EURIPIDES, ELECTRA 518-44: FURTHER DOUBTS ABOUT GENUINENESS

DAVID KOVACS

The subject of this paper is the notorious passage in which Electra, urged by the Old Man lo compare her hair and footprints with those found at the tomb of Agamemnon and to think whether she might recognize Orestes by means of clothing she had woven for him, pours scorn on these tokens of recognition. These lines, which seem to be a tasteless extra-dramatic hit at Aeschylus’ Choephot-i, are part of the reason for the unfavourable criticism the play has received since A.W. Schlegel in his Lecfures on the Dt-umatic Art called it ‘of all Euripides’ plays perhaps the vilest’. In 1877 A. Mau proposed the excision of the entire offending passage, and in 1950 he found powerful support from E. Fraenkel, who in an appendix to his commentary on the Agamemnon proposed to delete both Choephot-i 205- 1 1 and El. 5 18-44. Since then there have been numerous defenses and attacks, and the question shows no signs of quietly disappearing.’

This paper has three purposes. First, I hope by reviewing the contributions of G.W. Bond, D. Bain, M.L. West, and G. Basta Donzelli to clarify the issues between attackers and defenders by separating arguments for excision that are likely to carry some weight with unprejudiced readers from those that are either inconclusive or double-edged; some features of the passage, such as the unfairness of Electra’s criticisms, may be part of the reason we might wish i t were by someone else, but they cannot furnish a reason to believe that it is and may even furnish a reason for believing in its genuineness. Second, I will try to supply further ammunition to the attackers’ side by adding some items to the strongest category of evidence that these lines are a secondary addition, namely their lack of fit with their surroundings at the beginning and end of the passage in question. Evidence of this kind is not inconclusive or double-edged, and there is more of i t than attackers have so far realized. The question to be asked is not ‘Could Euripides have written these lines?’ but rather ‘Did the author of these lines, whether Euripides or another, compose the passage at the same time as the scene in which it stands, or is it a subsequent addition?’ It will be seen that the additional evidence I am putting forward is consistent with West’s hypothesis that the lines are a subsequent addition by Euripides himself to a play or a scene that did not originally contain them. Third, while admitting that West’s hypothesis of an interpolation by Euripides himself may be the best currently on offer, I will suggest, with all due tentativeness, another origin for the lines.

I I cite throughout by author’s name the following: A. Mau, ‘Zu Euripides Elektra’, in Commenfufioncs philologuc in honorem Theodori Mommseni (Berlin, 1877), 29 1-30] ; E. Fraenkel, Aeschylus: Agamemnon (Oxford, 1950). i i i . 821-26; H. Lloyd-Jones, ‘Some Alleged Interpolations in Aeschylus’ Choephori and Euripides’ Eleciru’, CQ I I ( 1961 ), 17 1-84; A. Vogler, Vergleichende Studien zur sophokleischen und euripideischen Electru (Heidelberg, 1967), 168, n.108; G.W. Bond, ‘Euripides’ Parody of Aeschylus’, Hermathenu 118 (1974). 1-14; D. Bain, ‘[Euripides], Elecwa 518-44’. BlCS 24 (l977), 104-16; G . Basta Donzelli, ‘Euripide, Eleitru 518-44’, BlCS 27 (1980), 109-19; and M.L. West, ‘Tragica IV’, BlCS 27 (1980), 17-22.

67

68 BlCS 36 ( 1989)

I

We can begin by setting out points on which all attackers and most defenders can agree. Almost everyone would agree2 that the lines uttered by Electra within the play are a criticism of another play, and that the passage is doing something which tragedy normally does not do, admitting its own fictitious character by allowing the world of the audience, which contains other plays in it, to impinge on that of the play they are watching.’ Scholars have claimed to find other examples of this kind of dramatic criticism in Euripides at Sup. 846ff and Pho. 75 1 f, but these cases are much more doubtful.

Attackers seize on this apparent uniqueness, but the argument is a dangerous one for them to make. Its force against the genuineness of the passage is blunted by the reply that what is unique in an author is not ipso fucw spurious. And it may turn in their hand and wound the attackers themselves when i t provokes the obvious question ‘Who besides Euripides could or would have done such a thing?’ This is a formidable question for attackers to answer, and it is made more formidable by the character of the lines themselves: they are written in flawless tragic trimeters, and anyone who tried to show that they could not be by Euripides on the basis of their style would soon cover himself with disgrace. Who, defenders may justly ask, might be supposed to have written verses that are both perfect in style and distressingly irreverent in content except for Euripides himself? What interpolator would have done so? What interpolator could?

Once we concede, as we must, that whoever wrote these lines was intent, for these twenty- seven lines, on something different from the normal concerns of a dramatist developing his own plot, it becomes pointless to complain that they do not have the excellences one would expect from a normal dramatic scene. It distresses attackers of the passage (and possibly defenders too) that the Old Man suggests a comparison of hair and footprints without indicating that, at least in the case of the latter, if the trial is to continue a change of venue is necessary. But defenders can reply that the suggestion is made only to be refused, and that if the author, whoever he is, is engaging in extra-dramatic criticism, he might well suspend the degree of dramatic realism normal for tragedy.

