Aeschylus’ Supplices Introduction and Commentary on vv. 1–523 Aeschylus’ Supplices Introduction and Commentary on vv. 1–523 B by Pär Sandin Corrected edition SYMMACHUS C LUND 2005 Aeschylus’ Supplices: Introduction and Commentary on vv. 1–523 / Pär Sandin. Corrected edition: Lund, Symmachus publishing 2005 First edition: Gothenburg, Göteborg University 2003 (doctoral dissertation) © Pär Sandin 2003, 2005 Printed in Sweden by CO-print Professional, Nässjö 2005 ISBN 91-628-6401-7 Symmachus publishing Karl XII-gatan 14c SE-22220 Lund Sweden Aeschylus’ (525–456 B.C.) drama the Suppliant women (Greek Hikétides, Lat. Supplices) is certain to be the first in a trilogy of tragedies with an appurtenant comic epilogue, ‘satyr-play’. The other two tragedies and the satyr-play have been lost except for a few lines preserved in quotations and, possibly, papyri. The dissertation contains an introduction to the entire drama, a translation and commentary on the first half of the text (verses 1–523), and an excursus. The Introduction deals with the date of the theatrical production, the literary theme, the mythological background, the hypothetical reconstruction of the trilogy, and the contemporary Athenian theatre. The Commentary constitutes the major part of the work, being primarily philological, but also literary and historical, dealing with matters of scenic production and the nature of the chorus, where some new hypotheses are proposed, and with Greek mythology, religion, politics, and history in general as these become issues of particular passages of the text. The constitution of the text is a major concern. The Supplices is based on virtually only one manuscript: the Florentine Laurentianus graecus 32.9 (‘Codex Mediceus’) from the 10th century. There are five apographa from the later Middle Ages and the Renaissance, but there is no evidence to suggest that any one of these has independent authority. The text is often in need of recon- struction by emendation. The approach has been moderately conservative. About thirty new conjectures of varying probability are proposed and dis- cussed; the reading of the extant manuscripts is defended in fourteen places against a majority of recent editors. The Excursus deals with a general problem of textual criticism in versified texts, the displacements of verses. The conclusion is that there has been an abuse of this conjectural measure in several editions. Aeschylus, Hiketides, Supplices, Suppliants, Suppliant women, tragedy, Greek drama, Greek theatre, textual criticism Preface The amount of work that remained to be done on the Supplices came as ra- ther a surprise to me, seeing that, at least in my own country, the belief pre- vails that ‘everything has been done’ on the authors at the high end of the Classical canon. The great edition and commentary of Holger Friis Johansen and Edward Whittle, renowned for its exhaustiveness, was published a mere twenty years ago. It was followed by a number of long and learned reviews; then Martin West’s monumental Teubner edition with the accompanying Studies in Aeschylus appeared in 1990. One might have thought that things had been put to a relative rest in the absence of further evidence. Neverthe- less, the present dissertation, originally intended as a collection of critical notes on discrete passages from several Aeschylean dramas (‘Studies on the Text of…’), turned out after a few months’ work to be a growing comment- ary on the Supplices, with gaps that needed filling. I thus set aside my notes on the other plays, publishing some material that was reasonably finished (Sandin 2001, 2002), and set to work on the Supplices. The gaps that needed filling were not only spatial, but conceptual: a modern commentary is expec- ted to offer more than text-critical notes, and I have done my best to meet this demand, if sometimes only with references to the works of specialists. Cert- ainly a large portion of the present study is devoted to textual criticism, which is inevitable in the case of a work notorious for the corrupt state of its text. Needless to say, Friis Johansen–Whittle’s commentary lay open by my side at virtually all times whenever and wherever I worked. The huge amount of information contained in it turned out not to be an obstacle, by virtue of its exhaustiveness, to further research; rather it was a great source of inspiration and a spur: when wrong, to attempt to disprove the commentators’ theses; when right, to advance further argument. Inevitably ‘pace FJ–W’, ‘rightly FJ– W’ and the like will occur repeatedly in my text—not, I hope, to the conster- nation of the reader. My views on theory and method are set out in a postscript to an article in Eranos 100 (Sandin 2002, 155–57). The present dissertation should be re- garded as a preliminary study: my intention is to publish a full commented edition of the Supplices and of the fragments of the lost parts of the trilogy (Aegyptii, Danaides) with appurtenant Satyr-play (Amymone). I owe my heartfelt thanks to all the people and institutions who have v guided me through the alternatingly idyllic, tragic, farcical, ecstatic, and unbearably dull process that is post-graduate studies. My tutor, Professor Staffan Fogelmark, has supported me throughout my academic career in Lund and Gothenburg. He has patiently read the drafts of my disserta- tion and supplied invaluable observations and criticism, often discussing Aeschylus with me in the company of scholars such as Turnebus, Stephanus, and Casaubon, in the surroundings created by his marvellous library. Be- sides—a debt that will be even harder to settle—he was the one who taught me Greek in the first place, sharing, during a happy period of my life, his expertise and his love for the beauty, precision, and cogency of the Greek language as mastered by the best authors. I shall be forever grateful. Professor Martin West generously supplied me with a copy of his unpub- lished repertory of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century emendations in the Supplices, based on his own collations of scholars’ marginalia in copies of the early editions (see his Studies in Aeschylus, pp. 358–65). He also took time to discuss a palaeographical detail in the Laurentianus Graecus 32.9 (‘Codex Mediceus’) with me. In the course of a stimulating correspondence, Dr. Sir Charles Willink discussed several details of textual criticism and metre in the first choral ode of the Supplices; he also supplied me with a draft of his own notes on the entire cantica of the play, and I have had reason to re-evaluate and correct my views in several places in the light of his observations. If I happen to disagree with either of these scholars in a few instances in my com- mentary, this in no way diminishes my opinion of their stature, and in partic- ular of Professor West’s unsurpassable contribution to Aeschylean studies. Two stipendiary visits abroad offered superb opportunities for research and much inspiration. In the spring and summer of 2000 I worked at the London Institute of Classical Studies, with the financial support of the Swedish Foundation for International Cooperation in Research and Higher Education (STINT) and Birgit och Gad Rausings Stiftelse för Humanistisk Forskning. During my stay, Professor Richard Janko took time—amidst mas- sive commitments of his own—to tutor me for free, reading and commenting on drafts of parts of the dissertation. The Director of the Institute, at that time Professor Geoffrey Waywell, and the staff were most kind and helpful in every way. My second sojourn was in Rome in 2002–3, at Svenska Institutet (Istituto svedese di studi classici), where I spent an unforgettable year having been awarded the ‘grand scholarship’ in philology. The Director, Professor Barbro Santillo Frizell, and the staff were exceedingly helpful. vi The Greek seminar in Gothenburg has endured several sittings devoted to Aeschylean textual philology, and supplied valuable criticism. In particular I would like to thank Dr. Karin Hult, who has also read all the Greek passages in the book and most of the English, correcting a number of errors; further- more she advised me on several practical details concerning the production of the book. Professor Marianne Thormählen has corrected my English with firm hand and unfaltering judgement; and Ms. Katarina Bernhardsson under- took to read the final typescript in full, saving me from a multitude of typo- graphical embarrassments. Apart from the grants and scholarships mentioned above, I am grateful for a considerable grant from Adlerbertska stipendiefonden, and, towards the costs of printing the book, one from Längmanska kulturfonden. A grant from Kungl. Vetenskaps- och Vitterhets-Samhället i Göteborg enabled me, in the late spring of 2003, to make an excursion from Rome to Bologna in order to examine in situ the manuscript Bononiensis Bibl. Univ. 2271. During my time as a doctoral student I have also received grants from Stipendiefonden Viktor Rydbergs minne and Stiftelsen Dagny och Eilert Ekvalls premie- och stipendiefond. Finally, I owe thanks to my family and friends for their support and under- standing. τοιῶνδε τυχὼν ἐκ πρυµνῆς φρενὸς χάριν σέβοµαι. Lund, December 2003. A renewed grant from Längmanska kulturfonden allowed the printing of this corrected edition. The text has been reset, but the pagination remains intact —a few words or lines may have been shifted into neighbouring pages. I am deeply indebted to Professor James Diggle for his critique of the first edition, presented, orally and in writing, at my public disputation in Gothenburg, 27 January 2004. Formal errors noted by Professor Diggle and others have been corrected here: the scholarly errors and misjudgements will have to remain for the present. I hope to be able to correct a few in the not-too-dis- tant future.