Cato's Daughter Porcia Has Herself a Really Good Cry

Cato's daughter Porcia has herself a really good cry

The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters

Citation Nagy, G. 2015.08.12. "Cato's daughter Porcia has herself a really good cry." Classical Inquiries. http://nrs.harvard.edu/ urn-3:hul.eresource:Classical_Inquiries.

Published Version https://classical-inquiries.chs.harvard.edu/catos-daughter-porcia- has-herself-a-really-good-cry/

Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:39666399

Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#LAA Classical Inquiries

Editors: Angelia Hanhardt and Keith Stone Consultant for Images: Jill Curry Robbins Online Consultant: Noel Spencer

About

Classical Inquiries (CI ) is an online, rapid-publication project of Harvard’s Center for Hellenic Studies, devoted to sharing some of the latest thinking on the ancient world with researchers and the general public.

While articles archived in DASH represent the original Classical Inquiries posts, CI is intended to be an evolving project, providing a platform for public dialogue between authors and readers. Please visit http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:hul.eresource:Classical_Inquiries for the latest version of this article, which may include corrections, updates, or comments and author responses.

Additionally, many of the studies published in CI will be incorporated into future CHS publications. Please visit http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:hul.eresource:CHS.Online_Publishing for a complete and continually expanding list of open access publications by CHS.

Classical Inquiries is published under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 In- ternational License. Every efort is made to use images that are in the public domain or shared under Creative Commons licenses. Copyright on some images may be owned by the Center for Hellenic Studies. Please refer to captions for information about copyright of individual images.

Citing Articles from Classical Inquiries

To cite an article from Classical Inquiries, use the author’s name, the date, the title of the article, and the following persistent identifer: http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:hul.eresource:Classical_Inquiries. For example: Nagy, G. 2019.01.31. “Homo Ludens at Play with the Songs of Sappho: Experiments in Comparative Reception Teory, Part Four.” Classical Inquiries. http://nrs.harvard.edu/ urn-3:hul.eresource:Classical_Inquiries. Classical Inquiries Studies on the Ancient World from CHS

Home About People

Home » By Gregory Nagy, H24H » Cato’s daughter Porcia has herself a really good cry Cato’s daughter Porcia has herself a really Share This good cry August 12, 2015 By Gregory Nagy listed under By Gregory Nagy, H24H 2 Comments Edit This

2015.08.12 | By Gregory Nagy

The lamentations that the sisters and the wife of Cato had performed in mourning for him are symmetrical, in their dramatic force, to the lamentations that could have been performed by Porcia, daughter of Cato, for her husband Brutus. I cite here a most revealing passage I found in Plutarch’s Life of Brutus, along with my own translation from the original Greek. We see here the figure of Porcia expressing her intense feelings of foreboding as she contemplates the doom that awaits her husband at the Battle of Philippi. Instead of lamenting here, over and over again, Porcia reverts—over and over again—to a timeless picture of such lamentation, as performed by Andromache in her feelings of foreboding over the impending doom of her husband Hector.

Classical Inquiries (CI) is an online, rapid-publication project of Harvard’s Center for Hellenic Studies, devoted to sharing some of the latest thinking on the ancient world with researchers and the general public.

Editor

Keith Stone [email protected]

Search for: Search

Subscribe Now!

Subscribe to this site to receive email updates about the latest research—just Andromache and Hector by Flaxman via Look and Learn [www.lookandlearn.com] one or two notices per week.

