About Demetrius of Phaleron

2025.07.09, rewritten from 2025.05.12 | By Gregory Nagy

Part I. Background

§0. This essay, the link for which is listed in the Bibliography under the entry Nagy 2025.07.09, is a pre-edited version of an article intended for an encyclopedia. (I am grateful to my colleague Keith DeStone for his most valuable editorial help with this project.) My essay is about Demetrius of Phalerum—the latinized spelling of his name here is a most conventional way of referring to Dēmētrios son of Phanostratos; Demetrius was citizen of Athens and native of the Athenian (“Attic”) deme (dêmos) of Phalēron, hereafter spelled simply as Phaleron. The lifetime of Demetrius extended from the mid-fourth century BCE into the early decades of the third, but precise datings for his life are elusive—except for a period of ten years, 317 to 307 BCE.

§1. A primary source for one exceptional period in the life of Demetrius, from 317 to 307 BCE, is the universal history of Diodorus of Sicily, who lived in the first century BCE. As we read in Diodorus 20.45.1–5, the city of Athens was militarily dominated during those years by a garrison of Macedonian troops who were then under the control of Kassandros—I will hereafter refer to this man by way of the latinized spelling of his name, “Cassander.”

§2. As we will see, the life of Cassander is directly relevant to the life of Demetrius—especially during the years 317–307. So, before I can say anything further about Demetrius, I first need to provide some historical ground about Cassander. He was a son of Antipater (Antipatros), a Macedonian general who became regent for Alexander the Great, king of Macedonia, around 334 BCE. That was the time when Alexander set out from Macedonia to embark on his grand project of invading the Persian Empire—and beyond—in the course of what became a series of spectacular conquests that eventually reached all the way to the Indian subcontinent. But how is Antipater relevant to the career of his son Cassander—or, ultimately, to the career of Demetrius? Here I need to highlight a historical event, quite unexpected at the time: it was the premature death of Alexander the Great, far away from home, in Babylon, on June 11, 323 BCE, at the age of 32 (for the dating, I follow Depuydt 1997). In the wake of Alexander’s premature death, Antipater became one of the many rival shapers of the enormous world-empire achieved by Alexander, king of Macedonia, but Antipater himself, who had been regent of Macedonia starting around 334 BCE, never became Alexander’s true successor as king of Macedonia in his own right. Antipater died in 319 BCE, never having become the new king of Macedonia—and thus before a new dynasty, to be founded by him, could ever take shape. Nor, for that matter, did the son of Antipater, Cassander, at the time of his father’s death, succeed in immediately becoming the direct successor of Antipater—even as regent of Macedonia. It took some time, though it was just a matter of two or so years, for the son to seize control of the regency, in 317 BCE. But then, after he became regent of Macedonia, it took Cassander even a longer time, much longer, to seize control of kingship. That happened much later, in 305 BCE. Only then could Cassander finally declare himself king of Macedonia. But even that kingship, as it turned out, never developed into a functioning dynasty. And that was because Cassander’s long-term ambition to become the definitive overall successor of Alexander came to a grim end in 297 BCE, when he died of a gruesome illness. I will have more to say later about that illness.

§3. The life and times of Cassander, as briefly sketched here, can be viewed as a pivotal phase in the maddeningly complicated overall history of what is conventionally described as the Hellenistic Age, the beginnings of which were inaugurated by the spectacular conquests of Alexander the Great. In this turbulent but most dynamic Hellenistic era, the evolving world-empire of territories initially conquered by Alexander became fragmented into new regional empires ruled by his feuding would-be successors, commonly described by way of the Greek word Diadokhoi, which in fact means ‘successors’.

§4. As we will now see, two of these new regional Hellenistic empires, as they evolved after the death of Alexander, were directly relevant to the life and times of Demetrius. One empire was centered in Macedonia and the other, in Egypt.

§5. In this essay, I will have more to say later, much more, about the second of these two rival empires just mentioned. For now, however, I limit myself to bare essentials. This empire was centered in Egypt and ruled by the dynasty of the Lagidai, founded by the Macedonian general Ptolemy, son of Lagos. After the death of Alexander, this general Ptolemy, formerly ruling simply as satrap of Egypt, assumed a role that evolved into a far more exalted status, since he was now being transformed into the king of Egypt—as the founder of a new dynasty that took over from the preceding old dynasties of Egyptian pharaohs. As we will see in more detail later, the first two kings of this Ptolemaic dynasty, Ptolemy I and Ptolemy II, were both involved in later phases of the life and times of Demetrius.

§6. But before I can say anything more now about the Ptolemaic dynasty in particular or even about Hellenistic dynasties in general, I first need to circle back to Cassander, since the involvement of Demetrius with the kings of Egypt was preceded by his involvement with Cassander. A formal relationship between Demetrius and Cassander got started in 317 BCE—back when Cassander was still regent of Macedonia, not yet the king there. How Demetrius got formally involved with Cassander, starting in 317 BCE, was conditioned by a political reality, already mentioned at the very start of this essay, where I referred to this reality as a stylized military occupation, by Macedonian troops, of the city-state of Athens. The stationing of these troops, garrisoned at the district of Munychia (Mounukhiā) in the Athenian harbor-city of Piraeus (Peiraieus), was linked with a stylized dictatorship headed by the Athenian politician Demetrius, whose rule in Athens could be backed up by the Macedonian military presence in Piraeus. Again a primary source here is the universal history of Diodorus: at 20.45.2, he reports that Cassander, in order to promote his own project of dominating Athens, appointed Demetrius as the epimelētḗs of the city. A neutral translation of this Greek word would be ‘overseer’ or ‘manager’ or even ‘curator’—though the actual régime of Demetrius during his ten years as epimelētḗs could also be described, less neutrally and more politically, as a stylized dictatorship—if I may return here to this term as I used it just a moment ago. We can find, already in ancient sources, such a negative view of Demetrius as dictator of Athens, installed by the would-be king of Macedonia. A typical example of such a negative view is a reference made by an antiquarian who lived in the second century CE: he was Pausanias, who says at 1.25.6 that Cassander made Demetrius the turannos ‘tyrant’ of Athens.

§7. Such a negative view seems to be linked with what Pausanias says later, at 9.7.2, in reporting about a gruesome illness that afflicted Cassander. This illness ultimately killed Cassander in 297 BCE—by which time he was king of Macedonia. In the context of expressing his own personal dislike of this Hellenistic king, Pausanias at 9.7.2 goes out of his way to describe, almost gloatingly, the king’s illness as a bad case of húderos ‘dropsy’—that is, ‘edema’, compounded by a foul infestation of the king’s weakened body by eulaí ‘worms’. It is almost as if the king had been afflicted by some kind of cosmic retribution.

§8. Negative views of Cassander—and there are many other such views attested in ancient sources—led to a tainted reputation for Demetrius. And yet, there have also survived attestations of positive views about him—and even about Cassander. A striking example, as we will see at a later point in this essay, is what ancient sources tell us about the efforts of Demetrius in promoting the appreciation of Homeric poetry—an appreciation shared by Cassander himself, who as we will also see was reputed to have actually memorized Homer.

§9. In the case of Demetrius, there now exists a publication that fully documents both kinds of views as reported in ancient sources about him—that is, views that are somewhat positive as well as negative. The publication is embedded in a book edited by William W. Fortenbaugh and Eckart Schütrumpf, titled Demetrius of Phalerum: Text, Translation and Discussion, which was first published in 2000 and was then republished in 2017 by Routledge. The first 310 pages of that book are printed there as Chapter 1—but this “chapter” features its own table of contents and its own indices. So, Chapter 1 is much more than a chapter. It is an exhaustive collection of ancient written evidence about Demetrius. The three editors of this chapter, who are Peter Stork, Jan Max van Ophuijsen, and Tiziano Dorandi, have provided in their 310 printed pages a most precious collection of information that I aim to use extensively hereafter. And I must add here a word about my system of citing ancient sources collected by these editors. They suggest at p. 10 of their work that the numbering of the testimonia and fragments that they have edited should be formatted this way: the abbreviation “SOD” should be added to any given number, corresponding to the initial letters of the family names Stork, Ophuijsen, and Dorandi. Thus for example the testimonia about Demetrius that I have cited so far, Diodorus 20.45.1–5 and Pausanias 1.25.6, can now be numbered SOD 30 and SOD 17 respectively. Another valuable resource is a book on Demetrius by Lara O’Sullivan (2009). Of particular interest to me is the role of Demetrius in shaping the institution of Athenian cadet-citizens called ephēboi, as noted by Blaise Nagy (1991:305).

