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THE CAUSE OF IDMON'S DEATH AT SENECA, MEDEA 652–3 AND AT VALERIUS FLACCUS 5.2–3
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 27 April 2020
Extract
‘The tale of the Argonauts was among the most popular myths in Greek and Roman literature of all periods.’ There was, however, not inconsiderable variation in certain aspects of the narrative: in the inclusion or exclusion of entire episodes; in (un)expected divergences from more authoritative versions of the story; and in the details of minutiae. In the Argonautic choral odes of Seneca's Medea (301–79 and 579–669), and in Valerius Flaccus’ incomplete epic, there is a conspicuous, learned engagement with much of the earlier tradition that hints at versions of the myth which are divergent from those that the two poets privilege in their respective narratives. Such moments serve to assert the playwright's and the epicist's status as docti poetae, and to engage the learned reader in a (re)negotiation of the tradition; at times, an awareness of a literary past seems to be given to particular characters too so as to heighten the reader's experience of the narrative—by a sort of prolepsis—as it unfolds.
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- Copyright © The Classical Association 2020
Footnotes
My thanks to Stephen Heyworth and Tobias Reinhardt for discussing aspects of this piece with me, and to CQ's reader for helpful comments. This piece was written whilst the author was the grateful holder of a postdoctoral fellowship from the British Academy.
References
2 Zissos, A., Valerius Flaccus’ Argonautica Book 1 (Oxford, 2008), xviiGoogle Scholar.
3 e.g. Valerius’ exclusion of the Stymphalian birds (cf. Ap. Rhod. Argon. 2.1030–89), and his addition of Aeson's and Alcimede's suicides (Val. Fl. 1.752–826).
4 For an overview of versions of the Argonautic myth, and for Seneca's and Valerius’ respective explorations of the tradition, see Boyle, A.J., Seneca: Medea (Oxford, 2014), lxi–lxxviii and Zissos (n. 2), xvii–xxviGoogle Scholar; for Valerian mythopoesis, see Clauss, J.J., ‘Myth and mythopoesis in Valerius Flaccus’ Argonautica’, in Heerink, M. and Manuwald, G. (edd.), Brill's Companion to Valerius Flaccus (Leiden, 2014), 99–114Google Scholar.
5 e.g. at 451–3, Seneca has Medea refer to the scattering of her brother's limbs over the arua of her father's kingdom (cf. Ov. Her. 6.129–30), but, at 133, she asserts that his dismembered body was scattered over the pontus (cf. Pherec. FGH 3 frr. 32a and 32b τὸν Ἄψυρτον καὶ μελίσαντας ῥῖψαι εἰς τὸν ποταμόν; Apollod. Bibl. 1.9.24 has the ambiguous βυθός, which could refer to the sea: μελίσασα κατὰ τοῦ βυθοῦ ῥίπτει). (On the many versions of Apsyrtus’ death, see Bremmer, J.N., ‘Why did Medea kill her brother Apsyrtus?’, in Clauss, J.J. and Johnston, S.I. [edd.], Medea: Essays on Medea in Myth, Literature, Philosophy, and Art [Princeton, 1997], 83–100)Google Scholar. I have tentatively wondered whether we should read campo for ponto at Med. 133, though remain unconvinced of the need for emendation.
6 One might think of the forceful assertion made by Medea as she girds herself to kill her children in Seneca's play: Medea nunc sum; creuit ingenium malis (910). She is ‘now’ the person that a reader familiar with the tradition expects her to be; it is at this moment that she embodies the traits of the figure who has committed such hideous acts each time a version of her story is recounted that she was, for Cicero, a byword for all that is repellent: he uses the words Palatina Medea to describe Clodia at Cael. 18. (A character's familiarity with their own literary past, often used by the author for ironic effect, is not uncommon in Ovid's Heroides.)
7 The lemma is taken from the OCT of Zwierlein, O., L. Annaei Senecae Tragoediae (Oxford, 1986)Google Scholar.
8 Arg. Orph. 722–5: ἔνθα καὶ αἶσα παρέσχε καταφθίσθαι δύο φῶτας, | Ἴδμον’ Ἀβαντιάδην <τε> κυβερνητῆρά τε Τῖφυν⋅ | τοῦ μὲν δὴ κατὰ σῶμα λυγρὴ ἠρείσατο νοῦσος, | τὸν δ<ὲ κατ>έκτανε θήρ, σῦς ἄγριος.
