Visual Imagery in Parthenaic Song

Bibliographic Data

ID20051446
AuthorsLaura Swift (0000-0002-3745-3500, corresponding author)
Year2016
Pages255-287
Publication date2016-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeCHAPTER
VenueThe Look of Lyric : Greek Song and the Visual (SOURCE_BOOK)
PublisherBrill (PUBLISHER • NL)
DOI10.1163/9789004314849_012
OpenAlexW584902483
ISBN9789004314849
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited19

This chapter explores the use of visual imagery in parthenaic song, and argues that it is a distinctive feature of the genre. The chapter examines visual imagery in the surviving partheneia (Alcman PMGF 1, 3, Pindar fr. 94b S.-M.) and contrasts this with the type of self-referentiality we find in choral lyric performed by male singers. While the identity of the singers is important to various types of lyric, it is only in partheneia that we find detailed descriptions of their appearance and actions. We find a similar fixation on the bodies of the performers in dramatic choruses who impersonate female singers, while other Greek texts which describe female chorality draw on this imagery. The chapter argues that this emphasis on the visual can be connected with the songs’ role in female transition and in displaying young women safely within their communities

Aesthetics · Art · Choir · Sociology · Visual arts · Classical Antiquity Studies · History · Psychology

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Open DOIOpen Access