It is likewise distressing that while some of Electra’s points make sense provided one accepts their naturalistic presuppositions (for instance, that since comparison of hair or feet would be inconclusive in the real world, it must be so regarded on the tragic stage). others succeed only by perverse misconstruction of Aeschylus, as in the assumption that Orestes wore boots or that the weaving in question was a whole garment Orestes must have out-grown. But as distressing as are both the Connecticut-Yankee realism and the misconstruction, arguments like these show no tendency to persuade any but the already persuaded. If we succeed in showing on other grounds that the lines in question are secondary, their banal rationalism and their perversity will give us reasons to be glad that they have been unmasked as an interpolation. Until then arguments of this nature seem better left alone.

There is one argument from the character of 5 18-44, however, that deserves careful consideration, though it too falls short of the proof we require. In 524-26 Electra denies that Orestes, her brave brother, would have come back to Argos in secret for fear of Aegisthus. The

Attempts of scholars to explain the passage not as dramatic criticism but a s psychology o r as an instance of the tragic theme of the fallibility of human reason are answered by Bond. pp. 2-3. For a general discussion of the difference between tragedy and comedy on this issue. see 0. Taplin. ‘Fifth-Century Tragedy and Comedy: A S ~ ~ i k r i s i s ’ . ./HS 106 (lY86). 163-74. and D. Bain. ‘Some Reflections on the Illusion in Greek Trapedy’.BlCS34(1Y87). 1-14,

DAVID KOVACS 69

full absurdity of this has yet to be adequately described. Orestes has a price on his head. a s everyone in the play. including Electra, must be presumed to know. I f he shows his face openly in Argos, he will be killed at once. Unless Orestes comes back from Phocis with an army at his back, a possibility never envisioned by any version of the myth, he must come back in secret. To think otherwise is to be completely out of touch with reality.‘

The reason few have commented on this is that i t is widely believed that Electra elsewhere in the play shows herself to have the kind of grandiose delusions about her brother that would lead her to make a statement like this. But this idea will not survive scrutiny. It is entirely possible that there may be a gap between Orestes and Electra’s view of him. I t is a different matter, however, to think that she has no appreciation of the danger her brother is in and thinks that he should abandon stealth. That is not the view she takes elsewhere in the play. There are several references by her to Orestes’ pitiable plight as exile ( 130-3 I , 201 -6, 233-35) and to the weakness of his position (352). In 275-77 she says merely that the time for Orestes to act is now and that, of course, he will kil l Aegisthus, just as Aegisthus killed Agiimemnon.’ (Aegisthus, of course, used stealth also.) She does not imply that he will march up to the palace door, announce his name, and ask for the honour of a duel. Nor do 336-38 imply that Orestes must be suicidal instead of brave. Here again the parallel with Agamemnon’s murderers is drawn suggesting stealth and not open battle. I t is not implied that Orestes must act in a suicidal manner but merely that i t would be shameful for him to fail. Lines 524-26 are an irrationality of which one would gladly be rid: they contradict not only Aeschylus but any version of the Orestes myth. Defenders raise the possibility that we have here Euripides recommending in this one passage a different view of stealth from the rest of the tradition. just as he seems to recommend a different view of Apollo’s role.” I do not think it very likely that in one passage only Euripides inserts lines of such great import and not only fails to reinforce this point at any other place in the play but even contradicts it. But since stronger evidence is available, I am happy to let this argument go. I t should be noted that these lines are embarrassing to both deleters and defenders since they leave off criticizing Aeschylus and attack the presuppositions of the myth common to all treatments of this theme. I t is hard to reconcile this motive with the motive visible in the rest of the passage.

I 1

But although these arguments are inconclusive, when we consider the passage at the points where it joins the uncontested lines before and after i t , there is considerable evidence that the

‘Some scholars advance what I would call a weak form o f this argument. Mau says (p.2YX) that Electra’s words contradict the whole play. Fraenkel says (p.X23). ‘ I f i t wa\ nccasary for Euripidcs to makes Orestcs act in this clandestine way. he would certainly not have made Electra say that wcrecy suggmted failure of C O U ~ J ~ C ’ . But in actuality i t is not merely Euripidcs‘ treatriient that Electra‘s words contradict hut any \J;r\ion o f the Orestes story whatever.

’ At 275tf she certainly shows impatience that Orestes has not appeared. hut I see no evidence that she supposes Orestes ought to come openly rather than in secret. The text o f 274. however, is d cult: for an attractive suggestion see R . P. Winnington-lngram, ‘Tragica’. HlCS 16 ( 1 96’)). 5 1-52. who writes Ti 6qz’ ’Op&ozqs npbs r a 6 ’ A p y o ~ &v pdhoi; (‘Why. in view of the Gtuation. will Oreste\ come t o Argos ai all’.)‘). This ha\ the mcrit of rendering 275 an intelligible comment on 274. I once thought o f a two-line lacuna:

Kreivaj r6pavvov (PQ< $poi ourripiov.

fipou Td6’; ctioxpdv y’ €?nor<’ 06 ykp vGv d t ~ p f i :

op. T i Stir’ ’Op&orq< xpb< rdrs: Apyos fiv pdhqt; <Hh.

Hh. op. dthh’ ;6)5 EXq1 T1 rC1OTbV 06 pEhh?lT&OV;>

‘’ See Lloyd-Jone\ (n. I ). I7X-7Y.

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surrounding scene was conceived and written before 518-44 and that to a certain degree it resists the intruder. The author of 518-44 could well be Euripides, but if it was, he was adding lines to a scene already coniplete without them.

Let us begin by considering 503-12. Here I shall first make suggestions on two textual problems in the passage, then discuss the passage in relation to our main problem. Fortunately the latter discussion does not depend on acceptance of my textual suggestions. The lemma is quoted from Diggle’s Oxford Text.

