Routes to reception : The case of Orpheus in early Christian art Janet Huskinson, The Open University
The aim of this paper is to look at some issues which may be involved in the reception of subjects into a contemporary but different culture, taking as a case study a scene from classical mythology - Orpheus and the beasts - as used in early Christian religious contexts.
The paper is more about routes and methods to reaching some understanding than about arrival and conclusions. After all, in the period to which my material belongs, that of late antiquity, there is rarely in the visual arts a single 'right' significance. Instead we expect multivalency, with layers of meaning built up over the course of centuries as images are repeated in many different contexts with the visual conservatism that is characteristic of Graeco-Roman art.
But the fact that we expect this does not prevent it from being confusing. This is especially so when, as now, we try to work out what a scene might have meant for a new and specific group of users. How did these Christians 'receive' Orpheus ? How can we begin to locate their likely reactions within this general situation of multivalency? In particular, to what extent may one explain the significance of an image 'received' into one genre in terms of its value in another? That is what I will be exploring today. (The personal history of this paper is, I should say, my own aporia with the so-called Christian Orpheus and not a study of reception theory and methodology.)
First, an introduction to the material: the subject is Orpheus charming the beasts by his singing. In the secular art of the later western Roman Empire - that is to say, from the second century AD onwards - this scene was well-established and used above all in decorative settings such as floor-mosaics.[1] The ingredients of the composition remained fairly constant: Orpheus dressed wholly or partially in oriental dress (to denote his Thracian origins) playing his lyre to all kinds of creatures.
The Christian examples which I shall take come from Christian funerary contexts in Rome and Ostia on sarcophagi and in catacomb frescoes.[2] I have chosen to concentrate on these pieces because they have a homogeneous background in the earliest period of Christian art, when it was borrowing motifs from classical art to help its own developing iconography. They come from a particular locality (Rome and Ostia[3]) and from a specifically funerary context which in the case of the catacombs was under official church control. However, it is important to note that the scene of Orpheus and the beasts continued to appear after this in the art of the Christian Empire, usually in secular settings as before.
Let us look at these early Christian pieces more closely. The sarcophagi are dated to around AD 230; they were possibly made in Ostia rather than in Rome. There are four main examples (one of which was re-used in a later Christian shrine at Ostia) and other fragments. They follow a popular standard design for sarcophagi of this period with panels of curved fluting alternating with figured scenes. Orpheus and his lyre are depicted in the centre. As this panel is rather restrictive in shape it leaves little room for more than a couple of animals and birds as his audience. Apart from a griffin which is included on the example in Porto Torres,[4] the animals are all sheep. The corner panels show various generic figures which are all permissive of Christian readings, some more so than others - philosophers, a fisherman, a praying woman. The earliest catacomb painting of Orpheus in Rome (that in S. Callisto) may be contemporary with these, but as a group - there are six paintings - they extend in date to the mid-fourth century AD. They decorated the walls of tombs and corridors or were the central feature in a painted ceiling. In these settings they were surrounded by depictions of Christian biblical stories, often used in a loosely programmatic way. Iconographically these examples are more varied than the version on sarcophagi. They show Orpheus playing his lyre to an audience of birds and animals. In the two frescoes in the Catacomb of Domitilla (one is probably based on the other) this is a mixture of wild and domestic creatures, but where they survive in the other scenes they are simply a few sheep and doves.
This change in the animals occurs only in these earliest Christian versions and seems potentially very significant. The image which it produces has strong pastoral resonances. In fact it is visually very similar to the Good Shepherd figure which was one of the most popular Christian symbols at the time, appearing frequently in the catacombs and on sarcophagi. So we can assume that by using Orpheus, a figure from pagan mythology, rather than the Good Shepherd, Christians were wanting to symbolize something more than the pastoralism of the Good Shepherd. At the same time they wanted to evoke something other than the pagan image with its mixture of animals; hence the iconographical change. So, it seems, there is some specific new significance to pursue. The question is how to identify and explain it, particularly in relation to the continued appearance of Orpheus in contemporary secular art.
The choice of Orpheus in this early Christian art has been much discussed but is hard to tie down.[5] To a certain extent this difficulty must reflect Orpheus' own elusiveness as a mythological figure who crosses boundaries between cultures of life and death and of wilderness and civilization; to pin him down to one set of values or another would threaten this freedom of movement. But another element in the problem relates to the way in which we as scholars trace the movement of the image across secular and Christian culture, across literature and art. In order to locate Christian reaction to it against a background of multivalency what routes can we use and where to begin?
Context is an obvious starting-point since it is often a potent factor in shaping meaning. But this is where my own difficulty begins, which I want to introduce briefly now. Here, it seems, we are dealing with the move of a visual image from one domain or discourse to another where it is given a different weighting, and this opens up questions about how much of its original significance may move with it. In its new, 'receiving' context the scene seems to have acquired a specific significance which was not given it by its original 'donating' settings. By this I mean that Christians took the scene of Orpheus and the beasts from the regular repertory of decorative art for use in a funerary context where art had clear symbolic and significatory functions. Of course one may argue that Christians often took low-profile secular motifs (such as the dove or victor's palm) and gave them a symbolic value of their own; they also occasionally took a pagan mythological figure to provide the form for a biblical figure which had as yet no iconography of its own (Endymion for Jonah, for example[6]). But the case of Orpheus and the beasts seems to me to be of a different order. Here we have a very well-known mythological figure still retaining his own recognizable visual identity (despite some adaptations) and furthermore continuing to appear in decorative arts of the later Christian empire. So the questions which concern me are about the likely reactions of Christian viewers confronted with this scene in the catacombs or on the sarcophagi: what did they draw on in making their response to it? How did they relate the image of Orpheus to the Christian setting? (We may note at this point that the same problem exists, but in reverse, for secular representations of Orpheus which post-date these Christian religious pieces; should they be seen as inevitably 'symbolic' or with Christian potential?)[7]
The answers for individual viewers are irretrievable ; but there are routes which may lead to a clearer view of the general understanding. One way, which we now start upon, is to consider the functioning of the scene in each separate context, secular and Christian, to map points of contrast and comparison.
We begin with the secular tradition and consider the value which the subject might have had in the long-established classical imagery that still held strong in later Roman art. As I said, Orpheus enchanting the beasts was a particularly popular subject in decorative arts across the later Roman world. It is found only seldom in other contexts, such as funerary art.[8] It was used to decorate objects large and small - gems, ivories, textiles, and pottery,[9] and floor-mosaics above all. One recent count of these numbered eighty-four, with the majority in the western Empire and in domestic settings.[10] Its popularity as decoration for these pavements can be attributed to many factors. Its subject was a well-known story with a magical, somewhat enigmatic hero, and it had evolved a limited number of compositions which craftsmen could repeat as a basis for their own versions.[11] It was an opportunity to depict a wide range of birds and beasts, tame and exotic, as later Roman art loved to do. The whole scene would have appealed to the viewer's sense of sight and sound, re-creating perhaps some of the idyllic peace which Orpheus had brought to the world, and reinforcing the visual image so often by the presence of a real pool or fountain. In short, there are strong and varied reasons for the popularity of the scene as a decorative motif in later Roman art.[12]
Although some scholars have looked for more specific (and sometimes esoteric) symbolism in their discussion of the scene in floor-mosaics, it is this concept of peace which seems to me to be its major value.[13] Its strength lies in its many facets: it presents Orpheus as the pacifier of nature, Orpheus as the magical singer, Orpheus as subduer of wild passions, Orpheus as expression of power over the natural world.[14] In Callistratus' literary ekphrasis of a statue of Orpheus (Descriptions 7) it is the power to enchant the senses which he emphasizes, while in the visual imagery on the mosaics this theme of pacification is heightened by motifs which contrast (the savagery of animal combats and circus activities) or complement it (the Seasons).[15] It slots into a wider repertory of themes in contemporary art which will be considered later.
However, it is important, I believe, to locate the search for significance primarily in the scene itself, and not to give any large place in the argument to aspects of Orpheus which are to do with other episodes in his myth. This is because by this time in the later Roman empire the stories which made up the myth of Orpheus were taking divergent paths so far as their representation in the arts was concerned.
Although this visual image of Orpheus and the beasts was widespread across the Roman Empire in terms of place and media, it was virtually the sole survivor of a range of scenes to do with the life of Orpheus which had existed in Greek art. His relationship with Eurydice, his violent death, and the fate of his severed head had also been depicted there; but apart from rare scenes of Orpheus with Eurydice, Roman art had come to concentrate almost entirely on this episode with the beasts. Yet though art had given up on most of these other episodes contemporary literature had not: it made use of the full range of topoi to do with Orpheus the mythological figure. In addition there was a body of writing associated with Orpheus the mystic teacher.[16]
Of course these distinctions were not entirely cut-and-dried . For instance there was some interplay between themes in art and literature. Philostratus' Ekphrasis on a picture of Orpheus dwells on the charming of the beasts but brings in the subject of his death in a savage final twist at the end (6: 31 ff): it uses the contrast to show Orpheus as victim as well as victor over the world of nature. Art too occasionally depicted other episodes from the myth: an example of Orpheus and Eurydice depicted in a funerary context occurs in the Tomb of the Nasonii at Rome.[17]
But despite these moments of overlap the general picture is of Orphic subjects developing along different paths in later art and literature, with the story of Orpheus and Eurydice being the favourite topos in literature and the charming of the beasts in art. Orpheus' persona as mystic teacher pursues yet another distinct path, and has, I would argue, little impact on the representation of these mythological events.[18] Here then, in art, literature and thought about Orpheus in the non-Christian culture of the time, the tendency is for subjects to separate out within the patterns of their own particular discourse. But a common link is the power of Orpheus' song to enchant and pacify.
