Terence

The theme that unites the first four papers in this collection (counting the two elements of the second paper as two separate papers for the purposes of this summary only) is the view of Geta as very much the nexus-figure for three different aspects of the play: he is by turns the willing and unwilling trickster of Demipho (with Phormio as his principal ally); he is also a devotee of the goddess Fortuna (his piety sits comfortably alongside that of Demipho: they may profitably be viewed as a composite character) to whom good luck deservedly accrues (in contrast to Phormio and Chremes, who personify those who either enjoy unmerited success – Phormio – or like Chremes get found out); and, finally, Geta is co-principal architect of the resolution of the two cousins' love entanglements (although he once more needs the assistance – this time unsought - of another character: Nausistrata). All four papers, looking at the play from the varied perspectives of plot, structure and linguistic choices, present mutually-supportive evidence for this interpretation.
The fifth (summarising) paper gathers together the specific evidence to substantiate the claim that the intention of Terence was to create a play to showcase the comedic potential of a parasite let loose in a plot dominated by chance and where all intrigues are ultimately confounded. It further develops the idea that the prologue and last scene of the play were tailored to one another so as to draw direct parallels between the alleged behaviour of Luscius Lanuvinus and Phormio. The sixth paper speculatively explores an obscure element of Terence's attack upon Luscius that continues to puzzle modern commentators. The seventh paper expands the examination of pietas beyond the religious aspect analysed in the third paper (the second part to the second paper listed above) to encompass familial and wider social pietas. It seeks to demonstrate that Terence handled this theme in a wholly consistent manner, with the parasite unequivocally depicted as a vir impius - rendering it implausible that Terence, apparently so dependent himself upon patronage, should have cast Phormio as anything other than a comic rogue who got lucky.
The principal conclusions from my analysis of Phormio can be summarised thus:
1. Terence employs ring-composition as a fundamental organising technique, founded upon the stage entrances at regular intervals of four of the characters: Demipho, Phormio, Chremes and Sophrona (see the summarising table at the end of the collection).
2. Terence uses word-tags to link connected themes/ideas. These include: postilla, ire pergam, ipse (with the specific meaning of dominus), heia, eu, attat & (when used by a male) pol. Also (integrating the prologue with the remainder of the play-text): lacesso and aequo animo.
3. The theme of pietas (or its lack) leading to both deserved and undeserved felicitas is another organising principle of the play: references to the gods and to religious observance are most certainly not just incidental add-ons.
4. There are several plausible explanations for the parasite Phormio getting star-billing in the prologue. He need not be - and in this play is not - the master of intrigue portrayed by some (most?) other commentators.
5. This play provides an excellent example of how the translation choices for just a few lines can transform the overall interpretation. And why translators need to situate their decisions within the wider academic debate, failing which they run the risk of misleading their audience.
6. It is a valid approach to interpret each of Terence's plays on an individual basis, given the small number he wrote and the insistence in the prologues upon originality. To focus on elements common to his corpus - or common to the even wider concept of a comoedia palliata - can lead to unwarranted (or at least unduly restrictive) conclusions.
7. In this specific play the prologue does form an integral part of the overall play-text (both in terms of the fundamental architecture of the play and as regards important thematic elements).
8. The structuring of this play raises fundamental questions as to the basis upon which Terence selected, and the degree to which he subsequently modified, his Greek original in this specific instance and, more generally, as regards his wider approach to his Greek source material. Terence did more than merely translate: he seems actively to have sought out plays, and (where appropriate) specific scenes from other Greek works where he deemed it appropriate, so as to develop various stock-characters from play to play and thereby to put his own stamp on a particular comedy. Modern scholarship generally supports the idea that Shakespeare adopted a somewhat similar approach to his source material in a number of plays.

The paper aims at examining different types of talk represented in the plays by Plautus and Terence. To this end, it combines Goffman's participation framework with tools of Conversation Analysis, which serve to offer a more nuanced definition of speaking turns and the conversational floor. After discussing several types of footing within comedy dialogues, turns are differentiated from other strands of communicating: side comments (including theatrical asides), self-directed cries and backchannel talk. Moreover, verbal interactions in Plautus and Terence are analysed in relation to their floor structure and the kind of participation they entail for the interlocutors. Finally, the concepts here presented, as argued throughout the paper, help to revisit some of the existing accounts of verbal interaction in Roman comedy.

