Philonides and Aristophanes
The other question respecting Philonides is one of very great importance in connection
with the literary history of the Old Comedy in general, and of Aristophanes in particular.
It is generally believed that Philonides was an actor of Aristophanes, who is said to have
committed to him and to Callistratus his chief characters. But the evidence on which this
statement rests is regarded by some of the best modern critics as leading to a very
different conclusion, namely, that several of the plays of Aristophanes were brought out in
the names of Callistratus and Philonides. This question has been treated of by such scholars
as seen Ranke, C. F. Hermann, Fritzsch, Hanovius, W. Dindorf, and Droysen; but by far the
most elaborate and satisfactory discussion of it is that by Theodor Bergk, prefixed to his
edition of the fragments of Aristophanes, in Meineke's Fragmenta Comicorum
Graecorum, vol. ii. pp. 902-939.
It must be remembered that, when a poet wished to exhibit a drama, he had first to apply
to either the first or second archon for a chorus, his obtaining which depended on the
opinion of the archon as to the merits of his play, and also in no small degree on personal
and political influence. We even find choruses refused to such poets as Sophocles and
Cratinus. Even when he succeeded in obtaining a chorus, he had to encounter the proverbial
capriciousness of an Athenian audience, whose treatment even of old favourites was, as
Aristophanes complains, no small discouragement to a young candidate for their favour. In
order to reduce the obstacles which a young poet found thus placed in his way upon the very
threshold, two courses were customary : the candidate for dramatic honours either brought
out in his own name the play of some popular poet, the intrinsic merit of which was sure to
obtain a chorus, or else he availed himself of the reputation of a well-known poet by
applying for a chorus in his name. The result was that by the former plan, which we know to
have been adopted by the sons of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Aristophanes, the young poet's
name became known, and he could more easily hope to obtain a chorus for one of his own plays
; and, in the latter case, the reception of his works would encourage him to appear again
under his own name, or the contrary. There is, in fact, a passage of Aristophanes, which, if
the figure be interpreted closely, would suggest the notion that it was customary for a
young poet to pass through the following three stages : the first, assisting another poet in
the composition of the less important passages of his plays (like the pupils of a great
artist), as we know Eupolis to have worked under Aristophanes in the
Knights
; then putting out his own dramas under the name of another poet, in order to see
how the popular favour inclined ; and lastly, producing them in his own name. These several
stages are perhaps intimated by the phrases,
ἐρέτην γένεσθαι,
πρωρατεῦσαι καὶ τοὺς ἀνέηους διαθρῆσαι, and
κυβερνᾶν αὐτὸν έαυτώ in the passage alluded to (
Eq.
541-543, see Bergk,
l.c. pp. 916, 917). In addition to the reasons just
stated, there is a very common opinion,
founded on the statement of a
grammarian (
Schol. 22 Aristoph. Nub. 530), that an express law forbade
a poet to exhibit a drama in his own name while he was under thirty years of age; but Bergk
has shown (
I. c. pp. 906, 907) that this law is probably one of those
innumerable fictions of the commentators, who state as facts things which are simply the
expression of their own notion of their author's meaning; for Aeschylus, Sophocles, and
Euripides are all known to have brought out plays in their own names while they were under
thirty.
Now, in every case, the name enrolled in the public records was that of the person in
whose name the chorus was applied for, whether he were the real author or not, and this is
the name which appears in the
Didascalia prefixed to a play under the form
ἐδιδάχθη διὰ Καλλιστράτου (
Acharn.), or
δἰ αὐτοῦ Ἀριστοφάνους (
Equit.). In fact, according to the original spirit of the institution, the
chorus was the only essential part of a play, and the public
functionaries knew nothing of
the author as such, but only of
the teacher of the chorus. Now we can easily understand how, when a poet
was wealthy and fond of enjoyment, he might choose to assign the laborious duty of training
the chorus and actors to another person; and thus, besides the reasons already stated for a
poet's using another's name at the commencement of his career, we see another ground on
which he might continue that practice, after his reputation was established.