505

510

The scene begins with the entry of the old retainer, the man who raised Agamemnon and also saved Orestes from the hand of Aegisthus. Electra has sent her nominal husband the Autourgos to ask this man for provisions with which to entertain Orestes’ supposed emissaries, and the Old Man enters carrying a lamb, some wine and other appurtenances of the meal and complaining of the uphill terrain. He sends the food indoors and wipes the tears from his eyes. Electra comments on his weeping.

There are two areas of difficulty in this passage. (1) Diggle is undoubtedly right to think that in 504 Murray’s text, which adopted &&pvqo&v from Dobree with transmitted K a d z as its subject, is objectionable. For, as Denniston says, to find a parallel for the absolute use of this verb is difficult. But Diggle’s own solution, to write K a K h v for K C I K ~ , is unsatisfactory for its vagueness: what ‘misfortunes’ and whose does Electra imagine the Old Man is reminded of? The Old Man’s own, as Diggle suggests? But the absence of a qualifying ‘your’ is difficult, and in the parallels Diggle cites the context supplies the qualifier, as Sansone points Furthermore, this rendering ‘Did my circumstances remind you of [your] misfortunes?’ means that Electra omits all reference to her own misfortune, most uncharacteristically: cf. 301, 303, and 354.

Does she say ‘reminded you of [my] misfortunes’ then? But those are already the subject of the sentence, d t p a , and it would make little sense to ask ‘Have my [general] circumstances reminded you of [my] misfortunes’ when there is no essential difference between the circumstances and the misfortunes. phv ~ & p h 6th xpovou napiozazat K a K a would give the sense we seem to require, and we might persuade ourselves that &vdpvqmv was a gloss on s c a p i o z a z a i and had somehow dislodged it.

Transmitted z&pa K a K a and the transmitted plural &v6pvqoav both could be genuine, and they make sense if we assume that ~ & p h K a K a is object,

We may, of course, rewrite:

But there is another possibility.

See J. Diggle, ICS (1977). 115-16. and Studies in the T e ~ r of Euripides (Oxford, 1981). 37. and D. Sansone’s review of Diggle in GGA 234 (1982). 34.

DAVID KOVACS 71

not subject. of the verb (dtvapipvfiioKo is sometimes construed with a double accusative) and that the subject once stood in the next line now lost:

phV TbpbC 6tbC XpdVOu 0’ hV&pVlloaV K a l &

< O ~ K O ~ TE cpafjhos Kai nEnhov 2phv p & q > ; Now Electra imagines that the sight of two of her specific privations reminds the Old Man of

the sum of her troubles, the whole complex of griefs and indignities stemming from the murder of Agamemnon and the usurpation of Aegisthus and Clytaemestra. The suggestion also gives more rhetorical balance to the alternatives Electra presents: her own troubles receive two lines and those of her father and brother three.x

(2) The Old Man’s answer also raises suspicions. Electra asks him. ‘Surely you are not weeping for my misfortunes, are you? Or is it for Orestes’ exile and the death of Agamemnon, whom you once tended as a babe holding him in your arms, tendence that has proved useless to you and to those you hold dear?’ According to L he replies, ‘Yes, useless. But nevertheless I could not endure (or did not put up with) this.’ He then goes on to describe how he paid honour to Agamemnon’s tomb, which he passed on his way to Electra’s cottage.

There are two possible referents for ‘this’: it may look backward to Agamemnon’s death (and perhaps to its effect on the Old Man’s own circumstances) or forward to the neglected state of the tomb the Old Man subsequently alludes to. And there are two possible meanings for O ~ K fiv~oxopvv, ‘could not endure (and hence wept at)’ and ‘would not put up with (and hence attempted to change)’. Logically, therefore, there are four possible ways of taking the line. But as the text stands none of them can be correct. On grounds of sense we may at once eliminate (a) ‘ I could not put up with the death of Agamemnon (and attempted to change it)’. That leaves (b) ‘I could not endure the death of Agamemnon (and hence wept at it)’; (c) ‘ I would not put up with the neglected state of his tomb (and attempted to change it); and (d) ‘ I could not endure the neglected state of his tomb (and hence wept at it)’.

We may eliminate (b) because of 6pos. The Old Man cannot say ‘Yes, his death robbed my labours of their point. Nevertheless that is what I am weeping for’, though I read in one translation (M. Hadas and J. H. McLean), ‘Aye, little [delight] indeed. Sti l l , i t was for this that I could not refrain my tears’, where the word I emphasize renders 6pos and shows what nonsense it makes.

‘looking forward: the neglect of Agamemnon’s tomb. “Here” ( y ~ gives the stress) “is something I could, and would, put an end to.” ’ This is difficult for two reasons. First, no explicit mention is made in the lines that follow of the tzcglcct of Agamemnon’s tomb, so that there is nothing to give T O ~ T O the sense Denniston postulates. Second, the Old Man has been asked why he weeps, and the context thus fails to suggest anyone putting an end to or putting up with anything. Unless we take 062 f i v ~ o ~ o p r p as ‘could not endure (and hence wept at)’, the Old Man fails to answer the question put to him and answers an entirely different one without any warning.”

