Lycophron
Lycophron (
Life and miscellaneous works
He was born at
Tragedies
The poetic compositions of Lycophron chiefly consisted of tragedies, which secured him a place in the Pleiad of Alexandrian tragedians. The Suda gives the titles of twenty tragedies, of which a very few fragments have been preserved:[4] Aeolus, Allies (Symmakhoi), Andromeda, Chrysippus, Daughters of Aeolus, Daughters of Pelops, Elephenor, Herakles, Hippolytus, Kassandreis, Laius, Marathonians, Menedemus, Nauplius, Oedipus (two versions), Orphan (Orphanos), Pentheus, Suppliants (Hiketai), Telegonus, and the Wanderer (Aletes). Among these, a few well-turned lines show a much better style than the Alexandra.
The Alexandra
One poem traditionally attributed to him, Alexandra or Cassandra,[5] has been preserved in its complete form. The first mention of Alexandra is from the first century A.D. by The ancient scholiast, whose report is traced back to Theon, an Alexandrian Grammarian (first century A.D.).[6] Alexandra runs at 1474 iambic trimeters. It consists of a prophecy uttered by Cassandra and relates the later fortunes of Troy and of the Greek and Trojan heroes. References to events of mythical and later times are introduced, and the poem ends with a reference to Alexander the Great, who was to unite Asia and Europe in his world-wide empire.[4]
The style obtained for the poem's author, even among the ancients, the title of "obscure"; one modern scholar says the Alexandra "may be the most illegible piece of classical literature, one which nobody can read without a proper commentary and which even then makes very difficult reading."[7] The poem is evidently intended to display the writer's knowledge of obscure names and uncommon myths; it is full of unusual words of doubtful meaning gathered from the older poets, and long-winded compounds coined by the author. It was probably written as a show-piece for the Alexandrian school, rather than as straight poetry. It was very popular in the Byzantine period, and was read and commented on very frequently; the manuscripts of the Alexandra are numerous. Two explanatory paraphrases of the poem survive, and the collection of scholia by Isaac and John Tzetzes is very valuable[4] (much used by, among others, Robert Graves in his Greek Myths).
Debate over the author of Alexandra
Through most of antiquity there seems to be a mostly universal opinion that the tragedy was written by Lycophron. The only real skeptics from antiquity instead believe that Alexandra was rather written by a homonymous poet who probably was a grandson of Lycophron and lived during the first half of the second century B.C.[6]
Many support that it was written be a revisionist. The reasoning behind this is that there are many historical inconsistencies within Alexandra. Many of the key elements of the poem do not line up with the third century B.C. Most of this has to do with the poem bringing up Rome. Alexandra takes place in Hellenistic period, and says that Rome was on the rise to be a great world power. An example is in verses 1444-1450; in which the poet describes the Roman's successes against the Macedonians. Many historians believe that for somebody living in the second century B.C., describing the
Cassandra prophesies that her Trojan ancestors' descendants "shall with their spears win the foremost crown of glory, obtaining the sceptre and monarchy of earth and sea" and elaborates with allusions to the course of historical events. Some scholars, such as Stephanie West, regard these passages as interpolations and defend the attribution of the bulk of the poem to Lycophron the tragic poet.[9] Thomas Nelson and Katherine Molesworth have argued that 'Lycophron' is a pen name to signpost the poem's style, aligning it with the 'frigidity' of Lycophron the sophist.[10]
Many scholars are certain that the Ptolemaic court would not have commissioned a piece to praise the Romans. Although the Egyptians and Romans had established a political relationship in 273 B.C., the two powers did not do much diplomacy together during the rule of Ptolemy II. Egypt became more dependent on Rome after the second century B.C. when the nation was a shell of its former self due to a series of weak pharaohs. This is why many historians believe that Alexandra was written after the military success of the Roman general Titus Quinctus Flamininus over Philip V of Macedonia at Cynoscephalae, which, if correct, would then give 197 B.C. as a beginning date or creation.[6]
Editions
- Aldus Manutius (1513), Aldine Press, editio princeps
- John Potter(1697, 1702)
- Ludwig Bachmann (1830), with notes and Scaliger's Latin verse translation online
- Félix Désiré Dehèque (1853), with French translation, Latin paraphrase, and notes online
- Gottfried Kinkel (1880)
- Eduard Scheer (1881–1908), including the paraphrases and Tzetzian scholia
- Teubner edition with German translation and commentary online
- Emanuele Ciaceri (1901), edition with Italian translation and commentary online
- George W. Mooney (1921), edition with facing English translation and explanatory notes. {reprinted Arno Press, 1979]
- Lorenzo Mascialino (1964), Teubneredition
- Pascal Quignard, Lycophron. Alexandra, Paris, Mercure de France (1971)
- André Hurst and Antje Kolde (2008), Budé edition
- Simon Hornblower (repr. 2017), with translation and commentary
Translations
- Philip Yorke, Viscount Royston (1784 - 1808, posthumously published 1832) online
- A. W. Mair (1921), Loeb Classical Library (online at the Internet Archive; online on Google Books)
- George W. Mooney (1921)
References
- ISBN 0-674-99143-5.
- ^ Suda λ 827
- ^ a b Callimachus; Lycophron; Aratus, Solensis; Mair, G. R. (Gilbert Robinson); Mair, A. W. (Alexander William) (1921). Callimachus and Lycophron. Kelly - University of Toronto. London : W. Heinemann ; New York : G. P. Putnam.
- ^ a b c d public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Lycophron". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 17 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 153. One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the
- ^ Alexandra is merely an alternative name for Cassandra.
- ^ JSTOR 4477344.
- ^ Gauthier Liberman, review of André Hurst (ed.), Lycophron, Alexandra, Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2009.03.38
- ^ Peter Marshall Fraser, "Lycophron," in Who's Who in the Classical World, ed. Simon Hornblower and Tony Spawforth, Oxford University Press, 2000.
- ^ Stephanie West, "Lycophron," in Encyclopedia of ancient Greece, ed. N.G. Wilson, Routledge, 2006 (cf. eadem, "Notes on the Text of Lycophron," Classical Quarterly, 33 (1983), pp. 114-135, and "Lycophron Italicised," Journal of Hellenic Studies 104 (1984), pp. 127-151).
- ISSN 0009-8388.
Further reading
- Studies
- Konze, J. De Dictione Lycophronis (1870)
- Ulrich von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, De Lycophronis Alexandra (1884) online
- Hornblower, Simon (2018) Lykophron's Alexandra, Rome, and the Hellenistic World (Oxford)
- McNelis, Charles and Sens, Alex (2016) The Alexandra of Lycophron: A Literary Study (Oxford)
- Nelson, Thomas J. and Molesworth, Katherine (2021) ‘Tragic Noise and Aristotelian Frigidity in Lycophron’s Alexandra’, Classical Quarterly 71, 200–215
- Rozokoki, Alexandra (2019) The negative presentation of the Greeks in Lycophron’s Alexandra and the dating of the poem.