The Acharnians of Aristophanes

Rogers says In the ‘Introduction’ to his edition of The Acharnians that if only one of Aristophanes’ Comedies survived to our day, The Acharnians ‘would have given us the most comprehensive idea of the range of Aristophanic satire … With the prodigality of youth’ – The Acharnians is Aristophanes’ third Comedy, but from the first two are extant only fragments – ‘the poet runs through the whole gamut of his likes and dislikes; his longing for Panhellenic unity, as in the great days of Marathon and Salamis; his efforts for right and justice, to\ eu] kai\ to\ di/kaion, in Athenian public life; and again the special objects of his aversion, as contravening these aims – the demagogues, the Informers, the war-party, the sophists, the lowering of the old heroic tragedy by Euripides – are all brought before us in turn; the germs of almost all his later efforts are discoverable in this early production.

The general idea of the play is very simple. An honest citizen [Dikaiopolis, dikaios ‘just’ polis ‘city’], finding it impossible to get the State to conclude a peace with Sparta, makes a private peace on his own account; and thenceforward is represented as living in all the joys and comforts of Peace, whilst the rest of the City continues to suffer the straits and the miseries of War.’ (xxvi)

Let me end this introductory post with the closing scene of the play. A messenger comes hurrying in, to rouse the household of Lamachus – the representative of War – and urge them to make all the necessary preparations for the reception of their wounded master.

Lamachus re-enters, wounded and dizzy with pain, supported by some rough male attendants. Dikaiopolis re-enters, jovial and dizzy with wine, supported by some gentle female attendants.

In his note on line 1174 – w} dmw~ej oi4 kat’ oi]ko/n e0ste Lama/xou ‘Varlets who dwell in Lamachus’ halls’ (translation Rogers) – Rogers point to ‘the similarity between the accident to Lamachus here (diaphdw~n ta/fron ‘leaping over a trench’) and the manner of his death some eleven years later, e0pidiaba\j ta/fron tina\ (‘crossing over a ditch’), kai\ monwqei\j met’ oli/gwn tw~n cundiaba/ntwn (‘and left isolated there with a few others who crossed the bridge with him’), a0poqnh/skei au0to/j te kai\ pe/nte h2 e4c tw~n met’ au0tou= (‘he and five or six of his men were killed’) – Thucydides vi. 101. And it is quite possible that Thucydides selected the particular word ta/froj there, in consequence of its occurrence here. Some remarks on the relation between the historian and the dramatist will be found in the Introduction.’