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Monody, Choral Lyric, and the Tyranny of the Hand-Book*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

M. Davies
Affiliation:
St John's College, Oxford

Extract

Open any history or hand-book of Greek literature in general, or Greek lyric in particular, and you will very soon come across several references to monody and choral lyric as important divisions within the broader field of melic poetry. And the terms loom larger than the mere question of handy labels: they permeate and pervade the whole approach to archaic Greek poetry. Chapters or sub-headings in literary histories bear titles like ‘Archaic choral lyric’ or ‘Monody’. Indeed it is possible to write a whole book and call it Early Greek Monody. Diehl's Anthologia Lyrica Graeca was structured around this distinction, which it adopted in preference to the chronological arrangement that is the obvious alternative. Indeed, it went so far as ‘to invent Greek titles “μονωιδίαι” and “χορωιδίαι” (sic)’. Most scholars would now agree that this is to go too far. But most would also continue to accept the validity and importance of the division, which a scholar has recently termed ‘the most fundamental generic distinction within ancient lyric poetry’

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1988

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References

1 G. M. Kirkwood (Ithaca/London, 1974).

2 To quote Pfeiffer, History of Classical Scholarship 1.283, who rightly deplores ‘the wrong impression’ thus produced that these ‘were terms of the ancient grammarians’.

3 Most, G. W.ap. Ancient Writers: Greece and Rome (ed. Luce, T. J., 1982), p. 89Google Scholar. Compare Rösier, W., Poetica (Zeitschrift für Sprach- und Literaturwissenschaft) 16 (1984), 192Google Scholar: ‘Fraglich ist…inwieweit die antike Nomenklatur allein überhaupt eine tragfähige Grundlage für eine Gattungsabgrenzung bietet, findet sich doch, abgesehen vom Fehlen eines Oberbegriffs, auch der trotz bestehender Unscharfe keineswegs belanglose Unterschied zwischen Einzel- und Chorlied nicht erfasst’ (my italics).

4 Second edition (Oxford, 1961), p. 6. Italics in the quotation are mine.

5 See especiallyLefkowitz, M., HSCP 67 (1963), 177ffGoogle Scholar. and 84 (1980), 29ff. Meditation upon the complexities that underlie ‘Ich’ in early Greek lyric has led W. Rösier (sup. cit. [n. 3], p. 189) to entertain a degree of scepticism about the distinction we are examining: ‘der Unterschied zwischen Einzel- und Chorgedicht insofern verschwimmen kann, als der Chor unter Umständen als blosses Medium des Autors fungiert. Doch auch da, wo der Text in dieser Hinsicht ambivalent oder gar auf die Individualität des Chores zugeschnitten ist, bleibt die Grenze hin zum Dramatischen unangetastet’. As will soon be seen, I think he could have carried this scepticism much further. For more general surveys of the problems posed by ‘I’ in early Greek lyric seeRösier, , Gnomon 52 (1980), 609ffGoogle Scholar. and QVCC 19 (1985), 131ffGoogle Scholar.

6 I will deal at greater length with this question in my forthcoming commentary on the poet. Suffice it here to observe that Stesichorus' monodic character was largely perceived by Kleine in his edition of the poet (Berlin, 1828) and then rediscovered, after intervening obfuscation, byWest, M. L., CQ 21 (1971), 312fGoogle Scholar. and Haslam, M. W., QUCC 17 (1974), p. 33Google Scholar and n. 53. (Wilamowitz already saw most of the truth (e.g.Sappho und Simonides [Berlin, 1913], p. 239Google Scholar where Stesichorus' titled poems are compared with the titled dithyrambs of Bacchylides: ‘es sind also alles mythische Erzählungen gewesen, entsprechend dem was wir über die Dithyramben des Lokrers Xenokrates hören’).) On ancient references to τ τρία τνCτηcίχορου see my note-inJHS 102 (1982), 206ffCrossRefGoogle Scholar.

