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Chronological Notes on Middle Comedy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

T. B. L. Webster
T. B. L. Webster
Affiliation:
University College, London
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Extract

My chief object in these notes is to provide evidence for tracing the ancestry of certain themes, situations, and characters which appear in New Comedy; I hope, however, that they may also be useful for the study of Middle Comedy itself. I am therefore chiefly concerned with the period from 400 b.c. to 320 b.c., when Menander had begun to write; I have, however, given some dates after 320 which were necessary to complete my story, but I have left out many plays by poets of New Comedy which can be dated in the decade 320–310 b.c. I have also omitted the originals of Plautus Amphitruo, Persa, and Menaechmi, although I am convinced that they all belong to Middle Comedy and hope to consider the problem more fully elsewhere; the tactics of the battle in the Amphitruo (242 f.) are possible for Epameinondas and Philip as well as for Alexander, but the clash of two kings seems to limit the reference to Alexander and Dareios as depicted in the famous mosaic, and the limits are 330–320 (there is very little evidence of mythological comedy after 320); the original of the Persa must have been written before Alexander's conquests and the limits seem to be 345–338; Hueffher's late dating of the original of the Menaechmi has been successfully countered by Fraenkel and the whole feel of the play suggests Middle rather than New Comedy. The following list is arranged in decades, except where it has proved necessary to use a longer period. I have tabulated first the plays or victories dated by inscriptional or other firm evidence; among these I have included the plays dated by Geissler, without comment except where I disagree with him.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 2 , Issue 1-2 , May 1952 , pp. 13 - 26
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1952

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References

page 13 note 1 I am very grateful to Professor D. S. Robertson for reading the first draft of my manuscript and making most useful criticisms.

page 13 note 2 See recently Maidment, C.Q., 1935, 15 f. Athens would scarcely be called ‘for tunate and rich’ (549) after Chaironeia; if the allusion to Diogenes (123) is accepted, the play cannot have been produced long before 340 B.C.

page 13 note 3 Plautinisches, 369. The original is possibly the Adelphoi of Alexis produced soon after 342 B.C.

page 13 note 4 Phil. Untersuch. xxx, 1925, 70 f.Google Scholar

page 13 note 5 The dating of the Lenaian list is based on Capps, A.J.P., 1900, 40 f.; 1907, 188 f., and I.G. 2325. Contrast excessively early dating in Schmid-Stahlin, iv. 143, n. 5.

page 13 note 6 I have adopted Geissler's date; the most recent discussions are in Schmid-Stählin, iv. 218 n. 1; Gigante, , Dioniso, xi. 147Google Scholar; Barry, , Eccl. as Political Satire, Chicago, 1942.Google Scholar

page 14 note 1 Meineke, , i. 354, dated by Pixodaros.Google Scholar

page 14 note 2 Skythai cannot be before 322 when payment for the Ekklesia was abolished; Parekdidomene cannot be before 312 (Seleukos) and Wilhelm (Urk. 56) prefers third century; Didymoi is dated by Ferguson (Hell. Ath. 118, n. 3) to 303, but by Ehrenberg (Aspects, 186) to 291. These plays are certainly by the later Antiphanes attested by Suidas, who may also have been the third-century actor. Kitharistes can just be included in the elder poet's work, perhaps posthumously produced; Dyspratos (remodelled by Epikrates) and Batalos (named after a flute player who provided a nickname for Demosthenes in his youth) must have been among his earlier works. We cannot say which poet wrote Gorgythos or Tyrrhenos (both 340–320). The elder poet met Alexander (Athenaeus, xiii, init.).

page 14 note 3 See Dittmer, , Athenian Comic Didascaliae, Leiden, 1923, for this and other Anaxandrides' dates based on inscriptions.Google Scholar

page 15 note 1 Meineke, , i. 414.Google Scholar

page 15 note 2 Geissler, , op. cit. 75.Google Scholar

page 15 note 3 Paideia, iii. 100. Perhaps also ‘is throttled by a trierarchy’ is peculiarly appropriate to the years before the reorganization in 357.Google Scholar

page 16 note 1 The dating of some of Alexis' plays in the late 60's seems necessary: the final date for Alexis is given by the mention of Arsinoë II and Ptolemy Philadelphos in the Hypoboli-maios; their marriage took place between 281 and 275 B.C.; if therefore Alexis' traditional age of 106 years is accepted, he could have been born well before 380 B.C., and therefore have begun writing in the late 60's.

page 17 note 1 As suggested by Geissler, , op. cit. 179Google Scholar; Capovilla, , S.I.F.C., 1922, 263 f.Google Scholar

page 20 note 1 In I.G. ii. 2. 2323a Paidion is certain; Plato is too early, Apollodoros and Poseidippos are too long. I suggest the reading may be Wilhelm, Urk. 49, remarks that there is scarcely room for Menandros before

page 20 note 2 I cannot follow Körte's identification (Rh. Mus. lx. 414) of Autokles with the Autokles mentioned by Herakleides Pontikos (ap. Ath. 537).

page 21 note 1 Pythionike is still alive but may have left Athens. Körte (R.E., s.v. ‘Timokles’) dates by Aeschines (1. 52) soon after 345, but I see no reason why Autokleides, like Misgolas, Tithymallos, etc., should not be notorious for 15 years or more.

page 22 note 1 The Tokistes must therefore be attributed to the later Nikostratos who won a Lenaian victory in this decade, was second in the City contest in 311 B.C., and is mentioned with Philemon and Ameinias in a Delian inscription of 280 B.C. Wilhelm, Urk. 132, adds Omitheutes (Harpokration quotes as NewComedy) and Basileis. Add also Apelauno-menos, Mageiros; both mention the Macedonian dish, mattye. The mention of Kephiso-doros (cf. Dionysios Homonymoi, Amphis Pianos, Timokles Ikarioi) in the Syros also suggests the younger poet.

page 23 note 1 I have not included in my lists, but have included in the following figures, the cases where we can say from the inscription (cf. Dittmer, op. cit.) that Anaxandrides won a place within a certain decade but cannot determine either the play or the exact year: 380–370, twice third and once fourth at the City Dionysia, thrice fourth at the Lenaia, 370–360 twice fourth at City Dionysia, once fifth in City Dionysia; 360–350 twice second at the Lenaia, twice fourth at the City Dionysia; 350–340 twice second at the Lenaia, twice fourth at the City Dionysia.

page 23 note 2 Vitucci, , Dioniso, vii. 210, 312Google Scholar, quotes evidence for productions of Comedy during the fourth century at Peiraieus, Ikaria, Anagyrous, Rhamnous, Aixone, Achamai. Add for Aixone, Ath. Mitt., 1941, pl. 73Google Scholar (cf J.H.S. lxxi, 222, n. 7).Google Scholar

page 25 note 1 The reference to a recognition in Aristophanes Kokalos I have omitted because the Kokalos was a mythological play and no doubt other mythological plays contained parodies of tragic recognition scenes. The recognitions of New Comedy are scenes of everyday life.

page 26 note 1 See C. Q. xlii. 19Google Scholar; Rylands Bulletin, xxxii.Google Scholar