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CRETAN ΝΟΜΟΙ: ARCHILOCHUS, FR. 232W WITHOUT HERACLIDES LEMBUS

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 January 2019

Andrea Rotstein
Andrea Rotstein*
Affiliation:
Tel Aviv University
*
arots@post.tau.ac.il
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Extract

Archil. fr. 232 West (= 50 Tarditi = 133 Bergk = 230 LB) reads as follows:

      νόμος δὲ Κρητικὸς διδάσκεται
      a Cretan law is taught (transl. Dilts)
That the term νόμος should be interpreted here in a legal sense has never been contested, and justly so, since its attested meanings are ‘usage, custom, legal norm, statute, law’. However, from the fifth century b.c.e. on, νόμοι are also related to music, referring to ‘melodies’ in general or, as a more technical term, to established ‘musical patterns’. The notion of distribution, of an order socially accepted as valid, seems to underlie the use of νόμος in both the legal and the musical fields.

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Research Article
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The Classical Quarterly , Volume 68 , Issue 2 , December 2018 , pp. 384 - 393
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Copyright © The Classical Association 2019 

Archil. fr. 232 West (= 50 Tarditi = 133 Bergk = 230 LB) reads as follows:

νόμος δὲ Κρητικὸς διδάσκεται
a Cretan law is taught (transl. DiltsFootnote 2)

That the term νόμος should be interpreted here in a legal sense has never been contested, and justly so, since its attested meanings are ‘usage, custom, legal norm, statute, law’.Footnote 3 However, from the fifth century b.c.e. on, νόμοι are also related to music, referring to ‘melodies’ in general or, as a more technical term, to established ‘musical patterns’.Footnote 4 The notion of distribution, of an order socially accepted as valid, seems to underlie the use of νόμος in both the legal and the musical fields.Footnote 5

The context transmitting our fragment supports the notion that νόμος belongs to the legal sphere. Indeed, Archil. fr. 232 is known to us through a citation by Heraclides Lembus, in his synopsis of the Aristotelian Constitutions (14 Dilts = FHG 2.211 Müller):

ὅτι δὲ ἀρχαιοτάτη τῶν πολιτειῶν ἡ Κρητικὴ ἐμφαίνει καὶ Ὅμηρος λέγων· τὰς πόλεις αὐτῶν εὖ ναιεταώσας καὶ Ἀρχίλοχος ἐν οἷς ἐπισκώπτων τινάFootnote 6 φησι· νόμος δὲ Κρητικὸς διδάσκεται.

Homer too indicates that the Cretan is the eldest among the constitutions, as he says ‘their cities, well-inhabited’, and Archilochus says, in those lines in which he mocks someone, ‘the Cretan law is taught’. (transl. Dilts)

Embedded in a text dealing with constitutions, our fragment has been interpreted accordingly. But would it be legitimate to disconnect it from the citation context? In this article I shall argue that Heraclides, or his source, does not shed light on Archilochus’ original poem. Consequently, I propose an alternative contextualization, claiming that the fragment belongs to the field of music.

*

As transmitted, our fragment has some textual difficulties. The paradosis may and has been defended,Footnote 7 yet scholars point out that διδάσκεται, understood as a passive verb, is unusual with a non-personal subject,Footnote 8 whereas the middle voice, ‘the Cretan law learns’, would make little sense either. A minor emendation of a common scribal mistake (ου into ο), as proposed by the sixteenth-century scholar Nicolaus Cragius (Niels Krag),Footnote 9 renders νόμους the object of a middle transitive:

νόμους δὲ Κρητικοὺς διδάσκεται
he is learning Cretan laws (transl. GerberFootnote 10)

Although only Bergk prints the emended text,Footnote 11 most commentators praise its elegance.

To what genre might Archil. fr. 232 have belonged? The line could be either an iambic trimeter or a trochaic tetrameter (West and Medaglia). Some scholars include the fragment among the Iambi (Tarditi and Treu); others among the Epodes (Lasserre and Bonnard); West locates it cautiously among fragments of uncertain genre. The introductory ‘mocking someone’ or ‘mocking some people’ (ἐπισκώπτων τινά / τινάς)Footnote 12 could suggest a piece of invective, possibly targeting stereotypical characteristics attributed to Cretans,Footnote 13 though ‘mocking’ may well derive from the perception of Archilochus as a blame poet.Footnote 14