7 See Testimonia B 5ff. in my forthcoming edition of the lyric fragments (vol. 1).

8 Sup. cit. (n. 6).

9 He is reported to have been the inventor of the cαμβκη [TB14], a type of lyre.

10 See, e.g., frr. 251, 258 and 262 (Stes.) = frr. 328, 335 and 317 (Ibyc.).

11 Ibycus' employment of this was obviously the reason for Welcker's verdict (inevitably limited to the citational fragments): ‘Der längere Anfang eines Liebesliedes von Ibykos in Chorstrophen und alle übrigen Bruchstücke berechtigen zu der Annahme, dass seine ganze Poesie für Chöre eingerichtet war’ (from his review of Schneidewin's Ibyci Rhegini carminum reliquiae, reprinted in KI. Schr. 1.230). So too Schmid, Geschichte der gr. Literatur I.I p. 492: ‘Wenn er in den Rhythmen sich nicht den Liedformen der östlichen Lyrik anschliesst, so muss er seine Lieder ebenso wie vorher seine Balladen für Chorvortrag bestimmt haben’ etc. Similarly Bowra (sup. cit. [n. 4], p. 251) infers of the Polycrates Ode ‘We have the best part of four triads, each composed in strophe, antistrophe and epode. This means that the poem was sung by a choir’. (The general inference is rightly questioned by Most (sup. cit. [n. 3]), p. 90.) ‘The erotic hymns written by Ibycus at the court of Polycrates seem to have been choral’ according toJebb, , Bacchylides (Cambridge, 1905), p. 42Google Scholar. For a recent instance of the inference that Ibycus is choral see Maehler's Introduction to his commentary on Bacchylides' epinicia (Die Lieder des Bakchylides 1.Die Siegeslieder I (Mnemos. Suppl. 62 [1982]), pp. 1 and 3)Google Scholar. The crushing effect of traditional assumptions is illustrated by the way in which Schmid (sup. cit., p. 496) perceives Ibycus' ‘Annäherung an Geist und Form der monodischen Lyrik’ but feels obliged to argue it away (p. 492) partly by recourse to an inappropriate analogy with Pindar's epinicia (‘einer Art subjektivster Epinikien’), partly by the conviction that only poetry which employs the metres of Anacreon and the Lesbian poets can be deemed monodic.

12 Greek Lyrics2 (Chicago, 1960), p. 37Google Scholar. But note that Wilamowitz (e.g.Pindaros [Berlin, 1922], p. 233)Google Scholar was already aware that ‘die Knabenlieder des Ibykos sind formell von denen des Anakreon im Vortrage nicht verschieden gewesen’.

13 Greek Lyric Poetry, p. xxiv. Cf. the same scholar in The Cambridge History of Greek Literature (hereafter CHGL), p. 214.

14 Sup. cit. (n. 1), p. 212 n. 19. Cf. W. S. Barrett's brief summary of the tone of Ibycus, fr. 287 as ‘sophisticated personal poetry’ (Euripides Hippolytos [Oxford, 1964], p. 434)Google Scholar.

15 E.g. Campbell (sup. cit. n. 13), p. xviii: ‘the long papyrus fragment [282 P = S151] attributed to Ibycus or an imitator…provides an example of choral poetry’, and in CHGL, p. 216: ‘the choral poem written for Polycrates’ (though CHGL ranks him, confusingly enough, under the heading ‘Monody’).

16 See especiallyBarron, J. P., BICS 16 (1969), 135fGoogle Scholar. and 31 (1984), Off. ‘We know nothing about performance. We cannot even say for certain that any fragment must have been sung solo or…chorally’ is the (excessively agnostic) verdict of Webster, T. B. L., The Greek Chorus (London, 1970), p. 79Google Scholar on Ibycus’ remains.

17 In spite of Bowra's picture (sup. cit. [n. 4], p. 258) of Ibycus spending upon Euryalus ‘the rich resources of choral song’. Fr. 288 is associated with the intimate context of the symposium (cf. n. 24 infra) byRösier, W., Würzburger Jahrbücher für die Altertumswissenschaft 9 (1983), 13Google Scholar.

18 Alcman ‘wrote songs for men as well as songs for women’ according to Webster, sup. cit (n. 16), p. 61. Such open-mindedness is unusual.

19 That ‘Alcman may speak in the first person singular as if he himself were singing’ is allowed byKaimio, M., The Chorus of Greek Drama within the light of the Person and Number Used (Helsinki, 1970), p. 31Google Scholar in a brief analysis of the first person references found in his fragments. See further Herington, J., Poetry into Drama (London, 1985), pp. 22ffGoogle Scholar. and 229.