L'articolo si propone di esaminare i diversi modi di parlare rappresentati nelle opere di Plauto e Terenzio. A tal scopo, la teoria del quadro di partecipazione di Goffman viene combinata con strumenti di analisi conversazionale che servono a offrire una definizione un po' più elaborata dei turni e del piano (ing. floor) di conversazione. Dopo aver discusso i vari tipi di ancoraggio dialogico nelle commedie, i turni vengono differenziati dagli altri livelli di comunicazione: commenti secondari (compresi gli "a parte" teatrali), esclamazioni autoreferenziali ed espressioni di feedback. Inoltre, le interazioni verbali in Plauto e Terenzio vengono analizzate in relazione alla loro struttura del piano di conversazione e al tipo di partecipazione che instaurano con gli interlocutori. Infine, i fenomeni presentati, come sostenuto in tutto il lavoro, aiutano a chiarire alcune concezioni dell'interazione verbale nella commedia romana.

Las cartas que Cicerón escribió a su esposa durante los meses que duró
su exilio muestran que esperaba que Terencia actuara públicamente para favorecer sus intereses. Partiendo del supuesto de que toda imagen de sí es necesariamente tributaria de la relación “yo”-“tú” (AMOSSY, 2010: 105), en el presente trabajo exploraremos cómo el retrato discursivo que Cicerón construye de Terencia no sólo contribuiría a aumentar sus propias posibilidades de autofiguración en un momento en el que su identidad pública se hallaba seriamente amenazada, sino que también respondería a la finalidad estratégica de configurar a su destinatario como un agente decisivo para asegurar su reditus.

What might it mean to use books rather than read them?

This work examines the relationship between book use and forms of thought and theory in the early modern period. Drawing on legal, medical, religious, scientific and literary texts, and on how-to books on topics ranging from cooking, praying, and memorizing to socializing, surveying, and traveling, Carla Mazzio and Bradin Cormack explore how early books defined the conditions of their own use and in so doing imagined the social and theoretical significance of that use.

The volume addresses the material dimensions of the book in terms of the knowledge systems that informed them, looking not only to printed features such as title pages, tables, indexes and illustrations but also to the marginalia and other marks of use that actual readers and users left in and on their books. The authors argue that when books reflect on the uses they anticipate or ask of their readers, they tend to theorize their own forms. Book Use, Book Theory offers a fascinating approach to the history of the book and the history of theory as it emerged from textual practice.

This book, based on a library exhibition at the University of Chicago, has been put online by the University of Chicago library and thus has no restrictions on use.

The scope of Hamilton’s project is not historical reconstruction, but an “attempt to show what the Romans were as they appear in their great authors” (263). Hamilton’s aim is to pinpoint the peculiar Roman qualities that distinguished them from the other cultures of antiquity (263). In order to do this, Hamilton takes her readers on a thirteen-chapter whirlwind tour of the most influential Roman writers—describing their texts and the Rome in which they lived. The book is written in four rough sections: the establishment of Roman letters in the comedies of Plautus and Terence (chapters 1-3); the Republic and Caesar as depicted by Cicero (chapters 4-6); the age of Augustus as depicted in the poetry of Catullus and Horace (chapters 7-10); and the elevation to romantic literature before the bifurcation and disintegration of Roman society (chapters 11-13). In each chapter, Hamilton makes the case that Roman writers were “Romans first” and “individual artists only second” (264). Her thesis is that in the end the differences between Roman authors were “superficial compared to their fundamental resemblances” (264). All followed “the Roman way.”