9 Ov. Ib. 503–4: quique Lycurgiden letauit, et arbore natum, | Idmonaque audacem, te quoque rumpat aper (cf. scholia ad loc.).
10 Apollod. Bibl. 1.9.23: οἱ δὲ Ἀργοναῦται πρὸς Μαριανδυνοὺς παρεγένοντο, κἀκεῖ φιλοφρόνως ὁ βασιλεὺς ὑπεδέξατο Λύκος. ἔνθα θνήσκει μὲν Ἴδμων ὁ μάντις πλήξαντος αὐτὸν κάπρου, θνήσκει δὲ καὶ Τῖφυς, καὶ τὴν ναῦν Ἀγκαῖος ὑπισχνεῖται κυβερνᾶν.
11 Hyg. Fab. 18: Argonautae dum apud Lycum morantur et stramentatum exissent, Idmon Apollinis filius ab apro percussus interiit, in cuius dum diutius sepultura moratur, Tiphys Phorbantis filius moritur (cf. 14.26).
12 Naupactica fr. 5 Davies (fr. 5 West; Σ Ap. Rhod. Argon. 3.523–4); fr. 6 Davies (fr. 6 West; ΣL Ap. Rhod. Argon. 4.66); and fr. 7 Davies (frr. 6–7 West; Σ Ap. Rhod. Argon. 4.86).
13 Eumelus, Corinthiaca fr. 4 Davies (fr. 21 West; Σ Ap. Rhod. Argon. 3.1354–7): οὗτος καὶ οἱ ἑξῆς στίχοι εἰλημμένοι εἰσὶ παρ’ Εὐμήλου, παρ’ ὧι φησι Μήδεια πρὸς Ἴδμονα [uel Ἰάσωνα]. The textual tradition of the scholia is divided and editors have presumably printed Ἴδμονα (L) rather than Ἰάσωνα (P) on the grounds that the former is the lectio difficilior. Michelazzo, F., ‘Il ruolo de Medea in Apollonio Rodio e un frammento di Eumelo’, Prometheus 1 (1975), 38–48Google Scholar, at 40–3 has argued (persuasively to my mind) in support of reading Ἰάσωνα.
14 pace Heinsius, D. in his ‘Animadversationes et Notae’, in Scriverius, P., L. Annaeus Seneca, Tragicus (Leiden, 1621), 328–30Google Scholar. He argues forcefully, though not persuasively, that Med. 652–69 are spurious: on 652 he writes: ‘Hactenus Seneca. Quae sequuntur usque ad finem, paedogoguli cuiusdam sunt. Qui hoc tamen est consecutus, ut impune eruditioribus illuderet. At quos viros haec non vidisse! Nam quot verba, tot mendacia, anachronismi, stribligines, ineptiae … Nescio utrum magis me misereat illius qui haec scripsit, an eorum qui hactenus Senecae attribuerunt.’ It should also be noted, in relation to the verses under discussion in this article, that the stanzaic structure of the ode strongly supports maintenance of them. From 607, stanzas are constituted of eight Sapphic hendecasyllabic verses followed by an Adoneus. There are a number of complicated issues surrounding the text at the close of the stanza beginning with the death of Idmon (see O. Zwierlein, ‘Weiteres zum Seneca Tragicus (II)’, WJA 4 [1978], 143–60, at 148–51), but it seems more than likely that the strict stanzaic pattern should be retained until the end of the ode.
15 Costa, C.D.N., Seneca: Medea (Oxford, 1973), 126Google Scholar; cf. Leo, F., L. Annaei Senecae Tragoediae (Berlin, 1878), 1.24–5Google Scholar, who considers a number of conjectures (of which only Peiper's—see below—is remotely plausible to my mind) before asserting that the vulgate ‘et verissimum est nec iam ab ullo libro lacessitum’.
16 Hine, H.M., Seneca: Medea (Warminster, 2000), 173Google Scholar; cf. Németi, A., Lucio Anneo Seneca: Medea (Florence, 2003), 232–3Google Scholar.
17 Biondi, G.G., Il Nefas Argonautico: Mythos e Logos nella Medea di Seneca (Bologna, 1984), 187–8Google Scholar. He asserts that the Calydonian boar killed Meleager rather than Ancaeus. This is not what Seneca wrote (strauit Ancaeum uiolentus ictu | saetiger; fratrem, Meleagre, matris | impius mactas morerisque dextra | matris iratae, 643–6), and it was, moreover, Meleager who killed the boar. (Boyle [n. 4], 291 seems to share the view put forward by Biondi that the ‘standard’ accounts of the deaths of Idmon and Mopsus were intentionally confused.)
