Seneca's "Hercules Furens": A Critical Text with Introduction and Commentary 9781501718267

Table of contents :
CONTENTS
PREFACE
ABBREVIATIONS
INTRODUCTION
The Ambivalent Hero
The Senecan Drama
Seneca's Sources
Date
Text and Apparatus Criticus
Sigla
HERCULES FURENS
PERSONAE
ACTUS PRIMUS
ACTUS SECUNDUS
ACTUS TERTIUS
ACTUS QUARTUS
ACTUS QUINTUS
APPENDIXES
BIBLIOGRAPHY
ADDENDA
INDEXES

Citation preview

CORNELL STUDIES IN CLASSICAL PHILOLOGY EDITED BY

FREDERICK M. AHL * KEVIN C. CLINTON JOHN E. COLEMAN *JUDITH R. GINSBURG G. M. KIRKWOOD * GORDON R. MESSING ALAN NUSSBAUM * PIETRO PUCCI WINTHROP WETHERBEE VOLUME XLV

Seneca's Hercules Furens A Critical Text with Introduction and Commentary by john G. Fitch

From Myth to Icon: Reflections of Greek Ethical Doctrine in Literature and Art by Helen F. North Lucan: An Introduction by Frederick M. Ahl

The Violence of Pity in Euripides' Medea by Pietro Pucci Epicurus' Scientific Method by Elizabeth Asmis The Rhetoric of Imitation: Genre and Poetic Memory in Virgil and Other Latin Poets by Gian Biagio Conte, edited by Charles Segal THE TOWNSEND LECTURES

Artifices of Eternity: Horace's Fourth Book of Odes by Michael C.]. Putnam

SENECA'S

Hercules Furens A CRITICAL TEXT WITH INTRODUCTION AND COMMENTARY

John G. Fitch

CORNELL UNIVERSITY PRESS ITHACA AND LONDON

First printing, Cornell Paperbacks, 2009

Copyright© 1987 by Cornell University All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this book, or parts thereof, must not be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the publisher. For information, address Cornell University Press, 124 Roberts Place, Ithaca, New York 14850. First published 1987 by Cornell University Press. International Standard Book Number 0-8014-7571-6 Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 86-11582 Printed in the United States of America. Librarians: Library of Congress cataloging information appears on the last page of the book. The paper in this book is acid-free and meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources.

TO MY PARENTS

CONTENTS Preface

9

Abbreviations

11

INTRODUCTION The Ambivalent Hero The Senecan Drama Conflicting views of Hercules Hercules 'sane' Hercules insane The dominion of death The final Act Summary Hercules Furens and Stoicism Seneca's Sources Date Text and Apparatus Criticus

13 15 21 21 24 28 33 35 38 40 44 50 53

Sigla

63

HERCULES FURENS

65 115 115 158 183 252 274 334

COMMENTARY Act I Ode I Act II Ode II Act III Ode III

[ 71

Contents Act IV Ode IV Act V

350 390 412

APPENDIXES 1. Further Details ofT (Par. Lat. 8031) 2. Addenda and Corrigenda to Giardina's Apparatus Criticus 3· The Colometry of the Anapestic Odes 4· Compound Adjectives and Adjectives in -x BIBLIOGRAPHY Addenda INDEXES 1. Index of Latin Words 2. General Index