*

Let us take a look at the text transmitting Archil. fr. 232. The Constitutions is an epitome of 40 out of the 158 constitutions that ancient lists attribute to Aristotle. Heraclides is usually identified as the second-century b.c.e. Heraclides Lembus.Footnote 15 A politician with a passion for note-taking, he produced an Epitome of the Treatises of Hermippus on Lawgivers, on the Seven sages, and on Pythagoras (P.Oxy. 1367). It has been argued that the original epitome by Heraclides was excerpted even further.Footnote 16 Comparison between the Athenian Constitution preserved in P.Lond.Lit. 108 and Heraclides’ epitome is illuminating: the extant papyrus amounts to eighty-two pages in the standard Loeb edition, whereas Heraclides’ Athenian section hardly occupies two pages and a half.

Archilochus’ fragment, along with half a line from Homer, is cited in the opening paragraph of the Cretan section to support the priority of the Cretan constitution, presumably over that of the Spartans. Taking into account Heraclides’ and his excerptor's unsystematic approach towards extraction and reduction, the extent to which the original passage has been reduced cannot be measured. Both citations, however, appeared most probably in the original work.Footnote 17 That it was relatively rich in poetic citations is a safe assumption, judging from the use of Solon's poems in the Athenian Constitution.Footnote 18 To be sure, ancient Greek poets had a role in local history, particularly as chronological milestones, and their works were often used as sources.Footnote 19 In Heraclides’ excerpts, however, relatively few poets are mentioned: Alcman (Sparta, 9), the Lesbian singer, that is, Terpander (Sparta, 11), Archilochus (Paros, 25),Footnote 20 Euripides (Samos, 35), Zenocritus and perhaps Erasippus (Locris, 60) and Homer (Cephallenia, 64).Footnote 21 All these references are anecdotal and, at best, have a loose connection to the surrounding context.

Poetic citations in Heraclides’ Constitutions are even fewer: only five, including Archil. fr. 232. Let us examine their correspondence to the original poems where comparison is possible.

The Homeric πόλεις εὖ ναιεταώσας (Il. 2.648) in the Cretan constitution (14) was taken from the catalogue of ships. The epithet is applied to the Cretan cities of Phaestus and Rhytium, with no connection to the argument regarding the priority of the Cretan constitution (better supported by the reference to Crete and its mythological lawgiver Minos in Od. 19.172–81).Footnote 22 At any rate, the expression is very much part of the epic idiom.Footnote 23

The excerpts of the Cymean constitution (38) include a line of Hesiod's Works and Days (348):

ἔθος δὲ ἦν αὐτοῖς εἰς τὰ κλοπιμαῖα συμβάλλεσθαι τοὺς γείτονας, διὸ καὶ ὀλίγα ἀπόλλυνται. πάντες γὰρ ὁμοίως ἐτήρουν. καὶ Ἡσίοδος ἐντεῦθεν δοκεῖ λέγειν· οὐκ ἂν βοῦς ἀπόλοιτ’ εἰ μὴ γείτων κακὸς εἴη.

It is their custom for neighbors to make reparations for theft; therefore, they lose few things, for all are equally on guard. And for this reason, Hesiod seems to say, ‘A cow would not be lost unless one's neighbor were evil’. (transl. Dilts)

The original context of Hesiod's line is paraenetic, underlining the advantages of maintaining good terms with one's neighbours. Heraclides, or his source, transformed the piece of advice into a description of customs. The wording is preserved but the original purpose is lost.

The short Magnesian section (50) includes another citation from Archil. fr. 20:

οὗτοι δι’ ὑπερβολὴν ἀτυχημάτων πολλὰ ἐκακώθησαν. καί που καὶ Ἀρχίλοχός φησι· κλαίω θαλασσῶν, οὐ τὰ Μαγνήτων κακά.

They were much distressed by excessive misfortune. Somewhere Archilochus says, ‘I lament the seas’ evils, not those of the Magnesians’. (transl. Dilts)

The first part of the citation, θαλασσῶν, ‘of the seas’, is obviously corrupt.Footnote 24 Tyrwhitt's conjecture τὰ Θασίων, adopted by most editors of Archilochus, is highly probable on both palaeographical and semantic grounds:

κλαίω τὰ Θασίων, οὐ τὰ Μαγνήτων κακά.
I bewail the woes of the Thasians, not those of the Magnesians. (transl. Gerber)

Since antiquity the fragment has served as one of the arguments for the dating of Archilochus, and the woes of the Magnesians seem to have become proverbial.Footnote 25 Although the content of the original poem is lost, the first person's sympathy for the Thasians seems to have vanished in Heraclides’ account. In fact, most of the Magnesian section simply expands Archilochus’ verse!

