"Corydon's Winning Words in "Eclogue 7
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3939341 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Rory B Egan (corresponding author) |
| Year | 1996 |
| Volume | 50 |
| Issue | 3/4 |
| Pages | 233 |
| Publication date | 1996-01-01 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Phoenix (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0031-8299 • E-ISSN: 1929-4883 |
| Publisher | JSTOR (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.2307/1192651 |
| OpenAlex | W2319922561 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
| References cited | 6 |
WITH THESE TERSE WORDS, as enigmatic as they are decisive, the herdsman Meliboeus concludes his report of the great contest in bucolic singing, the certamen magnum that he had once observed between his fellow herdsmen Thyrsis and Corydon. As he closes his account of what he calls the ludus (v. 17) with a statement of the verdict he simultaneously opens up a debate, still vigorous after two thousand years, as to why Corydon was the winner. Meliboeus offers no explicit help on this point. Indeed his abrupt closure seems almost calculated to challenge readers to tease out the reasons. Neither he nor any other participant in the poem even says who is responsible for the verdict, although it is often assumed that Daphnis, the storied master singer of the bucolic world, who was present as a distinguished observer at the contest, served as umpire.l Since Meliboeus' reticence at the end, his virtual assertion that he has told us all that he can, leaves us to reason why, the ludic qualities of the contest are thus extended beyond the contest itself, and indeed beyond the poem.2 Not every modern reader is willing to take up the game at all. T. E. Page (1963: 155), for instance, avoided it by pronouncing Meliboeus' declaration of Corydon's victory fictitious while, at the opposite end of the spectrum, others see it as superfluous on the grounds that Corydon's superiority is self-evident.3 We shall of course never know how confident such critics might be of Corydon's triumph if the poet had made Meliboeus keep entirely silent. In any case, every modern reader who does take up the game, who engages with the riddle, might be both burdened and assisted by the recorded efforts of numerous predecessors. Since the rules and criteria of the original contest are unknown, apart from the fact that Thyrsis was required to respond to each of Corydon's quatrains, each player in the interpretive game has always had some latitude in determining the rules by which to compete. The only constant is of course that everyone must attempt to ascertain why Corydon was the winner. As my own rules do not require me to wrestle with the arguments and opinions of all past players, I shall not engage in any sort of review of the dozens of earlier explanations for Corydon's victory.4
| Citations per year | 0.18 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2015 - 2016 (2) |
| Highly cited | No |