The language of tyranny in Cratinus, PCG 258

Datos Bibliográficos

ID11822505
AutoresMaria Noussia (University of Chieti-Pescara, autor de correspondencia)
Año2003
Volumen49
Páginas74-88
Fecha de publicación2003-01-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaProceedings of the Cambridge Philological Society (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0068-6735 • E-ISSN: 2053-5899
EditorialCambridge University Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1017/s006867350000095x
OpenAlexW2320194545
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas1
Referencias citadas25

A mock theogony from Cratinus' Chirones seems straightforward and uncomplicated evidence of the jibes of the comic poets against Pericles. The source for this fragment, Plutarch's Life of Pericles, chapter 3, in fact connects it with the usual sallies of the archaia about the shape of Pericles' head. Yet, the fragment equally reflects the presence of contemporary opposition in Periclean Athens against the statesman. Plutarch simply covers the density of its allusion, which is something beyond the comic resource of attacking marked peculiarities of appearance of politically prominent individuals: the Homeric-style hapax κεΦαληγερέταν alludes to the deformity of Pericles' head but also to his demagogic ability to assemble the masses in the so-called ‘language of the gods’. Many questions are, however, posed when we attempt to account for the allegories or the analogies the passage establishes. As Hanow wondered back in 1830: verum quid Χρόνος πρεσβυγενής ad Periclem faciat, non reperio; quamquam certam quandam rem a Cratino spectatam arbitror . The main purpose of this paper, therefore, is to examine the fragment afresh, in the hope of showing that the source for the parody of this piece of Cratinus may be traced elsewhere than so far suggested, and that there is good reason for Stasis and Chronus fathering this sinister infant

Allusion · Art · Comics · Fragment (logic · Literature · Opposition (politics · Politics · Byzantine Studies and History · Classical Antiquity Studies · Classical Philosophy and Thought · Computer Science · History · Law · Philosophy