Aristophanes and Athens: An Introduction to the Plays 0198721587, 9780198721581

Citation preview

Aristophanes and Athens An Introduction to the Plays ~

6'0

Douglas M. MacDowell

OXFORD

UNIVERSITY

PRESS

Oxford University Press, Walton Street, Oxford ox2 6DP Oxford New York Athens Auckland Bangkok Bogota Bombay Buenos Aires Calcutta Cape Town Dares Salaam Delhi Florence Hong Kong Istanbul Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madras Madrid Melbaurne Mexico City Nairobi Paris Singapore Taipei Tokyo Toronto and associated companies in Berlin lbadan Oxford is a trade mark of Oxford University Press Published in the United States by Oxford University Press Inc., New York Cl Douglas M. MacDowell 1995

First published in hardback and paperback 1995 Reprinted in paperback 1996 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without t1!eprior permission in writing of Oxford University Press. Within the UK, exceptions are allowed in respect of any fair dealing for the purpose of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Paunts Act, 1988, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of the licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside these terms and in other countries should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address abave The paperback edition of this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Cata/oging in Publication Data Aristophanes and Athens: an introduction to the plays. Douglas M. MacDowell. Includes bibliographical references. I. Aristophanes-Criticism and interpretation. 2. Greek drama (Comedy)-History and criticism. 3. Aristophanes-KnowledgeGreece-Athens. 4. Athens (Greece)-ln literature. I. Title. PA3879.M23 1995 882'.01-dc20 95-3669 ISBN 0-19-872158-7 (Hbk) ISBN 0-19-872159-5 (Pbk) Printed in Great Britain on acid-free paper by Biddies Ltd., Guildford and King's Lynn

Preface

Aristophanes is the most versatile and iridescent of authors. It is hard to define his qualities at all, and quite impossible to discuss them all fully within one book of moderate length. This book is primarily an introduction for those reading him for the first time, and I concentrate mainly on the subjects of the plays in relation to the historical circumstances of Athens, because that seems to me a good way for a newcomer to approach them. I say relatively little about literary and theatrical features, although those are not entirely ignored. Some problems about Aristophanes have aroused much scholarly controversy. I state my own views, of course, but I have tried to alert readers to the existence of alternatives, either in the text or in the footnotes. The footnotes refer, as a rule, to the more recent books and articles, in which references to earlier works can be found by anyone wanting a more exhaustive bibliography. They also give a few words in Greek, whereas the main text is written so as to be clear to readers who know only English. I quote Aristophanes in my own translations, because I find no published translation satisfactory for my purpose. For a scholarly study, a translation must be fairly literal and accurate; but besides giving the right sense it should also convey something of the original form. In the case of Aristophanes that means it must be in verse, in rhythms which are comparable to the rhythms of the original. English verse has to be based on stress rather than quantity of syllables, and I have used the familiar English five-foot iambic line to represent the Greek trimeter, but in other respects my translations keep close to the original metres. In recent years publishers have been reluctant to publish verse translations, and consequently there are now thousands of people who think that Aristophanes' plays are in the form and language of everyday conversation. They are not; the man in the Athenian street did not speak in iambic trimeters, still less in the trochaic, anapaestic, and other forms which Aristophanes often uses. If my translations seem more formal

VI

Preface

than others now current, that does not, I believe, give a misleading impression of Aristophanes. UniversityefGlas9ow September1994

Douglas MacDowell

Contents

Abbreviationsand Biblio9raphy ChronoloaicalTableof Plays Intention and Interpretation I. 2. The Audience and its Expectations 3. Early Plays 4. Akharnians 5. Horsemen 6. Clouds 7. Wasps 8. Peace 9. Birds 10. Lysistrata Womenat the Thesmophoria 11. I 2. Froas Womenat the Assemb!J' I 3. 14. Wealth Aristophanes and Athens I 5. Index

