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II. Menander

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2016

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The authoritative text of Menander is now Sandbach’s Oxford Text (1972), which unites in one volume all the extant papyrus remains, apart from a few of the tattiest scraps, from the seventeen plays of known or generally agreed title, and adds as a supplement several other papyrus fragments which have been attributed to Menander, together with the longer passages cited by ancient authors from Menander’s plays. This text is admirably complemented by the commentary of Gomme and Sandbach (Oxford, 1973). Many earlier editions, however, retain their value; Lefebvre’s 1911 publication of the Cairo papyrus includes photographs, Körte’s third Teubner edition (volume I: 1955, with addenda by Thierfelder) was standard in its day, Del Corno’s incomplete edition (Milan, 1966) contains a good introduction and useful analyses of the included plays. Noteworthy editions of individual plays include: Aspis and Samia, Austin (Berlin Kleine Texte 188a, 188b: text 1969, interpretative comments 1970); Dis Exapaton, Handley (BICS Supplement 22, forthcoming); Dyskolos, Handley (London, 1965: the standard commentary), Jacques (Budé: Paris, 1963), Lloyd-Jones (Oxford Text, 1960), J. Martin (second edition: Paris, 1972), Treu (Tusculum: Munich, 1960); Epitrepontes, Wilamowitz (Berlin, 1925: reprint 1958); Karchedonios, Kolax, Misoumenos, Austin (Comicorum Graecorum Fragmenta in Papyris Reperta: Berlin, 1973); Samia, Dedoussi (Cairo fragments, with commentary in demoticGreek: Athens, 1965), Jacques (Budé: Paris, 1971); Sikyonioi, Kassel (Berlin Kleine Texte 185, 1965). The fragments quoted by ancient authors are collected by Körte in the second Teubner volume (second edition 1959, with addenda by Thierfelder). The monostichs which early in the Christian era were claimed to derive from Menander’s plays have been edited by Jäkel (Teubner, 1964), with amendments and supplementary material in Hagedorn and Weber, ZPE iii (1968), 15-50.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1975

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References

Notes

1. This list is highly selective. I deliberately omit general works on Hellenistic literature and Greco-Roman drama, and highly specialized studies on (e.g.) vocabulary.

2. See the Gomme-Sandbach commentary, on 430—41, for the most recent discussion.

3. The many, equally valuable, papers in other languages are listed, play by play, in Mette’s Lustrum bibliographies.

4. The testimonia are collected in Körte’s edition, ii2 p. 1 ff., especially nos. 2, 7, 8, 9.

5. On the chorus in new comedy see Maidment, , CQ xxix (1935), 1 ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Webster, Studies in Later Greek Comedy, 58 ff.; Handley on Men. Dysk. 230 ff.; the Gomme-Sandbach commentary, pp. 12, 199, 301. On the five-act structure see Blanchard, , REG lxxxiii (1970/1), 38 ffCrossRefGoogle Scholar.

6. On the so-called three-actor rule’ in Menander, , see Pickard-Cambridge, Dramatic Festivals of Athens (2nd edition: Oxford, 1968), 154 ff.Google Scholar; Handley’s edition of Men. Dysk., p. 25 ff.; the Gomme-Sandbach commentary, p. 16 ff. An article on the evidence provided by the Roman adaptations from Menander has been compiled by Sandbach for the Préaux, Festschrift. 7. Vit. Eur. xxxix. 7.Google Scholar Cf. also Quintilian, x.1.69.

8. 69-71 Dindorf (Scholia, p. xxviii).

