Bryn Mawr Classical Review

Isabelle Algrain, L'alabastre attique: Origine, forme et usages. Etudes d'archéologie 7. Bruxelles: CReA-Patrimoine, 2014. Pp. 320. ISBN 9789461360427. €80.00 (pb).

Reviewed by Vincenzo Baldoni, Università di Bologna (vincenzo.baldoni@unibo.it)

Version at BMCR home site

Table of Contents

Il volume in esame è il risultato della lunga ricerca condotta da I. Algrain sull'alabastron attico ed è strutturato in due sezioni, la prima dedicata all'origine, alla produzione e allo sviluppo della forma, la seconda ai suoi usi; segue il catalogo degli esemplari figurati e a vernice nera.¹

Nell'introduzione si ripercorre la storia delle ricerche sull'alabastron e si mette in risalto una lacuna degli studi: finora le indagini si sono incentrate prevalentemente su aspetti stilistici o iconografici e manca dunque uno studio completo degli esemplari attici e della loro evoluzione formale.² L'Autrice dichiara di voler analizzare in particolare la figura del vasaio: considerando i raggruppamenti del Beazley, l'esame si concentra sulle forme e si confrontano i profili dei vasi per determinare gli aspetti morfologici peculiari di ciascun vasaio e quelli comuni a un atelier. L'analisi è finalizzata a riconoscere le mani dei ceramisti che lavorano in una stessa bottega (i cui vasi avranno elementi formali comuni; si veda ad esempio la tabella 1, p. 16) e a cogliere l'evoluzione della forma lungo la carriera di uno stesso ceramista; inoltre, si indagano l'organizzazione delle botteghe e le collaborazioni tra vasai e pittori.³ Sono valutati altri importanti elementi, come l'iconografia e lo schema decorativo, quest'ultimo considerato un marchio identitario delle officine. Come evidenziato dall'Algrain, il metodo è applicabile a quelle forme che, come l'alabastron, sono prodotte in un numero limitato di esemplari e che presentano molte varianti formali tra le botteghe.

La ricerca rientra nel filone di studi sulle forme vascolari attiche, un ambito che vanta una lunga tradizione⁴ e che più di recente è stato condotto integrando l'analisi della produzione con altri aspetti quali la distribuzione, l'iconografia, gli usi. L'Algrain esamina l'alabastron secondo una duplice prospettiva: da un lato integra efficacemente l'analisi morfologica con aspetti più tradizionali e traccia un quadro completo dell'intera produzione attica della forma (Capitoli 1-4); dall'altro illustra il panorama dei contesti d'uso di questo tipo di vaso, affrontando molti temi chiave dell'attuale dibattito scientifico sulla ceramica greca e sulla sua fruizione. Per la sua complessità, il tema della distribuzione degli esemplari esula dagli intenti del volume ed è trattato dall'Autrice in altre pubblicazioni.⁵

Nel capitolo 1, dedicato alle origini dell'alabastron, l'Autrice circoscrive l'ambito della propria ricerca solo alla forma che, elaborata in Egitto, si diffonde poi in Oriente e nel mondo greco ed è infine introdotta ad Atene; qui, alla metà del VI sec. a.C. circa, è prodotto il più antico esemplare a figure nere, decorato dal Pittore di Amasis. Quanto all'alabastron corinzio, se ne chiarisce una differente origine rispetto all'omonimo vaso ateniese.

Per le molte varianti presenti, l'Algrain opportunamente non presenta una tipo-cronologia generale, ma divide la produzione in tre fasi cronologiche, sulla base delle caratteristiche della forma, della decorazione e delle botteghe: la prima (Cap. 2) comprende gli esemplari databili tra la seconda metà del VI e gli inizi del V sec. a.C. (a parte l'esemplare decorato dal Pittore di Amasis, la produzione è documentata di nuovo a partire dall'ultimo quarto del VI sec. a.C.). L'efficacia del metodo emerge in particolare dall'analisi di realtà molto articolate come, ad esempio, la bottega del "vasaio di Paseas" e dei vasai Pasiades e Paidikos (vedi tabella nr. 5, p. 65). Nella seconda fase (prima metà del V sec. a.C.: Cap. 3) le botteghe che producono alabastra fabbricano principalmente lekythoi e presentano un'organizzazione spesso complessa, come ad es. l'atelier dei "vasai-pittori di Saffo, di Diosphos, di Haimon 1 e Haimon 2" (pp. 95-113). L'analisi è condotta con rigore metodologico e, quando necessario, se ne evidenziano i limiti: ad esempio, di fronte alla massa dei vasi attribuiti al vasaio-pittore di Haimon, l'Autrice si limita a distinguere le mani di due vasai (Haimon 1 e 2), lasciando aperto il problema del riconoscimento di altri ceramisti, poiché ritiene necessario un approfondimento complessivo sulla bottega. Attorno alla metà del V sec. a.C. finisce la produzione degli alabastra figurati, per riprendere solo con la terza fase (fine del V - inizi del IV sec. a.C.: Cap. 4). In quest'ultima, la forma presenta motivi geometrici o vegetali (ad es. del Gruppo Bulas) o è dipinta solo in bianco, a imitare gli esemplari in pietra, già diffusi dalla metà del V sec. a.C.: per questi, privi di decorazione, risulta particolarmente utile il metodo di analisi morfologica. Agli inizi del IV sec. ad Atene cessa del tutto la produzione di alabastra in ceramica e sopravvivono solo quelli in pietra, fabbricati fino all'età ellenistica, quando la forma verrà definitivamente rimpiazzata dal balsamario.

La seconda sezione si apre con un capitolo (Cap. 5) dedicato agli usi dell'alabastron. Se precedenti trattazioni su questo tema si erano basate principalmente sulle raffigurazioni vascolari, lo studio in esame propone un approccio più complesso, che tiene conto delle fonti letterarie, epigrafiche, iconografiche e archeologiche: ne esce un quadro variegato degli usi della forma, valutato in un'ampia prospettiva storica e archeologica. Legato prevalentemente — ma non esclusivamente — ad un pubblico femminile, alla toilette, alla cura del corpo e all'ornamento, l'alabastron appare sovente collegato ai riti del matrimonio, ma anche ad ambiti diversi, quali i rituali funerari, le offerte nei santuari, il banchetto e il contesto atletico. Per necessità di sintesi ci si sofferma in questa sede solo su alcuni aspetti della ricerca, che offre al lettore numerosi spunti di riflessione. L'Algrain esamina le immagini vascolari che mostrano gli usi dell'alabastron riconoscendo il valore simbolico (e non mimetico del reale) di queste raffigurazioni ed evidenziandone la polisemia e il carattere spesso volutamente ambiguo. Risulta così superata l'idea che il corpus delle immagini sugli alabastra costituisca un insieme uniforme e coerente, connesso in prevalenza alla donna e alle pratiche della seduzione.⁶ Al contrario, nel volume in esame si evidenzia come tale corpus sia molto più vario e non si presti a letture univoche, se non a costo di forzature. Emblematico è il caso delle figure femminili identificate come etere, quando, ad esempio, nella scena è presente un uomo che offre un dono ad una donna (pp. 160-161, cat. II.67, fig. 100); l'Algrain vi ravvisa invece una più complessa strategia narrativa che prevede l'unione del tema della seduzione e del matrimonio, cui rimanda il gesto compiuto dalla donna che allaccia la cintura del chitone. Più in generale l'Autrice, richiamandosi a recenti studi orientati verso la rivalutazione della figura femminile nella società ateniese,⁷ propone per questa e altri tipi di scene letture alternative, come nel caso delle cosiddette "hetaires fileuses" (pp.165-168). Notevoli risultati sono ottenuti anche dall'analisi contestuale, una prospettiva di indagine che è un punto di forza di questo lavoro e che si auspica verrà approfondita in futuro. L'esame dei diversi contesti d'uso, limitato nel volume agli esempi più significativi — in particolare ateniesi — chiarisce che l'alabastron non è un vaso di esclusiva pertinenza femminile. L'Algrain, anzi, si chiede se per l'Antichità sia legittimo distinguere nettamente tra vasi maschili o femminili o, piuttosto, se sia più corretto considerare tali differenze in modo meno rigido. Il capitolo esamina infine il contesto commerciale dell'olio profumato: l'alabastron e la pelike sono introdotti insieme nel repertorio del Ceramico ateniese quando, alla fine del VI sec. a.C., si diffondono qui pratiche di lusso di matrice orientale, testimoniate anche da altri oggetti di prestigio come phialai, parasole, olii profumati. Il capitolo finale (Cap. 6) approfondisce il tema dei profumi antichi e del loro rapporto con l'alabastron. La preziosità del contenuto è evidente se si considera la ridotta capacità della forma, mentre la scarsa praticità del vaso testimonia la voluta adesione al prototipo orientale, per evocarne l'origine prestigiosa. Alla provenienza esotica della forma e del contenuto rimandano, secondo l'Autrice, anche le raffigurazioni sul Gruppo degli alabastra del Negro, cui è dedicata ampia trattazione.

Nelle conclusioni l'analisi si allarga anche alle forme attiche per profumi (aryballos, lekythos, exaleiptron), delineando un quadro di riferimento utile per la definizione delle specificità dell'impiego dell'alabastron. Nelle ultime pagine l'Algrain torna sui destinatari dell'alabastron e sulla pluralità dei soggetti presenti sulla forma, tra i quali alcuni tipicamente maschili (ad esempio opliti, atleti), o episodi del mito, che la studiosa presenta in un'utile tabella di sintesi che copre l'intera produzione (tabella 11, p. 212). Tale varietà di soggetti è imputabile a diversi fattori: scelte dettate dalla moda del momento o dovute al ceramografo e alla tradizione di bottega, o, forse, a richieste specifiche. Non si può dunque stabilire per l'alabastron un legame costante tra forma e immagine, diversamente da quanto ravvisabile per altre forme del repertorio attico; devono essere invece valutati anche l'evoluzione delle iconografie nel tempo e il più ampio quadro della produzione: ad esempio, la preponderanza dei temi femminili sugli alabastra dopo il 480 a.C. è iscrivibile in un fenomeno più generale che riguarda anche altri tipi di vaso.

L'opera è corredata di due appendici (pp. 219-222), la prima con una tabella riepilogativa dei ceramisti che hanno prodotto alabastra e dei ceramografi che li hanno decorati; la seconda con una tabella in cui sono presentati i profili dei vasi rappresentativi per ciascuna bottega individuata nell'ambito della produzione.

Segue il catalogo dei 658 alabastra attici noti all'Autrice, la più ampia raccolta attualmente disponibile. Il catalogo è strutturato per fasi e, all'interno di queste, per botteghe. Le schede, sintetiche e con le più rilevanti informazioni, riportano anche la misura della capacità dei vasi, calcolata mediante il software disponibile sul sito web del CreA-Patrimonie,⁸ una bibliografia aggiornata e i riferimenti al Corpus of Attic Vase Inscriptions e al Beazley Archive Pottery Database. Per una più agevole fruizione del catalogo sarebbero risultati utili alcuni indici, ad esempio delle provenienze o del luogo di conservazione.

Il volume è molto curato nella sua veste editoriale ed è corredato di un ampio apparato grafico e fotografico, con molte immagini a colori e numerose tavole dei profili dei vasi più rappresentativi delle tipologie individuate.

Questo libro, rivolto principalmente ad un pubblico di specialisti, non solo presenta un esame aggiornato e completo sull'alabastron attico, colmando così una lacuna degli studi, ma — per originalità del metodo e ampiezza dell'analisi — costituisce anche un valido riferimento per future ricerche sulla ceramica greca.