EU/EEA Privacy Disclosures In my posting for 2015.07.29, I focused on a scene in Plutarch’s Life of Cato the Younger [Greek | English] Email Address where the women in Cato’s life—especially his wife, his sisters, and his daughters—are pictured in the act of mourning for the impending doom of this Roman statesman. Subscribe

In this moment, we see the lamentations of these women for the doomed Cato. And these lamentations, I suggest, are a properly operatic setting for the selfmade drama of Cato’s life: Now Online Selection 1: Lamentations that await the bitter end

[2] Κάτωνι δὲ οἱ πρῶτοι τῶν πολιτῶν συνηγανάκτουν καὶ συνηδικοῦντο μᾶλλον ἢ συνηγωνίζοντο, πολλὴ δὲ τὴν οἰκίαν αὐτοῦ κατήφεια καὶ φόβος εἶχεν, ὥστε τῶν φίλων ἐνίους ἀσίτους διαγρυπνῆσαι μετ᾽ ἀλλήλων ἐν ἀπόροις ὄντας ὑπὲρ αὐτοῦ λογισμοῖς, καὶ γυναῖκα καὶ ἀδελφὰς ποτνιωμένας καὶ δακρυούσας.

[2] In the case of Cato, the foremost citizens shared in his displeasure and sense of wrong more than they did in his struggle to resist, and great dejection and fear reigned in his household, so that some of his friends took no food and watched all night with one another in futile discussions on his behalf, while his wife and sisters wailed [cried out “potnia!”] and wept.

Plutarch Cato the Younger 27.2 [=Selection 5 from the last posting] [1]

I pick up here on the “operatic” behavior of the women in Cato’s life. Their “performances” of wailing and weeping are a most appropriate setting for the “final exit” of Cato. Such dramatic “exits” are typical also of the women in Cato’s life. I highlighted in my last posting a fictionalized remark attributed to Marcus Antonius as he comments on the death of Servilia, sister of Cato and mother of Brutus. Here is a dramatization of that remark from the HBO serial “Rome.”

And here is another dramatization of such an “operatic” exit, for Brutus himself, who remarks just before his own “exit” that he sends his best regards to his mother, Servilia.

Selection 2: Porcia reverts to having a good cry every time she looks at a picture of Andromache’s lamenting farewell to Hector

The lamentations that the sisters and the wife of Cato had performed in mourning for him are symmetrical, in their dramatic force, to the lamentations that could have been performed by Porcia, daughter of Cato, for her husband Brutus. I cite here a most revealing passage I found in Plutarch’s Life of Brutus [Greek | English], along with my own translation from the original Greek. We see here the figure of Porcia expressing her intense feelings of foreboding as she contemplates the doom that awaits her husband at the Battle of Philippi. Instead of lamenting here, over and over again, Porcia reverts—over and over again—to a timeless picture of such lamentation, as performed by Andromache in her feelings of foreboding over the impending doom of her husband Hector.

[23.2] ὅθεν ἡ Πορκία μέλλουσα πάλιν εἰς Ῥώμην ἀποτραπέσθαι λανθάνειν μὲν ἐπειρᾶτο περιπαθῶς ἔχουσα, γραφὴ δέ τις αὐτὴν προὔδωκε τἆλλα γενναίαν οὖσαν. ἦν γὰρ ἐκ τῶν Top Posts & Pages Ἑλληνικῶν διάθεσις, προπεμπόμενος Ἕκτωρ ὑπὸ Ἀνδρομάχης κομιζομένης παρ᾽ αὐτοῦ τὸ παιδίον, ἐκείνῳ δὲ προσβλεπούσης. [23. 3] ταῦτα θεωμένην τὴν Πορκίαν ἡ τοῦ πάθους εἰκὼν ἐξέτηξεν εἰς δάκρυα: καὶ πολλάκις φοιτῶσα τῆς ἡμέρας ἔκλαιεν.

