest
poets of the past, mythological as well as historical:€Orpheus, Mousaios,
Hesiod and above all Homer (1030–6). Any sense of humility evident in
these remarks is counterbalanced by the grandiose claims about Aeschylus’
place in the poetic tradition that are generated at the same time; a similar
tension operates in Aristophanes’ attempt to enlist poetic tradition in his
Although Euripides claimed a didactic role (ultimately a comically simplistic one), giving good
counsel (nouthesia) was not included in his arguments; his response at 1009–10 is aimed rather at
Aeschylus’ interests, as the emphasis on the city rather than the household (compare 959, 976–7)
also makes clear:€cf. Sommerstein (1996a) 15, differently Rosen (2008) 148.
143
There are references to other plays (Myrmidons and Salaminioi?) in 1041; see Dover (1993) ad loc.
144
Especially V. 1029–47, but the idea is implicit at Ach. 633–40 (Babylonians); Nu. 528–35
(Banqueters), 553–9 (Knights); Pax 739–60 (various plays including Knights and Wasps).
142
The poet’s parabasis
247
support in the parabasis of Knights, where he anoints himself the “humble”
successor to the great comic poets of the past. Finally, Aeschylus presents
the heroic models he believes should be selected by poets in order to have
the desired positive effect on the audience (1040–2), and contrasts them
with Euripides’ selection of unworthy mythological subjects (1043–52). A
pithy pronouncement about the poet’s role as didaskalos of the adult population (1053–5) reasserts the central point and the concomitant need to
replace Euripides’ notion of what is “practical” (959, 1056–8, which imply
χρήσιμα) with what is nobly and morally beneficial (χρηστά:€1056, 1062).145
It is on this higher purpose that an Aeschylean character’s elevated mode
of speech (1056–9) and attire (1060–1) depend. Euripides’ poetic tendencies stand in stark contrast (1062–4) and are directly to blame for the state
in which the city finds itself (1065–88), as Dionysos’ balancing summary
in the pnigos (1089–98) illustrates. Accordingly, both halves of the agon
conclude with the god of the Theater mocking and criticizing the younger
tragedian.
Many humorous remarks and outrageous assertions are scattered
throughout Aeschylus’ self-presentation in the agon€ – which is another
way it resembles a parabasis. But the central point of his argument was far
more likely to be taken seriously by the audience than anything Euripides
said,146 especially since Aristophanes allows Aeschylus to put his case with
the focus and sense of purpose he himself displays in his parabases. Still,
even if we recognize a similarity between Aeschylus’ speech and a parabasis
in matters of form, context and argumentation, these points are meaningless unless the substance of the passage brings to mind Aristophanes’
competitive persona as it emerges from his plays. That case is easily made,
however, since the central issue of Aeschylus’ self-presentation in Frogs€–
that poets have a responsibility in regard to Athenian society and politics€– is a familiar element of Aristophanes’ stage biography from the time
of his earliest surviving comedy.147 More than anything else, the parabasis
of Acharnians aims to demonstrate how Aristophanes’ ridicule of Athens
(631) brings profuse advantages to the city (633, 641), such that even the
king of Persia thought Athens militarily superior because of the poet’s
On the two terms, see Dover (1986) = (1987–8) vol. ii, 10–12; (1993) 178n.
See the remarks of Dover (1993) 15–18. As Rosen (2008, esp. 153–4, 157, 159) points out, the negative portrayal of Euripides is repeatedly allowed to stand, in spite of opportunities to direct the
same criticisms against Aeschylus were the portrayals based on a more realistic appraisal of the
two poets.
147
Sommerstein (1992) 27–30 argues that Aristophanes was fairly unique in this respect; Bakola
(2008) 4–7 clarifies this theme in Aristophanes’ stage biography.
145
146
248
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
activity and his ability to improve his fellow citizens:€ τοὺς ἀνθρώπους
πολὺ βελτίους γεγενῆσθαι (650). As he goes on to say, he will teach the
city many good lessons through his just ridicule (655–6), so as to make
the Athenians truly fortunate:€ὥστ᾿ εὐδαίμονας εἶναι (656).148 In both the
latter claim and especially the praise of the Persian King, Aristophanes
assigns himself a role identical to that attributed to Aeschylus through
Euripides:€ὅτι βελτίους τε ποιοῦμεν | τοὺς ἀνθρώπους ἐν ταĩς πóλεσιν (Ra.
1009–10). Even the emphasis on community (i.e., ἐν ταĩς πóλεσιν)149 applies
equally to Acharnians, since Aristophanes is keen to emphasize that he
goes about his task without losing sight of his dedication and devotion to
the city (661–4).150 Aeschylus’ theme, on which he stakes his poetic merit
in confrontation with a challenger, is near and dear to Aristophanes as he
presents himself in his plays.
Just as important, according to the logic of Frogs itself, Aeschylus’ poetic
claims can be identified with Aristophanes’ own. Their shared vision of
poetry’s role in the city enables the tragic poet’s self-assertive speech to
compensate for the missing parabasis anapests.151 Above all, the leading
parabasis epirrhema begins with a claim that, even in its brevity, anticipates most of what is at stake in the poetic outlook Aeschylus presents
and defends in his encounter with Euripides. In preparation for the public
advice to come, the initiates proclaim (Ra. 686–7):
τὸν ἱερὸν χορὸν δίκαιóν ἐστι χρηστὰ τῇ πóλει
ξυμπαραινεĩν καὶ διδάσκειν.
the holy chorus is right to advise the city
and teach it worthy lessons
With this slogan,152 the chorus epitomize the three considerations of greatest importance in Aeschylus’ speech:€ obligation to the polis (1009–10,
1083–8), a capacity to act as teachers (1026, 1054–5), and guiding all else,
consideration of what is truly beneficial (1031, 1035, 1056, 1062). What follows in both epirrhemata is Aristophanes’ counsel to the Athenians about
151
Cf. Ach. 497–501 for Dikaiopolis/“Aristophanes”’ related comments.
“In their communities,” as Sommerstein (1996a) and Henderson (2002) render the phrase.
Related comments at Eq. 510; Nu. 561–2; V. 650–1, 1017, 1037, 1043; Pax 759–60.
Although remarking on some of these similarities, Hubbard (1991) 212, argues that Aeschylus’
ideals sound too exclusive and authoritarian, and therefore too redolent of oligarchy for
Aristophanes to have attached himself to them. This overly suspicious interpretation contradicts
the fact that one of the chief figures in the oligarchy is directly associated with “Euripides” in
Frogs (Theramenes, 967).
152
Compare the chorus’ hope in the parodos to honor Demeter at her festival “by making many
amusing and serious remarks” (389–90).