viii Xll I

7 27 46 80 I I

3

150 180 199 229 251 274 301 3 24 350 357

Abbreviations and Bibliography

ABSA AJP Ar.Femmes Ar.Hardt BICS C&)f

CA CP

CQ_ CR Crux

EGr.Hist. G&]t

GRBS HCT

Annual efthe British Schoolat Athens AmericanJournal efPhilology Aristophane:LesFemmeset la Cite = Les Cahiersde Fontenay1 7 (Fontenay aux Roses 1 9 7 9) Aristophane, ed. J.M. Bremer and E.W. Handley= EntretiensHardt 38 (Geneva 1993) Bulletin efthe Institute efClassicalStudies Classicaet Mediaevalia ClassicalAntiquity ClassicalPhilology ClassicalQyarterly ClassicalReview Crux, essayspresentedto G. E. M. de Ste. Croix, ed. P. A. Cartledge and F. D. Harvey= History '?[Political Thou9ht 6 (1985) issue 1/2 Die Fra9menteder9riechischenHistoriker,ed. F. Jacoby Greece&_Rome Greek,Roman and Byzantine Studies A Historical Commentaryon Thucydidesby A. W. Gomme, A. Andrewes, and K. J. Dover (Oxford 1945-81)

HSCP /CS JG JHS MC ML Nomos

Harvard Studies in ClassicalPhilolo8Y Illinois ClassicalStudies InscriptionesGraecae Journal efHellenic Studies Museum Criticum A Selection'?[GreekHistorical Inscriptions,ed. R. Meiggs and D. M. Lewis (Oxford 1969) Nomos, essaysin Athenian law, politics and society,ed. P. Cartledge, P. Millett, and S. Todd (Cambridge 1990)

Noth.Dion.

Nothin9 to do with Dionysos?,ed. J. J. Winkler and F. I. Zeitlin (Princeton 1990)

Abbreviations and Bibliography P.Oxy. Rh.Mus. TAPA Tr.Com.Pol.

YCS ZPE

ix

Oxyrhynchus Papyri RheinischesMuseumfiir Philolo9ie Transactionsefthe AmericanPhiloloaicalAssociation Tra9edy,Comedyand the Po/is,ed. A. H. Sommerstein, S. Halliwell, J. Henderson, and B. Zimmermann (Bari 1993) YaleClassicalStudies Zeitschriftfiir Papyroloaieund Epi9raphik

The following list of modern books is not a complete bibliography, but gives details of some works for which I use abbreviated references. Details of other works, cited only once or twice, are given in the footnotes.

lnterpretazioni teatrali (Florence 1972-81). BowIE, A. M. Aristophanes:Myth, Ritual and Comedy(Cambridge

ALBINI,

UMBERTO.

1993).

CARRIERE,J.C. Le Carnavalet la politique (Paris 1979). CARTLEDGE,PAUL.Aristophanesand his TheatreeftheAbsurd (London 1990). CASSIO,ALBIOC. Commediae partecipazione(Naples 1985). -Edition of Aristophanes Banchettanti (Pisa 197 7). CROISET,MAURICE.Aristophanesand the PoliticalPartiesat Athens (trans. James Loeb, London 1909). DAVID,E. Aristophanesand Athenian Society efthe earlyfourth century B. C. (Leiden 1984). DEARDEN,C. W. The Sta9e efAristophanes(London 1976). DovER, K. J. Aristophanic Comedy(London 1972). -Greekand the Greeks( Oxford 198 7). --Greek PopularMorality (Oxford 1974). --Editions of Aristophanes Clouds(Oxford 1968), Froas(1993). EHRENBERG,VICTOR. The PeopleefAristophanes(Oxford, 2nd edn. 1951). FISHER,RAYMONDK. Aristophanes'Clouds:purposeand technique (Amsterdam 1984). M. Aristophanes,poet and dramatist(London HARRIOTT,ROSEMARY 1986).

HEATH,MALCOLM.PoliticalComedyin Aristophanes(Gottingen 1987).

HENDERSON,JEFFREY.The MaculateMuse (New Haven 1975; repr. with addenda, New York 199 1).