Finally, the Rhegian constitution (55) includes two citations connected to Anaxilas’ victory at Olympia with a mule-car:

ἐτυράννησε δὲ αὐτῶν Ἀναξίλας Μεσσήνιος. καὶ νικήσας Ὀλύμπια ἡμιόνοις εἱστίασε τοὺς Ἕλληνας. καί τις αὐτὸν ἐπέσκωψεν εἰπών· οὗτος τί ἂν ἐποίει νικήσας ἵπποις; ἐποίησε δὲ καὶ ἐπινίκιον Σιμωνίδης· χαίρετ’ ἀελλοπόδων θύγατρες ἵππων [ἐγένοντο].

Anaxilas the Messenian was their tyrant. And he entertained the Greeks after winning a race with mules at Olympia. And someone ridiculed him saying, ‘What would he have done if he had won with horses?’ Also Simonides composed the epinicium, ‘Hail daughters of storm-swift horses’. (transl. Dilts)

Anaxilas, tyrant of Rhegium, won the mule-cart competition at Olympia in 484 or 480 b.c.e. The first citation here is anonymous. The second is probably the first line of a victory ode by Simonides (fr. 515 PMG), recalled in Arist. Rh. 1405b to exemplify the use of epithets in bonam partem (horses instead of asses).Footnote 26 As it was usual in antiquity, the initial words of Simonides’ poem were cited as reference to the entire work, almost as a title,Footnote 27 whereas the actual content of the poem is indifferent to Heraclides or his source.

Let us sum up the examination of Heraclides’ poetic citations. We cannot assess consistency with the poem identified by Simon. fr. 515, but in fr. 20 the original sympathy for the Thasians has been lost. It is clear from the two instances allowing comparison, namely the Iliad (2.64) and Hesiod's Works and Days (348), that a reflection on the tone, content or purposes of the sources is lacking. Indeed, while Homer's πόλεις εὖ ναιεταώσας is formulaic and unrelated to the antiquity of the Cretan constitution, Hesiod's οὐκ ἂν βοῦς ἀπόλοιτ’ εἰ μὴ γείτων κακὸς εἴη is originally paraenetic rather than descriptive. Both citations have been reinterpreted from the point of what Heraclides’ source wished to illustrate. Such tendency towards decontextualized citation is a well-known phenomenon in antiquity;Footnote 28 being true to the sources seems to have often been less important than appealing to the authority of ancient poets. Hence, it is not unreasonable to suspect that Archil. fr. 232 was recontextualized to support the priority of the Cretan constitution. This, however, is not due to Heraclides’ deliberate distortion. Most likely, fr. 232 was taken from a secondary source, as Rhodes suggested for the poetic citations in the Athenian Constitution,Footnote 29 by the author of the original unabridged Cretan Constitution.

*

Granted that Archilochus’ reference to the Cretan νόμος may be disconnected from the sphere of constitution and law, we are left with another major semantic field to explore, that of music.Footnote 30

Ancient Greek musical theory classifies νόμοι according to musical instruments, and whether they were only instrumental or sung as well. Most early uses of the word νόμοι, however, refer more generally to melodies, songs or melodic patterns.Footnote 31 The term belongs to Greek musical history from relatively early times. νόμος in its musical sense is attested from the fifth century b.c.e., with Pindar, Aeschylus and Aristophanes as main exponents.Footnote 32 Alcman, however, may offer an even earlier testimony (PMGF 40):

ϝοῖδα δ᾿ ὀρνίχων νόμως
παντῶν
and I know the melodiesFootnote 33 of all birds (transl. CampbellFootnote 34)

Knowledge of the νόμοι of birds appears to be a metapoetic claim about the nature or the origins of Alcman's art.Footnote 35 νόμοι, to be sure, are often mentioned in lyric passages of Aristophanes that exploit the ‘song of birds’ metaphor.Footnote 36 A similar link between birds and music-poetic composition appears in another of Alcman's fragments (PMGF 39 = 67?):

ϝέπη τάδε καὶ μέλος Ἀλκμὰν
εὗρε γεγλωσσαμέναν
κακκαβίδων ὄπα συνθέμενος
these words and melody Alcman discovered,
putting together the articulated
utterances of partridges.

