Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre

Overview of Greek Drama

• Tragedy and Satyr Plays emerge at the
same time in late pre-Classical Athens
– but in retrospect, Tragedy seems to come first
• the works of only three Major Classical
Tragedians survive:
– Aeschylus (525-456 BCE)
– Sophocles (495-406 BCE)
– Euripides (485-406 BCE)
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Overview of Greek Drama
• the earliest known type of comic drama is
the Satyr Play
• “Old Comedy” is first presented at the
Dionysia in 486 BCE
• first extant Old Comedies are by
Aristophanes (mid-400’s – 386 BCE)
– Cratinus (active from 440’s-420’s BCE)
– Eupolis (active ca. 429-410 BCE)
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Overview of Greek Drama
• in the post-Classical period (after 404
BCE) tragedy begins to decline
• comedy dominates Greek theatre
– Middle Comedy (390’s- 320’s BCE)
– New Comedy (after the 320’s BCE)
• the greatest playwright of New Comedy
was Menander (344-291 BCE)
– but his work survives largely on papyrus
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Where were plays produced in
antiquity?
• Can we expect to find specially built
“theatres” for the earliest dramas?
• What should we look for in early venues
where drama might have happened?
– space for acting/impersonation
– space for seating/viewing
Knossos (Crete)
Knossos (Crete)
Reconstruction of Knossos
Open Space at Knossus
Open Space at Knossus
Open Space at Knossus
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Theatre of Dionysus (Athens)
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Theatre of Dionysus (Athens)
ORCHESTRA SKENE

THEATRON
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Theatre of Dionysus (Athens)
THEATRON

ORCHESTRA
SKENE
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Theatre of Thorikos (orchestra)
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Theatre of Thorikos (orchestra)
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Theatre of Thorikos (orchestra)
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Theatre of Dionysus (theatron)
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Theatre of Dionysus (theatron)
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Theatre of Dionysus (theatron)
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Skene
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Skene
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Special Effects
Ekkyklema: a rolling platform
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Special Effects
Mechane: a crane used to lift actors into the
air and fly them across the stage
• not necessary in plays until the 420’s BCE
– but the end of Euripides’ Medea (431 BCE)?
• how did it work, e.g. actor twisting on rope?
• when not in use, was it hidden from view?
– i.e. how illusionistic was Classical Greek theatre
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
How were Greek tragedies
presented?
• How many at a time?
– Trilogies
– actually tetralogies: 3 tragedies + satyr play
• In what style?
– Little opportunity for Interiority
– Presentationalism
• cf. courtroom trials
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
How were Greek tragedies
presented?
• Who paid for the production?
– Choregos (“producer”)
– a rich man required to do public service
• What was the playwright’s job?
– Chorodidaskalos (“chorus-teacher”)
– i.e. he taught the songs/dances to the chorus
– and originally he acted in the play himself
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Masks
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Masks
• masks allow for multiple-role playing
• three-actor rule
– protagonist
– deuteragonist
– tritagonist
• why only three?
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Voices
• must have been the actor’s principal tool
– cf. modern opera singers
• how difficult would it have been for the
audience to know which actor was
speaking at any moment?
– with masked actors at some distance
– thus, few trialogues, and all are found in later
Classical tragedy
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
Stichomythy (“line-talking”)
• predictable pattern of conversation based
on poetic meter
• e.g. Euripides’ Hippolytus (347-352)
Phaedra:  What thing is this that men call love? 
Nurse:  It’s sweetest, child, and bitter too.
Phaedra:   I’ve only known the latter, Nurse.
Nurse:      What’s that? Oh, you’re in love? With whom?
Phaedra:  That man, born from an Amazon . . .
Nurse:      Hippolytus? . . . 
Phaedra:   . . . Quoth you, not I!
Chapter 6: Greek Classical Theatre
The Finale of Euripides’ Orestes
Apollo
(the sun)
Apollo on
Orestes mechane,
on roof with mute
of skene, Helen
with mutes
playing
other roles Menelaus
on stage,
with army
Chorus in (secondary
Orchestra chorus)
 Overview of
Greek Tragedy
• evidence of many playwrights 
producing tragedies during the Classical 
Age, not just the three whose work is 
preserved
• e.g. Agathon who is mentioned Plato’s 
Symposium
• the same is true for comedy: not just 
Aristophanes, Cratinus and Eupolis
 Pre-Aeschylean
Tragedy
• inscriptions (epigraphical evidence)
• e.g. the Athenian victory lists
• also, the Parian Marble
– ca. 275 BCE: history of Greece, mainly 
Athens
– includes tragedy
 Pre-Aeschylean
Tragedy
• early tragedians: Choerilus and Pratinas
– no long quotes; few titles of plays known
• the best known pre‐Aeschylean tragic 
playwright is Phrynichus
– The Siege of Miletus: fined for causing the 
Miletus
Athenian people “too much grief”
– The Phoenician Women: opens with a 
The Phoenician Women
servant arranging chairs
 Aeschylus

• The Life and Times of Aeschylus
• Aeschylus’ Contributions to Greek 
Tragedy
• Aeschylus’ Agamemnon
• The Other Surviving Tragedies by 
Aeschylus
 Aeschylus
Life and Times

• the first tragedian whose work survives 
is Aeschylus (ca. 525 BCE ‐ 456 BCE)
• according to his tombstone,  Aeschylus 
fought in the Persian Wars
• but it does not mention his drama
• according to him, then, his most 
important achievement in life was 
fighting for freedom, not writing plays
 Aeschylus
Life and Times

• Aeschylus won the Dionysia for the first 
time in 484 BCE
• he produced his last known trilogy in 
458 BCE: Oresteia (including Agamemnon)
• he wrote and produced over eighty 
plays during his life 
• thus, he entered the Dionysia at least 
twenty times
 Aeschylus
Life and Times

• but only seven of his plays have survived
• nevertheless, we can see that he was the 
most important playwright of his day
– he won five or more victories at the Dionysia
– later playwrights often referenced and 
imitated—and satirized!—his work
– the audiences of the next generation enjoyed 
revivals of his drama
 Aeschylus
Contributions to Drama

• Aeschylus introduced the second actor 
(hypocrites/deuteragonist) to the stage
• thus, he was the inventor of dialogue in 
the conventional sense of the word, i.e. 
between actors (vs. actor and chorus)
• later, the principal actor came to be 
called the protagonist (“first contender”)
 Aeschylus
Contributions to Drama

• Aeschylus focused on creating language 
that was effective and affecting on stage
• his poetry is lofty, ornate and complex
• indeed, it is some of the most difficult to 
understand but most beautiful Greek 
ever written, cf. Shakespeare 
• at times, his imagery is so dense that it 
was rumored he wrote his plays drunk!
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• Aeschylus’ Agamemnon is the first 