We move now to the Christian standpoint, to see what there may have been in Christian religious experience or vocabulary which found resonances in this mythological scene. This was the route followed by many scholars in the past, beginning with that great seventeenth century explorer of the Roman catacombs, Antonio Bosio.[19] Earlier argument was skewed somewhat by the belief that Orpheus was the only pagan mythological figure to appear in such Christian settings, so that discussions naturally centred on his peculiar acceptability to Christians. One explanation often given for this was the reputation which Orpheus had acquired by this time, in early Christian and Jewish circles as well as pagan, as a mystic teacher who had come to embrace monotheism while a pupil of Moses.[20] This gave him an important role in Christian apologetic which is reflected in literature especially before the Peace of the Church (Edict of Milan) in AD 312 (though it has to be said that not all Christian writers who mentioned him in this context did so favourably). This might underlie Christian acceptance of Orpheus in their art, but it certainly has no overt reflection in this scene.
Usefully there are other Christian texts which relate more directly to the scene in question since they take as their theme the power of song to convert. How current their ideas were amongst the Christian communities of Rome and Ostia is otherwise unknown, but they enable us to attempt the iconographer's traditional route of using texts to match and explain the visual image. Both Clement of Alexandria and Eusebius of Caesarea (though writing about a century and a half apart) link Orpheus and Christ in their powers of song. Clement (Exhortation to the Greeks, 1 ff. especially 4 ff.) makes a contrast: Orpheus' song is deceitful and enslaves men to vice, while the Word of God tames their wild passions and leads them to Salvation. Eusebius (In praise of Constantine 14) compares the singers: as Orpheus is said to have charmed Nature by his song, so the Saviour of the World stills men's souls and brings harmony to the Universe. Perhaps this use of the topos by Christians suggests that Orpheus was thought of as an allegory, if not a type, of Christ who pacified and saved mankind by the new song of his Gospel.[21]
These references seem to suggest a new Christian significance for the well-established pagan subject, and one which could be related to the adaptation of the animals in most of these scenes to show the tamed and not the wild. They offer a theme which the usual Good Shepherd image would be inadequate to express (although it, in turn, had pastoral aspects which the mythological figure could not provide). So here visual image and written text seem to make a promising fit, as if to suggest that the speediest route to understanding the reception of Orpheus into Christian religious ideology comes from entering the topic from the Christian side.
So far our readings of the image have been based on an antithesis, pagan and Christian, 'either' 'or'. This may have been how many people at this period experienced the world, but it is not necessarily how the visual images themselves worked in their allegiances. The antithetical view produced, as we have seen, two rather different views of the scene of Orpheus, one open to a wide range of readings generally to do with the pacification of nature, and the other linked more closely with the role of song in this. There remains to be followed the route across the common ground. We have seen that Orpheus' power over nature, and more specifically the power of his song, is the theme shared by both sides, so this is the area to be explored. Space permits only three aspects of it to be examined here - nature, power over it, and song. The aim is to suggest how these elements in the Orpheus episode may touch upon subjects of wider interest to Christian and non-Christians alike as they drew on the shared repertory of themes in late antique art.
Nature: the theme of the natural world, its variety and abundance and its power to enhance or destroy the life of man is one of enormous importance in Graeco-Roman art and thought, and is particularly strong in the art of the later Roman empire where it occurs in Christian contexts as well as pagan and secular. Obviously it offers wide decorative possibilities for depicting all kinds of flora and fauna , whether in illusionistic or patterned styles. Floor-mosaics, to quote a medium which we have been considering, are full of such images - 'animal catalogues', pastoral vignettes (sometimes in scrolls of foliage), and, above all, the seasons with appropriate produce and activities.[22] In funerary art too representations of the seasons and rural activities (which for Christians turn into the pastoral paradise of the Good Shepherd) are some of the most popular themes of the third and early fourth centuries.[23] But underlying all these images is a network of symbolism which supports the view of a world that is essentially benign and optimistic; its ideal is the Golden Age or, in other terms, the Messianic Age. It is a world which allows mankind to prosper - provided that its forces are properly controlled.
Power over nature: this is represented by various artistic images which reinforce or invoke nature's benign aspects, and by others which suggest the aversion or destruction of evil forces. Inanimate objects, symbols, or specific plants and animals may be used in these ways.[24] Most frequently the role is played by figures who enact some kind of power over the forces of nature. Hunters, human and mythological, represent physical control; they capture nature's wildness, just as fishermen and farm-workers harvest its bounty.[25] Others - and Orpheus is among them - have 'magical' powers to control nature or to transform its normal patterns and to perform 'miracles'.[26] There are also figures who are in positions of authority over the natural world, in particular the emperor whose temporal rule is reflected in natural prosperity and abundance. Imperial qualities of this kind are also given to Christ (as he sits, clad in imperial purple, upon the globe in mosaics at S. Costanza and S. Vitale for instance), to David in the Gaza synagogue mosaic, and to Orpheus who appears with imperial attributes in the mosaics at Tolmeita and Hanover.[27] Adam put in charge of naming the beasts by God, appears dressed as a philosopher in a Syrian mosaic.[28] Animals too, without human figures, can play out these themes. Fighting each other they demonstrate destructive powers inherent in the natural world, and living together in peace, as in so-called Messianic scenes (referring to the prophecy of Isaiah) in mosaic pavements, they express its ideal harmony.[29] However this theme of power over the natural world is represented, it is has a central place in all branches of art at this time. There is one further aspect of it worth considering here: it has recently been suggested that in choosing such images to decorate their own property patrons were claiming something of these powers for themselves.[30] Would this personal empowerment also be a possibility for the Christians who had appropriated the figure of Orpheus in their art?
Song: here we can take the image of the song at its broadest to encompass not just its harmonious music but also the power of its words. Thus it immediately becomes part of the whole repertory of ideas and imagery which were to do with the Muses (and their mousike) and the power of culture and learning to transform and even to transcend human life.[31] This ideology was at its peak in the third and early fourth centuries, and the Christian Orpheus sarcophagi were very much part of this (to the extent that it is not completely clear that all of them were actually Christian[32]). There were important practical factors in this sharing: workshops produced sarcophagi for customers of different beliefs and there were also mixed cemeteries where Christian and pagan sarcophagi were placed together (and remember that before the Peace of the Church Christians might be afraid of exposing themselves to persecution). Reasons such as these lay behind the use of unexceptional or 'neutral' figures on sarcophagi which could if necessary be 'crypto-Christian': philosophers, and Orpheus too, perhaps, came into this group.
But the important fact for this discussion is the centrality of the theme of philosophical discourse and its power in human lives. Thus Muses, teachers, readers and declaimers are common images on pagan sarcophagi of the third century. Christians drew on the images, the philosopher types, the listening pupil, the scroll-boxes in order to articulate the value which they in their religious culture placed upon their True Learning as a way to salvation.[33] Murray has shown how the image of Orpheus and the music of his lyre has a place within this tradition and offers a Christian re-working of the song and its regenerative powers.[34]
The evidence from the sarcophagus in Boston (which to date has not been considered alongside the other pieces) has an important place in her argument because of the Christian nature of the figures in each of the two side-panels, which complement the central image of Orpheus: one is a praying woman, the other a Good Shepherd figure. They replace conventional secular figures which filled the panels on the other Orpheus sarcophagi; these had no overt religious symbolism (although the fisherman could be 'crypto-Christian') but appeared as 'intellectuals', with scrolls or philosopher's robes. The existence of Christian equivalents on the Boston piece fits with Murray's claim that the image of the Christian Orpheus stemmed from contemporary pagan ideas about divinisation through culture (traditionally represented by Apollo and by intellectual images of mortals) but that 'in the adoption of this idea into Christian thinking it underwent a transmutation which is clearly reflected in its iconography': Orpheus comes to represent for Christians man's spiritual salvation which lies beyond a cultural or philosophical conversion.[35] This argument is now reinforced by the alteration of the figures in these side panels; for by a similar process of transmutation conventional pagan images of the intellectual have been replaced on the Boston sarcophagus by images conventionally used to express Christian spiritual values and the afterlife of the soul.
These sarcophagi illustrate another aspect of this common ground on which I want to close, and that is the syncretistic image. I touched upon some practical factors which fostered the adoption of multi-purpose images, but here I want to demonstrate how certain depictions of Orpheus may contain strong resonances of other figures (principally Apollo) so that the two may become to some extent fused in the viewer's eye and mind. Certainly on these sarcophagi Orpheus closely resembles Apollo the lyre-player as he is found on sarcophagi; this is also true of the Boston sarcophagus where he appears in classical, not oriental dress, while the Porto Torres sarcophagus even places Apollo's griffin at Orpheus' side. A comparable effect occurs on a the side panel of a contemporary Muse sarcophagus in Rome where the seated figure with a Phyrygian cap could be either of the two.[36] Murray's thesis made much of the Apollo/Orpheus link and how it may relate to the Christian Orpheus, and I do not want to sustain it here in detail, but simply to point out the prominence of this type of syncretism, ideological and artistic, in this period. It is part of the cultural background against which we trace these routes.
To conclude: it seems to me that the possibilities for understanding the reception of this scene across contemporary cultures are richer if we think of both parties as being 'sharers' in a common stock, rather than 'donor' and 'receiver' in a transaction of imagery. Early Christian culture was, of course, part of the wider culture of its time, yet it needed to create and observe its own distinctions from it: hence the 'Christian versions' of pagan and secular types.