---

Notes:

1.   Lo studio, intrapreso come ricerca di dottorato, rientra in un pluriennale programma del CReA- Patrimonie dell'Université Libre de Bruxelles dal titolo La céramique dans les sociétés anciennes: production, distribution, usages. Su questi temi vedi anche Tsingarida, A. (ed.) (2009) Shapes and Uses of Greek Vases (7^th-4^th centuries B.C.). Bruxelles: CReA-Patrimoine; BMCR 2010.09.12.
2.   In particolare: Luchtenberg, S. (2003) Griechische Tonalabastra. Untersuchungen zu ihrer Formentwicklung, Verbreitung und zu ihrem Ursprung. Münster: Scriptorium; Badinou, P. (2003) La Laine et le parfum. Epinetra et alabastres. Forme, iconographie et fonction. Recherche de céramique attique féminine. Louvain: Peeters.
3.   Il confronto dei profili dei vasi è stato utilizzato anche per lo studio di altre forme vascolari, ad esempio: Jubier-Galinier, C. (2003) "L'atelier des Peintres de Diosphos et de Haimon," in P. Rouillard & A. Verbanck-Piérard (eds.), Le vase grec et ses destins. München: Biering & Brinkmann, p. 79-89 (lekythos); D. Tonglet, "New attributions to the Sappho-Diosphos Painters' workshop. A group of black-figure kyathoi reconsidered" BABesch (89). p. 1-25.
4.   A partire da: Haspels, C.H.E. (1936) Attic black-figured lekythoi. Paris: de Boccard; Bloesch, H. (1940) Formen attischer Schalen von Exekias bis zum Ende des Strengen Stils. Bern: Benteli.
5.   Ad esempio Algrain, I. (2012) "L'alabastre attique. Distribution et usages en Méditerranée occidentale" in D. Frère & L. Hugot, Les Huiles parfumées en Méditerranée occidentale et en Gaule, VIII^e s. av. VIII^e s. ap. J.-C.. Rennes: Presses Universitaires de Rennes.
6.   Secondo quanto emerge in particolare in Badinou (2003), op. cit. (n. 2).
7.   Vedi Frontisi-Doucroux, F. (2004) "Images grecques du feminin: tendances actuelles de l'interpretation." ClioMir (19), p. 2-9.
8.   CReA Patrimoine, Calcul de capacité de récipients.

(read complete article)

Elena Cazzuffi, Decimi Magni Ausonii, Ludus septem sapientum. Introduzione, testo, traduzione e commento. Spudasmata, Bd 160. Hildesheim; Zürich; New York​: Georg Olms Verlag, 2014. Pp. cliv, 137. ISBN 9783487151656. €39.80 (pb).

Reviewed by Jérémy​ Delmulle, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (jeremy.delmulle@gmail.com)

Version at BMCR home site

Preview
[The Table of Contents is listed below.]

La célèbre légende des "sept sages", forgée par la tradition grecque et qui devait être promise à une longue et large postérité, par le biais notamment de l'Historia de septem sapientibus et de ses multiples versions en langue vernaculaire, pour l'occident, ou de son adaptation dans Les mille et une nuits en orient, a aussi et d'abord été diffusée et étudiée par les Latins, de l'époque classique à la fin de l'empire. Le poète bordelais Ausone a composé au sujet des sept sages grecs un court poème de 230 vers intitulé précisément Ludus septem sapientum, qu'il a dédié à un autre poète de son cercle, Latinus Pacatus Drepanius. C'est de cet opuscule qu'Elena Cazzuffi a proposé, dans sa thèse de doctorat, une nouvelle édition et une traduction italienne, introduites par une étude monographique sur le poème et suivies d'un commentaire vers à vers: l'ensemble paraît aujourd'hui dans la collection Spudasmata.

Dans une très riche introduction (p. lxv-cliv), que précède une abondante bibliographie (p. ix-lxiii), Elena Cazzuffi aborde, l'une après l'autre, toutes les questions qu'a posées ou que continue de poser cette pièce singulière de l'œuvre d'Ausone. Dans un premier chapitre, l'éditrice s'intéresse à la question du titre et du genre de l'opuscule, pour en conclure que le tire reçu de Ludus, dont on doutait de l'authenticité ausonienne, rend trop compte des différentes finalités de l'opuscule pour n'avoir pas été choisi par l'auteur lui-même: le poème fait en effet intervenir tour à tour, comme sur une scène de théâtre, les sept sages, qui se présentent eux-mêmes et énoncent la maxime qui leur est traditionnellement associée, la "pièce" étant introduite par un prologus et l'intervention d'un ludius; d'une manière qui emporte l'adhésion, l'éditrice propose ainsi de traduire "Ludus" par "spettacolo", qui permet de comprendre d'un même coup la dimension théâtrale du poème, sa vocation de divertissement littéraire, ses rapports avec le dialogue philosophique et sa finalité proprement didactique de propédeutique à la sagesse (p. lxxii).

Se plaçant dans la lignée de R.P.H. Green, E. Cazzuffi propose (ch. 3) de voir dans le Ludus avant tout une œuvre scolaire; seulement, cette dernière n'aurait pas pour objet principal l'apprentissage du grec, de fait beaucoup moins mis en relief que d'autres aspects, mais le travail de mémorisation, associé à un apprentissage moral, enrichi d'une confrontation de la culture latine avec la culture grecque. Le poème présente les aspects d'un projet pédagogique complet (joignant à des fondements théoriques des indications pratiques, des exempla et des anecdotes); le dédiant à Pacatus peut-être comme à un ancien collègue magister, Ausone n'a de cesse que de faire entrer dans le Ludus les éléments caractéristiques de la poétique du lusus littéraire.

On trouvera dans les ch. 4 et 5 d'intéressants parallèles entre cette production littéraire d'Ausone et les diverses représentations des sept sages dans les autres arts: au théâtre, tout d'abord, qui se prête aisément à la comparaison, et dont il apparaît que le choix d'une fiction théâtrale pour la "mise en scène" des protagonistes peut être considéré comme une invention entièrement ausonienne; dans l'iconographie, ensuite (voir notamment, dans les notes des p. cvi-cvii, un relevé des œuvres antiques et tardoantiques ayant pris les sages pour sujet). Le chapitre suivant cherche à expliquer précisément par l'aspect théâtral donné à l'œuvre le choix métrique de l'auteur, qui a opté pour l'ïambe et le sénaire iambique (même si celui-ci est souvent irrégulier), ce qui rend plus naturelles ses multiples allusions à Plaute et à Térence et qui est en plein accord, dans le même temps, avec la finalité didactique du Ludus. Un important bilan est apporté aussi, dans le ch. 7, sur la place de l'opuscule ausonien dans la tradition, à la fois occidentale et orientale, des sept sages et de leurs maximes: l'éditrice a rassemblé au sujet des sages l'ensemble des témoignages grecs et latins (et donne, pour l'aire occidentale, le premier recensement exhaustif des documents en question), depuis la "proto-liste" de l'Hippias majeur de Platon; il ressort de cette analyse que, chez les Romains, les sept étaient considérés (par Cicéron, Valère Maxime,…) comme des modèles de la bonne gestion de la cité plutôt que comme les exemples essentiellement éthiques que voyaient en eux les Grecs. C'est davantage sur cet arrière-plan culturel que doivent donc se mesurer les spécificités et l'originalité du poème d'Ausone.

Bien que ce texte ait été déjà édité une vingtaine de fois (voir, p. ix-x, une liste sélective des principales éditions), E. Cazzuffi entend donner ensuite une nouvelle édition du texte – ou pour mieux dire, un texte critiquement revu (d'ailleurs publié sans apparat). Elle ne la fait pas reposer, cependant, sur un examen direct du matériel manuscrit, mais prend pour base les apparats critiques des précédentes éditions (p. clxiii). On pourrait légitimer ce choix si les recherches sur les manuscrits n'avaient rien apporté à notre connaissance du texte d'Ausone depuis l'édition de Green. Mais tel n'est pas tout à fait le cas: concernant l'un de ses principaux témoins manuscrits, le ms. Leiden, Universiteitsbibliotheek, Voss. lat. 111 (V), l'éditrice est restée tributaire d'une bibliographie ancienne. Ce témoin a longtemps été considéré comme le manuscrit redécouvert par Iacopo Sannazaro à la fin de l'année 1502 sur l'Île-Barbe, près de Lyon, et à partir duquel l'humaniste napolitain avait compilé des notes et effectué une copie de plusieurs pièces, aujourd'hui conservées dans le ms. Wien, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, 3261. Or, en 2002, Anne-Marie Turcan-Verkerk avait démontré, dans un article sur "L'Ausone de Iacopo Sannazaro: un ancien témoin passé inaperçu" (paru dans Italia medioevale e umanistica, 43, 2002, p. 231-312 et pl. VI-VII) que ce manuscrit humaniste était la copie non pas d'un témoin conservé (V), mais en réalité d'un autre témoin, lui aussi lyonnais, mais dont on n'a rien conservé d'autre (et qu'elle a siglé @); ainsi, toute moderne qu'elle est, la copie de Sannazaro revêt une grande valeur aux yeux des philologues, et devrait donc être convoquée au même rang que le ms. V et les deux autres témoins. Il eût été important de mesurer, à l'occasion de cette publication, la valeur de ce "nouveau" témoin @ (dont A.-M. Turcan-Verkerk avait d'ailleurs déjà indiqué quelques caractéristiques textuelles, concernant le Ludus, qui méritaient d'être prises en compte. (Pour être complet, je renvoie également aux derniers développements proposés tout récemment par Franz Dolveck au sujet de la tradition ausonienne et qui, parus en 2015, ne pouvaient bien sûr pas être connus de l'éditrice: "Les Orationes 'd'Ausone' et 'de Paulin': examen des problèmes liés à leur attribution" (en deux parties, dans Revue bénédictine, 125, 1 et 2, 2015.))

Quant au texte lui-même, publié avec sa traduction aux p. 2 à 17, il se signale surtout, vis-à-vis des tentatives antérieures, par un retour aux leçons des manuscrits (voir la table comparative des lieux variants par rapport à l'édition de Green, p. cliii-cliv): toutes ou presque sont justifiées, d'une manière raisonnable et assez convaincante, dans le commentaire qui suit le texte. La traduction, claire et élégante, soulève, quant à elle, deux ou trois questions tout au plus: au v. 22 (prologue; p. 2-3), Quid erubescis tu, togate Romule, Romule est traduit par "Romano", sans que cela soit jamais expliqué; au v. 137 (Chilon; p. 10-11), Lacones est rendu par "Spartani", alors que, s'agissant ici de la brevitas nota de ce peuple, "Laconici" aurait mieux correspondu à l'image traditionnelle dont il est question (E. Cazzuffi évoque d'ailleurs, dans les remarques stylistiques de son introduction, p. lxxxi, "la laconicità di Chilone"); au v. 166 (Thalès; p. 12-13), enfin, dans iubente Delio, le nom du Dieu aurait pu être conservé tel quel, plutôt qu'explicité ("per ordine di Apollo" pourrait au moins être complété par "Delio").