20 E.g. Sappho 1.15ff., 22.11, 130; Anacreon 358.1, 376.1, 394B, 400.1 (to say nothing of Ibycus 287.1). Fr. 26.If. P (οὔ μ' ἔτι, παρcενικα μελιγρυεc ἱαρóφωνοι, | γυῖα φρην δναται) is an undeniable instance of a first-person allusion to Alcman himself, but constitutes a special case since, according to the orthodox interpretation, it ‘may have been part of a prelude sung or recited by him before the performance of a partheneion’ (Campbell, et al. ) sup. cit. [n. 13], p. 217Google Scholar. I have my doubts but I here suppress them. Fr 40: Fοἶδα δ' ρνίχων νóμωc | πντων is also suggestive: (‘the poet thus speaks through the performers’ is the traditional explanation (so e.g. Kaimio, sup. cit. [n. 19], p. 32)Google Scholar; cf. Rösier, W., Dichter und Gruppe (Munich, 1980), p. 66 n. 87 etc.)Google Scholar as is fr. 106.

81 Most, , CQ 37 (1987), p. 3CrossRefGoogle Scholar n. 16, following Calame, , Alcman (Rome, 1983), p. xxGoogle Scholar. Compare my criticisms of Calame in Gnomon 58 (1986), 387Google Scholar. As for West's pretty picture (CQ 17 [1967], 15)Google Scholar of Alcman in fr. 5 col. ii ‘before Thales, before Pythagoras, lightly limning a philosophical cosmogony for girls to sing at a public entertainment, and priding himself not at all as a thinker but as a poet and musician’, it is not the least of the merits of the article by Most just cited that it reveals the implausibility of the first part of this scene (p. 6: ‘whatever could have induced Alcman to place such a rebarbative doctrine in the tender mouths of the Dymainian maidens?’) as well as of the second.

22 ‘Nimmt man aber an, der Chor sei hier wie bei Pindaros nur Organ des Dichters zum Ausdruck von dessen eigenen Empfindungen, so sind diese Gedichte erotische Enkomien der Art wie sie auch Pindaros…gemacht hat’:Schmid, , sup. cit. (n. 11), p. 492Google Scholar referring to Wilamowitz (sup. cit. n. 11), p. 511: ‘Enkomia sind solche Gedichte alle, wenn auch gerade kein Komos dabei gewesen sein mag’.

23 ‘The skolia of Pindar seem to have differed from ordinary drinking songs in being choric, or at least accompanied by a choric dance’:Fennell, C. M., Pindar: the Nemean and Isthmian Odes (Cambridge, 1899), p. 242Google Scholar (= 1883 edn, p. 219); ‘the skolia of Pindar were choral’: Jebb, sup. cit. (n. 11); ‘The cκóλιον…sung…by a company, like those of Ibycus, Pindar, and Bacchylides’: Bowra, , sup. cit. (n. 4), p. 6Google Scholar. And so on.

24 Fraenkel, , Horace (Oxford, 1957), p. 39Google Scholar: ‘as regards monody…it was again the banquet that furnished the richest opportunities’.

25 van Groningen, B. A., Pindare au Banquet: les fragments des scolies édités avec un commentaire critique et explicatif (Leyden, 1960), pp. 15fGoogle Scholar. Cf. Lloyd-Jones, , PBA 68 (1982), 143Google Scholar: ‘performed, as Pindar's encomia must have been, by a single person’ etc.

26 For the relationship between the terms cκóλιον and γκώμιον in ancient classifications of Greek lyric seeHarvey, , CQ 5 (1955), 162fGoogle Scholar.

27 See in particular Lefkowitz ap. Pindare (Entretiens Hardt 31 [1985]), pp. 46ffGoogle Scholar. and in AJP 109 (1988)Google Scholar, forthcoming.

28 Jurenka, , Sitzb. d. Wien. Akad. d. Wiss. 1 (1986), 44Google Scholar, was so impressed by the length of Pyth. 4 that he concluded it could never have been intended for performance (cf. the counterarguments of ImreMüller, , Quomodo Pindarus chori persona usus sit [Diss. Freiburg, Darmstadt, 1914], pp. 27f.)Google Scholar. Lloyd-Jones, sup. cit. (n. 25), Lefkowitz, , sup. cit. (n. 27), p. 49Google Scholar etc. deduce from the length that it was monodic.