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471

PREFACE Recent decades have seen a resurgence of interest in Seneca's tragedies, inspired in the 1920s by T. S. Eliot's two essays on Seneca's translators and by Otto Regenbogen's study of suffering and death in the tragedies, and fostered in the 196os by C.]. Herington's essay in Arion. There have also been more general cultural factors, among them a belated escape from the dictates of Romantic criticism, and a history of wars and superpower confrontations to which the Senecan themes of unreason, megalomania, and destructive self-assertion have an unmistakable relevance. Only very recently, however, has this revival been supported by the appearance of fully annotated editions of individual plays: in English we now have C. D. N. Costa's Medea (1973), R.]. Tarrant's Agamemnon (1976) and Thyestes (1985), and Elaine Fantham's Troades (1982). Such editions are indispensable to progress in criticism for several reasons. First, the editor serves an ancillary function, by gathering pertinent information from widely scattered and often inaccessible sources, and so permitting the critic to make an informed assessment of a particular passage. Second, the editor-commentator, by virtue of close familiarity with the text, is particularly well placed to assess critical views. Third, intensive work on a single play may reasonably be expected to open up lines of enquiry about the whole corpus. Thus Tarrant's pioneering work shed new light on many areas: inter alia, diction, the pervasiveness of Ovidian influence, and above all dramatic technique. My own work on Hercules Furens has in turn suggested avenues of research into relative dating, diction, anapest colometry, and expressive use of meter. My choice of Hercules Furens was determined in part by the challenges presented by the interpretation of the play, in part by its sheer literary power (notably in the choral odes), and in part by the significance of Hercules himself, the most important culture-hero of Greco-Roman civilization. Hercules Furens is the largest of the genuinely Senecan plays, [g)

Preface

its size matching its hero, a fact that has contributed to the size of my commentary. To avoid even greater length I decided, albeit reluctantly, not to attempt full documentation of Seneca's literary influence (even on the pseudo-Senecan Hercules Oetaeus). Some notable examples of classical and postclassical influence are given, however, for their intrinsic interest and for the light they shed on the quality of Seneca's verse. Portions of the Commentary were seen in an early draft by Frederick M. Ahl, C. J. Herington, and R. J. Tarrant. Of my colleagues at the University of Victoria, D. A. Campbell and P. L. Smith between them read the whole of the Commentary, while S. E. Scully read the Introduction. All of these scholars offered helpful comments and criticisms for which I am most grateful. I also thank Cornell University Press's anonymous referee for a detailed and expert critique of the whole work. Valuable advice on collation of manuscripts was given by M. D. Reeve, L. D. Reynolds, and A. P. MacGregor. Richard Tarrant was generous in his encouragement, lending microfilms and allowing me to see a typescript of his Agamemnon before publication. I cannot let this opportunity pass without expressing once again my admiration and gratitude to Fred Ahl, who first guided my Senecan studies; and to two other inspiring teachers of Classics, P. H. Vennis and the late J. L. Whiteley. This book has been published with the help of a grant from the Canadian Federation for the Humanities, using funds provided by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. I thank the editors of Cornell Studies in Classical Philology both for accepting my manuscript and for financial assistance in its publication. I am also grateful to S.S.H.R.C.C. and to the University of Victoria for financial support during study leaves in 1978-79, 1981-82, and 1984. The Canada Council provided funds to employ a research assistant, which was helpful at the preparatory stage: my thanks go to the Council and to P. J. Burnell for undertaking the useful though often tedious tasks involved. The Inter-Library Loans office of the University Library at Victoria has been diligent in pursuing many requests for out-of-the-way items. The burden of proofreading was lightened by the help of Pamela Hegedus and of my father, S. Gordon Fitch. A garland of praise, finally, to A. Nancy Nasser, who typed and retyped this magnum opus from my minuscule handwriting with unfailing accuracy and good humor. jOHN

Victoria, British Columbia October 1985

[ 1

o]

G.