Les "Note di commento" qui suivent, extrêmement riches (elles couvrent plus de cent pages), sont avec la présentation de l'œuvre brossée en introduction la partie véritablement novatrice de l'ouvrage. L'éditrice a rassemblé dans ce commentaire non seulement quelques notes critiques expliquant les choix qui l'ont amenée à proposer un texte latin différent de celui de ses prédécesseurs, mais aussi et surtout une explication vers à vers de chacune des sections de la pièce poétique. Le lecteur y trouvera l'explicitation de toutes les allusions faites par le poète, d'utiles rappels historiques sur les personnages évoqués par les "sages", des considérations d'ordre grammatical, stylistique et poétique, qui cherchent à expliquer les choix de l'auteur en accordant la plus grande place aux échos poétiques, qu'ils soient faits avec d'autres œuvres d'Ausone ou qu'ils se réfèrent aux compositions d'autres poètes, classiques ou contemporains du Ludus. Un index général, des noms propres et des notabilia achève commodément le volume.

Signalons, pour finir, quelques détails qui pourraient éventuellement gêner la lecture: les références faites au ms. V le sont bien à des folios, et non à des pages (comme par exemple p. cxxxiv); toujours concernant les manuscrits, l'éditrice choisit de signaler leurs cotes en latin, ce qui ne pose généralement aucune difficulté d'identification, hormis pour le "Par. S. German. lat. 1044" (mentionné p. cxlviii), qui est l'actuel ms. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, lat. 12600, mais qui ne contient que des vies de saints ; l'éditrice reproduit en fait une erreur de R. Peiper (lui-même dépendant de E. von Wölfflin) et doit vouloir faire référence au ms. Paris, BnF, lat. 3835. D'une manière générale, l'ouvrage est loin d'être dépourvu de coquilles, particulièrement nombreuses dans la bibliographie, surtout pour les titres en langue étrangère; il faut également corriger dans ces dernières pages quelques références erronées : p. xlii, l'article de J.F. Matthews est aux p. 1073-1099; p. xliii, l'article de Mondin 1994a commence à la p. 192 et non à la p. 125, etc.

Quoi qu'il en soit de ces dernières remarques, il est évident qu'une étude aussi approfondie de ce bref texte, aussi vaste que précise (par la contextualisation générale opérée dans l'introduction et l'analyse détaillée de son contenu donnée dans le commentaire), est appelée à devenir l'ouvrage de référence pour les lecteurs du Ludus et des autres opuscula d'Ausone.

Table des matières

Premessa
Riferimenti bibliografici
Edizioni e traduzioni citate
Opere di consultazione
Altre abbreviazioni bibliografiche

Introduzione
1. Il titolo e il genere
2. L'omaggio a Latino Pacato Drepanio
Latino Pacato Drepanio
Dediche poetiche: dei cliché da rispettare
3. Il Ludus tra la scuola e la poetica del lusus
Un'opera di scuola
Il greco nella scuola e le γνῶμαι
I contenu morali e la memorizzazione
La formazione dell'aristocrazia
Il lusus letterario
4. I sette sapienti a teatro
La struttura del dramma
Un teatro civico e di "costumi"
Possibili paralleli
5. Aspetti dell'opera riconducibili alla tradizione iconografica
6. I senari giambici del ludus
7. Cenni sulla circolazione dei nomi e dei detti dei sette sapienti
Area orientale
Area occidentale
8. Tradizione del Ludus septem sapientum e cenni sulla sua fortuna umanistica e rinascimentale
9. Le Sententiae septem sapientum e il De septem sapientibus ex Graeco

Abbreviazioni dei titoli delle opere di Ausonio
Nota al testo
Testo e traduzione
Ludus septem sapientum

Note di commento
Ausonius Consul Drepanio Proconsuli Salutem
Prologus
Ludius
Solon
Chilon
Cleobulus
Thales
Bias
Pittacus
Periander
Indice dei nomi e delle cose notevoli
(read complete article)

Cosetta Cadau, Studies in Colluthus' "Abduction of Helen". Mnemosyne supplements. Late Antique literature, 380. Leiden: Brill, 2015. Pp. 324. ISBN 9789004279506. €126.00.

Reviewed by Marcelina Gilka, University of Exeter (mg334@ex.ac.uk)

Version at BMCR home site

Preview

As the first English-language monograph dedicated entirely to Colluthus' epyllion, this book is very aware of its mission to re-evaluate a text which hitherto has received little attention and even less praise (as is noted in the introduction in a brief survey of preceding secondary literature). It comprises four chapters of varying length, of which the first provides basic information and the other three focus on different aspects of style, whilst also following the poem's structure fairly closely. Cosetta Cadau mostly examines the Abduction as a product of its time that demonstrates resemblances to near-contemporary works, but also offers some nuanced original readings. However, one might raise two issues with the execution of the project. First, the author enters into guesswork as she tries a little too hard to reconstruct Colluthus as an individual and the circumstances in which the text would have been written, read and performed, which is not very fruitful given the limited evidence we possess for these things. Secondly, there is a substantial imbalance in the attention paid to the different parts of the text, and in particular the scene of Hermione's lament has not received the treatment it deserves. While the prose is generally clear, I must highlight a number of minor inaccuracies which can be puzzling to the reader.

The short chapter 1 ('Colluthus in His Context') begins by stringing together the very limited knowledge we have about Colluthus' vita. It then proceeds with a useful overview of literary activity during the reign of Anastasius I, in which Colluthus flourished. Moreover, the poem's genre is discussed. Cadau acknowledges the problems associated with the conceptualisation of the epyllion, but makes a good case for the Abduction 's classification as such, employing acceptable criteria.

Chapter 2 ('Colluthus and His Models') explores the influences of other genres on the text, which are exemplified from passages from the beginning of the poem up to the judgement episode (lines 1-191). The proem and the shepherd Paris are inspired by bucolic, the Eris scene by epic, and Aphrodite's victory speech by invective. There is little to disagree with here, since the argument mostly relies on a great number of strong parallels with other texts (some new, others pointed out by scholars before). The discussion of the models for the Eris section is particularly impressive and includes two tables which help to visualise the verbal links. We also find an intriguing comparison of Aphrodite's hairstyle in the Abduction with examples from both literature and art. I am, however, not persuaded by the attempts to establish a metapoetic (and metaleptic) correspondence or rivalry between Colluthus and Paris presented on pp. 46 f. and 50 f. Furthermore, the exposition on the latter pages seems to contain a logical flaw (why does Paris necessarily lose to Colluthus, and why is Colluthus therefore better than the god Pan?). On page 72 it is claimed that in Nonnus, Dionysiaca 25.197, Heracles 'kills the Lerna', although of course it is the hydra that is killed by the hero, while Lerna is the name of the region in which the monster had its lair.¹ On p. 82 Cadau contradicts herself within a single paragraph by first stating, incorrectly, that 'Strife is not present in the Cypria' , amongst other texts (in fact, she is mentioned right at the beginning of Proclus' summary; at line 6 of M. Davies' edition, which is present in the bibliography) and four lines later referring to two fragments of the Cypria in which Eris is essential to the plot.

With chapter 3 ('Colluthus' Visual Epyllion') we move into the middle section of the narrative, from Paris' journey to Sparta up to his encounter with Helen (lines 192-325). Its prevailing idea is that the Abduction reflects the fascination with visual experiences in Colluthus' time. This is both the longest and in my opinion the most stimulating part of the book. After a careful discussion of literary visuality and terminology, it is argued well that appearance and the act of looking are driving forces within the poem. The chapter features a sophisticated reading of the first meeting between Paris and Helen, with the central observation that, contrary to expectations, Paris' words betray that he is not actually very romantically inclined towards the woman. Meanwhile, Helen shows herself to be the active lover through her gestures, speech and especially her gaze. Finally, Cadau deals with possibilities for the performance of the piece. She shows that the poem contains traces of ethopoeia and progymnasmata which were a popular part of late antique paideia. On grounds of style and structure, the suggestion is cautiously brought forward that the Abduction could have been performed as a pantomime, which is interesting, but not fully convincing, owing to the lack of external supporting material.

The final chapter 4 ('Colluthus' Polyphonic Epyllion') is concerned with narratological aspects of the Abduction. First we get a comprehensive overview of the different modes of speech within the poem, in comparison with other texts.² Then follows a fascinating sub-chapter on 'Auctorial Addresses', which investigates Colluthus as an overt narrator when he apostrophises Dionysus and Phyllis. The next sub-chapter, 'Characters' Addresses', juxtaposes the ways in which Hermione and Paris respectively talk to Helen (the former as though Helen were there when she is not, the latter as though she were not present when she is in front of him). At the end the figure of Helen is chosen as a case- study for the revelation of a character's psychology through their utterances and behaviour.

At this point the book left me disappointed: the author does not fulfil the expectation raised by the previous chapters, which focus on specific portions of the poem, stage by stage. Rather, the section describing Hermione's lament is very much neglected. The scene dedicated to Helen's daughter is Colluthus' single most innovative contribution to literature and arguably the very climax of his work, yet unfortunately the book does not do it justice.³ The monograph is, of course, not a commentary and is under no obligation to treat each episode equally, but surely much more could and should have been said about the extraordinary portrayal of the young princess. This is particularly regrettable, since it would have been very easy to reconcile it with the exciting theme of this last chapter. For instance, Cadau could have used it to illustrate Colluthus' appeal for reader-response, which she promotes on various occasions,⁴ as the passage lends itself to such readings on account of the scarcity of spatio-temporal indicators within Hermione's monologue.⁵

Overall, the book is successful in filling a research gap and bringing new life to the scholarship of the Abduction with modern approaches. Cadau has found a large number of lines from earlier poetry which may have functioned as both literal and thematic models for the epyllion. Apart from adding more parallels from Nonnus, whose style Colluthus is widely recognised to have copied, she is the first to advocate Claudian as another late antique source of inspiration. This significantly leads the author to declare herself in favour of the poet's knowledge of Latin which has been the object of much debate, although—perhaps wisely—she does not take a stance on the question of his familiarity with Ovid. The next step from here would be to investigate the importance of these newly revealed relationships for the poem as a whole and to examine whether the fact that Colluthus emulates writers who lived about a century before him means that we should view him in their category or whether marked imitation is rather a sign of remoteness and thus of a rapid, conscious transformation of the poetic scene at the time.

---

Notes:

1.   The error is perhaps caused by a mistranslation of the phrase λύσατο Λέρνην as 'he destroyed [the] Lerna' instead of 'he freed Lerna [from the hydra]'.
2.   Here, a confusion of characters has occurred twice within two pages; on p. 226 one reads: 'Zeus and Paris ask their interlocutors whether they have ever heard of Hermes, Troy and Priam (71, 280, 282)', but 'Hermes' should be corrected to 'Paris' who is the real subject of Zeus' question at line 71, while Hermes is his interlocutor. On p. 228 Cadau writes: 'Athena also makes a statement', but then proceeds to quote lines 151-3 which are in fact Hera's words.
3.   In simple terms of space, Hermione occupies 61 out of 392 lines (over 15%) of the epic, but the author grants only 6 pages to her exclusively (in comparison, even Eris, who only appears in 25 lines, is given 14 pages).
4.   The fourth chapter lays emphasis on the ways in which the narrator invites the narratees to interact with the text (e.g. pp. 229 f., as well as p. 31 in ch. 1).
5.   With regard to the book's primary interest, Colluthus' position in his social context, this part of the epyllion also would have had much to offer: Hermione is the very first female human child represented in such depth in literature (and by this I mean an a-sexual pre-teenage girl who does not yet care for marriage, but rather for her parents), which poses the question whether society now took children and their cares more seriously, and whether this may have had anything to do with the rise of Christianity.