148
149
150
The poet’s parabasis
249
how to act in their present desperate situation:€recall the city’s exiles (687–
705) and entrust their affairs once again to men whose birth, breeding
and experience make them fit to lead (718–37). The focus on Athens’ decadence, which Aristophanes implicitly acknowledges, anticipates the slide
towards ruin Aeschylus blames on Euripides. The ponēroi Aristophanes
holds accountable for the city’s misfortunes (730–3) thus fit the social profile of those who flocked together to support Euripides in Hades (771–6,
779–81) and who (according to Aeschylus) have likewise come to dominate
Athens because of the examples Euripides’ plays provide the city (1013–17,
1069–73, 1078–88). Aristophanes longs for the leadership of men “raised in
palaistrai, choruses and music” (729), while Aeschylus is eager to reassert
related ideals by rehabilitating the failing system of public liturgies (1065),
filling the palaistrai again (1070), and conditioning the youth to participate more honorably in the festivals (1087–8). Playful and charming as the
parabasis is, especially with the coinage metaphor of the second epirrhema
(718–26), the directness of Aristophanes’ political advice is conceded even
by those who generally question the seriousness of his claims to have an
impact on Athens through his poetry.153 The Athenians themselves seem
to have recognized Aristophanes’ success in capturing ideas and concerns
informing current discussions; according to a plausible reconstruction
of events alluded to in ancient sources, not long after Frogs was staged,
the Athenians put the political advice the parabasis contains into effect
and honored the poet in a manner befitting a benefactor of the dēmos, by
awarding him a sacred olive crown and authorizing a reperformance of his
play.154
It appears that Aristophanes has gone to some lengths to make the parabasis syzygy and Aeschylus’ performance converge on a single poetic ideal,
for he does what Aeschylus proposes and defends as a general poetic program, and that amounts to the work typically carried out by the parabasis anapests. Without mentioning his own name, Aristophanes makes
the case that he and his poetry belong in the tradition of poets who were
great civic benefactors. One consequence of the interpretation of the parabasis anapests as assimilated with an agon epirrhema is that the assumptions on which Aristophanes’ claims about his poetry are based become a
gambit tested by the poetic contest his play presents to the audience. To
that end, the exhortation to the audience “to change their ways and use
See esp. Heath (1987) 19–21.
Ra. Hyp. I (c) Dover and the Life of Aristophanes (= Ar. test. 1.35–9). On the evidence and its
interpretation, see Sommerstein (1993) 461–6.
153
154
250
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
the chrēstoi once again” (734–5), with which the parabasis closes, predisposes them to attach significance to what Aeschylus says in the contest,
abandoning Dionysos’€– and by implication their own€– putative attachment to the failing poetic agenda of Euripides. For dramatic and comic
purposes, Aeschylus’ conflict with Euripides is drawn out through a number of additional rounds. Still, the early indications of shared vision in
Aeschylus’ and Aristophanes’ opinions about poetry make the outcome
predictable.155
Aristophanes’ investment in the contest of Aeschylus and Euripides cannot really be questioned, since the matter of political advice is taken up in
the final round of the contest, where Aristophanes’ advice in the parabasis
syzygy is virtually restated.156 After the epirrhematic agon, the contestants
proceed to analyze the minutiae of one another’s poetry in several scenes,
until at last Dionysos proclaims himself unable€– or rather unwilling157€– to
decide between them (1411–13). This confession comes at the same moment
that the poetic contest is realigned to suit Dionysos’ original plan to fetch
a poet from Hades. To cajole his visitor out of his reluctance to decide
the contest, Pluto reveals that the poet to whom Dionysos awards victory
will return with him to Athens. Although this blatantly undermines the
premise of the Underworld contest, the expedient is necessitated by the
play’s original premise and makes explicit what has been implied for some
time:€that Dionysos’ peculiar katabasis will be realized in the poetic agon.
Thus prompted, Dionysos shares his reasons for descending to Hades in
the first place (Ra. 1418–21):
ἐγὼ κατῆλθον ἐπὶ ποητήν. τοῦ χάριν;
ἵν᾿ ἡ πóλις σωθεĩσα τοὺς χοροὺς ἄγῃ.
ὁπóτερος οὖν ἂν τῇ πóλει παραινέσειν
μέλλῃ τι χρηστóν¸ τοῦτον ἄξειν μοι δοκῶ.
I came to Hades for a poet. Why?
So that after the city was saved, it could continue to celebrate
â•… choral festivals.
Cf. Erbse (1975) 51–3; Sommerstein (1996a) 16. In addition to the epirrhematic agon, the weighing scene (1364–1410) is clearly won by Aeschylus. I cannot agree with (e.g.) MacDowell (1959)
265, that Aristophanes intends the agon to be a close one; similarly in Knights the contest is
drawn out far longer than it needs to be, in order to show that Cleon deserves to lose Demos’
support. Although my reading assumes literary complexity and nuance, I do not see as much
irony in the outcome of the contest as does Rosen (2004).
156
Pace Heath (1987) 20–1.
157
As Dover (1993) ad loc., rightly emphasizes. Dionysos’ situation is thus comparable to that of
Philocleon, who despite his signal defeat in the agon requires the additional domestic trial scene
(V. 764–1008) to bring him around completely.
155
The poet’s parabasis
251
So whichever of you can offer the city
some beneficial advice, he’s the one I think I’ll lead back.
Dionysos’ pronouncement does not precisely match his impassioned quest
for Euripides, which lay at the heart of his plan as first laid out. Acting
now as judge in a contest, he must set personal favor aside. He came down
in search of a good poet (71), and his reason was linked with a concern for
the continuing vitality of the Theater, since contemporary poets could not
be counted on for more than a single festival (94–5). But only now is his
original plan of saving the genre openly described as having a bearing on
Athens’ safety generally. Although this is sometimes taken as evidence for
a change in Dionysos’ character,158 several considerations suggest the contrary. Dionysos presents his explanation as though it were exactly the one
he formulated originally; rather than taking advantage of the opportunity
to draw attention to a shift in outlook, Aristophanes does his best to elide
any impression that a change has occurred.159 Moreover, as noted in the
discussion of the opening scenes, Aristophanes grounds Dionysos’ original
motivations and specific objective in the Athenian experience of tragedy as
part of the city’s festive life-cycle; far from interjecting a thought alien to
the god’s endeavor to this point, on a fairer assessment this passage articulates an idea that is both natural for the audience and has been implicit in
the action all along€– that the fate of tragedy, the Dionysian festivals and
the polis are inextricably bound together and rest in the balance.
The articulation is important nonetheless. When the plan to rescue
Euripides was first presented, it was within a scene whose purpose was to
establish Dionysos in his capacity of theater god and critic. The poetic agon
has put this capacity to an extreme test, but only now can Dionysos really
be said to set the contest’s critical agenda. With the re-presentation of his
plan in the contest’s final moments, it is as if every other method for evaluating the poets’ dynameis has been exhausted, so that Dionysos defines his
intention in relation to the single remaining criterion that will allow him
to settle the contest once and for all. Thus the explanation for his katabasis he offers now sets up the line of questioning he pursues in addressing the poets (1435–6). All this puts emphasis on the final round; still, in
offering this final criterion Dionysos only reintroduces ideas expressed by
Especially Segal (1961); cf. Bierl (1991) 42. Better in my opinion is Lada-Richards (1999) 220–3,
who takes into consideration how the agon influences Dionysos’ mindset, rather than the katabasis of the first half.
159
The same is true for the reconfiguring of the contest to fit the play’s premise. When it is important (as Dionysos’ change would seem to be), Aristophanes does not avoid marking dramatic
changes of purpose and mindset:€esp. Eq. 1131–50; Nu. 1452–61; V. 737–84.
158
252
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
both Aristophanes in the parabasis and Aeschylus in his parabatic eppirrhema.160 Supplying beneficial advice (1420–1 παραινέσειν … τι χρηστóν)
reactivates the bond between the two poets, whereas everything we have
heard from Euripides suggests that he will be at a significant disadvantage.