§10. Looking for positive as well as negative ancient reportage, I will now proceed to consider further what I have already described as the stylized dictatorship of Demetrius in Athens during the ten years extending from 317 to 307 BCE, as documented for example in the testimonia numbered SOD 30 and SOD 17 in the book edited by Fortenbaugh and Schütrumpf (2017)—that is, in the passages from Diodorus and Pausanias that I have already discussed. In the course of considering further the available ancient sources, I must stress what I think is a pressing need to keep in mind, front and center: it is the very idea of tyranny, since, as we will see, the role of Demetrius as a public figure in Athens is directly relevant to questions—already ancient questions—about his moral standing as a politician who has been accused of tyrannical behavior but who has also been recognized as a reputable philosopher. In this context I note the subtitle of the book by Lara O’Sullivan (2009) about Demetrius, A Philosopher in Politics.

§11. In the book edited by Fortenbaugh and Schütrumpf (2017), there is a pertinent essay by Hans B. Gottschalk (pp. 367–389) about these questions, titled “Demetrius of Phalerum: A Politician among Philosophers and a Philosopher among Politicians.” I cite here the evaluation by Gottschalk (p. 368), who notes that in his own lifetime he has witnessed a shift in opinion—away from the idea that Demetrius had tried, “deliberately and consciously, to put Academic [that is, basically, Platonic] and Aristotelian political principles into practice.” As Gotschalk goes on to observe (pp. 368–369), “opinion has veered away from this view,” shifting toward an alternative idea, which is, that “most of his reforms could have been motivated by practical considerations and historical experience more than the desire to implement a philosophical programme.” To that extent, then, Demetrius could be viewed not only as a philosopher but even as a “statesman.” As Gottschalk himself describes Demetrius (p. 368), “he was a man of varied gifts, a voluminous writer and one of the leading orators of his day, as well as a statesman.”

§12. This comprehensive description by Gottschalk brings me to consider other merits attributed to Demetrius—besides his status as a philosopher. And I start with his adeptness as an orator. I cite here, as just one example, the admiring words of a most admirable ancient reader of his: Quintilian, in his Institutio Oratoria 10.1.80 = SOD 125, has this to say about Demetrius: ultimus est fere ex Atticis qui dici possit orator ‘he is just about the last of the Attic [orators] who can be called an orator’. As for the “voluminous” writings of Demetrius in general, I cite especially the testimony of Diogenes Laertius, dated to the third century CE, in his Lives of the Philosophers 5.75–83 = SOD 1.

§13. As for the description, also quoted from Gottschalk, of Demetrius as a “statesman,” we find a comparably mitigated view in an influential essay by Stephen V. Tracy, titled “Demetrius of Phalerum: Who was He and Who was He Not?”—published in the same book edited by Fortenbaugh and Schütrumpf (2017, pp. 331–345). Without excusing any moral lapses that may have involved Demetrius during his rule as epimelētḗs of Athens between the years 317 and 307—a rule that I have already described as a “stylized dictatorship”—Tracy explains that the most compromising aspect of this régime, which I have already described as a “stylized occupation” of Athens by Macedonian troops stationed at the harbor of Piraeus, cannot be blamed directly on Demetrius—or even on his patron, Cassander. For a summary of the historical background (relevant ancient sources can be consulted at SOD 12–19), I cite a formulation by Tracy (p. 332), whom I quote here directly (though I have latinized some of his transliterations of Greek forms):

By abolishing the liturgy [leitourgíā] known as the choregia [khorēgíā] and substituting pay for the chorus, he [Demetrius] made dramatic performances fully professional. This change had far-reaching positive effects for it hastened the creation of the guilds of Dionysiac artists [Dionū́sou tekhnîtai] at Athens and elsewhere. These became influential associations of professional actors who performed Athenian dramas all over the Greek-speaking world during the Hellenistic and Roman periods. And, on the basis of the report of Athenaeus [14.620b] that ‘Demetrius of Phaleron first introduced those who are now called Homēristaí into the theaters’[,] Greg Nagy in a recently published book entitled Poetry as Performance: Homer and Beyond [1996] argues persuasively that Demetrius likewise reformed public performances of Homer in Athens and played a crucial role in the creation and dissemination of the so-called koine [koinḗ] text of Homer. This text, really the Athenian city text, was fundamental to the work of the Alexandrian editors of Homer.

§24. Tracy highlights here, in agreement with my argumentation published in 1996, what can definitely be described as a significant accomplishment of Demetrius, who is credited with reforming the public performances of Homeric poetry in Athens. But then Tracy goes on to highlight, at a later point in his essay (pp. 343–344), also a second most significant accomplishment of Demetrius. This other accomplishment, which I too highlighted in my book published in 1996, involved the role of Demetrius as an advisor of Ptolemy I, the first Hellenistic king of Egypt. As we will see, Demetrius advised Ptolemy to establish a royal library in Alexandria—though the definitive establishment of such a library had to wait till the reign of Ptolemy II.

§25. In what follows, I will epitomize my own overall argumentation, originally presented in Chapter 6 and Chapter 7 of Poetry as Performance (1996), about these two accomplishments of Demetrius, that is, both (1) his earlier reforming of Homeric performances in Athens and (2) his later advising of Ptolemy I, which led to the definitive establishment of the great Library of Alexandria during the reign of Ptolemy II. But the two chapters are not aligned symmetrically with these two stated accomplishments of Demetrius, since my primary concern, in both chapters, was not Demetrius for his own sake. Rather, the bigger concern for me had been this question: how did Homeric poetry get transformed from an earlier phase where it had existed as a medium of public performance curated by magistrates in the city of Athens to a later phase where it became a text to be re-edited by experts at the great Library of Alexandria in Egypt? In seeking an answer, I argued in my two chapters that a pivotal figure in the history of this transformation turned out to be Demetrius himself in his two consecutive roles as (1) a magistrate who reformed Homeric performances in Athens and as (2) an advisor to the Ptolemaic dynasty in Egypt—an advisor whose advice led to the establishment of the great Library of Alexandria, which in turn led to the re-editing there of an Athenian City Text or koinḗ of Homer, mentioned in the formulation of Stephen V. Tracy as quoted in §23 above. In terms of my overall argument, that text was already being edited by Peripatetics in Athens, and it was based on a seasonally recurring and reshaped “script” for Homeric performances as most recently reformed by Demetrius, who was a follower of Aristotle and the Peripatetics in their approach to the preservation of such treasured cultural legacies as the poetry of Homer. And, again in terms of my overall argument, the missing link for connecting the two accomplishments of Demetrius that I highlighted was none other than Aristotle.

Part II. Two lasting accomplishments of Demetrius

§26. In the paragraphs that follow, I will track, by way of footnotes starting already in the next paragraph, at §27, the existing correspondences, in content, between what I argue briefly here in Part II and what I argue at greater length in the printed version of my book Poetry as Performance: Homer and Beyond as published in 1996—and at even greater length in a new online version as published in 2025.05.10 by Classical Continuum and available gratis at https://continuum.fas.harvard.edu/poetry-as-performance-homer-and-beyond/. The date given for that online publication, 2025.05.09, is merely the time of inception, since this new online version is not exactly a second edition of the older printed version. Although it contains corrections and some rewritings—as is to be expected in new printed editions—this new online version is a work-in-progress, containing not only the old footnotes, at times rewritten with new annotations added, but also new endnotes containing further new annotations. All the new annotations are meant to promote further thinking, further work-in-progress. So, when I said a moment ago that I will track, by way of footnotes starting in the next paragraph, at §27, the correspondences between the content of this essay and the content of Poetry as Performance, hereafter to be abbreviated as “PP,” what I meant is that I will indicate here in the footnotes, by way of cross-references, the numberings of corresponding pages and footnotes in the printed version of “PP.” For example, the reference to “Mossé 1989” in footnote 1 of my essay here is followed by a cross-reference that reads: “see also PP 157 n14.” But the footnotes in the present essay here can likewise cross-refer to ancient sources relating to the life and times of Demetrius (there is a more exhaustive set of sources collected in SOD 8–42) as also to other content published in the book edited by Fortenbaugh and Schütrumpf (2017). Finally, I aim to elaborate, in upcoming paragraphs, on the following terms as used in the succinct formulations of Tracy, quoted above: leitourgíā, khorēgíā, Dionū́sou tekhnîtai, Homēristaí, koinḗ. In the same way as I have formatted the transliterations of the Greek terms that I have listed just now, I will continue to write out any accentuations or lengthenings of vowels in transliterated Greek forms that are italicized.

§27. The centerpiece of the entire epitome that follows here is a passage taken from Athenaeus (14.620b–c), which suggests that traditions of performing Homeric poetry were reformed in Athens at the initiative of Demetrius during the period of his rule in Athens between 317 and 307 BCE. Since our basic attested source concerning Demetrius and his reform of Homeric traditions is going to be this one single passage from a relatively late author, Athenaeus of Naucratis, who flourished around 200 CE, and since the wording of this passage, as we are about to see, is opaque and occasionally difficult to interpret, it is essential for the sake of an overall perspective to begin with a brief overview, in the following sub-paragraphs A–D, of some accomplishments of Demetrius where historians today are in general agreement that he is in fact deserving of credit.