(read complete article)

Demetrios Michaelides (ed.), Medicine and Healing in the Ancient Mediterranean World. Including the proceedings of the international conference with the same title, organised in the framework of the Research Project INTERREG IIIA: Greece/Cyprus 2000/2006, Joint Educational and Research Programmes in the History and Archaeology of Medicine, Palaeopathology, and Palaeoradiation, and the 1st International CAPP Symposium 'New Approaches to Archaeological Human Remains in Cyprus'. Oxford; Philadelphia: Oxbow, 2014. Pp. xix, 354. ISBN 9781782972358. $99.00.

Reviewed by Petros Bouras-Vallianatos, King's College London (petros.bouras-vallianatos@kcl.ac.uk)

Version at BMCR home site

Preview

This book contains an interesting collection of forty-two papers arising from two events, both held in Nicosia, Cyprus, in 2008: a) an international conference "Medicine in the Ancient Mediterranean World" organised by Demetrios Michaelides, and b) the 1^st International CAPP Symposium "New Approaches to Archaeological Human remains in Cyprus" organised by Kirsi Lorentz. The volume is edited by Demetrios Michaelides, who inter alia must be congratulated for his efforts in promoting the study of medicine in ancient and medieval Cyprus.¹

The vast majority of the chapters are written in English; there are also six contributions in Modern Greek and two in French. Although a number of the papers are brief, presenting only preliminary results and taking the form of oral presentations, there are some well-researched and original studies. The volume is divided into nine thematic parts ranging from art and literature to history and archaeology: "Medicine and Archaeology," "Media," "The Aegean," "Medical Authors/Schools of Medicine," "Surgery," "Medicaments and Cures," "Skeletal Remains," "Asklepios and Incubation," "Byzantine, Arab and Medieval Sources". The chapters within each part are usually arranged in chronological order.

Given the length of this work, it is impossible to discuss all the contributions. (The table of contents is accessible via the Preview, above.) I will therefore concentrate on some of those which may raise interesting issues for further examination.

In Chapter 2 Georgia Karamitrou-Mentesidi and Kostas Moschakis provide an overview in the form of a catalogue listing a variety of artefacts (mostly dated to the second and third centuries AD) related to medicine (e.g. small sculptures of Asklepios and Hygieia, relief votive stelai, inscriptions referring to doctors) from the ancient city of Aiani (near Kozani in Western Macedonia, Greece) and the surrounding area. Although the authors make little attempt to contextualise these items in light of contemporary medical practice, the list contains some little-studied material. For example, there is a gravestone (cat. no. Ptol. 79) of a female physician, on which a large number of instruments, including cups, scissors, probes, scalpels, and hooks are depicted. In Chapter 4 Demetrios Michaelides gives a brief account of various anatomical votive offerings carved in limestone from the island of Cyprus, now dispersed in various local and overseas museums, which are dated to the Hellenistic and Roman periods. This account anticipates his forthcoming complete catalogue of all medical ex-votos of Cypriot origin, which medical historians and archaeologists will find extremely useful. The majority of the items originate from nineteenth-century excavations from which there are insufficient published records to allow archaeologists to date them properly and relate them to particular centres of healing. It is, however, extraordinary that all the items with a known provenance come from five neighbouring inland sites, viz. Chytroi, Voni, Arsos, Golgoi, and Mathiatis.

Part 3 opens with a chapter (6) by Robert Arnott on two Linear B tablets from Pylos, dated to around 1200 BC, in which he attempts to cast new light on Mycenaean medical practice. The endeavour involves both speculation and a number of conjectures, about which I have some reservations. For example, with regard to the first tablet (PY Eq 146), the word i-ja-te is translated as "physician", although this translation is debatable and is based only on the word's "phonetic resemblance" to the Archaic ia(/ē)tēr and iatros. The same applies to the next tablet, where — although the word pa-ma-ko (translated as "medicine") might relate to the Archaic term pharmakon — there is no other word on the tablet or any supplementary evidence to suggest a medical context. Nonetheless, in a number of places Arnott rightly points to the limitations involved in interpreting literary sources, and suggests that a better basis on which to make plausible assumptions about Mycenaean medical practice would be the interpretation of archaeological findings, an area in which he has indeed contributed some invaluable studies in the past.²

One of the most interesting papers (Chapter 15) is in Part 4 and is written by Philip van der Eijk. He critically discusses W.H.S. Jones' (1876-1963) theory of "malaria". Jones, an influential twentieth-century classicist and translator of three volumes of Hippocratic works for the Loeb Classical Library, is well-known for his theory that malaria was first introduced to Greece in the mid-fifth century BC as a consequence of the Persian invasions. Van der Eijk's historiographical analysis of Jones' approach is thought-provoking, especially in that it alerts readers to the possibility of inconsistent results based on selective use of evidence. It also reflects on the risks involved in the interpretation of a mixed corpus of literary sources — consisting of medical texts, historiography, and tragedies — from a retrospective point of view, viz. use of modern terminology to refer to diseases and symptoms mentioned in ancient texts.

Ralph Jackson's paper (Chapter 18) is by far the most interesting and original contribution in Part 5 and focuses on surgery. The author presents a large number of intact scalpels (about seventy) dated to the Roman period from a variety of sites, including Pompeii, Rimini, and Bingen. In his interpretation he makes use of a variety of textual testimonies on the use of surgeon's knives written by medical authors such as Celsus, Galen, and Paul of Aegina. In this way Jackson shows how different kinds of scalpels can be connected with a variety of operations, ranging from simple bloodletting techniques to the cutting of stones in the urinary bladder. Readers looking for an exhaustive discussion on the topic can now consult the recent monograph on Greek and Roman surgical instruments by Lawrence Bliquez,³ but Jackson's paper serves as an excellent introduction to the topic for the non-expert or for undergraduates. Stefanos Geroulanos, Charalambos Panaretos, and Efterpi Lyberopoulou are the authors of Chapter 20 entitled "Surgery in Byzantium", which is an extended version of Geroulanos' earlier homonymous paper.⁴ The implied claims of the title exceed the substance of the chapter, which is limited to an otherwise useful, long list of operations and medical instruments from the works of three early Byzantine medical authors, i.e. Oribasios, Aetios of Amida, and Paul of Aegina. Unfortunately, a fully-fledged study of surgery in the Byzantine Empire remains a desideratum. Furthermore, the description of vast numbers of operations by the aforementioned medical authors does not necessarily mean that such invasive techniques were used throughout the Byzantine Empire. Another crucial point, which the authors may consider in a forthcoming study, is the total absence of any manual on surgery by any Byzantine physician after the late ninth/early tenth century, a terminus ante quem that roughly corresponds to the last Byzantine text of this kind, a work by Leo the physician.⁵

Alain Touwaide, the author of Chapter 23, provides a stimulating preliminary approach to the study of composite drugs in antiquity with special focus on the Hippocratic Corpus. Using evidence derived from modern studies on the chemistry of natural products, Touwaide argues that ancient compound drugs are based on a "well-designed strategy". For example, he does not consider the consistent use of incense (anti-inflammatory) and myrrh (antiseptic) in a large number of compound drugs for gynaecological affections coincidental, but thinks that they would have been included to help in the treatment of potential secondary infections. In my view, there are, at least, two major issues which need to be addressed in future studies of this sort: a) the accuracy of the procedure of retrospective identification of vegetal drugs mentioned in ancient texts, and b) the actual methods of preparation of composite drugs and, more importantly, extraction of active ingredients from plants in the ancient world in the absence of techniques of separation, such as distillation. The study is accompanied by a very useful appendix with a list of 255 names of ancient authorities, cited in the primary sources as authors of compound drugs.

Effie Photos-Jones' and Allan Hall's contribution (Chapter 24) focuses on the extremely popular mineral drug known as "Lemnian Earth", which was extracted from an area in the North-Eastern part of the Aegean island of Lemnos and is said by a large number of medical authors from Galen to the early Modern period to be an extremely effective antidote to snake bites, inflammation of the eye, and ulcers. Basing themselves on literary accounts, the authors suggest that the medicine was produced by enriching the raw material with the water of local streams, which most probably had a high alum content. Consequently, the widespread effectiveness of the drug might be explained by the astringent and bactericide properties of the alum, which seems to have been its active ingredient. It is worth noting that the authors have not so far encountered alum in samples recovered from the area of the spring concerned on Lemnos, but their ongoing project will hopefully provide results that will permit a more convincing evaluation of the written accounts in the future.

Sherry Fox, Ioanna Moutafi, Eleanna Prevedorou, and Despina Pilides are the authors of a study analysing trauma patterns in 82 individuals from four sites in early Christian Cyprus, including one urban, inland site (the Hill of Agios Georgios) and three rural sites near the south coast (Kalavasos-Kopetra, Alassa-Ayia Mavri, and Maroni-Petrera). According to their results, of the 24 adults recovered from the inland site, 16 (67%) show some kind of pathological lesion, while the remaining 8 (33%) present evidence of single trauma. On the other hand, of the 21 adults from the south coast, 9 (43%) show some sort of pathological lesion and only 4 (19%) display evidence of single or multiple trauma. According to the authors, the higher proportions in the case of the inland site could be explained by demographic differences between the two groups of samples. These preliminary results show how palaeopathological findings could potentially fuel future microhistorical studies.

Georgia Petridou's paper (Chapter 36) is arguably the most interesting in Part 8. It discusses divine epiphanies as diagnostic and therapeutic tools in the ancient cult of Asclepius. Firstly the author provides some very useful background material on the introduction of Asclepius' cult to Athens before proceeding with a discussion of a representative number of examples of the god's various manifestations, including anthropomorphic and zoomorphic ones (the latter in the form of the god's sacred snakes). Incubation was the preeminent means of acquiring healing epiphanies; in some examples, although there is a miraculous healing outcome, we can see patterns of rational medicine applied, such as surgery or administration of drugs on the patient's skin. Ultimately, Petridou shows that Asclepius' epiphanies bear the special signs of divine revelation and thus an effective contextualisation of the healing process should always take into consideration his twofold profile as both god and healer.

The lack of a useful index and the preliminary nature of the majority of the studies detract from the value of this book. ⁶ It is noteworthy that in the archaeology-related chapters, there is abundant use of photographic material, which is indeed very useful for the reader. In short, this volume raises a number of important questions and constitutes a useful source of information on various aspects of medicine and health in the ancient and medieval Mediterranean world. It could appeal to a variety of audiences from historians of medicine to palaeopathologists and philologists to art historians.

---

Notes:

1.   For example, D. Michaelides, "Ιατροί και Ιατρική στην Αρχαία Κύπρο," M. Vryonidou-Giankou (ed.), Η Ιατρική στην Κύπρο: Από την Αρχαιότητα μέχρι την Ανεξαρτησία, Nicosia 2006, 12-68.
2.   For example, R. Arnott, "Surgical Practice in the Prehistoric Aegean," Medizinhistorisches Journal 32 (1997), 249-78.
3.   L. Bliquez, The Tools of Asclepius: Surgical Instruments in Greek and Roman Times, Leiden 2015, 72-107. See BMCR 2015.12.14.
4.   S. Geroulanos, "Surgery in Byzantium," M. Grünbart et al (eds.), Material Culture and Well-Being in Byzantium (400-1453), Vienna 2007, 129-34.
5.   F. Z. Ermerins (ed.), Anecdota Medica Graeca. Leipzig 1840, 79-221 passim.
6.   There are only a few typos, e.g. "Παπαδόπουλλος" for "Παπαδόπουλος" (37), "Dekomedes" for "Demokedes" (70).