tragedy in the Oresteia trilogy 
• in Agamemnon, Clytemnestra kills her 
husband Agamemnon when he comes 
back from Troy in triumph
• in the next play of the trilogy (The 
Libation‐Bearers), Agamemnon’s son 
Orestes returns and murders his mother 
Clytemnestra in revenge
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• in the final play of the Oresteia trilogy 
(The Eumenides), Orestes is put on trial 
Eumenides
and acquitted of Clytemnestra’s murder
• this trilogy is Aeschylus’ greatest work
• it was composed only two years or so 
before his death
• this shows that he stayed active in 
theatre and was a vital creative force 
well into later life
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• not only did Aeschylus write and 
choreograph The Oresteia but he acted in 
it at its premiere
• most likely, he played Clytemnestra, the 
main character in Agamemnon
• even though there are no trialogues in 
the play, the dramatic action requires 
that there be at least two other actors
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• one actor must play Clytemnestra (the 
protagonist’s role), one must play 
Agamemnon and one must play 
Cassandra
• these three characters appear on stage in 
the one scene together
• a breakdown of the division of roles 
among actors shows why this is so
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon
Actor 1 Actor 2 Actor 3
Watchman Prologue: The long wait for 
Agamemnon to return
CHORAL ODE: The Chorus remembers Iphigenia
Clytemnestra The Beacon Speech: The
Greeks have won at Troy
CHORAL ODE: The Chorus thanks the gods for victory
Clytemnestra Herald A Report from Troy: The
Greeks are returning
CHORAL ODE: The Chorus remembers Helen 
Clytemnestra Agamemnon (Cassandra)* Clytemnestra greets 
Agamemnon
*Cassandra does not speak during this scene
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon
Actor 1 Actor 2 Actor 3
Clytemnestra Agamemnon (Cassandra)* Clytemnestra goes inside 
the palace with Agamemnon 
CHORAL ODE: The Chorus has a sense of foreboding doom
Clytemnestra (Cassandra)* Clytemnestra tries to make
Cassandra come inside
Cassandra Cassandra foresees her own
and Agamemnon’s deaths
CHORAL ODE: The Chorus hears Agamemnon being murdered
Clytemnestra Clytemnestra (on the 
ekkyklema) gloats over
Agamemnon’s body
Clytemnestra Aegisthus Aegisthus and the 
Chorus quarrel
*Cassandra does not speak during this scene
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• the play opens with a servant—a 
Watchman—waiting for his master 
Agamemnon’s return from Troy
• the Watchman speaks from the roof of 
the palace (the skene building)
• the time is dawn—plays at the Dionysia 
began when the sun rose
• in the darkness, the Watchman’s voice 
sounds as if the palace itself is speaking
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• the chorus of Argive elders enters next
• it is composed of elders because old men 
and young boys were the only males left 
in Argos during the Trojan War
• once the chorus enters, it spends the 
entirety of the play on stage singing and 
dancing
• and helping no one at all!
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• Aeschylus’ odes are densely packed 
with imagery and poetic expressions:
Since the young vigor that urges
inward to the heart
is frail as age, no warcraft yet perfect,
while beyond age, leaf
withered, man goes three footed
no stronger than a child is,
a dream that falters in daylight.
Aeschylus, Agamemnon 76‐83
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• at some point during the first choral ode, 
Clytemnestra enters
• it is difficult to determine her precise 
movements in this play, which is 
unusual in Greek tragedy
• normally, all characters’ entrances and 
exits are announced
• by withholding these announcements, 
Aeschylus is showing her sneakiness
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• a Herald reports that the Greeks are 
returning
• Clytemnestra tells him to leave and send 
in Agamemnon
• the audience knows that, if Clytemnestra 
meets Agamemnon in the play, this actor 
will have to play him
• this is a highly sophisticated technique 
called metatheatre
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• when Clytemnestra finally meets 
Agamemnon, her speech is full of irony 
and concealed rage at her husband: 

Had Agamemnon taken all 
the wounds the tale whereof was carried home to me, 
he had been cut full of gashes like a fishing net.

(Agamemnon 866‐872) 
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• when Clytemnestra finally meets 
Agamemnon, her speech is full of irony 
and concealed rage at her husband: 

If he had died each time that rumor told his death, 
he must have been some triple‐bodied Geryon
back from the dead with threefold cloak of earth upon
his body, and killed once for every shape assumed.
(Agamemnon 866‐872)
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• to test whether Agamemnon knows 
about her plans and to see for herself 
how blindly self‐absorbed he is, 
Clytemnestra rolls out a purple carpet 
for him to walk on as he enters the 
palace
• the purple carpet is actually a collection 
of tapestries, i.e. textile artwork from 
inside the palace
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• the question Clytemnestra is asking 
herself is: Will Agamemnon commit 
hubris by walking on works of art?
• “as Priam might have, if he had won”? 
• the stripe of purple running up the stage 
into the palace is a symbol 
foreshadowing the blood that is about to 
pour out of the door
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• Agamemnon proves to be as full of 
himself as he is in Homer and treads the 
carpet as he proceeds inside the palace
• he walks on a symbol of his own blood!
• but first he makes Clytemnestra agree to 
take Cassandra inside the palace
• concubines are not a Greek custom so 
this is a terrible insult to his wife
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• but Clytemnestra is so pleased her husband 
does not know about her plan to kill him 
that she ignores the insult Cassandra 
represents to her wifely dignity and exults:
The sea is there, and who shall drain its yield? It breeds
precious as silver, ever of itself renewed,
the purple ooze wherein our garments shall be dipped.
And by God’s grace this house keeps full sufficiency
of all. Poverty is a thing beyond its thought.
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• Aeschylus’ treatment of Cassandra is 
one of best aspects of the play
• at first, she does not speak
• the original Greek audience would 
surely have concluded that this part is 
being played by a mute actor
• especially after the next scene when 
Clytemnestra tries to make her come 
inside the palace
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• but after remaining silent for two scenes 
and an entire choral ode, suddenly 
Cassandra not only speaks but sings!
• the actor playing Cassandra at the 
premiere was, no doubt, a famous singer 
in the day whom Aeschylus has kept 
hidden thus far behind Cassandra’s 
mask and costume
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• Cassandra can see the future and knows 
that Clytemnestra is going to kill her as 
well as Agamemnon
• she sees all time as happening at once
• for instance, when she approaches the 
doors of the palace, she sees and smells the 
flesh of children roasting
• they are Thyestes’ sons eaten by him a 
generation before in that very palace
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• in a brilliant stroke of theatre, Aeschylus 
shows how Cassandra can speak the 
future plainly but not be believed
• her first words in Greek come in a wild, 
off‐kilter meter called dochmiacs which 
make her sound insane
• but as the scene progresses, she calms 
down and begins to speak more clearly 
in a normal cadence (iambs)
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• but the clarity of her words comes too 
late to convince the chorus that her 
prophetic vision is valid
• the chorus has already made up its mind 
that she is a madwoman and so they do 
not listen to her
• thus, Aeschylus shows how Cassandra 
can speak the truth but not convince 
anyone to believe her
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• in frustration, Cassandra throws down 
her staff and tears off her holy garland 
and stomps on it
• this is an act of heresy against the god 
Apollo
• she can no longer bear living and turns 
to enter the palace, in full knowledge she 
will be killed inside
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• her last words are poignant: 

Yet once more will I speak, and not this time my own
death’s threnody. I call upon the Sun in prayer
against that ultimate shining when the avengers strike
these monsters down in blood, that they avenge as well
one simple slave who died, a small thing, lightly killed.

(Agamemnon 1327‐1330)   
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• her last words are poignant: 

Alas poor men, their destiny. When all goes well, 
a shadow will overthrow it. If it be unkind, 
one stroke of a wet sponge wipes all the picture out; 
and that is far the most unhappy thing of all. 

(Agamemnon 1327‐1330)   
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• almost immediately, the chorus hears 
Agamemnon’s cries as Clytemnestra is 
butchering him in his bath
• the chorus is confused and feeble, and 
they do nothing but debate what to do
• the doors of the palace open to reveal 
Clytemnestra (on the ekkyklema) covered 
in blood, gloating in triumph over 
Agamemnon’s body
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

Clytemnestra:
I struck him twice. In two great cries of agony
he buckled at the knees and fell. When he was down
I struck him the third blow, in thanks and reverence
to Zeus the lord of dead men underneath the ground.
Thus he went down, and the life struggled out of him;
and as he died he spattered me with the dark red
and violent driven rain of bitter savored blood 
to make me glad, as gardens stand among the showers
of God in glory at the birthtime of the buds.
 Aeschylus
Agamemnon

• the play ends with Clytemnestra singing 
a triumphant dirge (kommos) over 
Agamemnon’s corpse
• in the last scene, Aegisthus appears and 
quarrels with the chorus
• the final lines are trochaics (DUM‐da) 
which show an increased pace of action
 Aeschylus
Choephoroi (The Libation- Bearers)

• Orestes returns in disguise to Argos and 
runs into his sister Electra at the tomb of 
their father Agamemnon
• her (excessive) grief steels Orestes to do 
what he must, i.e. avenge their father’s 
death at his mother’s hand
• after killing Aegisthus, Orestes goes into 
town to confront Clytemnestra
 Aeschylus
Choephoroi (The Libation- Bearers)

• an old Nurse (Cilissa) recalls changing 
Orestes’ diapers (“Children’s young 
insides are a law to themselves”) but still 
agrees to help him
• when Orestes finally confronts 
Clytemnestra openly, she bares his 
breast to remind him where he came 
from and says: 
I think, child, that you mean to kill your mother!
 Aeschylus
Choephoroi (The Libation- Bearers)

• having killed his mother, Orestes sees 
the Furies rising from her blood and 
runs off the stage 
• end of Part 2 of The Oresteia
 Aeschylus
The Eumenides (The Furies)