In that case, there can be little doubt that the determining performance of
the contest will favor Aeschylus, and beyond him Aristophanes.161
In answer to Dionysos’ first question, “What should be done about
Alcibiades?” (1422–3), the tragedians offer contrary advice€– Euripides that
he should be regarded as an enemy (1427–9), Aeschylus that he should be
allowed to return and restored to power (1431–2).162 Although in the epirrhema of the parabasis syzygy only those disenfranchised after the expulsion of the Four Hundred were singled out for reinstatement in the city,
Aeschylus’ recommendation can easily be seen to reflect the general spirit
of that advice, to the same extent that Euripides’ condemns it.163 Certainly
the call in the parabasis for Athens to reinvest in elite leadership has just
as much relevance for Alcibiades, whose place in the city’s ongoing discussions about its political future is assured by the way Dionysos introduces
his question (1423, 1425–6).164 With the harmonious note it strikes in relation to the political advice in the parabasis, that response might have sufficed for Aristophanes to allow his Dionysos to judge in favor of Aeschylus.
But as πρῶτον μέν in 1422 demonstrates, Dionysos never intended his initial question to produce a definitive selection, but only to introduce the
broader question about the city’s salvation he poses next (1435–6).
In their parodos the chorus of initiates summon τὴν Σώτειραν in the hope that she will save
their land for the future (377–82), and soon thereafter they call on Demeter to save her chorus
(386) in a way that reflects Dionysos’ project to save the choruses of his festival. It is unclear
that the chorus’ remarks here stand in pointed contrast to Dionysos’ feelings about the need for
Euripides (Segal (1961) 224–5), as opposed to expanding on his comments and clarifying what is
actually at stake in the god’s€– and through him the city’s€– crisis.
161
Cf. Erbse (1975) 56; Padilla (1992) 379–80; Lada-Richards (1999) 221.
162
On the doublet 1431a–b, see Dover (1993) 372, and Cannatà (2003), who (p. 278) misinterprets
Aeschylus’ advice.
163
Wills (1969b) 54; Hubbard (1991) 214; Vickers (2001) 194–5, who presses the relationship to an
extreme. Sommerstein (1996a) 17, suggests that Aeschylus’ comparison of Alcibiades to a lion
might imply a certain amount of danger in this path.
164
For Alcibiades’ activity in these final years and its relevance to this passage, see Meiggs (1972)
372–3; Dover (1993) 370–1; Sommerstein (1996a) 1432n. The forgiving tone relative to Alcibiades
may have a more general relevance for Frogs, given Aristophanes’ comparatively restrained treatment of him throughout his poetic career and because by recalling the Eleusinian procession in
the first half of the play Aristophanes offers the audience a stark reminder of one of Alcibiades’
greatest acts of public benefaction in recent years, when in 407 he reorganized the procession
after a period when it could not be celebrated due to Spartan occupation of much of the Attic
countryside (X. HG 1.4.20); cf. Dover (1993) 371, contra Tierney (1935) 201.
160
The poet’s parabasis
253
At this point, textual problems render interpretation difficult, since
although Dionysos requests a single response from each poet (1435), the
manuscripts offer three.165 The situation is the more regrettable, because
it comes at the final challenge in the poetic contest. The most likely solution (adopted by Dover and Sommerstein in their editions) is that one
response is a substitute Aristophanes composed for the commemorative
second production of the play, and that all three have been combined in
our manuscripts in a way that does not reflect any single performance.166
If 1442–50 belong to the second production,167 by having one poet recommend that Athens “withdraw its trust from those it now trusts, and
trust instead those it does not currently trust” (1446–8), Aristophanes
reasserts, albeit more sententiously, the essential advice of the parabasis, which is identified in our sources as the passage that earned him
public honor.168 For the original performance at the Lenaia of 405,
Aristophanes left Dionysos (and the audience) to decide the outcome on
the basis of a preposterous response that can only belong to Euripides
(1437–41, 1451–3), and another offered by Aeschylus (1463–5) that can be
regarded as an invigorated continuation of current policies.169 Perhaps
more revealing than Aeschylus’ prescription are his requests for information about Athens’ current political situation (1454–60), on which he
bases his advice. With these remarks he reintroduces terminology and
ideas that are by now quite familiar:€ which men the city “uses” (1455
χρῆται), and whether they are good (1455 τοĩς χρηστοĩς) or bad (1456
τοĩς πονηροĩς).170 Moral considerations continue to be the framework
within which Aeschylus makes sense of his role as poetic advisor, so that
The conflation of the texts occurred in the early stages of transmission, since the problem was
already noted in antiquity:Â€Σ VEΘRa. 1437–41a (Aristarchos named); b (Apollonios named); c; d.
Dover (1993) 373–6, and Sommerstein (1996a) 286–8, who summarize earlier solutions, of which
Newiger (1985) is most important; cf. Cannatà (2003), N. G. Wilson (2007b) 183. Von Möllendorf
(1996–7) 142–8, and Willi (2002) 18–20, offer a fresh defense for the transmitted text.
167
As both Dover and Sommerstein argue, though they assign the part of the interlocutor to different characters (Dover to Aeschylus, Sommerstein to Euripides).
168
See esp. Wills (1969b) 54–5; Sommerstein (1974) 27; Erbse (1975) 57; Dover (1993) 374;
Sommerstein (1996a) 289–90.
169
Thus Sommerstein (1974) 25–6, who refutes the claims of anachronism by other scholars;
ΣRVEΘRa. 1463 and ΣRVMEΘRa. 1465a adduce Pericles’ strategy (Th. 1.143.4). An underlying message of peace is detected by Willi (2002) 24–6, who thus aligns Aeschylus with the position of
Aristophanic comedy.
170
The revised advice contained in 1442–50 also follows naturally from these, and the transposition (endorsed by Dover and Sommerstein) largely negates Hubbard (1991) 215–16, who (with
Euripides assumed as interlocutor) distinguishes between the specific advice of the parabasis to
use the chrēstoi and the equivocating advice simply to use the opposite, since the terms of the
former are adequately set in place in the lead-up.
165
166
254
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
through his inquiry he carries out his task as a remedy for the sociopolitical tensions Aristophanes concentrated on in the parabasis. Their
shared outlook here goes along with a shared poetic style when a new
metaphor is offered; instead of coinage, it is now taste in clothing€– the
chlaina versus the sisura (1459)€– that illustrates the vogue in Athenian
political discussions.171
The difference between the two poets must thus have been as clear here
as it was in the weighing scene that immediately preceded. It is no wonder, therefore, that despite his earlier hesitation, Dionysos no longer resists
Pluto’s urging, and adopts a solemn official tone to proclaim that he has
reached a verdict (1467).172 Following the promptings of his psychē (1468),
he at last awards Aeschylus the victory (1471). On the face of it, there would
seem to be some justification for interpreting Dionysos’ dependence on his
“soul” as a sign of the irrational and arbitrary nature of the final determination.173 But the exact sense of psychē is difficult to pin down, and by
the end of the fifth century the term can imply rational evaluation.174 At
a minimum, it is difficult to believe that by handing the matter over to
his psychē at the crucial moment Dionysos hoped to do anything other
than offer assurances to the contestants, along with Pluto and the wider
audience. In this respect, therefore, the guidance provided by Dionysos’
psychē might testify to the depth of his convictions,175 by conveying a sense
of directness, fairness and perhaps even truth€– in short, the ideals that
constituted the basic obligations of a judge. This interpretation fits well
with the immediate aftermath of the verdict in favor of Aeschylus, since
Dionysos evinces not the slightest hesitation in rebuffing Euripides’ challenge (1469–78) and even deploys Euripidean quotations to assert his
point, among them the verse from Hippolytos the god used in the prologue
to express his admiration for the poet.176 That, together with the chorus’
For the clothing types, cf. Stone (1984) 166. See [X.] Ath. 10 for the alleged association between
humble dress and radical democracy.