Here the term μέλος seems to refer to the melody of a song, as opposed to its words.Footnote 37 Poetic composition is presented as a discovery departing from observation of the natural world. The shared reference to birds in this and the previous fragment raises the possibility that, as in Aristophanes’ metaphor, the terms νόμος and μέλος may have been partly equivalent.Footnote 38 The word μέλος appears in another of Alcman's fragments that is connected to music (PMGF 126):

Φρύγιον αὔλησε μέλος τὸ Κερβήσιον
he piped a Phrygian tune, the Cerbesian (transl. Campbell)

μέλος refers here to a melody played by the αὐλοί, a melody qualified as Phrygian. Regional traditions, as a matter of fact, have a role in musical classification. In the fifth century b.c.e. ethnic labels were used to identify νόμοι. Aeschylus refers to Ionian νόμοι (Ἰαονίοισι νόμοισι, Supp. 69), Euripides to Phrygian νόμοι (Φρυγίοισι νόμοις, Or. 1426), and Telestes (fr. 810 PMG) opposes the Phrygian νόμος to the Lydian hymn, referring in both cases to ἁρμονία or musical scale.Footnote 39 A roughly contemporary of both Alcman and Archilochus, Terpander, active in Lesbos and Sparta, was credited with the invention or renovation of νόμοι for the kithara. A tradition going back to the fourth century b.c.e., if not earlier,Footnote 40 attributes several names to those νόμοι, among them terms correlating style, or rather tune, with ethnic labels, such as Dorian, Lydian and Phrygian (Plut. [De mus.] 1132D).Footnote 41

Both the arguable use of νόμος in Alcman as equivalent to μέλος and the traditional use of ethnic labels for musical classification, perhaps as early as Terpander, support the notion that the Cretan νόμος of Archil. fr. 232 refers to a melody. Does the Archilochean corpus afford further support for this interpretation?

Archilochus’ work, in spite of its fragmentary state, is relatively rich in terminology pertaining to the field of poetry and music. Richer, at any rate, than any other iambic or elegiac poet, except Theognis.Footnote 42 The following table sums up his poetic vocabulary, including fr. 232:Footnote 43

Assuming the possibility that the word νόμος had a musical sense in the seventh century b.c.e. (with Alcman and Terpander) and considering the nature of Archilochus’ metapoetic statements, interpreting fr. 232 in a musical context makes perfect sense: a musical term accompanied by a verb of knowing and a regional qualifier. The fragment would then read as follows:

νόμος δὲ Κρητικὸς διδάσκεται
a Cretan melody is taught

or with Cragius's emendation:

νόμους δὲ Κρητικοὺς διδάσκεται
he is learning Cretan melodies

This interpretation is consistent with a salient aspect of Cretan reputation. In fact, Crete was associated with music and dance from early times, as it emerges from the Iliad (16.617), where Meriones is said to move in battle as a dancer, and the reference to the Cretan sailors as performers of paeans in the Homeric Hymn to Apollo (516–17).Footnote 45 Crete was considered a place where song and dance originated, particularly armed dance, through the figures of Thaletas, the Curetes and Pyrrhichus.Footnote 46 Furthermore, in the Classical period the term Cretan is frequently applied to rhythm, melody, song and dance. A fragment of a hyporchema usually attributed to Pindar speaks of a Cretan manner (τρόπος) of dance.Footnote 47 Cratinus refers to a Cretan μέλος, possibly referring to a song in paeonic rhythm.Footnote 48 Aristophanes mentions Cretan monodiesFootnote 49 and a Cretan way of dancing.Footnote 50 What specific features such songs and dances may have entailed is beyond the scope of this article. For our purpose, it is enough to locate the νόμος mentioned by Archilochus within a traditional perception of Cretan μουσική.Footnote 51

*

To sum up, there is enough evidence to suspect that Archil. fr. 232 was not originally related to Cretan legal or constitutional history. It would be legitimate, therefore, to read it in the context of μουσική, a field well represented in the Archilochean corpus. νόμος in Archil. fr. 232 should be taken as a melody associated with Crete, perhaps by virtue of its rhythm. If my interpretation is allowed, our fragment should be restored to the field of the ancient Greek history of music, to fill in the ‘virtual absence’Footnote 52 of the term νόμος in its musical sense before the Classical period.

