Aristophanes and Old Comedy

A Look at the Genre

More of This Feature • Aristophanes' Individual Plays

Related Resources • Aristophanes Links • Tragedy • The Roman Origins of Satire (Horace) • Plautus • Athenian Months • Fourth Century B.C. Timeline

From Other Guides • Aristophanes - Classic Literature

According to Horace (serm. I.4.1), there were 3 recognized great writers of Old Comedy:

1. Cratinus,
2. Eupolus and
3. Aristophanes.

Aristophanes is the only one whose work has survived. After Old Comedy came Middle Comedy and then New Comedy, which was translated in Rome (e.g., Plautus). From Rome it was transmitted and modified during the Renaissance and continues in the modern world of television and movies. New Comedy looks at human relations, while Old Comedy satirizes the life of the polis. For this reason Old Comedy is called political comedy and bears marked similarity to modern political cartoons. Another difference between Old Comedy and New is that the chorus is a central feature of older drama (whether tragedy or comedy). The creatures, human, animal or otherwise, form the chorus, and provide the name for many of Aristophanes' plays, e.g., frogs.

Festivals for Dionysus

Comedies were performed at religious fertility festivals in honor of Dionysus, in the month of Elaphebolion, at the City Dionysia (or Great Dionysia) and in the month of Gamelion, at the Lenaia. Until the Peloponnesian War, 5 comedies were performed, but during the war, the number was reduced to 3. In the pre-war period, the 10th of the month of Elaphebolion (March) was, according to classical philologist Albin Lesky, reserved for comedy. Tragedies were performed on the other days of the festival: 11th-13th Elaphebolion. During the war, comedies were performed each afternoon, following the morning's tragic tetralogy (a series of 3 tragedies and a satyr play) -- probably on the 10th-13th, excluding the 12th. At the Lenaia, too, 5 poets took part until the war reduced the number to 3. Like the tragedians, writers of comedy were judged and awarded prizes. The most successful writer of Old Comedy was Magnes, with 11 victories at the City Dionysia. We know that he wrote a Wasps, Frogs, and probably a Birds. The first comedy victor was Chionides in 486, while the last competition we know of from inscriptions was in 120 B.C.

Print References on Aristophanes:

The Complete Plays of Aristophanes, edited by Moses Hadas
A History of Greek Literature, by Albin Lesky
The Clouds, by K.J. Dover

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