Smith, William: A smaller dictionary of Greek and Roman antiquities (London, 1871)

TRAGOEDIA.

TRAGOEDIA.

the principal persons of the drama, declare
their emotions and sufferings. Euripides
was also the inventor of tragi-comedy. A
specimen of the Euripidean tragi-comedy is
still extant in the Alcestis, acted b. c. 438, as
the last of four pieces, and therefore as a
substitute for a Satyrical drama. Though
tragic in its form and some of its scenes, it
has a mixture of comic and satyric characters
(e. g. Hercules) and concludes happily.—The
parts which constitute a Greek tragedy, as to
its form, are, the prologue, episode, exode,
and choral songs ; the last divided into the
parode and stasimon. The 7rpoAoyo? is all
that part of a tragedy which precedes the
parodos of the chorus, i. e. the first act. The
tVeio-dSioi/ is all the part between whole cho-
ral odes. The efoo'os that part which has no
choral ode after it. Of the choral part the
TrapoSo; is the first speech of the whole chorus
(not broken up into parts) : the stasimon is
without anapaests and trochees. These two
divisions were sung by all the choreutae, but
the "songs on the stage" and the /conn01 by
a part only. The commus, which properly
means a wailing for the dead, was generally
used to express strong excitement, or lively
sympathy with grief and suffering, espe-
cially by Aeschylus. It was common to the
actors and a portion only of the chorus.
Again the TrapoSo? was so named as being the
passage-song of the chorus sung while it was
advancing to its proper place in the orches-
tra, and therefore in anapaestic or marching
verse : the o-rda-iiiov, as being chaunted by
the chorus when standing still in its proper
position. — The materials of Greek tragedy
were the national mythology,

14 Presenting Thebes, or PeIop'& line,
Or the tale of Troy divine.'1

The exceptions to this were the two histori-
cal tragedies, the " Capture of Miletus," by
Phrynichus, and the "Persians" of Aeschy-
lus ; but they belong to an early period of
the art. Hence the plot and story of the
Grecian tragedy were of necessity known to
the spectators, a circumstance which strongly
distinguishes the ancient tragedy from the
modern. — The functions of the Chorus in
Greek Tragedy were very important, as de-
scribed by Horace [Ar. Poet. 193),

" Actoris partes ehorns ofliiiumque virile
Defrndat: neu quid metiios inttrcinat actus.
Quod non pruposito eonducat, et haereat apte," &c.

It often expresses the reflections of a dispas-
sionate and right-minded spectator, and in-
culcates the lessons of morality and resigna-
tion to the will of heaven, taught by the
occurrence of the piece in which it is engaged.
With respect to the number of the chorus
see Chorus.—(2) Roman. The tragedy of

the Romans was borrowed from the Greek ;
but the construction of the Roman theatre
afforded no appropriate place for the chorus,
which was therefore obliged to appear on the
stage, instead of in the orchestra. The first
tragic poet and actor at Rome was Livius
Andronicus, a Greek by birth, who began to
exhibit in b. c. 240. In his monodies (or
the lyrical parts sung, not by a chorus, but
by one person), it was customary to separate
the singing from the mimetic dancing, leav-
ing the latter only to the actor, while the
singing was performed by a boy placed near
tbe flute-player {ante tibichiem) ; so that the
dialogue only [diverbia) w:as left to be spoken
by the actors. Livius Andronicus was fol-
lowed by Naevius, Ennius, Pacuvius, and
Attius. These five poets belong to the earlier
epoch of Roman tragedy, in which little was
written but translations and imitations of the
Greek, with occasional insertions of original
matter. How they imitated the structure of
the choral odes is doubtful—perhaps they
never attempted it. In the age of Augustus
the writing of tragedies, whether original or
imitations, seems to have been quite a fashion-
able occupation. The emperor himself at-
tempted an Ajax, but did not succeed. One
of the principal tragedians of this epoch was
Asinius Pollio, to whom the line (Virg. Eelog.
viii. 10) applies—

" Sola Sopliocleo tua carmina dlgna cothurno."

Ovid wrote a tragedy on the subject of Me-
dea. Quintilian says of Varius, who was
distinguished in epic as well as tragic poetry,
that his Thyestes might be compared with
any of the Greek tragedies. Some fragments
of this Thyestes are extant, but we have no
other remains of the tragedy of the Augustan
age. The loss perhaps is not great. The
onl)' complete Roman tragedies that have
come down to us are the ten attributed to the
philosopher' Seneca ; hut whether he wrote
any of them or not is a disputed point. To
whatever age they belong, they are be-
yond description bombastic and frigid, ut-
terly unnatural in character and action, full
of the most revolting violations of pro-
priety, and barren of all theatrical effect.
Still thej- have had admirers : Heinsius calls
the Hippolytus " divine," and prefers the
Troadcs to the Hecuba of Euripides : even
Racine has borrowed from the Hippolytus in
Phodre. Roman tragedians sometimes wrote
tragedies on subjects taken from their na-
tional history. Pacuvius, e. g. wrote i
Pauhis, L. Accius a Brutus and a Dec'uts.
Curiatius Maternus, also a distinguished ora-
tor in the reign of Domitian, wrote a Do-
mitius and a Cato, the latter of which gave
offence to the rulers of the state.