DOI Artikel:
Kenyon, Frederic George: Progress of Egyptology: graeco-roman Egypt
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.12419#0065
Graeco-Koman Egypt.
45
Ichneutae of Sophocles, of which a really substantial portion has been
recovered. Perhaps half the play is represented, and about half the lines
are either complete or admit of probable restoration; and this is enough to
<nve us a real idea of what a satyric drama by Sophocles was like. As was
to be expected, the comic side of it is not emphasised. In the words as
they stand there is little humour; and the comedy must have depended
mainly on the " business " of the chorus of satyrs and their leader, Silenus.
The situation, however, on which it is based—the theft of Apollo's cattle
by the infant Hermes, and the invention of the lyre by the same—is
humorous, and the style is light and agreeable, so that one can well
believe that the play would have formed a pleasant mental relief after the
strain of such a tragedy as the Oedipus Tyrannus or the Trachiniae. Dr.
Hunt has once more shown his skill and judgment as an editor, and he has
been materially assisted in the reconstruction and interpretation of the
mutilated passages by Prof, von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff and Prof.
Gilbert Murray.
The same volume contains also extensive remains of another Greek
drama, apparently in the same hand as the Ichneutae, and therefore
probably by the same author. Its subject is the death of Eurypylus
before Troy, and since it cannot be identified with any of the recorded
plays of Sophocles, Dr. Hunt is fully justified in assigning to it provision-
ally the title of Eurypylus. Unfortunately the fragments, though over a
hundred in number, cannot be pieced together to any great extent, and
only two passages, of twenty and sixteen lines respectively, can be restored
to any approximation to completeness. A separate edition of the Ichneutae
and the Eurypylus (with other tragic fragments from papyri previously
published) has been prepared by Dr. Hunt, and was published by the
Oxford University Press about two months after their first appearance in
the Oxyrhynehus volume.2 Dr. Hunt has also published a verse trans-
lation of the Ichneutae in Blackwood's Magazine for September last. The
papyri containing these two plays are of the late second, or possibly the
third, century.
Another interesting text is the life of Euripides by Satyrus, of which
about 27 extremely narrow columns are represented by considerable
remains, in addition to a large number of fragments. The title, which is
preserved, shows that the roll, which is of the second or early third century,
originally included the lives of Aeschylus and Sophocles as well, and was
the sixth book of Satyrus' collection of biographies. Much of the
information has come down to us through other channels; but some is new
(as the statement that Euripides assisted Timotheus by writing the
45
Ichneutae of Sophocles, of which a really substantial portion has been
recovered. Perhaps half the play is represented, and about half the lines
are either complete or admit of probable restoration; and this is enough to
<nve us a real idea of what a satyric drama by Sophocles was like. As was
to be expected, the comic side of it is not emphasised. In the words as
they stand there is little humour; and the comedy must have depended
mainly on the " business " of the chorus of satyrs and their leader, Silenus.
The situation, however, on which it is based—the theft of Apollo's cattle
by the infant Hermes, and the invention of the lyre by the same—is
humorous, and the style is light and agreeable, so that one can well
believe that the play would have formed a pleasant mental relief after the
strain of such a tragedy as the Oedipus Tyrannus or the Trachiniae. Dr.
Hunt has once more shown his skill and judgment as an editor, and he has
been materially assisted in the reconstruction and interpretation of the
mutilated passages by Prof, von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff and Prof.
Gilbert Murray.
The same volume contains also extensive remains of another Greek
drama, apparently in the same hand as the Ichneutae, and therefore
probably by the same author. Its subject is the death of Eurypylus
before Troy, and since it cannot be identified with any of the recorded
plays of Sophocles, Dr. Hunt is fully justified in assigning to it provision-
ally the title of Eurypylus. Unfortunately the fragments, though over a
hundred in number, cannot be pieced together to any great extent, and
only two passages, of twenty and sixteen lines respectively, can be restored
to any approximation to completeness. A separate edition of the Ichneutae
and the Eurypylus (with other tragic fragments from papyri previously
published) has been prepared by Dr. Hunt, and was published by the
Oxford University Press about two months after their first appearance in
the Oxyrhynehus volume.2 Dr. Hunt has also published a verse trans-
lation of the Ichneutae in Blackwood's Magazine for September last. The
papyri containing these two plays are of the late second, or possibly the
third, century.
Another interesting text is the life of Euripides by Satyrus, of which
about 27 extremely narrow columns are represented by considerable
remains, in addition to a large number of fragments. The title, which is
preserved, shows that the roll, which is of the second or early third century,
originally included the lives of Aeschylus and Sophocles as well, and was
the sixth book of Satyrus' collection of biographies. Much of the
information has come down to us through other channels; but some is new
(as the statement that Euripides assisted Timotheus by writing the