Denniston chooses (c), and on TOGTO (508) he writes:

Those who find insufficient cause here to posit a lacuna may find i t more satisfactory to delete ;I litic. M. J . Cropp suggests pc’r / i t / o r ~ r . s that i f SO4 were bracketed and fi in 505 accented as 4, all would be well. He points out that the Old Man in SOX does not answer the alternative question put to him (on which see bclow), and he can see no reason why Electra should have asked an alternative question in the first place. The resulting sequence is attractive enough to be considered carefully, and i t is not hard to divine the motive that might have led actor or reader to insert such a line. I f an H in 505 were misunderstood as the disjunctive particle, i t might well invite a supplctton. ( I argued for a similar \equence of events having occurred at And,-. 194-98 in HSCP 81 (1977) 137-48.) Still. I am inclined to think that SO4 lacks grammar and sense not because it is an interpolation (why .\hou/d an intcrpolator express himself so badly?) but because i t is incomplete. This seems to tell heavily against the version of D. J. Mastronarde, Contuct arid Ui,scmtrnir i /y: Sonic Cor t i~w/ ior t ,~ of’S/wcc./i L I I I ~ A(.riori 011 the Greek 7~r.trgic. Stu,qc, (Berkeley. 1979). 42, ‘Useless indeed. But ncvcrthele\s this is at

72 BlCS 36 ( 1 989)

The last possibility, ‘Nevertheless it was the following fact that made me weep’, is the most likely, though here too, as the text now stands, there is a serious objection. The Old Man now answers the question, but there is still no clear content to the roOro since the description that follows fails to make explicit the fact that before the ministrations of the unknown visitor and those of himself Agamemnon’s tomb had had no offerings. Certainly 6pqpias r q h v (510) is no way to make clear that the tomb is neglected, for it means simply that the Old Man found himself alone.“’

I believe that the Old Man did answer the question, that TOOTO y ’ 0 6 ~ rjveo~dpqv is that answer, meaning ‘this was what I could not endure and why I therefore weep’, that roOro refers to the dishonour done to Agamemnon in death, and that after saying ‘Yes, useless: but nevertheless to return to the main point [see Denniston GP 460-62 for this use of 6 ’ o h ] , the reason for my weeping is the following’, he went on to say explicitly that Agamemnon had not had a proper burial, e.g.:

dtvOvq6’. 6pw5 6’ 04v TOGZO r’ 06X fivEoXOpqv, <i6hv lipoq30v nar&pa oov Kr~pLoparov>. qhl90v ybp a6ZoO npb5 racpov n a p E p j 6606, K a i TcpOOX&ObV EKhIXVo’ 6pqph5 TUXhV, K Z h .

The passage now makes the following unexceptionable sense. Electra asks the Old Man why he is weeping: is i t for her misfortunes, or for the exile of Orestes and the death of Agamemnon, which last deprived the Old Man of the expected fruits of his labours? The Old Man replies that he has indeed been so deprived, but that the main reason for his weeping was the fact of the disgrace Agamemnon is suffering in death quite apart from the consequences to himself. He has just seen this recently, for (+p, 509) he passed by the tomb (presumably for the first time) on his way to Electra’s house. There he did what he could to honour the dead man.

I t is always distressing to come to the conclusion that the text before you is probably lacunose for it means that there is almost no chance of recovering the author’s wording. But clearly lacunae occur, and we must accept them with the best grace we can. Omission of lines has been postulated on good grounds at El. 538, 582, 1045, 1154, 1173, and 118 1 (to name only those places where I agree with Diggle), and when satisfactory sense can be recovered only by the assumption of a lacuna, i t is some encouragement to know that this diagnosis has been made already in the same text.

Now we may return to the main argument, noting two facts of cardinal importance for the discussion of 5 18-44 which follows, facts that are fortunately independent of the truth or falsity of my suggestions. First, the Old Man is weeping, and his weeping has something to do with either Agamemnon’s death or (as I prefer to believe) with his failure to be properly honoured in death. Second, while he reports his own ministrations at the tomb and those of the unknown person who had preceded him, there is nothing before 5 18 to counteract the impression his weeping produces that his mood is one of elegiac sorrow and that he is not a man on whom there has just dawned the possibility of exciting developments in the very near future.

There is strong reason to think, on the basis of the undisputed lines, that when the scene was originally written the Old Man was conceived of as having no inkling whatsoever that Orestes

least ;I hardship I did not endure: For I did visit his tomb Mastronarde calls this a difficult passage. and he must surely be aware that his examples of double question and surmise question tend to make it unlikely that the Old Man ignored Electra’s ;IS completely as his version and others like i t cause her to do. This point is noted in passing by Basta Donzelli (n. I . I 12) who says the neglect of the tomb is ’suggerito. piu che descritto’.

DAVID KOVACS 73

might be in the Argolid. As we noted already at the end of our discussion of 503ff. the Old Man enters with eyes moist from weeping. In his tale up to 5 17 there is nothing to suggest that he is aware of the possibility that momentous changes in Electra's situation may be afoot, and his weeping strongly suggests the opposite. If Euripides wrote a scene in which he intended to include the passage in which the Old Man argues tenaciously for Orestes as the bringer of the offerings, we would expect either that this point of view would affect his mood as he comes on or that he would realize suddenly in the course of describing the offerings at the tomb just what they must mean.

The first of these possibilities, a breathless and excited entry and. immediately after the delivery of the provisions, the excited announcement that Orestes may be in the country, would be a wonderfully effective opening to a scene in which Electra dashes cold water on the idea of her brother's return. By contrast, it is hard to think of anything less effective as a prelude to S18ff than the opening we actually have, where the essential fact that the tomb has already received sacrifices is introduced without any appreciation of its possible significance and without the speaker's demeanour being affected." The other possibility likewise goes unrealized: the Old Man shows no signs of realizing inter i~ui~u~?diin? the possible significance of what he is saying.