18 Henderson, J., ‘Poetic technique and rhetorical amplification: Seneca Medea 579–669’, Ramus 12 (1983), 94–113CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 107.
19 See n. 14.
20 Koetschau, P., ‘Zu Seneca's Tragoedien’, Philologus 61 (1902), 133–59CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 137–8.
21 Zwierlein, O., Kritischer Kommentar zu den Tragödien Senecas (Stuttgart, 1986), 151Google Scholar.
22 Peiper, R. and Richter, G., L. Annaei Senecae Tragoediae (Leipzig, 1867)Google Scholar.
23 e.g. the Nemaean lion ([Sen.] HO 1193) or the Lernaean hydra (Lucr. 5.26); cf. TLL 10.1.1930.59–1931.8.
24 HF 1084; Tro. 584; Med. 681 (where snakes may also be implicit), 720; Phaed. 210 (of libido); Oed. 4, 55, 152, 589, 1060; Thy. 89.
25 Tro. 628 (of Astyanax), 892 (of Helen).
26 Med. 355 (of the Sirens); cf. Verg. Aen. 3.215 of the Harpies and 3.620 of Polyphemus.
27 Ag. 557 (of shallow straits as a pestis for sailors).
28 Giardina, G., Tragedie: Lucio Anneo Seneca (Pisa, 2007), 1.293Google Scholar. He also prints Phrygiis for Libycis, comparing Catull. 46.4; this takes us further from the paradosis than Lyciis, and is less felicitous in the light of the presence of Lycus in most accounts.
29 Indeed, the term uerres is not used by the majority of poets, but cf. Hor. Carm. 3.22.6–8: quam [pinum] per exactos ego laetus annos | uerris obliquum meditantis ictum | sanguine donem.
30 cf. TLL 8.1449.71–1450.34.
31 For the intrusion of apparent glosses into the Senecan paradosis, cf. HF 659–60 and Tro. 921–2 with Zwierlein (n. 21), 55–6 and 104–5 respectively.
32 The lemma is taken from Courtney, E., C. Valerius Flaccus: Argonauticon Libri Octo (Leipzig, 1970)Google Scholar.
33 Liberman, G., Valerius Flaccus, Argonautiques: Chants V–VIII (Paris, 2002), 159Google Scholar supports (and prints) Löhbach's conjecture, non conscius; for a persuasive defence of the transmitted non inscius, see Spaltenstein, F., Commentaire des Argonautica de Valérius Flaccus (livres 3, 4 et 5) (Collection Latomus 281) (Brussels, 2004), 390Google Scholar.
34 Courtney (n. 32) wonders, in his apparatus criticus ad loc., whether morbo should be read for morbis. Besides the juxtaposition of Fata and Morbus at Sen. Oed. 1059 (where they are joined by Macies, Pestis and Dolor), the only other instance of the pairing of fatum and morbus is in a figurative usage at Sall. [Ad Caes. sen.] 2.13.6: quippe si morbo iam aut fato huic imperio secus accidat, cui dubium est quin per orbem terrarum uastitas bella caedes oriantur?
35 Wijsman, H.J.W., Valerius Flaccus, Argonautica, Book V: A Commentary (Mnemosyne Supplements 158) (Leiden, 1996), 15CrossRefGoogle Scholar. He cites uolnere labens at Luc. 2.265, but these words refer to a man stumbling after being wounded by what cannot, in the light of the context, be a fatal blow: quis nolet in isto | ense mori, quamuis alieno uolnere labens, | et scelus esse tuum? (2.264–6); cf. Fantham, E., Lucan: De Bello Ciuili Book II (Cambridge, 1992), 129Google Scholar: ‘[t]he … man [wounded by another] seeking his death blow from Cato is a pointed perversion of the epic situation in which a warrior, killed by an Achilles or Aeneas, takes comfort from their greatness.’
36 Stephen Heyworth has suggested leto as an exempli gratia conjecture.
37 For the corruption of one form into an adjacent one (morbo > morbis) under the influence of a neighbouring word (fatis), cf. Val. Fl. 4.593, where futuris is transmitted as futuros in V, presumably under the influence of the preceding animos.
38 A recent treatment and overview may be found in Buckley, E., ‘Valerius Flaccus and Seneca's tragedies’, in Heerink, M. and Manuwald, G. (edd.), Brill's Companion to Valerius Flaccus (Leiden, 2014), 307–25Google Scholar.