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A.U · Etveu9epot Na.Ppnaia.T 9Aaaov'te1; Oh:O'iev Notvtv Kaetvrov 'A9nvow, Llt\'Tpo~ Ouvek' EUKAEE'i~ CHAPTER TWO ATHENIAN FOUNDATION MYTHS AND THE ION; IONIANISM AND AUTOCHTHONY ... a.u · Etveu9Epot na.ppnaia.t 9aAAOV'tE1; oh:o'iEv notvtV KAEtvrov 'A9nvow, llT\'tPo~ ouvEK' EUKAEE'i~ ... but rather that they may live in glorious Athens as free men, free of speech and flourishing, enjoying good repute where their mother is concerned Euripides' Hippo[ytus 421-23 (tr. Kovacs) 2.1. INTRODUCTION Two important political themes are prominent, and ingeniously com­ bined, in Euripides' Ion. The first is Ionianism, that is the Ionian character of Athens, and the supposed connection between Athens as colonial metropolis or founding city on the one hand and the Ionians as colonists on the other. The Euripidean genealogy of Ion, according to which he was son of Apollo, assumes that Apollo is 7tO.'tponoc;, the common ancestral god of both Athenians and lonians, 1 1 The view I follow is that of Smarczyk 1990: 363 (against the scepticism of Wilamowitz about whether the Ionians recognized Apollo as Patroos), cf. Dougherty 1996: 26l. The main non-Euripidean texts in which Apollo is said to be patroos because of his paternity of Ion are Plato, Euthyd. 302 c-d, 'An61vlvrov na.'tpipo~ lha 'tllV 'tOU "Irovo~ yEvEcnv, and Diod. 16.57.4, where it is said of the Athenians that they boasted 'tov 'AnoAArova. na.'tpipov a.u'trov dva.t Ka.t np6yovov. This is from Diodorus' account of the third Sacred War, his source for which is much disputed. It was probably not Ephorus but some other fourth-century historian such as Demophilos, Diyllos or Duris; see Markle 1994 and McQueen 1995. Plato may merely be following the innovator Euripides: see Parker 1987: 213 n. 80, who observes that 'Apollo's epithet [patroos] is explicable without reference to Ion'; Parker does not discuss the evidence of Diodorus or the problem of his source at 16.5 7, a passage which is perhaps less likely than Plato to be derived from Euripides, though one cannot be absolutely sure that Ka.t np6yovov was not a flourish added by Diodorus himself. In OCD 3, under 'patrooi theoz', Parker (i) accepts the usual view that Apollo was patroos to the Ionians and (ii) links this with his role as father of the Ionian ancestor Ion; as he nicely puts it there, the 'ancestral god is also an ancestor god'. Contrast 198 7: 207 where he argued that Euripides' innovation was ATHENIAN FOUNDATION MYTHS AND THE ION 45 and is identical with both Apollo Pythios the god of Delphi and with Apollo of Delos. 2 The second idea is autochthony, the idea that the Athenians were 'earth-born', gegeneis (see below 2.3.), and had always occupied the same land: Ion's mother Kreousa is descended from the earth-born kings of Athens. I shall argue that Ionianism and autochthony were related via a contrast with a third notion, that of Dorianism; that the Athenians were proud of being both Ionian and autochthonous; and that Ion is both a document of this twofold pride and also a reassertion of lonianism in particular, at a moment of great imper­ ial despondency. Autochthony is important, but is not unique to Ion; it featured in Erechtheos and perhaps also in Melanippe Sophe. It is emphatic lonianism which gives Ion its unique importance for the classical literary scholar and historian. Another view has however been advanced. The stress on the Ionians as colonists of the Athenians has been seen3 as an actual denial or rejection of the Ionian ancestry of the Athenians them­ selves: instead of belonging to a large and undifferentiated category of lonians, all of whom (as another myth had it) came from the Peloponnese, 4 the Athenians were colonisers of the Ionians, but could themselves boast the oldest and most prestigious origin possible, namely the Earth. That is, they were 'autochthonous'. The myth of Athenian colonization of Ionia is thus (it is argued) a way of rec­ onciling Athens' undoubted lonianism with the idea of Athenian autochthony.5 The two leading notions of the Ion, lonianism and too bold to be taken up by the subsequent tradition, which left Ion as a general and an immigrant. Complete consistency in the traditions should not be looked for: if Euripides was innovating, it was an innovation which fitted snugly onto existing notions and habits. For further discussions and suggestions see Hedrick 1988 who connects the cult of Apollo with Peisistratos, and Cole 1997 who reads the Ion as a new departure from the tradition, a complete re-mythicization by Euripides. 2 On the identification with Apollo Pythios, see Hedrick 1988: 200; Smarczyk 1990: 364 n. 83; both cite Dem. 18.141. On the identification with Apollo Delios see Smarczyk 1990: 364-65 n. 84. For the closeness of Delphic and Delian Apollo see further below ch. 3.3. For the precinct of 'Apollo and Poseidon' at Aegina in the time of the Athenian empire see below n. 37: both Apollo and Poseidon had Ionian associations which may be played on in the Ion despite Aegina's firmly Dorian character. 3 Hall 1997b: 54-5. 4 The father (Melanthos) and a son (Neleus) of the Athenian king Kodros were supposed to have come from Messenian Pylos. See Hall 1997b: 51. 5 That is the clear implication of Hall 1997b: 56 where he speaks of 'reconcili­ ation between Ionian and autochthonous origins' as the context in which Ion must .
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