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A Note on Wasps 349
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009
Extract
Philocleon, confined to his house by his son Bdelycleon, appeals to the chorus of heliasts, expressing his eagerness to join them as they journey to their courts:
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References
1 MacDowell, D. M., Aristophanes' Wasps (Oxford, 1971), p. 181.Google Scholar
2 Sommerstein, A. H., Wasps (Warminster, 1983), p. 178Google Scholar, following Rogers, B. B., The Wasps of Aristophanes (London, 1915), p. 55.Google Scholar
3 van Leeuwen, J., Aristophanis Vespae (Leiden, 1909), p. 63.Google Scholar
4 Wasps 848 probably refers to sanides in this context. Aeschines (3.200, 201) refers to sanides containing the text of the graphe paranomon against Ctesiphon. Isocrates (15.237–8) may refer to the publication of pending suits on sanides, although Harrison, , The Law of Athens, ii, p. 91 n. 1Google Scholar, suggests that this passage refers to the public display of the names of those convicted of various charges. In addition, sanides were used to display the names of those who served in the cavalry under the Thirty (Lysias 16.6; 26.10), laws subject to review (And. 1.83; Aesch, 3.38), and the names of state debtors ([Dem.] 25.70). For a discussion of publications on sanides see Wilhelm, A., Beiträge zur griechischen Inschriftenkunde (Vienna, 1909), pp. 240–2.Google Scholar
5 Starkie, W. J. M., The Wasps of Aristophanes (London, 1897), p. 186Google Scholar, notes that the verb ‘is most unsuitable of walking δι τν σανδων in a court’. The use of περιελθεῖν with δι is unusual, and I can find no parallel. I take the force of δι in the prepositional phrase δι τν σανδων to be stronger than the περ of περιελθεῖν.
6 For the uses of δι with the genitive see Kühner-Gerth, , Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache II 3 (Hanover, 1898), pp. 480–3.Google Scholar
7 LSJ9 x.v. δι (4) cites Xen. Hell. 7.4.22 and Hdt. 4.39 as passages in which δι means ‘along’. In the first of these, the wall of the Arcadians actually runs over the middle of the hill; in the latter, Herodotus envisions the area of Syria and Egypt as a peninsula which runs into the Mediterranean. Both conform to the normal meaning of δι.
8 Starkie, op. cit. (n. 5), p. 187.
9 Dem. 21.103.
10 Military campaigns: Ar. Peace 1179–83; state benefactors: Isoc. 18.69; proposals for new or revised laws.: And. 1.84; Aesch. 2.38; Dem. 20.94, 24.18, 23.
11 Ar. Peace 1179–83. The phrase ev ν τῷ δεγματι δικν at Knights 979 may refer to the publication of pending suits at the statues of the Eponymoi, but this is far from certain.
12 The monument of the ten tribal heroes seen by Pausanias (1.5.1) and uncovered by the American excavators of the agora was not constructed until the mid-fourth century. The location of its predecessor is not precisely known, although there is a likely candidate. This is a monument base located some fifty metres south of the later monument whose period of use falls between c. 430 and c. 370, roughly the time when literary references to the statues of the Eponymoi begin. See Shear, T. L., ‘The Monument of the Eponymous Heroes in the Athenian Agora’, Hesperia 39 (1970), 141–222; esp. pp. 203–22Google Scholar for the original monument.
13 The journal's referee suggests that Philocleon desires to go around ‘among the notice boards’; this phrase, however, is better expressed with the phrase ν ταῖσι σανσι. Cf. Ar. Lys. 558–9: νν μν γρ δ κν ταῖσ χτραις κα τοῖς λαχνοισιν μοως | περιρχονται κατ τν γορν ξὺν ὅπλοις ὥσπερ Κοραντες.
14 Schol. Wasps 349 in Venetus: δι τν σανςων Τν δρυφτων. τν ταλωτν το δικαστηρου, ἵνα λγῃ πιθυμ ν τῷ δικαστηρῳ λθωῖν. ἢ σανδων περιεχουσν τ νματα τν εἰσαχθησομνων εἰς τ δικαστριον, ποῖον δεσει πρτον εἰσαχθναι κα κατ τξιν.
15 MacDowell, Sommerstein, and Van Leeuwen do not refer to this note. Rogers, loc. cit., p. 55, states that ‘it would be unusual for Aristophanes to use the technical word in anything but its technical meaning’. But Aristophanes was not a technical writer nor did sanis necessarily have but one technical meaning.
16 Dryphaktoi are attested in the Bouleuterion (Ar. Knights 674–5; Xen. Hell. 2.3.50, 55; [Dem.’ 25.23; see Rhodes, , The Athenian Boule, pp. 33–4Google Scholar and Roux, , BCH 100 [1976], 475–83)CrossRefGoogle Scholar and for the law courts at Wasps 386, 552, and 830–1, where they are described as πρτον μῖν τν ἱερν. See also Pollux, 9.17. They are mentioned in an unknown context for the temple of Athena Nike at IG I3 64.14.
17 A scholiast to Wasps 386 says as much: δρφακτα λγετο τ ταλώματα το δικαστηρυ κα τ περιφργματα δι τ κ ξλων κα σανδων τν κ δρυς εἶναι κατεσκευμνα. λει δ π μρους τ δικαστριον. Inscr. Del. 366.47 records the purchase of oaken beams for the dryphakton of a stoa of Poseidon.
18 Jacoby, , FGrHist IIIb (Suppl.) 315Google Scholar, suggests that Didymus is the ultimate source of the fragment, which occurs in three lexica to the orators. It is of course impossible to prove that these are the actual words of Philochoros, but the opening sentences in which the procedure of ostracism is described do have a technical ring, suggesting that they go back if not to the original law, perhaps to Philochoros himself.