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Notes On Aristophanes' Acharnians

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Alan H. Sommerstein
Alan H. Sommerstein
Affiliation:
University of Nottingham
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Extract

Dikaiopolis, having borrowed a beggar's disguise from Euripides, is about to return to the place where he has set the butcher's block over which he will make his defence of his private peace-treaty. He finds, however, that his (or ) is reluctant to take the plunge. ‘Forward now, my soul,’ he says to it, ‘here's [or ‘there's’] the . What does mean here? Plainly we are meant to think of a foot-race; but is the ‘line’ in question the starting line or the finishing line? The question has implications for production. If it is the starting line, Dikaiopolis must point to an imaginary line on the ground just in front of him; if the finishing line, he must point to the block. The scholia take ypanfiri to mean ‘starting line’ here; but this sense has no fifth-century support. At this date ypanfiri in connection with races meant always ‘finishing line’ (Pind. Pytb. 9.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 28 , Issue 2 , December 1978 , pp. 383 - 395
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1978

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References

1 One may compare the modern use of the expression ’the line’ in races of various kinds or in rugby football.

2 The Acharnians style him their fellow- tribesman (Acb. 568).

3 I know of no Athenian who bore the name other than the two already mentioned (for P.A. 13883a might be identical with the fourth-century Tydeus son of Lamachos). There was, however, one other contemporary Tydeus of some significance – the pro–Athenian son of Ion of Chios (Thuc. 8.38.3).

4 Knights 1088,1092; Lys. 1181; Ekkl. 998. In Lys. 12 the meaning could be either yes, <we are thought to be wicked> and what's more, by jove, we are wicked' or ‘yes, <we are thought to be wicked> because, by jove, we are wicked’; I prefer the former slightly, not only for consistency with the other passages but also because it seems a little livelier.

5 There may well be considerable corruption in the text of this passage; but the only textual point important for our purposes is that many critics have followed Hermann in giving 1377 f. to Kadmos and altering . This, if correct, would not affect the central features of the idiom under discussion; as Herakles 755 shows, the riposte introduced by is not always made by the same person who takes the retaliatory action complained of.

6 Rennie actually wished to read .

7 Cf. also Med. 1314 f., where, as was pointed out by Arnott, P. D., Greek Scenic Conventions in the Fifth Century B.C. (Oxford, 1962), p.86,Google Scholar the audience is misled into supposing that the ekkyklema is about to appear.

8 I consider it virtually certain that the ekkyklema was used in this scene, which I intend to discuss fully in a later paper.

9 On this scene, where the use of the ekkyklema has sometimes been doubted, see Dearden, C. W., The Stage of Aristophanes (London, 1976), pp. 65–7.Google Scholar

10 Apart from Ach. 479 and 1096, there are two other such references in Aristophanes, both of which use expressions meaning ‘roll me inside’: Knights 1249 () and Thesm. 265 ().

11 This is proved by 354, where the chorus-leader says to Tekmes referring to 323–7 where Ajax is described as sitting in the midst of the animals he has slaughtered; evidently we are presented with a motionless tableau. Despite Pickard-Cambridge (The Theatre of Dionysus in Athens (Oxford, 1946), pp. 109 f.), the macabre display of the animals cannot be censured as improper, or regarded as impossible, for the author of King Oedipus and of Philoktetes.Google Scholar

12 Aeschylus and Sophocles, so far as we know, never use the word; Euripides uses it three times in the sense ‘close’ (but only of closing the mouth or the eyes) and three times in other senses.

13 Apart from other considerations, the Choes was a winter festival.

14 Cf. Dearden, , The Stage of Aristophanes pp. 58–9, 65–6.Google Scholar

15 Stage, pp. 50––74.

16 Stage, p.26.

17 Stage, p.147.

18 Only once in Aristophanes (Peace 287) does seem to mean ‘take into the skene’; and even there, in view of the contrast with … (288), it is arguable that Kydoimos takes the (a mortar and, probably, a cook's portable table) out by the wings and not into the skene.

19 Dale, A. M., Collected Papers (Cambridge, 1969), p.291.Google Scholar

20 See Dover, K. J., PCPhS 12(1966), 2 ff. Dearden, Stage, pp. 20–9, does not make a convincing case for the single-door theory. To take one example, in Clouds 803–13 Strepsiades first tells Socrates to go into his house, and then apparently himself goes into his own; Dearden, who with good reason is not prepared to let Strepsiades go into the house into which he has just asked Socrates to go, has him going out and coming back by the parodos (Stage, pp. 28 f.), though this makes nonsense of 814 where in view of 123 and 802 can only mean ‘here <in my house>rsquo;.rsquo;.>Google Scholar

21 Dover, K. J., Aristophanic Comedy (London, 1972), p.83.Google Scholar

22 It depends on whether the emphasis in the sentence is on (implying ‘I am now roasting the thrushes, but you cannot yet see me doing so; how much more will you envy me when you can!’) or on (implying ‘you now see me doing something other than roasting the thrushes’ – e.g. skewering them, cf. 1007 – ‘how much more will you envy me when I begin the actual cooking!’). The latter fits better with the context and the scenic probabilities, since it is most unlikely that Dikaiopolis cooks out of sight in this early part of the scene and comes outside later with all his equipment and helpers. Be that as it may, what is plainly and indubitably stated here is that the chorus will see the process (the participle is present) of roasting the thrushes. For the type of expression cf. Knights 1388, Peace S59, 863, 913,916, 1351; the situation previewed in an utterance of this type always comes to pass (though in one or two cases in Peace it comes to pass only after the action of the play ends).