In 487-5 17, then, there is strong evidence that the Old Man has no thought that Orestes may have come. There is also evidence in 545-52 that he still has no thought of it. To be sure, Bain,, following Mau, argues that there is a lacuna after 546 in which a reference to him is concealed, e.g.:

&Ah' fi TI< a6zoG r&pov 2 n o i ~ z i p a ~ &os ZKEipaT: fi zf jo6~ O K O X O ~ S hai9iov xfiovO5 <QlOh&V 'Op&ozqs EiS cpihov owzqpiav>.

But there is no good reason to think that this is so. Nothing in any of the lines on either side of 5 18-44 shows any awareness by the Old Man of the possibility that Orestes has arrived, and i f there is a lacuna after 546, as there probably is, there is no reason to think that Orestes' name occurred in it. ( I return to this difficult passage below.)

But there is not only negative but also positive evidence that the Old Man imagines that Orestes is still in exile and nowhere near the Argolid. Here are 547-52:

oi 6 i (EVOI KOO; pozihopai yixp ~ioiGiov a6roiS 2pEoi9a1 006 ~ a a p l j ~ o u nEp.

Hh. O'i6' 6 K 6dpoV PaiVOUOi haIvqphi no6i.

nohhoi yap 6 v r q E ~ F V E ~ ~ E ~ O I V K a K o i . np. hhh' E6yEVEi5 p&v. Zv 6& KlPST$WI T66,. 550

6pos 6 i XaipeIv T O i S S&vou< npooevv&no. In 547 the Old Man remembers the strangers for whom he has brought provisions, and he asks to see them personally so that he can get news from them himself of Orestes. I t would be special pleading to argue that, in spite of what he explicitly says, in actuality he suspects that one of them is Orestes and that ~ioiG&v in 547 shows that he really thinks that they are other than they seem. (Cf. Cho. 85 1-54, where i6~ iv in Aegisthus' mouth is no indication that he doubts the identity of the messengers.) What he says, therefore, implies that he thinks they have correct information to give him and that they are who they cldim to be, Orestes'

I ' Viigler speaks of 'der in hiichster Erregung aufgctretcne Altc'. and thinks i t would he strange if his report. delivered in such a spirit, made no contribution to the sequel. I wonder where he wes the Old Man's 'excitement'. In his complaint about the climb and its effect on his hack and feet'? In hi\ leiwrely description o f the viands he brings? In his weeping'? There is nothing elhe before he makes his report. A\ for the rcport, while an actor might recite i t in an excited tone of voice. there is nothing in the actual words to make him do so.

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emissaries. That implies, of course, that Orestes is still abroad: no need for emissaries if he has come in person. The same tale is told by his comments on the noble bearing of the strangers and his aspersions on the unreliability of noble birth as an indication of character. This is not the attitude a faithful retainer takes toward someone he thinks may be ‘young master’ in disguise. In short, the immediate vicinity of 518-44, so far from showing us an Old Man convinced that Orestes may have come, goes very far toward proving the opposite.

The point of juncture at the end of the suspected passage also is evidence, for 545 joins up badly with 544 and flawlessly with 5 17.

n& &v TOT’ hv nais ra6zix v i h E X O L cpapq, ~i pil (uva6(oivS’ oi xinhoi r h ohpari; &Ah’ fi n< cr6zoB rckpov 2 n o t ~ z i p q (Eves t i ~ ~ i p a r ’ ;i ~ O S E O K O ~ O ~ ~ hapbv ~60v05t.

545

In this context there is no good reason to use a6ro6 to refer to Agamemnon, who has not been mentioned for twenty-five lines, especially when Orestes is the subject of the immediately preceding sentence and no possessive is really needed with rckpov. On the other hand, aGroC, looks genuine: it is both the transmitted reading and protected from emendation by the identical position of a6706 in 509. It is a strong point in favour of deletion that excellent sense is obtained if we set 545 after 5 17.

~h6aGpao: & nai, ris nor’ hv~~phnwv Erhq n p o ~ ~6pbov Ehb~iv. 06 y&p Appiov yi TI<. &Ah’ 4 n5 ah06 nicpov Enoi~ripa~ cEvo< t2Kceipa.r’ 4 rfjoS~ O K O T C O ~ ~ habiuv ~ 6 o v o ~ t

517 545

If 545 is correct as transmitted, it is a fair inference that the prolonged discussion of Orestes in 5 18-44 did not intervene.’? We should note that in its new context the reference in 546 to cut hair is now in place, much more so than when it followed the discussion of footprints and weaving.

One objection to the excision deserves to be mentioned.“ The lock of hair figures in the undoubtedly genuine portion of the play, and if we remove the demolition scene, there seems no purpose for its inclusion since it plays no part in the recognition that follows, which is accomplished by means of the scar. But this is easily answered. The lock was famous, being mentioned by Stesichorus and used by Aeschylus. It requires no special explanation to account for such an item in a tragedy on a traditional theme. And it does make a contribution to the play, however small, as part of the shadow that great events cast before them, whether or not human observers can interpret the signs.

Before passing on to my third topic, the authorship of these lines, I would like to put forward a more economical solution to the problems of 545f and at the same time to propose a friendly amendment to West’s discussion. West argues that if we had a passage with a lacuna in i t as follows:

~&i~aGpao: & mi, ri5 nor’ hvbphxwv Ezhq npos r6ppov 6h6Av. 06 yap Appiov $ r15. ............................................................................