(read complete article)

Joseph Roisman, Ian Worthington, Robin Waterfield, Lives of the Attic Orators: Texts from Pseudo-Plutarch, Photius, and the Suda. Clarendon ancient history series. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2015. Pp. xvii, 381. ISBN 9780199687671. $50.00 (pb).

Reviewed by Jacques Schamp, Université de Fribourg (jacques.schamp@unifr.ch)

Version at BMCR home site

Preview

Le public anglo-saxon pouvait lire depuis longtemps le texte grec et la traduction des Vies des dix orateurs attribuées à Plutarque (H. N. Fowler, 1936) dans le tome X de la collection Loeb. Il n'en allait pas de même pour l'adaptation du même ensemble conservée dans la Bibliothèquede Photios (cod.259-268) ni pour les documents analogues analysés séparément sur Eschine (cod. 61) et sur Isocrate (cod. 159) ni pour les articles sur les dix orateurs compilés au X^e s. pour la Souda. Chacune des pièces bénéficie d'une traduction de la même plume, celle de M. Waterfield. L'ouvrage s'inscrit dans une collection dont les lecteurs ne sont pas censés lire le grec (voir, toutefois, p. 13). Il en résulte pour la Souda une série de références surprenantes pour tout helléniste (par exemple p. 324 « Alphaiota 347 : Aeschines »). Bien conçue, l'introduction fait le point sur ce que l'on croit savoir de toutes les œuvres traduites et commentées ici. Pourquoi dix orateurs ? Le Canon des dix orateurs, probablement constitué au I^er s. de notre ère, n'était connu ni de Cicéron ni de Denys d'Halicarnasse, mais bien de Quintilien, et il a condamné à la disparition les ouvrages de nombreux orateurs, sauf notamment quelques discours d'Apollodore introduits dans le corpus démosthénien par Callimaque ; le cas d'Hégésippe, lui, avait fait déjà l'objet de discussions dans l'Antiquité ; pour Démade, qui ne paraît pas s'être jamais soucié de réunir une collection de ses discours, on ne possède qu'une série hétéroclite d'anecdotes et de bons mots remontant à l'époque hellénistique.

Logiquement, la part du lion revient au Ps.-Plutarque, pour lequel l'étude des sources est prometteuse. C'est ce qui explique un choix éditorial parfaitement approprié. Le traité bénéficie d'une traduction à pleine page (pp. 41-70) et d'un commentaire distinct (pp. 71-277). Ne laissant rien dans l'ombre, ce dernier porte pratiquement sur chaque ligne et se fonde sur une bibliographie impressionnante (pp. 335-66). Pour Photios et la Souda, qui n'appelaient pas une exégèse aussi détaillée, les explications prennent la forme de notes logées sous la traduction. On saura gré aux auteurs de ne s'être pas attardés à des développements oiseux. Toutefois, on peut se demander si le regroupement Ps.-Plutarque, Photios et Souda est judicieux et satisfaisant. On aurait du mal à prouver que les articles de cette dernière sur les dix orateurs ont peu ou prou emprunté au Ps.-Plutarque ou à Photios. En revanche, aucun des trois contributeurs ne semble s'être demandé pourquoi Photios a éprouvé le besoin de traiter deux fois d'Eschine et d'Isocrate, alors qu'il n'a pas trouvé le temps de lire Lycurgue jusqu'au bout, bien qu'il lui réserve un chapitre dans le même style que pour les autres neuf orateurs (cod. 268, 496 b 38-41).¹ Les réponses possibles résident évidemment dans les études sur la nature de la Bibliothèque et le projet de Photios.² Enfin, a priori, fallait-il exclure toutes les données disponibles sur les orateurs attiques et retenir seulement le Ps.-Plutarque, Photios et la Souda ?

Dans des manuscrits d'Antiphon et d'Isée, les discours sont introduits par un Γένος, documents de farine analogue au Ps.-Plutarque ; trois témoins d'Isocrate au moins renferment une Vie d'Isocrate anonyme ; relativement nombreux, les manuscrits d'Eschine sont précédés, suivant les cas, par une anonyme Vie d'Eschine l'orateur, un Sur Eschine l'orateur d'Apollonios ou un [Sur Eschine] , sans compter un chapitre de Philostrate ; une Vie de Démosthène a été placée en tête d'un manuscrit sous le nom de Zosime d'Ascalon, ainsi qu'une Vie anonyme, sans compter la biographie sommaire de Libanios servant d'introduction aux Hypotheseis des discours. Bref, on se trouve devant une littérature assez vaste qui n'a pas été considérée ici et qu'il serait intéressant d'étudier à fond. N'a-t-elle vraiment aucun message historique à transmettre et n'éclairerait-elle pas sur la nature véritable des notices du Ps.-Plutarque et de Photios ? Ceci n'est pas sans conséquences sur certaines prises de position de l'introduction, toute intéressante qu'elle est. Peut-on croire que chacun des chapitres est le produit d'une seule plume (p. 12) ? En quête d'une date pour la composition du Ps.-Plutarque, les historiens britanniques soulignent l'importance de la description de la tombe d'Isocrate surmontée d'une sirène. Philostrate (VS I, 17, 503) avait encore pu, vers 242-3, la voir in situ, mais le Ps.-Plutarque (838 C) la donne comme disparue de son temps. À mon sens, le rapprochement montre que la Vie d'Isocrate est postérieure au règne de Gordien III, mais la conclusion ne doit pas être étendue à tout le recueil. Chacun a le droit d'exprimer des réserves sur la conception générale du présent ouvrage. Les auteurs ont pris la sage précaution de le munir d'un « Glossary of Technical Terms » et d'un commode « Select Index ».

Reste en définitive un livre fort intéressant qui rendra de distingués services aux historiens, épigraphistes et archéologues du monde anglo-saxon.

---

Notes:

1.   La traduction de φέρεσθαι δὲ αὐτοῦ ἐξ ἱστορίας ιεʹ μεμαθήκαμεν est curieuse : « I understand from my researches, however, that there are fifteen extant under his name ». On doit évidemment comprendre : « Mais nous avons appris par l'histoire qu'il y en a de lui 15 en circulation ». Or c'est exactement le nombre donné par le Ps.-Plutarque (843 C). L'ἱστορία en question paraît donc n'avoir été qu'une Vie de même farine que celle du Ps.-Plutarque, et l'on ne doit pas faire de Photios un rat de bibliothèque.
2.   Sur ce point, l'information des auteurs mériterait d'être rafraîchie et complétée, voir F. Ronconi, L'automne du patriarche. Photios, la Bibliothèque et le Venezia, Bibl. Naz. Marc., Gr. 450 dans J. Signes Codoñer et Inmaculada Pérez Martín (édd.), Textual Transmission in Byzantium : between Textual Criticism and Quellenforschung, Turnhout, 2014, pp. 93-104 ; J. Schamp, Le projet pédagogique de Photios dans P. Van Deun-Caroline Macé (édd.), Encyclopedic Trends in Byzantium ? Proceedings of the International Conference held in Leuven, 6-8 May 2009, Louvain-Paris, 2011, pp. 57-75, spécialement pp. 66-71 ; Photios abréviateur, dans Marietta Horster et Christiane Reitz (édd.), Condensing texts—condensed texts, Stuttgart, 2010, pp. 649-734, surtout p. 661 ; 671-6 ; 723-6.

(read complete article)

Marion Bolder-Boos, Ostia: der Hafen Roms. Zaberns Bildbände zur Archäologie. Darmstadt: Verlag Philipp von Zabern, 2014. Pp. 144. ISBN 9783805348195. €29,95.

Reviewed by Marcel Danner, Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg (MarcelDanner@gmx.de)

Version at BMCR home site

Preview

In den letzten Jahrzehnten erfreute sich Ostia, die Hafenstadt Roms, einer wachsenden Beliebtheit seitens der archäologischen Forschung. Zahlreiche Untersuchungen zu einzelnen Gebäuden und zur Stadtentwicklung haben unsere Kenntnisse insbesondere der zuvor nur am Rande beachteten späten Phasen der Stadt bereichert. In der deutschen Archäologie genoss Ostia zuletzt eine besondere Popularität. Dies spiegeln nicht nur Forschungsprojekte wie die von Michael Heinzelmann und Axel Gering geleiteten Untersuchungen, sondern auch zwei jüngst erschienene Überblickswerke wider. Klaus Stefan Freyberger stellte einer breiten Leserschaft 2013 in seinem Buch Ostia: Facetten des Lebens in einer römischen Hafenstadt anhand ausgesuchter Gebäude unterschiedliche Aspekte urbanen Lebens vor. An einen ähnlichen Adressatenkreis richtet sich auch die hier rezensierte Darstellung von Marion Bolder-Boos.

Die Gestaltung des Bandes erweckt einen ansprechenden Eindruck. Der Text liest sich flüssig und ist im Wesentlichen gut redigiert. Einzelne orthographische Fehler und redaktionelle Ungenauigkeiten lassen sich zwar feststellen, trüben den Gesamteindruck aber kaum. Anders als bei älteren Bänden der Reihe unterstreicht der Verzicht auf Einzelnachweise den populärwissenschaftlichen Charakter des Buches, lässt den Leser aber leider auch im Ungewissen über den Ursprung von Datierungen und Deutungen. Dem Fachmann fällt dieser Verzicht auf Transparenz, der durch ein Verzeichnis mit 48 wissenschaftlichen Publikationen im Anhang nur bedingt kompensiert werden kann, negativ auf. Positiv hervorzuheben sind die zahlreichen Fotografien unter den 121 Abbildungen, die durchweg farbig und hoch aufgelöst sind. Pläne wurden dagegen sparsam eingesetzt. Die eigens angefertigten Umzeichnungen sind zudem äußerst schematisch. Auf die Angabe unterschiedlicher Bauphasen wurde verzichtet, so dass die Grundrisse einen aus nicht zusammengehörigen Bauteilen resultierenden, ahistorischen Zustand zeigen.

Ihre inhaltliche Zielsetzung stellt Bolder-Boos zu Beginn klar heraus: Keine „komplette Darstellung der antiken Stätte", sondern „eine chronologische Übersicht über die Stadt und ihre bauliche Entwicklung" sei ihr Anliegen (S. 7). Die Gliederung des Buches folgt dieser Zielsetzung, indem sie Epoche für Epoche die von der Autorin als repräsentativ angesehenen Gebäude behandelt. Themen wie Sakral- und Wohnarchitektur werden in nahezu allen Kapiteln aufgegriffen, um die Veränderungen auf religiöser und sozialer Ebene zu veranschaulichen. Andere Gebäude wie die großen Getreidespeicher, die vor allem in der frühen und mittleren Kaiserzeit errichtet wurden, werden hingegen an jeweils geeigneter Stelle betrachtet. Literarische Quellen und Inschriften liegen den Ausführungen zu den historischen Zusammenhängen zugrunde, werden jedoch nur vereinzelt ausdrücklich genannt.