• Orestes flees to Delphi (the seat of 
Apollo’s oracle), seeking the support of 
the god who ordered him to murder his 
mother
• around him lie an exhausted chorus of 
Furies (on the ekkyklema) who have been 
chasing him
• the ghost of Clytemnestra whips them 
awake and stirs them into “fury”
 Aeschylus
The Eumenides (The Furies)

• their opening dance was so frightening 
to the audience that one ancient source 
reports pregnant women in the theatre 
went into labor 
• Apollo appears and the scene changes to 
Athens
• where Athena agrees to serve as the 
judge in Orestes’ case
 Aeschylus
The Eumenides (The Furies)

• the Furies play the part of the prosecutor 
• Apollo acts as Orestes’ “defense 
attorney”
• in the end, Athena acquits him on the 
grounds that a mother is not a true 
parent but only the “field” in which a 
man sows his “seed” (the child)
• thus begins our long and glorious—and 
invariably just—judicial system
 Aeschylus
The Suppliants

• second play in a trilogy about the 
Danaids (“daughters of Danaus”)
• a myth about the resettlement of Greece 
by the descendants of Io (Isis of Egypt)
• best scene: their cousins abduct the 
Danaids (the chorus) on stage and force 
them to marry them 
 Aeschylus
Persae (The Persians)

• an in‐your‐face account of the Persians’
defeat in the Second Persian War
• how they must have suffered back in 
Persepolis though no Greek actually saw 
that happen
• the first and last “historical” play 
surviving from ancient Greek drama
• best scene: Atossa performs a séance and 
resurrects from hell the soul of Darius
 Aeschylus
The Seven Against Thebes

• a play about Polyneices and Eteocles, the 
incestuous offspring of Oedipus and 
Jocasta 
• they kill each other in battle
• best scene: a presentation of the shields 
of the defenders of Thebes
• the last scene was added later by some 
later hand (not Aeschylus!) to accord 
with Sophocles’ Antigone
 Aeschylus
Prometheus Bound

• perhaps the last play Aeschylus wrote
• for production in Sicily (where he died)?
• the new king of heaven, Zeus punishes 
the Titan Prometheus for giving fire to 
humankind
• opening scene: Hephaestus reluctantly 
nails his fellow “Titan” to a rock
• from there on throughout the play, 
Prometheus never moves!
 Aeschylus
Prometheus Bound

• a chorus of Oceanids (sea‐goddesses) 
and Oceanus (a fellow Titan) try to 
convince Prometheus to apologize to 
Zeus and reconcile with him 
• is this the staunch democrat Aeschylus’
condemnation of tyranny?
– Byzantine copyists were so incensed by the 
negative depiction of Zeus as a tyrant that 
they wrote derogatory verses in the margins 
of the text
 Aeschylus
Prometheus Bound

• next, another of Zeus’ victims appears: 
Io, the mortal girl whom Zeus loved and 
was changed into a cow to hide her 
(unsuccessfully) from Hera
• is Aeschylus again condemning the 
sexual excesses of tyrants?
• in any case, the cow‐girl being chased by 
an invisible gadfly is a powerful effect 
on stage
 Aeschylus
Prometheus Bound