I t is not that there is risk ofambiguity. that the audience might suppose thal someone else’s tomb is meant. Basta Donzelli’s argument (n.1. 110) that this is not to be feared is beside the point. for any reference to D tomb in this context will refer to that of Agamemnon. But since ‘the tomb‘ by itself would have conveyed all the infonnation needed, i t is a tair inference that if Euripides wrote ’ Iris tomb‘. he did so in a context that did not repel the possessive genitive but made it natural.

I ‘ The others are adequately discussed and refuted by BLiin (n. 1 ). 105-6.

DAVID KOVACS 75

oi 6& C&VOl no6: pouhopal ykp Ei(n6bV ctdTOb5 6p&Ol’fCXlOO6 K a O l p j T O U n&pl,

we would conclude on grounds of basic dramatic structure that the lacuna would include. spoken by the Old Man. either something like 5 18f.

&hh’ qh6’ YOU< XOU 0 0 5 KCt&pllTO< hdrl’fpal. pohbv 6’ iripqo’ a8hiov rcppov na~p05

bhh’ q TI< ah06 rdrcpov 2 n o i ~ r i p a ~ &v05 ~ K E ~ ~ O L T ’ 4 ~ i j 0 6 ~ o~onob5 hal9bv ~ B o v b g <. . .>

or like S45f.

followed by a reply from Electra dismissing his evidence, i.e. something like 524-6, O ~ K a@’ bv6pO~. h $pov, oocpoij I~ip15, &i KpUJcTbV

6OKEi< &6Eh(PbV TbV &bV E66CrPOq p0hriV. f i v rjv6’ &V Aiyio1’oU cpdpUL

He thinks that these lines (518f or 54Sf followed by 524-26), since they correspond to our intuition of what is needed, are presumptively genuine.

In fact, however, 524-26 are, as already demonstrated, some of the most puzzling and ruinous in the whole disputed passage. If they do not go, deletion loses much of its point. But fortunately we can satisfy West’s intuition about what must be there much more easily and make fewer changes in the wording of the text and the speaker assignments. We need not bother with 518-19 or 524-26: 545-46, once they are fixed, will give us everything we require.

There are several problems with 545-46. First, rfjo6E o ~ o ~ t o b 5 hap& xi?ovd5 (the reading of L) is implausible: if frontier-guards are mentioned what the maker of the grave-offerings must have done is not to ‘take’ them but to slip past them. Victorius’ hai’fhv is inevitable. Second, third, fourth and fifth (all inseparable), there is doubt who the speaker of these lines is; what two classes of person he or she has in mind: whether 546, lacking a proper caesura, is sound; and whether a line is missing after it.

L marks a change of speaker at 547, and unless we assume that there was another change o f speaker in the putative lacuna after 546, this means that the parudosis assigns 545-46 to Electra. This might be wrong, and i t is not impossible to imagine that a paragraphos was added secondarily to 547, perhaps when our putative interpolation was made, but ccteris purihirs we would be happier if we did not need to alter speaker-changes.

Who then are the two classes the speaker has in mind‘? If they are (a) strangers and (b) citizens, then, as Bain argues (pp. 108-9), the lines don’t fi t either Electra or the Old Man. Electra would be denying without argument the force of the Old Man’s statement in 5 17 that no Argive can have done the deed, while in the Old Man’s mouth the lines are unexplained self- contradiction. (Furthermore an Argive does not have to escape the notice of guards watching the border.) But if the two groups are (a) strangers and (b) Orestes, the situation is almost as bad. There is no reason, of course, why once 5 18-44 are removed from this passage Electra could not suggest in 545-46a that Orestes has come. But if that were so, when 518-44 were added we would expect not the accidental loss of 546a but the deliberate excision of all three lines, which contradict the sceptical Electra of the demolition-passage.

I t would seem that we are forced to remove the change of speaker at 547 and put into the Old Man’s mouth the suggestion that either some stranger has made the hair-offering or Orestes

“Dramatic texts surviving from antiquity u\e the paragraph05 but no speaker names, which arc thus without authority. Speaker-changes, however, d o have authority, and we should feel the same reluctance to change them as we do the words of the text.

himself has come. But that is not much better, either with or without 5 18-44 preceding. In the first case, as Bain well remarks, &Ah’ .;i rig KTA. is no way for the Old Man to acknowledge the force of Electra’s argument, nor, it might be added, for him to stand his ground. In the second case, his words stand in contrast, if not outright contradiction, to his assumption in 547ff that the strangers are emissaries of Orestes and that Orestes is therefore abroad.

Proceeding in this fashion has led us to an impasse, one that is rendered even more uncomfortable by nagging doubts about the metre of 546. The line lacks a normal caesura,I5 and since confidence in its soundness has such disagreeable consequences, we are justified in trying the hypothesis that 546 is corrupt, with or without a lacuna following.

What do we really need after 06 yktp A p ~ i w v $ rq‘? The Old Man ends his speech with a puzzling fact he cannot explain. I suggest that all we require is that Electra (a reaction from her is surely desirable here and the next lines are hers in L) suggest some possible non-Argive who could have made the offering, a tentative explanation for the puzzling fact. We know how people in Euripides reply to puzzling facts by putting forth tentative hypotheses to cover them. At Alcesris 816 Heracles, puzzled by the Servant’s news that there is greater grief than he suspected in Admetus’ house, asks hhh’ fi nErcovl9a 6 ~ i v ’ 6x0 ~ E V O V P@v; And Hippolytus, confronted by the riddling but clearly sinister words of his father says (Hipp . 932)

ahh’ fi rq 6s obv 035 p~ 6iapahbv E X E ~ cpihwv, vooo6pEv 6’ 066EV 6VZES dino1;

There are similar situations and similar locutions at H.F. 1128, I.T. 1170, loit 755, H d . 490, Bu. 922, and I .A. 847, and they suggest that in our passage the disjunctive fi should be replaced by interrogative fi and the lines assigned to Electra, with a question-mark at the end.

