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A Greek Carnival

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

D. S. Robertson
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Extract

In the discussion of Greek dramatic origins, a curious passage of Apuleius has never, so far as I know, been mentioned.

In the second book of the Metamorphoses the hero Lucius describes a feast given at Hypata in Thessaly by his rich relative Byrrhena. After the feast Byrrhena informs him that an annual festival, coeval with the city, will be celebrated next day—a joyous ceremony, unique in the world, in honour of the god Laughter. She wishes that he could invent some humorous freak for the occasion. Lucius promises to do his best. Being very drunk, he then bids Byrrhena good-night, and departs with his slave for the house of Milo, his miserly old host. A gust blows out their torch, and they get home with difficulty, arm in arm. There they find three large and lusty persone violently battering the door. Lucius has been warned by his mistress, Milo's slave Fotis, against certain young Mohawks of the town—‘uesana factio nobilissimorum iuuenum’—who think nothing of murdering rich strangers. He at once draws his sword, and one by one stabs all three. Fotis, roused by the noise, lets him in and he quickly falls asleep.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 39 , November 1919 , pp. 110 - 115
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1919

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References

1 Met. ii. 31–iii. 18.

2 ii. 18.

3 ‘Cum suis insignibus,’ iii. 11.

4 Cervantes perhaps had this incident in mind in Don Quixote, part i. ch. 35.

5 iii. 3.

6 iii. 1.

7 iii. 12.

8 iii. 15.

9 ii. 31.

10 ib.

11 So F. Haupt reads ‘inbueret,’ but Apuleius is fond of ‘induo’ in the sense of ‘adopting’ a strange form: cf. ii. 22 ‘uersipelles … muscas induunt,’ iii. 23 ‘cum semel auem … induero.’ Its use with ‘materiem’ is, however, difficult.

12 iii. 11.

13 Themis by J. E. Harrison, 1912, p. 341 ff.

14 iii. 11.

15 F has ‘auctorem & | torem suum’ (‘& torem’ crossed out by a later hand): Φ has ‘auctorem & tutorem’: ‘actorem’ (read by Helm) is due to Vollgraff.

16 Lucius' orgy with Fotis after her confession (iii. 20) is obviously a private affair, but it crowns with amusing propriety his day's religious adventure.

17 iii. 2.

18 To some extent Lucius doubles the rôles of victor and victim. He has to be in the limelight, and it is obvious that the Hypatines did not take their ritual very seriously.

19 Petron. ap. Serv. ad Verg. Aen. iii. 75.

20 iii. 9.

21 Philostr. Imag. i. 25, and on vases.

22 iii. 12.

23 ii. 16, iii. 27–29.

24 ix. 32.

25 x. 29.

26 xi. 14.

27 iii. 11. Cf. Florida 18, ‘solis annua reuerticula.’

28 Cf. Frazer, , Adonis, Attis, and Osiris, ed. 3, vol. i. p. 273Google Scholar; also Clemen, G. ‘Der Ursprung des Karnevals’ in Archiv für Religionswissenschaft, xvii. 1–2, pp. 139–158.Google Scholar

29 Vopisc. Aurel. i. 1.

30 Herodian, I. x. 5–7.

31 xi. 8.

32 It may be observed that certain features of the trial-scene, though explained by the story, are oddly reminiscent of the Thracian Carnival described by Dawkins, in J.H.S. xxvi. 1906, p. 191Google Scholar: the old woman in rags, the baby, the policemen, and the goatskins.