X

Abbreviations and Bibliography

HENDERSON,JEFFREY.Edition of Aristophanes qsistrata (Oxford I 987). HOFMANN, HEINZ. Mythos und Komodie(Hildesheim 1976). HUBBARD,THOMASK. The Mask '![Comedy(Ithaca, NY, 1991). HUGILL, WILLIAMM. Panhellenismin Aristophanes(Chicago 1936). KASSEL,R., and AusTIN, C. PoetaeComiciGraeci(Berlin 1983). KRAUS,WALTHER.Aristophanes'politischeKomodien(Osterreichische Alcad. der Wiss., Phil. -hist. Klasse,Sitzungsberichte 453, 1985). LIND, HERMANN.Der GerberKleon in den 'Rittern' desAristophanes (Frankfurt 1990). MACDOWELL,DOUGLASM. The Law in ClassicalAthens (London 1978). --Edition of Aristophanes Wasps(Oxford 1971 ). --Edition of Demosthenes A9ainst Meidias(Oxford 1990 ). MCLEISH, KENNETH. The TheatreefAristophanes(London 1980). MARIANETTI,

MARIE

C. R.eli9ionand Politicsin Aristophanes'Clouds

(Hildesheim 1992). MASTROMARCO,GIUSEPPE.Storia di una commediadi Atene (Florence 1974). MouLTON, CARROLL.AristophanicPoetry(Gottingen 1981 ). MURRAY, GILBERT.Aristophanes:A Study (Oxford 1933). NEWIGER, HANS-JOACHIM.Metapherund Alle9orie(Munich 1957). O'REGAN, DAPHNE E. Rhetoric, Comedy,and the ViolenceefLan9ua9e in Aristophanes'Clouds(New York 1992). OsTWALD, MARTIN. FromPopularSoverei9ntyto the Soverei9ntyefLaw (Berkeley 1986). PADUANO,Gu1Do. 119iudice9iudicato (Bologna 1974). PERUSINO, FRANCA.Dalla commediaantica alla commediadi mezzo (Urbino 1987). PICKARD-CAMBRIDGE, ARTHUR w. Dithyramb, Traaedyand Comedy (2nd edn. rev. T. B. L. Webster, Oxford 1962). --The DramaticFestivalsefAthens (2nd edn. rev. John Gould and D. M. Lewis, Oxford 1968, repr. with addenda 1988). PLATNAUER,MAURICE.Edition of Aristophanes Peace(Oxford 1964). RAu, PETER. Paratra9odia(Munich 1967). RECKFORD,KENNETHJ. Aristophanes'Old-and-New Comedy1: Six Essaysin Perspective(Chapel Hill 1987). RENNIE, W. Edition of Aristophanes Acharnians(London 1909).

Abbreviations and Bibliography

xi

ROGERS,BENJAMINB. Editions of Aristophanes Acharnians(London 1910), Kni9hts (1910), Clouds(2nd edn. 1916), Wasps(2nd edn. 19 15), Peace( 2nd edn. 191 3), Birds ( 1906), gsistrata ( 191 1), Thesmophoriazusae(1904), Froas(2nd edn. 1919), Ecclesiazusae (1902), Plutus (1907). ROTHWELL,KENNETHS. Politicsand Persuasionin Aristophanes' Ecclesiazusae(Leiden 1990). Russo, CARLO FERDINANDO.Aristophanes,an Authorfor the Sta9e (London 1994). STE. CROIX, G. E. M. DE. The Ori9ins efthe PeloponnesianWar (London 1972). SIFAKIS,G. M. Parabasisand Animal Choruses(London 197 1). SoMMERSTEIN,ALAN H. Editions of Aristophanes Acharnians (Warminster 1980 ), Kni9hts ( 198 1), Clouds( 198 2), fflisps (1983), Peace(1985), Birds (1987), 1:J'sistrata (1990), Thesmophoriazusae( 1994). STANFORD,W. B. Edition of Aristophanes Froas(2nd edn., London 1963). STARKIE,W. J. M. Edition of Aristophanes Acharnians (London 1909). STONE, LAURAM. Costumein AristophanicPoetry(Salem 1984). TAAFFE,LAURENK. Aristophanesand Women(London 1993). TAILLARDAT,JEAN. Les lma9esd'Aristophane(2nd edn., Paris 1965). THIERCY, PASCAL.Aristophane:.fictionet dramatur9ie(Paris 1986). UssHER, R. G. Edition of Aristophanes Ecclesiazusae( Oxford 197 3). YETTA,MAssIMO. Edition of Aristophanes Le Donne all'assemblea (Milan 1989 ). WHITMAN, CEDRICH. Aristophanesand the ComicHero (Cambridge, Mass. 1964). WILAMOWITZ-MOELLENDORFF, ULRICH VON. Edition of Aristophanes Lysistrate(Berlin 19 27). ZANETTO, GIUSEPPE.Edition of Aristophanes Gli Uccelli(Milan 1987). ZANNINI QuIRINI, BRUNO. Nephelokokky9ia:la prospettivamitica de9li Uccellidi Aristefane (Rome 198 7). ZIMMERMANN,BERNHARD.Untersuchun9enzur furm und dramatischenTechnikder AristophanischenKomiidien(Konigstein and Frankfurt, 1984-7).