Betrachten wir den Aufbau des Bandes etwas genauer: Nach einem kurzen Vorwort (S. 7) wird in einem ersten Kapitel das frühe Castrum besprochen (S. 9–15). Die Autorin stellt der literarischen Tradition, nach der Ostia als erste Kolonie Roms im 7. Jh. v. Chr. von Ancus Marcius gegründet worden sein soll, den archäologischen Befund gegenüber. Demzufolge wurde erst im 4. Jh. v. Chr. aus strategischen Gründen eine befestigte Siedlung an der Tibermündung angelegt. Diese kann nur bedingt rekonstruiert werden, da sich aus der Frühzeit allein wenige Reste der Befestigungsmauern und der Binnenbebauung erhalten haben. Von der Kolonie des 2. und 1. Jh. v. Chr., der das zweite Kapitel gewidmet ist (S. 16–36), lässt sich ein differenzierteres Bild gewinnen. Bolder-Boos beschreibt, wie die Siedlung als Hafen Roms an Bedeutung gewann und zur Stadt heranwuchs. Als repräsentativ für deren Entwicklung werden die ersten merkantilen Bauten, die zunehmende Anzahl an Heiligtümern, drei Atriumhäuser, der erweiterte Mauerring des 1. Jh. v. Chr. und die außerhalb gelegenen Nekropolen besprochen. Die Veränderungen der julisch-claudischen sowie der flavischen und trajanischen Zeit werden im dritten und im vierten Kapitel dargelegt (S. 37–51 und S. 52–70). Hervorgehoben wird die Förderung der Stadt durch die Mitglieder der jeweiligen Kaiserfamilien, die in den Bau neuer Hafenanlagen wie des Portus Traiani investierten, die Errichtung öffentlicher Thermen und Prachtbauten sowie die zunehmende Anzahl an Speicherbauten. In trajanischer Zeit errichtete man schließlich erste Mietblöcke mit Appartements für die wachsende, im Gewerbe tätige Bevölkerung.

Im fünften Kapitel bespricht die Autorin die hadrianische Zeit, ohne wie in anderen Kapiteln die soziale und wirtschaftliche Verfassung der Stadt klar herauszuarbeiten (S. 71–95). Die monumentale Ausgestaltung des Forums, der Bau weiterer gewerblicher Einrichtungen, Vereinshäuser und Großbauten sowie zahlreicher der in dieser Zeit besonders beliebten medianum-Appartements suggeriert jedoch eine besondere Prosperität. Neben die Heiligtümer römischer Gottheiten traten in jener Zeit auch Kultstätten für orientalische Götter. In antoninischer Zeit, der das sechste Kapitel gewidmet ist (S. 96–117), scheinen im Wesentlichen ältere Entwicklungen fortgeführt worden zu sein: Wie in den vorhergehenden Kapiteln werden Vereinshäuser, Thermen und Speicherbauten besprochen. Ein Mietshaus und eine Stadtvilla veranschaulichen die Wohnkultur dieser Zeit. Auch in diesem Kapitel vermisst der Leser jedoch eine historische Einführung. Das 3. Jh. n. Chr. wird in einem kurzen siebten Kapitel besprochen (S. 118–128). Neben dem letzten großen heidnischen Sakralbau und einem späten Vereinstempel stellt Bolder-Boos drei herrschaftliche Stadthäuser vor. Diese sollen zeigen, dass Ostia von der sogenannten Krise des 3. Jh. n. Chr. nicht spürbar in Mitleidenschaft gezogen wurde. In einem achten Kapitel wird die spätantike Stadt präsentiert (S. 129–138). Nach einer knappen Darlegung des urbanen Wandels und der religiösen Verfassung Ostias im 4. und 5. Jh. n. Chr. konzentriert sich die Autorin auf drei luxuriöse Häuser. Abschließend werden der städtische Niedergang und die Abwanderung der Bevölkerung in das nahegelegene Gregoriopolis thematisiert.

Ein letztes Kapitel resümiert die neuzeitlichen Forschungen in Ostia (S. 139). Fünf Themenkästen zu sozial- und religionsgeschichtlichen Phänomenen sowie zu ausgesuchten Bauten („Tod und Begräbnis"; „Das römische Badewesen"; „Ein Hotel in Ostia"; „Das macellum"; „Der römische Mithraskult") ergänzen die Kapitel. Anhänge, die dem fachfremden Leser bei der Lektüre Orientierungshilfen bieten sollen, runden den Band ab: Hier finden sich eine Liste mit den Epochen der römischen Kultur und den Regierungszeiten der römischen Kaiser, eine schematische Darstellung der römischen Mauerwerks- und Fußbodenarten sowie ein Glossar mit den verwendeten Fachbegriffen. Die bereits erwähnte Liste mit weiterführender Literatur verweist auf die wichtigsten wissenschaftlichen Publikationen.

Obwohl das Ziel der Autorin die Veranschaulichung der Stadtentwicklung in chronologischer Abfolge ist, werden nicht alle Phasen in gleichem Maße gewürdigt. Der Schwerpunkt liegt auf der frühen und mittleren Kaiserzeit (S. 37–117), während die Siedlung der republikanischen Zeit (S. 9–36) ebenso wie die Stadt des 3. bis 5. Jh. n. Chr. (S. 118–138) nur am Rande betrachtet werden. Entsprechend kleinteilig erscheint die Untergliederung der frühen und mittleren Kaiserzeit in vier ausführliche Kapitel, während die frühen und die späten Phasen der Stadtgeschichte in jeweils zwei kurzen Abschnitten besprochen werden. Während die knappe Behandlung der Frühzeit die spätere Überbauung vieler älterer Strukturen durch kaiserzeitliche und spätantike Gebäude widerspiegelt, hätte man die späten Phasen der Stadt gerade in Anbetracht der zahlreichen jüngeren Forschungen zur Entwicklung Ostias in der Spätantike auch differenzierter darstellen können.

Jenseits seines chronologischen Schwerpunkts gestattet der Band unterschiedlich tiefe Einblicke in bestimmte Phänomene oder zeitliche Abschnitte. Besonders gelungen sind etwa die Ausführungen zu den Heiligtümern (S. 20–30, 37–40, 78–85) und zu den Aquädukten (S. 47–50), die sich nicht auf Beschreibungen der erhaltenen Bauten beschränken, sondern deren Bedeutung vor ihrem jeweiligen historischen Hintergrund erläutern. Dagegen scheinen mir die Besprechungen verschiedener Wohnbauten sowie die Einordnung der Gebäude in die historischen Zusammenhänge der hadrianischen und antoninischen Zeit weniger gelungen. Beispielsweise hätten die signifikanten städtebaulichen Veränderungen hadrianischer Zeit wie die Errichtung großangelegter Planviertel mit ihren sozial- und wirtschaftsgeschichtlichen Implikationen klarer herausgearbeitet werden können. Anstatt dessen beschreibt Bolder-Boos hier mehr als sie erklärt. Diese Beobachtung lässt sich auch auf die Besprechung verschiedener Bauten in anderen Kapiteln übertragen: Warum wird etwa die Unregelmäßigkeit des Grundrisses der Horrea di Hortensius ausführlich beschrieben, aber nicht erklärt (S. 19)?

Einige der ausgewählten Befunde scheinen mir an falscher Stelle genannt zu werden oder generell wenig geeignet zu sein, um die Entwicklung der Stadt sinnvoll zu repräsentieren. Weshalb wird beispielsweise die Domus delle Pareti Dipinte als Exempel eines spätrepublikanischen Wohnhauses herangezogen, wenn sie doch „keinen für römische Wohnhäuser typischen Grundriss" besitzt (S. 30)? Die Domus della Fortuna Annonaria ist kein besonders gelungenes Beispiel „für die gehobenen Stadthäuser des mittleren 2. Jhs. n. Chr." (S. 110), da ihr Zustand zu dieser Zeit nur sehr lückenhaft zu rekonstruieren ist. Eher hätte sie die Wohnkultur des 4. Jh. n. Chr. repräsentieren können, wie übrigens auch die als Beispiele für das 3. Jh. n. Chr. herangezogenen Domus IV, IV, 7 und Domus delle Colonne (S. 126–127). So stützen die Befunde für die Autorin den tatsächlich nur teilweise zutreffenden Eindruck, dass „das Leben in der Stadt in dieser Zeit weiterhin pulsierte" (S. 128). Ihre Einschätzung steht jedoch im Gegensatz zu der vorherrschenden Forschungsmeinung, der zu Folge für Ostia ab der Mitte des 3. Jh. n. Chr. von einer rückläufigen wirtschaftlichen und demographischen Entwicklung auszugehen ist.¹

Die Deutungen anderer Gebäude sind nicht plausibel oder müssen als überholt gelten. Einige Beispiele können dies veranschaulichen: So bezeichnet Bolder-Boos etwa die Domus delle Gorgoni, die üblicherweise als Wohnhaus angesehen wird, mit Verweis auf die „neuesten Forschungen" als Vereinshaus der Leichenbestatter (S. 35). Dabei handelt es sich jedoch um eine isolierte und nicht ausreichend fundierte Hypothese.² Umstritten ist die Deutung des sogenannten Sede degli Augustali als Vereinshaus der Kaiserpriester (S. 100–102). Anstatt dessen wurden zuletzt Interpretationen als schola eines anonymen Vereins oder als großes Stadthaus vorgeschlagen.³ Auch die traditionelle Auslegung des sogenannten Macellum entbehrt einer ausreichenden Grundlage (S. 108).⁴ Falsch sind die Behauptungen, die Wände des Vestibüls in der Domus del Ninfeo seien „im unteren Abschnitt mit Marmorplatten verkleidet" gewesen (S. 134) und die Begrenzungen ihres rückwärtigen Hofes seien nicht freigelegt worden (S. 135).⁵

Diese Kritik soll jedoch nicht über die Stärken des Buches hinwegtäuschen: Eine zusammenfassende Besprechung der komplexen Stadtgeschichte und der baulichen Entwicklung von Ostia ist ohne Zweifel eine große Herausforderung. Dass Bolder-Boos dabei auf bestimmte Phänomene und Phasen besonderes Augenmerk legt, andere hingegen flüchtiger behandelt, ist ebenso verzeihlich wie kleinere inhaltliche Schwächen. Gegenüber dem eingangs erwähnten Buch von Klaus Stefan Freyberger entfaltet der hier rezensierte Band gerade in der diachronen Darstellung urbanen Wandels seine Stärken. Im Wesentlichen ist es der Autorin damit gelungen, gerade dem deutschsprachigen Laien eine gut lesbare und schön bebilderte Darstellung der antiken Hafenstadt Roms und ihrer Geschichte an die Hand zu geben. Ebenso mag der Band Studienanfängern des Faches einen ersten Zugang zur archäologischen Stadtforschung eröffnen. Für einen tieferen und differenzierteren Einblick in die Entwicklung und den Baubestand der Stadt ist eine Lektüre des 1960 erstmals erschienen Standardwerks Roman Ostia von Russell Meiggs jedoch ebenso unerlässlich wie eine Konsultation der weiterführenden Forschungsliteratur.

---

Notes:

1.   C. Pavolini, L'edilizia commerciale e l'edilizia abitativa nel contesto di Ostia tardoantica, in: A. Giardina (Hrsg.), Società Romana e impero tardoantico 2: Roma. Politica, economia, paesaggio urbano (Rom 1986) 246– 254; C. Pavolini, La trasformazione del ruolo di Ostia nel III secolo d. C., Mélanges de l'École Française de Rome 114, 1, 2002, 343–349.
2.   J. T. Bakker, Regio I – Insula XIII – Domus delle Gorgoni (I, XIII, 6).
3.   M. L. Laird, Reconsidering the so-called "Sede degli Augustali" at Ostia, Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome 45, 2000, 72; C. Pavolini, Un gruppo di ricche case ostiensi del Tardo Impero. Trasformazioni architettoniche e cambiamenti sociali, in: O. Brandt – P. Pergola (Hrsg.), Marmoribus vestita. Miscellanea in onore di Federico Guidobaldi, Studi di antichità cristiana 62 (Rom 2011) 1025–1026; P. Pensabene u. a., Ostiensium marmorum decus et decor. Studi architettonici, decorativi e archeometrici, Studi miscellanei 33 (Rom 2007) 437.
4.   V. Kockel – S. Ortisi, Ostia. Sogenanntes Macellum (IV 5, 2). Vorbericht über die Ausgrabungen der Universität Augsburg 1997/8, Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts. Römische Abteilung 107, 2000, 351– 354.
5.   G. Becatti, Case Ostiensi del Tardo Impero (Rom 1949) 10–13; Calza u. a., Topografia generale, Scavi di Ostia 1 (Rom 1953) Beil. 11.