Footnotes

This research was supported by the Israel Science Foundation (grant no. 169/11), as well as by the Kadar Family Award for Outstanding Research at Tel Aviv University. An EDEN (Erasmus Mundus Academic Network) scholarship made possible an inspiring research visit to the University of Bologna, Department of Classical Philology and Italian Studies in the summer of 2015. I much benefited from discussion of an earlier version of this article at the 45th Conference of the Israel Society for the Promotion of Classical Studies (Bar Ilan University, 1 June 2016). I am grateful to Federico Condello, Marco Ercoles, Margalit Finkelberg, Valentina Garulli, Dwora Gilula, Andras Karpati, Sarah Olsen, Douglas Olson, Laura Swift and Rachel Zelnik-Abramowitz for their useful suggestions. Special thanks go to Jonathan Schabbi for his vital assistance with many bibliographical quests as well as proofreading. Unattributed translations are mine.

References

2 M.R. Dilts, Heraclidis Lembi Excerpta Politiarum (Durham, NC, 1971), 19.

3 LSJ s.v.; Montanari, F., The Brill Dictionary of Ancient Greek (Leiden, 2014)Google Scholar, s.v. For comprehensive surveys of ancient references to νόμος, see Laroche, E., Histoire de la racine NEM- en grec ancien (Paris, 1949), 163–219Google Scholar and Ostwald, M., Nomos and the Beginnings of the Athenian Democracy (Oxford, 1969), 20–54Google Scholar. The term νόμος does not appear again in Archilochus’ extant poems (the related νομóς for pasture-place is attested in fr. 122.7).

4 On musical νόμοι, see Barker, A., Greek Musical Writing (Cambridge, 1984), 2.249–55Google Scholar; Gostoli, A., Terpander: veterum testimonia et fragmenta (Rome, 1990), xvi–xxviii, 101–3Google Scholar; Nagy, G., Pindar's Homer: The Lyric Possession of an Epic Past (Baltimore, 1990), 87–104Google Scholar; West, M.L., Ancient Greek Music (Oxford, 1992), 214–16Google Scholar; Barker, A., ‘Heraclides and musical history’, in Fortenbaugh, W.W. and Pender, E.E. (edd.), Heraclides of Pontus: Discussion (New Brunswick, NJ, 2009), 273–98, at 291–4Google Scholar; Power, T.C., The Culture of Kitharôidia (Washington, DC, 2010), 215–34Google Scholar; Barker, A., Ancient Greek Writers on their Musical Past: Studies in Greek Musical Historiography (Pisa, 2014)Google Scholar; Rocconi, E., ‘The music of the laws and the laws of music. Nomoi in music and legislation’, Greek and Roman Musical Studies 4 (2016), 71–89, at 72–5Google Scholar. Lasserre, F., Plutarque: De la Musique (Lausanne, 1954), 22–7Google Scholar, Rutherford, I., ‘Apollo's other genre: Proclus on νόμος and his source’, CPh 90 (1995), 354–61Google Scholar and Mathiesen, T.J., Apollo's Lyre: Greek Music and Music Theory in Antiquity and the Middle Ages (Lincoln, NE, and London, 1999), 58–71Google Scholar focus on later sources, such as Proclus’ Chrestomatheia (ap. Phot. Bibl. 320a) and Plutarch's [On Music] (1140F).

5 Laroche (n. 3), 166–71; Ostwald (n. 3), 54.

6 One branch of the tradition (d, g, a, b) reads τινά, another (V) reads τινάς, thus ‘ridiculing someone’ or ‘ridiculing some people’ (the manuscript tradition of the Constitutions is studied by M.R. Dilts, ‘The manuscript tradition of Aelian's Varia Historia and Heraclides’ Politiae’, TAPhA 96 [1965], 57–72).

7 Medaglia, M., Note di esegesi archilochea (Rome, 1982), 70–3, at 72Google Scholar interprets διδάσκεται as ‘educate’. All modern editors keep the paradosis, except Bergk, T., Poetae Lyrici Graeci (Leipzig, 1882 4), vol. 2, fr. 133Google Scholar.

8 Bossi, F., Studi su Archiloco (Bari, 1990), 237–8Google Scholar, following B. Marzullo, ‘Archil. fr. 232 W. νόμος δὲ Κρητικὸς διδάσκεται’, MCr 10–12 (1975–7), 45–6; but see counterexamples in Medaglia (n. 7), 72 n. 11. The verb διδάσκω is not attested again in Archilochus’ extant poems.

9 Krag, N., Heraclidae Pontici De Politiis libellus cum interpretatione latina (Geneva, 1593)Google Scholar.

10 Gerber, D.E., Greek Iambic Poetry. From the Seventh to the Fifth Century BC (Cambridge, MA, 1999), 239 n. 1Google Scholar.