Chronological Table of Plays

Extant plays are in capital letters. Banqueters Babylonians AKHARNIANS HORSEMEN furmers Merchant-ships Clouds 1 Proa9on WASPS PEACE CLOUDS2 Amphiaraos BIRDS LYSISTlU.TA WOMENAT THE THESMOPHORIA1 Wealth 1 Gerytades FROGS WOMENAT THE ASSEMBLY WEALTH2 Kokalos Aiolosikon 2

427 426 Dionysia 425 Lenaia 424 Lenaia 424 Dionysia? 423 Lenaia? 42 3 Dionysia 422 Lenaia 422 Lenaia 421 Dionysia not performed 414 Lenaia 414 Dionysia 411 Lenaia 41 1 Dionysia 408 407? 405 Lenaia 391 ? 388 3 8 7 Dionysia 386?

ChronologicalTableof Plays

xiii

The following plays are undated . .AiolosikonI .Anaa,ros Broilers Daidalos Danaids DionysosShipwrecked Dramas1 , or Centaur Dramas2, or Niobos Heroes Islands Lemnian Women

Old.Age Peace2 Phoenidan Women Poetry Polyidos Seasons Storks Telemessians Triphales Womenat the Thesmophoria2 WomenEncamping

I

Intention and Interpretation

Is it possible for us to understand an ancient comedy? The obstacles are formidable. This is not just because our copies are derived from manuscripts containing scribal errors, written in an ancient language which we know imperfectly; those are difficulties in any classical Greek text, but modern scholarship has done much to correct the errors of transmission and to improve our knowledge of the language. But a play was more than a text. Aristophanes' primary intention was not to write a book for readers in later generations, but to provide a performance in the Athenian theatre on a particular day. The words which we now read were only one element of that performance. At least four other elements were of major importance. First, there was the speaking of the words, the tone of voice. Any actor, even an amateur, knows that the effect of a line can be drastically altered by the manner in which it is uttered: it may be made serious or comic or ironic. Second, there was the stage action. By 'business' an actor may clarify and emphasize the sense of the words, or he may divert attention from them; some action may proceed in mime with no words at all. Whereas modern plays have stage directions to help readers to imagine the action, ancient plays lack that aid. Third, there was the theatrical equipment, including costumes and scenery. Scenery may not have amounted to much in Aristophanes' time, but he certainly used comic costumes and disguises, and exploited for comic purposes certain stage equipment, notably the ekkyklema and the mekhane.Fourth, there was the music, especially the singing and dancing of the chorus. No one nowadays would think he knew all about TheMikadoor The Phantomof the Operaif he had never seen a performance or heard any of the music. Can we then claim to understand Waspsor Frogs? Even if we could be transported by some time-machine to the fifth century B c to attend a performance in the theatre of Dionysos,