That brings us to 546 and its putative sequel 546a. The want of a proper caesura is puzzling, but so too is the phrase ‘the watchers ($this lund’, where simple ‘watchers’ is all we need (cf. 97) and where the genitive would suggest they are watching the land (cf. 354 for this word with an objective genitive). As for its content, the remaining disjunctive in 546 reminds us that we still need two possible makers of hair-offerings, preferably ones Electra can mention without gratuitously contradicting 5 17 or without introducing the possibility that Orestes is in the country, a possiblity which, as i t is being mentioned for the first time in the whole play, the Old Man could not have passed over in silence. There is one other possibility, in two parts, that Electra is capable of imagining: perhaps one of the 5Evoi sent by Orestes took pity on Agamemnon’s tomb and cut his own hair, or perhaps he brought an offering of hair to this land from Orestes. The Greek for this is surprisingly close to the reading of L:

hhh’ fi ns a6ro6 tdrcpov PrcoiKripag 5Evwv ~ K O X O ~ ~ hadbv 2mipar’ fi rrjv6’<2p xl96va < ~ ~ V E ~ K E ~06p06 ouyyovou rpixcbparax

HA.

(For another line that was corrupted by transposition of words and lost its caesura in the process, see Supp. 699.) This achieves the result tentatively suggested by Bain, p. 106: ‘She may have said for example “it must have been the {EVOI who so honoured the tomb’’ which reminding the old man of the purpose of his visit would lead nicely into oi 6E 5Evoi no6: (I.547)’.lh We save sense, dramaturgy, and metre by not reassigning 545-46 and by simplifying Electra’s reaction to a pair of closely linked hypotheses about the offerings.

l 5 See Diggle’s discussion of lines lacking a proper caesura in G R B S 13 (1973). 263.65. I t will be seen that doubt is cast on all but one of the cases of hexerninieral c;iesur;i without elision cited by West. 22 n.23. To base belief in the genuineness of a phenomenon on a passage in the / . A . would be needlessly rash.

I h Basta Donzelli suggested (n . I . I 1 I ) that the second of Electra‘s I W O hypotheses was the sending of Orestcs hair by an intermediary. and she showed that Bairi’s objection was not fatal. Her conservative attempt. however. t o retain 546 exactly as transmitied. followed by ~ E V O U ; P x e p ~ e otjyyovoq Xnisqv xnrpi. is scarcely intelligihle Greek.

DAVID KOVACS 77

517 545

111

The case against 5 18-44, though not absolutely conclusive, is stronger than has generally been thought. But if they are spurious, i t must be admitted candidly that i t is very hard to imagine what their origin might be. It has been suggested by M. L. West that they are a subsequent interpolation by Euripides himself. This hypothesis, which covers many of the facts, still does not explain why Euripides should at some subsequent time have decided to vandalize his own

We have in these lines an elaborate criticism of the way Aeschylus handled the myth of Orestes’ return, particularly the recognition. As i t happens, there is a class of work that, we are told, regularly engaged in such criticism. The late writer Platonius in a work on Comedy (S(*holiu in Aristophuncm I , ia Koster, p.5) says:

play.”

fi 6E p & q Kopq6ia & X ( P ~ ~ K E T~XS ro ia6ra~ ~ X O ~ ~ E O E ~ S (i.e. the political concerns of Old Comedy). in i 6E rb O K ~ K T E I V ioTopias bqi9Eioas TcolqraT< qhikv.

~ f i s ~payo6iaq noiqttv. zoia6~a 6E Fpdrpa~a ~ a i 2v ~ f i nahaL@ KCB~@@ Eor~v E C ~ E ~ V , h ~ p z e k v ~ a i o v 26t6dr~iYq hoinbv rqq dhiyapXia5 ~pa~vviYeiqc, . oi yoih ’ O ~ U O O E ~ ~ Kpazivou O ~ ~ E V O S &u.sipqo~v Epuoi . Fiaovppbv 6E n‘jq ’06uooeias ‘Opljpou. roiaCrai yixp ai Kark TQV p i q v Kwpcp6iav ~ x o ~ ? E o E ~ ~

EiOiV. p6190Us ~p T l V a q T I I ~ E V T E ~ 6 V T a i q KOpq6iais Toi5 nahaiodpoiq E ~ ~ ~ ~ & V O U S Gie‘ovpov h5 K ~ K & pq6Ev~as.

hVE6duVOV ykp TO TolO6TOV, OIOV 6lao6pElV “OpqPOV EiK6VTa TI fi TbV 6EiVCX

All of this, and particularly the last sentence, sounds like a description of the send-up of the Orestes myth we are discussing. We do not actually have fragments that match this description: generally, in the fragments of Middle Comedy we possess, the fun that is had with serious myth is that of introducing incongruous elements from everyday life.’’ But the remains of Middle Comedy are not very extensive, and what we have is skewed by the culinary interests

” I t might have some appeal. though. to thosc who still believe in what is mideadingly referred to ah the ‘traditional’ date o f 413 for the production of the play. An elegant variation on the .S[./rirh/odetlrc,or.ic. of W. Theiler, WS 79 (1966). 103. according to which Euripides wrote the play in the 420s and kept i t in a drawer unt i l 413 might be t o suppose that the original production in the 420s was succeeded by a performance, in some other place than the first production, in 41 3. The second production used an augmented text containing th r demolition-scene and the allusion to the Sicilian expedition. I must say, however, that I do not find the reference to the Sicilian sea sufficiently striking to make extra-dramatic rcference a certainty.