• the play ends with the appearance of 
Hermes (“Zeus’ lackey”) who tries to 
force Prometheus to give in 
• when the Titan refuses, the stage 
swallows him up
• how was that done on the ancient stage?
• cf. the story of Satan (“bringer of fire”)
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
How old is Greek Comedy?
• several humorous scenes in Homer
– Dios Apate (“The Seduction of Zeus”): Iliad
(Book 14)
– Ares and Aphrodite: Odyssey (Book 8)
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Comedy in Drama
• komoidia: “party-song” (kom- + -oid-)
• komastai (“partiers”)
• originally, songs abusing party-goers at
revels?
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Ancient Features of Comedy
• the phallos
– actually mentioned very little in texts
• the parabasis (“step-aside”)
– remnant of the original “party-song” focused
directly at particular audience members?
– explains the general absence of a “fourth wall”
in later classical comedy
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Dorian Farce?
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Early Comedy in Sicily?
• Epicharmus of Syracuse
– dates?: ca. 530-440 BCE
• Epicharmus’ purported contributions
– the comic agon
– stereotypical comic characters, e.g. the
gluttonous Heracles, the cowardly Odysseus
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Satyr Plays
• Satyrs
• Silenus: their father/leader
– wise, philosophical, ironic
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Satyr Plays
• Praxiteles’ Satyr Pouring Wine
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Satyr Plays
• Pratinas the early tragic playwright
– earliest known writer of satyr plays
– the inventor of the satyr play?
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Aeschylus as a Writer of Satyr Plays
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Aeschylus’ Prometheus the Fire-Bringer
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Sophocles’ The Trackers
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
The Pronomos Vase
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Euripides’ Cyclops
• http://www.usu.edu/markdamen/ClasDram
/chapters/083reading3cyclops.htm
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Early Old Comedy
• began ca. 485 BCE (victory lists)
• nature of early comedy is unclear
– not taken seriously because comedy doesn’t
seem serious
• but plots are probably very loose, i.e.
episodes do not necessarily follow
logically from one to the next
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Early Old Comedy
• new dramatic festival: the Lenaea (ca. 440
BCE)
– shows growing interest in comedy
– also, shows need for more opportunities to
stage comedies
– only one per playwright at the Dionysia
• versus three tragedies by each tragedian
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Early Comic Poets
• earliest names of comic playwrights:
Chionides and Magnes
– Aristophanes recalls the public’s mistreatment
of Magnes
– also Aristophanes seems to tie himself to
Magnes’ style of comedy
• cf. play titles: Frogs, Dionysus, Birds, Lydians
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Cratinus
• older contemporary of Aristophanes
• active from the 440’s – late 420’s BCE
• Dionysalexandros (“Dionysus Does
Paris”)
– Dionysus pretends to be Paris and steals
Helen
– see hypothesis
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Pherecrates
• long fragment from Chiron
– “The Lament of Music”
Chapter 8: Early Greek Comedy
and Satyr Plays
Eupolis
• younger contemporary of Aristophanes
• died during Peloponnesian War
– henceforth, dramatists are exempted from
military service in Athens
• long papyrus fragment of The Demes
• also, dialogue from The Taxiarchs
 Chapter 9: Aristophanes
Aristophanes’ Life and Career
• lived from ca. 450-386 BCE
• active as a playwright from 427-388 BCE
– thus flourished young (cf. Shakespeare,
Wilde, Molière)
– but also maintained his comic vigor by
changing with changing times
 Chapter 9: Aristophanes
Aristophanes’ Drama
• elegant verse mixed in with earthy humor
– often sexual/scatological but never gratuitous
• focused on current events and political
figures, e.g. Cleon
• from early on there was a need for
commentary, hence scholia(sts)
– e.g. scholia cite the dates and festivals of
Aristophanes’ plays
 Chapter 9: Aristophanes
Aristophanes’ Drama
• thus, Aristophanes’ plays have always
been very important to historians of the
Classical Age
• but were they ever restaged in antiquity?
– he rewrote two plays (Frogs and Clouds)
– but for a reading public only?
• but cf. Taplin’s Comic Angels
 Chapter 9: Aristophanes
Aristophanes’ First Two Plays
• The Banqueters (427 BCE)
– produced by Callistratus because
Aristophanes was still too young
– won first prize (but at Lenaea or Dionysia?)
– agon between a good young man and a
profligate young man
• cf. Just Reason vs. Unjust Reason in Clouds
– a good name for a kom-oidos (“party-song”)
 Chapter 9: Aristophanes
Aristophanes’ First Two Plays
• The Babylonians (Dionysia, 426 BCE)
– little is known about it (e.g., did it win?)
– Dionysus is an important character
• like in Cratinus’ Dionysalexandros which was
produced a few years before
– includes a savage attack on Cleon
• Cleon sued Aristophanes and slandered his good
family name, but Cleon apparently lost the case
 Chapter 9: Aristophanes
The Acharnians
(Lenaea, 425 BCE)
• but Cleon’s case also seems to have kept
Aristophanes out of the Dionysia for the
next two years
• Dicaeopolis (“Just City”) makes a private
treaty with Sparta and holds a big komos!
• another attack on war-mongering Cleon
• won another first prize (hooray!)
 Chapter 9: Aristophanes
The Knights
(Lenaea, 424 BCE)
• even with Cleon at the height of his power,
Aristophanes attacked him again
• Cleon is “the Paphlagonian” who caters to
Demos (“People”)
• a sausage-seller beats the Paphlagonian
at a contest over Demos’ affection
• won a third first prize (go dude!)
 Chapter 9: Aristophanes
The Clouds
(Dionysia, 423 BCE)
• Aristophanes returns to the Dionysia, but
gets third place (ack!)
• attack on philosophy
• Socrates is unfairly
treated as a sophist
• real reason for using him:
Socrates was ugly!
 Chapter 9: Aristophanes
The Wasps
(Lenaea, 422 BCE)
• Aristophanes goes back to the Lenaea
• attacks the Athenian jury system
• young Bdelycleon holds home-trial to
entertain his conservative father Philocleon
• sues family dog Labes for stealing cheese
– spoof of General Laches’ embezzlement trial
• won second place (whew!)
 Chapter 9: Aristophanes
The Peace
(Dionysia, 421 BCE)
• Cleon is dead now (killed in battle)
• the hero wants to fly to heaven and bring
the goddess Peace back to earth
• rides a giant dung beetle
– spoof of Euripides’ Bellerophon
– excuse for much scatological humor
• won second place (well, okay!)
 Chapter 9: Aristophanes
The Birds
(Dionysia, 414 BCE)
• the birds of the world decide to intercept
divine offerings and tax the gods
• a spoof of the greed which led to the Sicilian
Expedition?
• wonderful opportunity for bird costumes!
– despite the war, no reduction in theatre budget!
• won second prize (thanks a lot!)
 Chapter 9: Aristophanes
Thesmophoriazusae
(“Women Celebrating Demeter”)
(411 BCE)
• attack on Euripides and rescue plays of 412
• Euripides dresses an older male relative in
drag and sneaks him into a women’s festival
• then has to rescue him, à la Helen
• did this inspire Pentheus in The Bacchae?
 Chapter 9: Aristophanes
Lysistrata
(411 BCE)
• Aristophanes’ best known comedy today
• women mount a sex strike until the men of
Greece agree to stop fighting the war
• a spoof of women as much as men
• beneath all the comedy lurks a sense of
desperation (war? ha ha ha!)
 Chapter 9: Aristophanes
The Frogs
(Lenaea?, 405 BCE)
• the cowardly Dionysus wants to rescue
Euripides from Hades
• dresses up like Heracles (Hercules)
• ends bringing Aeschylus back
http://www.usu.edu/markdamen/ClasDram/c
hapters/093reading4frogs.htm
 Chapter 9: Aristophanes
Ecclesiazusae
(“Assembly-Women”)
(392 or 391 BCE)
• women dress up as men and take over the
assembly
• n.b. no new costumes
• beginning of the change into Middle
Comedy
 Chapter 9: Aristophanes
Plutus (“Wealth”)
(388 BCE)
• Aristophanes’ last surviving play
• the god of Wealth regains his sight and
begins distributing money more fairly
• almost no choral odes!
• but there are places marked for them
– chorou (“chorus’ [song]”)
• another sign of things to come!
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
The Hellenistic Age
• general chaos and confusion after
Sparta’s victory in the Peloponnesian War
• led to a civil war of sorts inside Greece
• the rise of Thebes
• the Battle of Leuctra (371 BCE): “the
graveyard of the Spartan aristocracy”
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
The Hellenistic Age
• the rise of Macedon
• especially, Philip II
• defeated the combined forces of the
southern Greeks at Chaeronea (338 BCE)
• but Philip was assassinated (336 BCE)
• and Alexander assumed Philip’s throne,
saddled up and rode east
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
The Hellenistic Age
• Alexander’s conquests opened up the
East to Greek cultural colonization
• the Greek language began to evolve into a
vernacular dialect called koine
• the Greeks were, in general, richer than
ever before
– but depressed
– and disoriented (get it?)
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Philosophy in the Hellenistic Age
• rise of many new philosophies
• Stoicism: be unemotional and trust that
the universe has a plan
• Epicureanism: retreat behind garden
walls and avoid pain
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Art in the Hellenistic Age
• all this led to drastic
changes in art
• e.g. statuary focuses
on violence/pain
• technically brilliant but
hollow
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Post-Classical Drama
• tragedy faltered, collapsed and died
– though revivals of “old” tragedies from the
Classical Age still had a huge following
• comedy survived by inventing the sit-com
• also, mime thrived but did not peak — yet!
– still too bawdy and low-brow for most viewers
– drama would not sink as low as mime— at least,
for a while
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Post-Classical Drama
• according to Platonius, funding for drama
was undercut, leading to cost-cutting
measures
– e.g. fewer choruses (or new odes)
– also, the end of the parabasis
– and the end of the phallus
• also, less direct assault on those in power
• instead, comedies ridiculed figures in myth
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Post-Classical Drama
• no play extant from 388 to 316 BCE
• this period is called “Middle Comedy”
• but we can judge from the outcome what
must have happened
– especially, the development of stock
character types
– e.g. braggart soldier, greedy prostitute, young
lover, stingy old man, etc.
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Post-Classical Drama
• cf. Theophrastus’ Characters
http://www.usu.edu/markdamen/ClasDram/chapters/101lat
ergkcomedy.htm#theophrastus
• n.b. “character” = “image on a coin”
• but who invented “characters”: comic
poets or philosophers?
– comedy seems the more likely source!
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Post-Classical Drama
• Euripides: the “father of New Comedy”
• later comic poets used his melodramatic
style, particularly in crafting complex plots
• but no choruses (i.e. written by dramatists)
– only four “choral interludes” (> five acts)
– Aristotle called these songs embolima
(“throw-ins”)
– but were they unrelated to the plot?
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Post-Classical Drama
• greatest author of Middle Comedy was
Alexis of Thurii
• no play of his survives entire
– but many fragments
– and the Greek original of Plautus’ Poenulus?
• invented the character of the parasite
– parasitos (“priest’s assistant”)
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
New Comedy
• by late 300’s BCE, New Comedy appears
– many playwrights from outside Greece
• based on common domestic concerns
– e.g. family, wealth, being a good neighbor
• but built around extraordinary
coincidences, like Euripides’ rescue plays
– e.g. recovery of long-lost children
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
New Comedy
• New Comedy was seen to reflect life in the
day realistically
• thus, it also shaped life in Hellenistic
Greece
– e.g. offered a more optimistic and hopeful
view of life than that of Stoics/Epicureans
• but still another “garden wall” for Greeks
desperate to flee from the world at large
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
New Comedy
• three great exponents of New Comedy
– cf. the triad of classical tragedians
• Philemon (ca. 368-267 BCE)
– won most often at the Dionysia
– much reflection on philosophy
• Diphilus (ca. 360-290 BCE)
– from Sinope (on the shore of the Black Sea)
– famous for farce and physical comedy
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
New Comedy

an ancient
bust of
Diphilus
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Menander
• but the “star of New Comedy” was
Menander (ca. 344-291 BCE)
– however, only considered best after his
lifetime, cf. Euripides
• his plays, however, were not carried down
through a manuscript tradition
– his Greek is later (not classical) so his drama
was not used in training medieval schoolboys
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Ancient Depictions
of Menander
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Menander
• yet much of his work has been found
among the papyri unearthed in Egypt
– very popular reading even long after his death
• one complete play (Dyscolus, “The
Grouch”) and many sizeable fragments
– more than half of Samia, Epitrepontes, Aspis
– less than half of Sicyonius, Misoumenos,
Perikeiromene
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Menander
• from the remains of Menander’s work, it’s
clear the three-actor rule remained in effect
– even though New Comedy requires much more
action than tragedy or Old Comedy ever had
– i.e. entrances/exits, more characters to play,
and thus frequent/faster costume changes
– sometimes only five lines on stage to effect a
change of role offstage (and move to a new
point of entry): see handout on Dyscolus
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
a Roman mosaic
depicting the
opening scene of
Menander’s
Synaristosai
(“The Ladies
Who Lunch”)
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Menander
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Menander
• took stock characters of Middle Comedy
and made them more humane/subtle, e.g.
– Polemon the “braggart soldier” in love
(Perikeiromene)
– Thais the kindly madam (Eunuch)
– Davus the inept “managing slave” (Andria)
• thus, characters resist “characterization”
– this sort of metatheatre promoted realism
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Menander
• characters who recur in Menander:
– Moschion (“Bull-Calf”): young lover/rapist
– Demeas (“People”): gruff old man
– Smikrines (“Small”): stingy old man
– Syros (“Syrian”): clever doorman/butler
• principal theme in Menander is love
– especially, the freedom to marry as one
chooses
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Menander’s Samia
• an excellent example of Menander’s subtle
use of “characters”
– all of them want and try to do what’s right
– in the end, coincidence, character and a
friendly universe save them
• from this, they — and we! — learn lessons
• in particular, all our lives have the makings
of a “happy ending” if we’ll just let it happen
Chapter 10: Later Greek Comedy
Menander’s Epitrepontes
(“The Litigants”)