[23.2] As Porcia was preparing to return from there [= from the retinue of Brutus heading The Last Words of Socrates at for Philippi] to Rome, she tried to conceal her extreme emotional state, but a certain the Place Where He Died painting [graphē] gave her away, in spite of her noble character. The subject [of the painting] was derived from Greek traditions. It showed Hector at the moment when Homo ludens at play with the Andromache is saying goodbye to him as he goes off [to war] and she is taking back from songs of Sappho: Experiments in his arms their little child while her gaze is riveted on him [= Hector]. [23.3] As Porcia was comparative reception theory, gazing at all this, the picture [eikōn] of the emotion [pathos] caused her to dissolve into Part Five tears, and she kept on revisiting it many times a day and weeping over it. Who is the best of heroes, Plutarch Life of Brutus 23.2–3 Achilles or Odysseus? And which As I argue in 1§§208–211 of my book Homer the Classic:[2] is the best of epics, the Iliad or the Odyssey? {1§208} The story of Plutarch goes on to compare Porcia with Andromache, who is pictured as the most accomplished singer of laments in Homeric poetry. Andromache was sent back to her weaving after her own final lamenting farewell to Hector: Most Common Tags Ἀκιλίου δέ τινος τῶν Βρούτου φίλων τὰ πρὸς Ἕκτορα τῆς Ἀνδρομάχης ἔπη διελθόντος·

Ἕκτορ, ἀτὰρ σύ μοί ἐσσι πατὴρ καὶ πότνια μήτηρ ἠδὲ κασίγνητος, σὺ δέ μοι θαλερὸς παρακοίτης [Iliad 6.429–430] Achilles Aphrodite apobatēs Ariadne

μειδιάσας ὁ Βροῦτος “ἀλλ’ οὐκ ἐμοί γ’” εἶπε “πρὸς Πορκίαν ἔπεισι φάναι τὰ τοῦ Ἕκτορος· Aristotle Artemis Athena Athens Catullus Chalcis chariot fighting <ἀλλ’ εἰς οἶκον ἰοῦσα τὰ σαυτῆς ἔργα κόμιζε,> στόν τ’ λακάτην τε καὶ μφιπόλοισι κέλευε· ἱ ἠ ἀ Commentary Delphi [Iliad 6.490–491] Demodokos Dionysus etymology σώματος γὰρ ἀπολείπεται φύσει τῶν ἴσων Euripides Gregory Nagy H24H HAA ἀνδραγαθημάτων, γνώμῃ δ’ ὑπὲρ τῆς πατρίδος ὥσπερ ἡμεῖς ἀριστεύσει.” ταῦτα μὲν ὁ τῆς Πορκίας υἱὸς ἱστόρηκε Βύβλος. travel-study Helen Hera Herodotus

And when Acilius, one of the friends of Brutus, quoted the verses spoken by Andromache Hippolytus Homer to Hector, Homeric epic Iliad Hector, you are for me my father and my mother the queen Jean Bollack lament Lelantine War mimesis and my brother as well as my vibrant partner in lovemaking [Iliad 6.429–430] Minoan Empire Mycenae Odysseus

Brutus smiled and said: “But it does not even occur to me that I should say to Porcia the Odyssey Pausanias verses spoken by Hector: Phaedra Pindar Plato Poetics Posidippus But you [= Andromache] go back to the household and attend to your own work, Sappho Theseus weaving Zeus that is, the loom and the shuttle, giving orders to the handmaidens [who work for you]. [Iliad 6.490–491] Archives

[[Plutarch continues quoting the words of Brutus]] Even if she may not be physically up to performing deeds of valor that equal those of men, when it comes to her powers of mind, she can perform the greatest deeds of valor just like me.” This story about Porcia was told Archives Select Month by her son Bibulus.

Plutarch Life of Brutus 23.3–6 Users

{1§209} The idea of being sent back to your weaving is being equated in this story with the idea of being sent back, again and again, to weaving the original picture, which is a tapestry that recounts the sorrows of war as experienced by Andromache.[3] We see here a poetics of retrospection, which is already at work in Homeric poetry. In an exquisite moment, we see Andromache herself returning again and again to the Log out original picture of her last farewell to Hector:

ἐντροπαλιζομένη, θαλερὸν κατὰ δάκρυ χέουσα

She was turning her head back again and again, shedding tears thick and fast.[4]