29 But toSegal, C.ap. CHGL, p. 187Google Scholar (cf. his Pindar's Mythmaking [Princeton, 1986], pp. 4f. and 10)Google ScholarPythian 4 is still ‘our longest extant choral ode’.

30 Identical, in other words, with two of the grounds for deeming Stesichorus monodic.

31 The assumption of choral performance is often written into the definition of the victory ode (e.g. Fraenkel, , sup. cit. [n. 24], p. 40Google Scholar: ‘πινίκια, poems sung by a chorus to celebrate a victory’, Fowler, R. L., The Nature of Early Greek Lyric [Toronto, 1987], p. 100, etc.)Google Scholar. For a detailed survey of the evidence as to the performance of Pindaric epinicia see Herington, (sup. cit. [n. 19]), pp. 28ffGoogle Scholar. and 181ff., Lefkowitz, , AJP 109 (1988)Google Scholar, forthcoming.

32 Sup. cit (n. 11), p. 233 commenting on 1.7f. (λλ δωρίαν πò φóρμιγγα παccλον|λμβαν’): ‘1st das leere Redensart oder dürfen wir ihn beim Wort e nehmen ? 1st dies ein Chorlied, oder sang Pindar, die Phorminx auf den Knien, wie die bildende Kunst ihn dargestellt hat ? Mich dünkt, man braucht es nu r auszusprechen, dies Bild ist die Wahrheit’. Gerber's, commentary ad loc. (Toronto, 1982)Google Scholar deplores any such attempt to extract factual information about performance from conventional expressions. On the evidence of art (for what it is worth) see Lefkowitz, , sup. cit (n. 27), p. 48Google Scholar n. 45.

33 Sup. cit. (n. 11), p. 240: ‘Ol. 2 knüpft zwar auch an den Sieg an, ist aber gar kein Epinikion, sondern ein Gedicht an und auf Theron, ein Enkomion im späteren Sinne. Nichts deutet auf Vortrag durch einen Chor, die Phorminx wird eben so wie in Ol. 1 erwähnt, und so werden wir auch dies Gedicht von Pindar selbst vorgetragen glauben’.

34 Sup. cit. (n. 27), p. 47. See tooHerington, (sup. cit. [n. 19], pp. 27, 231 n. 68)Google Scholar etc.

35 ‘The circumstances, obviously, are not like those in which the epinician would originally have been performed; and yet it seems of some interest that by 423 B.C. a middle-aged Athenian can expect, apparently as a matter of routine, to hear the song performed by a soloist’:Herington, (sup. cit. [n. 19]), p. 28Google Scholar. Agreed, except for that jarring ‘obviously’ at the start. Pindar Nem. 4.13ff. seems to envisage, ‘apparently as a matter of routine’, monodic performance of a victory ode: see Lefkowitz, , AJP 109 (1988)Google Scholar, forthcoming.

36 E.g. Gerber sup. cit. (n. 32). Since Pindaric references to singer-dancers are suspiciously and regularly vague (‘There is no indication whatsoever of their number in any given ode’: Herington sup. cit. [n. 19], pp. 29f.) it would be hard to argue that they occupy some privileged position of reality in contrast to the obviously conventional allusions to monodic performance.

37 Sup. cit. (n. 4).

38 Sup. cit. (n. 1) p. 212 n. 16. As Mr Barrett reminds me, this is an inaccurate summary of Plato's passage, since, with both ρ'αϕωιδία and κιθαρωιδία instances of μονωιδία, the only instrumental performance mentioned is of the αὐλτηc. Like the authors of several translations of the Laws into English, Kirkwood may be failing to distinguish between κιθαριcτc (‘lyre-player’) and κιθρωιδóc (someone who sings to his lyre): cf.Fowler, sup. cit. [n. 31] p. 96Google Scholar.

39 Manchester (1921), 1.583.

40 As Pfeiffer observed, sup. cit. (n. 4), ‘Plato was actually speaking of the training of solo-singers and chorus-singers in the course of a discussion of musical education. The two terms are not used either by him or by any other ancient writer for theoretical classification’. That ‘Plato in the Laws 700b ignores this method of division’ is observed by e.g.Smyth, Herbert Weir, Greek Melic Poets (London, 1900), p. xxGoogle Scholar n. 2.

