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Herodotus in The Theatre at Alexandria? On Athenaeus 14.620D

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 September 2019

Ivan Matijašić
Ivan Matijašić*
Affiliation:
Newcastle University
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Abstract

This article discusses a passage in Athenaeus (14.620d) that refers to the performance of Herodotus’ work in a theatre in Hellenistic Alexandria. In his edition of Athenaeus, highly valued and still influential, August Meineke replaces Herodotus’ name (unanimously transmitted in Athenaeus’ manuscripts) with Hesiod’s. In this article I set out to overturn a widespread tendency to accept Meineke’s emendation of Athenaeus 14.620d, reconsidering the possibility that Athenaeus did in fact name Herodotus in the light of (a) the difficulty of explaining the origin of the alleged mistake in Athenaeus’ manuscript tradition and (b) the ancients’ tendency to draw parallels between Herodotus’ style and language and Homeric poetry. The fact that Athenaeus refers to theatrical performances of both Herodotus’ work and the Homeric poems will be shown to be very much in line with the ancient rhetorical, historiographical and biographical tradition which regarded Herodotus as the most Homeric of all prose writers.

Keywords

HerodotusHomeric poemsAthenaeustheatrical performancesHellenistic Alexandria
Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 139 , November 2019 , pp. 83 - 93
Copyright
© The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 2019 

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Footnotes

*

[email protected]. I would like to express my gratitude to Ettore Cingano and Stefania De Vido for inviting me to present my research at the Dialoghi di storia e letteratura tra Mediterraneo e Vicino Oriente at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice on 14 November 2017. Thanks go to the Gerda Henkel Foundation for financial support at the initial stages of this research. Aude Cohen-Skalli, Massimo Giuseppetti, Filip-pomaria Pontani, Joseph Skinner, Federico Santangelo, Olga Tribulato and Stefano Vecchiato kindly offered their suggestions at different stages. Finally, thanks go to the JHS Editor, Douglas Cairns, and the two JHS referees for very useful comments. It goes without saying that any mistakes or inaccuracies are my responsibility alone.