FITCH

ABBREVIATIONS ALL Axelson Bomer D-S

EAA

Giardina H-S

Jocelyn K-S Leo L-S IJMC

N-H

OCD OLD

Otto

PrellerRobert RE

Archiv fur lateinische Lexikographie und Grammatik. Leipzig 1884-

1909. Axelson, Bertil. Unpoetische Worter. Lund 1945· Bomer, Franz. P. Ovidius Naso: Metamorphosen. Kommentar. Heidelberg 1960-. Daremberg, C., and E. Saglio. Dictionnaire des antiquites grecques et romaines d'apres les textes et les monuments. Paris 1877-1919. Enciclopedia dell' Arte Antica. Rome 1958-. Giardina, Gian Carlo, ed. L. Annaei Senecae Tragoediae. 2 vols. Bologna 1966. Hofmann, J. B. Lateinische Syntax und Stylistik. Rev. Anton Szantyr. Munich 1965. Jocelyn, H. D. The T-ragedies of Ennius. Cambridge 1967. Kuhner, R., and C. Stegmann. Ausfuhrliche Grammatik der lateinischen Sprache: Satzlehre. 5th ed. Hanover 1976. Leo, Friedrich, ed. L. Annaei Senecae Tragoediae. 2 vols. Berlin 1878-79 (reprinted Berlin 1963). Lewis, C. T., and C. Short. A Latin Dictionary. Oxford 1879. Lexicon lconographicum Mythologiae Classicae. Zurich 1981-. Nisbet, R. G. M., and Margaret Hubbard. A Commentary on Horace: Odes Book I. Oxford 1970. A Commentary on Horace: Odes Book II. Oxford 1978. The Oxford Classical Dictionary. 2d ed. Oxford 1970. Oxford Latin Dictionary. Oxford 1968-82. Otto, A. Die Sprichworter und sprichwortlichen Redensarten der Romer. Leipzig 1890 (reprinted Hildesheim 1962). "Nachtrage" refers to R. Haussler, ed. Nachtrage zu A. Otto, Sprichworter. Hildesheim 1968. Preller, L., and C. Robert. Griechische Mythologie. 4th ed. Berlin 1920-21 (reprinted Berlin 1966-67). Pauly A., G. Wissowa, and W. Kroll. Real-Encyclopadie der klassischen Altertumswissenschaft. Stuttgart 1950-. [ 11]

Abbreviations Roscher Sen. Trag. Strzelecki Tarrant TrGF TLL

Wilamowitz

Roscher, W. H. Ausfuhrliches Lexikon der griechischen und ramischen Mythologie. Leipzig 1884-1937 (reprinted Hildesheim 1965). Senecan tragedy excluding ps.-Sen. Hercules Oetaeus and Octavia. Strzelecki, L. De Senecae Trimetro Iambico. Krakow 1938. Tarrant, R. ]., ed. Seneca: Agamemnon. Cambridge 1976. Snell, B., R. Kannicht, and S. Radt, eds. Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta. Gottingen 1971-. Thesaurus Linguae Latinae. Leipzig 1900-. Wilamowitz-Moellendorf, U. von, ed. Euripides: Herakles. 2d ed. 3 vols. Berlin 1895 (reprinted Berlin 1959).

Other abbreviations are from the standard abbreviation lists in OCD and L'Annee Philologique. Works listed in the Bibliography are generally cited in abbreviated form by the author's name and page: e.g. Ahl 25 = F. M. Ahl, Lucan: An Introduction (Ithaca 1976) p. 25. If several works by a single author appear in the Bibliography, my citations distinguish them by date, for example, Leo 1876 432. It should be noted that I use Sen. Trag. in reference to the genuine plays of the corpus only, that is, excluding HO and Oct.

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INTRODUCTION

INTRODUCTION The Ambivalent Hero Hercules has appeared in many guises over the centuries, from aggressive bully to exemplar of virtue. This section of the Introduction will do no more than touch upon certain aspects of the Hercules tradition up to Seneca's time. It will not attempt to catalogue all authors who wrote about Hercules-which would in itself be a Herculean labor-nor to chronicle all the vicissitudes of his reputation. 1 Its purpose is simply to outline those earlier views and treatments of the hero which seem to me to have an important bearing on Seneca's play. From the earliest times Hercules' heroism is ambivalent. On the one hand he is "the best of men," 2 endowed with invincible strength and courage. On the other hand, any strength that goes so far beyond the human norm is potentially dangerous and unpredictable. His killing of wife and children shows how easily his strength may turn in the wrong direction. On that occasion he at least had the excuse of madness, but there was no such excuse for his murder of his music teacher Linus, who had simply angered him. The dangerous side of his personality is already evident in Homer, who mentions his attacks on the gods and his murder of his host Iphitus; for the former action he is described as O?(E"t"ALO~, o(3QtJ.LO€QY6~. 0~ OU'X Dee"t"' at(J'l)Aa QE~OOV, and for the latter as again O?(E"t"ALO~, and lacking in atoc.O~ toward the gods (Il. 5·403, Od. 2 1.28). Yet this criticism is mild in comparison with the devastating condemnation implied in Sophocles' Trachiniae: here Hercules is portrayed as drunk at the court of Eurytus, vengeful and deceitful in his murder of Iphitus, lustful and brutal in destroying Oechalia to seize 1. For a valuable study of literary adaptations of Hercules from Homer to the twentieth century see G. Karl Galinsky, The Herakles Theme (Oxford 1972), to which I am heavily indebted in much of this section. 2. E.g. Soph. Trach. 811; cf. G. Murray, Greek Studies (Oxford 1946) 108.