41 Apart from the Platonic passage ‘χορωιδία does not occur elsewhere at all and μονωιδία is strictly applied to the song of a single actor in tragedy’: Pfeiffer, sup. cit. (n. 3). μονωιδóc occurs inTzetzes, Vit. Hes. (pp. 35, 62ff. Colonna)Google Scholar where μονωιδοί are contrasted with λυρικοί and defined as the authors of works delivered by one performer, like Lycophron's Alexandra (see the same author's commentary on the start of that work [1.4. Scheer]). Likewise, χορωιδω is late and rare (Dio Cassius 61.19 of exhibitions in honou r of Ner o in A.D. 59). The earliest extant instances of the verb μονωιδω are in Cratinus, fr. 270 K- A (PCG 4.258) from the Ωραι (whose date is not precisely ascertainable: see Kassel-Austin, sup. cit.) and Aristophanes' Peace 1012 (produced 421). ‘The rather surprising fact’ that χορóc and χορευταί are not used by Pindar or Bacchylides of the performance of victory odes, ‘although Pindar uses bot h words (and Bacchylides uses choros) often enough with reference to nonepinician performances’ is remarked on byHerington, (sup. cit. [n. 19]), p. 30Google Scholar.

42 Die Lyrik in der Kunsttheorie der Antike (Munich, 1936), p. 16Google Scholar.

43 Sup. cit. (n. 26), p. 159 n. 3. Cf. the remarks of Rosier cited in n. 3 supra. For Rösier the absence of the distinction from ancient writings constitutes another reason for being reluctant to take ancient nomenclature for Greek lyric seriously. But if one first examines the internal evidence of the poems themselves (as we have done), perhaps one will be prepared to be impressed, for once in a way, with this implicit verdict of ancient critics.

44 See tooMaehler, , sup. cit. (n. 11), p. 1Google Scholar: ‘die heute übliche Einteilung in Lieder, die von Einzelsängern, und solche, die von Chören vorgetragen wurden, [ist] nicht antik’ etc.

45 Vorlesungen über schöne Literatur und Kunst (ed. Minor, J., 2 (1984), p. 240)Google Scholar. A similar distinction in the same writer's Geschichte der klass. Lit. (1802) (edited by Minor and also by Lohner, E. in Schlegel, A. W., Kritische Schriften und Briefe 3 [1964], pp.210ff.)Google Scholar.It is interesting that Alcman and Ibycus are in the latter ranked with ‘Melische Dichter’ (here equivalent to monodic poets).

46 Sup. cit. (n. 45), p. 242. For a useful summary (with bibliography) of the general contributions of nineteenth-century German culture and scholarship to our picture of Greek lyric poetry seeRösier, sup. cit. (n. 3), p. 193Google Scholar and n. 41.

47 In Über die Schülen der griech. Poesie (1794) and Geschichte der Poesie der Griechen und Römer (1798). The early writings of Friedrich Schlegel (born 1772) are to be consulted in the first volume of the critical edition by Behler and Eichner (1979) under the heading ‘Studien des klass. Altertums’: see p. 560.

48 ‘Sehr viel tiefer’ [i.e. in comparison with the superficialities of August Wilhelm] ‘oft wirklich genial sind die ersten Arbeiten von Friedrich Schlegel…Von ihm stammt im wesentlichen die Vorstellung von einem organischen Leben, Wachsen und Welken der Literatur, für das die griechische das Hauptexempel ist, und demgemäss die allgemeine Beurteilung der Gattungen’ [my italics] ‘und Epochen' (Die griechische Literatur des Altertums [Die Kultur der Gegenwart 1.8]1 233 = 3316).

49 This work first appeared in English, having been commissioned by the London Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge: for a brief résumé of the facts see Pfeiffer, History of Classical Scholarship 2.187 and n. 3. I quote from the revised version of the translation from Muller's German MS. by Sir G. C. Lewis and J. W. Donaldson (London, 1858), 1.218ff. ≃Griechische Literatur4 (Stuttgart, 1882)Google Scholar, 1.275ff.

50 ‘His most successful book’ (Pfeiffer, sup. cit. [n. 49], p. 187).

