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Impiety Avenged: Rewriting Athenian History 125 Splendide Mendax Rethinking Fakes and Forgeries in Classical, Late Antique, and Early Christian Literature edited by Edmund P. Cueva and Javier Martínez BARKHUIS GRONINGEN 2016 Book design: Barkhuis Cover Design: Nynke Tiekstra, Noordwolde Image on cover: Unknown, Statuette of a Sleeping Cupid, 50 - 100, Marble 13.5 × 41.9 × 26 cm (5 5/16 × 16 1/2 × 10 1/4 in.), The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Digital image courtesy of the Getty's Open Content Program. ISBN 9789491431982 Copyright © 2016 the authors and editors All rights reserved. No part of this publication or the information contained herein may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, elec- tronical, mechanical, by photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written per- mission from the authors. Although all care is taken to ensure the integrity and quality of this publication and the information herein, no responsibility is assumed by the publishers nor the authors for any damage to property or persons as a result of operation or use of this publication and/or the information contained herein. Contents Acknowledgments IX I. Introduction 1 JAVIER MARTÍNEZ Cheap Fictions and Gospel Truths 3 II. Classical Works 21 BRIAN R. DOAK Remembering the Future, Predicting the Past: Vaticinia ex eventu in the Historiographic Traditions of the Hebrew Bible and the Ancient Near East 23 GAIUS C. STERN Imposters in Ancient Persia, Greece, and Rome 55 III. Greek Literature 73 REYES BERTOLÍN The Search for Truth in Odyssey 3 and 4 75 VALENTINA PROSPERI The Trojan War: Between History and Myth 93 EMILIA RUIZ YAMUZA Protagoras’s Myth: Between Pastiche and Falsification 113 JAKUB FILONIK Impiety Avenged: Rewriting Athenian History 125 VI CONTENTS MIKEL LABIANO Dramas or Niobus: Aristophanic Comedy or Spurious Play? 141 EDMUND P. CUEVA ὃ γὰρ βούλεται τοῦθ̓ ἕκαστος καὶ οἴεται: Dissembling in the Ancient Greek Novel 157 IV. Latin Literature 175 ANDREW SILLETT Quintus Cicero's Commentariolum: A Philosophical Approach to Roman Elections 177 KLAUS LENNARTZ Not Without My Mother: The Obligate Rhetoric of Daphne’s Transformation 193 MICHAEL MECKLER Comparative Approaches to the Historia Augusta 205 V. Late Antique Works 217 ANNE-CATHERINE BAUDOIN Truth in the Details: The Report of Pilate to Tiberius as an Authentic Forgery 219 KRISTI EASTIN Virgilius Accuratissimus: The “Authentic” Illustrations of William Sandby’s 1750 Virgil 239 LUIGI PEDRONI The Salii at the Nonae of October: Reading Lyd. Mens. 4.138 W 273 CRISTIAN TOLSA Evidence and Speculation about Ptolemy’s Career in Olympiodorus 287 CONTENTS VII VI. Early Christian Works 301 SCOTT BROWN Mar Saba 65: Twelve Enduring Misconceptions 303 ARGYRI KARANASIOU A Euripidised Clement of Alexandria or a Christianised Euripides? The Interplay of Authority between Quoting Author and Cited Author 331 MARKUS MÜLKE Heretic Falsification in Cyprian’s Epistulae? 347 Contributors 355 Indices 361 Index locorum 361 General Index 363 Impiety Avenged: Rewriting Athenian History JAKUB FILONIK University of Warsaw In sources from various periods of antiquity we can find numerous remarks concerning the trials for ἀσέβεια (“impiety”) that reportedly took place in fifth- and fourth-century Athens. Despite several notorious trials well attested in the contemporary sources, these remarks can often be dated many centuries later than the actual events that they describe, sometimes even as late as the biograph- ical writings of Diogenes Laertius (ca. 3rd century CE) or Plutarch (1st/2nd century CE), neither of whom was particularly careful in his approach to the sources. This essay argues that some of these cases follow a pattern of construct- ing ancient fake testimonies of the past and, as such, they display numerous shared features relating to their fictive nature. The first to raise serious doubts about the value of these testimonies in ex- tenso was Dover (1976) in his paper on the freedom of intellectuals in ancient Greece, followed by important general remarks on Hellenistic biography by Lefkowitz (1981, 110–111 et al. and 1987) and Stone (1988), and a more de- tailed study of selected fifth-century cases by Wallace (1994). Here, I would like to go one step further in calling the surviving testimonies into question. In order to give a more detailed picture of the methods of ancient biographers and schol- ars, I will focus in this essay on four cases of the use of fake source material in the descriptions of the trials allegedly held in classical Athens. First, I argue that some of these trials almost certainly did not take place, while traditions that refer to those possibly authentic most likely included numerous fictitious additions. Second, I intend to highlight the shared features of the cases described below. Third, I discuss possible reasons