Introduction Iole; as a husband who neglects the admirable Deianira and insults her by taking a mistress openly, and finally as a tyrannical father in his commands to Hyllus. 5 Such excesses might be appropriate to the folktale hero whose arete consists of getting his own way regardless of opposition, but they must appear savage and hubristic when set within the context of civilized reality. It is not surprising, in view of Hercules' importance in religion and mythology, that there are many attempts to paint a more favorable picture, and in particular to justify that constant resort to violence which seems endemic in the labors. For example, the historian Timaeus insists that Hercules did his bloody deeds only under orders; when he was free to act on his own initiative, he established the Olympic Games, the epitome of civilized competition rather than barbaric conflict. Others portray Hercules' violence as justified by the barbaric nature of his opponents: Pisander calls him a "mostjust killer"; Aeschylus notes that Geryon's herdsmen were "unjust men"; Pindar describes the beasts slain by him as "knowing nothing of justice," and emphasizes the injustice of his human adversaries, the guest-cheating Augeas and the guestcleaving Parians. 4 As for the story of Hercules' hubristic attacks on the gods, Pindar with characteristic radicalism rejects it as palpably untrue (Ol. g.3off.). An even more radical reinterpretation and justification is seen in Prodicus' fable of Hercules at the crossroads: here Hercules undertakes the labors not under constraint but out of a free choice, deliberately prefering the hard road of Virtue to the easy path of Vice. 5 Whether or not Hercules' labors can be justified, a rather different question continues to be asked, namely whether all this slaying of monsters represented an achievement of any real value. "What was so wonderful about his killing a marsh-hydra?" asks Euripides' Lycus (151f.), and Hercules himself comments that he would have been better employed in defending his family than in the labors (575f.). Lucretius scorns the labors as irrelevant; the genuine dangers to be faced are those of the mind, cares, fears and desires, and it was Epicurus, not Hercules, who showed men how to overcome such monsters (5.22-54). Seneca himself expresses doubts, though he does so more tactfully, and replaces Epicurus with the Stoic Cato as a foil to Hercules. Cato, he re3· In Homer a less unfavorable view of Hercules is taken at ll. 18.117-19 and Od. 11.601-26; and in Sophocles we find a much more favorable view of him once

he is safely removed from contact with humans and translated to Olympus, viz. in Phil. On Hercules in Trach. see further R. P. Winnington-Ingram, Sophocles: An Interpretation (Cambridge 1980) 81-86, with references to more favorable views taken by some critics; also Galinsky 46-52 with n. 16. 4· Timaeus FGrH 566 F22; Pisander fr. 10 Kinkel; Aesch. fr. 74 N; Pind. Nem. 1.63 atbgobtxac;, 0[. 10.34 sEVaml-tac;, fr. 140a.56 SEVObafxta. 5· Xen. Mem. 2.1.21-43· [ 1

6]