A. To start, Demetrius is best known for having initiated a major reform of Athenian State Theater in the fourth quarter of the fourth century, following similar reforms initiated by an earlier Athenian statesman, Lycurgus, in the third quarter.^[1] Demetrius took the decisive step of abolishing the khorēgíā, that is, the leitourgíā ‘liturgy’ or ‘duty’ imposed on wealthy citizens to finance the choruses of State Theater.^[2] From around 309 BCE onward, the Athenian State went beyond the earlier pattern of paying salaries to the actors, hereafter paying salaries also to the chorus and even financing its costumes.^[3]

B. Demetrius is also credited with other such cultural reforms, each of which was seemingly intended to insure the prevalence of canonical forms. For example, he was responsible for a collection of a corpus of popular tradition that has come down to us as the Fables of Aesop: in Diogenes Laertius 5.80, we read ἀλλὰ μὴν καὶ λόγων Αἰσωπείων συναγωγαί ‘and then there were also collections of Aesopic tales’, and, in 5.81, there is a reference to this corpus in the bibliographical listing of his works: Αἰσωπείων α’.^[4]

C. In addition, Demetrius had a role in establishing a canonical form for the ongoing lore about the Seven Sages (Stobaeus 3.79 and 43.131).^[5]

D. Demetrius is the same person, I should also add, who was author of two volumes entitled “On the Iliad” (Περὶ Ἰλιάδος α’ β’) and four volumes entitled “On the Odyssey” (Περὶ Ὀδυσσείας α’ β’ γ’ δ’), according to Diogenes Laertius (5.81).

With this historical background in place, I now turn to the key passage suggesting that Demetrius had also reformed the institution of Homeric performances in Athens:

Nor were rhapsodes [rhapsōidoí] missing from our symposia. For Larensis took delight in the works of Homer as no one else could, so much so that he made even Cassander, the one who was King of Macedonia, look superficial. About whom [Cassander] it is said by Carystius in his Historika hupomnḗmata that he was such a Homer-enthusiast [phil-Hómēros] that he could orally render much of the epic poetry of Homer. And he [Cassander] made his own private transcript of the Iliad and Odyssey. That the rhapsodes [rhapsōidoí] were also called Homēristaí is reported by Aristocles in his work On choruses. Demetrius of Phaleron was the first to introduce those who are nowadays called Homēristaí into the theaters. Chamaeleon, in his work On Stesichorus, says that not only the poetry of Homer was melodically sung but also that of Hesiod and Archilochus, even that of Mimnermus and Phocylides. Clearchus, in the first of the two scrolls of his work entitled On riddles, says: “Simonides of Zacynthus, seated on a stool, used to perform rhapsodically [verb rhapsōideîn] the poetry of Archilochus in the theaters.”^[6] Lysanias, in the first scroll of his work On the iambic poets, says that Mnasion the rhapsode [rhapsōidós] used to act [hupokrínesthai] in his performances [deíxis plural] some of the iambs of Simonides.^[7] As for the Katharmoi of Empedocles, Kleomenes the rhapsode [rhapsōidós] used to perform them rhapsodically [verb rhapsōideîn] at the Olympics, as Dicaearchus says in his work, The Olympic. Jason says, in the third scroll of his work The sacred institutions of Alexander, that Hegesias the performer of comedies acted [hupokrínesthai] in the Great Theater in Alexandria the poetry of Hesiod, and Hermophantos, the poetry of Homer.

Athenaeus 14.620b–c

§28. According to this passage, the contents of which are recapitulated by Eustathius (4.937.18–24 ed. van der Valk), Demetrius of Phaleron transferred the performances of Homer ‘into the theaters’, as we see from the highlighted wording, and the performers of this reformed performance tradition are ‘nowadays’ called Homēristaí. The wording here allows for a variety of interpretations. My own is this: that the Homēristaí eventually replaced the earlier category of rhapsōidoí or rhapsodes. Since Athenaeus is linking performances in theaters by Homēristaí with historically attested performances in theaters by rhapsōidoí, we may infer that he thinks of the Homēristaí as continuing in the traditions of the rhapsodes—this despite the likelihood that the performance traditions of the Homēristaí, as we will see below, evolved into something quite different from the traditions of the earlier rhapsodes. As we begin to recognize the differences, however, we should at the same time keep in mind that the performance traditions of fifth- and fourth-century rhapsodes, who apparently declaimed in recitative style, without musical accompaniment, were in turn quite different from those of the even earlier aoidoí ‘singers’ as they are actually portrayed by the Homeric narrative.^[8] I argue, then, for a historical connection between rhapsōidoí and Homēristaí on the basis of the passage just quoted from Athenaeus (14.620b–c). These arguments are in general agreement with conclusions reached by the papyrologist Geneviève Husson, and we will examine presently some of the supporting evidence that she adduces.^[9]

§29. In earlier work on this same passage from Athenaeus, I had already posited a continuity between the rhapsōidoí and the Homēristaí, though at the same time I stressed the differences between the two designations of performers, recognizing that the testimony of Athenaeus may well have conflated various different stages in the evolution of performance traditions.^[10]

§30. Granting that there are differences, I propose to defend the connection between rhapsōidoí and Homēristaí made by our source here, Athenaeus of Naucratis, who cites the authority of Aristocles (between first century BCE and first century CE).^[11] I also defend the connection that Athenaeus makes between Demetrius and the shifting of performances of Homer ‘into the theaters’, in which context Athenaeus identifies the performers as the Homēristaí.^[12] Further, on the basis of morphological parallels about to be adduced, we will consider the possibility that the term goes as far back as Demetrius himself. As we proceed, however, it is important to keep in mind that, even if the word Homēristaí goes as far back as the era of Demetrius, it does not follow that Homeric performers known by such a name in the late fourth century BCE would have been just like the Homēristaí in the era of Athenaeus, at the beginning of the third century CE, about half a millennium later.^[13]

§31. Let us begin by considering a premier example of rhapsode-style performance in theaters, as cited by Athenaeus in the same passage quoted above: he is someone called Hermophantos, who is described, towards the end of our passage, as ‘acting’ the poems of Homer at a performance in the Great Theater of Alexandria. The authority cited by Athenaeus for this information, Jason of Nysa (first century BCE), takes us back to the Ptolemaic era.^[14] We may compare another passage that deals with the performance of a rhapsode in the Ptolemaic era of Alexandria:

Ζεὺς δ᾿ Ἥρην ἐκάλεσσε κασιγνήτην ἄλοχόν τε [Iliad XVIII 356]^[15]

The rhapsode [rhapsōidós] became overnight the talk of everybody. Here is what he did: at the wedding of Ptolemy who, in marrying his own sister was considered to be committing a deed unnatural and unholy,^[16] he [= the rhapsode] began with the following words:

And Zeus summoned Hera his sister, his wife [Iliad XVIII 356]

Plutarch Quaestiones convivales 736e

§32. There is also earlier and to that extent even more valuable evidence connecting the performance of Homer with theatrical traditions. Already in Plato’s Ion, we see the figure of Socrates making an explicit equation between the rhapsōidós ‘rhapsode’ and the hupokritḗs ‘actor’ (536a).^[17] The rhapsode Ion himself is vividly portrayed as a master of histrionics (535c). Aristotle too in his Poetics notes an overlap between the art of the rhapsode and the art of the actor in drama, commenting on what he considers to be overacting on the part of one particular rhapsode, Sosistratos by name, specifically with regard to this man’s use of physical dramatic gestures (1462a6).

§33. We find further evidence for a relatively early theatricalization of rhapsodic traditions when we look beyond the references to a specifically Homeric repertoire on the part of rhapsodes. Let us begin again with Plato’s Ion, where we learn that a rhapsode’s repertoire could include not only Homer and Hesiod but also Archilochus (531a, 532a).^[18] In light of this information, we may look back at the extended passage in Athenaeus (14.620b–c), where we saw sources from the third century BCE reporting rhapsodic performances of Archilochean poetry in particular (Clearchus) and “iambic” poetry in general (Lysanias).^[19] I note in both sets of testimony the strong emphasis on the theatrical aspects of performance: the rhapsodic performance of Archilochean poetry by Simonides of Zacynthus is said to take place in theaters [théatra], while Mnasion the rhapsode is said to act [hupokrínesthai] in his performances [deíxis plural] of íamboi ‘iambs’ (Athenaeus 14.620c).