Now we learn from Aristophanes himself, to say nothing of other evidence, not only the
fact that he brought out his early plays in the names of other poets, but also his reasons
for so doing. In the Purabasis of the Knights (5.514), he states that
he had pursued this course, not from want of thought, but from a sense of the difficulty of
his profession, and from a fear that he might suffer from that fickleness of taste which the
Athenians had shown towards other poets, as Magnes, Crates, and Cratinus. Again, in the
Parabasis of the
Clouds (5.530), he expresses the same
thing in the following significant language :--
κἀγώ, παρθένος γὰπ έτʼ ἦ, κοὐκ ἐξῆν πώ μοι τεκεῖν
ἐξέθηκα, παῖς δʼ
ἑτέρα τις λαβοῦσʼ ἀνείλετο,
where the last words evidently imply, if the
figure is to be interpreted consistently, that the person in whose name he brought out the
play referred to (the
Daetaleis) was
another poet. It
was evidently the word
ἐξῆν in this passage that
misled the scholiast into his fancy of a legal prohibition.
We must now inquire what light the ancient grammarians throw upon the subject. The author
of the anonymous work, Περὶ κωμωδίας, who is
decidedly one of the best of these writers, states (p. xxix.) that "Aristophanes first
exhibited (ἐδίδαξε) in the archonship of Diotimus
(B. C. 427), in the name of Callistratus (διὰ καλλιστράτου); for his political comedies (τὰς πολιτικὰς) they say that he gave to him,but those against
Euripidesand Socrates to Philonides; and on account of this (first drama) being esteemed a
good poet, he conquered on subsequent occasions (τοὺς
λοιποὺς, sc χρόνους), enrolling his own
name as the author (ἐπιγραφόμενος). Afterwards he gave
his dramas to his son" (Araros). The play which he exhibited on this occasion was the
Δαιταλεῖς (Nub. l.c. and Schol.). To the same effect another respectable grammarian, the author of
the life of Aristophanes, tells us(p. xxxv.) that "being at first exceedingly cautious and
otherwise clever, he brought out (καθίει, the regular
word for bringing into a contest) his first dramas in the names of (διὰ) Callistratus and Philonides; wherefore he was ridiculed
.... on the ground that he laboured for others : but afterwards he contended in his own name (αὐτὸς
ἠγωνίσατο) :" here again the phrase "that he laboured for others" must imply
that Callistratus and Philonides were poets.
Thus far all is clear and consistent. Aristophanes, from motives of modesty and caution,
but not from any legal necessity, began to exhibit, not in his own name, but in that of
Callistratus, and afterwards of Philonides. The success of these first efforts encouraged
him to come forward as the avowed author of his plays; and again, towards the close of his
life, he aided his son Araros, by allowing him to bring out some of his dramas (the
Cocalus for example) in his own name. But at the close of this very same
Life of Aristophanes (p. xxxix.) we find the error which we have to
expose, but yet combined with truth as to the main fact, in the statement that "the
actors of Aristophanes were Callistratus and Philonides, in
whose names (
διʼ ὧν) he exhibited
his own dramas, the public (or political) ones (
τὰ
δημοτικά) in the name of Philonides, and the private (or personal) ones
(
τὰ ἰδιωτικά) in that of Callistratus." It seems
that the grammarian, though himself understanding the meaning of
διά, copied the error into which some former writer had been led, by supposing
that it referred to the
actors : for, that it cannot have that sense in
the passage before us, is obvious from the tautology which would arise from so translating
it, and from the force of the
ἑαυτοῦ ; namely, "
the actors of Aristophanes were Callistratus and Philonides, by whom
as actors he exhibited his
own dramas." We may,
however, with great probability regard the passage as a later interpolation : how little
credit is due to it is plain from the fact that the distribution of subjects in the last
clause agrees neither with the testimony already cited, nor with the information which we
derive from the
Didascaliae, as to the plays which were assigned respectively
to Philonides and Callistratus. From the
Didascaliae and other testimonies,
we find that the
Babylonians (
B. C. 426) and the
Acharnians (
B. C. 425) were also brought out in
the name of Callistratus; and that the first play which Aristophanes exhibited in his own
name was the
Knights,
B. C. 424 (
ἐδιδάχθη....διʼ αὐτοῦ
τοῦ Ἀριστοφάνους, Didasc.). And hence the notion has been hastily adopted,
that he henceforth continued to exhibit in his own name, until towards the close of his
life, when he allowed Araros to bring out his plays. But, on the contrary, we find from the
Didascaliae that he brought out the
Birds (
B. C. 414) and the
Lysistrata (
B. C. 411)
in the name of Callistratus (
διὰ καλλιστράτου).