11 Bergk (n. 7); followed by Edmonds, J.M., Elegy and Iambus (Cambridge, MA, 1931), vol. 1Google Scholar.

12 See n. 6 above.

13 Crete and Gortyn are mentioned by Archilochus (frr. 271, 24.2).

14 Cf. ψέγει introducing Archil. frr. 19 and 122 in Arist. Rh. 1418b23–33, the fragments displaying no traces of verbal abuse. Comparison with Callimachus and Horace suggests that criticism may have also been achieved through impersonation rather than vituperation (Rotstein, A., The Idea of Iambus [Oxford, 2010], 65Google Scholar). For Archilochus as representative of invective, see Rotstein (this note), 282–318.

15 Bloch, H., ‘Herakleides Lembos and his Epitome of Aristotle's Politeiai’, TAPhA 71 (1940), 27–39, at 31–7Google Scholar.

16 Polito, M., Dagli scritti di Eraclide sulle Costituzioni. Un commento storico (Naples, 2001), 199–243Google Scholar analyzes the epitomizing procedures involved in the constitution of the text.

17 Polito (n. 16), 68. Poetic citations, however, may have been drawn from a secondary source (Rhodes, P.J., A Commentary on the Aristotelian Athenaion Politeia [Oxford, 1993; first published 1981], 124Google Scholar); see n. 29 below.

18 Solon frr. 4a, 4c (Ath. pol. 5), 5 and 6 (Ath. pol. 11.2–12.1), 34, 36 and 37 (Ath. pol. 12.3); and see Hendrickson, T., ‘Poetry and biography in the Athēnaiōn Politeia: the case of Solon’, CJ 109 (2013), 1–19Google Scholar, with further references.

19 Rotstein, A., Literary History in the Parian Marble (Washington, DC, 2016), 95–129Google Scholar.

20 The Parian section, only 35 words long, reports well-known facts about Archilochus’ death.

21 In addition, Lycurgus’ role in the transmission of the Homeric poems is mentioned in the Spartan section (10).

22 Polito (n. 16), 69.

23 Cf. Hom. Od. 8.574, Hymn. Hom. Ap. 3.175, Hes. fr. 141.17.

24 One manuscript of the Constitutions, V, transmits the senseless κλαίω θαλασσῶν, which is omitted by the manuscripts of the x family. The fragment is cited also by Strabo (14.1.40), with corruption on the same point.

25 Cf. Suda M 24, T 53, s.v. (τὰ) Μαγνήτων κακά.

26 See Mosino, F., ‘Simonide, Esopo e le mule’, QUCC 28 (1978), 93–6Google Scholar; Nicholson, N., Aristocracy and Athletics in Archaic and Classical Greece (Cambridge, 2005), 83–4Google Scholar.

27 Nachmanson, E., Der griechische Buchtitel: Einige Beobachtungen (Darmstadt, 1969)Google Scholar.

28 Citations of Solon's poetry in the Athenian Constitution are a case in point. See Lardinois, A.P.M.H., ‘Have we Solon's verses?’, in Gehrke, H.-J., Blok, J.H. and Lardinois, A.P.M.H. (edd.), Solon of Athens: New Historical and Philological Approaches (Leiden, 2006), 15–33Google Scholar; Hendrickson (n. 18). Important methodological warnings derive from experimental attempts to reconstruct plots of Old Comedy from citations (Dover, K.J., ‘Foreword: Fragments’, in Harvey, D. and Wilkins, J. [edd.], The Rivals of Aristophanes [London, 2000], xvii–xixGoogle Scholar; Olson, S.D., ‘Athenaeus’ Aristophanes, and the problem of reconstructing lost comedies’, in Chronopoulos, S. and Orth, C. [edd.], A Fragmentary History of Greek Comedy [Heidelberg, 2015], 35–65Google Scholar). Olson's assessment of Athenaeus’ quotations of Herodotus, Xenophon and Plato with the control of extant texts is particularly illuminating (S.D. Olson, ‘Athenaeus’ “fragments” of non-fragmentary prose authors and their implications’, AJPh 139 [forthcoming]).