2

Intention and Interpretation

we should still be in difficulty, because we could not become ancient Athenians. Athenians were not just like us. They had a different way of life and different beliefs, and we should not take it for granted that they would be interested or amused or convinced by the same things as ourselves. Furthermore, they came to the theatre expecting a particular kind of performance on a particular occasion. Any modern reader can easily see that Aristophanes' plays are extremely topical; we miss many points, comic or serious, because of our ignorance of the circumstances of the time. We cannot fully appreciate the likes and dislikes, the pleasures and worries, of Aristophanes and his spectators. Is it therefore pointless to try? Some modem critics have thought so. Taking the view that it is impossible to discover the intentions of an ancient writer and the reactions of his original audience, they consider their function to be simply to express their own reactions to the text. But this is an arid activity. Who wants to know the effect of a text on an individual modern critic? No doubt my personal reactions are interesting to myself, but your reactions may well be different, and there is no good reason for me to write, or for you to read, a book about my personal tastes. What you are interested in, if you have picked up this book, is not me, but Aristophanes. _Fe_want to know aE~u~him because he was a comic genius with an . a1·· ----,-_~-r ----------- ----- -- ---------- - - --- - - --exception llllll(I. --· Although we can never get completely inside his mind or see every aspect of it, we can in fact see a good deal. It is not the case that we can discover nothing about his intentions. All the difficulties which I listed at the beginning of this chapter can be alleviated to some extent. For many lines in the plays it is reasonably clear what tone of voice is appropriate (the rich variety of Greek particles often helps), what stage action accompanies them, and what costumes or stage equipment are being used. The general character of the music is sometimes perceptible from the metre of the words, although we lack the tunes. Many lines or longer passages are so obviously meant to be funny that we can safely make inferences from them about the Athenian sense of humour (which actually turns out to differ less from ours than might have been expected). And we do have a fair amount of information about the political and socialhistory of the time, enabling us to understand a substantial proportion of the topical references in the plays. So we can form an idea of what Aristophanes is getting at, at least for most of the time. We shall

Intention and Interpretation

3

never understand his mind entirely, but that is no reason for not carrying our investigation as far forward as we can. The main purpose of this book, then, is a historical one: to ascertain some of Aristophanes' purposes and intentions in writing his plays. Now, a dramatist may want his plays to appeal to the general public, or to a more limited and intellectual audience; or he may write only for a few readers or just for his own personal satisfaction, not expecting his work to be performed at all. We can safely put Aristophanes in the first category. We know that his plays were performed in competitions before a large audience, and that several of them won the first prize. One of his aims must have been to entertain and impress spectators who were not especially intelligent or learned. (The nature of the Athenian audience will be considered further in Chapter 2.) That does not preclude the possibility that he sometimes slipped in one or two jokes which would have been appreciated only by a few co9noscenti;and occasionally he may have overestimated the audience's intellectual interests and capacity (notably in Clouds; see Chapter 6). But normally his plays must have been clear and entertaining to ordinary Athenians at first sight and hearing (and that encourages us to reject some over-subtle interpretations which modern scholars have put forward from time to time). That was presumably true also of Aristophanes' rivals, whose comedies are now lost: Kratinos, Eupolis, Pherekrates, Phrynikhos, and the rest. But we have good reason to think that Aristophanes was also trying to do something more. He was not merely hoping that the spectators would laugh more loudly at his comedies than at the others; he was attempting to do new things.' Always I do something clever, bringing in some new ideas.

( Clouds54 7)

Poets who do something new should be cherished, he claims ( Wasps I o 51-9). Some of his innovations are merely matters of dramatic technique, such as making the chorus dance its exit at the ' Cf. A. H. Sommerstein in Ant.ikeDramentheorienund ihre &uption (=Drama B. Zimmermann, 199 2) 14-33. He shows that there is some evidence from the fragments that other comic dramatists also claimed originality in various features of dramatic technique and skill, but not, like Aristophanes, in the giving of good advice to Athens. 1, ed.

Intention and Interpretation

4

end of the play ( Wasps1 5 3 6-7). But there are several passages in which the chorus or a character says that the poet gives good advice or instruction to the audience. Here are some of the most explicit. Do not resent it, men of the audience, If I, a beggar, speak to Athenians Concerning Athens in a comedy. For even comedy lcnows what is right, And what I'll say, though startling, will be right.

DIKAIOPOLIS.

(Akharnians497-501)'

The poet declares he deserves to receive rewards for the good that he's done you. (Akharnians633) He says that he'll teach you a lot of good things,and so make you thoroughly happy. (Akharnians656) But in this case the poet deserves it, Because he detests just the same men as we do, and ventures to say what is rightful. (Horsemen509-10)

But we've a little story with a point. (Wasps64) And next, 0 ye people, pay heed to our words, if you're willing to hear some plain speaking; For the time has arrived when the poet desires to find fault, and to blame the spectators. He declares that they've injured him, quite unprovoked, in spite of the good that he's done them. (Wasps1015-17) We, the sacred chorus, have a duty to the citizens: We should offer good advice and teaching. (Frogs686-7)

Even now, you silly men, it's not too late to change your ways. (Frogs734) ' This passage, including the element of parody in it, is discussedin Ch. 4.