Thus far the testimonies quoted have only referred to Philonides in general terms : it
remains to be seen what particular plays Aristophanes brought out in his name. From the
above statements of the grammarians it might be inferred that Aristophanes used the name of
Philonides in this manner before the composition of the
Knights
; but this is probably only a part of the error by which it was assumed that, from
the time of his exhibiting the
Knights, it was his constant custom to bring
out his comedies in his own name. It is true that
the scholiast on the passage
from the
Clouds, above quoted, in which the
Daetaleis is
referred to, explains the phrase
παῖς ἑτέρα as
mealling
Φιλωνίδης καὶ καγγίστρατος, and Dindorf, by
putting together this passage and the above inference, imagines that the
Daetaleis was brought out in the name of Philonides (
Frag.
Arist. Daet.); but the scholiast is evidently referring, not so much to the bringing
out of this particular play (for
παίς ἑτέρα cannot
mean two persons, nor were dramas ever brought out in more than one name) as to the practice
of Aristophanes with respect to several of his plays. There is, therefore, no reason for the
violent and arbitrary alteration of the words of the grammarian, who, as above quoted,
expressly says that the play was exhibited
διὰ
καλλιστράτου. There is, therefore, no evidence that Aristophanes exhibited under
the name of Philonides previous to the date of the
Knights ; but that
he did so afterwards we know on the clearest evidence. His next play, the
Clouds (
B. C. 423), we might suppose to have been brought
out in the name of Philonides, on account of the statement of the grammarian, that
Aristophanes assigned to him the plays against Socrates and Euripides, coupled with the
known fact that the
Frogs were exhibited in the name of Philoides ; but,
however this may be, we find that, in the following year,
B. C.
422, Aristophanes brought oult two plays, the
Proagon and the
Wasps, both in the name of Philonides, and gained with them the first and
second prize. This statement rests on the authority of the difficult and certainly corrupted
Passage in the
Didascalia of the
Wasps, into the critical
discussion of which we cannot here enter, further than to give, as the result, the following
amended reading, which is founded on the Ravenna MS., adopted both by Dindorf and Bergk, and
of the correctness of which there can now hardly be a doubt :--
Ἐδιδάχθη ἐπὶ ἄρχοντος Ἀμυνίου διὰ Φιλωνίδου ἐν τῇ πθʼ ὀλυμπιάδι ·
Βʼ (i. e.
δεύτερος)
ἦ. εἰς Λήναια · καὶ ἐνίκα πρῶτος Φιλωνίδης Προαγῶνι, Λεύκων
Πρέσβεσι γ (i.e.
τρίτος) ; from which we
learn that the
Wasps was exhibited at the Lenaea, in the 89th Olympiad, in
the year of the Archon Amynias, under the name of Philonides. and that it gained the second
place, the first being assigned to the
Προάγων, which
was also exhibited in the name of Philonides, and which we know from other sources to have
been a play of Aristophanes (see the Fragments), and the third to the
Πρέσβεις of Leucon.
* Clinton (F. H. vol. ii. p. xxxviii. n. i.) gives a very good account of the
extraordinary errors which have been founded on this passage; to which must be added his
own, for, on the strength of a reading which cannot be sustained, he makes the passage mean
that Aristophanes gained the first prize with the
Wasps, and some poet, whose name is not mentioned, the second with the Proagon.Plays produced by Aristophanes under the name of Philonides
In the year B. C. 414 we again find Aristophanes exhibiting two
plays (though at different festivals), the
Amphiaraus, in the name of
Philonides, and the
Birds, in that of Callistratus (
Arg. in
Av.) ; and, lastly, we learn from the
Didascalia to the
Frogs, that that play also was brought out in the name of Philonides. We
thus see that Aristophanes used the name of Philonides, probably, for the
Clouds (see Bergk,
l.c. pp. 913, 914), and certainly
for the
Wasps, the
Proagon, the
Amphiaraus, and
the
Frogs. The
Daetaleis, the
Babylonians, the
Acharnians, the
Birds, and the
Lysistrata,
were brought out, as we have seen, in the name of Callistratus. Of the extant plays of
Aristophanes, the only ones which he is known to have brought out in his own name are the
Knights, the
Peace, and the
Plutus. His two
last plays, the
Cocalus and
Aeolosicon, he gave to his son
Araros. The
Themophoriazusae and the
Ecclesiazusae have no
name attached to them in the
Didascaliae.These views are further supported by Bergk, in an elaborate discussion of all the
passages in Aristophanes and his scholiasts, which bear upon the matter; which must be read
by all who wish to master this important question in the literary history of
Aristophanes.