51 Geschichte der Philologie, p. 57 (‘die Literaturgeschichte…die nicht nur die lesbarste, sondern allein eine wirkliche Geschichte ist’) ≃ History of Classical Scholarship, p. 128.

52 Thanks to the various recent studies of individual lyric poets by F. G. Welcker, which for the first time tried t o build u p a significant and continuous picture of the contributions of Alcman, Stesichorus an d Ibycus an d their place in Greek literature.

53 This concession is often made by scholars eager to preserve the general distinction. SoMaehler, , sup. cit. (n. 11), p. 1Google Scholar: ‘[die Einteilung] ist…nicht immereindeutig, denn…kann derselbe Dichter sowohl für Chöre wie für den Einzelvortrag gedichtet haben, wie es z. B. Alkaios und Simonides getan haben’.

54 Van Groningen, , La Composition Littéraire Archaique Grecque (Amsterdam, 1958), p. 186Google Scholar.

55 These questions are fromBowra, sup. cit. (n. 4), p. 7Google Scholar, and pp. 6f. respectively, in the case of the 1960 edition, and p. 3 in that of the 1935 edition. See too van Groningen sup. cit. (n. 54): ‘les limites entre la monodie et l'ode exécutée par un choeur ne peuvent être tracées avec une précision absolue’ (the first sentence of a chapter entitled ‘La lyrique chorale’, preceded by a chapter called ‘La Monodie’).

56 Sup. cit. (n. 2).

57 Frühgr. Dichtung und Philosophic, p. 484 ≃ Early Greek Poetry and Philosophy, p. 425.

58 Sup. cit. (n. 11), p. 5. Maehler is talking primarily of epinicia, but also of paean and dithyramb, as the context makes clear.

59 Sup. cit. (n. 1), pp. 9f. It is a fashion with many modern scholars to conclude, on no grounds worth mentioning, that choral lyric was particularly ‘communal’: seeLefkowitz, (AJP 109 (1988)Google Scholar, forthcoming) for some bibliography.

60 A History of Greek Literature, pp. xivf. (≃ Geschichte der gr. Literatur3 p. ix).

61 Sup. cit. (n. 11), p. 238. On this and the following Homeric passage see in generalDale, , Collected Papers, pp. 158ffGoogle Scholar.

62 Sup. cit. (n. 23).

63 Sup. cit. (n. 11), p. 43.

64 Sup. cit. (n. 11), p. 1 and n. 4.

65 Sup. cit. (n. 19), p. 31.

66 Sup. cit. (n. 27), p. 31.

67 See, e.g.,Rösier, W., Rh. Mus. 119 (1976), 302ffGoogle Scholar.

68 Figures from Mr Barrett who observes that the longest would seem to be Pindar, Paean 6 (2 x 196+177 = 565) and Bacchylides 17 (2 x 196+172 = 564). Pindar's epinicia (excluding the spurious Ol. 5) have stanzas of 60–169 (average 98), triads of 200–390 (average 290). Among the shortest are (strikingly enough, in contrast to Paean 6) Pindar, Paean 5 and the same poet's παρθνεια. Also the (monodic) encomia of Bacchylides and Pindar.

69 An exception, as Mr Barrett points out, is Pindar, Is. 3/4. But this obviously constitutes a very special case: even if (as is likely) we have to do with two separate poems, the same victor and (at least in part) the same victory are involved.

70 The case of Alcman is particularly difficult. As is well-known, several scholars are of the opinion that some of the laconisms now present in his text represent later additions due not to the poet but to his Alexandrian editors. See especiallyRisch, , Mus. Helv. 11 (1954), 20ffGoogle Scholar. = Kl, Schr. pp. 314ff., Hooker, J. T., The Language and Text of the Lesbian Poets (Innsbruck, 1977), pp. 63ffGoogle Scholar.

71 This requires calling the two lyric poets from Ceos (Simonides and Bacchylides) after their genre rather than their actual birthplace. That the Argive poetess Telesilla should be ranked (from the metrical viewpoint at least) as an ‘eastern’ is no very great incongruity. Here, as throughout this article, I designedly exclude the Boeotian Corinna from discussion because of the total uncertainty as to her date.

72 Oxford, 1982. See too his remarks inCQ 23 (1973), 179ffCrossRefGoogle Scholar.

73 As it is from Paul Maas's determinedly scientific treatise on the same topic.