(read complete article)

Anne-Marie Guimier-Sorbets, André Pelle, Mervat Seif el-Din, Renaître avec Osiris et Perséphone: Alexandrie, les tombes peintes de Kôm el-Chougafa. Antiquités Alexandrines, 1. Alexandrie: Centre d'Études Alexandrines, 2015. Pp. 177. ISBN 9782111298583. €40.00.

Reviewed by Marjorie S. Venit, University of Maryland (venit@umd.edu)

Version at BMCR home site

Preview

The title of this volume accommodates multiple meanings: most straightforwardly, it addresses the subjects of the paintings that form the substance of the book, but it also calls to mind the deceased persons once entombed below the paintings and also the volume's raison d'être, as it heralds further images that have recently reemerged through new photographic techniques.

The paintings in question are found in two tombs in "The Hall of Caracalla," a catacomb that received its name from a mistaken historical connection, also called the "The Nebengrab," based on its proximity to the larger and far better known "Great Catacomb" at Kom el-Shoqafa. They are dated by Anne-Marie Guimier-Sorbets and Mervat Seif el-Din to the end of the first through the middle of the second century CE. Their imagery, conceived in two registers on the back and side walls of the tomb niches created by the rock-cut sarcophagi below, consists of two sets of scenes. The first, from the Egyptian myth of Osiris, is in an egyptianizing style in the upper register, and the second is from the Greek myth of Persephone in a classicizing style in the lower. With their emergence dependent on the level of humidity in the catacomb — when they appear, at best, as vague ghost images —the paintings had never been seriously studied, even though they had been mentioned as early as 1901. When the paintings reappeared in the early 1990s, they were photographed with infrared film under the direction of Jean-Yves Empereur, the Director of the Centre d'Études Alexandrines, but it was not until 1996, when André Pelle considered photographing them with a view camera under ultraviolet fluorescent light that their imagery more fully emerged. Subsequently, guided by Guimier-Sorbets and Seif el-Din, who were to publish the two tomb chambers in the BCH in 1997,¹ Mary-Jane Schumacher made paintings to clarify the still ghostly images, which were incorporated, along with Pelle's photographs, as illustrations in the article.

More recently, Pelle re-photographed the tomb with a high-resolution digital camera and remarkable new evidence emerged. These new photographs, some of which include traces of the imagery's original color, form the basis for this book.

The volume is divided into three parts: the first, a brief introduction by Empereur, addresses the photographic history of the tomb paintings; the second, by Pelle, provides the technical account of the imagery's photography; and the third and longest section, by Guimier-Sorbets and Seif el-Din, presents a new description and a revised interpretation of the imagery in the two tomb niches.

Empereur notes that the recovery of the two tomb chambers for modern study falls into four stages: one, his observation of the images of Tomb 1 in 1993 and his interpretation of them as figures dancing or as the Judgment of Paris;² two, a more correct visualization of the scenes photographed under ultraviolet light in 1996 that permitted the "Judgment of Paris" to be correctly interpreted as the Abduction of Persephone; three, a new reading of the imagery in 2012 realized through the use of a digital camera and manipulation with relevant software; and four, in 2014, the raising of some of the original colors of the paintings through further digital manipulation.

Pelle was the photographer in both the late 1990s and the second decade of the 2000s, and his account records the technical aspects that finally illuminated the paintings. In 1996, after confirming that infrared photography provided no conclusive evidence for the subject of the Greek paintings, Pelle opted for the other extremity of the spectrum. He turned to "black light," shooting in the dark with the tomb walls illuminated by ultraviolet fluorescent tubes. Though the colors of the paintings had completely disappeared to the naked eye, the pigments had left remains on the limestone support and because the materiality of the support and those of the remains differed, photographs taken under UV light were able to separate the image from the background. Even paintings in sections of Tomb 1— and all those of Tomb 2 — that showed no ghost images at all, could be seen. This technique provided the photographs published in the BCH by Guimier-Sorbets and Seif el-Din.

This volume, however, highlights the images that Pelle took with a digital camera, images that he then manipulated with computer software. Unlike pigment, the primary colors in light, and thus photography, are red, green, and blue (RGB). With computer software, Pelle converted the RGB scale to CIE Lab, which permits the calibration of colors based on three calculations — L: the light or luminescence; a: the red/green axis; and b: the yellow/blue axis — and he then inverted and separated out the three components, L, a, and b. Finally, he reassembled the three layers, adjusting the transparency of each to obtain the results that most clearly elucidated the images. Since photographs taken with the camera closet to the image gave the best results, most images in the book consist of these close-ups. Manipulation of the saturation levels in CIE Lab also revealed the actual colors used in the paintings. When so manipulated, shooting under cold LED light permitted Egyptian blue to emerge, while shooting with a flash revealed yellows and reds.

Aside from clarifying images seen in 1996 and exposing their colors, these new techniques also revealed images never seen before that revised the interpretation of scenes, and these new images and details required the third part of the book — a new description and interpretation of the paintings of Tombs 1 and 2. Guimier-Sorbets and Seif el-Din provide the history of the discovery of and the early scholarship on the catacomb and its tombs, a thorough description of the tomb-niche architecture, and a full description of the narrative paintings and the images on the tombs' ceilings, pilasters, and pediments, as well as their interpretation.

The two tombs generally repeat the same scenes, though details differ. The upper register of the back wall of Tomb 1 shows a mummy lying on a lion-bed being attended by Anubis (or a priest in an Anubis mask). Below the lion-bed are two canopic jars and to either side of the bed stand Nephthys and Isis, their wings outstretched. Behind Nephthys stands a pharaoh figure and behind Isis, Horus or Re-Harakhty. That of Tomb 2 depicts the same narrative, but the two goddesses are undifferentiated and the canopics beneath the lion-bed number four. The upper register of the right walls of both tombs show the resuscitation of Osiris, set between Isis and Thoth as does the left wall of Tomb 2, whereas the left wall of Tomb 1 differs somewhat with Thoth and Isis flanking the fetish of Osiris.

The greatest changes wrought by the new photographs are in the scenes of the myth of Persephone, especially those of the lateral walls. The lower register of the back wall of Tomb 2 shows Persephone abducted by a quadriga-driving Hades as Artemis, Aphrodite and Athena look on, as does the back wall of Tomb 1, though a robbers' hole, cut through from the Great Catacomb, has destroyed the chariot scene. The left wall of Tomb 2 again depicts the three goddesses alongside Persephone as she gathers flowers in the meadow, a reading that marks a slight change from that of 1997, which saw the standing female figures as Oceanids and added an anthropomorphic river god. The left wall of Tomb 1, which is greatly destroyed, depicts Athena, armed and armored, kneeling at a kalathos with an indistinct figure to her proper left. This reading marks one of the greatest differences in interpretation from that of 1997, which saw a river god near the container beneath the tree and the left-hand figure as a nymph. The meaning of the scene on the right wall of Tomb 2 (that of Tomb 1 is entirely destroyed), however, is the one most altered by the new photographs and the one that necessitates an entirely new interpretation for the ensemble. Initially the scene was interpreted as the anodos of Persephone as she emerged from the cavern that marked the Underworld while Hermes, Hekate, and Demeter looked on, thus augmenting the relatively rare representations of the subject in ancient art. With the new photographic technology, however, it has become clear that the moment depicted is one entirely different. The new photographs indicate the cavern as the destination of the charioteer; Hermes stands to the left of the cave that leads to the Underworld, which is articulated by three-headed Cerberus, who guards the entrance. Then to the right, as if the wall of the cavern were transparent, a quite masterful but somewhat less distinct painting, indicates Hades and Persephone enthroned side-by-side in three-quarter view.

The remainder of the volume addresses the tombs' ceiling, pedimental, and pilaster decoration and adduces comparative material for both the Egyptian and Greek imagery and the authors' interpretations of the ensemble. With the reinterpretation of the scene on the right wall of Tomb 2, the remarkable visual correspondence between the Egyptian and the Greek myths heretofore encapsulated in the two registers is shattered. The rationale for the anodos of Persephone as a complement to the resurrection of Osiris can no longer be sustained, since the former scene has ceased to exist. Instead, the authors now connect the paintings to the Mysteries of Persephone and Demeter and interpret the entire suite of Greek images more generally.

Based on Pelle's new photographic record, the absolute meaning and relationship of the two superimposed friezes can now be opened to discussion. So far as I know, the two paintings of the myth of Persephone are the only examples of a Greek myth depicted in an Alexandrian tomb, and the treatment of the resuscitation of Osiris differs from that normally depicted in contemporaneous tombs in the Egyptian chora. Thus, the imagery encapsulated in these two tombs acquires both special distinction and crucial importance, not only in the history of Alexandrian eschatological history, but in that of eschatological thought in Egypt and in the wider Greek world. The new visual explication of the images by means of digital technology is thus of greatest consequence, and we are fortunate to have this handsomely produced book with its copious illustrations as a means of beginning to wrestle with the questions that the tombs' imagery now raises.

---

Notes:

1.   M. Seif El-Din and A.-M. Guimier-Sorbets, "Les deux tombes de Perséphone dans la nécropole de Kom el-Chougafa à Alexandrie, Bulletin de correspondance hellénique 121.1 (1997): 355–410. Subsequently discussed in A.-M. Guimier-Sorbets, "The Function of Funerary Iconography in Roman Alexandria. An Original Form of Bilingual Iconography in the Necropolis of Kom el Shoqafa" in: Proceedings of the XVth International Congress of Classical Archaeology, Amsterdam, July 12–17, 1998: Classical Archaeology towards the Third Millennium: Reflections and Perspectives. (R. F. Docter and E. M. Moormann, eds.). Amsterdam: Allard Pierson Museum: vol. I, 1999: 180–182 and A.-M. Guimier-Sorbets and M. Seif el-Din, "Les peintures de la nécropole Kom el-Chougafa à Alexandrie. Éléments de méthode pour la lecture iconographique et l'interprétation du style 'bilingue'" in: La peinture funéraire antique IV ^e siècle av. J.-C.–IV^e siècle ap. J.-C. Actes du VII^e Colloque de l'Association Internationale pour la Peinture Murale Antique (AIPMA) 6–10 Octobre 1998. Saint Romaine-en-Gal-Vienne (under the direction of A. Barbet). Paris: Editions Errance, 2001: 129–136.
2.   J.-Y. Empereur, A Short Guide to the Catacombs of Kom el-Shoqafa Alexandria. Alexandria: Serapis Publishing, 1995: 22 (as the Judgement of Paris).

(read complete article)

James Henderson Collins II, Exhortations to Philosophy: The Protreptics of Plato, Isocrates, and Aristotle. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2015. Pp. xiv, 300. ISBN 9780199358595. $74.00.