29 Polito (n. 16), 68; Rhodes (n. 17), 124. One could argue that Aristotle had a special interest in Archilochus and that he may have known the original poem, but whether Aristotle was personally involved in the composition of the Cretan Constitution is a matter of controversy. For Aristotle's scholarly interest in Archilochus, see Rotstein (n. 14), 67–8. Archilochean quotations appear in Rh. 1418b31 (frr. 19 and 122; see n. 13 above), Pol. 1328a3 (fr. 129) and Soph. el. 166a37 (a possible variant of fr. 192). Moraitou, D., Die Äußerungen des Aristoteles über Dichter und Dichtung außerhalb der Poetik (Stuttgart and Leipzig, 1994), 130–42Google Scholar gives a useful list of poetic citations in Aristotle's works.

30 See n. 4 above.

31 As in παντοίων νόμων, ‘melodies of every kind’ (Pind. Nem. 5.5). The notion of νόμοι as competitive pieces for solo performance at festivals is not attested for the fifth century b.c.e. (Barker [n. 4 (2009)] and [n. 4 (2014)]). Extensive classifications are also a later development, and the alleged early conservatism of musical νόμοι, a Platonic fiction (Barker [n. 4 (2009)], 293–4, Rocconi [n. 4]).

32 Rocconi (n. 4), 72–5 surveys the pre-Platonic use of νόμος in the musical sense.

33 Cf. Lanata, G., Poetica preplatonica. Testimonianza e frammenti (Florence, 1963), 43Google Scholar and, more hesitantly, Barker (n. 4 [2009]), 291 n. 35.

34 Campbell, D.A., Greek Lyric (Cambridge, MA, and London, 1982–93), vol. 2Google Scholar.

35 See, however, Ostwald (n. 3), 22, for the possibility that νόμος may refer here to the ‘ways’ of all birds.

36 Ar. Pax 1159–60, Av. 210, 745, Ran. 683–5 (T.J. Fleming, ‘The musical nomos in Aeschylus’ Oresteia’, CJ 72 [1977], 222–33, at 231 n. 40). See Ercoles, M., ‘Notes on the aulodic nomoi apothetos and schoinion’, Greek and Roman Musical Studies 2 (2014), 177–83, at 181CrossRefGoogle Scholar on the metaphor ‘bird call = melodic custom (νόμος)’.

37 Lanata (n. 33), 41–2.

38 Gentili, B., ‘I frr. 30 e 40 P. di Alcmane e la poetica della mimesi nella cultura greca arcaica’, in Studi filologici e storici in onore di Vittorio De Falco (Naples, 1971), 57–67Google Scholar; Nagy (n. 4), 88; Rocconi (n. 4), 73.

39 Cf. Fleming (n. 36), 222; Rocconi (n. 4), 74. Based on the frequent association of νόμοι with ethnic labels, Nagy (n. 4), 88 suggests that νόμος has the general sense of ‘localized melodic idiom’.

40 Heraclides of Pontus, as transmitted by Plut. [De mus.] (1132D = Gostoli, test. 28), possibly Glaucus of Rhegium (Barker [n. 29 (2009)]).

41 Regional traditions play a role in the classification of ἁρμονίαι and τόνοι (e.g. Pl. Resp. 398–403, Plut. [De mus.] 1132D; Ath. Deipn. 625c–626a). The labels ‘Dorian’, ‘Lydian’ and ‘Phrygian’ were used for the basic scales in musical theory (Aristid. Quint. De mus. 1.9). See M.L. West, ‘The singing of Homer and the modes of early Greek music’, JHS (1981), 113–29; Barker (n. 4 [1984]), 249–55; Solomon, J., ‘Towards a history of tonoi’, Journal of Musicology 3 (1984), 242–51CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Barker (n. 4 [2009]), 291–4; Power (n. 4), 215–34; Barker (n. 4 [2014]).

42 Corrêa, P., ‘Musical instruments and the paean in Archilochus’, Synthesis 16 (2009), 99–112, at 99–100Google Scholar.

43 I have studied Archilochus’ poetic vocabulary elsewhere (A. Rotstein, ‘The poetics of Archilochus’ [MA Thesis, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1997]; ‘Archilochus and the system of genres in archaic literature’, in Wasserman, N. (ed.), Wool from the Loom: The Development of Literary Genres in Ancient Literature [Jerusalem, 2001], 23–37Google Scholar, in Hebrew).

44 ‘I myself taking the lead in the Lesbian paean to the pipe's accompaniment’ (transl. Gerber), or ‘leading a paean to the Lesbian αὐλός’. Tradition supplies no parallel for either the ‘Lesbian paean’ or the ‘Lesbian αὐλός’ (Corrêa [n. 42], 103–6 with further references).