172
Cf. Radermacher (1954) 347.
173
Wilamowitz (1929) 474; Erbse (1975) 59; Dover (1993) 19–20; Sommerstein (1996a) 1468n.; von
Möllendorff (1996–7) 135; Willi (2002) 20–1.
174
E.g. S. Ant. 176 (with Griffith); TrGF ii, fr. 16(a); Antipho 4.1.7; X. Mem. 1.2.53; Pl. R. 353d. Claus
(1981) examines the development of the term; see his discussion of the present passage (89). Use
of the related term thumos may be helpful:€see e.g., E. Med. 309–10, where Creon’s choice according to his thumos is regarded (albeit deceitfully) as unobjectionable.
175
Handley (1956) 214–15; Woodbury (1986) 245; Lada-Richards (1999) 219. Recall too the emphasis
Dionysos placed on the judging process in summoning the Muses to oversee his decision
(872–84).
176
Ra. 101–2, 1471~ Hipp. 612. Cf. von Möllendorff (1996–97) 136.
171
Celebrating Poetic Victory
255
elaboration on Euripides’ literary offences (1491–9), creates the impression
that in the end this was no unprincipled or arbitrary choice.
C e l e br at i ng P oe t ic V ic t or y
In conformity with the pattern in other plays, the final scene of Frogs
affirms the successful resolution of the comic undertaking by introducing
a mood of vigorous celebration. The sense in which these victory celebrations anticipate the poet’s objective for the comic competition is acutely
felt. In defense of his award of victory to Aeschylus, Dionysos confidently
presents his decision to the audience so that they can accept it for themselves (1475 τί δ᾿ αἰσχρóν¸ ἢν μὴ τοĩς θεωμένοις δοκῇ;). The implicit suggestion, which really amounts to a request, is that the success of Frogs’ internal
agon be transformed into a positive reception of Frogs at the Lenaia, an
idea elaborated in what follows. The celebration commences with Pluto’s
invitation to withdraw into his palace, where he plans to host a feast in
honor of the contest outcome (1479–80).177 But Euripides is not to partake;
Pluto’s dual (1480 σφώ) indicates that only Dionysos and Aeschylus are
invited.178 I have argued in more detail elsewhere that the close association
of the god of the Theater and a freshly victorious poet in the context of a
celebratory feast was an ideal that had already been developed in the fifth
century in connection with the victory feast, with which the dramatic festivals closed.179 That Aristophanes deploys this image now, however fleetingly, only makes sense; in Frogs the celebratory sequence that elsewhere
typically sees the performers off stage is modulated by the milieu of poetic
competition that dominates the play’s action. As the actors depart for this
celebration, Aeschylus’ victory is amplified by the song the chorus perform
in his honor, divided as it is between a eulogy for the victor (1482–90) and
condemnation of the defeated (1491–9). For Aeschylus, the song is a true
makarismos (1482 μακάριóς γ᾿ ἀνήρ), attesting to the superior state of blessedness and good fortune he has attained thanks to his agonistic success.180
Much the same effect of glorifying Aeschylus’ achievement is created by
Dionysos’ ready acquiescence (1481 οὐ γὰρ ἄχθομαι τῷ πράγματι) perhaps hints at his familiarity with the situation.
178
Cf. Dover (1993) 1479n.
179
Biles (2007); see 34–5 for the passage under discussion here. Pluto’s characterization of the feast
as xenismos (1480 ξενίζω Meineke (Dover):€ξενίσωμεν Rogers (Wilson):€ξενίσω codd.) helps establish the epinikian ideal. Lada-Richards (1999) 229 adduces instead the model of athletic victory
celebrations.
180
For this idea as it fits into the epinician praise of Pindar, see Kurke (1991) 124–5, 127. LadaRichards (1999) 328–9 emphasizes a connection with mystic rites.
177
256
Dionysos and Dionysia in Frogs
the formal procession that accompanies the tragedian with dance and
song (1524–33) as he sets off to Athens. Dionysos surely accompanies him,
but once Pluto’s invitation to celebrate has been extended, all indications
are that the victorious poet stands front and center during the remainder
of the play. The procession back to the city is then very much a victory procession for the winning poet. To be more precise, we should say that from
Hades Dionysos and Aeschylus will reappear at future Dionysian festivals,
which means that their true destination is the Theater itself. The envisioned
epiphany is left for the audience to imagine; but while Aeschylus himself
would never set foot in the Theater again, his victory can be entrusted to
Aristophanes (much as his seat of honor in Hades had been entrusted to
Sophocles (1515–23)), as the poet who has been shown by his play itself to
be most capable of serving Athens in its time of crisis.