Intention and Interpretation

5

First answer this question: what quality found in a poet deserves admiration? EURIPIDES. He deserves it for skill, and for giving advice, and also because we make people Become better in all of the cities. 3 (Frogs1008-10)

AESCHYLUS.

There are also other lines which, though less clearly, seem to imply a serious intent to advise the Athenians and tell them what they ought to do. But they do not occur in every play; and even where they do occur it has been argued, most strongly by Heath, that such passages are only ironic. According to Heath they display 'mock-seriousness', 'amiable banter', or 'an elaborate joke': Aristophanes, speaking through the mouth of a chorus or a character, puts on a comically solemn air, and the more he protests his seriousness, the more loudly the audience laughs. 4 Certainly it is possible for a comedian to use humour of this type, and we cannot rule out a priori that Aristophanes does so from time to time; but a joke used in one place is not necessarily used in another place, and we therefore have to interpret each passage individually. It is over-simple to assume that, if a play is a comedy, everything in it must be a joke. In fact even Heath allows that there is one exception, Frogs686-7, in which the chorus states as a general principle that it is right for the chorus to give good advice and teaching to the city. But by admitting this exception Heath undermines his whole argument; for if we take this particular statement seriously, it means that comic choruses give good advice regularly, not in this play alone. So, as we read the plays, it is reasonable to expect that we shall find, at least occasionally, a scene or passage in which Aristophanes 3

1bis passage occurs in a discussion of tragedy, not of comedy; but since the

poets whom Aeschylus proceeds to take as examples (Orpheus, Mousaios, Hesiod, Homer) are not authors of tragedies but of poetry of other kinds, it is likely that his question and Euripides' answer are meant to apply to all poetry, including comedy. ~ Heath Political Comedy16-2 1. There have been many discussions of this topic. Note especially A. W. Gomme's article 'Aristophanes and politics', CR 52 (1938) 97-109, reprinted in his MoreEssaysin GreekHistoryand Literature(Oxford 1962) 70-91; he stresses that Aristophanes is an artist, not a politician, but concedes that some passages in the plays have serious political intentions. For short surveys of recent views see Cartledge Ar. and his Theatreof the Absurd,J. M. Bremer in Ar. Hardt 127-34. Discussions of this aspect of particular plays are mentioned in the footnotes to the appropriate chapter.

6

Intention and Interpretation

is not just trying to make the Athenians laugh but is making some serious point which is intended to influence them. This may well be one of the things which he claims to be new in comedy (though, since we have no comedies by his predecessors, we cannot be quite sure that they never gave serious advice). But we need not expect to find this feature in every play. Some modern discussions of Aristophanes suffer from a desire to fit all his plays into a single pattern: his comic aim or method, or his political or intellectual attitude, is assumed to have been always the same. Really there is no special reason why he should have held the same views throughout a dramatic career of about forty years, or have written the same kind of play again and again. In this book, therefore, there is not much generalization. My purpose is to take each play individually and to ascertain, as far as is practicable, what Aristophanes is getting at and what influence or effect he wishes that particular play to have on his Athenian audience. I must begin by considering what sort of an audience it was, and what sort of performance it expected.

2 ~

--------------

~

The Audience and its Expectations

THE DRAMATIC

FESTIVALS

For the Athenians, a play was a special occasion. Now we are accustomed to seeing plays at any time, but in the fifth century B c plays were performed within the town' of Athens at only two periods of the year. Both were festivals of Dionysos: the town Dionysia, which took six days in the month Elaphebolion (which roughly corresponded to our month of March), and the Lenaia, lasting four days in Gamelion (approximately January). 2 These festivals were celebrations in honour of the god, and they included religious ceremonies, processions, and choral performances as well as plays. There were plays also at local festivals (the rural Dionysia), for example at Peiraieus and Eleusis, but little is known about those. It is possible that new plays were always performed first in the town, and the rural Dionysia saw only revivals.1 In the time of Aristophanes the plays for the town Dionysia were certainly performed in the theatre of Dionysos beside the Akropolis, but it has been questioned whether the Lenaia plays were performed there too. In earlier times that festival had been celebrated at a precinct called the Lenaion, of which the location is uncertain.+ Most scholars assume that, once the theatre ofDionysos was established, it was used for the Lenaia plays also; but Russo, adapting an earlier ' Throughout this book I use 'town' to mean the urban area (dO'Tv), 'city' to mean the political entity of the city-state (1r6,\,S'). ' For details of the festivals see Pickard-Cambridge Festivals. 3 Aelian VarioHistoria 2. 1 3 suggests that some new tragedies by Euripides were performed at Peiraieus, but the wording is not quite explicit, and anyway this is not contemporary evidence. 4 Cf. R. E. Wycherley Hesperia34 (1965) 72--6, Pickard-Cambridge hstivals 37---9.