45 Lawler, L.B., ‘Krêtikôs in the Greek dance’, TAPhA 82 (1951), 62–70Google Scholar; Huxley, G., ‘Cretan paiawones’, GRBS 16 (1975), 119–24Google Scholar.

46 Schol. Pind. Pyth. 2.127 (= Sosibius, FGrHist 595 F 23), Ephorus, FGrHist 70 F 147–9, Ath. Deipn. 630b, Poll. Onom. 4.99 (cf. P. Ceccarelli, ‘Naming the weapon-dance: contexts and aetiologies of the pyrrhiche’, in Πρακτικά ΙΑ΄ Διεθνούς Συνεδρίου Κλασσικών Σπουδών, Καβάλα 24–30 Αυγούστου 1999. Εις μνήμην Νικολάου Α. Λιβαδάρα = 11th International Congress of Classical Studies [Athens, 2002], 2.197–215).

47 Pind. fr. 107b: ἐλαφρὸν ὄρχημ’ οἶδα ποδῶν μειγνύμεν· | Κρῆτα μὲν καλέοντι τρόπον, τὸ δ’ ὄργανον Μολοσσόν. ‘I know how to join in the light dancing of feet; | they call the style Cretan, but the instrument Molossian.’ (transl. Race, W.H., Pindar: Nemean Odes. Isthmian Odes. Fragments [Cambridge, MA, and London, 1997]Google Scholar; cf. Rutherford, I., Pindar's Paeans: A Reading of the Fragments with a Survey of the Genre [Oxford, 2001], 77–8Google Scholar).

48 ἔγειρε δὴ νῦν, Μοῦσα, Κρητικὸν μέλος (‘So then, Muse, stir up a Cretan song’, Cratinus, Trophonius, fr. 237 PCG). Transl. van Ophuijsen, J.M., Hephaistion on Metre. A Translation and Commentary (Leiden, 1987), 116Google Scholar; Ophuijsen gives ‘Cretic song’, as does Storey, I.C., Fragments of Old Comedy. Volume I: Alcaeus to Diocles (Cambridge, MA, 2011)Google Scholar. The fragment is, in fact, cited by Hephaestion (Ench. 40) to show that Cretic was an alternative name to the Paeonic, but in its original performance context the ‘Cretan μέλος’ may have well been understood as a song in a certain rhythm rather than metre. Cf. the reference to Cretan rhythms in an anonymous song: Κρησίοις ἐν ῥυθμοῖς παῖδα μέλψωμεν (‘In Cretan rhythms let us sing of the child’, PMG 967 = Dion. Hal. Comp. 25; transl. Campbell [n. 34], vol. 5).

Tradition has Thaletas of Gortyn, a native of Crete, as the inventor of the cretic rhythm (Plut. [De mus.] 1134D). A competing tradition, perhaps as early as Glaucus of Rhegium (Bartol, K., ‘How was iambic poetry performed? A question of Ps.-Plutarch's reliability (Mus. 1141A)’, Euphrosyne 20 [1992], 269–76, at 271Google Scholar) credits Archilochus with the cretic (Plut. [De mus.] 1140F–1141B). Had fr. 232 been phrased not in the third person, as it has been transmitted, but in the first, in the manner of most of Archilochus’ metapoetic statements, one would be inclined to consider our fragment as the basis for the heurema.

49 ὦ Κρητικὰς μὲν συλλέγων μονῳδίας (‘you collector of Cretan arias’, Ar. Ran. 849). Transl. Henderson, J., Aristophanes IV: Frogs, Assemblywomen, Wealth [Cambridge, MA, 2002], 141)Google Scholar.

50 Κρητικῶς οὖν τὼ πόδε καὶ σὺ κίνει (‘so you start moving your feet too, in a Cretan way’, Ar. Eccl. 1165–6).  Henderson [n. 49], 409 has ‘to a Cretan tune’.

51 Nothing rules out the possibility that the νόμος mentioned by Archilochus was meant to accompany dance, as in Ar. Av. 743–6, where νόμοι and χορεύματα are the joint result of singing. Some of Archilochus’ poems may perhaps allow to trace a tenuous Cretan connection among Enuaulos (Archil. fr. 1), attested in Linear B tablets, the paean (fr. 121), of Cretan origins according to some ancient sources, and the Cretan melody of fr. 232.

52 Barker (n. 4 [1984]), 254.