Looking at the two sides separately and in antithesis did produce some important points, but mainly of contrast. Looking at the common ground between them gave more space for exploring broader issues and interests which they shared; these showed a wider basis from which the Christian image could spring. This route also helped with my specific problem of different genres as the common view showed how some of these themes linked various types of contemporary genre or discourse. This sharing between the two cultures of course goes deeper than a visible use of similar images: it inevitably involves many shared memories and motifs which may not all be consciously in play at any given time but are there to be activated when the occasion needs.
Something of this can be seen in literature across the centuries, classical and post-classical, with the story of Orpheus and Eurydice; this is re-created across time and cultures as well as for different poetic needs.[37] The reception of the scene of Orpheus and the beasts may be part of a comparable process: instead of trying to account on a micro-scale for matches and mismatches in its usage, a long-term vision allows us to tolerate some of the uncertainties and possibilities for change.
But in searching out these routes for reception there is one factor which we have barely mentioned, and that is the influence of the subject-matter itself. Here it is the mythical Orpheus, who is such a model of ambiguity and paradox that the power of his song to subvert the course of even the best argued cases is something we should expect and allow for.[38]
[return to contents] Notes
[1] eds. H. C. Ackerman and J. R. Gisler, Lexikon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae VII, 1 (LIMC) (Zurich and Munich, 1994) 90ff. nos. 94ff. [return to text]
[2] J. Huskinson, 'Some pagan mythological figures and their significance in early Christian art', Papers of the British School at Rome, 42, 1974, 68ff., 87f. for details. To be added: M.Comstock and C.Vermeule, Sculpture in Stone: the Greek. Roman. and Etruscan Collections of the Museum of Fine Arts. Boston (Boston, 1976) no. 251. [return to text]
[3] Huskinson Figures: 87f. no. 15. [return to text]
[4] G.Pesce, Sarcofagi romani di Sardegna (Rome, 1957) no. 57. [return to text]
[5] For summaries of other scholars' views see : H. Stern,'La Mosaïque d'Orphée de Blanzy-lès-Fismes', Gallia 13, 1955: 41ff.; and 'L'Orphée dans l'art paléochrétien', Cahiers archéologiques 23, 1974, 1ff.; J .B. Friedman Orpheus in the Middle Ages (Cambridge Mass., Harvard University Press, 1970); M. C. Murray, 'The Christian Orpheus', Cahiers archéologiques 26, 1977, 19ff.; and Rebirth and Afterlife (BAR International series 100) (Oxford, 1981); and LIMC 104. [return to text]
[6] n.b. Orpheus too was used as a figure type for David (e.g. the Gaza synagogue mosaic: LIMC 97 no. 170) and Adam (see below).[return to text] [return to text]
[7] The fourth century Orpheus mosaics in Britain are a case in point: some scholars have sought to confirm a Christian religious element in them: e.g. K. Branigan, The Roman Villa in S.W. England (Bradford on Avon, l976) 65ff.; E.W.Black, 'Christian and pagan hopes of salvation in Romano-British Mosaics', in eds. M. Henig and A. King, Pagan Gods and Shrines of the Roman Empire (Oxford, 1986) 153ff.; and D.Watts, Christian and Pagan in Roman Britain (London, Routledge, l99l) 36, 207f. [return to text]
[8]8e.g. LIMC 94f. no. 145 (reliefs from Danube area); G. Koch and H.Sichtermann, Römische Sarkophage (Munich, 1982) 416. [return to text]
[9] e.g. LIMC nos. 143, 149-158, 168 and 169. [return to text]
[10] D. Michaelides, 'A new Orpheus mosaic in Cyprus', Acts of the International Symposium 'Cyprus between the Orient and Occident' Nicosia 8-14 September 1985 (Nicosia, 1986) 477. [return to text]
[11] G. Guidi, 'Orfeo, Liber Pater, e Oceano in mosaici della Tripolitania', Africa Italiana 6, 1935, 120ff.; Stern Mosaïque 49ff.; and A. Ovadiah and S. Mucznik, 'Orpheus Mosaics in the Roman and Early Byzantine Periods', Asaph: Studies in Art History 1, 1980, 43ff. [return to text]
[12] Stern Mosaïque 68; Michaelides Cyprus 483f. [return to text]
[13] e.g. Ovadiah and Mucznik Mosaics 49f; B. Walters, 'Littlecote', Current Archaeology 80, 1981, 264ff. [return to text]
[14] cf. S. Scott, 'Symbols of power and nature: the Orpheus mosaics of fourth century Britain', ed. P. Rush, Theoretical Roman Archaeology: Second Conference, (Avebury, 1995) 105ff. [return to text]
[15] LIMC 103ff. has a good discussion of this. [return to text]
[16] Summed up by F. Graf, 'Orpheus: a poet among men' in ed. J. Bremmer, Interpretations of Greek Mythology (London, Croom Helm, 1987) 80ff. [return to text]
[17] B. Andreae, Studien zur römischen Grabkunst (Heidelberg, 1963) 121. [return to text]
[18] cf. Ovadiah and Mucznik Mosaics 49f. cf. I. Linforth, The Arts of Orpheus, (Berkeley, University of California Press, 1941) for the difficulty in finding any sect that might be described as unequivocally Orphic despite the increase in esoteric cults in the second and third centuries AD. (cf. Murray's argument in Rebirth 45ff. : the Orpheus of philosophical and mystic tradition is not the Orpheus of art.) [return to text]
[19] A. Bosio, Roma Sotterranea (Rome, 1632) 627ff. [return to text]
[20] Summarized by Friedman Orpheus 13ff; Murray Rebirth 42, especially n.37. For monotheism in the Diathekai : Linforth Arts 280. [return to text]
[21] E. Irwin, 'The Songs of Orpheus and the New Song of Christ', in ed. J. Warden Orpheus: the metamorphoses of a myth (Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1982) 51ff. She observes (56) that Christian art did not use Orpheus as a psychopomp figure. The Eusebian reference is too late to have influenced the image of the Christian Orpheus, but it may be used to confirm the currency of the idea at the time. [return to text]
[22]e.g. K.Dunbabin, The Mosaics of Roman North Africa (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1978) 158ff. (for seasons) and 231 (Christian versions of rural themes). [return to text]
[23] e.g. Koch and Sichtermann Sarkophage 116ff., 217ff. [return to text]
[24] e.g. Dunbabin Mosaics 161ff. [return to text]
[25] e.g. Dunbabin, Mosaics 46ff.; S. Ellis, 'Power, architecture, and decor: how the late Roman aristocrat appeared to his guests' in ed. E. Gazda, Roman art in the private sphere (Ann Arbor, University of Michigan Press, 1991) 124ff. [return to text]
[26] e.g. J. Thirion, 'Orphée magicien dans la mosaïque romaine', Mélanges d'archéologie et d'histoire de l'école française de Rome 67, 1955, 169ff.; for Dionysus in El Djem mosaic: Dunbabin Mosaics 184f.; T. Mathews, The Clash of Gods: A reinterpretation of early Christian art (Princeton NJ, Princeton University Press, 1993) 68f., and chapter 3 passim for Jesus the Magician. [return to text]
[27] For Christ in mosaics: W.F.Volbach, Early Christian Art (London, 1961) pls. 35 and 158. For David at Gaza see n. 6 above. For Orpheus mosaics at Hanover and Tolmeita: LIMC 92, no.124, and 94 no. 141. [return to text]
[28] For Adam: M.T. and P. Canivet 'La mosaïque d'Adam dans l'église syrienne de Huarte', Cahiers archéologiques 24, 1975, 49ff. [return to text]
[29] Examples of fighting animals on sarcophagi: C.R.Chiarlo, 'Sul significato dei sarcofagi a lenos decorati con leoni', Annali della scuola normale di Pisa. 4 1974, 1307ff. To show how specific the symbolism could become: see L. Musso in ed. A. Giuliano, Museo Nazionale Romano. I Le Sculpture ii (Rome, 1981) 84f. Mosaics: D. Levi. Antioch Mosaic Pavements I (Princeton NJ, Princeton University Press, 1947) 318f. and Dunbabin Mosaics 230f. [return to text]
[30] e.g. Ellis (see note 25) and Scott (see note 14). [return to text]
[31] H. Marrou, Mousikos Aner (Grenoble, 1937); F.Cumont, Recherches sur le symbolisme funéraire des romains, (Paris, 1942) 253ff. [return to text]
[32] Although they have been traditionally considered as Christian (presumably mainly because of their find-spots), there is in fact little to separate them from the single surviving 'pagan' strigillated sarcophagus which has Orpheus in the centre, and at the corners lions devouring prey, accompanied by an attendant: Koch and Sichtermann Sarkophage fig. 182. [return to text]
[33] e.g. Marrou Mousikos 269ff. for Christian treatment of the theme. [return to text]
[34] Murray Rebirth Chapter 2. [return to text]
[35] Murray Rebirth 61. [return to text]
[36] M. Wegner, Die Musensarkophage (Die antiken Sarkophagreliefs) V,3 (Berlin, 1966) no. 24 (for a comparable figure of Apollo), and no. 184 (for the Apollo/Orpheus figure). This may be the point (i.e. re syncretistic approaches) to mention the report by Scriptores Historiae Augustae: Alexander Severus 29,2 that this emperor had in his Lararium images of both Orpheus and Christ. See also M. Henig, 'Personal interpretations of deity' in Henig and King, Shrines 164. [return to text]
[37] P. Dronke, 'The return of Eurydice', Classica et Medievalia 23, 1962, 198ff.; and C. Segal, Orpheus: the myth of the poet (Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989). [return to text]
[38] These qualities of Orpheus are beautifully summed up by Segal Orpheus 34ff. [return to text]
* Neoptolemus and the Bow: Ritual thea and Theatrical Vision in Sophocles' Philoctetes * Ismene Lada-Richards * The Journal of Hellenic Studies, Vol. 117, (1997), pp. 179-183 (article consists of 5 pages) * Published by: The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies
Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2000.08.10 Ismene Lada-Richards, Initiating Dionysus: Ritual and Theatre in Aristophanes' Frogs. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1999. Pp. xxiv + 387. ISBN 0-19-814981-6. $145.00.