The Audience and its Expectations

8

theory of Anti, has maintained that this transfer did not take place until later, so that Aristophanes' Lenaia plays were performed not in the theatre of Dionysos but in the different and less elaborate surroundings of the Lenaion. 5 Russo's general arguments from the texts of the plays are inconclusive, 6 but he has one stronger argument to which his critics have given too little weight: in Aristophanes and other texts of the fifth and fourth centuries referring to the dramatic contests at the Lenaia festival the phrase 'at the Lenaion' is regularly found. 7 The Lenaion has been identified with the precinct of 'Dionysos in the marshes' by Slater, who argues that that was the place where plays were performed at the Lenaia festival. 8 Yet it seems unlikely that an open space or makeshift theatre would have continued to be used when the theatre of Dionysos was available, and it is probably better to accept that the theatre of Dionysos was used but the phrase 'at the Lenaion' had become conventional and so continued in use even when no longer true literally. The plays were performed in competitions, in which there seems to have been keen rivalry for the honour of winning. At both the town Dionysia and the Lenaia the number of comedies was normally five, but a widely-held modern view is that the number was temporarily reduced to three during the Peloponnesian War, to save time and expense by making each festival one day shorter.' Since most of Aristophanes' plays were written during those years, that would mean that we should think of him as having two competitors rather than four on each occasion. But the theory is not firmly based. The only evidence for it is the fact that the hypotheses (ancient introductions, written probably in the Hellenistic period) to several of his plays specify only the plays which came first, second, and third in the contest. A hypothesis of Peace is an example. 5

C. F. Russo Aristefane,autore di teatro (Florence 196 2) 1-2 1, with addenda on pp. 403-4 of the reprint ( 1984). (This chapter is not included in the English version of Russo's book.) ' Cf. Pickard-Cambridge Festivals39-40, Dearden Sta9e 5-8. 7 /1rl A.,,valcp:.Akharnians 504, Plato Protagoras3 27d, Demosthenes 21 . 1o, JG 2' 1496.74, 1496.105. ' N. W. Slater ZPE 66 (1986) 255-64. ' A. K~rte Rh.Mus.60 ( 1905) 42 7-8, followed by many other scholars without discussion.

The Audience and its Expectations

9

The poet was victorious with the play in the arkhonship of Alkaios, in town. Eupolis was first with Flatterers,Aristophanes second with Peace, and Leukon third with Clansmen. (Peacehyp. iii)

But this may equally well be interpreted as meaning that only the first three competitors were awarded prizes or had their names inscribed in the records, an interpretation that may be supported by the way in which, in this particular case, Aristophanes is said to have been victorious (that is, won an award) with the play which came only second. ' On the other hand, there is evidence that the comic dramatist Platon came fourth in a comic contest around this time,'' and it has been argued by Luppe that the total number of comedies known to have been performed during the Peloponnesian War is too large to have been fitted into the programme if only three were put on at each festival. 12 The evidence on both sides of this argument is tenuous, but on balance it is preferable to accept that there were always five comedies at each of the two festivals. If more than five poets, then, wanted to present comedies at the same festival, a choice among them had to be made by the magistrate in charge (the Arkhon for the town Dionysia, the Basileus for the Lenaia). Some time beforehand each poet would 'ask for a chorus',' 3 and the magistrate would select five. The criteria of selection are not known; perhaps none were laid down and each magistrate chose in any way he liked. He is unlikely to have read complete scripts; he may have been guided by the previous successes and reputations of the various authors. The town Dionysia were regarded as more important than the Lenaia, and may have been more difficult to get into. The same papyrus fragment which tells us that Platon came fourth on one occasion goes on to say that in consequence he had to go ba