§34. In this connection, it is crucial to compare a statement made by Aristotle:

It should be ordained that younger men not be theater-goers [theātaí] of íamboi or of comedy until they reach the age where they have the opportunity to participate in lying down together at table and getting intoxicated [that is, to participate in symposia], at which point their education [paideíā] will make them altogether immune to the harmful effect of these things’.^[20]

Aristotle Politics 7.1336b20–22

I infer that Aristotle is contrasting professional performance by actors in theaters—or even by theatricalizing rhapsodes—with performance by amateurs at symposia, and that he has in mind such poets as Archilochus when he speaks of the performance of íamboi, presumably by rhapsodes, as parallel to the performance of comedy by actors.^[21]

§35. Here I pursue further, now moving considerably ahead in time, the connection already made in the third century BCE by the sources of Athenaeus (14.620b–c) between rhapsode-style performance and the setting of theaters. There is an incidental reference to theatrical performances of Homer in a much later source, Achilles Tatius (3.20.4): τῶν τὰ Ὁμήρου τῷ στόματι δεικνύντων ἐν τοῖς θεάτροις ‘those who perform [deiknúnai] the poems of Homer orally in theaters’.^[22] There is a related passage, by the same author (Achilles Tatius 8.9.2–3), where the art of performing Homeric poems is designated by the verb Homērízein. It is this verb, of course, from which Homēristaí is derived. As we examine this passage, we will note various allusions to the theatricality of Homeric performance in what seems to be a parody of the very ideology of paideíā ‘education’ in the arts. The context is this: in a legal wrangle, a speaker is attacking his opponent by portraying him as a moral degenerate. The man’s degeneracy is being expressed metaphorically in a humorous narrative about his counterfeit paideíā ‘education’ in the arts, as it were, where the idea of practicing the art par excellence seems to be equated mockingly with a theatrical image of ‘playing the Homēristḗs’. The central joke is in the word itself, since the form Homērízein is being used here as a pun to convey a sexual double entendre (mēr‑ in the sense of ‘thigh’):

When he was a boy, he would consort with many respectable men, and in fact he prodigiously spent the entire bloom of his youth in this pursuit. He put on the look of solemnity and played the role [hupokrínesthai] of moderation, pretending to be passionately devoted to education [paideíā] and behaving consistently in a submissive and abjectly self-abasing way towards those who became involved with him in this pursuit. Leaving his father’s house, he rented a little shack. So he had his ménage there, being the Homēristḗs^[23] for the most part, while all along playing host and making friends with anyone who would prove useful for whatever he wanted. And in this way, the thinking was, he was edifying his spirit. Of course, all this was acting [hupókrisis], a thing of perversion.

Achilles Tatius 8.9.2–3

§36. Given that the art of the rhapsode was becoming ever more theatrical and mimetic over time, as we see from the testimony of Plato and Aristotle already in the fourth century BCE, we have reason to expect Athenaeus, near the beginning of the third century CE, to assume that the theatrical tradition of the Homēristaí was ultimately derived from an earlier rhapsodic heritage. Further, on the basis of Aristotle’s remark about stylized physical gestures in the mimesis of Homer—let us say the acting of Homer—we have reason to expect such specific aspects of mimetic performance to become ever more pronounced with the passage of time. Let us consider a case in point, with explicit reference to Homēristaí. In the Interpretation of Dreams by Artemidorus (4.2 p. 205 ed. Hercher), dated to the second century CE, there is an anecdote about a surgeon who once dreamed that he was acting Homer, expressed by the verb Homērízein (ὁμηρίζειν νομίσας), and the reason given for this dream is a mechanical analogy between the motions made by surgeons as they make their incisions and the motions made by Homēristaí as they make their gestures of wounding opponents with weapons and drawing blood: καὶ γὰρ οἱ ὁμηρισταὶ τιτρώσκουσι μὲν καὶ αἱμάσσουσιν, ἀλλ᾿ οὐκ ἀποκτεῖναί γε βούλονται· οὕτω δὲ καὶ ὁ χειρουργός ‘for just as the Homēristaí make wounds and draw blood, without any intention of killing, so also does the surgeon’.^[24]

§37. There is a comparable reference to Homēristaí in Petronius (Satyricon 59.2–6), where the histrionics of these performers are being ridiculed as an abstruse exercise in art, on display for pretentious but ludicrously ignorant connoisseurs.^[25] In this humorous account, the host Trimalchio starts by saying (59.2–3): …simus ergo, quod melius est, a primitiis hilares et Homeristas spectemus ‘so let us be festive, which is better, right from the start; let us watch the Homēristaí. At that point (59.4–6), intravit factio statim hastisque scuta concrepuit. ipse Trimalchio in pulvino consedit, et cum Homeristae Graecis versibus colloquerentur, ut insolenter solent, ille canora voce Latine legebat librum. mox silentio facto “scitis” inquit “quam fabulam agant? Diomedes et Ganymedes duo fratres fuerunt. horum soror erat Helena. Agamemnon illam rapuit…” ‘there entered right away a troupe [of Homēristaí], beating on their shields with their spears. Trimalchio himself sat down on his cushion and, while the Homēristaí were having their dialogues in Greek verses, in their usual pompous manner, he [Trimalchio], in a sonorous voice, was reading along, in Latin, from a scroll.^[26] Then after a moment of silence, he said: “do you know what story they are acting? Well Diomedes and Ganymedes were two brothers. They had a sister, Helen, and Agamemnon abducted her …”’[this display of Trimalchio’s faulty education continues through section 6]. When Trimalchio finishes (59.6): haec ut dixit Trimalchio, clamorem Homeristae sustulerunt, … ‘when Trimalchio said these things, the Homēristaí raised a clamor …’.

§38. These passages from Artemidorus and Petronius show clear signs of a newer and ever more theatrical stage in the lengthy history of Homeric performance traditions—a stage where these traditions come closest to our own contemporary notion of a “script.” We begin to appreciate from these later sources just how far the theatrical conventions in the performance of Homer have evolved from the conventions envisioned by earlier sources. We have just seen in the passage from Artemidorus that the Homēristaí actually act out the wounding of opponents with weapons. Now we see in Petronius that such explicitly mimetic gestures are being reinforced by stage props, as it were, such as spears and shields.^[27] Moreover, in the passage from Petronius, it appears that different players take on different roles in enacting a Homeric scene. The players seem to have speaking parts, delivered in Greek verses (to be contrasted with Trimalchio’s Latin), apparently representing the speeches of Homeric heroes engaged in combat with each other. I infer that these dialogues were dramatically excerpted—or let us say “scripted”—from actual combat scenes contained by the overall Homeric narrative. Thus I propose to adjust, ever so slightly, a formulation concerning the Artemidorus and the Petronius passages: according to Louis Robert, the Homēristaí mimed battles.^[28] Surely the activity of miming does not exclude the factor of speaking parts, delivered in Greek verse. Still, my use of the expression “speaking parts” shows just how far removed we now are, as we contemplate this particular moment in the history of Homeric performance, from the early traditions of the rhapsodes. The text of Homer has achieved the status of a “script.”

§39. The usage of calling the performers of Homer Homēristaí, as made explicit in the literary passages surveyed so far, is confirmed by attested references, in documentary papyri from Oxyrhynchus, to live performances of Homer by Homēristaí in Hellenized Egypt:^[29]

1. P.Oxy. 3.519 fr. A 3–4 (Oxyrhynchus; ii CE) ὁμηριστῇ (δραχμαί ͺ+ number 448)
2. P.Oslo 3.189.16 (place?; iii CE) ἀπόδιξις Ὁμηρι[στῶν], ἀγὼν ποιητῶν at line 19
3. SB 4.7336.26 (Oxyrhynchus iii CE) ὁμηριστῇ. Same document, line 29 [ἄλλ]ῳ ὁμηριστῇ
4. P.Oxy. 7.1050.26 (Oxyrhynchus ii/iii CE) ὁμη̣ρ̣ι̣σ̣[τῇ]
5. P.Oxy. 7.1025.8 (Oxyrhynchus; iii CE) καὶ Σαραπᾷ ὁμηριστῇ

As Husson notes, all these occasions of performance by Homēristaí are festivals.^[30] Moreover, the dates of all these occasions are not far removed from the era of our main source about Homēristaí, Athenaeus of Naucratis (around 200 CE). It is realistic, no doubt, to be reminded again that we are by now over 500 years removed from the glory days of Demetrius , whom Athenaeus credits with the theatricalization of rhapsodes. But it is also realistic to keep in mind the continuity, however transformed, of Hellenic culture even half a millennium later. As Husson points out, for example, the metropolis of Oxyrhynchus had a theater with a seating capacity of over 10,000.^[31] Such theaters were to be found throughout the Hellenic cities that dotted the Egyptian hinterland or khṓrā, and Husson reminds us that the cultural vitality of urban life in that era can in no way be imagined as a phenomenon restricted to a small handful of “gymnasium élite.”^[32]

§40. For yet another attestation of Homēristḗs, we turn to an inscription, published by Charlotte Roueché,^[33] that was found by excavators on the side of a doorway leading into Room 6 behind the stage front of the theater at Aphrodisias in Caria: it reads Δημητρίου ὁμηριστοῦ διασκεύη ‘[theatrical] equipment of Demetrius the Homēristḗs’,^[34] and its date cannot be much later than the end of the third century CE.^[35] As in the case of the evidence of the papyri found in Oxyrhynchus, the naming of this Homēristḗs occurs in a context associated with mimes.^[36] In this era, however, it must be kept in mind that such an association does not reflect negatively on the Homēristaí, since the status (and prestige) of mimes was ascending exponentially throughout the Hellenic areas of the Empire at around the time of the third century CE.^[37] The question, then, is not whether the status of Homēristaí was declining with the passage of time: what needs to be determined, rather, is to what extent their very identity was becoming assimilated to that of mimes.^[38]

§41. The picture that we see emerging in the second and third centuries CE, that of Homer as an obviously excerpted “script” to be performed by Homēristaí in a stylized mimetic format, can be seen as a terminal or at least near-terminal stage in the history of Homeric performance.^[39] This has been my argument so far. To be sure, any continuum entails discontinuities as well as continuities—one might say that this is the essence of Hellenism, even of tradition itself—but I maintain that the cumulative evidence of the traces that we have examined up to now does indeed seem to bear out the suggestion made in the passage of Athenaeus that the Homēristaí continued the traditions of the rhapsōidoí.