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General index
abuse
and comedy 194, 226–7, 240–1
of rivals 36, 185–6
Acharnae
and Rural Dionysia 64–6
Acropolis 112
Aelian 62, 196
Aeschylus
and Aristophanean poetics 5–6, 37;
see€also€A ristophanes and Aeschylus
and Cratinus 232
and Demeter 228
and Marathon generation 203
as parabatic figure in Frogs 245–7
and poetic past 230
Myrmidons 238
Persians 246
reperformance of plays 60, 173
Seven Against Thebes 23, 239, 246
Agathon 42, 83, 215
departure from Athens 217
agōn 67
agon, poetic 12, 15, 20, 211, 217
influence on genre 3–5
and krisis 234–6, 251–2
and literary criticism 230–1, 238
and revision 172–3
agōnisma 2, 168, 187
Aischines 195
Alcibiades 252
Alcman, as competitive poet 25–7
Alkidamas
Contest of Homer and Hesiod 47–8, 238
Ameipsias 39, 185
and defeat of Clouds I 184–5
Amphidamas 24
Anthesteria 85, 230; see€Choes
Antimachus 90–2
Antiphanes 137
Thamyris 13
Aotis 25
apatē 69
apoleipsis 159
Apollo 17, 229
Archilochus 130
and Cratinean poetics 140–3, 144–5, 153–4,
166
archon basileus 85, 87
Aristonymus 39
Aristophanes
‘emulated’ by rivals 183
and ‘Aeschylus’ 245–55
and Bdelycleon 163–4
and Dikaiopolis 57, 71–2, 73–5, 77–81, 95–6
and Sausage-seller 100, 123
as sophisticated poet 7–8, 123–4, 127, 143, 165,
205–6, 208–10
Babylonians 59, 71, 73–5, 80, 81–3, 180
Banqueters 178–80, 196
Birds 50–2, 195–6
second parabasis 197
Clouds
discontinuity in versions 202
double-agon 202–3
recontestation 168–9
rivals of Clouds II 184–5
second parabasis 199
versions of 10, 167–8
feud with Cleon 71, 74–5, 77, 163
first victory, with Babylonians 82, 97
Frogs
frog-chorus 228–31
katabasis in 219–32
reperformance of 173, 249
rivals of 185
versions of 253
Knights
agonistic quality of 98
Lysistrata 9
on peace 78–80
280
General index
Peace 158–9
Proagon 43
record of success 194–5
rivalry with Cratinus 14–15, 39, 94–6
rivals’ abuse of 37–8, 39–40, 102, 124, 143,
147, 209–10
Thesmophoriazusae 47
use of directors 39–40, 100–1, 102
Wasps
as comeback play 154–5
second parabasis 192
Aristotle 5, 61, 119, 135
and contest records 114, 116
Astydamas 23
Athena 108
Athenian democracy 47
athletic contest 20
audience
and agonistic poetry 3, 123–4, 149–51
and Comedy, in Pytine 151
and Demos, in Knights 121–2, 126–8, 131–2
and Dionysos, in Frogs 213–14
and judges 188, 194
antagonism with 136–7, 148, 155, 177–8
appeal to 126–7, 131–2, 164
continuity of identity 121–2, 179
engagement of 127, 178–9, 239
expectations 37–8
judgment 179–80, 194–5
manipulation of 164–5, 171–2, 186
poetic authority 181
reading 168–9, 214
theatrical competence 68, 103
Barrett, W. S. 174
Bowie, A. M. 29, 104
Callimachus 141, 168
canonization 173
captatio benevolentiae 103
Charon 220
Chionides 1
Choes 85–7
aitiology of 90, 92
drinking contest 85–6
Cholleidai 66
choregos 83, 90, 109
chorus
animal chorus 228
and festival organization 217
and performance 225
and poet 34–5, 39, 122, 135
fluctuation in identity 123, 227–8
looping effect, in Frogs 240–2
of Acharnians 64–5
281
chous-pitcher 92, 93
chrēstos 253
City Dionysia 40, 43, 60, 68, 113
Clay, J. S. 20
Cleon 197
and Aristophanean poetics 4, 37, 39, 132–3
and Clouds II 199–200
and storm imagery 122, 123
closure, victory in 87–8, 129–32, 165–6, 255–6
competitive poetics 2, 31, 76, 95–6, 138, 154, 165,
168, 198
contest records 10, 113–21, 174, 196
distortion of 116–20, 179–80
and management of festival 113–14
convention 37
Corinna 21
Crates 14, 104–5, 115, 126, 127
and didaskaliai 119–20
Cratinus 91–2, 115
abuse of rivals 104, 124
and Archilochus 135; see€also€A rchilochus and
Cratinean poetics
as comic hero 151
as focalizer of poetic rivalry 106–7
at Lenaia of 425 97–8
and Cleon in Knights 123–5, 129
and defeat of Clouds I 184
and Eleusinia in Frogs 226
and intoxication 140–2, 144, 146, 148–9,
152–4
and Philocleon in Wasps 165
and poetic past in Frogs 231–2
Didaskaliai 116, 134–7
in Aristophanes 105–6, 144–6
Pytine 8, 10, 138, 139, 142–3, 146–54
adapted in Wasps 156–66
as dramatized parabasis 30–1, 146
legal theme in 159–62
respect for in Frogs 185
Satyrs 124
cult, adaptations of 222
defeat as theme 113, 136–7
Demeter 228, 232, 241
dexios 124, 127, 205
diachrony/synchrony 237–8
didaskaliai (production, production records)
115–16, 134, 168
Dikaiopolis as producer 68–70, 71–2
Dionysos
and Aristophanean poetics 178, 214
and Cratinus 146
and epinikia iconography 93–4
and evolution of audience tastes 238–9
god of theatre 213–19
282
General index
Dionysos (cont.)
and literary criticism 214–16, 235
and modernity 219, 232
and polis 216–18, 251
priest of 85–6, 178
and ship-cart procession 221
directing plays see€komoidodidaskalia
dithyramb 110, 134–5, 142, 226
divine assistance 25, 53, 107, 108, 128, 228
divorce see€marriage
Dobrov, G. W. 155–6
domestic trial
in Pytine 160–2
in Wasps 162
Dover, K. 191, 201, 253
dual 255
echthros 37, 104, 108–9
eisagōgē 221
Eleusinia
afterlife 223–4
gephyrismos 227
in Frogs 222–8
prorrhēsis 224–7
empeiros 236
entrance fee, to theatre 220
epideixis 43–4, 237
epinician 113
epinikia 83–4, 90–1, 131, 255
epirrhematic agon 36, 66–8
in Cratinus 142–3, 147, 160–2
parabatic function of, in Frogs 242–50
Eratosthenes 168
euchomai, in Homeric formulae 19–22
Eupolis 47, 94–5, 142, 147, 182–3
at Lenaia of 425 97–8
Marikas 184
Euripides 215
Andromeda 217
and Aristophanean poetics 124, 143
Hippolytos 254
Hippolytus plays 174–5
in Acharnians 68–70
and modern poetry 243–4
and moral degeneration 203, 249
Telephos
in Acharnians 66–70, 72–3, 75, 81
Eurytos and competitive folly 16–19
father-beating 203–4
festivals 12
contests at 56, 62
first-person, and poet’s voice 28, 36, 77, 177–8
Foley, H. 73
food 126, 127
Ford, A. 12
fragments, methodology 6–7, 142
garlands, victory symbol 99, 100, 106, 128, 146
Gelzer, T. 243
generational conflict 203–4
Gilula, D. 50, 51
Goldhill, S. 73
Gorgias 69
Hagesichora 25
Hamilton, R. 86
hatred, as theme 125; see€also€echthros
Heath, M. 137–8, 156
Hekate 226
Helen 170
Heliodorus 190–3
Hellenistic scholarship 33, 46, 49
Hermippus 183, 184
heroic duel 19
Hesiod
and parabasia 27
as competitive poet 23–5
poetic biography 23–4
self-assertion in 25
Hesychius 134, 149
history, of theater competition 113, 114–15, 135
Homer