Reviewed by Diego De Brasi, Philipps-Universität Marburg and Notre Dame Institute for Advanced Study (debrasi@staff.uni-marburg.de/ddebrasi@nd.edu)

Version at BMCR home site

Preview

In the last decades scholarship has increasingly stressed the importance of literary aspects in Plato's dialogues.¹ James Collins' inspiring book attempts to develop such literary readings by taking into consideration the educational context of the dialogues and focusing on protreptic as an emergent literary genre in 4^th-century BC Athens. His argument is based on a simple and yet often underestimated characteristic of Athenian culture: at the latest since the expansion of the sophistic movement,² philosophers and educators competed as 'sellers' in the 'marketplace of ideas' (passim) and tried to persuade students that they were the best teachers. Beginning with this assumption, Collins explores the strategies and mechanisms used by the best representatives of the protreptic genre —Plato and Isocrates—in order to undermine the claims of their rivals and argue for their own 'superiority' in educational matters. He argues especially that the techniques of Plato and Isocrates show how protreptic was still a developing genre at this time, and how both Plato and Isocrates attempted to absorb and replace other literary genres.

The book is simply and efficiently structured. After an Introduction, in which different theories of genre are examined and protreptic is defined, Collins analyzes at length Plato's Euthydemus and Protagoras as well as Isocrates' Against the Sophists, Cyprian discourses, To Demonicus, Antidosis and Panathenaicus. In the epilogue he focuses on Aristotle's Protrepticus as a more rigid example of protreptic. In the following discussion I will focus only on some aspects of his thorough analysis.

Beginning with etymology, Collins defines protreptic as conversion, since the exhortatory movement implied in the verb προτρέπω ('urge on, impel') is often—or, more radically, always—linked to the abandoning of previous opinions and ways of life (apotreptic, cf. ἀποτρέπω, 'turn away from'). However, it soon becomes clear that the author aims at a broader examination of ancient and modern genre theory in order to highlight the versatility of protreptic at its beginning. Collins sets out four characteristics of protreptic (17-18). According to him protreptic is: (a) dialogic, in the sense that it 'always contains the voices of its competition'; (b) agonistic; (c) situational; and (d) rhetorical. Furthermore, he implicitly argues via a discussion of theories of genre in Aristotle (especially the Rhetoric), Francis Cairns and Mikhail Bakhtin that, in order to interpret protreptic as genre, we must consider genre not as a strictly codified category (as Cairns does), but as a situational, always-fluctuating discourse about situations, that is capable of absorbing elements from other established genres (i.e. as Bakhtin does).³

The first part of the study is dedicated to Plato. Collins deals here with various aspects of Plato's literary technique and highlights, especially in his analysis of the Euthydemus, how, according to Plato, philosophy consists both of reasoning and emotional involvement (54 n. 2 and 59). In particular, the analysis of Plato's staging of the Euthydemus shows how two processes contribute to a more lively depiction of Socratic protreptic and apotreptic. The first is Plato's use of different, interwoven levels of action, i.e. the extradiegetic frame, in which Socrates discusses with Crito Euthydemus' and Dionysodorus' 'performance', and the intradiegetic dialogue, which this performance represents. In this context it is argued, for example, that Socrates' depiction of the intradiegetic level within the extradiegetic frame reveals that Crito (and the reader with him) participates as a spectator in a performance, but is led by Socrates' description to look at this performance from a biased point of view.⁴ The second is Plato's portrayal of the dialogue's characters. Thus, for example, Socrates' reference to Euthydemus' and Dionysodorus' previous athletic careers (271c-276d) should be interpreted as a hint about their incapacity to properly protrepticize (78-9). Acknowledging Socrates' 'ventriloquism', i.e. his ability to integrate the points of view of his competitors into his own protreptic discourse, leads further to an examination of the reasons why the use of apotreptic in a protreptic discourse is important. Collins detects four main motives: "(1) to differentiate the targets and methods of competitors; (2) to inform the consumers of costs; (3) to question the quality of what the competition has to offer; and (4) to influence consumers to identify its activities with a questionably appealing experience or personality" (84). Notable is also the analysis of the formal features of Socratic protreptic, which are "adaptability, an operative psychological account, the establishment of a range and hierarchy of goods, and a rhetoric of usefulness which differentiates other activities . . . from philosophy" (89). Here some intriguing intertextual comparisons of sometimes questionable plausibility are suggested. For example, it could be true that Plato lets Socrates reverse the language of the ephebic oath in the Apology (29d-e);⁵ but does the context in which Cleinias concurs with Socrates that the practice of philosophy is a necessary task for human beings (Euthyd. 282d) really suggest that he takes an oath comparable to the ephebic one (93-7)? On the other side, Collins is absolutely right in pointing out that in the Euthydemus Plato castigates 'something far worse' than the written word criticized in the Phaedrus, namely 'public speech that has the same deficiencies as the written word' (100), and in this implicitly condemns Alcidamas' criticism of written speeches.

The treatment of the Protagoras is considerably less thorough than that of the Euthydemus, but it presents similar strengths and weaknesses. It is quite appealing to interpret this dialogue not so much as an example of protreptic, but as a depiction of the processes in which consumers are involved after they have been successfully protrepticized. But it is not obvious—as suggestive as it might be—how Plato 'mapped' onto both Protagoras and Socrates what Collins, following Martin, calls the 'sibship function' recognizable in Hesiod's depiction of the quarrel between his own persona and that of his brother Perses in the Works and Days (163-6).

The brief remarks on the Clitophon are also a welcome analysis of Plato's literary technique. Nonetheless one would have expected at least a mention in a footnote that the authenticity of this dialogue is (still) highly debated.

The second, much shorter part of the book focuses on Isocrates. The author rightly claims that, in spite of still common 'misrepresentations' of his works, the works of Isocrates should be considered as 'perhaps the most successful example[s] of philosophical protreptic' (172), whose originality consists in his use of protreptic as an instrument propagating an idea of philosophy as 'a review . . . and a "rediscovery" of ancient learning in modern times' (176). Thus, in Collins' analysis, Against the Sophists represents the place where Isocrates distances himself from his competitors by revealing their over-confidence and greed, and by stressing his own peculiar approach to education. Isocrates' addresses to the young kings Nicocles (Nicocles, To Nicocles) and Demonicus (To Demonicus) are, instead, the best examples of his protreptic art. Indeed, these are complex texts in which Isocrates not only speaks to multiple audiences, but uses multiple literary devices. Especially persuasive is the treatment of Isocrates' engagement with epic and didactic poetry: Collins highlights how in his depiction of Evagoras' deeds Isocrates integrates elements of poetic genres in order to differentiate himself from his rivals. In other words: through his artful combination and reshaping of epic and prosaic elements in his rhetorical praise of Nicocles' father, Isocrates implicitly shows his readers that he—differently from some private persons and especially from his competitors—has understood and can teach successfully the difference between praise and reproach (197-206). Finally Antidosis and Panathenaicus are examined. These orations are Isocrates' energetic reshaping of his own protreptic method through both a scrutiny of his rhetorical discourse and educational intent (Antidosis), and a staged example of dialogical collaboration between him and his students (Panathenaicus). However, the Antidosis also shows the failure of Isocrates' educational program and its possible causes.⁶

The study closes with a brief examination of Aristotle's Protrepticus, based on the reconstruction of the text offered by D. S. Hutchinson and M. R. Johnson. Collins' main point here is that, although Aristotle is in some way introducing the voices of his competitors in the discussion, he never explicitly uses other genres in order to enrich the literary quality of his protreptic. In fact, Collins shares Werner Jaeger's opinion that Aristotle's dialogues are better understood to be the juxtaposition of arguments constrained in a 'scientific style of demonstration and confliction' (263). Furthermore, he offers a possible sociological explanation for the crystallization of protreptic with and after Aristotle, namely the introduction of a more or less institutionalized educational system in Athens at the end of the 4^th century BC.

A bibliography, an index locorum and an index of subjects round up the book. A few typos should be noted: 'protopetics' for 'protreptics' (80); ωφέλιμον for ὠφέλιμον (88); ανατρεπτικοί for ἀνατρεπτικοί (91 n. 48); 'Lykurgos, Leokrates 1.76-78 76-77' for (presumably) 'Lykurgos, Leokrates 1.76-78'; ἡμῖν for ὑμῖν (128 quoting Euthyd. 291c); 'predominately' for 'predominantly' (172); 'Serrres' for 'Serres' (280). Some footnotes must have been misplaced, e.g. n. 18 at p. 73,⁷ and n. 3 at p. 172.⁸

Notwithstanding these qualms, Collins' book is an altogether welcome contribution to our understanding of the cultural context in which Plato's philosophy originated.

---

Notes:

1.   Cf. for example A. W. Nightingale, Genres in Dialogue: Plato and the Construct of Philosophy, Cambridge 1995; A. Michelini (ed.), Plato as Author: The Rhetoric of Philosophy, Leiden and Boston 2003; M. Erler, Platon, (Grundriss der Geschichte der Philosophie begründet von F. Ueberweg, Völlig neu bearbeitete Ausgabe. Die Philosophie der Antike, 2/2), Basel 2007, 60-98; A. Capra, Plato's Four Muses. The Phaedrus and the Poetics of Philosophy, Cambridge and London 2014; and, with a different approach, T. A. Szlezák, Platon lesen, Stuttgart 1993 and M. Migliori, Il disordine ordinato: la filosofia dialettica di Platone, 2 vols., Brescia 2013 (see BMCR 2014.08.40).
2.   In his introduction, however, he briefly examines Hesiod's Works and Days and the fragments of Parmenides as examples of "earlier protreptic configuration" (7-16).
3.   F. Cairns, Generic composition in Greek and Roman poetry, Edinburgh 1972; M. Bakhtin, The dialogic imagination: Four essays, Austin 1981; Id. Problems of Dostoevsky's Poetics, Minneapolis 1984; Id. Speech genres and other late essays, Austin 1986.
4.   He argues for example that Socrates' 'peristrophic' (all-embracing) prologue aims at a destabilization of "the setting and roles for performing wisdom" (75).
5.   Nevertheless Collins' interpretation seems still one-sided. Why should we not consider the more apparent intertextual relationship with defensive rhetorical strategies? Besides, Socrates speaks in the Apology as a seventy year old man accused of corrupting Athenian youth, while the ephebic oath was taken by young boys at the beginning of their civic 'career'.
6.   These are identifiable with: (1) stubbornness and ineptness on the side of the student; (2) the caprice of the uneducated crowd; (3) 'the jealousy of slanderous rivals'; (4) the influence of popular poetry on political debates; and (5) Isocrates' own shortcomings in his protreptic attempts (238).
7.   Collins refers to the analysis of erotic dialogue in S. Goldhill and S. von Reden, "Plato and the Performance of Dialogue" in Performance-Culture and Athenian Democracy, ed. by S. Goldhill and R. Osborne, Cambridge 1999, 257-89. But he describes something which is only loosely related to erotic in the Euthydemus. Besides, erotic dialogue is not the focus of Goldhill's and von Reden's argument.
8.   In the main text a passage from S. Halliwell, "Philosophical Rhetoric or Rhetorical Philosophy? The Strange Case of Isocrates" in The Rhetoric Canon, ed. by B. Schildgen, Detroit 1997, 107-25 is quoted. The reference in the note, however, is to J. Ober, "I, Socrates. . . The Performative Audacity of Isocrates' Antidosis" in Isocrates and Civic Education, ed. by T. Poulakos and D. Depew, Austin 2004, 21-43 (erroneously mentioning p. 109!).

(read complete article)