§42. There are further traces of Homēristaí to be found, in Eustathius. There is need for some caution here, given that this scholar of the twelfth century CE often makes spectacular mistakes in his own internalized chronology of the cultural history of Classical and post-Classical Athens, Ptolemaic and post-Ptolemaic Egypt. Still, Eustathius had access to information that was often more complete than what we now have, as for example in the case of the text of Athenaeus that he used for reference, and thus the actual information that he gives can be valuable even when his own interpretation of that information may not be so.^[40]

§43. Let us return to the evidence of the extant papyri, all dated to the second or third century CE, concerning the performances of Homēristaí. It is important to note that these attestations come from a relatively late era—considerably later than that of the “eccentric” Homer papyri of 300 to 150 BCE or so. I have argued that a phase of relatively more fluidity in the Homeric performance tradition, as reflected in the “eccentric” papyri, was coming to a halt by around 150 BCE, after which time both the performance tradition and the commercial “books” or scrolls of Homer could revert to reflecting more closely an earlier and more canonical Athenian rhapsodic performance tradition.^[41] But we have yet to consider fully whether the very term Homēristaí is related to such an earlier, more canonical, rhapsodic tradition.

§44. True, the attestations of this term are so relatively late that we cannot be sure, at this point in the argument, whether it is justifiable to date the institution of Homēristaí as far back as the fourth century BCE. For now, at least, the only direct textual evidence we have for this argument is the passage in Athenaeus 14.620b–c, as quoted above, which suggests that the Homēristaí are offshoots of Homeric performance traditions as reformed by Demetrius. What follows, however, is additional textual evidence for taking the actual term Homēristaí all the way back to the era of Demetrius. Also, I will present arguments for linking this term with the idea of a fourth-century “State Script.”

§45. We have already noted that Demetrius, credited in Athenaeus (14.620b–c) with a reform of Homeric performance traditions at Athens towards the end of the fourth century, is also to be credited with a major reform of Athenian State Theater. By abolishing the khorēgíā, he brought about the ultimate professionalization of the chorus, that former bastion of non-professional and “liberal” education.^[42] Thanks to the reforms of Demetrius, as we have seen, the Athenian State was hereafter paying salaries not only to the actors, as it had already before, but also to the chorus, even financing its costumes.^[43] In other words, Demetrius legitimated the evolution of a relatively more professionalized corps of actors in State Theater.^[44] This historical fact suggests that a new detail can be added to the argument: extrapolating from Athenaeus (14.620b–c), I now propose that Demetrius legitimated the evolution of a corps of Homeric performers who were relatively more professionalized than earlier performers—and who may have been actually called Homēristaí.

§46. I hasten to add that any increased inclusiveness of membership in an actors’ corps, as implied by the professionalization of the chorus in Athenian State Theater, seems symptomatic of a decreasing flexibility in the inherited repertoire. By the time of Demetrius, the ancestral choral traditions in Athens seem to have grown so obsolete as to require revitalization by professionals. The trend of professionalism in the fourth century BCE is made clear by Pickard-Cambridge (1988:279–280), who traces this trend forward in time into the norms of professionalism that prevail in the early third century BCE and thereafter, under the general heading of Dionū́sou tekhnîtai ‘Artists of Dionysus’: see his illuminating chapter “The Artists of Dionysus” (pp. 279–321). He also points out that this category of Dionū́sou tekhnîtai included “professional reciters of epic” (p. 92n4). This observation is relevant to the book of Stephanes (1988) on the Dionū́sou tekhnîtai, especially pp. 573–574, where he provides an index of attestations involving rhapsōidoí (more on this subject in PP 177–178).

§47. Returning to the historical fact that Demetrius had a role in the reshaping of Athenian State Theater, I now link this fact with another fact, extrapolated from Athenaeus (14.620b–c): as we have seen, this same Demetrius had a role in the reshaping of Athenian traditions in performing Homer. I now propose that Demetrius legitimated the evolution of a corps of Homeric performers who were relatively more theatrical than earlier performers—and who may have been actually called Homēristaí.

§48. The professionalization of the chorus in Athens, I should emphasize, resulted in the detachment of its civic connectedness with the city-state of Athens, so that Athenian-style dramas, now sung and danced by professional choruses, could spread throughout the Hellenic world. And I will from here on argue for a comparable detachment of rhapsodic performances of Homeric poetry from the connectedness of this poetry to Athens. Despite such a detachment, however, I will also argue that an Athenian “State Script” of Homer facilitated the circulation of this poetry throughout the Hellenic world, and that Demetrius had a role in the promoting of such a “script.”

§49. There is in fact a historical precedent, beyond the reshaping of Athenian State Theater instituted by Demetrius himself in the fourth quarter of the fourth century, for this same man’s reshaping of Homeric performance traditions. A few years earlier, in the third quarter of the fourth century, we find that the statesman Lycurgus of Athens had instituted something that seems analogous: this Lycurgus had initiated reforms in the performance traditions of State Theater in Athens, legislating an official “State Script” for the tragedies of three poets and three poets only, Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides.^[45] The crucial piece of evidence comes from a compressed and problematic passage in [“Plutarch”] Lives of the Ten Orators (841f).^[46] According to this passage, Lycurgus introduced a law requiring that the Athenians erect bronze statues of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, and that the State make official the texts of the tragedies of these three poets.[47]

§50. In developing the argument for a relationship between the Homēristaí and an Athenian “State Script” of Homer, I posit the following sequence of events:

(A) A new state-controlled performance tradition and “script,” associated with the Homēristaí, is founded by Demetrius in Athens sometime between 317 and 307 BCE.

(B) Then, with the fall of Demetrius in 307 BCE, the Athenian State loses or at least relaxes control of Homeric performance traditions, with the result that more variations can proliferate in Athens and elsewhere.^[48] Such variations are reflected in the so-called “eccentric” Homer papyri. This period of instability in performance traditions lasts until around 150 BCE. And, during this period from 307 BCE to 150 BCE, we can expect the generic designation of Homeric performers to default to the older term rhapsōidoí ‘rhapsodes’.^[49]

(C) After this burst of variation peters out, around 150 BCE, the performance traditions of the Homēristaí reassert themselves, matching closely the more canonical textual traditions of the Athenian “State Script” as now reconstituted by Aristarchus.^[50]

§51. In terms of this hypothetical scenario, the relatively late attestations of the word Homēristaí in the papyri can be correlated with the relatively most rigid period in the evolution of Homeric transmission.

§52. Here we return to the term Homēristaí, which Athenaeus (14.620b–c) connects with a reform of Homeric performance traditions under the régime of Demetrius—and which I have tried to connect with the idea of an Athenian “State Script” of Homer. And we have seen that the same term Homēristaí was actually used in Hellenized Egypt with reference to Homeric performers. Now I propose to go one step even further: the standard “script” tradition of Homeric performers in Egypt, who were known as Homēristaí, may have been derived from a “State Script” instituted for Homeric performers in Athens under the régime of Demetrius, who were also known as Homēristaí according to my interpretation of the passage from Athenaeus.

§53. Here I find it relevant to highlight what is said about Demetrius in the Letter of Aristeas, dated around 100 BCE.^[51] This document dramatizes the genesis of the Septuagint in mythological terms that I think are closely analogous to a wide variety of narrative traditions where the synthesis of oral and textual traditions is pictured as an instantaneous cohesion, a spontaneous generation, a Big Bang. I have treated at length this type of narrative about the genesis of Homeric poetry in my book Homeric Questions.^[52] Here I need only add two points. First, the narrative of the spontaneously inspired collective translation of the Septuagint by 72 assembled wise men, as reported in the Letter of Aristeas and other sources, fits neatly the specific rhetoric of distinct Alexandrian Jewish identity, as a 1991 article by Naomi Janowitz has shown clearly.^[53] Second, it fits also the general rhetoric of generating an aetiology for a sacred text. As an aetiology, it reveals some remarkable parallels with the various aetiologies about the genesis of Homeric poetry.