Catalogue of Ships 18
and competitive displays 16–22
heroic duels 104
Horace 141
Hubbard, T. K. 29, 35, 200, 208
humor, registers of 204–5, 207–9, 212–13
Hyperbolos 183, 197
hypothesis ancient 167–8, 174, 175, 189–90, 198,
202–3
Iakchos 223
iconography 93–4, 221
idiom, agonistic 5, 110–12
Ilissos 220
inspiration 140–1
instruction
as plot motif 152
and poetry 247–8
intertextuality 137–8, 144, 146, 153–4, 156, 163
invocation 21, 26
Ion of Chios 84, 235
Iophon 215, 236
Jones, N. F. 64, 66
judges 51, 87, 122, 136, 187–9, 196, 198
and judging process 188–9
oath 195, 237
General index
Kallias 117
Karkinos 166
katakeleusmos 67, 166, 244
kaunos 161
Kinesias 226
kommation 190
komoidodidaskalia 100–3, 135
komoidoumenoi 199–200
kompos 23
Konnos 145
Kopaic eel 84, 89
kordax 183
Lada-Richards, I. 222
Lamachus 74, 87, 91
laughter 136, 164, 186
Lenaia 43, 120
lērein 32, 148, 152
Lykis 185
lyre 229
Lysippos 117
Magnes 14, 104, 110–12, 115, 126
and didaskaliai 118
makarismos 255
marriage, as plot motif 147,
159–60
Martin, R. P. 19
metaphor, agonistic
athletic 7–8, 76
blindness 171
chariot 155
horse 154
lyre 13
marriage 150–1
military 104–5, 108
naval 100, 103, 107
river 104, 144–5, 153–4
swan 26, 229
wine 67, 135
metatheater 63, 164, 212–13, 222
meter
anapest 124, 224, 244
archilochean 136, 166
eupolidean 186
iambic trimeter 67
Morsimus 123
Muellner, L. 19–20
Muses 103, 225, 229, 232, 237
and poetic authority 20–1, 53, 241
Nike 108–9, 112
Nikobolos 112
novelty in poetic claims 129, 132, 162–3, 166,
182–3
283
oath 51, 178
Odysseus, and competitive restraint 16–19
Oineus 64, 69
old age, as theme 115, 119
Olson, S. D. 68, 196
oral tradition 169
Orestes 92–3
originality 137–8, 155; see€also€novelty
paean 128–9
palinode 202, 204
Pan 229
parabainein, in parabatic formula 33–5, 46–52
parabasis
antecedents of 15–27
competitive function of 8, 28–32
development of 31, 198
dialogue between rivals in 35–6, 40
elements in fragments 32
in Cratinus 147
and invocation 53
odes in 53, 107–9, 193–4
and poetic persona 29–32
and prorrhēsis, in Frogs 242
syzygy 191
para prosdokian 7, 104, 237
parelthein, in formula for audience address
47–50
performance culture 169–71
performance, immediacy of 3, 5–6, 37, 155, 166,
181–7, 237–8
periagermos 88
Pericles 47, 56, 220
personification 102, 147, 150–1
phallic procession 61–2
phallus 205, 206–7
Pherecrates 5, 37, 195, 196, 245
phortikos 157, 179
phrontistērion 222
Phrynichus 183, 184, 185
Phrynichus trag. 71
physical abuse 205, 207
physis 206–7
Pindar 22, 223
Pithoigia 85
plagiarism 137, 147, 163
Plato 2, 205
Critias 21
Symposium 42, 84
Plato Comicus 33–4, 36, 183, 184
Platonius 140
plays, as competitive pieces 2–3, 8
Plutarch 56, 234
poetic past 228–30
Polemos 91
284
General index
Poseidon 107
prayer 20–2, 99–100, 108, 227–8
proagon 40–6, 84, 237, 243
and comic parabasis 43–6
tragic poets at 42–3
prohedria 86
prologue
Acharnians 59–61
Frogs 212–14
props 63–4, 68
protagonist, poet’s identification with 9, 30,
57–8, 76, 96; see€also€Aristophanes and
Dikaiopolis etc.
Prytaneion 131, 146
Pseudo-Longinus 145
psychē 254
Pythangelos 215
pytinē-flask 148–9
redemption 30, 147–8
rehabilitation, as plot motif 157–9, 163
reperformance, of Athenian drama
172–4
retribution, as plot motif 197–8, 207–8
Revermann, R. 88
reversal, in plot 152–3, 201–2
revision
and recontestation 169–76
retention of material in 190–1,
199–201
thematized in Clouds II 199–210
and tragedy 174–5
rhetorical topoi 160–1
Rosen, R. M. 139–40, 141, 145
Rural Dionysia 60–70
and Acharnians 62–3
major poets at 62
reperformances at 60–1, 62, 68
scholia ancient 5, 71, 74, 118, 125, 139, 145, 179,
190, 193, 197
Segal, C. 218, 236
self-assertion 32, 49, 177, 242
self-praise 23, 35
setting, dramatic shifts of 64
sex, as metaphor 108, 151
Sickinger, J. P. 114
Sider, D. 42
Sidwell, K. 139–40
Sifakis, G. M. 28, 31, 242
Simonides 203
Sirens 26
Slater, N. W. 127, 220
Sommerstein, A. H. 94, 253
sophia/sophos, in poetic claims 7, 111, 127, 181,
205, 234
Sophocles 215, 216
first contest with Aeschylus 235
Thamyris 13, 14
sōphrosynē 208, 209
speech-act 19, 31
spondai 130
stage action 88, 131, 159
stage biography 31, 76, 102, 122, 125, 144, 247
in Cratinus 137, 144
staging 221
Stesichorus
Palinode 172
performance context 172
Street of Tripods 88, 131
Strepsiades as hero 58
succession as theme 121
superlative expression 111, 112, 118
Telecleides 120
temporal distortion 237–8
textuality 170
Thamyris
and Cratinus 13–14
as prototypical competitive poet 12–22, 50,
54–5, 172
in Athenian drama 12–13
in Knights 13–15
theatrocracy 56; see€also€audience
thiasos 224
thriambos; see€dithyramb
Thucydides 2–3, 47, 64, 238
thunderbolt 143
torches 205, 208
Totaro, P. 190
transgression 27, 49–50, 52–4
transmission of plays 192, 253
tripod 24
tropaion 104, 110, 112
trygoidia 72, 73, 81, 84–5
vase paintings 23, 45, 113
Victors List 116–17
victory celebration; see€epinikia
victory monument 104, 109–13
West, M. L. 24
Wilson, P. 42, 88–90
xenia 221
Xenokles 215
youthfulness, as theme 122–3, 125
Index of passages
370–3â•… 80
370–4â•… 78
378â•… 71
383–90â•… 68
393–4â•… 68
412â•… 69
412–80â•… 68–70
481–6â•… 67
497–501â•… 84
497–503â•… 30
497–504â•… 70–2
498â•… 80
500–1â•… 80
501–2â•… 75
502–7â•… 81
503â•… 79
505–6â•… 78
515–16â•… 78
524–31â•… 79
539–43â•… 72
560–1â•… 80
572–625â•… 74–5
577â•… 78
598â•… 78
607â•… 78
626–718â•… 76–83
628â•… 85
628–9â•… 33, 52
630–2â•… 37
631–64â•… 247–8
659â•… 37
659–64â•… 35
665–6â•… 53
848–53â•… 14, 94, 185
885–6â•… 84
1000–94â•… 85–6
1143â•… 95
1143–73â•… 90–4
1162–73â•… 95
1168–73â•… 185
Aelianâ•…
Varia Historiaâ•…
2.13â•… 62, 196
Aeschinesâ•…
1.193â•… 36, 48
3.95â•… 47
3.232â•… 195
Scholia in Ctes. 67â•… 41
Aeschylusâ•…
Agamemnonâ•…
789â•… 27
test. 1.12 Radtâ•… 173
Alcmanâ•…
PMG 1â•… 25–7
PMG 30â•… 26
PMG 39â•… 31
Anonymousâ•…
De Comoedia (Prolegomena III)â•…
pp. 7–8â•… 117
p. 8â•… 118
p. 9â•… 97, 102, 143
Antiphanesâ•…
fr. 104â•… 13
fr. 189â•… 43, 137
Antiphonâ•…
5.11–12â•… 49
Archilochusâ•…
fr. 120W2â•… 135, 140–1
Aristophanesâ•…
Acharniansâ•…
5–36â•… 58–61
194–202â•… 61
199–202â•… 65–6
201–2â•… 130
242–4â•… 63
263–79â•… 61–4
266–7â•… 66
317â•… 80
317–32â•… 66
358–65, 385–92â•… 66–7
285
286
Aristophanes (cont.)
Acharnians (cont.)