Reviewed by Mark W. Padilla, Bucknell University (mpadilla@bucknell.edu) Word count: 1953 words
Scholars (such as myself) who are partial to Aristophanes' Frogs and to readings of Athenian drama that stress Dionysian structures and poetics have long considered the comedy overlooked as a rich ground for the kind of "archaeology" of ritual and social practices long now associated with Euripides' Bacchae. Lada-Richards (L-R) has now brought the Frogs out fully from the shadow of its tragic cousin and, in an optimistic and expansive fashion, attempts "to reconstitute the original circuit of communication between the play and its recipients, that is, to identify the codes which would have made possible the emission and decipherment of messages within the original communicative channel between the author/sender of the Frogs and his fifth-century addressees, whether spectators or readers. Rather than seeking one single meaning, this book attempts to reconstruct the wider spectrum of potential meanings that various segments of the text could have in their own sociocultural milieu" (pp. 12-13). A mouthful to be sure, but still just the beginning. The book is a revised and expanded Cambridge dissertation and its significant drawback is its encyclopedic ambitions that threaten to bury Aristophanes' play beneath several "tons" of Dionysiaca, material that is carted in from multiple directions and ritualistic contexts. Whether or not the play remains alive amid this mass of referentiality perhaps depends, to maintain the archaeological metaphor, on how assiduous readers remain in digging through the study's full treatment.
Initiating Dionysus features an introduction, nine chapters, an epilogue, and an appendix on "Ritual Disguise in the Greek World" (in addition to the General Index and Index of Frogs Passages Discussed). The Introduction expands on the quotation provided above. Chapter One -- "'Dionysiac' and 'Heraclean' in the Prologue of the Frogs" -- discusses some of the structural similarities between Dionysus and Heracles, such as their human, bestial, and divine attributes and ambiguities. Since Dionysus appears on stage dressed in a Heraclean skeue and visits the hero's house, the audience witnesses the two clusters of mythological and ritual characteristics both as entities at opposite ends of a single semantic pole and as an "intertwinement." Chapter Two -- "'Separation', 'Limen', 'Aggregation': The Frogs as a 'Rite of Passage'" -- develops ritual elements that complement the mythical ones developed in Chapter One. Focusing on the "rite of passage" as the operative paradigm, L-R discusses why she wishes to broaden the frame of inquiry beyond the categories of mystery rites (Dionysian, Eleusinian and Orphic) that other scholars have discussed, so as to emphasize ephebic initiatory material, as organized by the separation-limen-aggregation model developed by Arnold van Gennep. A number of traditional elements associated with these kinds of rites that are thematically featured in the play are discussed. In an assessment of how tragedy and comedy respectively utilize ritual liminality, L-R argues that, while tragedy's "tendency [is] not to resolve the ambiguities of ritual liminality" (p. 114), "it appears that comic liminality tends primarily to exploit and magnify the features which narrowly defined ritual liminality ... shares with festive occasions or civic rites of reversal, for instance, rank reversals (masters/slaves), exchanges of costume, etc. In a word, in the comic dramatization of liminary time and space, playfulness is paramount" (p. 115). The Frogs participates in this pattern, by unfolding "along the lines of the most characteristically comic rhythm, namely, that of release, renewal, and revitalization" (p. 119).
Chapter 3 -- "The God of Wine and the Frogs" -- incorporates the sympotic and festival aspects of Dionysus as represented in the play, perhaps arguing most originally that the literary debate, or agon, functions for the audience as a kind of "intellectual banquet" whose mimetic qualities evoke the symposium. However, the focus extends beyond the private sphere, in that "both Euripides and Aeschylus succeed in implicating the purely political dimension of the city's life in the theatrical/sympotical discourse, and are expected to exert a beneficial influence on it" (p. 146).
Chapter 4 -- "Initiating Through Acting" -- considers the play's metatheatrical dimensions. In an analysis that tends toward the abstract, L-R argues that the ritualistic and theatrical components of Dionysus' identity are set into relief, and that "the play stimulates the spectator to hold in sight simultaneously the two angles from which the phenomenon of 'playing the other' is conceivable, both of which are markedly 'Dionysiac' and ultimately based on the experience of ekstasis" (p. 172). The god's engagement in a Heraclean persona functions centrally in this project. Chapter 5 -- "Dionysus, the Poets, and the Polis" -- picks up the thread woven more intermittently in the previous chapters, namely the ways in which the character of Dionysus "evolves" (by virtue of its functionality in the play's action, pp. 216-17) in a fashion that symbolically rescues the "politico-religious identity" of the polis community of Athens, a movement ratified and confirmed upon Dionysus' judgement of Aeschylus as the agon's winner.
Chapters 6 and 7 -- respectively, "Aeschylus: A 'Dionysiac' Poet?" and "Dionysus 'Returns' to Heracles" -- develops the idea that the god's evolution, culminating in the declared victory of Aeschylus over Euripides, aligns him with the older poet in ways that confirm the naturalness of the decision, given the tragedian's own "Dionysian" elements in the contexts hitherto developed. Secondly, the figure of Heracles, too, is brought into this alignment, so that the god, the tragedian, and the hero all stand together in ways positive for the city and against the sensibilities infused in the fictional characterization of Euripides. Here, L-R substantially expands upon the lines of an argument I myself presented in a 1992 essay1 in the attempt to frame the play's dramatic action and thematic structure as a coherent whole (as opposed to a collection of two or more disparate parts, as some scholars have argued). This coherence is rooted in the development of Dionysus' character as it moves first awkwardly and ironically through the Heraklean impersonation scenes and then more affirmatively into his growing valuation of the polis-affirming sensibilities of Aeschylus. L-R states: "In a classical Greek audience's perspective, the agon of the Frogs can be said to complement the divine actor's 'character advancement' not only by effecting the reincorporation of 'Heracles', the model, into the persona of Dionysus, the impersonator, but also, most importantly, by steering and transfusing the Dionysiac and the Heraclean sides into the space and the moulds of the polis" (p. 278).
Chapter 8 -- "Dionysus the Civic Viewer" -- crowns this reading, and also opens the path to the final chapter (Chapter 9) -- "Dionysus, Comedy, and Tragedy." Here, Dionysus develops yet "another metatheatrical position, that of an 'internalized' spectator, a role culminating in the highest function reserved for him within the play, namely, the role of a civic judge." This "mediational" role takes place on a number of different levels and is "envisaged as an amalgam of possible audience-responses in other respects as well" (p. 280). These responses are concerned with the "point of view of the ignorant, uneducated, unperceptive member of the audience as well as with the mental framework of the education minority, preoccupied with issues of semantics, definition, and accuracy of diction" (p. 283). This perspective assumes a theatricalized organization, in that the god possesses a "simultaneous" combination of tragic and comic personas, thus suggesting that "the Frogs recreates and re-enacts the interplay of conflicting moods and tensions which builds the real event of the Great Dionysia dramatic festival, the primary civic occasion which hosts the theatrical performance of both genres" (p. 324).
L-R provides a powerful and long overdue appreciation of the complexity, sophistication, and importance of Aristophanes' Frogs. Though often dismissed as a broken-backed play whose major contribution is as a proto-literary critical treatise, one belonging with the assessments of Plato and Aristotle on tragedy, we can now more fully appreciate that the comedy is much more; its very structure engages the audience dramatically with its messages, in that the audience ideally experiences on some receptive level the very process of Dionysian fusions and juxtapositions that render the god a powerful force simultaneously in civic and theatrical life. Thus the Frogs stands alongside of Euripides' Bacchae, albeit with a comic center of balance, as an important vehicle of the symbolic vocabulary that Athens developed in the late fifth century to understand and express the interrelations of its culture, rituals, society, and politics under the sign of Dionysus.
Aside from certain stylistic concerns (e.g., such repetitious transition phrases as "In other words"), my critical responses are organized into two main areas. The first concern is the question raised at the outset of this review, namely, whether the play survives this reading as a piece of theater. In the attempt to appreciate how "Dionysus' perspective has broadened so much during the agon of the Frogs as to become identical with the perspective of the entire Athenian polis as a theates" (p. 312), one wonders if that effort of total encompassing ultimately deconstructs itself. Has the god become too complicated, too invested with referentiality, to allow for the notion that the fictionalized god can speak for an entire audience at a time of tremendous upheaval? If the "intertexuality" that L-R seeks to tease out is aligned with that "elucidated by Julia Kristeva ... as the relation of a text to the multiplicity of cultural discourses" (p. 16), the stability of the proposed reading is itself a suspect construct. The "utopian" orientation of the play surely did not answer all of the audience's concerns, no matter how inclusive its repertory of ritualistic registers. Therefore, the "hope and light" with which the play "fills both stage and auditorium" (p. 329) and which mitigates the "funereal" requirement that the saving of the city lies in the hands of a long-dead poet is overly dependent upon a fractured Dionysian cultural poetics.
