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The book's concluding study presents the rhetorical education of the fourth century ad, not as the end but as only midway in the literary culture of Hellas, between Homer and the Byzantine emperor Manuel Palaeologus. The first section of this chapter examines the rhetoric from Homer to Byzantium, from the Iliad to Emperor Manuel II. The second section considers mid-antiquity's pivotal significance, when the Roman empire of Manuel — Greek, Christian and detached from Rome — began to take root. The third section examines a lengthy passage from the scholia to Demosthenes' speech On the False Embassy. The lecturer deploys, in what may seem obsessive detail, the formidably elaborate apparatus of contemporary rhetorical theory. The fourth section notes that his contemporaries and successors saw Menander primarily as a specialist in the kind of minute analysis of forensic and deliberative oratory.

This chapter describes the dramatic use of speech within speech in Menander's comedies. It begins with a historical review that stretches from Homer down to Hellenistic literature, then considers the specific role ‘speech within speech’ takes on in New Comedy. By distinguishing factual and imagined quoted speech, it shows that Menander's usage is closer to that of Euripides than to that of Aristophanes even though the absolute frequency of quoted speech is comparable in all three authors.

This chapter continues the investigation of Plautus’ use of irony and innuendo. Jokes and riddles in Poenulus, Rudens, Amphitryo, and Stichus suggest that characters’ onstage actions occasionally betray their claims or that the jokes they make sometimes presuppose a Greek background. Discussion then turns to the composition and character of Plautus’ audience. Contrary to many prevailing views, it is concluded from archaeological, demographic, and literary evidence that Plautus’ primary audience was essentially aristocratic, alert, well educated, philhellenic, sophisticated, and reasonably well acquainted through education with Greek literature and culture, including the comedy of Menander and Greek oratory. Extended discussions include the Roman “Bacchanalia affair” of 186 bc alongside Plautus’ Truculentus and a speech of Hyperides, connections between the poetry of Sappho and Plautus’ Miles Gloriosus and Curculio (Gorgylio), and connections between the poetry of Callimachus and Plautus’ Pseudolus (Pseudylus). It is concluded that Plautus should be seen as an author in tune with the poetic currents and developments of the contemporary Hellenistic world rather than wholly divorced from them.

This chapter examines the portrayal of monsters, ogres, and demons in Sicilian and Attic comedy throughout the 5th century bc. In early comedy and mime (Epicharmus, Sophron, Cratinus, Crates) the monster was typically confronted and vanquished by a mythical hero (often Heracles), and this pattern reappeared in one lost early play of Aristophanes. In Acharnians, however, we meet the politician (Lamachus) as monster, and, far more spectacularly, Cleon a year later in Knights; by Wasps, Aristophanes himself has become the Heracles figure who defeats the giant. In Frogs, on the other hand, uniquely, a monster figure—Aeschylus—is victorious; and meanwhile Aristophanes' contemporary Phrynichus seems to have begun a process of demythologizing and humanizing the monster/demon which eventually led to the antisocial types depicted by Menander (Knemon, Smikrines).

Gellius freely admits Greek words, phrases, and quotations to his text, but generally in relation to Latin. He has much to say about translation from Greek into Latin, and the limits to its possibility; he also sometimes employs unacknowledged calques of Greek words. A survey of his reading demonstrates the expected knowledge of Homer, and direct acquaintance with Aristophanes' Frogs, Menander's Plocion, Aeschines' In Timarchum, and Demosthenes' De corona; he is also the first author to quote any of the Anacreontea. Knowledge of other poems and speeches may be second-hand. The chapter compares Gellius's Greek reading and interests with those of Fronto, Marcus Aurelius, and Apuleius.

The importance of Book 10 lies in its theatricality, both in the main narrative and in the inset tales, just before the beginning of Book 11. This chapter combines a look at tragic and comic elements in Book 10 with an analysis of how Apuleius manages not only to cross genres, but also to merge them in a constant metamorphosis not only of the man Lucius into a beast, but also of tragedy into comedy, or vice versa. The chapter first looks at the theatricality of the two inset tales, then at that of the main narrative. It analyses how the interaction of both levels of the narrative is influenced by dramatic elements, and how far an overlap of motifs can be established in both.

This chapter focuses on Menander's play titled The Shield, which is about a young man named Cleostratos who has reportedly been killed in a surprise night attack on the Greek camp by the natives while campaigning in Lycia. It mentions Cleostratos's ex-tutor Daos who returned home a shield that helped to identify Cleostratos's body. It also recounts how Daos's arrival is met by Cleostratos' elder uncle, Smikrines, who plots to secure the shield by invoking the law that will allow a family member to claim Cleostratos' heiress-sister in marriage. The chapter reviews Daos' monologue, which shows clear evidence of careful planning by Menander in terms of theme, structure and style. It describes the sombre tone of the The Shield, which was evident from the outset and adherent to the tragic forms of metre in the first nine lines and the heavy implications of death.

This chapter provides the text and translation of Menander's play, The Shield, which centers on Cleostratos who was killed on a Greek camp while campaigning in Lycia. Cleostratos's former tutor, Daos, brought home a shield that can identify Cleostratos' body. When Daos arrived, Cleostratos' elder uncle, Smikrines, made up a scheme to possess the shield by invoking the law that allows a family member to claim Cleostratos' heiress-sister in marriage. Smikrines attempted to win over the support of Daos but is rebuffed when he claimed that a slave has no role in such matters. The correctness of Daos' thinking is soon confirmed when Chairestratos intervenes, pointing out the age differential between Smikrines and his niece and offering to cede to the booty in return for allowing the girl and his stepson's, Chaireas, wedding to go ahead.