1171–2â•… 95
1173â•… 14
1178–81â•… 95
1190–1228â•… 86–90
1224â•… 87, 194
1227–34â•… 130
Assembly Womenâ•…
329–30â•… 226
1154–62â•… 89
1161–2â•… 103
Birdsâ•…
267–326â•… 135
444–50â•… 89
444–7â•… 50–1
445–6â•… 103
737â•… 53
1102–17â•… 51–2, 197
1103â•… 195
1114â•… 195
1764–5â•… 128
Cloudsâ•…
75–132â•… 201
312â•… 2
339â•… 84
518â•… 70
518–19â•… 35
518–27â•… 8
518–35â•… 176–81
520–36â•… 30
520–5â•… 209
520–6â•… 165
520–7â•… 155
524–5â•… 155
524–5â•… 196
525â•… 195
528–32â•… 101
537–44â•… 204–5, 209
541–2â•… 207
542â•… 208
543â•… 208
545–50â•… 132
545–59â•… 181–7
549–50â•… 132
549–62â•… 53
550â•… 132
551–62â•… 132
553–5â•… 156
560–2â•… 28
563–74â•… 53
575–94â•… 199–201
581–7â•… 132
591–4â•… 197
595–606â•… 53
623–6â•… 197
Index of passages
781–803â•… 201
889â•… 193
889–1104â•… 203–4
949–60â•… 205–6
955–8â•… 181
957â•… 67
961–1023â•… 206–7
1036–1104â•… 207
1113–30â•… 187–99
1201–11â•… 27
1214–1302â•… 202
1297–1300â•… 207
1303–20â•… 197
1321–1451â•… 203–4
1452–61â•… 198
1454–1509â•… 208
fr. 30â•… 35
fr. 31â•… 35
fr. 58â•… 186
fr. 75â•… 74
fr. 84â•… 73, 74
fr. 130â•… 87
fr. 156.9â•… 72, 108
fr. 264â•… 35
fr. 322â•… 197
fr. 346â•… 36
fr. 347â•… 72
fr. 348â•… 21, 36, 44, 53, 151
fr. 448â•… 85
fr. 488â•… 31, 35, 124, 143
fr. 590â•… 101
fr. 673â•… 161
fr. 688â•… 32, 36, 154
fr. 719â•… 44
fr. 880â•… 149
Frogsâ•…
1–18â•… 212–14
13–15â•… 185
16–18â•… 217
52–105â•… 214–16
79â•… 236
83–4â•… 217
94â•… 217
95â•… 150
108–276â•… 219–22
154–7â•… 223
205–67â•… 228–31
211–19â•… 92
297â•… 86
323–53â•… 223–4
354–71â•… 224–7
356â•… 240
356–7â•… 231–2
357â•… 185
385–93â•… 227–8, 241
674–5â•… 53
Index of passages
674–737â•… 240–2
686–7â•… 48
686–737â•… 248–50
758–80â•… 234–5
771â•… 237
785–811â•… 235
804â•… 232
811â•… 236
851–94â•… 236
867â•… 36
871–94â•… 21
873â•… 237
875–87â•… 241–2
882–4â•… 67, 181
887â•… 228, 232
907–1098â•… 242–50
916–32â•… 238–9
1022–5â•… 239
1109–18â•… 239–40
1256â•… 231
1259â•… 232
1264–77â•… 230
1284–95â•… 230
1300â•… 232
1418–21â•… 250–2
1422–78â•… 252–5
1479–99â•… 255
1524–33â•… 255–6
Knightsâ•…
40–702â•… 121–2
128–43â•… 121
225–8â•… 123
400â•… 185
400–1â•… 123–5
500–2â•… 99–100, 125
507–36â•… 38–40, 54–5
507–9â•… 33, 52
509–11â•… 122
510â•… 125
512–19â•… 100–3
515–17â•… 14, 150
515–19â•… 144
516–17â•… 108
519â•… 126
519–40â•… 115–21, 126–7
520–5â•… 14
521â•… 110–11
521–44â•… 103–7
522–5â•… 149
526–36â•… 13–14, 30, 185
526–8â•… 123, 144–5, 154
528â•… 109
529–30â•… 145
531â•… 148, 152
531–6â•… 129
534â•… 145
534–5â•… 99
534–6â•… 146
536â•… 148, 152
537–40â•… 14
538–9â•… 149
541–5â•… 15, 144
541–7â•… 122
544–50â•… 28
547–50â•… 100
551–3â•… 53
551–64â•… 107
581–94â•… 107–9
586–94â•… 53
611–15â•… 125
692–3â•… 123
845â•… 123
1111–50â•… 126
1151–1204â•… 126–7
1209–10â•… 127, 128
1227–8â•… 128
1248–54â•… 127–8
1254â•… 130
1316–18â•… 128–9
1388–95â•… 130
1397–1401â•… 129
1404–5â•… 129
1404–8â•… 130–1
Lysistrataâ•…
1291–3â•… 129
1318–19â•… 224
Peaceâ•…
700–3â•… 158–9, 185
732â•… 70
734–5â•… 33, 52
734–53â•… 3–6, 36–7
735â•… 35
739â•… 5
739–49â•… 132
748–52â•… 132
749–50â•… 245
751–60â•… 132
754–74â•… 35
765–74â•… 28
775–80â•… 53
1020–2â•… 85
test. 1.7–10â•… 39
Thesmophoriazusaeâ•…
295–311â•… 222
443â•… 47, 48
785â•… 33
847–8â•… 173
Waspsâ•…
54–66â•… 3, 8, 155, 208
62–3â•… 132
65–6â•… 157
88–130â•… 157
287
288
Aristophanes (cont.)
Wasps (cont.)