A second area of concern is located in the play's status as "history." L-R's structuralist emphasis leaves the play dislocated from the immediate context of its production. In my own reading of the play, I suggest that the Frogs ultimately features a militaristic emphasis, in the "boot camp" experience of Dionysus learning under the drill instructors of the Heracles-Aeschylus axis; the joke resides in the event of a proven "wimp" becoming a readied soldier. Moreover, this attention to militarism would seem to reflect the late stages of the Peloponnesian War. L-R's reading might argue for a very different historical referentiality, but it provides few hooks to attach the play to anything of a "concrete" nature; rather, the set of ideas presented and featured drifts in the broad currents of the fifth-century Athens. Although Aeschylus' plays were re-performed after his death, the tragedian's sensibilities are rooted in another era and the play's fun with, and criticism of, certain elements of those sensibilities are themselves a dramatic message. Indeed, comedy was itself changing at this time, as was tragedy and the city for that matter. Thus Aristophanes' ultimate valuation of Aeschylean virtues is a celebration of them, but also, somewhat coldly, a farewell to them in the way celebrations often signal; they dismiss as much as recall. Aeschylus will not in fact "bring these things into effect" (v. 1515), any more than the fictional "Maximus," in the recently released movie, "Gladiator" (Universal Pictures-Dreamworks, 1999), was historically able to thwart the self-serving Emperor Commodus and return Rome to a virtuous Republic as intended by the "Aeschylean" Marcus Aurelius just before his death. L-R is on safe grounds when she grounds her reading in ritual-genre considerations (as noted above); but the shift from convention into actual audience appreciation and perception is a tricky one.
Initiating Dionysus: Ritual and Theatre in Aristophanes' Frogs is an important, comprehensive, theoretically sophisticated, and well-researched treatment of a single play. In this reader's view, it is also a most welcome study. Notes:
1. Mark Padilla, "The Heraclean Dionysus: Theatrical and Political Renewal in Aristophanes' Frogs", Arethusa 25 (1992): 359-84.
One of the greatest aesthetic attractions in the ancient world was pantomime dancing, a ballet-style entertainment in which a silent, solo dancer incarnated a series of mythological characters to the accompaniment of music and sung narrative. Looking at a multitude of texts and particularly Lucian’s On the Dance, a dialogue written at the height of pantomime’s popularity, this innovative cultural study of the genre offers a radical re-assessment of its importance in the symbolic economy of imperial and later antiquity. Rather than being trivial or lowbrow, pantomime was thoroughly enmeshed in wider social discourses on morality and sexuality, gender and desire and a key player in the fierce battles about education and culture that raged in the ancient world. A close reading of primary sources, judiciously interlaced with a wealth of interdisciplinary perspectives, makes this challenging book essential for anyone interested in the performance culture of the Greek and Roman world. About The Author:
Ismene Lada-Richards is Lecturer in Classics at King’s College London.
Her study Silent Eloquence: Lucian and Pantomime Dancing was published this summer Contact Classics Department King's College London Strand London WC2R 2LS
Thomas Falkner, professor of classical studies and former Dean of Faculty and interim Vice President for Academic Affairs at The College of Wooster, has been named Provost and Dean of the Faculty at McDaniel College in Westminster Md., effective July 1.
An expert in Greek tragedy, Greek and Latin literature, and comparative literature and the Classical tradition, Falkner has taught Classics for 31 years, 27 of them at Wooster. Even as an administrator at Wooster, he continued to teach one course each year. "My idea of a good time is 50 minutes spent engaging students in the classroom," he says. "We should develop a restless appetite for knowledge in our students."
Chosen from a field of 86 applicants in a national search, Falkner has 10 years of administrative experience. "Dr. Falkner comes to us highly recommended as an enthusiastic advocate of the liberal arts, as a dedicated teacher and a learned scholar, and as an accomplished administrator," said McDaniel President Joan Develin Coley. "His colleagues praise his energy, intelligence, and humanity. We are thrilled to welcome him to the 'Hill.' He is sure to enrich our community."
McDaniel College and The College of Wooster have been recognized by author Loren Pope as two of the 40 Colleges That Change Lives.
While at Wooster, Falkner was instrumental in creating the new general education curriculum, establishing a Faculty Instructional Technology Center, and developing study abroad programs in Greece, Kenya, and Thailand. Recognized by the National Endowment for the Humanities on five occasions, Falkner has written and edited four books and many articles on Greek and Latin literature, blending his passions for teaching and scholarship.
"There is a real synergy between teaching and scholarship," he says. "We want our students to be good scholars and it is important that faculty members continue their own scholarly development. The work that you are doing for your own scholarly projects often spills over into your classroom presentations, into the research your students are involved in."
A magna cum laude graduate of LeMoyne College in Syracuse, N.Y., in 1969, Falkner studied at the American Academy in Rome before earning his master's and doctorate degrees in Classics at the State University of New York in Buffalo.
"If I had been asked to sit down with a pencil and paper and describe the kind of liberal arts college I would like to be a part of, it would have looked a lot like McDaniel College," says Falkner. "I am particularly impressed by the strong sense of community here."
Falkner, 56, was born and raised in Amherst, N.Y. His wife Rose Falkner is Director of International and Off-Campus Study at The College of Wooster. They have three daughters: Renate, 28, a professional violist; Annegret, 24, a graduate student in neuroscience; and Karelisa, 20, a sophomore English major at Oberlin College.
Falkner succeeds Sam Case, who is retiring from the position he has held since 2001. Case's leadership of academic planning and direction of the recent Middle States re-accreditation evaluation resulted in a final report which reaffirmed, in positively glowing terms, the College's mission and strategic planning.
McDaniel College, a private four-year college of the liberal arts and sciences, was founded in 1867 as Western Maryland College. Students from 23 states and 19 countries pursue more than 60 programs of study, including dual majors and student-designed majors. The school enrolls 1,600 undergraduates and 1,100 graduate students on a 160-acre campus located 30 miles northwest of Baltimore and 56 miles north of Washington, D.C.
Pat Easterling was Regius Professor of Greek at Cambridge from 1994 until she retired in 2001; before that she taught in Manchester, Cambridge and London. She works mainly on Greek literature, particularly tragedy; but she also studies the survival and reception of ancient drama. Her most recent book is Greek and Roman Actors: aspects of an ancient profession (Cambridge 2002), co-edited with Edith Hall. She is currently writing a commentary on Sophocles' Oedipus at Colonus.
Further proof of the current enthusiasm for Greek drama and its reception: Surviving Greek Tragedy by Robert Garland, on the point of being published by Duckworth. Garland's book covers the whole story from the fifth century BC to the present, with a fascinating section on the centuries when no plays were put on anywhere. This is when it mattered most that some books survived – and that a few plays were studied as school texts by Greek speakers. It's vigorously written and finely illustrated, and the last chapter enters the debate about making sense of modern productions.
Ο Βάλτερ Πούχνερ γεννήθηκε στη Βιέννη. Σπούδασε θεατρολογία στο Πανεπιστήμιο της Βιέννης και το 1972 απέκτησε τον τίτλο του διδάκτορα της Φιλοσοφικής Σχολής, με μια εργασία για το νεοελληνικό θέατρο σκιών. Το 1977 ανακηρύχθηκε υφηγητής, στο ίδιο Πανεπιστήμιο, με μια διατριβή για τη γέννηση του θεάτρου στον ελληνικό λαϊκό πολιτισμό. Από τότε έχει εγκατασταθεί μόνιμα στην Ελλάδα. Δίδαξε επί δώδεκα χρόνια Ιστορία Θεάτρου στη Φιλοσοφική Σχολή του Πανεπιστημίου Κρήτης. Από το 1989 διδάσκει στο Πανεπιστήμιο Αθηνών, στην αρχή στο Τμήμα Φιλολογίας και από το 1991 στο Τμήμα Θεατρικών Σπουδών. Παράλληλα εξακολουθεί να διδάσκει Θεατρολογία στο Πανεπιστήμιο της Βιέννης και έχει μετακληθεί πολλές φορές ως επισκέπτης καθηγητής σε αυστριακά πανεπιστήμια. Το 1994 εξελέγη αντεπιστέλλον μέλος της αυστριακής Ακαδημίας Επιστημών. Έχει δημοσιεύσει περισσότερα από 30 βιβλία και 200 μελετήματα για θέματα του ελληνικού και βαλκανικού θεάτρου, της συγκριτικής λαογραφίας, των βυζαντινών και νεοελληνικών σπουδών εν γένει, καθώς και της θεωρίας του θεάτρου και του δράματος.