§54. The testimony of the Letter of Aristeas is relevant to our discussion not only because of the parallelisms between the status of the Septuagint and the status of Homeric poetry. Even more important, the Letter of Aristeas credits none other than Demetrius, the historical figure whom Athenaeus (14.620b–c) credits with reforming the Athenian traditions of Homeric performance, as the agent responsible for the actual commissioning of the Septuagint. Here I return to the historical background, reported by a variety of sources (Strabo 9.1.20 C398, Diodorus 20.45, and Diogenes Laertius 5.78), about the initiative of Demetrius, after the death of Cassander in 297 BCE, to seek refuge at the court of Ptolemy I in Alexandria, whose first wife, Eurydice, happened to be the sister of Cassander;^[54] in Alexandria, it can be argued, Demetrius participated in the grand project of in instituting the collection of books that resulted ultimately in the Library of Alexandria.^[55]

§55. More than that, the Letter of Aristeas represents Demetrius as advising King Ptolemy to commission the Septuagint for a specific purpose, that is, so that the régime may possess the sacred text of the Alexandrian Jews. Even though the narrative of the Letter of Aristeas confuses Ptolemy I with Ptolemy II, the ideology that is being dramatized here is historically verifiable.^[56] The Ptolemies developed the policy of possessing official sacred texts representing each of the major cultural constituents of their kingdom, a prominent example being the history of Egypt by Manetho.^[57]

§56. Although the Letter of Aristeas says that Demetrius of Phaleron was head of the Library under Ptolemy II, other sources indicate Ptolemy I, not II (Eusebius Historia Ecclesiastica 5.8.11 = Irenaeus Adversus Haereses 3.21.2) while still other sources give both possibilities (Clement of Alexandria Stromateis 1.48). It is clear from the arguments assembled by Bayer 1942 (especially p. 99) that Demetrius was formally associated with Ptolemy I. On this detail, as Blum 1991 (p. 100) points out, the Letter of Aristeas has it wrong in referring to Ptolemy II instead of Ptolemy I. On the other hand, Blum (pp. 116–117n27) takes to task Pfeiffer 1968:98 for making too much of the attested references to Ptolemy I instead of II as the reputed founder of the Library (such as Eusebius and Irenaeus, as mentioned above)—as if these references supposedly had it wrong. These references, Blum argues, had it right in assuming that Demetrius was formally associated with Ptolemy I, though the Letter of Aristeas did have it wrong in assuming that Demetrius was formally associated with Ptolemy II. To quote further from Blum (p. 101): “one should not diminish the role of [Demetrius of Phaleron] in the foundation of the Alexandrian Library, as Pfeiffer and others have done.” Ptolemy II “supported the library during his forty years of government so lavishly that he was thought to have been its founder already in the second century BCE”—to quote further from Blum (p. 102). Analyzing the entry in the Suda on Zenodotus, Blum (p. 101) disputes those who infer, on the basis of what the Suda says, that Zenodotus was the first Head of the Library: “it [= the wording in the Suda] does not say that he was the first head of the library,” only that he was a head [italics supplied by me]. Arguing that this position of “head” really became defined only later, Blum (p. 102) even speculates that the rank of Zenodotus “was lower than that of Demetrios and that he was probably subordinated to him.”

§57. That said, I return to the point I was making earlier about the policy of the Ptolemies to commission authoritative Greek texts representing each of the major non-Greek cultural constituents of their kingdom. So far, we have seen the example of the Septuagint, translated into Greek from Hebrew. A most prominent further example is the History of Egypt by Manetho. As noted by Blum (1991:103), this work was supposedly dedicated to Ptolemy II Philadelphus. Blum (p. 103) also documents, in the same context, reportage about a “translated” book originally authored by Zoroaster, which was supposedly commissioned, again, in the reign of Ptolemy II. I suspect, however, that the original commissioning, in both these cases, as also in the case of the Septuagint, could be traced all the way back to the era of Ptolemy I, whose primary agent, as I am arguing, was Demetrius.

§58. The partly mythologized role of Demetrius as the agent responsible for the acquisition of the Septuagint by the Ptolemies can be drawn into a parallel with his reported role in the acquisition of Classical Greek books for the Library of Alexandria (Letter of Aristeas 9–10).^[58] The parallelism itself is of great historical interest.^[59] With regard to the role of Demetrius as a collector of the Greek Classics, it has been argued that it was in fact he who became the first de facto head of the Library of Alexandria, and that Zenodotus took over at the Library only around 291 BCE—or maybe even as late as 283 BCE, when Ptolemy II Philadelphus became sole ruler. In any case, 283 BCE marks the point when Demetrius, who had miscalculated in the politics of succession, became a persona non grata to the new king and was banished.^[60] Demetrius had been a protégé of Eurydice, the first wife of Ptolemy I and sister of Cassander, Demetrius’ deceased patron; Ptolemy II, on the other hand, was the son of Berenice, the second wife of Ptolemy II.^[61]

§59. Here I return to my description, at §25, of Demetrius as an advisor to the Ptolemaic dynasty in Egypt—an advisor whose advice led to the establishment of the great Library of Alexandria, which in turn led to the re-editing there of an Athenian City Text or koinḗ of Homer, mentioned in the formulation of Stephen V. Tracy as quoted in §23 above. For earlier Homer critics like Demetrius himself, I argue, the koinḗ text of Homer could have meant the Athenian “City Text,” as reshaped through editing by Aristotle and his Peripatetic School, while for later critics like Aristarchus, the same designation would have meant, more generally and more simply, copies derived from the Athenian “City Text.” Now that we see how Demetrius became a persona non grata to Ptolemy II and his descendants, we may ask whether such a debacle may have produced radical changes in any reference by later Alexandrian critics—starting already with Zenodotus, the protégé of Ptolemy II—to the Athenian “City Text” of Homer. Any reference by Alexandrian critics to the Athenian text, from that point onward, would be likely to underplay or even slight what may once have been a key role played by the Peripatetic figure Demetrius in curating this text—and even in its transformation into a Ptolemaic possession.^[62] The formulation of Pfeiffer (1968:95) is instructive: “the line Philitas-Zenodotus-Callimachus, of which we have stressed the non-Aristotelian character, met in Alexandria with a genuine Peripatetic line from Athens.” And, at its earliest stages at Alexandria, the Peripatetic approach was represented most visibly by Demetrius of Phaleron, as Pfeiffer concedes (p. 96). For a discussion of instances in the Homer scholia where the views attributed to Aristarchus imply an awareness of Aristotle’s views on Homer, I cite Lührs (1992:13–17).

§60. So, Demetrius was eventually slighted by the Alexandrians who studied Homer not because they were hostile to Peripatetic tradition. The legacy of Demetrius faded merely because he eventually fell out of favor with the Ptolemies. We see such a pattern of fading even when it comes to the ultimate service performed by Demetrius for the Ptolemies. There is a celebrated remark by Strabo (13.1.54 C608–609) about Aristotle’s prestige as a renowned collector of books, and in this context it is he rather than Demetrius who gets the credit—despite the historical evidence indicating otherwise—for ‘teaching’ the Ptolemies how to achieve the greatest book-collection of them all, the Library of Alexandria: Ἀριστοτέλης … πρῶτος ὧν ἴσμεν συναγαγὼν βιβλία, καὶ διδάξας τοὺς ἐν Αἰγύπτῳ βασιλέας βιβλιοθήκης σύνταξιν ‘Aristotle … was the first that we know of to collect books, and he taught the kings in Egypt how to put together a library’.

§61.This is not to say that Zenodotus and the Alexandrian critics that came after him slighted the Peripatetic tradition of Aristotle—all on account of the fallen Demetrius, that most visible of Peripatetics in early Alexandria.^[63] I am saying only that a Homeric diórthōsis or ‘editorial procedure’ linked to Aristotle, if it was strongly identified with the subsequent editorial and political activities of Demetrius of Phaleron at the Library of Alexandria, would have faded from official memory along with the man who brought it from Athens. Or, even more likely, such a diórthōsis of Aristotle could have changed identities many times over, becoming transformed into the diórthōsis of Demetrius and then into the diórthōsis of Zenodotus, whose own editorial reshaping could easily have justified in any case such a change of nomenclature.^[64]

§62. In the preceding paragraph, I have used the word diórthōsis, in the general sense of ‘editorial procedure’, with primary reference to the editing of Homer by the Peripatetics. But now we will see that the verb from which the noun diórthōsis derives, which is diorthoûn, and which means ‘correct’ in the sense of ‘regulate’—in the further sense of ‘control’—can be used in an even more general sense with reference to the custodianship of manuscript transmission. And such custodianship depends on the actual ownership of precious tests.