23 It is certainly curious that the brazier had been brought out previously at 888. Possibly Dikaiopolis is supposed to have intended originally to cook the eel on the spot, and then changed his mind; more likely the brazier and fan are brought out solely in order to figure as ‘sacred objects’ in the mock procession, including also Dikaiopolis' children and slaves, which escorts the eel to its new home. If the brazier had been left outside after 894, there would have been no need for Dikaiopolis to carry a heavy sack indoors at 970.

24 This may have consisted only in the preparation and roasting of the thrushes; while Dikaiopolis' orders at 1014 and 1047 appear to be given to slaves actually with him, it is possible that some at least of the orders of 1040–3 are shouted by Dikaiopolis over his shoulder into the house (note 1042, 1046).

25 Stage, pp. 64–7.

26 Strictly, we should perhaps say ‘was intended to be used’, since it cannot be proved (though there is no positive reason to doubt) that the version of Clouds that was actually produced did contain these scenes in substantially the form in which we have them.

27 It perhaps needs to be said that this in itself neither proves nor disproves that only one door was available in the skene: cf. pp.387–8 and n.20.

28 It is tempting to take 942, ‘That is certainly plain <, that the gods are favouring us>; for look, here's the altar outside!’, as referring to the quasi-miraculous appearance of an altar (and other properties: cf. 948–9) on the ekkyklema; but an altar so placed might be a little difficult to Walk round (956–8), and Trygaios would not have needed to fetch a table (1033) since it would have been waiting inconspicuously on the platform to be used when needed. Peace 942 must be otherwise explained:, see Dearden, , Stage, pp. 46–8, 161.Google Scholar

29 Of whom I was one, in my translation of the play (Harmondsworth, 1973).

30 Wasps 1474–81 might be regarded as another example of the type.

31 This scholion is preserved only in late manuscripts (Vp3, C, L); but there is no reason to doubt that it is ancient, and was overlooked by the copyists of the scholia in the older extant manuscripts or their exemp lars as they approached the end of their task.

32 Austin, C., Nova fragmenta Euripidea in papyris reperta (Berlin, 1978).Google Scholar

33 Although vVilamowitz (Hermes 54 (1919), 58 = Kl.Scbr. iv. 296), who first drew general attention to the evidence that Ach. 1188 was a quotation from Telephos, believed that 1188 could be accepted as genuine without also accepting 1181–7; ‘an 1180,’ he asserted, ‘schliesst der Vers tadellos ein.’ Few, I think, would agree with this claim: Lamachos evidently fell and cracked his head on a stone (1180) after, and as a result of, the injuries mentioned in 1178–9 – at a moment, therefore, when he was no longer ‘chasing and repelling the raiders with his spear’. If there is a line to which 1188 ‘fits flawlessly on’, it is, as Rennie saw, 1178: Lamachos was wounded by a stake when leaping over a ditch in pursuit of the raiders. But to bring 1188 next to 1178 would re quire either the deletion of the blameless verses 1179 f., or the disruption by transpo sition of the additive sequence of injuries in 1178–80 with considerable loss of rhetorical effect.

34 Since Wilamowitz's discussion (cf. preceding note), the chief treatments of the passage have been: Buchwald, W., Studien zur Chronologie der attiscben Tragodie 455 bis 431 (Diss. Konigsberg, 1939), p.27;Google Scholar V. Coulon(-Tauber), Philologus 95 (1942), 31–40; Erbse, H., Eranos 52 (1954), 89–96;Google ScholarPage, D. L., WSt 69 (1956), 125–7;Google ScholarDale, A. M., BICS 8 (1961), 47–8 = Collected Papers, pp. 170–2;Google ScholarFraenkel, E., Beobacb-tungen zu Aristophanes (Rome, 1962), pp. 31–42;Google ScholarDover, K.J., Afata 15 (1963), 23–5;Google ScholarTaillardat, J., Les Images 'Aristopbane 2 (Paris, 1965), p.367;Google ScholarRau, P., Paratragodia (Munich, 1967), pp. 139–42;Google ScholarWest, M. L., CR 21 (1971), 157–8. These are referred to hereafter by author's name only.Google Scholar

35 For ‘rouse from <one's sleep on>’, cf. Od. 4. 730 similarly, with the preposition omitted in lyrics, Eur. Herakles 1050 , Rhesos 532 (text suspect on metrical grounds: Hartung, which the Christus Patiens seems to support). There is no need to suppose, as many have done, that the line must mean that the Gorgon somehow (how?) fell or was knocked off the shield.