‘Sex, Lies and Sophistic: Rhetoric and the Novel’ forthcoming in Blackwell Companion to Greek Rhetoric ed. I. Worthington (Oxford: Blackwell)
‘Behind the Mask: Pantomime from the Performer’s perspective’ forthcoming in New Perspectives on Ancient Pantomime ed. E. Hall and R. Wiles (Oxford)
‘Basil of Caesarea and Greek Tragedy’ forthcoming in Blackwell Companion to Classical Receptions ed. L. Harwick and C. Stray (Oxford: Blackwell)
‘Ekphrasis’ (1,000 words) and ‘Praise of Cities’ (600 words) forthcoming in The Classical Tradition ed. A. Grafton et al. (Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press)
‘Accomplishing the Picture: Ekphrasis, Mimesis and Martyrdom in Asterios of Amaseia’ forthcoming in Art and Text in Byzantium ed. L. James (New York: Cambridge University Press)
‘Logiques du mime dans l’Antiquité Tardive’, Pallas, 71 (2006) 127-136
‘Rhetorical and Theatrical Fiction in Chorikios of Gaza’ in Greek Literature in Late Antiquity: Dynamism, Didacticism, Classicism, ed. S. Johnson (Aldershot, 2006) 107-124
‘The Imagines as a Fictional Text: ekphrasis, apatL and illusion’ in Le défi de l’image: Philostrate, Callistrate et les énigmes de l’image sophistique, ed. M. Costanti et al. (Rennes, 2006) 113-136
‘Fiction, Mimesis and the Performance of the Greek Past in the Second Sophistic’, in Greeks on Greekness: Viewing the Greek Past under the Roman Empire, ed. D. Konstan and S. SaVd (Cambridge, 2006) PCPS Supplementary Volume 29, 27-46
‘The Protean Performer: Mimesis and Identity in Late Antique Discussions of the Theater’, in Performing Ecstasies: Music, Dance, and Ritual in the Mediterranean ed. L. Del Giudice and Nancy Van Deusen (Ottowa, 2005) 3-11
‘Praise and Persuasion: argumentation and audience response in epideictic oratory’ in Rhetoric in Byzantium ed. E. Jeffreys (Aldershot, 2003) 127-135
‘Female Entertainers in Late Antiquity’ in Greek and Roman Actors ed. P.E. Easterling and E. Hall (Cambridge, 2002) 282-303
‘The Progymnasmata as Practice’ in Education in Greek and Roman Antiquity ed. Y.L. Too (Leiden, 2001) 289-316
‘Ekphrasis, Amplification and Persuasion in Prokopios' Buildings’ L'Antiquité tardive, 8 (2000) 67-71
'Picturing the Past: Uses of Ekphrasis in the Deipnosophistae' in Athenaeus and His World: reading Greek culture in the Roman empire, ed. D. Braund and J. Wilkins (Exeter University Press, 2000)
'The Aesthetics of Sacred Space: Narrative, Metaphor and Motion in Ekphraseis of Church Buildings' , Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 53 (1999) 59-74
'Ekphrasis Ancient and Modern: the invention of a genre', Word and Image, 15 (1999) 7-18
'Landscape' in A Guide to the Late Antique World, ed. G.W. Bowersock, P. Brown and O. Grabar (Cambridge, MA, 1999) 537-8
Contribution to a discussion of Gibbon's treatment of Byzantium 'Taking a leaf from Gibbon', Dialogos: Hellenic Studies Review, 6 (1999) 144-7
'Rhetoric and Poetry' in Handbook on Classical Rhetoric in the Hellenistic Period (330B.C.-A.D.400), ed. S. Porter (Leiden, 1997) 339-69
'Salome's Sisters: the Rhetorics and Realities of Dance in Late Antiquity', in Men, Women and Eunuchs: Gender in Byzantium, ed. L. James (London, 1997) 119-48
'Imagination and the Arousal of the Emotions in Greco-Roman Rhetoric', in The Passions in Roman Thought and Literature, ed. S. Braund and C. Gill (Cambridge, 1997) 112-27
'Mémoire et imagination: les limites de l'enargeia dans la théorie rhétorique grecque' in Dire l'évidence, ed. C. Lévy and L. Pernot (Paris, 1997) 229-48
'The Form and Function of a Late Byzantine Commentary', in Medieval and Renaissance scholarship : proceedings of the second European Science Foundation Workshop on the Classical Tradition in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance ed. N. Mann and B. Munk Olsen (Leiden, 1996)
'Ekphrasis' (2,000 words) in The Macmillan Dictionary of Art and Archaeology, London, 1996
‘A Slavish Art? Language and Grammar in Late Byzantine Education and Society', Dialogos: Hellenic Studies Review, 1 (1994) 81-103
'The Nomoi of Gemistos Plethon in the Light of Plato's Laws', Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 52 (1989) 214-19
With M. Koortbojian, 'Isbella d'Este's Philostratos', Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 56 (1993)
With P. Weller, articles on 'Descriptive Poetry' and 'Enargeia' in The New Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics (Princeton, 1993)
With L. James, 'To Understand Ultimate Things and Enter Secret Places: Ekphrasis and Art in Byzantium', Art History, 14 (1991) 1-17
Reviews:
I. Rutherford, Canons of Style in the Antonine Age: Idea Theory in its Literary Context, Classical Philology 97 (2002) pp. 194ff.
M. Patillon (trans. and comm.), HermogPne: L’art rhétorique, Rhetorica 2000
F. Létoublon, Les lieux communs du roman, The Classical Review, n.s. 44,2, 1994, pp. 274-5
P. Holliday (ed.), Narrative and event in Ancient Art, Art Bulletin (March, 1996)
A.S. Becker, The Shield of Achilles and the Poetics of Ekphrasis, Bryn Mawr Classical Review (Fall, 1995)
Work in Progress
Books:
Ekphrasis, Imagination and Persuastion in Ancient Rhetorical Theory and Practice (Forthcoming from Ashgate Press, 2008)
Demons and Dancers: Theatrical Performance in Late Antiquity under contract with Harvard University Press
Chapters:
La Peur de la mimPsis théâtrale for publication in La Peur de l’Image (ed. L. Bachelot et C. Pouzadoux)
Translation
Contributor to a group translation into French of Dio Chrysostom’s Trojan Oration (Or. 11), Research Team THEMAM, Paris X
Recent Papers
‘Ancient Pantomime Performance’, Gulbenkian Seminar on Dance and Neuroscience, Sadlers Wells, London (November 2006)
‘Philostrate: entre l’image et la constitution du mythe’ Colloque ‘Mythe, Imaginaire, Fiction’ Paris X-ENS (September 2006)
‘La Decadanse: Dance and disturbance in Late Antiquity’, Greek Drama and Modern Dance, Archive of Pantomime from the Performer’s Perspective, Oxford (July, 2006)
‘Le jeu corporel de la pantomime antique’ Colloque ‘Le jeu du hors-texte’, Toulouse (May 2006)
‘Behind the Mask: Pantomime from the Performer’s Perspective’, Pantomime Day, Archive of Performances of Greek and Roman Drama, Oxford (July, 2005)
‘La peur de la mimPsis théâtrale’ seminar in series on La Peur de l’Image, Université de Paris X-Nanterre (UMR 7041) (May 2005)
‘Teaching Rhetoric in Late Antiquity’, The Late Antique and Byzantine Classroom, ICS, London (April 2005
‘Pagans and Christians on the Late Antique Stage’, Spring Symposium on Byzantine Studies, Belfast (April 2005) Contact
Email: r.webb@history.bbk.ac.uk
Ruth Webb is currently Professeur associé in the Department of Greek, Université de Paris X Nanterre
School of History, Classics and Archaeology, Birkbeck, University of London, Malet Street, London WC1E 7HX. Departmental Office tel.: 020 7631 6268/6299/6266/6217
Since the middle ages, scholars of the ancient graeco-roman worlds have based their work on the great literary texts of antiquity world, preserved in a manuscript tradition. Indeed, those texts, some of the greatest achievements of the world’s literary output, provide the central reason why most people study those periods. At a later date, the artefacts of the period became the subject of study – firstly as works of art, and later as matter for cultural history. A special category of material is the documents which have survived from antiquity – written artefacts, whose status in the among the material to be studied is not entirely clear. The deluge of papyri, and of inscriptions, which have been published since 1840, has been difficult to deal with using the categories of earlier, literature based, study; and book-based publication has created a gulf between texts preserved in this way, and those in the literary tradition. Online publication, using TEI, offers an opportunity to bridge that gulf. Biography
Charlotte Roueché trained as a classicist (in Cambridge) and a Byzantinist (in Paris). She teaches Classical and Byzantine Greek language, culture and history at King’s College London. For many years she has worked on Greek inscriptions on stone excavated at sites in Turkey – particularly Aphrodisias (working with the New York University excavation, http://www.nyu.edu/projects/aphrodisias/) and Ephesus (working with the Austrian Archaeological Institute). The need to publish an adequately rich account of this important material led her to explore and develop web publication: this was made possible by a partnership with Tom Elliott, formerly of UNC Chapel Hill, and now of ISAW, New York. Together they received funding from the Leverhulme Trust and the AHRC, which has enabled her two first publications in TEI-compliant XML, to be found at http://insaph.kcl.ac.uk.
Professor Charlotte Roueché Link to print version Print version Professor of Late Antique and Byzantine Studies
Contact Details Charlotte Roueché specializes in the language and history of the Late Roman and Byzantine periods. She has published Greek inscriptions found in Kuwait, and two studies of those found during the current excavations at Aphrodisias (Turkey); she is now working on the late Roman inscriptions of Ephesus . She also works on the literature of the Byzantine Empire, and is editing the Advice and Anecdotes of Kekaumenos - the memoirs of an eleventh-century general.
From September 2000 to September 2002 she held a British Academy Research Readership , in order to prepare, with Joyce Reynolds, the final publication of the inscriptions of Aphrodisias.With the support of the Leverhulme Trust 's Research Interchange Scheme, she prepared an online second edition of Aphrodisias in Late Antiquity (2004). With a further grant from the Arts and Humanities Research Council she and colleagues have now published the full corpus IAph2007 of all the Aphrodisias inscriptions. She is now working on a new project, funded by the Leverhulme Trust, to publish an online Corpus of the Inscriptions of Roman Cyrenaica. With the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World at NYU, she and her team have been awarded a Joint Digitisation grant for the Concordia project, to develop further tools, and to publish the Inscriptions of Roman Tripolitania. She also directs the Arabic Sources for Byzantines and Crusaders project, funded by the Leverhulme Trust, which aims to supplement the Greek source material in the Prosopography of the Byzantine World. Publications See full list of publications. Other activities Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries (elected 1999)
Fellow and Tutor in Classics, Trinity College CUF Lecturer in Classical Languages, Faculty of Classics Director, Archive of Performances of Greek and Roman Drama
Trinity College Oxford, OX1 3BH
Tel: (01865) 279854 Fax: (01865) 279911
peter.brown@trinity.ox.ac.uk
Research Interests
Latin Poetry, Greek and Roman Comedy Selected Recent Publications
'Gnatho's Monologue: Eunuchus 232-264' in L.Benz (ed.), Terenz und die Tradition des Stregreifspiels. . 1995: 'Aeschinus at the Door: Terence, Adelphoe 632-43 and the Traditions of Greco-Roman Comedy' in Papers of the Leeds International Latin Seminar vol. 8, ed. R.Brock and A.J. Woodman, Francis Cairns, Leeds, 71-89. 1997: 'An interpolated line of Terence at Cicero, De Finibus 2.14', Classical Quarterly, 47, 583-4. 2000: 'Knocking at the Door in fifth-century Greek Tragedy' in S.Godde and T.Heinze (edd.), Skenika: Beitrage zum antiken Theater und seiner Rezeption., Festschrift for H-D Blume, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Darmstadt, 1-16. 2001: Introduction to Menander, The Plays and Fragments, translated with notes by M. Balme, Oxford University Press.. 2002: 'Actors and actor-managers at Rome in the time of Plautus and Terence', in Greek and Roman Actors: Aspects of an Ancient Profession, eds. P.Easterling and E.Hall, Cambridge, 225-337.