533–5â•… 67
552–82â•… 164
650–1â•… 30
744–6â•… 158
805–994â•… 162
860–90â•… 21
870–86â•… 162–3
995â•… 158
1010–12â•… 164
1015–17â•… 8, 155
1016â•… 70
1017â•… 195
1018–22â•… 101
1018–47â•… 180
1025–30â•… 132
1029–37â•… 132
1037–43â•… 163
1043–7â•… 155
1044â•… 8, 195
1044–59â•… 155
1044–7â•… 200
1045â•… 3, 164, 195
1046–50â•… 132
1048â•… 3
1049–50â•… 7
1050â•… 155
1051–4â•… 162
1051–9â•… 28, 164
1265–91â•… 192
1284–91â•… 186
1299–1321â•… 165
1474–81â•… 165
1485–1537â•… 165–6
1528â•… 46
Aristophanic Hypothesesâ•…
Ach. Hyp. I. 32–4â•… 97–8
Eq. Hyp. II. 21â•… 102, 105
Nu. Hyp. Iâ•… 167, 189, 193, 198, 202
Nu. Hyp. IIâ•… 39, 115, 167
Pax Hyp. IIâ•… 174
Ra. Hyp. 1c Doverâ•… 173
V. Hyp. I. 32–4â•… 8
Aristophanic Scholiaâ•…
Ach. 378â•… 71, 74
Ach. 654â•… 79
Ach. 849aâ•… 94
Eq. 400aâ•… 125, 138–9, 147, 159–60
Eq. 508bâ•… 46
Eq. 522aâ•… 118
Eq. 532â•… 13
Eq. 1291â•… 148
Nu. 1115aâ•… 190–3
Nu. 312aâ•… 43
Index of passages
Nu. 524câ•… 179
Nu. 529bâ•… 196
Nu. 553â•… 168
Nu. 889dâ•… 193
Pax 734bâ•… 33
Pax 749â•… 5
Ra. 1437–41â•… 253
V. 61câ•… 43
V. 1045aâ•… 196
V. 1050bâ•… 196
V. 1109aâ•… 41
Aristotleâ•…
Poeticsâ•…
1449a 10–13â•… 61
1449a37– b9â•… 1
1449a7–31â•… 5
1449b8–9â•… 119
1456b15–18â•… 21
Rhetoricâ•…
1416a 28–35â•… 58
Astydamasâ•…
TrGF 60 T 2a–bâ•… 23
Bacchylidesâ•…
1.157–8â•… 106
4.4–16â•… 111
Calliasâ•…
fr. 17â•… 36
Callimachusâ•…
fr. 544 Pf.â•… 141
Certamen Homeri et Hesiodiâ•…
70–4â•… 47–8
Chionidesâ•…
test. 1â•… 1
Corinnaâ•…
PMG 654.19–22â•… 21, 236
Cratinusâ•…
fr. 17â•… 36, 137, 142
fr. 20â•… 134, 137
fr. 38â•… 134–6, 142, 148
fr. 52â•… 48
fr. 102â•… 159
fr. 182â•… 70
fr. 193â•… 139, 147, 160–1
fr. 194â•… 147, 161
fr. 195â•… 147, 148, 157, 161
fr. 196â•… 147, 148
fr. 197â•… 161
fr. 198â•… 104, 145, 153–4
fr. 199â•… 148–9, 157, 158, 159
fr. 199.3–4â•… 142–3
fr. 200â•… 148, 158
fr. 201â•… 149
fr. 202â•… 148, 157
Index of passages
fr. 203â•… 141, 153, 154
fr. 204â•… 161
fr. 207â•… 161
fr. 208â•… 32, 152
fr. 209â•… 152
fr. 210â•… 147, 163
fr. 211â•… 35, 142, 148, 151
fr. 213â•… 30, 35, 40, 147–8, 163
fr. 237â•… 53
fr. 251â•… 35
fr. 255â•… 94
fr. 342â•… 31, 35, 124, 143, 165
fr. 346â•… 216
fr. 349â•… 145
fr. 360â•… 3, 32, 35, 70, 103, 136–7, 188
test. i.6–9 (Dionysalexandros)â•… 36
test. ii (Pytine)â•… 138–9
test. iii (Pytine)â•… 146
Demosthenesâ•…
18.28â•… 220
21.18â•… 173
37.37â•… 49
Euphanesâ•…
fr. 1â•… 17
Eupolisâ•…
fr. 77â•… 145
fr. 89â•… 35, 147, 148
fr. 99.29â•… 72
fr. 102â•… 48
fr. 102.1–3â•… 47
fr. 173â•… 36
fr. 192.157â•… 34
fr. 205â•… 32, 34, 36, 70
fr. 228â•… 36
fr. 229â•… 36
fr. 245–7â•… 135
fr. 316â•… 48
fr. 392â•… 32, 35, 36, 70, 103, 142
test. iii (Autolykos)â•… 47
Euripidesâ•…
Electraâ•…
518–37â•… 175
fr. 480â•… 175
fr. 698â•… 70
fr. 703â•… 70
fr. 706â•… 66
fr. 712, 712aâ•… 75
Hipp. Hyp. 26–8â•… 174–5
Medeaâ•…
309–10â•… 254
382â•… 49
1053–5â•… 224
test. IA.11â•… 44
Gorgiasâ•…
fr. B 23 D–Kâ•… 69
Hephaestionâ•…
8 p. 72 Consbruchâ•… 46
Hesiodâ•…
Theogonyâ•…
22–34â•… 23–4
217, 220–2â•… 27
Works and Daysâ•…
654–9â•… 24
Hesychiusâ•…
π 4486â•… 149
Homerâ•…
Iliadâ•…
1.1â•… 22
2.484–93â•… 7, 18
2.594–600â•… 12, 16
Odysseyâ•…
1.1â•… 22
8.202–35â•… 17–18
8.221–8â•… 16–17
Homeric Hymnsâ•…
hAp. 149–73â•… 24
hCer. 478–9â•… 226
hMerc. 41–51â•… 229
Horaceâ•…
Epist. 1.19.1–3â•… 141
Ibycusâ•…
PMG 310â•… 22
Inscriptiones Graecaeâ•…
IG I3 833bisâ•… 109–11
IG I3 970â•… 62
IG II2 2318.8â•… 1
IG II2 2318–25â•… 118
IG II2 2325â•… 185
IG II2 2325.122â•… 5
IG II2 2325.124â•… 183
IG II2 2325.126â•… 95
IG II2 2325.39–53â•… 116–17
IG II2 2325.56â•… 5
IG II2 2325.58â•… 82
IG II2 2325.61â•… 183
IG II2 3090â•… 176
IG II2 3092â•… 64
IG II2 3106â•… 64
IG II2 6004â•… 112
IG XII ix 189â•… 41
IG XIV 1097, 1098aâ•…
117–18
Isocratesâ•…
Helenâ•…
64â•… 170
289
290
Lysippusâ•…
fr. 4â•… 36
Menanderâ•…
fr. 239â•… 160
Metagenesâ•…
fr. 15â•… 35, 36
Palatine Anthologyâ•…
13.28â•… 99, 106, 115
13.29â•… 154
Pherecratesâ•…
fr. 100â•… 5–6, 37, 245
fr. 102â•… 35, 36, 91,
195–6
fr. 147â•… 135
fr. 155â•… 150
fr. 204â•… 36
Phrynichusâ•…
fr. 33â•… 161
Pindarâ•…
N. 6.25–7â•… 111
O. 13.112–13â•… 111
P. 8.95–7â•… 100
Platoâ•…
Alcibiades Iâ•…
105a–bâ•… 47
Critiasâ•…
108c–dâ•… 21
Lawsâ•…
834eâ•… 2
Phaedrusâ•…
243a–bâ•… 170
243bâ•… 170
Symposiumâ•…
173aâ•… 83–4
175d–eâ•… 42
194bâ•… 41–5
212e–13eâ•… 42
Plato Comicusâ•…
fr. 69â•… 245
Index of passages
fr. 96â•… 70
fr. 99â•… 33, 35, 36, 52, 70
fr. 106â•… 35, 39
fr. 107â•… 35, 39
fr. 115â•… 143
fr. 244â•… 34
Platoniusâ•…
Diff. Char. (Prolegomena II)â•…
p. 6â•… 140
Plutarchâ•…
Cimonâ•…
8.7â•… 47
8.7–9â•… 44, 234
Niciasâ•…
3â•… 111
Pratinasâ•…
PMG 708â•… 25
Solonâ•…
fr.13.2â•… 21
Sophoclesâ•…
fr. 244 Radtâ•… 13
fr. 314.153–5â•… 111
Stesichorusâ•…
PMG 192â•… 170–2
PMG 193â•… 170
Telecleidesâ•…
fr. 2â•… 48
test. 5â•… 174
Thucydidesâ•…
1.22.4â•… 3, 238
2.19–21â•… 64
2.38â•… 56
2.38.1â•… 220
5.45.4â•… 47
Xenophonâ•…
Hellenicaâ•…
1.7.11â•… 47