The People of Aristophanes (Routledge Revivals)

A Sociology of Old Attic Comedy

Victor Ehrenberg

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781135090302
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Greek Ancient History
• Index: History

First published in 1951, The People of Aristophanes provides a sociological account of Athens in the period of its greatest glory. Drawing upon Old Attic Comedy and the plays of Aristophanes, the author recreates, for the reader, the life of Athens at that time. He writes extensively about social structure, family, religion and political relationships within the state, and discusses the far-reaching changes which took place within Athenian society.

CHAPTER I

OLD COMEDY

IT does not lie within the scope of this chapter to give a complete and general characterization of what is called Old Attic Comedy. Questions, for instance, relating to the development of artistic form, or the religious and social antecedents of comedy, though they may arise incidentally, are not fundamentally relevant to our inquiry. The three questions, or groups of questions, with which it is proposed to deal in this chapter, are: (1) The unity of Old Comedy, (2) The poet and his audience, (3) Reality in comedy.

1. THE UNITY OF OLD COMEDY

How far is it legitimate to regard the period of Old Comedy as a coherent period in Greek life and history? Old Comedy began before the middle of the fifth century B.C. with Kratinos and Krates — except for a few predecessors of Kratinos, who remain mere names to us.¹ Its end came with a process of internal change which began towards 400 B.C. So far as we know, no one of the important comic poets of the fifth century produced any play later than about 385. The Alexandrian division into Old and New Comedy, which was based on the recognition of decisive differences of form and content, does not seem to have fixed a definite year as a boundary between the two kinds of comedy. It was the later grammarians who, in distinguishing a Middle Comedy, limited it to the period from 404 to 338 (or 336), thus including the two latest extant plays of Aristophanes. These dates are indeed landmarks of political history, but in dealing with comedy we cannot accept the division without reservations. There can be no doubt about the gradual change in comedy after 404, but it is too rigid and artificial to separate from the earlier period the later works of such poets as Aristophanes and Platon, the bulk of whose works belongs to Old Comedy, both in date and character. In general, the whole question of these lines of demarcation, which are in fact zones of demarcation, is of little importance. It may be remarked, however, that Antiphanes, the first poet who certainly belonged to Middle Comedy, produced his first play about 387, while the latest poets of Old Comedy, such as Strattis and Theopompos, began writing about 410, so that, with no gap in production, there was yet a clear distinction between two generations.¹ For our purpose, at any rate, it is proposed to regard the period of Old Comedy as covering the years 455-385, and as a period, though not usually so regarded, a real and demonstrable unity.²

At first sight, the history of Athens in those years is not easily conceived as a unity. The period begins with the conclusion of the Persian Wars, and the temporary conclusion of the wars between the Greek States; at its very start stands the removal of the treasury of the Confederacy from Delos to Athens. All this made possible the fifteen peaceful and powerful years of the Periclean Age. Those years were followed by the great war and the collapse of Athens. Then began the struggle which is typical of the fourth century: the varying rivalry of the Greek States, and their varying dependence on foreign powers. But up to 387, this dependence had not yet been formulated in strict and binding terms, and the great influence of Persia on affairs in Greece in the decade following 403 was not dissimilar in character to that of the preceding ten years. The position was finally stabilized by the ‘King’s Peace’, by which Persia guaranteed the autonomy of the Greek States; in a sense, that year 387 was the end of one chapter of history and the beginning of a new one.

The events of the whole of this period of seventy years may be seen as the changing aspect of one picture, the picture of the State and people of Athens, and of her empire. The changes, it is true, were profound, and the year 404-3 stands as a landmark in the process of decline and subversion. It is understandable that many scholars believe that the interruption by the débacle of the lost war was more important than all traces of possible continuity. The dualism of the fifth century had broken down and with it the relative balance of power within the Greek world. However, the end of a war is not necessarily the end of an epoch. The results of the war, its aftermath, can be considered as belonging to a period of transition. To the very end, the Athens of the Peloponnesian War had been, in a sense, the Athens of Perikles and the Aegean realm. The Athens of Thrasyboulos and Konon showed altered features, but, in a quick and most impressive political recovery, it was concerned to re-create the great traditions of the past; and, further, the events of this period were closely and inevitably connected with those of the last years of the war. The many law-suits which arose out of the events of 411 and 403 are one typical symptom of this fact.

