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Xanthias and HeraklesAuthor(s): G. W. ElderkinSource: Classical Philology, Vol. 31, No. 1 (Jan., 1936), pp. 69-70Published by: The University of Chicago PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/264017 .
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NOTES AND DISCUSSIONS
XANTHIAS AND HERAKLES
In the
Frogs
of Aristophanes
the slave
Xanthias
accedes to the
request
of
Dionysus
that
he
take the lion's
skin
and club
of
Herakles,
and
pose
as
the
hero.
Dionysus predicts that
this
Herakleioxanthias
will
prove
to
be
the
whipped
slave from Melite.' Since there was a famous cult of Herakles in
the
deme
Melite,
and Xanthias has assumed the attributes
of the
hero,
the
point
of the prediction seems to be that Herakles had at some time received a
whipping, either
at his
initiation
into the
lesser
mysteries
in
Melite or
during
his
service as a slave at
the
court
of
Omphale. Kock,
however, noting
the
reference
to Callias
in
verse
428, believes that Aristophanes
is
here taking
another
fling
at
him, especially since
Callias lived
in
Melite;2
but
the
term
,IacLTUrylas
could not be applied
so
appropriately
to
Callias,
who was
not
a
whipped slave,
as to
Herakles,
who had
been,
and to
Xanthias,
who
was
about
to be whipped while disguised as
Herakles.
The name
Zcwcapas,
which
occurs several times
in
Aristophanes,
is
derived
from
tavcos,
yellow, and denoted a flaxen-haired slave. The comic poet
may here
be playing upon
an
assumed derivation from actvetv,
to card, as
if
the name were formed from the
aorist passive
cavwOes.Slaves not only carded
wool,
as
Herakles did for
Omphale, but they were
probably the first
to
be
carded
when
the aKKaWGaame
into use
as a
means of
punishment. When
Croesus succeeded to the
kingship
of
Lydia, he punished the man
who had
supported
his
half-brother Pantaleon for the
succession
by having
him
dragged
to
his
death over aKaWOat.3
The verbs talvetv
and
KPacrTLv,
which
had the same meaning, were
used in a transferred sense
with
g'arTTL.4
When
in the
Frogs
(657) Xanthias is
whipped, he exclaims
o'0otL
and asks the
servant
to remove a thorn:
Trv
a'KacaOc
fQeXe.
Commentators ssumethat
the
thorn
is
in
his
foot.
It
is
rather
in
the back, where
many thorns must have
been
lodged
in
the
case of
those unfortunate slaves who were carded. The
1
Frogs
499-501.
2
Ad vs.
501.
Hesychius,
s.V. ebrl
KVJ&c/OV
XKWJV.
&LaOepcwv:
6
oUv'
Kpo7oos
Trp
iXOp6p
eppeitaLe
Ta?s
&K&J'OcZ
KaL
OVTws
&LeLpeV
(cf. Herodotus i.
92).
Alyattes nominated
Croesus as
his
successor
perhaps
because his
mother
was a Carian
and
therefore
of superior
birth,
whereas Pantaleon was the son of an Ionian woman. Such determination of status was
the rule
among
the
Lycians.
The names of
Croesus and his
half-brother appear to
have
been
Lydian
and Greek in
keeping with the
nationality
of their
mothers.
Cratinus
Incert.
116:
rTB
aoTrLyL
KJ4V&qeW;
Dion. Hal. iii. 30:
talvewr6
TCoWAa
jA/oTLrC&.
69
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70
NOTES
AND
DISCUSSIONS
inference
rom
a passage
n
Herodas
s that offenders
were hung
up by
the
foot to
be carded.5
The
exclamation
f
Xanthias
n
verse
649
brings
he
question
as
to whether
he
hassuffered
ny pain,
to
which
he replies
n the
negativeby sayingthat he
was
just
thinking
of the Herakleia
which
was celebrated
n the deme
Diomeia.
That
a
Herakleioxanthias
whom Dionysus
has compared
o
the
Melitean
whip-slave
Herakles)
houldbe
reminded,
by the whipping,
of the
Diomeian
festival depends
for
its
significance
upon
some
close
relationship
between
Melite
and Diomeia.
The close connection
s
established
by the record
of
a
migration
of Meliteans
o the deme
of
Diomeia.6
It may
be
assumed
hat
the
settlers
took
with
them
to their new
home
the cult
of the Melitean
Herakles
where t may havebeenfusedin someway with the greatcult of Herakles n
Kynosarges.
The remark
of Xanthias
would become
highly
significant
f
the
cult
of the
transplanted
Melitean
Herakles ncluded
a
mystic
rite of
flagella-
tion
suchas
we see
depicted
n the frescoes
of the
Villa Item.
This is the
more
likely
because
the descent
of Dionysus
and the pseudo-Herakles
o bring
up
Euripides
s
clearly
an
Aristophanic
arody
of
the mystic
descent
to Hades
of
the
real Herakles
and Dionysus.
The comicpoet
may
have
had
in mind
the
Orphic
KaTrai3acs
s
'Atbov.
t is
during
heirdescent
n
the Frogs
hat
the
two
receive
a
whipping.
Mystic
rite may
well
have enacted
the story
of
the
descentof the god and hero to the abodeof the dead and their significant
return.
Kock,
however,
believes
that
the remark
of
Xanthias
was
intended
by
the
slave
to
convey
the
impression
hat the whipping
didnot cause
him
any
pain
physically
but
that
he was
saddened
and grieved
by
the cessation
of the
festival
of
Herakles,
whom
he is
impersonating.
This seems
to bea very
much
forced
explanation.
There
would be
more
point
to the reference
by
Xanthias
to
the festival
if it reminded
he Athenians
of some punishment
which
an
impersonator f Herakles
received
at the Herakleia.
The
act
may
itself
have
been
a
burlesque
f a onceserious
rite.
The whipping
of
Heraklesby
an
Om-
phale
would
have offered
opportunities
or
jibes
at the
festival
such
as
might
well
make
of
the
Diomeian
Herakleion
rendezvous
f
jokers
whose
witticisms
became
so famous
as
to
provoke
the curiosity
of Philip of
Macedon.7
Not
only
Herakles
but
Dionysus
as
well
became
the
target
of
comedy,
so
that
Julian
centuries
ater
could refer
to the comedians
who drag
Herakles
and
Dionysus
on the
stage
and make
a
public
show
of them.8Perhaps
Aristoph-
anes
in the
Frogs
should
receive
the blame
or the credit
for starting
the
two Thebansons of Zeuson the roadto ridicule.
G. W.
ELDERKIIN
PRINCETON
UNIVERSITY
6
iv.
78;
cf. Headlam,
Herodas,
p.
211.
6
Plut.
De
exil.
6.
7
Athenaeus
xiv.
614d.
s
Misopogon
366c;
Orat.
vii.
204b.
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