El teatro es un proceso de comunicación que tiene como objeto al ser humano en todos los sentidos; pero el individuo no sólo sirve para dar sentido al teatro, sino que es su condición de posibilidad: nace en el creador de la obra dramática; crece gracias a las personas que contribuyen a transformar la imaginación, la emoción, el pensamiento y las palabras en una realidad concreta; vive en el espectador que contempla lo que ocurre en escena. Sólo así se convierte la realidad en ficción y, al mismo tiempo, la ficción en verdad. Pero cuando suena el aplauso final, el teatro sigue su proceso vital en forma de un texto que espera a que, con el tiempo, un lector inicie un nuevo proceso de comunicación.
El teatro como texto y el teatro como espectáculo. Siempre corpóreo, siempre físico, sea en el espacio de una habitación, de una calle, de una plaza, del suelo, de un teatro… o en el pequeño espacio de un libro.
Por primera vez se reúnen y se estudian desde el punto de vista etimológico, filológico, lingüístico, dramático, cultural y literario las voces relativas al teatro romano: el dramaturgo, el actor, los artistas, el espectador, la escenografía, el edificio, el atrezo, el disfraz, los patrocinadores públicos y privados, la música y el baile presentes en el espectáculo, la expresión corporal y la gestualidad, los personajes y su universo dramático, el aplauso y el abucheo… En definitiva, este Diccionario abarca el teatro como recinto, como expresión cultural, como texto y como representación.

Parker, Holt N. - Plautus vs. Terence : audience and popularity re-examined. AJPh 1996 117 (4) : 585-617. • The ancient sources are clear in stating that both Plautus' and Terence's plays had a large and popular following. There is no basis for the common modern statement that Plautus was the pre-eminent playwright of Rome or that Terence was a failure or at least out of touch with the crowd.

Attraverso una ricognizione delle testimonianze letterarie e degli ultimi studi, il lavoro si propone di offrire un quadro il più possibile completo della musica e della danza nel teatro di Plauto e Terenzio. L'elemento musicale della “palliata” infatti, pur di importanza cruciale, resta tuttora uno degli aspetti meno noti del teatro antico. Si passano in rassegna quindi i pareri critici più aggiornati e si propongono alcuni tentativi di interpretazione sugli strumenti musicali, sul ruolo dei musicisti, sulla struttura della commedia (cantica e diverbia) e sulle questioni della performance, del contesto e della messa in scena.

This study focuses on the influence of classical authors on Ben Jonson’s dramaturgy, with particular emphasis on the playwrights Aristophanes, Plautus, and Terence, and the literary satirists Horace, Juvenal, Persius, and Lucian.  Jonson was a man of the theatre just as much as he was a man of letters, and in order to illuminate this aspect of his creative personality the thesis considers how classical performance elements (including the Aristophanic ‘Great Idea,’ chorus, and Terentian/Plautine performative strategies) as well as ‘performative’ elements from classical literature (such as the presentation of satirical personae) manifest themselves in the staging of his plays. The emphasis on performance helps to steer the thesis away from focusing purely on classical literary allusions within Jonson's playtexts, and instead encompasses non-literary elements like theatregrams, modes of performance, spatial practices, and structural techniques that are not necessarily apparent on the page but are key elements of Jonson's dramaturgy.
The thesis contends that, in performative just as much as literary terms, Jonson's appropriation of the classics fits with the creative techniques of imitatio and contaminatio, two practices that placed emphasis on the modelling of literary or dramatic works on the examples of past writers and of the creative blending of these models to produce a new aesthetic object. In addition, it is argued that the moral imperatives that drive Jonson's dramatic output are also a product of both of these creative practices, imbuing it with a blend of Greek and Roman dramaturgical and philosophical viewpoints that create a uniquely Jonsonian dramaturgy that is, in varying combinations, moralising, aggressive, sympathetic, and cynical.
The study proceeds thematically rather than chronologically, and makes use of critical methods and scholarship from a range of disciplines, including performance and comparativist criticism, English philology, classical studies, spatial theory, and reception studies. The whole thesis is unified by its emphasis on Jonson’s imitative and contaminative strategies, which serve as useful conceptual models for examining how he allowed his classical sources to become ‘guides, not commanders,’ their influence giving his work the curious quality of being simultaneously deeply indebted to the ancient authors and playwrights while never being completely beholden to them.
An appendix on all classical allusions in Jonson's comedies as documented by the plays' recent major editors and an appendix detailing the extant records of classical performances c.1450-1650 conclude the thesis.