This chapter includes the commentary on Menander's The Shield, which focuses on Daos' monologue that is marred by the loss of its initial words. The foundation upon which subsequent action is based on Daos' monologue shows clear evidence of careful planning by Menander in terms of theme, structure and style. The sombre tone, evident from the outset, adherence to the stricter forms of metre and heavy implications of death present a highly charged and unexpected opening for what purports to be a comedy. This was clearly designed to arrest the audience's attention with a tantalising amount of information. Underpinning the expository importance of the speech is its structural form, wherein Menander introduces an outer framework formed by the failure to return home in the opening address.

This chapter focuses on Menander's play titled The Arbitration, which begins with the arrival of a young man named Charisios who was then informed by his slave Onesimos that during his absence his wife Pamphile has given birth to a baby. It examines Charisios's decision to flee his home and be entertained every night by a music girl after realizing his wife's baby could not be his. It also explores Charisios' behaviour, which was described as a vain attempt to blot out the pain of his discovery and the pain from the very course of action he has taken. The chapter discusses Charisios's stage appearance, which was dominated by a reality that was difficult to gauge as it was bitten by self-recrimination in a situation far removed from normality. It mentions how Pamphile is personified as the victim of the males who surround her, which is seen as a contradiction to her name that means 'Dear to all'.

This chapter includes the commentary on Menander's The Arbitration, which contains what appears to be a critical judgment of the play that is fully in accordance with the modern-day verdict. The restoration of The Arbitration's general features can be achieved with a fair degree of certainty on the basis both of New Comedy's conventions and of later developments in the surviving action. It discusses the convention of introducing characters at the beginning of an Act or scene as though already in mid-conversation, which provides an easy route for supplying necessary background information. It also mentions the reference by Erotian on the single word 'jar' in The Arbitration, which provides a few clues as to its position within the play. The chapter looks at the information given by Onesimos in the opening scene, which has been augmented by details provided by a source aware of the true situation.

Gods are a significant presence in Greek comedies, as it is the case of Hermes, the god who plays a decisive part as the divine assistant of the “comic hero” Trygaeus in Aristophanes’ Peace and makes the audience laugh when he asks the slave Karion to give him a job in Aristophanes’ Plutus. But the presence of Hermes on the comic stage does not limit itself to these famous examples. Quite often the god is present also as a statue, and sometimes this statue behaves like a real character, because it speaks and interacts with the other characters. The chapter deals with this peculiar role of Hermes. Given the significance of classical comic theatre for a full understanding of the life of the Athenian society, the chapter is also a contribution to the study of the figure of the god and the functions he performed in classical Athens.

This chapter, a discussion of both Greek and Roman new comedy, explores the relationship between youth and remorse that has previously been adumbrated. In comedy, a topsy-turvy genre, the young are rarely remorseful. Instead, remorse is displaced onto their fathers, especially when those fathers are competitors for the favours of women. Even here, however, the expression of remorse is seen as a degrading punishment for the fathers, lowering their status even further.

This chapter analyzes the final section of the Thanksgiving Address, an elaborate assembly of scriptural examples—the expulsion of Adam from Eden, Abraham’s departure from his homeland, the parable of the prodigal son, the Babylonian captivity of the Jews—which the author marshals in order to lament his own departure from his studies with Origen. The passage is not easily coordinated with the classical rhetoric of leave-taking—as described by Menander of Laodicaea and exemplified in an oration by the fourth-century bishop Gregory of Nazianzen—but may be closer to a form of rabbinic homiletics. Especially pronounced is the reversal of both classical and scriptural structures and the lack of clarity surrounding the necessity of departure. It is suggested that the Plato’s Republic and the necessity of the guardians to return to the cave, thus retracing their philosophical ascent, might have provided the effective model. Origen’s own writings are examined in order to bolster the hypothesis.

Ancient Greek and Roman moralists seem not to have identified loyalty as a specific virtue, and for good reason: loyalties can be divided or misdirected. Affection or love (philia) was the ground of commitment. As the sociologist Georg Simmel observed, “If love continues to exist in a relationship between persons, why does it need faithfulness . . . ? Faithfulness might be called the inertia of the soul. It keeps the soul on the path on which it started, even after the original occasion that led it onto it no longer exists.” The contrast between the classical emphasis on love as the basis of constancy and the modern regard for loyalty is illustrated by way of analyses of Euripides’ tragedy Orestes and Menander’s comedy Epitrepontes (Arbitrants), on the one hand, and John Galsworthy’s drama Loyalties and Edward Albee’s A Delicate Balance, on the other.

A criticism of the epistemological foundations of much topographical writing: the attempt to bring Livy, Virgil, and other Latin authors into a state of agreement with the terrain causes particular alarm; for it is an easy but very dangerous step from exploring the countryside of Italy oneself to assuming that Livy or Virgil likewise thought it their business to explore the ground described in their narratives. This paper is concerned not so much with the question of whether Livy and Virgil were travellers and observers—some fairly striking arguments that they were not emerges in passing—as with that of why Roman topographical writing was of such exceptionally low quality.

A detailed analysis of Aeneid 6.847–53. In one of the loftiest passages of the Aeneid, we have seen Virgil use poetic, verbal, lexical, grammatical, syntactical means of a simple, sober character (apart, clearly from the exchange of ducere and excudere, of course). He may perhaps have had in mind the age of Ennius and Cato the Censor, two writers who might actually have appreciated the austere content and manner of these verses.