9. Cf. especially Webster, Studies in Menander, 153 ff.

10. There are now many studies devoted to several of the more important stereotypes. A selective list might include the following. Cook/џауечзоч: Dohm, , Mageiros (Zetemata xxxii: Munich, 1964)Google Scholar; Giannini, , Acme xiii (1960), 135216 Google Scholar; Treu, , Philologus cii (1958), 215-39Google Scholar. Hetaira: Hauschild, , Die Gestalt der Hetäre in der griechischen Komödie (Diss. Leipzig, 1933)Google Scholar. Leno: Stotz, , De lenonis in comoedia figura (Diss. Giessen, 1912 Google Scholar: Darmstadt, 1920). Old Men: MacCary, , ТАРА cii (1971), 303-25Google Scholar. Old Women: Oeri, , Der Typ der komischen Alten in der griechischen Komödie (Diss. Basel, 1945)Google Scholar. Parasite: Lofberg, , CPh xv (1920), 6172 Google Scholar; Ribbeck, , Kolax: eine ethologische Studie (Abh. ix, Leipzig, 1884)Google Scholar. Slaves: Harsh, , ТАРА lxxxvi (1955), 135-42Google Scholar; Langer, , De servi persona apud Menandrum (Diss. Bonn, 1919)Google Scholar; MacCary, , ТАРА c (1969), 277-94Google Scholar. Soldier: Hanson, , ‘The Glorious Military’, in Dudley, and Dorey, , The Roman Drama (London, 1965), 5185 Google Scholar; Hofmann, and Wartenberg, , Der Bramarbas in der antiken Komödie (Abh. Akad. Wiss. DDR, Berlin, 1973)Google Scholar; MacCary, , AJP xciii (1972), 279-98Google Scholar; Ribbeck, , Alazon: ein Beitrag zur antiken Ethologie (Leipzig, 1882)Google Scholar.

11. Arnott, , GRBS ix (1968), 161-68Google Scholar.

12. Cf.Wehrli, , Motivstudien zur griechischen Komödie (Zurich and Leipzig, 1936)Google Scholar, an important study which argued that a number of characteristic New Comedy motifs-contrasted brothers, rivalry between father and son, the love interest itself—derived from Old Comedy, rather than from tragedy.

13. Cf.Arnott, , Hermes xciii (1965), 253 ff.Google Scholar

14. Cf.Handley, in Entretiens Hardt xvi (1970), 175.Google Scholar

15. Cf. Handley (n. 14 above), 24.

16. Cf. Webster, Studies in Later Greek Comedy, 77.

17. Cf.Arnott, , Gnomon xlii (1970), 25 Google Scholar; xlvi (1974), 12. Other parallels are discussed by Webster, Studies in Menander, 188 f.; Handley (n. 14 above), 20 ff.

18. Cf. particularly Webster, Studies in Menander, 153 ff.; Handley (n. 14 above), 20 ff.; Sandbach, ibid., 124 ff.

19. Cf. Handley (n. 14 above), 22 f. and BICS xii (1965), 47 ff.; Kassel, , Eranos lxiii (1965), 8 f.Google Scholar; Lloyd-Jones, , GRBS vii (1966), 140 f.Google Scholar; Arnott, , G & R xix (1972), 74 f.Google Scholar; Sandbach’s commentary, ad loc.

20. The name is not quite certain: for a discussion, see Sandbach’s commentary on Sik. 184.

21. The bibliography is large. The most judicious survey of Menander’s relation to philosophy is Gaiser, , Antike und Abendland xiii (1967), 8 ffGoogle Scholar. Barigazzi’s useful book, La formazione spirituale di Menandro (Turin, 1965)Google Scholar, rather overstresses Menander’s debt to the Peripatetics, as his reviewers showed: e.g. Sandbach, , Gnomon xxxix (1967), 238 ff.Google Scholar; Gigante, in Palmer, and Hamerton-Kelly, , Philomathes (The Hague, 1971), 461 ffCrossRefGoogle Scholar. Other helpful discussions include Tierney, , Proc. R. Irish Acad. lxiii/c (1935/7), 249 ff.Google Scholar; Webster, Studies in Menander, 195 ff.; Del Corno’s introduction to his edition of Menander, 39 ff.; Wehrli, , Entretiens Hardt xvi (1970), 147 ff.Google Scholar

22. Cf. Handley on Dysk. 864; Turner, in Entretiens Hardt xvi (1970), 29 f.Google Scholar

23. Turner (n. 22 above), 153.

24. See below, III. 8.

25. Cf. also Etn. Nic. 1160b24 ff.

26. See below, III. 8.

27. Anderson, , G & R xvii (1970), 199 ff.Google Scholar, argues that the Dyskolos applies to comedy those doctrines which Aristotle’s Poetics elaborates for classical tragedy.

28. E.g. Wehrli (n. 21 above), 103 f.

29. Cf.Ludwig, , Entretiens Hardt xvi (1970), 90 f.Google Scholar; Gaiser, , Grazer Beiträge i (1973), 122 ffGoogle Scholar. Tierney and Webster (n. 21 above) also make some valuable points.

30. Wright, , Studies in Menander (Diss. Princeton, 1911), 1 ff.Google Scholar; Werres, , Die Beteuerungsformeln in der attischen Komödie (Diss. Bonn, 1936)Google Scholar.