§63. So, we are about to see that the pieces of evidence concerning the activities of Demetrius in Egypt add up to a premier example of a historical fact: that the ideology of actually possessing the text, whether by commissioning or by acquisition, was a driving principle in the genesis of the Library of Alexandria. Witness this anecdote reported by Plutarch:

Δημήτριος ὁ Φαληρεὺς Πτολεμαίῳ τῷ βασιλεῖ παρῄνει τὰ περὶ βασιλείας καὶ ἡγεμονίας βιβλία κτᾶσθαι καὶ ἀναγινώσκειν· “ἃ γὰρ οἱ φίλοι τοῖς βασιλεῦσιν οὐ θαρροῦσι παραινεῖν, ταῦτα ἐν τοῖς βιβλίοις γέγραπται”

Demetrius of Phaleron gave King Ptolemy this advice [paraínesis]: that he should possess [ktâsthai] and read [anagignṓskein] books about kingship and hegemony, giving this as a reason: “those who are near and dear to kings do not dare to give them advice [paraínesis] about the kind of things that are written in these books.”

Plutarch Regum et imperatorum apophthegmata 189d

§64. In this regard, not enough attention has been paid to a detail recorded in Plutarch’s Life of Alexander 8.2, on the authority of Onesicritus FGH 38 F 134 (who actually accompanied Alexander on his campaigns), concerning a copy of the Iliad known as ἐκ τοῦ νάρθηκος ‘the one from the casket [nárthēx]’, which Alexander the Great reputedly used to keep under his proskephálaion ‘headrest’ as he slept. This copy, Plutarch says, had been ‘corrected by Aristotle’, Ἀριστοτέλους διορθώσαντος (8.2): in other words, the verb diorthoûn here in the sense of ‘correct’ or ‘regulate’ or even ‘control’ points to what I have been calling the diórthōsis of Aristotle. Rudolf Blum is helpful in suggesting ways to visualize the nárthēx ‘casket’ as a container big enough to accommodate the text of the Iliad: he estimates the dimensions at 40 x 30 x 25 centimeters.^[65] In what follows I offer a way to visualize further the idea of a nárthēx under the proskephálaion, sometimes mistranslated as a ‘pillow’. But first I should simply put on record my conviction that the wording used here to describe Aristotle’s work on this copy, diorthoûn ‘correct’, may yet vindicate the historicity of Plutarch’s description, thus removing the doubts expressed by Rudolf Pfeiffer concerning whether or not Aristotle had produced his own edition of Homer.^[66]

§65. There is in fact evidence linking this technical word diorthoûn with the school of Aristotle.^[67] Also relevant is Aristotle’s traditional sobriquet as the anagnṓstēs, the ‘Reader’ (PP 149). In the light of this sobriquet, I find it significant that Plutarch’s Life of Alexander describes Alexander, precisely in the context of his possessing Aristotle’s edition of Homer, as philanagnṓstēs (8.2).^[68] In this same context, Alexander is said to have taken along on his military campaigns not only this text of Homer as “edited” by Aristotle but also texts of the tragic poets Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, as well as texts of the dithyrambic poets Telestes and Philoxenus (8.3).^[69] The texts of the three tragedians must be related to the official Athenian State Script of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, commissioned by the statesman Lycurgus (“Plutarch” Lives of the Ten Orators 841f).^[70] In this connection, we may note the opinion of Rudolf Blum and others that Aristotle himself was the one who had produced, at the initiative of Lycurgus, these official Athenian texts of tragedy.^[71] Like Aristotle, Lycurgus had studied in Plato’s Academy.^[72]

§66. What is essential for the present argument is not whether this story of Plutarch about Alexander stems from a historical fact. What matters is whether the use of the story is indeed a historical fact. I suggest that it is, and that it reflects an ideology promoted by the dynasty of the Ptolemies when they came to power in Egypt. The premise of this ideology, I suggest further, is that the Ptolemies had succeeded in taking possession of the most canonical text owned by Alexander the Great, his own copy of the Iliad. When the Library of Alexandria was founded, starting in the reign of Ptolemy I and continuing into the reign of Ptolemy II, the core of its acquisitions may indeed have included texts from Alexander’s own library. The expression ἐκ τοῦ νάρθηκος ‘the one from the nárthēx’ (8.2), designating Alexander’s copy of the Iliad, seems typical of the terminology used for cataloguing new acquisitions in the Alexandrian Library.^[73]

§67. Let us return to the detail in Plutarch’s Life of Alexander 8.2 concerning a copy of the Iliad kept in a box that was placed under the proskephálaion of Alexander the Great as he slept. I prefer to translate proskephálaion as ‘headrest’. The point is that the text was under the king’s head, so that the notion ‘under the headrest’ translates into ‘under the bed under the headrest under the head’. As we will now see, not only did the king possess the text: in the logic of the story, the text possessed the king—specifically the king’s head—in his sleep.

§68. The narrative of the Life of Alexander tells of a dream that Alexander had after he conquered Egypt (26.3: νύκτωρ κοιμώμενος ὄψιν εἶδε θαυμαστήν), and according to my interpretation this dream was caused, in terms of the story, by the presence of the Homeric text under Alexander’s head. For the story of the dream, Plutarch cites as his source Heraclides Ponticus (F 140 Wehrli), and he adds explicitly that this was the story ‘believed by the people of Alexandria’ (26.3)—that is, that this story was accepted as a charter myth, as it were, of Alexandria.^[74] Moreover, the story of the dream is explicitly connected by Plutarch with Alexander’s choosing to store the Homeric Iliad in a container (26.2: αὐτὸς ἔφη τὴν Ἰλιάδα φρουρήσειν ἐνταῦθα καταθέμενος). This container had been his most precious war-prize by far, a kibōtíon ‘box’ that had been captured from his defeated enemy, King Darius (26.1). The kibōtíon ‘box’ as described here by Plutarch is clearly identical with the nárthēx that we have already seen at an earlier point in the narrative (8.2).^[75]

§69. The dream of Alexander takes place after he has been pondering where he should found the ultimate Hellenic city; in the dream, an old man with gray hair appears to him and declaims the verses that we know as Odyssey iv 354–355 (Plutarch Life of Alexander 26.5). When Alexander awakens, he realizes that the apparition was Homer and that the mention of Pharos in the Homeric verses meant that he was destined to found the ultimate city at the very site that was to become Alexandria (26.5 and following). I see here a charter myth reflecting what I have just described as the ideology of the Ptolemaic dynasty in Egypt—and, more directly, the early ideology of the Library of Alexandria. This charter myth, to repeat, would have been founded on the idea that the Ptolemies now possessed the texts of Alexander the Great, especially Aristotle’s text of Homer. According to this charter myth, as Alexander reportedly inferred after his dream, he now had Homer as his military companion (26.3: οὔκουν [οὐκ] ἀργὸς οὐδ᾿ ἀσύμβολος αὐτῷ συστρατεύειν ἔοικεν Ὅμηρος)—and so too, according to this version of the story as believed by ‘the people of Alexandria’, did the Ptolemies (26.3: εἰ δ᾿, ὅπερ Ἀλεξανδρεῖς λέγουσιν Ἡρακλείδῃ [F 140 Wehrli] πιστεύοντες, ἀληθές ἐστιν).^[76] What was ‘believed’ by ‘the people of Alexandria’ was the ideology of the Ptolemies. And this ideology, I propose, goes back to a time when Demetrius of Phaleron was still helping Ptolemy I acquire all the available books of Greek civilization, the most treasured of which could have been the text of Homer’s Iliad, the product of a diórthōsis executed by Aristotle himself.

§70. Another prominent example of this driving idea, that the Library of Alexandria was predicated on the ideological principle of possessing the canonical texts, is the report of Athenaeus (1.3a–b) concerning the patron of Zenodotus, who was none other than King Ptolemy II himself, and who reigned from 283 to 246 BCE: the king purchased the whole library of Aristotle from one Neleus, to whom it had been handed down by Theophrastus, who in turn had inherited it from his teacher Aristotle himself. Included in this collection, we might expect, were other valuable copies of Homer. But given the fact that Demetrius of Phaleron was a student of Theophrastus, we might also expect that any “State Script” of Homer, instituted under the régime of Demetrius while he was still in power in Athens, would have already incorporated the diórthōsis of Aristotle. If Demetrius had brought with him from Athens an authorized copy of such a “State Script” at the time when he was welcomed to Alexandria by Ptolemy I, then the later purchase of Aristotle’s whole library by Ptolemy II need not have significantly affected the Alexandrian textual transmission of Homer. This line of reasoning may explain in part why we find in the Homeric scholia no mention, attributed to the Alexandrian critics, of a Homeric diórthōsis by Aristotle; the results of such a diórthōsis would have been already incorporated into the text as reshaped under the régime of Demetrius of Phaleron—and as further reshaped through the Homeric diórthōsis by Zenodotus and by the later Alexandrian critics.^[77]

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Notes

[1] On Lycurgus as a cultural forerunner of Demetrius, see Mossé 1989. See also PP 157 n14. I give details at §49 below.

[2] Blum 1991:24.

[3] Blum 1991:24.