Introduction

marks, did not fight with wild beasts, which is a job for the hunter or peasant, but came into conflict with ambition afld the lust for individual power. 6 Even those who are well-disposed toward Hercules sometimes define his heroism in terms not so much of his external achievements as of the qualities of spirit that made therri possible. Just such an approach is found in I socrates, who praises Hercules not for his labors but the excellences of his spirit, wisdom, desire for glory, justice, and philanthropy (5.109- 14). The most memorable redefinition, however, is that given in "Euripides' Heracles. By the end of that play Hercules' heroism, learned in facing the labors, has been brought to bear on a new and more difficult challenge, that of facing the tragic circumstances of human life. In such interpretations we see a tendency to place the focus less on physical conflicts than on spiritual ones. The process reaches its logical, if uninspiring, conclusion when Hercules' external foes are allegorized as dangers of the spirit: Cerberus represents earthly lusts and vices according to Servius, and Fulgentius takes Antaeus to mean lust, and Cacus to signify evil incarnate. 7 But if the value of the labors was sometimes questioned, they were more frequently praised and justified as having a beneficent purpose, to make human life more secure. Hercules "made the straits kindly to seafarers," he "pacified the woods of Erymanthus," 8 and in Euripides his task is defined by Amphitryon as nothing less than e!;rn.t£Qffiom yaiav, to civilize the earth (20, cf. 851f.). Thus he is a protector and savior from the evils of life. According to the possibly Hesiodic Shield of Heracles, Zeus fathered the hero "to be a defender against ruin (c'.tti}~ c'.tA.xti}Qa) for gods and bread-eating men" (28f.), and in the certainly Hesiodic Theogony we are told that he "warded off the deadly plague (sc. the eagle) from Prometheus, and delivered him from his miseries" (527f.). In cult, one of the titles most frequently applied to him is c'.tA.e!;(xaxo~, and he is invoked as a deliverer from troubles of all kinds, particularly disease. 9 In fact the notion of deliverance associated with the hero sometimes extends as far as deliverance from death. The idea of conquest over death is, of course, implicit in some details of the myth itself: like Orpheus, he descended to the land of death and returned; he also shot Pluto with an arrow, and wrestled with Thanatos for Alcestis' life. 10 It is hardly surprising, therefore, to find associa6. Const. Sap. 2.2. In similar vein, but in a nonphilosophical context, Tiberius compared Hercules' fights against beasts unfavorably with Augustus' struggles and achievements among men (Dio Cass. 56.36.4). 7· Serv. ad V. Aen. 6.395, Fulg. Myth. 2.3f., cf. also Dio Chrys. 5.22ff. 8. Pind. Isthm. 4·57• V. Aen. 6.8o2f. 9· RE Suppl. 3.100I.5ff., 1013.10ff. 10. Some of the other labors also appear to have connotations of defeating death;

Introduction

tions with some of the mystery· religions. According to one tradition he was initiated in the Eleusinia before his catabasis. 11 In the Pythagorean basilica at Rome, the representation of Hercules rescuing Hesione implies the liberation of the pure soul from the shackles of the body. 12 In Roman times, representations of Hercules are frequently found in funerary contexts, in which the hero is a prototype and guarantee of immortality. Sometimes he reclines at his ease after the toils of this life, as his human followers hope to do in their turn. Often the dead are actually represented with the attributes of Hercules, to suggest their identification with the hero. 13 But this is an anonymous form of immortality, suitable for ordinary men. Hercules also becomes a model, in Hellenistic and Roman times, for the extraordinary individual who, by his personal merits and his services to his fellow men, becomes a god: the 6Ei:o~ ClVTJ1]} 4 On the Greek side Alexander the XOOJ.I.OXQU'tCSV de- P'JC cac II 284 flumini T CS -is P fulmini E I 285 stetisti scissa E T CV fetistis cissas pac(altera s postea era.) fecisti scissa S II 287 cessit Leo cecidit E A II 295 imperatum E 1 A impertitum E 2 lloquor: locu £ 1, corr. m.2ll3o1 muta E multa A ll302 eleusin tacita A(n postea era. T) deus intacita ea' om:a (cf. perfregit ossa). There is no equivalent in the Greek to corpori trunco e.q.s. Similarly, Sen. has Agamemnon beheaded (Ag. go1ff.) without a precedent in Aeschylus. The image of a headless body is a particularly powerful one for the Romans, cf. V. Aen. 2.557£. iacet ingens litore truncus, avulsumque umeris caput et sine nomine corpus, Sen. Tro. 141 Sigea premis litora truncus (both of Priam), Luc. 2.171-73 (Sullan proscriptions), 8.6o7ff. (Pompey).

