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KINA[I]DOS: A PUN IN DEMOSTHENES’ ON THE CROWN?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 April 2014

Deborah Kamen
Deborah Kamen*
Affiliation:
University of Washington
*
[email protected]
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Extract

In his speech On the Crown (330 b.c.e.), the orator Demosthenes twice refers to his opponent Aeschines as a kinados (‘fox’), both times in the context of accusing him of flattery and slandering in the service of Philip of Macedon (18.162, 242). Although a number of scholars have studied the use of invective in the speeches of Demosthenes and Aeschines, very little attention has been paid to the significance of this peculiar epithet. In this note, I investigate why Demosthenes calls Aeschines a kinados, suggesting that, in addition to painting Aeschines as devious, the word may also have served as a pun.

Type
Shorter Notes
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 64 , Issue 1 , May 2014 , pp. 405 - 408
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 2014 

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References

1 See e.g. Bruns, I., Das literarische porträt der Griechen im fünften und vierten jahrhundert vor Christi geburt (Berlin, 1896), 570–85Google Scholar; Rowe, G.D., ‘The portrait of Aeschines in the Oration on the Crown’, TAPhA 97 (1966), 397–406Google Scholar; E.M. Burke, ‘Character denigration in the Attic orators, with particular reference to Demosthenes and Aeschines’ (Diss., Tufts University, 1972), chs. 4–7; Dyck, A.R., ‘The function and persuasive power of Demosthenes' portrait of Aeschines in the speech On the Crown’, G&R 32 (1985), 42–8Google Scholar; Easterling, P., ‘Actors and voices: reading between the lines in Aeschines and Demosthenes’, in Goldhill, S. and Osborne, R. (edd.), Performance Culture and Athenian Democracy (Cambridge, 1999), 154–66Google Scholar; Worman, N., ‘Insult and oral excess in the disputes between Aeschines and Demosthenes’, AJPh 125 (2004), 1–25Google Scholar and Abusive Mouths in Classical Athens (Cambridge, 2008)Google Scholar, ch. 5; Llamosas, V. Muñoz, ‘Insultos e invectiva entre Demóstenes y Esquines’, Minerva 21 (2008), 33–49Google Scholar; Kamen, D., ‘Servile invective in Classical Athens’, SCI 28 (2009), 43–56.Google Scholar

2 But see Yunis, H., Demosthenes On the Crown (Cambridge, 2001)Google Scholar, on 18.162, who points out the irony in describing Aeschines as a (smart) fox, since a few words later he is described as unperceptive (οὐκ αἰσθάνει); and Muñoz Llamosas, (n. 1), 40, who notes the use of kinados, here and elsewhere in Greek literature, to refer to misused cunning.

3 Fox: Etym. Magn., Harp., Phot., Suda s.v. κίναδος; Σ Ar. Nub. 448, Theocr. 5.25.

4 Wild animal: Etym. Magn., Harp., Hsch., Phot., Suda, Zonar. s.v. κίναδος; Σ Ar. Nub. 448, Theoc. 5.25. The second hand on a codex of Dem. 18 (F2) glosses the κίναδος in 162 as θηρίον.

5 On these attributes of foxes, see e.g. Arist. Hist. an. 488b20: Καὶ τὰ μὲν πανοῦργα καὶ κακοῦργα, οἷον ἀλώπηξ (‘And some [animals] are deceitful and evildoing, like the fox’). On kinados used of evildoers and deceitful people, see Etym. Magn. and Suda s.v. κίναδος; Σ Ar. Nub. 448, Theoc. 5.25. The more common Greek term for ‘fox’, ἀλώπηξ, could be used in a similar way, although it appears in our sources less commonly (see e.g. Ar. Lys. 1133). See further Bowra, C.M., ‘The fox and the hedgehog’, CQ 34 (1940), 26–9CrossRefGoogle Scholar on the fox (and hedgehog) in classical literature; cf. Wackers, P., ‘The image of the fox in Middle Dutch literature’, in Levy, B.J. and Wackers, P. (edd.), The Fox and Other Animals (Amsterdam, 1993), 181–98.Google Scholar

6 There are many more examples: e.g. in Menander's Epitrepontes, a greedy old man named Smicrines is referred to as a kinados (Men. Epit. 165); and a shepherd in Theocritus addresses his rival shepherd, a suspected thief, as kinados (Theoc. Id. 5.25). See also Andoc. 1.99, Aeschin. 3.167, Din. 1.40.

7 See Rowe (n. 1).

8 See also Muñoz Llamosas, (n. 1), 44 n. 57, who observes that orators’ insults can carry sexual connotations through puns, using kinados/kinaidos as an example.