http://www.usu.edu/markdamen/ClasDram/cha
pters/103reading5epitrepontes.htm
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
Changes in Festivals
• evolution toward the inclusion of drama in
more festivals
• festivals also became panhellenic
• the general collapse of civic pride in
Greece led to fewer choregoi
• which, in turn, forced the creation of the
agonothetes (“dramatic-contest official”)
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
Changes in Actors and Acting
• the rise of mega-stars like Polus
– very popular around the known world!
• also, the formation of The Artists of
Dionysus, a union overseeing the
interests of theatre professionals
– especially those who went on tour
– n.b. the usefulness of the three-actor rule and
embolima to touring actors
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
Changes in Drama
• Was exposition added to the dramas to
make them more comprehensible to the
ever increasing influx of foreign viewers?
– that is, do the texts of tragedies, as we have
them, stem in any significant way from scripts
written down in the Post-Classical Age?
– unlikely! Given the variability of myth, the
classical tragedians would have needed to
supply exposition, especially for foreigners
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
Changes in Drama
• nevertheless there are clear interpolations
inserted by later hands into the texts of
classical dramas as we have them
– e.g. Antigone 905-915
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
Changes in Theatre
• new technical devices
– bronteion: thunder
– keraunoskopeion: lightning
– “Charon’s steps”: dead rising from tombs
• many different types of theatres
– some are larger than the Theatre of Dionysus
(Ephesus)
– others are smaller (Delphi)
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
The Theatre of Epidauros
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
The Theatre of Epidauros
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
The Theatre of Epidauros
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
The Theatre of Epidauros
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
The Theatre of
Delphi
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
Mime
• a low-brow form of entertainment
– not popular during the Classical Age, even
though it is attested that far back
– nor even during the Post-Classical Age
• rose to prominence in the Roman period
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
Mime
• highly variable in form and tone
– mostly raucous, indecorous, full of slapstick
– but later mime could be philosophical
• and may not even have been performed
• only one principal performer (archimime)
– who played all the speaking parts!
• mime was what the early Christian fathers
despised and protested against so much
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
Mime
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
Mime
• no mimes have been carried through a
literary tradition (duh!)
• but six Mimiambi by Hero(n)das have
turned up on an Egyptian papyrus
– all are vulgar; some even obscene
• cf. the Oxyrhynchus Mime (“The
Adulteress”)
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
Conclusion: Classical Drama
• note how quickly the evolution of drama
took place
– from invention to the sit-com, in 300 years!
• the number of “geniuses” who appear:
– "Thespis," Phrynichus, Aeschylus, Sophocles,
Euripides, Cratinus, Eupolis, Aristophanes,
Alexis, Philemon, Diphilus, Menander, etc.
– even Renaissance Italy can’t match this!
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
Conclusion: Classical Drama
• no new technical advances until the
advent of electricity
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
Conclusion: Classical Drama
• moreover, there have been no new
dramatic techniques invented at all!
– costuming, dialogue, masks, prologues,
irony, epilogues, tech crews, disguises,
actors' unions, character-types, scenery,
pampered stars, farce, love triangles, flying
around the stage on ropes, hit musicals,
censored plays, touring shows, . . .
– and if you add mime: nudity and sex, too!
Chapter 11: Post-Classical Theatre
Conclusion: Classical Drama
• but don’t be depressed!
• we don’t have to be better than the
Greeks, because we are the Greeks!
– just Greeks arriving at the party a little late
– and speaking Latin with a German accent!
• the Greeks are our ancestors, too, and we
today own them as much as anyone else
• speaking of Latin, next up is Rome!
Chapter 12: The Roman World
Overview of Roman Drama
• we owe a great debt to the Romans in
terms of culture, language, politics, DNA
• and also theatre, but only in certain ways
– Greek terms: theatre, drama, tragedy,
comedy, critic, theory, program, orchestration
– Roman terms: actor, circus, perform, nudity,
spectacle, media, transvestite, violence
• not to mention “histrionic opera,” “sports
personality,” and “stupid farce”
Chapter 12: The Roman World
Overview of Roman Drama
• but the Romans were, on the whole, not
innovators in theatre or drama
– they were mostly transmitters of Greek culture
• Roman drama was largely dependent on
its inimitable Greek forebear
– to the Romans, theatre was a diversion and
form of leisure, cf. neg-otium (“no business”)
– not an art to be taken seriously per se
Chapter 12: The Roman World
Overview of Roman Drama
• the works of only three Roman playwrights
have been preserved whole
– Plautus (fl. 208-186 BCE): 19 comedies
based on Greek originals by a variety of New
Comedy dramatists (Middle Comedy?)
– Terence (fl. 166-160 BCE): 6 comedies, all
from Menander and Apollodorus of Carystus
– Seneca (4 BCE - 65 CE): 8 tragedies based
on Greek tragedy, 1 fabula praetexta
Chapter 12: The Roman World
Geography
• Italy is the boot-
shaped peninsula
west of Greece
• Alps to the north
• Sicily to the south
Chapter 12: The Roman World
Early Rome
• myth: the Romans
were Aeneas of
Troy’s descendants
• reality: they were a
branch of the Indo-
Europeans
– closely related to the
Celts (or Gauls)
Chapter 12: The Roman World
Early Rome
• myth: the early founders of the city of
Rome were the twin brothers Romulus
and Remus in 753 BCE
Chapter 12: The Roman World
Early Rome
• reality: the early
Romans were the
subjects of the
Etruscans
– culturally, if not
politically too
• today, the Etruscans
are a linguistic and
historical mystery
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Roman Republic
• began in 510 BCE (or so we’re told)
• governed by a Senate run by patricians
• early Roman history was dominated by the
“Conflict of the Orders”
– the struggle for power between the patricians
and the plebeians (commoners)
• ultimately, the plebeians won many rights
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Roman Republic
• also the period of the
development of the legion
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Roman Republic
• the Romans conquered
most of Italy by 264 BCE
• came into contact with
Greeks living in Magna
Graecia (southern Italy)
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Punic Wars
• expansion brought the
Romans into contact
with Carthage
• First Punic War
(264-241 BCE)
• Second Punic War
(218-202 BCE)
– Hannibal
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Punic Wars
• ultimately, the
Romans won the
Battle of Zama
(202 BCE)
• led by the general
Scipio Africanus
Chapter 12: The Roman World
Rome in the Second Century
• the Romans were now an international
power, both militarily and economically
• they began expanding to the east
• conquered Greece by the mid-second
century BCE
• the integration of Greek and Roman
culture is called Hellenism
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Roman Revolution
• the rise of generals
• the first was Marius
– a popularis, from the
lower classes
– reformed the army
– tied his soldiers to
himself directly by
paying for their armor
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Roman Revolution
• the next was Sulla
– from the upper class
– at first, one of Marius’
lieutenants
– rose to confront Marius
– attacked and defeated
the Senate
– became dictator
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Roman Revolution
• next up was Pompey
– one of Sulla’s
lieutenants
– adulescens carnufex
– defeated Spartacus,
then the Aegean
pirates
– by 62 BCE, Rome’s
greatest general
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Roman Revolution
• finally, Julius Caesar
– from a good Roman
family, but poor
– had great charisma
– brought together
Pompey and Crassus
into the First
Triumvirate (60 bce)
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Roman Revolution
• Julius Caesar
– became proconsul of
Gaul
– brought the entire area
under Roman control
– like Marius, Caesar
tied his legions to
himself, not Rome
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Roman Revolution
• Julius Caesar
– crossed the
Rubicon
– defeated Pompey
at Pharsalus
– met Cleopatra in
Egypt
– then defeated the
Senate twice more
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Roman Revolution
• Julius Caesar
– with that, he was in
sole control of Rome
– was assassinated on
March 15, 44 BCE
(Ides of March)
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Roman Revolution
• Octavian
– Caesar’s teenage heir
– teamed up with Mark
Antony to defeat
Caesar’s assassins at
Philippi in 42 BCE
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Roman Revolution
• Octavian
– but Antony went into
league with Cleopatra
– Octavian defeated
them: Actium, 31 BCE
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Roman Revolution
• Octavian
– became princeps
• was renamed Augustus
– “restored” control of the
Roman state to the
Senate in 27 BCE
– but it was only a hollow
shell of representative
government
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Roman Empire
• The Pax Romana
– 200 years of
relative peace (27
BCE -180 CE)
– by then, Rome
was run by a
succession of
imperatores
(“generals”)
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Roman Empire
• The Pax Romana
– great age of
prosperity and art
– emperors: Trajan,
Hadrian, Marcus
Aurelius
– authors: Vergil,
Horace, Ovid,
Juvenal
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Colosseum
Chapter 12: The Roman World
Pompeii
Chapter 12: The Roman World
Pompeii
Chapter 12: The Roman World
Pompeii
Chapter 12: The Roman World
Pompeii
Chapter 12: The Roman World
Pompeii
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Decline and Fall of Rome
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Middle Ages
Chapter 12: The Roman World
The Middle Ages
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
The Phases of Roman Theatre and
Drama
• Native Italian drama (pre-240 BCE)
– Fescennine verses, phlyaces, Atellan farce
• Literary Drama (240-100 BCE)
– Plautus and Terence, Republican tragedians
• Popular Entertainment (100 BCE-476 CE)
– circuses, spectacles, mime (Seneca)
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
The Evidence for Roman Theatre
and Drama
• there is a major discrepancy between the
textual and material evidence
– the majority of Roman drama comes from the
late Republic (late 200’s/early 100’s BCE)
• Seneca’s tragedies are later but it is questionable
whether they were designed for performance
– all existing Roman theatres—and depictions
of them!—date to after the 100’s BCE
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
The Evidence for Roman Theatre
and Drama
• there is a major discrepancy between the
textual and material evidence
– moreover, the shows presented in Roman
theatres were aimed at the lower classes
• those interested in sports, circuses, mimes
– conversely, all existing dramas—even those
of Plautus—were aimed at the higher social
strata of Roman society
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
The Evidence for Roman Theatre
and Drama
• it comes down to a difference between
“readers” and “viewers”
– that is, a literate nobility as opposed to an
uncultured mob
– cf. Greece where the aristocrats and
Intelligentsia ruled the stage
• thus, Roman literary drama rose and fell
quickly
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Native Italian Drama
• the earliest attested forms of Roman
entertainment come from the Etruscans,
e.g. gladiatorial combat
– Etruscan ister > Latin histrio (cf. histrionics)
– Etruscan phersu > Latin persona (cf. person,
personality)
• n.b. the Etruscans dominated the early
Romans (600’s/500’s BCE)
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Native Italian Drama
cf. scenes of merriment on Etruscan tombs
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Native Italian Drama
• Fescennine verses (from Fescennium)
Fescennium
– crude clowns improvising alternating verses
– cf. early Greek komos—is this a “history”
concocted in the absence of real data?
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Native Italian Drama
• hilarotragodia (or phlyaces/phlyax plays)
– no scripts preserved
– and only one author’s name and play titles are
cited: Rhinthon of Syracuse
• but he lived in southern Italy and wrote in Greek, so
how “Roman” can he have been?
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Native Italian Drama
cf. vases from southern Italy
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Native Italian Drama
• phlyax plays or Aristophanes exported?
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Atellan Farce
• also at this time, Atellan farce
– from the Oscan city of Atella
• focus: Atella’s crazy ways
• repeating cast of characters
– very broadly drawn, e.g.
• Maccus the clown
• Bucco the braggart
• Dossenus the glutton
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Atellan Farce
• also Pappus,
Pappus the foolish old man
– cf. Pantalone in commedia dell’arte
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Atellan Farce
• cf. scenarios as well, e.g. balcony scenes
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Atellan Farce
• how could Atellanae have been preserved
from antiquity until the early modern age?
– very popular in early Rome
• only eclipsed during the height of fabulae
palliatae (“Greek-attired [literary] drama”)
– revived in the first century BCE by Novius
and Pomponius
• literary Atellan farce?
– again during the reign of Hadrian (2nd c. CE)
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Native Italian Drama
• after Atellanae, “Literary Drama” arose
• we’ll study this in greater depth in the next
chapter when we examine Plautus and
Terence
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Roman Theatre
• no permanent (stone/concrete) theatre in
the city of Rome until 55 BCE
– the Theatre of Pompey
• before that, all theatres were “temporary”
– i.e. made of wood, but not necessarily cheap!
– these are now impossible to reconstruct
• all the same, theatres existed throughout
the rest of the Roman world
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Roman Theatre
• all extant theatres date to the first century
BCE and later
• when the Romans began to use concrete
• thus, they could be situated downtown
• major question: how representative are the
extant structures of Roman theatre design
in general?
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Roman Theatre
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Roman Theatre
 Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Roman Theatre
Cavea