The new volume 11 (2021) of our journal, the Logeion, is now available. The contents and abstracts have been uploaded to the website of the journal (https://logeion.upatras.gr/node/263). With this volume, the Logeion is beginning its second decade of life and presence in the world republic of classical learning.

As is our usual practice, the present volume puts on display the research fruits of a wide range of experts on ancient drama: revered grand masters who have taught generations of scholars and continue teaching us the most intimate secrets of scholarship through their treasured writings, notably Kyriakos Tsantsanoglou and Katerina Synodinou; mature academics at the height of their research (Nikos Charalabopoulos, Marigo Alexopoulou, Xeni Arapogianni); distinguished artists of the theatre who also pursue notable activity in scholarship and academia (Maria Konomi); and —what gives me special pleasure— scholars of the younger generation, whose dynamic presence and original works afford ample hope for the future of our cherished classical discipline: the prodigious Mattia De Poli, two excellent young Latinists (Justin Dwyer and Maria Haley), the scholar of ancient religion Aikaterini-Iliana Rassia, and two of my own former students and now worthy colleagues-in-knowledge, the enfant terrible Dimitrios Kanellakis and Eva Keramari. All scholars interested in ancient drama should read and profit from their contributions.

This is one of the rare volumes of the Logeion in which I have not contributed a text, and in this respect it is bound to become a collectors’ item. But sit tight: I am preparing to make my comeback in the following volume, next year, with an essay on Aristotle’s "Ethics" and the characters of ancient comedy.

The present paper falls within a question that is wider than that of the simple behaviour of ellipsis in some specific verb(s). That general frame refers to the particular behaviour of the verb sum, especially applied to its copulative-attributive use. As is known, traditional grammar has tended to diminish its semantic content; in more recent approaches and from different perspectives the ‘Copula support’ Theory has been gaining ground. Depending on the language of reference, and according to this theory, the copula can be considered even something less than a mere carrier of the categories of person, mood, time or aspect. From this point of view the verb ‘be’ would behave in a different way from other verbs, even in the way of organizing its valencies: in a sentence as such Alexander erat rex Macedonnum, we would have to consider erat rex Macedonum as a syntactic unit in accordance with its equivalence to expressions like regnat.
In a different study  I tried to analyze this approach from a positive point of view: different ‘predicational’ types of sum were proposed according to its qualitative and quantitative valency and semantic notion. The gradation of the semantic content that the verb sum is able to express was shown so that we can appreciate a fluctuation between the more or less scarce value the verb sum has in some constructions and the full value that it has in existential ones.
In the present paper, the analysis of the resource to ellipsis is taken as a tool to provide a particular support for the previous proposal. Leaving aside a detailed examination of the phenomenon of ellipsis, this concept will be handled here in a wide sense to refer to one constituent of the sentence structure more or less recoverable from the extra- or intralinguistic context, including those cases in which ambiguity is possible or even sought by the author with different purposes. From this approach it is inferred that we accept the existence of a gradation in the recoverability of the elliptical element. In this sense, we count on the distinction between the ‘pure nominal sentence’ and the ‘sentence without verb’; this analysis is about the second type.
Traditional grammar and also more recent studies reckon that the copulative-atributive verb is that in which ellipsis occurs chiefly or even in a unique way, due to its scarce or void semantic content; as things are, it is of interest to study up to what point the omission is predictable and the conditions under which this omission takes place.
Essentially the present study is intended to show the following: (i) if and up to what point the ellipsis of the verb is a distinctive feature of sum and other verbs that can own an attributive use in a qualitative sense, but it could affect other verbs with a full semantic content; (ii) are there cases in which the observed ambiguity cannot be solved in a sure and univocal way?
The object of this study has added difficulties if we bear in mind that the copula is present in some languages and absent in others —at least in the 3rd person— and that the fact under study is precisely a lexical absence, with all the problems that this implies.
The basic corpus of study will be, on the one hand, the comedy of Plautus and Terence, and on the other hand, the letters of Cicero, although we will make concrete references to other literary genres, authors and languages. The chosen option counts on particular advantages, such as the abundance of ellipsis in texts where dialogue and monologue, narration and description, speakers with different language registers, etc., co-exist.
As for the methodology, we start from specific texts in which we can appreciate a more or less clear verb ellipsis and so —if convenient or necessary— to be able to restore the hypothetically omitted form through several criteria. Afterwards, in some cases we will test if the ellipsis of verba dicendi, faciendi or movendi, among others, occurs in structures similar to those which are frequently more attested for the ellision of sum forms.
This analysis allows us to affirm that: (i) the ellipsis of finite forms of sum or other verbs with similar uses (monstror, appareo, exsto, etc.) can be abundant in some structures —especially the copulative-attributive ones— but not always the most frequent (cf. Tables 2 and 3).; (ii) verb ellipsis occurs with verbs having a full semantic content in concrete constructions (structures of question-answer, constructions with adjectives or adverbs, formulaic expressions or cases of change of discourse topic; (iii) the ambiguity provided by ellipsis occurs in a gradual way, so that the restitution of the omitted word is not always possible in a unique and sure way.
In short, these facts seem to imply that we can observe in the copulative verb “par excellence” a similar behaviour to that of other verbs which do not share that copulative nature, at least to the same degree. Consequently, and in one of the uses of sum, the full verbal nature of this verb cannot be denied; a nature similar to that of other verbs such as the factive ones.