Titular CUF Lecturer in Classical Languages and Literature, Faculty of Classics Fellow, New College
Research Interests
Hellenistic and later Greek literature Selected Recent Publications
'Pilgrimage To The Holy City (Hierapolis/Membij)', in Seeing the Gods: Pilgrimage in Greco-Roman and Early Christian Antiquity, ed. J. Elsner and I. Rutherford, Oxford University Press. 1998: 'The Bonds of Cypris: Nonnus' Aura', Greek Roman and Byzantine Studies, 39, 293-306. 1998: 'An early reference to Perfect Numbers? Some notes on Euphorion SH 417', Classical Quarterly, 48, 187-94. 1999: Parthenius of Nicaea: The Poetic Fragments and the Erotica Pathemata edited with an Introduction and Commentary, Oxford: Clarendon Press. 2000: 'The Roots of Daphne', Hermathena, 168, 11-19. 2000: 'Partheniana Minora', Classical Quarterly, 50 (I), 303-05. 2000: 'Romanised Greeks and Hellenised Romans: Later Greek Literature', in Literature in the Greek and Roman Worlds, ed. O. Taplin, Oxford University Press, 257-84. 2000: 'Sophisticates and Solecisms: Hellenistic Literature' in Literature in the Greek and Roman Worlds. ed. O.Taplin, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 217-56. 2001: 'Galli in the Cult of the Dea Syria', in Eunuchs in Antiquity and Beyond, ed. S. Tougher, Classical Press of Wales/ Duckworth, 71–86. 2001: 'Mambogaios', Epigraphica Anatolica, 33, 113-18. 2002: 'Nothing to do with the Artists of Dionysus?', in Actors and Acting in Antiquity, edd. E. Hall and P. A. Easterling, Cambridge University Press, 211-26. 2003: Lucian, On the Syrian Goddess: Edited with Introduction, Translation, and Commentary, Oxford University Press.
Richard HunterProfessor Richard Hunter is Regius Professor of Greek and a Fellow of Trinity College.
For a pdf of Professor Hunter's Inaugural Lecture please click here
Major publications:
The Shadow of Callimachus (Cambridge, 2006); The Hesiodic Catalogue of Women: Constructions and Reconstructions (Cambridge, 2005); (with M. Fantuzzi) Tradition and Innovation in Hellenistic Poetry (Cambridge, 2004); Plato's Symposium (Oxford, 2004); Theocritus: Encomium of Ptolemy Philadelphus (Berkeley, 2003); Theocritus. A Selection (Cambridge, 1999); Studies in Heliodorus (Cambridge, 1998); Theocritus and the Archaeology of Greek Poetry (Cambridge, 1996); The 'Argonautica' of Apollonius: literary studies (Cambridge, 1993); Apollonius of Rhodes: Argonautica Book III (Cambridge, 1989); The New Comedy of Greece and Rome (Cambridge, 1985); A Study of Daphnis & Chloe (Cambridge, 1983); Eubulus: The Fragments (Cambridge, 1983)
Current research interests:
Ancient Literary Criticism, Hellenistic and Roman Poetry, the Novel
Recent graduate research topics supervised:
Hesiod, Herodotus, the rhetorical tradition, Hellenistic culture, Roman comedy
Other Faculty positions:
Chair, School of Arts and Humanities
Contact:
Faculty of Classics, Sidgwick Avenue, Cambridge, CB3 9DA
Ο Γ. Μ. Σηφάκης είναι ομότιμος καθηγητής της αρχαίας ελληνικής φιλολογίας του Πανεπιστημίου Θεσσαλονίκης και πρώην Alexander S. Onassis Professor της αρχαίας ελληνικής φιλολογίας και του νεοελληνικού πολιτισμού στο Πανεπιστήμιο της Νέας Υόρκης (1992-2003). Έχει επίσης διδάξει στα Πανεπιστήμια της Καλιφόρνιας, της Θεσσαλονίκης και της Κρήτης. Οι ερευνητικές του δραστηριότητες και δημοσιεύσεις αφορούν στην από σκηνής ερμηνεία του αρχαίου δράματος, στην ποιητική της αφήγησης στην αρχαία, μεσαιωνική και νεώτερη λογοτεχνία, και στην παραδοσιακή λογοτεχνία. Μεταξύ των έργων του: "Parabasis and animal choruses" (1971)· "Για μια ποιητική του ελληνικού δημοτικού τραγουδιού" (1988)· "Aristotle on the function of the tragic poetry" (2003).
G. M. Sifakis is an Emeritus Professor of Classical Greek in the University of Thessaloniki. He studied in Athens (1953-58) and London (1961-64), where he specialized in ancient drama under the guidance of T. B. L. Webster, and wrote his doctoral dissertation on theatre history in the Hellenistic period, focusing on the two centers of Apollo’s worship, Delphi and Delos. He has taught at University of California, Los Angeles (1968-70), the universities of Thessaloniki (1970-91) and Crete (1978-79), and at New York University (1992-2003). He was Interim President of the University of Crete from 1981 to 1986, and Director of the Institute for Mediterranean Studies, FORTH, from 1985 to 1992. He is currently an honorary director of research at IMS, in charge of Ancient Theatre Electronic Documentation Project (as well as of the Musical Tradition of Lyra in the Folk Music of Rethymnon). After the untimely death of the late Georgios Amargianakis, Professor of Ethnomusicology in the University of Athens (formerly of Crete), Sifakis was asked by IMS to supervise the work of the research team which Amargianakis had earlier put together so as to extend its research into the folk music of the Rethymnon region (and beyond the official boundary of the modern prefecture). Amargianakis’ research group had successfully finished their study of the violin traditions of the western and eastern ends of Crete (code named ‘Thalêtas’). Professional Distinctions: In 1984 he was named ‘honorary member’ of the Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies (London), and in 1986 he was elected Fellow of University College London. He was ‘Webster Visiting Professor’ at Stanford University in April 1988, and ‘T. B. L. Webster Fellow’ at the Institute of Classical Studies of London University in March 2000. In 2003 he was named ‘distinguished member’ of the Foundation for Research & Technology – Hellas. In 2005 he was granted the degree of ‘honorary doctor’ of the Department of Theatre Studies of the University of Patras. Publications: Much of G. M. Sifakis’ work deals with ancient drama and, more specifically, with the history and theatre production of drama, in his earlier publications; with the theory and poetics of tragedy and comedy, in his more recent ones. The most important of his publications, relevant to the Ancient Theatre Project of the Institute for Mediterranean Studies, are listed below: • ‘Comedia: An actress of comedy’, Hesperia 35 (1966), 268-73. • Studies in the History of Hellenistic drama (London, 1967). Page 2 C.V. G.M.SIFAKIS — 2 — • Parabasis and Animal Choruses: A Contribution to the History of Attic Old Comedy (London, 1971). • ‘Aristotle, EN IV.2, 1123a 1924, and the comic chorus in the fourth century’, American Journal of Philology, 92 (1971), 410-32. • ‘Children in Greek Tragedy,’ Bulletin of the Inst. of Classical Studies 26 (1979), 67-80. • ‘Boy actors in New Comedy’, in G. W. Bowersock, W. Burkert, M. C. J. Putnam (eds.), Arktouros: Hellenic Studies Presented to Bernard M. W. Knox on the Occasion of His 65th Birthday (Berlin – New York, 1980), pp. 199-208. • ‘The social function of theatre in ancient Athens’, Archaiologia 12 (1984), 8-10 (in Greek). • ‘The structure of Aristophanic comedy’, Journal of Hellenic Stud., 112 (1992), 123-42. • ‘The One-Actor Rule in Greek Tragedy’, in A. Griffiths (ed.), Stage Directions. Essays in Ancient Drama in Honour of E. W. Handley (BICS Suppl. 66, London, 1995), pp. • ‘Function and significance of music in Greek tragedy’, Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies 45 (2001), 21-35. • ‘Ancient theatre electronic documentation project’, Kleos 7 (2002) (written in collaboration with members of the ATEDP team). • ‘Looking for the actor’s art in Aristotle’, in Pat Easterling & Edith Hall (eds.), Greek and Roman Actors. Aspects of an Ancient Profession (Cambridge, 2002), pp. 148-64 • Aristotle on the Function of Tragic Poetry (Herakleion, 2002). • ‘Electronic documentation of the history of ancient theatre’, Scientific American (Greek edition), vol. 3 (January 2005), 20-25. Publications: Although most of G. M. Sifakis’ work is devoted to ancient drama and theatre, he has a parallel interest in traditional arts and culture (ancient and modern), especially in folk poetry and music. Some of his publications, directly or indirectly relevant to the IMS project of the ‘Musical Tradition of Lyra in the Folk Music of Rethymno’ are listed below: • ‘The traditional character of ancient Greek poetry and art’, Scientific Yearbook of the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Thessaloniki, 12 (1971), 453-70 (in Greek). • Towards a Poetics of Modern Greek Folksong (Herakleion, 1988) (in Greek). • ‘Some questions of the poetics of Digenis E and the akritic songs’, Ariadne 5 (1989), 125-39 (in Greek). • ‘Homeric survivals in the medieval and modern Greek folksong tradition?’, Greece & Rome, 39 (1992), 139-54. • ‘The problem of orality in medieval vernacular poetry’, in N. M. Panayotakis (ed.), Origini della letteratura neogreca. Atti del secondo congresso internazionale ‘Neogreca Medii Aevi’ (Venice & Athens, 1993), pp. 267-84 (in Greek). • ‘Formulas and their relatives: A semiotic approach to verse making in Homer and modern Greek folksongs’, Journal of Hellenic Studies, 117 (1997), 136-53. Page 3 C.V. G.M.SIFAKIS — 3 — • Béla Bartók and the Folksong (Herakleion, 1997) (with the co-operation of Vera Lampert; in Greek). • ‘Editorial problems of folksongs’, in Mnêmê Elenês Tsantsanoglou.Ekdotika kai ermêneutika zêtêmata neoellênikês logotechnias (Thessaloniki, 1998), pp. 99- 114 (in Greek). • ‘Function and significance of music in Greek tragedy’, Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies 45 (2001), 21-35. • ‘Looking for the tracks of oral tradition in medieval and early modern Greek poetic works’, Journal of the Hellenic Diaspora, 27 (2001), 61-86. • ‘Erotokritos and the verse patterns of the folksong fifteen-syllable verse’, Proceedings of the International Conference on Erôtokritos (University of Crete, 2003) (forthcoming, in Greek).