There still remain, however, one or two questions which must not be passed over.
Supposing it established, that Aristophanes brought out many of his plays in the names of
Callistratus and Philonides, might they not also be the chief actors in those plays, and,
if not, who and what were they ? From what has been said in the early part of this article,
a strong presumption may be gathered that the persons in whose names the dramas of others
were exhibited were themselves poets, who had already gained a certain
degree of reputation, but who, from advancing years, or for other reasons, might prefer
this sort of literary partnership to the risk and trouble of original composition. Indeed,
it would appear, on the face of the thing, an absurdity for a person, who did not profess
to be a poet, to enrol his name with the archon as the author of a drama, and to undertake
the all-important office of training the performers. But we have the evidence of
Aristophanes himself, that those in whose names he exhibited his dramas, were poets, like
himself, ἑτέροισι ποιηταῖς (Vesp. 1016; comp. Schol.) : we have already seen that
Philonides was a poet of the Old Comedy; and with reference to Callistratus, we have no
other information to throw doubt on that contained in the above and other passages of
Aristophanes and the grammarians. The fact, that we have only three titles of plays by
Philonides, and none by Callistratus, accords with the view that they were chiefly employed
as διδάσκαλοι of the plays of Aristophanes. We have
seen, indeed, that one or two of the grammarians state that they were actors ; but, with all the evidence on the other side, there can be little doubt
that this statement has merely arisen from a mistake as to the meaning of the word διὰ in the
Didascaliae. That word has its
recognized meaning in this connection, and no one hesitates to give it that meaning in the
Didascaliae of the earlier plays : there is no good authority for supposing
it to designate the actor : the
Didascaliae were not designed to record the
name of the actor, hut that of the poet, whether real or professed; the terms
διδάσκαλος, χοροδιδάσκαλος, κωμωδοδιδάσκαλος, are used as
precisely equivalent to
ροιητής and
κωμῳδοποιητής · and the notion that the
χοροδιδάσκαλος and the chief actor could be the same person
involves the almost absurd idea of the chief actor's training himself. The common story
about Aristophanes taking upon himself the part of the chief actor in the
Knights is shown by Bergk to be, in all probability, a mere fabrication of
some grammarian, who mistook the meaning of
ἐδιδάχθη δἰ
αὐτοῦ τοῦ Ἀριστοφάνους in the
Didascalia ; and there is no
clear case, after the regular establishment of the
drama, in which a poet was
at the same time the actor, either of his own plays, or of those of another poet. There is
a curious confirmation of one of the arguments just urged in one of the
scholia on that passage of the
Clouds which has so misled the
commentators (Clouds 531),--
Δηλονότι ὁ Φιλωνίδης κὰ ὁ
Καλλίστρατος, οἱ ὝΣΤΕΡΟΝ γενόμενοι ὑποκριταί τοῦ
Ἀριστοφάνους, the author of which passage evidently inserted
ὕστερον in order to gloss over the absurdity of giving
διὰ different meanings in the
Didascaliae of the earlier and the later plays.
One more question of interest still remains, respecting the knowledge which the Athenian
public had of the real author of those plays which appeared under other names, especially
in the case of Aristophanes ; concerning which the reader is referred to Bergk l.c. pp. 930, &c.), who sums up the whole discussion in words to the
following effect :--that Aristophanes, through youthful timidity, when he began to write
plays, entrusted them to Callistratus ; but afterwards also, even when he had made the
experiment of exhibiting in his own name, he still retained his former custom, and
generally devolved the task of bringing out the play on Callistratus or Philonides; that
both these were poets, and not actors; nor did even Aristophanes himself act the part of
Cleon in the
Knights ; that the fame of Aristophanes, though under the name
of another, quickly spread abroad; and that it was he himself, and not Callistratus, whom
Cleon thrice attacked in the courts of law (p. 939).