This is the seventh volume produced by B. within ‘KomFrag’ (‘Kommentierung der Fragmente der griechischen Komödie’), the well-known international research project on comic fragments, which is directed by Bernhard Zimmermann (Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg), under the auspices of the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences. In his six other volumes within this project B. has already studied other plays/fragments by Aristophanes as well as other poets of Old Comedy.
In the present volume (written in German) B. studies the surviving fragments (a total of 103) from the following six plays by Aristophanes: Σκηνὰς καταλαμβάνουσαι, Ταγηνισταί, Τελεμησσῆς, Τριφάλης, Φοίνισσαι and Ὧραι (most of the surviving fragments are preserved by lexicographical sources and ancient scholia). B. adheres to the standard guidelines of the KomFrag project (that govern mostly structure, but also content). Accordingly, the analysis of each play begins with a discussion of the title, followed by meticulous study of the fragments; for each fragment B. provides a citation context, discussion of issues of textual criticism (where applicable), metrical analysis and an overall interpretation, before proceeding to the analysis of the fragment's individual terms and expressions.
It is a truism that working with fragments can be demanding and challenging. B. manages to meet this challenge and provide the scholarly community with a useful tool for approaching several snippets and little gems of Aristophanes’ dramatic output. In introducing each play B. discusses the title as comprehensively as possible; in doing so, he epitomises all we know about the play (on the basis of surviving fragments and other testimonies), whilst he refrains from unnecessary speculation. A welcome feature of these introductory discussions is that he often attempts to link each play's surviving material with (aspects of) the title, carefully implementing reasonable conjectures. Moving from the play's title to the fragments, B. proves scrupulous and takes a very systematic approach to each fragment's citation context, critical issues as well as metrical analysis. He manages to clarify the often convoluted (and/or elliptical) context of the lexicographical source, disentangle the various readings, detect metrical patterns camouflaged in prose, and effectively discuss and settle issues of textual criticism. His discussions under the rubric ‘Interpretation’ are instructive and to the point, while the analysis of individual terms (where there are any) complements the picture for the reader. Ubiquitously, B. does not discuss the fragmentary material in vacuo; instead, he resorts to parallel cases (from comedy and beyond), seeks additional information and corroborating testimonies from a wide range of sources, while he simultaneously has a perfect grasp of relevant bibliography (older and recent), with which he engages in discussion.
A representative case of B.'s diligence is the discussion of Aristophanes, fr. 526 K.-A. (pp. 93–5), which consists of a single word (ἀμφαριστερόν). B. exhaustively discusses the term (and its source) against its cognates, synonyms and antonyms, as they feature in a number of lexicographical sources as well as other passages (from comedy, tragedy, lyric poetry, historiography and philosophy), before establishing that ἀμφαριστερόν was an ad-hoc coinage by Aristophanes, meant to describe satirically someone as being absolutely incompetent (literally, as using both hands as left ones, i.e. ‘awkward’ hands).
Another exemplary handling of available evidence and surviving testimonies is to be found in the analysis of fr. 566 K.-A. (pp. 159–60), where B. detects and registers tradition's inconsistency. In particular, he methodically demonstrates how an entry in Hesychius’ lexicon supplies an incorrect and anachronistic interpretation of this fragment, wrongly based on a piece of evidence that was not yet present in Aristophanes’ time (i.e. a four-headed Hermes statue in Kerameikos). Again, to safely reach this conclusion, B. scrutinises a great number of lexicographical sources, along with pertinent scholarly discussions.
Most praiseworthy is also B.'s analysis of the play Φοίνισσαι, and especially fr. 573 K.-A. (pp. 175–7), where he looks at Aristophanic paratragedy in relation to Euripides, engaging in discussion with recent scholarship on the subject. Through solid argumentation he substantiates, crystallises and advances our knowledge regarding Aristophanes’ penchant for parodying Euripides’ musical choices (especially monodies and other lyric stanzas).
The introduction to Ὧραι is exemplary. B. competently places the play within the comic tradition of naming plays after minor deities, whilst citing and discussing a significant number of parallels.
Of course, when dealing with such a bulk of material, oversights are naturally unavoidable. The volume could have benefited from some additional discussions; for example, in introducing Σκηνὰς καταλαμβάνουσαι (Women occupying tents) B. studies at length the precise meaning of σκηνή (which is indeed crucial in correctly understanding the title), along with the apparent female identity of the chorus (as in Lysistrata, Thesmophoriazusae and Ecclesiazusae). At this point B. could have also detected and similarly discussed the comic motif of women going awry and ‘misbehaving’ (i.e. transcending their socially/politically assigned role/status), which presently suggests itself. Beyond Old Comedy and Aristophanes’ ‘women plays’, this motif is detectable in two plays called Γυναικοκρατία (Female Dominion), one produced by Amphis (PCG 2.216–17) and one by Alexis (PCG 2.46–7). B. could have referred to these plays, along with the corresponding commentaries (A. Papachrysostomou, Amphis: Introduction, Translation, Commentary [2016]; and W.G. Arnott, Alexis: the Fragments. A Commentary [1996], respectively). Thus, the notion of continuity of the comic genre would be better evinced. Likewise, in discussing fr. 494 K.-A. (featuring a hetaira being assimilated to a wild beast, a panther; pp. 26–8) B. could have mentioned the comic topos according to which hetairai are visualised as monsters and wild beasts; this is best exemplified in Anaxilas fr. 22 (with G.M. Tartaglia, Alkenor – (Asklepiodo)ros: Introduzione, Traduzione e Commento [2019], pp. 120–56). Aristophanes’ fragment would thus be highlighted as foreshadowing this trend.
Additionally, fr. 508 K.-A. (from the play Ταγηνισταί, Frying-pan men) calls for some careful consideration. B. (following the interpretations of G. Kaibel and T. Bergk, as quoted and further advanced by Kassel–Austin, PCG 3.2.268) detects funerary connotations and interprets στεφάνωσαι and the whole fragment as a rude address from an impertinent boy towards an elderly figure (pp. 60–1); the boy supposedly asks the elderly figure to put on a wreath, for his time to die has come. However, as known, the use of garlands was not restricted to funerary rites; there are other possibilities for interpreting the immediate context of this fragment; for example, a symposion, especially given the play's title (for instance, the speaker could be an elderly figure encouraging a youth to wear a garland and join in the festivities, since he now has the proper age). Although B. is generally rigorous, consciously refraining from unwarranted speculation, here he seems to have readily adopted Kaibel's and Bergk's interpretations. B. could challenge Kaibel and Bergk and at least entertain the idea of an alternative setting, especially since there is no firm evidence for a funerary one. Besides, B. commonly takes under consideration the play's title when interpreting a fragment (cf. what he says about fr. 529 K.-A. from the same play, p. 97: ‘ein kulinarischer Einsatz des Herdes geht aus dem Komödientitel eindeutig hervor’); similarly, the play's title (Frying-pan men) strongly points towards a symposion, instead of a funeral, for fr. 508 too.
Overall, and despite occasional infelicities, B. has done the scholarly community a great service in thoroughly examining and thereby making easily accessible a significant number of Aristophanic fragments, along with the corresponding plays. The volume is tangibly permeated by B.'s care to point out all possible parallelisms and associations, thus placing these fragments within their original context, whilst enriching his discussions with ideas and arguments from germane scholarly conversations. This is another highly commendable KomFrag volume.