Versurae

Orchestra

Scaenae
Scaena
Frons
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Roman Theatre: Scaenae Frons
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Roman Theatre: Scaenae Frons
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Roman Theatre: Versurae
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Roman Theatre
• do the plays which have been preserved
tell us anything about the theatres in which
they were performed?
– and do the data which the plays provide
accord with the structures which survive?
• e.g., was there an altar on stage?
– no altars in surviving Roman theatres!
– but cf. the end of Plautus’ Mostellaria
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Roman Theatre
• in general, Roman theatre reflects the age
in which it lived, i.e. Hellenistic tastes
– focus on spectacle
– cf. late Republican scaenae which rotated or
were made of marble/glass/gilded wood
• also, Roman plays were produced at a
number of festivals, even funerals
– and huge budgets — but for sets, not drama!
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Roman Theatre
• acting was also Hellenistic
– with emphasis on pathos
Chapter 13: Early Roman Theatre
Roman Theatre
• actors were often slaves
– belonged to a grex (“flock”)
– led/owned by a dominus (“master”)
• no three-actor rule!
• thus, were masks used?
– Yes! masks allowed some role-sharing,
though nothing as regimented as in Greece
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Early Roman Literary Drama
• beginning of Latin literature: Livius
Andronicus translated Homer’s Odyssey
into Latin (240 BCE)
– Livius Andronicus: Greek-speaking slave living in
the house of the Livii (Roman gens)
– also translated Greek tragedies and comedies
into Latin and had these dramas produced on
stage
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Early Roman Literary Drama
• Why do Romans translate Greek drama?
Why don’t they write their own?
– because they can! No copyright laws!!
– also, Greek drama brings with it complex but
coherent plots, especially New Comedy
• n.b. Greek comedies also imported native
Athenian customs which made no sense to
Romans, so some adaptation was necessary
to make Greek comedy viable in Rome
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Early Roman Literary Drama
• these early Roman literary dramas were
produced at festivals, e.g. Ludi Romani
• one of the first famous playwrights of the
Roman stage was Gnaeus Naevius
– produced tragedies and comedies
– also injected current events into his drama and
made powerful enemies among the elite
• n.b. early tendency toward “Romanization”
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Titus Maccius Plautus
• first real “star” of the Roman stage was Titus
Maccius Plautus
– a joke name based on aristocratic nomenclature
– “Dick Bozo Flatfoot”
• little is known about Plautus’ life
– probably from the lower classes
– first known professional playwright!
• highly successful dramatist
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Plautine Comedy
• same milieu as New Comedy: mostly,
suburban middle-class “characters”
• but Plautus’ characters are more
stereotypical than Menander’s
– but this is NOT a step backward!
– in fact, it is a step forward in producing
theatrically effective world-class comedy
– maybe not great art, but always great theatre!
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Plautine Comedy
http://www.usu.edu/markdamen/ClasDram/c
hapters/142reading7miles.htm
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Plautine Comedy
• Plautus utilized his unique position between
philosophical Greece and fun-loving Rome to
shape a new “multicultural” form of drama
– thus his drama still works well today
• this opportunity helps clarify why he didn’t
write his own plays
– he saw the advantage in this formula: Atellan
farce (saturae) + Menandrean New Comedy
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Greek Originals
• those Greek plays underlying Plautus’
comedies are called “Greek originals”
• important question: how did Plautus adapt
these Greek originals?
• and didn’t he have to change different
playwrights’ work in different ways?
– e.g. Menandrean subtle comedy vs. Diphilus’
knockabout farce
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Greek Originals
• Plautine changes:
– besides including stereotypes, added music
– also, punctuated action (with four act-breaks) >
continuous action (no act-breaks)
• but no direct evidence, until the discovery of
the Dis Exapaton fragment
– ca. 100 lines of Menander’s Greek original
underlying Plautus’ Bacchides
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Greek Originals
http://www.usu.edu/markdamen/ClasDram/c
hapters/141plautus.htm#disexapaton
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Amphitryo
• Amphitryo and Alcmena are a happily
married and faithful couple
• until Jupiter decides to disguise himself as
Amphitryo and impregnate Alcmena
– from that union is born Hercules
• when the real Amphitryo returns, confusion
ensues over whether or not Alcmena has
slept with another man
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Amphitryo
• a “twins” comedy—of sorts
• a spoof of mythology
– from a Middle Comedy original?
• best scene: Mercury disguises himself as
Sosia (Amphitryo’s servant) and beats up the
real Sosia
• warning: the play is fragmentary!
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Aulularia (“The Pot of Gold”)
• from an original by Menander?
• an irascible old man named Euclio lives
with his daughter in poverty and distrusts
the whole world
• when he discovers a pot of gold hidden in
his house, he goes insane with suspicion,
convinced that everyone is trying to steal it
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Aulularia (“The Pot of Gold”)
• his daughter has been impregnated by a
rich young man who wants to marry her
but is afraid to ask her father for her hand
• the young man’s uncle also wants to marry
the girl and Euclio agrees
• but a slave finds and steals the gold
• when the girl gives birth, Euclio lets the
young man marry his daughter
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Aulularia (“The Pot of Gold”)
• best scene: the young man admits the
“truth” to Euclio who thinks he’s confessing
that he’s stolen the gold
– the Latin word aula (“pot”) is feminine gender,
so “she” can be taken as the gold or the girl
– a wonderful commentary on what fathers
ought to value more: daughters or dowries?
• warning: the end of the play is missing!
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Bacchides (“The Bacchises”)
• based on an original by Menander
• there are two prostitutes who are sisters
and have the same name (Bacchis)
• one needs money to buy the other from a
soldier who has her on contract
• she convinces her boyfriend Mnesilochus
to have his slave Chrysalus swindle the
money needed out of Mnesilochus’ father
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Bacchides (“The Bacchises”)
• Chrysalus does, but Mnesilochus
overhears someone talking about Bacchis
kissing Pistoclerus (Mnesilochus’ friend)
• Mnesilochus returns the money to his
father, and then realizes his mistake
• Chrysalus has to dupe his master again
– hence, the title of Menander’s original Dis
Exapaton (“The Double Deceiver”)
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Bacchides (“The Bacchises”)
• best scene: the prudish pedagogue Lydus
follows Pistoclerus into Bacchis’ house, and
then runs outside in horror at what he’s
seen inside there
• later, Lydus drags Pistoclerus’ father to the
“den of iniquity” but Mnesilochus defends
his friend until he hears about the kissing!
• warning: the opening of the play is missing!
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Captivi (“The Captives”)
• a “serious” comedy, or so Plautus claims
• two captives exchange identities, and the
master is sent home, not the slave
• when their captor discovers the ruse, he
threatens the hapless slave who is
eventually recognized as his son
• best scene: the fond farewell of master and
slave who are really praising themselves
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Casina (“Cinnamon”)
• based on Diphilus’ Cleroumenoi (“The Lot-
Casters”)
• an old man lusts after his wife’s maid and
tries to marry her off to a man who will let
him have the ius primae noctis
– cf. Beaumarchais’ The Marriage of Figaro
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Casina (“Cinnamon”)
• nothing but best scenes!
– the lot-casting scene between husband and
wife over who gets to pick a groom for Casina
– Pardalisca’s false tragic report that Casina
has gone mad and “has a knife”!
– the male-bride wedding!!
– and its aftermath!!!
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Mercator (“The Merchant”)
• from an original by Philemon
• a old man and his adult son are in love
with the same girl
• best scene: father and son try to make
sure their “clients” get the girl
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Menaechmi
• the prototype of twins comedy
– adapted by Shakespeare, Comedy of Errors
• twins are separated as boys and one is
renamed Menaechmus for the other
• ultimately, they’re confused with each
other because of their appearance
– later their actions are also confused
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Menaechmi
• a very mechanical plot, with little character
development