I t should be noted that West’s idea of a later interpolation by Euripides wa\ anticipated by E. Rruhn in the 10th edition of F.W. Schneidewin and A. Nauck‘\ SophoXlrs, vol. 5 (Berlin, 1912). p. 24. Anm. 1, ;I\ I learned from R. Bohme. ‘Aischylos und dcr Anagnorismos’. Hvr.me.7 73 ( 1 93X), 204.

pect see G. Schiassi, ‘Parodia e travestimento mitico nella commedia attica di mezzo’. Kcndic,on/c dcll‘ I s t i t r r to Lomhardo, Classe di lettere ecc. X X (1955), 99-120, a reference I owe to the illuminating discussion o f Middle Comedy in R.L. Hunter, Euhulus: 7%f Fingniett ts (Cambridge, 19x3).

78 BlCS 36 ( 1989)

of our chief source, Athenaeus. And there is one other notice, contemporary with Middle Comedy, that suggests that matters of tragic plot were ‘corrected’ by comic poets, Aristotle, Poetics 1453 a 31ff.:

6Eu‘SEpa 6’ 4 n p k q k p p & v q 6nO ‘SiVhV 2onv [o6ozaoq], il 617rAfjV ‘SE Ti lV o h z a a v E~ouoa, K-abcinep ;1 ’O66ooeia, ~ a i rekuzhoa 2g 2vav‘~ias ‘tois Pehtioa ~ a i ~ e i p o a v ... Eonv 6E o i q aijsq &no ‘~paywtFia< fi6ovQ hkhb! p ~ h h o v n j s KwpwiGias 0 i ~ t . i ~ ~ . yip, &v oi E ~ ~ i o t o i hoiv $v SO^ ~ I & H .

& ~ C O ~ V T ~ L O K E ~ 06Geis 6n’ o66~voq. O b V ’OPEOZqs K a i A’iylobos, cpht FVOp&VOl hi TEhEu‘CfiS & ~ & p ~ O V T ~ ~ , K a i

Here Aristotle” tells us that comedy made use of at least one tragic myth and altered it remarkably. And interestingly enough it is a comedy on the Orestes and Electra theme. We know the name of one poet of Middle Comedy who wrote an Oresfes, Alexis (Kock, ii.358).

What is the relevance of all this? Elecrra 5 18-44 are the work of a man of talent if not of genius, a professional poet, to judge by their quality, and not an actor or producer. They are well written, yet highly irreverent. Their source may be Middle Comedy, a play on the Orestes theme.2” Some comic poet held the recognition scene of Aeschylus’ Choephol-i up to gentle ridicule. Some tragic producer in a weak moment borrowed these twenty-seven lines from this comedy for a fourth-century or later production of the Efecrl-a, and they were added to his copy of the play and somehow reached Alexandria. As far their perfect conformity to tragic metre and vocabulary, it is not at all hard to find among the fragments of Middle Comedy runs of lines written in the high style, where Porson’s Law is kept and caesuras are regular. See, for example, ( I cite Kock except where noted) Antiphanes frr 1.1-5, 18, 29,94, 175, 176, 2 17, 238; Anaxandrides frr 4, 54; Eubulus (K.-A.) frr 9, 14, 40, 93; Philetaerus fr 13; Amphis frr 3, 21; Alexis frr 119, 240; Xenarchus fr 1 ; Diphilus (K.-A.) fr 86. These comic poets favoured the plays of Euripides, but we also have titles, such as ‘En& 6ni q @ x s , which take those of Aeschylus for their subject.”

This hypothesis is highly speculative, and I do not expect that 518-44 will be transcribed by Kassel and Austin for their volume of Adespota Comica, though they might deserve a mention. But the theory has the merit of accounting for 524-26, which are hard to explain if either Euripides or some other person bent on criticizing Aeschylus is the author of the passage. These lines criticize the presuppositions of the myth, precisely the kind of thing that happened in the Orestes play Aristotle mentioned.?’

University c$ Virginia

I y G . F. Else in his commentary tries to show that the last sentence cannot be by Aristotle. One of his reasons seems weighty: Aristotle uses p61Yo< elsewhere not of the antecedent myth but of the plot as shaped by the poet, though authors do occasionally depart from their ordinary usage. But his second reason, that Orestes’ and Aegisthus’ going off friends doesn’t at all resemble the double denouement of the Odyssey, proves nothing. A tragedy where some people turn out happy uses a pleasure akin to that of comedy, where everyone does. In any case, whether Aristotle wrote it or not, the author must have had an actual comedy in mind in which Orestes and Aegisthus did go off as friends. Bond, then, was not as far-fetched in his argument as it might seem when he suggested (n.1. 8) that the proper spirit in which to approach our lines was that of an Athenian audience watching Aristophanes.

?I See A. Korte, RE 1 I . 1263 for a list. ?? My thanks for helpful criticism go to R. Scodel and M.J. Cropp. neither of whom may be presumed to subscribe to

my views.