The Origins of Theater in Ancient Greece and Beyond: From Ritual ... Google Books από Eric Csapo, Margaret Christina Miller - 2007 - Performing Arts - 440 σελίδες
''Η μουσική στο θέατρο απασχολεί την Eva Stehle, τον Claude Calame και τον Andrew Barker στα άρθρα της δεύτερης ενότητας. Στο μάλλον καλύτερο και, μέχρι στιγμής, διεξοδικότερο κείμενο που έχει γρταφτεί ποτέ για το θέμα του, ο Eric Csapo αντιστρέφει το κέντρο βάρος της Stehle αναφερόμενος στην επίδραση του θεατρικού στροιχείου στη μουσική και δίνει το ιστορικό, κοινωνικό, αισθητικό και πολιτικό στίγμα της ‘Νέας Μουσικής’, εισάγοντας την τρίτη ενότητα με θέμα τις πολιτικές όψεις της μουσικής.''
Murray, Penelope & Peter Wilson, edd., Music and the Muses: The Culture of Mousike in the Classical Athenian City (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004)
''Στα πρακτικά αυτά συνεδρίου που πραγματοποιήθηκε στο Πανεπιστήμιο του Warwick το 1999, συναντούμε συντελεστές του Performance Culture and Athenian Democracy (1999), όπως τον Claude Calame, τον Andrew Ford και τον Peter Wilson, αλλά και άλλους σπουδαίους ερευνητές της ΑΕΜ: την Eva Stehle, τον Robert Wallace, τον Eric Csapo και τον Andrew Barker.''
Professor Department of Classics & Ancient History School of Philosophical and Historical Inquiry (SOPHI) Quadrangle Building A14 The University of Sydney NSW 2006 Australia office: MacCallum-Brennan 710 phone: 612 9351-7078 fax: 612 9351-3918 eric.csapo@arts.usyd.edu.au Fields of Expertise
* Greek literature and culture * Greek and Roman drama * History of the ancient theatre * myth
Education
* 1977: BA Honours Classics, University of British Columbia * 1977/8: Study in Greek Philosophy, Christian Albrechts Universität, Kiel, Germany (DAAD Stipend) * 1978/9: Study in Law, McGill Law School, McGill University, Montreal * 1981: MA Classics, University of Toronto * 1981/2: Regular Member, American School of Classical Studies at Athens (Thomas Day Seymour Fellow) * 1987: PhD Classics, University of Toronto. Thesis: Stock Scenes in Greek Comedy, supervised by E.R. Fantham and J.N. Grant.
Select Publications
* “The Dolphins of Dionysus,” in E. Csapo and M.C. Miller, eds., Poetry, Theory, Praxis (Oxbow, Oxford 2003) 69-98. * "The Politics of the New Music," in P. Murray and P.J. Wilson, eds., Music and the Muses: The Culture of ‘Mousike’ in the Classical Athenian City (Oxford University Press, Oxford 2004) 207-248. * “Some Social and Economic Conditions behind the Rise of the Acting Profession in the Fifth and Fourth Centuries B.C.,” in C. Hugoniot, F. Hurlet, S. Milanezi, eds., Le Statut de l'acteur dans l'antiquité grecque et romaine (Presses Universitaires François-Rabelais 2004) 53-76. * Theories of Mythology (Blackwell, Oxford 2005, repr. with corrections 2005). xii + 338 pages. * The Origins of Theater in Ancient Greece and Elsewhere: From Ritual to Drama (Cambridge UP, New York 2006). Jointly edited with M. Miller. * “The Men who Built the Theatres: Theatropolai, Theatronai and Arkhitektones,” f in P. Wilson, ed. Epigraphy of the Greek Theatre (Oxford University Press, Oxford 2007) 87-115. * “The Iconography of the Exarchos,” forthcoming in MeditArch 19 (2007). * “Cockfights, Contradictions, and the Mythopoetics of Ancient Greek Culture,” forthcoming in ARTS (2007). * “Timotheus and the New Music,” forthcoming in F. Budelmann, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Greek Lyric (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge). Jointly authored with P.J. Wilson.
Synopsis Greek theatre was one of the glories of the ancient world. It survives not only in cultural traditions, but in plays which can still be read and seen and in artistic images. This book examines the history of Greek theatre as seen through representations on painted pottery, terracotta figures, sculpture, mosiacs, metalware and gems. Depictions of performances, actors and their masks were frequent in classical times and continued to appear down to the fifth and sixth centuries AD and beyond, long after the plays had ceased to be staged. The remains of actual theatres and texts of surviving plays also help to give us an idea of how Greek drama developed from the choral origins and how it must have appeared in its heyday. Painted or sculpted representations may not be as literal as photographs, but they tell us much about Greek drama as its ancient admirers saw it. Terracottas and vase paintings often show details of costumes, masks, and stage settings. They also give glimpses of scenes from lost plays, as well as from famous and familiar ones. Most important of all, they allow us to recapture, in part, how theatre was seen and experienced by its first audiences and how images of it informed their lives and cultures.
Το θέατρο είναι από τα μεγαλύτερα επιτεύγματα του αρχαίου ελληνικού πολιτισμού. Οι τραγωδίες και κωμωδίες που έχουν σωθεί εξακολουθούν και στις μέρες μας όχι μόνο να μεταφράζονται και να διαβάζονται, αλλά και να αναβιώνουν τακτικά στις μεγαλύτερες θεατρικές σκηνές του κόσμου. Το βιβλίο αυτό εξετάζει την ιστορία του αρχαίου θεάτρου ως καλλιτεχνικής πράξης μέσα από τα πολυάριθμα αντικείμενα που έχει φέρει στο φως η αρχαιολογική έρευνα σχετικά με θεατρικές παραστάσεις στην αρχαιότητα: αγγεία, πήλινα ειδώλια, γλυπτά, ψηφιδωτά, αντικείμενα από μέταλλο και πολύτιμους λίθους. Οι απεικονίσεις παραστάσεων και υποκριτών με τα προσωπεία τους συνηθίζονταν στα κλασικά χρόνια και συνεχίστηκαν ως τον πέμπτο και τον έκτο αιώνα μ.Χ., όταν πια τα ίδια τα έργα είχαν προ πολλού πάψει να παίζονται. Οι απεικονίσεις αυτές ασφαλώς δεν είναι τόσο πιστές όσο οι σημερινές φωτογραφίες, αλλά μας διδάσκουν πολλά για το αρχαίο δράμα. Συχνά διασώζουν εντυπωσιακές λεπτομέρειες των κοστουμιών ή των προσωπείων, αλλά και συναρπαστικές σκηνές από χαμένα σήμερα έργα, ή από έργα πασίγνωστα και οικεία στον σύγχρονο θεατή. Εξάλλου, τα ερείπια των αρχαίων θεάτρων και τα κείμενα των έργων που σώζονται μας βοηθούν κι αυτά με τη σειρά τους να φανταστούμε πως αναπτύχθηκε το δράμα από τις καταβολές του σε προδραματικούς χορούς, και πως πρέπει να ήταν τον καιρό της μεγάλης ακμής του. Στις μέρες μας, που η αναβίωση του αρχαίου δράματος έχει μπει σταθερά στη ζωή μας, το βιβλίο τούτο μπορεί να αποτελέσει ένα βοήθημα κι έναν οδηγό τόσο για τους συντελεστές όσο και για τους θεατές σύγχρονων παραστάσεων αρχαίων έργων. |
Bibliographic information Title: Εικόνες από το αρχαίο ελληνικό θέατρο ISBN: 9605240246 Publisher: Πανεπιστημιακές Εκδόσεις Κρήτης; 3rd edition (1996) Prototype: Images of the greek theatre Author(s): Richard Green , Eric Handley Format: Μαλακό εξώφυλλο Subject: Θέατρο Dimensions: 17 x 24 cm Pages: 140