– some characters do not even have names
– e.g. Matrona (“Wife”), Senex (“Old Man”)
• best scene: one of the twins has to feign
insanity to escape his “father-in-law”
– pretends to be riding in a chariot and tries to
run the Senex over
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Mostellaria (“The Haunted House”)
• features Plautus’ most daring and amoral
servus callidus (“clever slave”), Tranio
• Tranio has led his young master into such
debauchery he’s had to sell his father’s
house while he was away on business
• when the old man returns, Tranio pretends
it’s haunted to keep him out
– the “noises off” are really a komos in progress!
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Mostellaria (“The Haunted House”)
• of course, the man who bought the house is
one of the father’s old friends and returns it
• the father is convinced to forgive his son, but
is determined to punish Tranio
– Tranio flees to an altar and refuses to get off it
– the play ends with this stalemate!
• best scene: Tranio tricks the old man and a
loan shark—at the same time!
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Persa (“The Persian Man”)
• has no upper-class characters
– slaves, a hetaira, a parasite, a pimp and the
most loquacious virgin in all of Roman Comedy
• a slave in love with a hetaira has to swindle
money out of a pimp to buy her contract
• best scene: the parasite forces his virgin
daughter to act like a Persian and she
lectures him on morality, but tricks the pimp
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Pseudolus
• famous now because it is the basis of A
Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the
Forum
• features Ballio, the prototype of evil pimps
• the slave Pseudolus dupes him out of the
girl whom Pseudolus’ young master loves
• best scene: Ballio parades his “wares”
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Rudens (“Rope”)
• from an original by Diphilus (cf. Casina)
• another “evil pimp” play, in this case the
devious Labrax (“Sea Bass”) who tries to
abscond with a girl and her maid after a
young man has paid for them
• the gods protect the girls and shipwreck
the pimp
• lots of wet people and flotsam!
 Chapter 14.1: Plautus
Rudens (“Rope”)
• in the end, one of the girls discovers her
father and marries her lover
• unique setting: a seashore in North Africa
– cf. Shakespeare’s The Tempest
– Gripus = Caliban
• best scene: a tug-of-war over the pimp’s
trunk which Gripus hauls ashore in a
fishing net, full of money and trinkets
 Chapter 14.2: Terence
Roman Comedy after Plautus
• transitional figure between Plautus and
Terence: Caecilius Statius
– no play of his survives but many fragments
– less boisterous comedy than Plautus
– he was “more Greek,” e.g. titles in Greek
• cf. Plautus and Naevius whose plays almost
invariably have Latin titles that are often not even
translations of the Greek original’s title
 Chapter 14.2: Terence
Publius Terentius Afer
• Caecilius Statius reportedly heard the
young Terence read his first play (Andria)
• “Publius Terentius Afer” was apparently
his real name, even though he was a slave
– cf. Livius Andronicus
– supported by aristocrats, e.g. the Scipios
• his dates are uncertain: born ca. 195-185
BCE and died soon after 160 BCE
 Chapter 14.2: Terence
Terence’s Drama
• every play he wrote survives in full!
– shows the high esteem in which he was held
in antiquity and ever after — until our age!
– we can track his career better than any other
ancient playwright, including Sophocles
• his plays were produced at a variety of
festivals, including state funerals
– e.g. Adelphoe which premiered at Aemilius
Paullus’ funeral in 160 BCE
 Chapter 14.2: Terence
Terence’s Drama
• Julius Caesar wrote a treatise on
Terence’s sermo purus (“clean dialogue”)
• Saxon canoness Hrotsvit (or Hrotswitha)
imitated the language of Terence’s dramas
– but she celebrated Christian virgins
• more than 600 Terence manuscripts
survived the Middle Ages
 Chapter 14.2: Terence
Terence’s Drama
• also, scholia are attached to all of
Terence’s comedies, cf. Aristophanes
– but A’s scholia elucidate historical context
– conversely, Terence’s scholia discuss the
nature of his drama, which shows how
important Terence was as a Roman author
• some of these scholia are from the hand of
Aelius Donatus, St. Jerome’s teacher
 Chapter 14.2: Terence
Terence’s Prologues
• among the most important features of
Terence’s work are the prologues
prefixed to all six of his comedies
– Terence speaks to us directly in his own voice
– cf. the parabases of Aristophanes’ comedies
• but Terence doesn’t discuss current
politics, instead theatre-related issues
– e.g. playwriting, producing plays
 Chapter 14.2: Terence
Terence’s Prologues
• e.g., the prologue of Andria mentions the
complaints of a “malevolent decrepit poet”
– Donatus: Luscius Lanuvinus
• also raises the issue of contaminatio
– “pollution”; lit. “touching together”
– i.e. mixing two different Greek originals in one
Roman adaptation
• growing independence of Roman playwrights?
 Chapter 14.2: Terence
Terence’s Prologues
• why was contaminatio an issue?
– were there too few Greek originals available?
– was it a matter of excessive “Hellenism,”
which dictated that Menander’s drama
shouldn’t be tampered with?
• n.b. Terence “contaminated” all his plays
– e.g. Adelphoe: scene from Diphilus inserted
into Menander comedy
 Chapter 14.2: Terence
Terence’s Prologues
• prologue of Hecyra (“Mother-in-law”)
notes difficulties in staging this comedy
– based on an original by a Greek imitator of
Menander: Apollodorus of Carystus
– twice interrupted by crowds interested in other
things (boxing match, gladiators, etc.)
– shows the Romans’ basic inclination toward
“popular entertainment”
 Chapter 14.2: Terence
Terence and Menander
• n.b. the all-but-total victory of Menander
over his rivals (Diphilus, Philemon, etc.)
• Terence’s drama includes some of the
best examples of Menander’s formula for
success: the humane treatment of
character-types, esp. sympathetic “fools”
– Thraso (The Eunuch)
– Micio (Adelphoe, “The Brothers”)
 Chapter 14.2: Terence
The “Roman” in Roman Comedy
• the Romans’ only known innovation in
theatre is dramatic suspense
– no statement at the beginning of the play
telling the audience the resolution of the plot
– e.g. the end of the prologue of Adelphoe:
So, don't expect to hear the plot of the play here.
The old men who come on first will reveal it, some of it,
The action will unveil the rest.
 Chapter 14.2: Terence
The “Roman” in Roman Comedy
• why did the Romans invent dramatic
suspense?
– better, why didn’t the Greeks?
• the Greeks needed to feel superior to the
play, whereas the Romans did not
– part of the Romans’ general attitude that a
play is a ludus (“playtime”)
 Chapter 15: Roman Tragedy
Quintus Ennius
• first major Roman-born playwright after
Livius Andronicus
• devised the equations of Greek and
Roman deities
• also wrote comedy, history, satire,
religious treatises
• freely adapted/Romanized his Greek
models
 Chapter 15: Roman Tragedy
fabulae praetextae
• plays based on Roman life
– literally, “toga-wearing plays”
• first known author is Gnaeus Naevius
– who is also known to have gotten into trouble
for irritating important politicians
• only one surviving example of these plays:
Seneca’s Octavia (after 68 BCE)
 Chapter 15: Roman Tragedy
Marcus Pacuvius
• tragedian (ca. 220-130 BCE)
• used contaminatio
– e.g. merged Sophocles and Euripides
• said to have been grave in tone
– but Nerei repandirostrum incurvicervicum
genus (“Nereus’ bent-beaked, convex-necked
brood,” i.e. dolphins)?
 Chapter 15: Roman Tragedy
Lucius Accius
• tragedian (ca. 170-86 BCE)
• considered Rome’s best tragic poet
– his work was available for reading at least 500
years after his lifetime
• like his predecessors, engaged in
contaminatio
• and wrote fabulae praetextae
 Chapter 15: Roman Tragedy
Age of Popular Entertainment
• horse races, gladiatorial combat, public
executions of criminals
– “bread and circuses” (Pliny the Younger)
• but not all entertainments were low-brow
– closet dramas, cf. Ovid’s Medea
• also, pantomime (soloist + chorus)
– stories told through dance and expressive
gesture
 Chapter 15: Roman Tragedy
Horace’s Ars Poetica
• poetic instruction manual for how to write a
drama
– cf. Aristotle’s Poetics
– n.b. neither Aristotle nor Horace are known to
have written a play
 Chapter 15: Roman Tragedy
Horace’s Ars Poetica
• Ars Poetica codifies the “rules” for drama
– e.g. begin your story by leaping in medias
res (“into the middle of things”)
– through Horace these rules were passed to
early modern dramatists
• especially classical French playwrights like Racine
and Molière
• in particular, the five-act rule
 Chapter 15: Roman Tragedy
Seneca
• only surviving Roman tragedies
• these dramas may not be by the famous
Roman philosopher and tutor of Nero
– Octavia cannot be by Seneca
• he is a character in the play
• hints at Nero’s death (three years after Seneca’s)
– the plays do not espouse Stoic principles
• characters are brutal and unsympathetic
• cf. Atreus in Thyestes
 Chapter 15: Roman Tragedy
Seneca
• performability: were these tragedies even
designed for performance?
– can they even be performed the way they’re
written?
• full of sententiae (“opinions,” pithy axioms for
living)
– do they conform with the type of performance
spaces attested for the day?
• yes! both physically and emotionally!
Chapter 15: Roman Tragedy
Seneca