:nmM; Ei; ;aveov xaQa, I EQQYJ;E

1026 nee usquam est. "It no longer exists" (having been obliterated), cf. Hor. Sat. 2.5.101£. ergo nunc Dama sodalis I nusquam est? Sen. Tro. 39off. nee amplius, I iuratos superis qui tetigit lacus, I usquam est. 1026ff. Seneca's Amphitryon deliberately attempts to provoke Hercules into killing him, whereas H.'s attack on him in Eur. has no other prompting than that of madness (1001). Readiness to die in intolerable circumstances appears often in Sen. Trag., but is particularly characteristic of Amphitryon, cf. sogf., 1311f. Seneca's version also creates dramatic tension, similar to that in Act V over the imminent suicides of H. and Amphitryon. 1027 vivax senectus. The same phrase occurs in the same metrical position, again in self-address (Hecuba), at Tro. 42; the common source is Ov. Met. 13.518ff. (Hecuba again) quo me servas, annosa senectus? I quid, di crudeles, nisi quo nova funera cernam, I vivacem differtis anum? 1027f. habes mortem paratam. A familiar thought in the Stoicism of Sen.'s prose works: for an example with paratus cf. Ep. 30.16 a quo enim non prope est (sc. mars), parata omnibus locis omnibusque momentis? But utterance of it does not turn a dramatic character into a Stoic exemplar, unless one is willing to apply that label to Phaedra also (Pha. 878 mori volenti desse mars numquam potest). On this point cf. 1271f. comm. 1028-31. The transmitted text from the middle of 1028 to the beginning of 1030, pectus in tela indue I vel stipitem istum caede monstrorum illitum I converte, presents a difficulty: is Amphitryon addressing these words to himself or to Hercules? The immediately preceding phrases (1o26b-28a) are clearly self-address; the immediately following phrases in 103of. are equally clearly directed at H. But where does the change occur, and why is it not more clearly marked? One solution would be to end self-address after indue, with tela taken in the general sense of "weapons," and indue meaning "thrust upon," for which there are good precedents, particularly Ov. Am. 2.10.31£.

Commentary: Act IV induat adversis contraria pectora telis I miles (cf. OLD s.v. induo 5b)! 50 I am more inclined to think that the balance offered by the paradosis between tela "arrows" and stipitem "club" is genuine, and that both clauses

are therefore addressed to the same person. But it seems unlikely that they are self-address. First, the phrase caede monstrorum illitum would be pointless, and we should have to alter monstrorum to nostrorum with Schmidt 1865 23f.; admittedly not a major difficulty.m More serious is the fact that pectus in tela indue would have to mean "press your breast upon his arrows," an odd thought to say the least. Another serious objection lies in the fact that if Amphitryon begins to address H. at falsum ac nomini turpem tuo, there is no indication of the change of addressee in the Latin. Probably, then, Am phi tryon begins to address Hercules immediately after the words mortem paratam in 1028. It is noteworthy that Sen. nowhere else in verse or prose repeats in with induere, and Muller wff. persuasively suggested that the in of 1028b conceals an original en. For en used to attract the attention of another to oneself cf. Pha. 54 ades en comiti, diva virago, and for closely similar situations in which the speaker uses en in inviting an attack upon himself/herself cf. Med. g66 lania, perure, pectus en Furiis patet, HF 1172f. en nudus asto; vel meis armis licit I petas inermem. This, then, gives the much-needed indication of the point at which Amphitryon begins to address H. Unfortunately Muller's conjecture in full, pectus en telo indue, is less persuasive: I do not know what it would mean if addressed to H. as Muller intended, nor did Muller explain. Instead I propose pectori en tela indue, "Here, plunge your arrows into my breast." For a parallel usage of induere cf. Phoen. 180 nunc manum cerebro indue, "Now plunge your hand into the brain" (for induere = "thrust into" cf. also Plaut. Cas. 113 proin tu te in laqueum induas, Cic. Div. 2.44 cum autem [venti] se in nubem induerint, Col. 8.11.4 partes summae lingulas . . . habent, quae . . . foratis perticis induantur); similar phrases with other verbs include Oed. 1036f. pectori infigam meo I telum, Pha. 1177 pectori ferrum inseram, Ag. 723 flammas pectori infixas meo. A parallel correction is necessary at 13 12, from ferro pectus . . . 130. It will then be necessary to emend vel at the beginning of 1029. The best replacement would be en, used to attract Hercules' attention (on this use of en see further below); other possibilities would include hue or iam. The explanation of the corruption will lie in ambiguous compendia and/or an assumption that indue and converte are addressed to the same person. 131. Some have thought further emendation necessary to indicate the direction in which the tela are to be turned, but convertere can have the sense convertere in se, "attract, turn toward oneself," and although the object in this usage is normally other people's gaze or attention, there is a parallel for weapons at Sil. 9·392f.