Iliad 6.496

{1§210} Andromache and Hector have just parted, turning away from each other and heading in opposite directions. He is going off to die while she is going back to her weaving. As she is being led away, Andromache keeps turning her head back again and again, entropalizomenē, hoping to catch one last glimpse of the receding view of her doomed husband.[5]

{1§211} Just as Andromache is shaping her last mental image of her last parting with Hector, so also the poetry of epic is shaping the last mental image of Andromache in its own act of retrospective, of returning to the fixed image. Every time Homeric poetry is performed, it can return once again to the picture of Andromache in the act looking back to see if she can capture one last glimpse of Hector. It is a world of tears, and there is a world of beauty in these tears. To quote Virgil (Aeneid 1.462), sunt lacrimae rerum. ‘there are tears [lacrimae] that connect with the real world [res plural], and things that happen to mortals touch [tangere] the mind [mens]. To look back on this world is to look back on perfection, in all its frozen beauty. Homeric poetry is like that: it looks back on its own crystallized perfection.

Postscript: Variations on Hector and Andromache by de Chirico

Just as Porcia returns to the image of Hector and Andromache, we too get attracted to it and return to it. Here I cite several modern masterpieces by Giorgio de Chirico (1888–1978). Each offers a variation on the Hector and Andromache theme.

“Hector and Andromache,” 1912 “Hector and Andromache,” 1924 “Hector and Andromache,” 1926 “Hector and Andromache,” 1942 “Hector and Andromache,” 1968

And just as each look by Andromache is a different image, so also each look “by” de Chirico is a different image.[6]

Notes

[1] Greek text for Plutarch’s Cato the Younger via Perseus: http://data.perseus.org/texts/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0007.tlg050. Translations by G. Nagy.

[2] Greek text for Plutarch’s Life of Brutus and Iliad as it appears in G. Nagy, Homer the Classic.

[3] In my book Masterpieces of Metonymy (2§69), I analyze the pictures that are patternwoven into the web of Andromache in Iliad 22.440–441.

[4] A related image is Iliad 6.484, where Andromache is described as δακρυόεν γελάσασα ‘smiling through her tears’.

[5] There is a comparable image in Euripides’ Hecuba 939.

[6] My personal favorite—the version to which I keep coming back—is the one dated 1926. Also, Claudia Filos draws my attention to a cartoon version of Porcia looking at Hector and Andromache as well as the following works by de Chirico: “The Dioscuri” (1974), “The Prodigal Son” (1922), “The Prodigal Son” (1965).

Bibliography

Nagy, G. 2008|2009. Homer the Classic. Online | Printed version. Hellenic Studies 36. Cambridge MA and Washington DC. Nagy, G. 2015. Masterpieces of Metonymy: From Ancient Greek Times to Now. Cambridge MA and Washington DC.

Tags: Andromache, Brutus, Cato, de Chirico, Hector, Plutarch, Porcia, Rome (HBO serial) 2 Responses to Cato’s daughter Porcia has herself a really good cry

constance klahn August 13, 2015 at 9:54 am (Edit)

Professor Nagy,

Thank you for widening the pathway to clearer insight of the beautiful language and myths of the ancient Greek culture, as well as Plutarch’s Life of Cato and Brutus, through your series of enlightening essays in Classical Inquiries; and for having included in your audience all interested person.

Greatly enjoyed and much appreciated!…….Constance Klahn

Rovi Oky Hidayat November 6, 2015 at 9:42 am (Edit)

we see the lamentations of these women for the doomed Cato. And these lamentations, I suggest, are a properly operatic setting for the selfmade drama of Cato’s life

« About three fairhaired Egyptian queens A historical Cato caught in the vortex of an ancient biography »

Classical Inquiries, edited by Keith Stone, is licensed under a Creative Commons AttributionNonCommercial 4.0 International License.

EU/EEA Privacy Disclosures Cookie Policy CHS GR Privacy Notice

Classical Inquiries powered by WordPress and The Clear Line Theme