selections from Seneca’s Phaedra

Chapter 16: Late Classical Theatre
Late Roman Theatre
• virtually no evidence for drama/theatre
– all but no dramatic texts from Rome after
Seneca
– and “popular entertainment” tends to leave
behind few very traces in the historical record
• principal high-brow form: pantomime
– introduced to the Romans by Pylades and
Bathyllus (22 BCE)
Chapter 16: Late Classical Theatre
Late Roman Theatre
• nature of pantomime
– no words spoken by the soloists
• though a chorus sings and explains the story
– a vehicle for dance and gesture
– pantomime dancers wore masks with no
opening for the mouth
• part of the multi-culturalism prevalent in
imperial Rome
Chapter 16: Late Classical Theatre
Late Roman Theatre
• but sports were far more popular, e.g.
– venationes: wild animal hunts
• horrific environmental devastation!
– naumachiae: artificial sea battles
• introduced by Julius Caesar in 45 BCE
• also mime continued to be popular
– women provided sexual content
• executions were popular, too
Chapter 16: Late Classical Theatre
Late Roman Theatre
• one perplexing piece of evidence about
late Roman theatre has emerged:
the “Charition” vaudeville
A Greek Man Woman B King
Charition Woman C Barbarian A
Clown Woman D Barbarian B
Woman A Charition’s Brother Ship Captain
CHORUS
Chapter 16: Late Classical Theatre
The End of Classical Drama
• popular entertainment ended only with the
collapse of classical civilization
– the shift to Christian ethics undermined it
• in the East, however, it continued:
Byzantine theatre
– mostly sporting events, mimes, etc.
Chapter 16: Late Classical Theatre
Classical Drama After Antiquity
• very few texts
– e.g. Christus Patiens (Christos Paschon): a
patchwork of lines from Euripides recast so as
to tell the story of Christ’s crucifixion
• in Islam, no drama at all!
– taking the second commandment literally,
Muhammad forbade all “realistic” art
• in China/India, a different sort of drama
Chapter 16: Late Classical Theatre
Conclusion
• the rediscovery of drama/theatre in the
Renaissance
– classical drama provided the model on which
drama/theatre was rebuilt
• modern theatre has also “recapitulated”
the evolution of classical drama
– e.g. re-invention of “quiet” Menandrean
comedy
Chapter 16: Late Classical Theatre
Conclusion
• that begs the question of whether or not
Shakespeare will survive the next “dark
age” even as well as Sophocles
– how will he get through the coming change of
culture which will denounce him as old-
fashioned or profane or prudish or immoral?
– and what about when his English is no longer
understood?
Chapter 16: Late Classical Theatre
Conclusion
• is a world without theatre, without
Shakespeare or Plautus or Euripides
worth living in?