31. Cf. Ludwig, (n. 29 above), 45 ff.; Gaiser, (n. 29 above), 122 ff.; Arnott, , Gnomon xlvi (1974), 12 f.Google Scholar

32. Cf. Sandbach’s commentary, 21 ff.

33. Cf.Préaux, , Chronique d’Egypte xxxii (1957), 84 ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Del Corno’s introduction to his edition of Menander, 58 f.

34. The Samia provides the clearest illustration, with Demeas going wrong because he is quick-witted and wants to believe well of Moschion; Nikeratos, because he is imperceptive; and Moschion, because he is selfish, impulsive, and unable to think through all the consequences of an action. Cf. Turner, (n. 22 above), 171 f.; Arnott, , Leeds University Review xiii (1970), 15 ff.Google Scholar; Jacques’ edition of the play (Paris, 1971), xxvii ff.

35. Cf.Körte, , Die Menschen Henanders (SB Leipzig 89/3, 1937)Google Scholar; Kraus, , Wiener Humanistische Blätter xiii (1971), 7 ffGoogle Scholar.

36. Contrast Lloyd-Jones, , GRBS xii (1971), 195 Google Scholar, with Gaiser, (n. 29 above), 129 n. 47.

37. The quotation is from part 3, chapter 6.

38. Post, , AJP lxxx (1959), 410 Google Scholar. The idea is developed in Handley, (n. 14 above), 8 ff.

39. Arnott, , Phoenix xviii (1964), 110 ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

40. Moralia, 347f (= testimonium 11 in the second volume of the Körte-Thierfelder Teubner edition of Menander, p. 3). Cf.Wilamowitz, , Das Schiedsgericht (Berlin, 1925), 119 Google Scholar; Corbato, , Note sulla poetica menandrea (University of Trieste, Istituto di Filologia Classica, 1959)Google Scholar.

41. The bibliography is large. Cf.Turner, , Rylands Bulletin xlii (1959), 254 Google Scholar; Thierfelder, , Knemon, Demea, Micio, in Menandrea: Miscellanea Philologica (Genoa, 1960), 108 f.Google Scholar; Kraus’ introduction to this edition of the play (Vienna, 1960), 20 ff.; Schäfer, , Menanders Dyskolos: Untersuchungen zur dramatischen Technik (Meisenheim am Gian, 1965), 66 ff.Google Scholar; MacCary, , ТАРА cii (1971), 306 Google Scholar; the commentaries on the play by Handley and Sandbach, ad loc.

42. Webster, , Rylands Bulletin xlv (1962), 237 ff.Google Scholar; Handley, (n. 14 above), 5 f.

43. On the structure of the Dyskolos, see especially Schäfer (n. 41 above), 75 ff.

44. Cf. Treu’s edition of the Dyskolos (Munich, 1960), 135; Handley, , Menander and Plautus: A Study in Comparison (London, 1968), 20 n. 8Google Scholar. Sandbach’s scepticism about the function of this echo device (commentary ad loc.) is perhaps surprising, in view of the existence of other links here subsidiary and additional to the Phyle one.

45. Handley, (n. 14 above), 10 ff.

46. Cf.Tarn, , Hellenistic Civilisation (3rd edition: London, 1952), 273 Google Scholar. The permutations are well presented by Mette, , Lustrum x (1965), 100 ffGoogle Scholar.

47. Cf.Del Corno, , Maia xxii (1970), 336 ff.Google Scholar; Handley (n. 14 above), 5f., 20; Préaux, , Chronique d’Egypte xxxii (1957), 84 ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Webster, , Rylands Bulletin xlv (1962), 240 fGoogle Scholar.

48. MacCary, , TAPA ci (1970), 277 ff.Google Scholar, is basic here. Cf. Del Corno’s edition of Menander (Milan, 1966), 57 ff.; Jacques, Bulletin Budé (1969), 200 ff.; Mette, , Lustrum x (1965), 22 ff.Google Scholar

49. Cf.MacCary, , AJP xciii (1972), 281 ffGoogle Scholar.

50. Cf.Arnott, , G & R xvii (1970), 32 ff.Google Scholar; Sandbach, , Entretiens Hardt xvi (1970), 111 ffGoogle Scholar. Wilamowitz has some interesting remarks in his edition of the Epitrepontes (Das Schiedsgericht), 151 ff.