[4] Cf. FGH no. 228 p. 957. Jacoby (FGH no. 228 Notes p. 644) points out that the bibliography of Demetrius’ works as listed in Diogenes Laertius 5.80-81 tends to prove the connection of Demetrius with the Library of Alexandria (T 6b, e), in that ordinarily there are no such lists for “modern” authors. The total list, as given in Diogenes Laertius 5.80–81, is staggering. See also Sollenberger 2017.

[5] Χρειῶν α’ in the bibliography of Demetrius as given in Diogenes Laertius 5.81 has been identified with this lore about the Seven Sages: Jacoby FGH no. 228 (Notes p. 644). In Diogenes Laertius 1.22, we read about Thales of Miletus: καὶ πρῶτος σοφὸς ὠνομάσθη ἄρχοντος Ἀθήνησι Δαμασίου, καθ’ ὃν καὶ οἱ ἑπτὰ σοφοὶ ἐκλήθησαν, ὥς φησι Δημήτριος ὁ Φαληρεὺς ἐν τῇ τῶν Ἀρχόντων ἀναγραφῇ ‘and he was the first [of the Seven Sages] to be named Sage [sophós], at the time when Damasios was archon in Athens, at which time all seven Sages were to be called that, Sages, as Demetrius of Phaleron mentions in his List of Archons’ (Demetrius of Phaleron FGH 228 F 1).

[6] On the dating of Clearchus, who flourished between 300 and 250 BCE, see Bartol 1992:67, with further references.

[7] Lysanias was reportedly the teacher of Eratosthenes (as we read in the Suda, under the entry on Eratosthenes); the lifetime of Eratosthenes can be dated to the third century BCE, so that Lysanias is roughly contemporaneous with Clearchus. I draw attention to the dates of Clearchus (previous note) and Lysanias because both these relatively early sources seem to associate the art of the rhapsodes with theatrics.

[8] For an extensive discussion of the recitative format of rhapsodic performance traditions: Nagy 1990:19–28.

[9] Husson 1993. She stresses the pertinence of Athenaeus 14.620b–c to the history of Homeric performance traditions. She argues also that the comments by Robert 1936=1969:673n4 and 1983:182–184 on Homēristaí need to be modified, if ever so slightly, on the basis of this passage.

[10] Nagy 1990:26–27. See also O’Sullivan 2009:183 n50.

[11] Cf. Husson 1993:94–95.

[12] Cf. Husson 1993:95. She notes that the usage of the term Homēristaí seems to be linked with the era of Athenaeus.

[13] Timothy Boyd draws my attention to Diomedes Ars Grammatica 3.484.12–16 (fourth-century CE), where the word rhapsōidíā is associated with performance, in theatrical contexts, by Homēristaí.

[14] Husson 1993:95.

[15] Commentary in PP 161–162 n30.

[16] The historical occasion is the marriage, in the first quarter of the third century BCE, of Ptolemy II Philadelphus to his sister, Arsinoe, in accordance with the practice of Egyptian pharaohs—and in violation of Hellenic practices.

[17] See also Plato Ion 535b; cf. Husson 1993:95.

[18] Nagy 1990:25.

[19] See PP 159.

[20] Commentary in PP 163 n37.

[21] Further discussion in PP 218.

[22] On this passage, see Jones 1991:189, especially with reference to the use of weapons as props, as it were, for Homeric performance. I have more to say later about weapons as props.

[23] In LSJ under the entry Homēristḗs, it is pointed out that the word conveys a sexual double entendre in this context. For another such sexual pun involving mēr‑ in the sense of ‘thigh’, see Crates, Greek Anthology 11.218.

[24] Cf. Jones 1991:189. For a related passage, Achilles Tatius 3.20.4, see above.

[25] Cf. also Jones 1991:189.

[26] The humorous effect that is intended here may be this: one would expect an educated person to read along from a libretto written in the original Greek, as it were, but Trimalchio has to resort to a Latin translation. The implications of this detail, where someone is described as reading along while the Homeric performers recite their lines, may be pertinent to a custom dating back to fourth-century Athens.

[27] For comparative evidence in Indic traditions as observed in our own times, see PP 167 n44.

[28] Robert 1936=1969:673n4 and 1983:182–184. More details in Husson 1993:94n6.

[29] Details reviewed in PP 167–168.

[30] Husson 1993:97.

[31] Husson 1993:99.

[32] Husson 1993:99.

[33] Roueché 1993:18; this evidence was kindly brought to my attention by Geneviève Husson, per litteras (29 November 1994).

[34] Roueché 1993:22. On diaskeûos in the sense of ‘theatrical equipment’ (perhaps ‘costume’), see Roueché p. 20.

[35] Roueché 1993:24.

[36] Roueché 1993:16.

[37] Further details in PP 170 n62

[38] The passage about the Homēristaí in Petronius Satyricon 59.4–6, as discussed above, is instructive in this regard. Details in PP 170 n63.

[39] What is already “scripture” for Aristarchus may continue to be a “script” for the Homēristaí.

[40] Details in PP 171–172.

[41] See PP 141 and 144.

[42] Blum 1991:24.

[43] Blum 1991:24.

[44] What follows in §46 corresponds to PP 173–174 n74. More on this subject at PP 177 n89.

[45] Cf. Wilamowitz 1895:132 and 148, followed by Blum 1991:42, on the “theater reform” of Lycurgus. I do not agree with the opinion of Wilamowitz that the texts of the Athenian tragedians originally came into being as books intended for a reading public.

[46] See Bollack 1994.

[47] The text is quoted, translated, and interpreted in PP 175–177.

[48] There may be a comparable pattern of increased variation in theater. For possible references in New Comedy to the fall of Demetrius and to a subsequent relaxation of governmental control over the conventions of Athenian State Theater, see MacKendrick 1954; cf. Wiles 1984.

[49] What follows in this paragraph corresponds to PP 177n 89.

[50] Details in PP 177–178 n90.

[51] On which see Murray 1987.

[52] Nagy 1996b:70–75.

[53] Janowitz 1991.

[54] This crucial link between Demetrius and Ptolemy I was brought to my attention by J.D. Morgan (per litteras 30 November 1993).

[55] Cf. Blum 1991:100–101, reviewing the discussions of Wilamowitz 1924 I 22 and 165, Pfeiffer 1968:96, 99–104.

[56] What follows in §56 is an expanded rewriting of PP 197 n33.

[57] See PP 197.

[58] PP 196–198.

[59] Although the Letter of Aristeas says that Demetrius of Phaleron was head of the Library under Ptolemy II, other sources indicate Ptolemy I, not II (Eusebius Historia Ecclesiastica 5.8.11 = Irenaeus Adversus Haereses 3.21.2) while still other sources give both possibilities (Clement of Alexandria Stromateis 1.48).

[60] PP 198.

[61] PP 198.

[62] What follows in this paragraph corresponds to PP 198–199 n39 and n40.

[63] I agree with Slater 1989:42, who argues that the tradition of the Alexandrian school, which “is best represented in our surviving scholia,” was “rooted in the methods of the sophists as redefined by Aristotle.” Still, there are clear signs of anti-Peripatetic tendencies, especially in the line of thought represented by Callimachus: see Pfeiffer 1968:136–137.

[64] In this connection, we may note that Rengakos 1993:11 cautions against the reductionist mentality, evident already in the ancient world, of crediting Zenodotus, by retrojection, with all or most pre-Aristarchean variant readings of Homer. On the methods of Zenodotus in editing Homer, see Rengakos pp. 18–21 (with whom I agree that the variants reported by Zenodotus are genuine textual variants, not glosses or cited parallels, as van Thiel 1992 argues).

[65] Blum 1991:69–70 n45.

[66] Pfeiffer 1968:71–72.

[67] PP 121.

[68] For a mention, in passing, of a rhapsōidós ‘rhapsode’ who performed at a grand feast, the context of many other performances as well, arranged by Alexander the Great, I cite Athenaeus 12.538e. Worth noting is the whole narrative of the feast in Athenaeus 12.538c–539a, reporting the account of Chares in his History of Alexander (FGH 125 F 4). Cf. Pickard-Cambridge 1968:280.

[69] Telestes and Philoxenus are dated to the late fifth and early fourth centuries BCE.

[70] On which see PP 174–175.

[71] Blum 1991:42.

[72] Blum 1991:42.

[73] Witness the designation of a certain category of acquired texts as ἐκ τῶν πλοίων ‘straight off the boats’ (Galen 17.1.606.13–14).

[74] On the concept of a charter myth, see Leach 1982:5, following Malinowski 1926.

[75] On the use of the word kibōtós ‘box’ and its derivatives to designate the special storage place of texts containing a powerful political message, see Nagy 1990:171–172, 431.

[76] Relevant is the Homerizing idea, as reported by Plutarch (Life of Alexander 5.8, 15.9), of Alexander as a “second Achilles.”

[77] See PP 199. Even before the Ptolemaic acquisition of the library of Aristotle, we may expect that the Library at Alexandria already had selective access to the works produced by the school of Aristotle, as eventually represented by his successor Theophrastus: see Blum 1991:59.