City University of New York (CUNY) CUNY Academic Works All Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects 6-2017 Aeschylean Drama and the History of Rhetoric Allannah K. Karas The Graduate Center, City University of New York How does access to this work benefit ou?y Let us know! More information about this work at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/2111 Discover additional works at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu This work is made publicly available by the City University of New York (CUNY). Contact: [email protected] ΑESCHYLEAN DRAMA AND THE HISTORY OF RHETORIC by ALLANNAH KRISTIN KARAS A dissertation submitted to the Graduate Faculty in Classics in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, The City University of New York 2017 © 2017 ALLANNAH KRISTIN KARAS All Rights Reserved ii AESCHYLEAN DRAMA AND THE HISTORY OF RHETORIC by Allannah Kristin Karas This manuscript has been read and accepted for the Graduate Faculty in Classics in satisfaction of the dissertation requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Date Dee Clayman Chair of Examining Committee Date Dee Clayman Executive Officer Supervisory Committee: Dee Clayman Joel Lidov Lawrence Kowerski Victor Bers (Yale University) THE CITY UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK iii ABSTRACT Aeschylean Drama and the History of Rhetoric by Allannah Kristin Karas Advisor: Professor Dee Clayman This dissertation demonstrates how the playwright Aeschylus contributes to the development of ancient Greek rhetoric through his use and display of πειθώ (often translated “persuasion”) throughout the Oresteia, first performed in 458 BCE. In this drama, Aeschylus specifically displays and develops πειθώ as a theme, a goddess, a central principle of action, and an important concept for his audience to consider. By tracing connections between Aeschylus’ innovations with πειθώ and later fifth and early fourth century conceptions of Greek rhetoric, I argue that Aeschylus plays a more important role in the development of practical principles and concepts of the rhetorical art than has been previously acknowledged. Methodologically, in this dissertation I combine word studies and thematic analysis together with examinations of choral narratives and staging, iconographical research on the goddess Peitho, and a close study of Athena’s speeches to the Erinyes (Eu. 778-891) through the lens of Aristotle’s Rhetoric. Through these diverse modes of analysis, this dissertation validates Aeschylus as a conceptually innovative playwright and offers an approach for further examination of early Greek rhetoric through the portrayal of πειθώ in drama. iv For ALL of my big wonderful family, especially, Grandpa Nick “the Greek” v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to extend heartfelt thanks, first of all, to Dee Clayman, my advisor, professional mentor, and dissertation committee chair. Her invaluable help, frank advice, and constant encouragement, has helped make the entire dissertation process an opportunity for growth, enrichment, and even joy. I am also grateful to other members of my committee: Joel Lidov, for his genuine interest, keen insights and careful feedback; Victor Bers, for his many, tirelessly detailed notes; and, Lawrence Kowerski, for thought-provoking questions throughout. I also thank the other scholars who have obligingly read and provided comments on early drafts of this dissertation, particularly, David Sansone, Andrew Miller, Victoria Pedrick, and Elias Theodoracopoulos. I am likewise grateful to those who, at meetings for the Society for Classical Studies, the Classical Association of the Atlantic States, Ancient Drama in Performance, and the Classical Association of the Middle West and South, moderated and attended panels where I presented incipient ideas for various chapters of this project. Thank you especially to the faculty, staff, and student community at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, who have helped support my doctoral research. Thank you to Tristan Husby and Melissa Marturano for their companionship throughout the writing process; and very special thanks to Marilyn Mercado for her constant friendship, her ever-positive attitude, and her indispensable practical support to us all in the Program of Classics. I also owe thanks to professors from the University of Dallas and from Magdalen College, David Sweet, Karl Maurer, and Patrick Powers, who fostered in me my first love for the ancient Greek language and the Classical world. vi These acknowledgements would not be complete without my deepest thanks also to the countless friends and family members who have walked beside me throughout the entire dissertation process. To ALL of my lovely friends and family, especially in New York, I owe immense thanks for their constant love, inexhaustible patience, and encouraging presence throughout this adventure. Thanks, in a very special way, to my dear friend Alvaro del Portillo, who has bent over backwards for me countless times over the past number of years. I am grateful also to my wonderful grandparents and to my favorite people in the world—Trevor, Anselm, Olivia, Francesca, Mary, Dominic, Faustina, Athanasius and Avila—for filling my life with nonstop excitement, deep affection, and immense joy. Finally, and most especially, thank you to my dear, loving, and incredibly generous parents, Andrew and Laura Karas, who continually teach me, by their example, what matters most in life. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT…..….………………………………………………………………………………iv LIST OF FIGURES….…………………………………………………………………………...ix ABBREVIATIONS….……………………………………………………………………………x PREFACE: Outline of Chapters………………………………………………………………….xi CHAPTER ONE: Greek Rhetoric, Drama, and Πειθώ……………………………………………1 I. Introduction II. Scholarship on the History of Greek Rhetoric III. Πειθώ: A Catalog of Uses Before and After Aeschylus IV. Rhetorical, Civic, Public Peitho: A Fifth Century Phenomenon? CHAPTER TWO: The Goddess Peitho: Personified Aspects of Rhetoric?………………...…...41 I. Introduction II. A New Genealogy and Persona (Ag. 385) III. Peitho’s Companions (Cho. 726) IV. Peitho’s Role and Function (Eu. 885, 970) V. Conclusion CHAPTER THREE: The Centrality of Πειθώ to the Oresteia….......…………..…………….…71 I. Introduction II. Definitions III. The Dramatic Prominence of Πειθώ: Agamemnon, Choephoroi, Eumenides IV. Conclusion CHAPTER FOUR: Πειθώ and Athena’s Rhetoric at Eumenides 778-891……………….……109 I. Introduction II. The Prominence of Athena’s Πειθώ III. The Aristotelian Model IV. Athena’s Work as Deliberative Speech V. Structure and Argument in Athena’s Speech VI. Conclusion CONCLUSION…………………………………………………………………………………144 BIBLIOGRAPHY…………………………………………………...………………………….146 viii LIST OF FIGURES Fig.1. Peitho and Aphrodite……………………………………………………………………...17 Fragment of a terracotta skyphos by a follower of Douris, c. 490 BCE. MMA 1907. 286.51. Photo from collections of Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Fig. 2. The abduction of Helen…………………………………………………………………..22 Skyphos by Makron, c. 490-480 BCE Boston 13.186. Photo from collections of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Fig. 3. Peitho and Aphrodite Pandemos……………………………..…………………………..26 Triobol coins. c. 510-490 BCE Photo from Seltman 1924, Plate XXII, dd-ee. Fig. 4. Demonassa with Peitho(?) and Eros……………………………………………………...67 Interior of kylix by Meidias. c. 400 BCE. Malibu 82.AE.38. Photo from collections of the J. Paul Getty Museum, Malibu. ix ABBREVIATIONS ARV Attic Red-Figure Vase-Painters. 1956. Edited by J.D. Beazley. 2nd ed., Oxford. BA Beazley Archive Database. www.beazley.ox.ac.uk. BM The British Museum, London, United Kingdom. DK Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker.1954. Edited by Herman Diels and Walther Kranz. Berlin. IG Inscriptiones Graecae. 1913. Berolini: De Gruyter. LIMC Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae. 1981. Edited by Hans Christoph Ackermann. Germany: Artemis-Verl. LSJ Liddell, Henry George, and Robert Scott. 1968. A Greek-English Dictionary. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. MMA The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. PMG Poetae Melici Graeci. 1962. Edited by D.L. Page. Oxford. PMGF Poetarum Melicorum Graecorum Fragmenta. 1991. Edited by Malcolm Davies. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. SEG Supplementum Epigraphicum Graecum. 1935-. Leiden, UK: Brill Academic Publishers. Snell Pindari Carmina cum Fragmentis. 1987. Edited by Bruno Snell and Herwig Maehler. Leipzig, Germany: Teubner. TLG Thesaurus Linguae Graecae: A Digital Library of Greek Literature. www.tlg.uci.edu. V Sappho et Alcaeus.1971. Edited by Eva-Maria Voigt Hamm. Amsterdam: Athenaeum Polak & Van Gennep. x PREFACE: Outline of Chapters This dissertation examines πειθώ and its connection with the idea and practice of Greek rhetoric in the fifth and early fourth centuries BCE. Specifically, I demonstrate how Aeschylus contributes to the development of rhetoric through his use and display of πειθώ in the Oresteia (458BCE). In this drama, Aeschylus assigns the goddess Peitho new features that will become characteristic of ancient Greek rhetoric; he presents his new ideas of πειθώ as central to the plot movement of the entire trilogy; and, at the culmination of the drama, he stages a work of persuasion framed in terms of πειθώ and in the form of masterful speeches (Eu. 778-891) that seem to anticipate the model of deliberative speech discussed much later in Aristotle’s Rhetoric. Chapter One: Greek Rhetoric, Drama, and Πειθώ, provides the scholarly context for my argument: discussions of the history of rhetoric