9 On the figure of the kinaidos, see Winkler, J.J., The Constraints of Desire: The Anthropology of Sex and Gender in Ancient Greece (New York, 1990), 45–70Google Scholar; see also Ormand, K., Controlling Desires: Sexuality in Ancient Greece and Rome (Westport, CT, 2008)Google Scholar, 19 and passim. James Davidson downplays the penetration element: Davidson, J.N., Courtesans and Fishcakes: The Consuming Passions of Classical Athens (London, 1997), 167–82Google Scholar and The Greeks and Greek Love: A Radical Reappraisal of Homosexuality in Ancient Greece (London, 2007), 55–60.Google Scholar

10 Indeed, even Winkler (n. 9), 65 misquotes the text as reading kinaidos.

11 Cf. the use of the kinados/kinaidos pun in Lucian, Pseudol. 32, as pointed out by Maxwell-Stuart, P.G., ‘Three words of abusive slang in Aeschines’, AJPh 96 (1975), 7–12Google Scholar, at 11.

12 On the pun on kinados in Andoc. 1.99, see Hickie, W.J., Andocides De Mysteriis (London, 1885)Google Scholar, ad loc.; MacDowell, D.M., Andokides, On the Mysteries (Oxford, 1962)Google Scholar, ad loc.; Wankel, H., Demosthenes, Rede für Ktesiphon über den Kranz (Heidelberg, 1976)Google Scholar, on Dem. 18.162.

13 MacDowell (n. 12), ad loc. points out Andocides’ play on words here.

14 For discussion of the multiple meanings of this nickname, see Dover, K.J., Greek Homosexuality (Cambridge, MA, 1978)Google Scholar, 75; Henderson, J., The Maculate Muse (New York and Oxford, 1991)Google Scholar, 203; Yunis (n. 2), on 18.180; Fisher, N., Aeschines, Against Timarchos (Oxford, 2001)Google Scholar on Aeschin. 1.131; Yunis, H., Demosthenes, Speeches 18 and 19 (Austin, 2005)Google Scholar, 76 n. 151; Worman (n. 1 [2004]), 8 and (n. 1 [2008]), 240; Ormand (n. 9), 50.

15 This is probably the sense Demosthenes has in mind when he alludes to his nickname in 18.180; see Yunis (n. 2), ad loc. On Demosthenes as a chatterer, see Worman (n. 1 [2004]) and (n. 1 [2008]), ch. 5.

16 That it refers to effeminacy: Harp. s.v. Βάταλος; Σ Aeschin. 1.126.

17 That it refers to Batalos the auletês: Plut. Dem. 4.6; Lib. Arg. D. 5. For an alternate theory that Batalos was a writer of wanton verses and drinking songs, see Plut. Dem. 4.6.

18 For batalos a synonym of prôktos (‘anus’): Σ Aeschin. 1.126; Eup. fr. 92 K.-A.; cf. Plut. Dem. 4.7, who says simply that it's a part of the body not decent to be named.

19 Manuscripts with the kinados of Aeschin. 3.167 emended to kinaidos: ma, ga. Worman (n. 1 [2004]), 16 and (n. 1 [2008]), 261 takes this passage as reading kinaidos.

20 On laughter in the courtroom, see Halliwell, S., ‘The uses of laughter in Greek culture’, CQ 41 (1991), 279–96CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 292–4. We might compare the laughter provoked by Timarchus’ and Autolycus’ (unintentional) double entendres in the Assembly (Aeschin. 1.80–4); on the meaning of these double entendres, see Fisher (n. 14), ad loc.

21 On the uproar caused by juries in general, see Bers, V., ‘Dikastic thorubos’, in Cartledge, P.A. and Harvey, F.D. (edd.), Crux: Essays in Greek History Presented to G.E.M. de Ste. Croix on his 75th Birthday (London, 1985), 1–15Google Scholar; on the role played by bystanders in the courtroom, see Lanni, A., ‘Spectator sport or serious politics? οἱ περιεστηκότες and the Athenian law courts’, JHS 117 (1997), 183–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

22 That such gyrations (κύκλῳ περιδινῶν σεαυτόν, ‘whirling yourself around in a circle’) were kinaidos-like is perhaps substantiated by a folk etymology of kinaidos: ‘moving one's genitals’ (κινεῖν τὰ αἰδοῖα; Etym. Magn., Zonar. s.v. κίναιδος). This description of Demosthenes may also have called to mind Aeschines’ earlier portrayal (in 346 b.c.e.) of the effeminate Timarchus performing gymnastics before the Assembly (Aeschin. 1.26).

23 See Worthington, I., ‘Greek oratory, revision of speeches and the problem of historical reliability’, C&M 42 (1991), 55–74Google Scholar on the revision of forensic speeches.

24 See also Worman (n.1 [2004]), 16 n. 49, who points out a number of other passages (1.66, 92, 95, 110) where Dinarchus echoes Aeschines’ portrait of Demosthenes.

25 See Winkler (n. 9), 64–70 for a discussion of ancient texts explaining the phenomenon of kinaidoi by nature (φύσει or κατὰ φύσιν).

26 On the effeminacy of flatterers, see Worman (n. 1 [2008]), 304–7.

27 I use ‘fag’ here in the North American sense of ‘effeminate gay man’.