36 Certain and possible tragic examples are collected by Barrett in his note on Eur. Hipp. 1049.

37 West points this out against Dover who first brought these parallels into the discussion.

38 For a full list see Rau, p.101 n.13 and p.139 n.6.

39 On the non-comic examples cited e.g. by Coulon, see Fraenkel, pp. 36–8; but Plut. 277–8 and Ar. fr. 647 are hard to explain away. In the Plutus passage () there is no reason to claim, as Fraenkel does, that is impersonal; rather its subject is (your lettered division of the corps of jurors'). Cf. Clouds 623–4 . Against the evidence of fr. 647 () all that Fraenkel can find.to say is that it is ‘completely useless as an example because we do not know what form the entire sentence took’; what conceivable form can it have taken that would invalidate the example? The natural conclusion on the evidence is that in colloquial speech of Aristophanes' time the use of the accusative as the ‘absolute case’ neuter participles was occasionally extended from impersonal to personal verbs; it may be significant for the stylistic level of this usage that the speaker in Plutus is a slave and in the fragment apparently a woman.

40 Adopted by Coulon in his edition, but withdrawn in his critical note on Plut. 277 and in REG 44 (1931), 20–1; favoured by Rau and West.

41 The nearest parallel is probably the use of Karatai to mean ‘break by accidentally dropping’ (Acb. 931, Wasps 1436).

42 It is thus not necessary, with Erbse 90, to take with (‘lying on the rocks he spoke’).

43 Dover also took exception to on the ground of the syntactic difficulty and of the repetition of the word.

44 Here we should read, with van Leeuwen, .

45 Cf. Page, p.lz6. Note also that in 1105 Lamachos, singling out one of his plumes for special mention, called it the feather of an ostrich (), and it is at least plausible that this is the same outsize plume that was ridiculed earlier. Fraenkel, p.38 defends , arguing that both in 589 and in 1182 the -bird is to be equated with Lamachos himself (he might have compared Birds 287–90, where the -bird is equated with Kleonymos); but in that case it is surprising that the identification, which is essential to the joke (and would be essential to the very intelligibility of 1182), is never made explicit (contrast Birds 284 ).

46 For noun + –even disregarding all other inflected forms of the latter – cf. Aesch. Eum. 409, 454,1024–5; Prom. 1051- 2; Soph. Aj. 658; Tr. 142, 1197; El. 452; Eur. Hipp. 1208;Andr. 166;Hek. 501;El. 688, 868;Ion 1021;Hel. 502.

47 Cf. Birds 636;Eccl. 958–9, 967–8 (all lyric).

48 Cited by Erbse, p.93 n.2. I pass over the far-fetched Kombination by which Erbse himself attempts to prove that here means ‘urinary incontinence‘, except to note that even if the word could bear that meaning, the standard sign of terror in Aristophanes is not urinary but faecal incontinence.

49 It is not common for the second of two successive participial phrases thus to be subordinate to, and refer to an earlier time than, the first; but cf. PI. Rep. 366 a ‘making entreaty for our sins and trans gressions we shall persuade the gods and get off without punishment’ (trans. Lindsay; emphasis mine).

50 The absence of an article with is not surprising in paratragic language; it adds to the general absurdity that , unlike (with 1178 cf. Soph. Aj. 1279 ), is a down-to-earth word not found in tragedy.

51 For referring to the behaviour of a coward, rather than that of an absconding slave, cf. Soph. Aj. 1285.

52 Rau, p.142, tries to make sense of the line by claiming that it refers ‘ironically to the heroic deed of Lamachos as a whole … as it was looked forward to by the hero, not as it happened’; but if the line is meant to modify in sense 1178–87 as a whole, it is very awkward to make it depend grammati cally on 1187 only, as Aristophanes has done. The conjecture , whose corollary would be the construing of with (so Coulon), has been correctly evaluated by Fraenkel, p.41 n.l.

53 There is no actual authority in the scholia or elsewhere for this supposition; but the very incongruity of the phrase with its context, the high-poetic use of = ‘boat', and the fact that this part of Dikaiopolis’ speech is studded with quotations from Telephos (540, 543, 555–6 = fr. 708, 709, 710), combine to make it highly probable: cf. Wilamowitz, pp. 58–9. The phrase (along with from the beginning of 541) appears as Eur. fr. 708a Nauck–Snell = 116 Austin.

54 Such as the Custom House launch dreamed up by J. S. Reid(ap. Merry). Others have sought to get coherent sense by emending in 542 (e.g. Muller, Hamaker, van Leeuwen), thus destroying or obscuring the parallel (necessary to Dikaiopolis' argument) between the activities of the hypothetical Spartan and the alleged activities of Athenian against Megarian goods (515–22).

55 See E. W. Handley in Handley and Rea, The ‘Telephus’ of Euripides (BICS. Suppf. 5, 1957), pp. 28–9, who reasonably assigns it to Telephos' own account, in the prologue of the play, of how he came by his famous wound. Postscript: To the bibliography in n.34 there should be added Dover's discussion in Illinois Classical Studies ii (1977), 156–8, which appeared too late for me to do more than call attention to it.Google Scholar