for the emergence and re-use of those inauthen- tic testimonies. Finally, I tentatively suggest some new arguments concerning 126 JAKUB FILONIK legal issues connected with the early impiety trials.1 The four cases in question are those of Aspasia, Protagoras, Euripides, and Phryne. First, let us have a look at a particularly revealing passage from Diogenes Laertius, which proves to be very informative on the methods of ancient biog- raphers describing events dating back to the classical period: Of the trial of Anaxagoras different accounts are given. Sotion in his Suc- cession of the Philosophers says that he was indicted by Cleon on a charge of impiety, because he declared the sun to be a mass of red-hot metal; that his pupil Pericles defended him, and he was fined five talents and banished. Satyrus in his Lives says that the prosecutor was Thucydides,2 the opponent of Pericles, and the charge one of treasonable correspondence with Persia as well as of impiety; and that sentence of death was passed on Anaxagoras by default. When news was brought him that he was condemned and his sons were dead, his comment on the sentence was, “Long ago nature condemned both my judges and myself to death”; and on his sons, “I knew that my chil- dren were born to die.” Some, however, tell this story of Solon, and others of Xenophon. That he buried his sons with his own hands is asserted by Demetrius of Phalerum in his work On Old Age. Hermippus3 in his Lives says that he was confined in the prison pending his execution; that Pericles came forward and asked the people whether they had any fault to find with him in his own public career; to which they replied that they had not. “Well,” he continued, “I am a pupil of Anaxagoras; do not then be carried away by slanders and put him to death. Let me prevail upon you to release him.” So he was released; but he could not brook the indignity he had suf- fered and committed suicide. Hieronymus in the second book of his Scat- tered Notes states that Pericles brought him into court so weak and wasted from illness that he owed his acquittal not so much to the merits of his case as to the sympathy of the judges. So much then on the subject of his trial. ————— 1 The content of this essay has been supplemented by Filonik (2013) which focuses on legal and socio-political aspects of the impiety accusations in classical Athens, and in- cludes a detailed discussion of the less clear-cut cases, such as those of Anaxagoras, Di- agoras, and some fourth-century trials. The project from which the present paper emerges has been funded by the National Science Centre, Poland based on the decision number DEC2012/07/N/HS2/00967. The research has been also supported by the Foundation for Polish Science (FNP). 2 For controversies on Thucydides, son of Melesias, anti-Periclean opposition in Athens, and Plutarch’s account of these “events,” see Andrewes 1978; Raaflaub 2000, 98–100. 3 FGrHist IV A 3, 1026 T 6 b = F 65. For Hermippus’ of Smyrna methods in his biograph- ical writing, see e.g. Bollansée 1999a: 118ff., 182–84. IMPIETY AVENGED 127 […] At length he retired to Lampsacus and there died. (D. L. 2.12–14; trans. R. D. Hicks). Here, we are given several variants of—apparently—the same events, which demonstrate the author’s complete lack of ability to assess the sources available to him. As if presenting these four variants as equally plausible were not confus- ing enough, the biographer simply adds that Anaxagoras died at Lampsacus. To support this statement, Diogenes Laertius (2.15) further “quotes” the inscription from the philosopher’s grave, followed by a more elaborate epigram written by our biographer, which, again, focuses on the trial resulting in the philosopher’s death(!) For the story to be rendered more appealing, he includes (1) gnomic quotations—ascribed to various authors—which offer a brilliant summary of the famous person’s death, (2) witty dialogues with renowned figures (in this in- stance, Pericles) who are introduced only to offer aid to the central character, and (3) the authority of earlier authors merged into one ostensibly coherent nar- rative. In his Life of Pericles (32), Plutarch mentions the charge of ἀσέβεια against Aspasia, the concubine of Pericles. According to the biographer, the case was brought by Hermippus the comic writer (not his Hellenistic namesake just men- tioned), who claimed that Aspasia was helping free women to rendezvous with Pericles. The latter was also said to have helped in her acquittal by shedding a flood of tears over her fate before the dicasts (a story Plutarch attributes to Aes- chines of Sphettus). The biographer most likely transferred the stage humor of the comic writer Hermippus to an imaginary lawsuit.4 It would otherwise be an isolated example from classical Athens of a comic poet repeating his insults from the stage in court.
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