It we turn from the political history of those seventy years to literature and art, which best express the spirit of the age, we have a similar, though somewhat different picture. Aischylos died in 456-5. Sophokles had by then won several victories, but his greatest plays were still to come. Euripides, in 455, produced a play for the first time, so far as we know. Both died in 406, and tragedy survived only in a weak and negligible form. In the spheres of both politics and tragedy, there is a profound parallelism in development. The deeper significance, however, of these dates in the history of literature is brought out by other facts. Soon after 450 Protagoras, and, about the same time, Anaxagoras, had come to Athens, and with them philosophy invaded Athens.¹ Perikles formed his circle of friends in which a new spirit was incarnate. The sophists coined a new type of thought, creed and speech, which, in the succeeding generation, developed into ethical radicalism. This ‘age of enlightenment’ created the great intellectual experience which culminated in Sokrates. Herodotos, who, about 450, was occupied with his journeys and the writing of some of his Logoi, was already influenced by the new spirit; Thucydides was permeated by it. Contemporary with the great war, and its historian, he probably died a few years after 399, the year in which Sokrates was put to death. Sokrates himself represents a turning-point. His pupils, each in his different way, founded on his thought and life as well as on the work of the sophists a new epoch in the development of the human mind.

The parallelism in the development of architecture and art is evident. The building of the Parthenon began in 447, but the work of preparing for it must have been going on for several years. In 437 the Propylaea were begun. The Parthenon was almost finished in 432; the Propylaea remained a torso, though only because the original plan was reduced for ritual and religious reasons. During the war the Erechtheion was being built. From the most perfect example of Doric architecture the buildings of the Acropolis had proceeded first to the harmonious union of Doric severity and Ionian lightness, and then to the Maidens’ Porch, which, though perfect in its own way, must be regarded as decoration rather than pure architecture. In this process of architectural development, a certain internal dissolution is obvious, though one which certainly does not involve decline. The Long Walls and those of the Peiraeus, after their demolition in 403, were rebuilt in the ’nineties, and afterwards much activity was shown in building. But its purpose and its significance were altered, and a decisive part was now played by private architecture. Sculpture meanwhile went through the development from Pheidias to Praxiteles. These names stand out at each end of a process of change which can be best illustrated by the manner in which the gods were represented. Whereas the statues of Pheidias embodied Olympian majesty and power, the Parthenon frieze already shows the gods, though taller than men, sitting at their ease among human beings. With Praxiteles they became an image of human perfection and perfect humanity. ‘Man is the measure of everything.’

What is the significance of these familiar dates and facts in the sphere of intellectual and artistic development? Above all, they prove the continuity in change. They prove that the break of 404 was not a complete break, that indeed in all the change a great tradition lived on, and that the early fourth century, though it opened new roads, was also a fading away of previous times. The dates and facts, however, prove something more. In the same decades in which Athens fought the fight for her empire, and finally for her existence, she experienced the great break which destroyed Attic Tragedy, and created Attic Philosophy. This means, in fact, that the operation of one general process united the years we have fixed as the life-time of Old Comedy. Individualism and rationalism conquered man and State, and it is the dynamic experience of this process which gave to the age its most exciting features....

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Original Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of Illustrations
• Quotations and Abbreviations
• Introduction
• CHAPTER I Old Comedy
• CHAPTER II The Comedies
• CHAPTER III The Farmers
• CHAPTER IV The Upper Classes
• CHAPTER V Traders and Craftsmen
• CHAPTER VI Citizens and Foreigners
• CHAPTER VII The Slaves
• CHAPTER VIII Family and Neighbours
• CHAPTER IX Money and Property
• CHAPTER X Religion and Education
• CHAPTER XI War and Peace
• CHAPTER XII Economics and the State
• CHAPTER XIII The People and the State
• Conclusion
• Chronological Table
• General Index