Commentary: Act IV induam to ferrum pectori . .. induam. No emendation will now be needed in 1029. 132 Thus the whole of 1028b-31 is addressed to Hercules. As H. will not return to the stage till 1035, Amphitryon must be calling into the palace, where H. fails to hear him (cf. introduction to Act IV).

1030£. falsum e.q.s. These striking words perhaps suggest a certain bitterness over the paternity question, which would be natural enough in Amphitryon's position as a surrogate father. They certainly reveal an understanding that one symptom that has emerged in Hercules' madness is a brutal megalomania which spurns human limitations and obligations altogether. 1032-34. Most MSS assign these lines to Theseus (surprisingly in the case of the A manuscripts, in view of their reading genitor for senior). But Theseus was sent away at 914-17 (v. comm. ad loc.), and it seems highly unlikely that Sen. brings him back at this point solely in order to speak these colorless lines, particularly as there is no other indication in the text that he has reappeared. It is true that he must return unheralded at some point before 1173, where the text shows him to be onstage; but such an unobtrusive entrance would come more appropriately at the beginning of Act V (unannounced entrances frequently occur as an Act begins) rather than in the midst of the mad-scene. The only satisfactory solution is to give the present lines to the Chorus, an attribution found "in M and perhaps in an ancestor of the Etruscus. 133 Indeed the timid tone of the lines suits the Chorus better than Theseus. As H. does not reappear onstage until 1035 (v. introduction to Act IV), this attribution is consistent with the Senecan practice of occasionally using the Chorus in dialogue when no alternative interlocutor is available, i.e. when there is only one speaking character onstage.134 132. One will not alter monstrorum to nostrorum: Amphitryon is attempting to fall in with H.'s heroic delusions (as in 103of. and 1039-42), not to dispel them. Converte means simply "turn," the direction being easily supplied from the context. 133. Leo I 83f. drew attention to the scene-rubric in the Etruscus before 895. Hercules. Amphytrion. Megera. Chorus., which might suggest that 1032-34 were properly attributed to the Chorus rather than Theseus in some ancestor of the Etruscus. However that may be, it seems unlikely that ~ somehow preserved the correct attribution independently of the Etruscus and handed it on to M; more probably M simply misread the abbreviation the. as cho. 134· It is sometimes said that choral interventions in dialogue (i.e. other than bridge-passages immediately subsequent to odes, on which see 202-4 comm.) occur only when no other interlocutor is present, but that formulation is too rigid. At Oed.

Commentary: Act IV

1032 te . . . ingeris. The reflexive use of this verb is popular with Sen., occurring seven times in the prose, though only here in the tragedies. 1033 profuge. This verb appears fourteen times in Sen. Trag., a remarkably high frequency in verse. It is completely avoided in most dactylic poetry and also absent from Cat. and used only once in Hor. (in Epodes); even Plaut. and Ter. have only five uses between them. 1034. The fear that Hercules will add crime to crime by killing his father possibly derives from Eur. 1075f. (Amphitryon) «A/...' e'L ~tE xavei: 3t