This article proposes a new interpretation of the Ep. IX 12 of Pliny the Younger. In the middle of the text we find a reference to ll. 101-110 of Terence's Adelphoe, while the concluding sentence (et hominem esse te et hominis patrem) reveals the affinity with a similar expression , not identified so far, which was present in the texts of consolation (especially Seneca's Consolatio ad Marciam and Plutarch's Consolatio ad Apollonium, but originating from Teles). Pliny, through the mediation of the School of Rhetoric, recovers this sentence and transforms it into a real pedagogical project clearly derived from Terence.

A set of commentaries on Terence, whose witnesses appear for the first time in the XII-XIIIth century and show certain common features, are known as 'commentarii recentiores'. Despite their significance in the history of the Terentian exegesis, we know very little about them: hardly a few passages have been edited and the identification of the commentaries itself is still confusing and erroneous in some respects. The purpose of this article is to set as accurately as possible the catalog of these 'commentarii recentiores', distinguishing them from each other, and to define every commentary through the mss that transmit them.

This paper aims to investigate the use of time-related features of talk in evoking (im)politeness in Roman Comedy. To this end, I use evidence from the scansion of the text to identify syllable shortenings and accumulations of heavy (slow-pacing) tokens, as well as rhythmical patterns within utterances pronounced in socially charged situations. Moreover, the (im)polite value is associated with the meticulously timed delivery of speech acts (e.g., mocking threats) with particular focus on the
culture-specific use of religious formulae. As a result, the paper tentatively presents some methods of recovering prosodic cues for verbal interaction, represented in the comedy text.

In contrast to the comedies of Menander and Plautus, in Terence sacrifice is wholly absent.  Sacrifice was an important part of ancient Roman domestic life.  Yet Terence neither stages nor mentions any ritual whatsoever.  Terence deliberately and thematically erases sacrifice from his plays and, in doing so, highlights the instability of his plays' domestic relationships -- and perhaps those of his audience as well.  Terence focuses intensively on the relationships of family members, who are, in Rome, always allied by the practice of domestic cult.  To eliminate sacrifice -- an important element of domestic life -- shows that Terence sees the Roman family as formally dysfunctional.

By using the methods of Conversational Analysis, the present chapter aims at investigating the placement of Nominal Address (here: personal names) throughout the verbal interaction in the comedies by Plautus and Terence. After describing the system of turn-taking, adapted for theatrical dialogue, the main focus is placed on how the tokens of address are integrated into the turn design. Accordingly, various pragmatic functions will be analysed in relation to the positioning of Nominal Address: both in a single turn (in turn-initial, mid-turn and turn-final position) and inside the structure of an adjacency pair. In conclusion, it is stated that, depending on their sequencing patterns, the Nominal Address functions on three different levels: dialogical (turn-taking), interpersonal (stance-taking and politeness), and textual (discourse organization).