§ 12 Records of Dramatic Contests
It is difficult in modern times to realize fully the keenness of the interest with which the various dramatic contests were regarded by the old Athenians, and the value which was attached to victories obtained in them. The greatest statesman was proud to be successful with a chorus in tragedy or comedy. It was a proof both of his taste and of his munificence. The tragic poet held as high a place in the popular estimation as the orator or the general. Victorious competitors were not content with the mere temporary glory they obtained. Every care was taken to perpetuate the memory of their success in a permanent form. Elaborate records were also erected by the state. A description of the various kinds of memorials, of which fragments have been preserved, will be a convincing proof of the enthusiasm with which the drama was regarded in ancient times.
First, as to the private monuments. These were erected by the victorious choregi, and appear to have differed widely in style and costliness, according to the wealth and taste of the individuals. Thus the mean man in Theophrastus, when he had been successful with a tragic chorus, was content to erect a mere wooden scroll in commemoration of his victory.177 Another cheap device was to dedicate some article of theatrical costume, such as an actor’s mask.178 But the ordinary form of memorial, in the case of the dramatic contests, consisted of a marble tablet, containing a painting or sculptured relief.179 At first, no doubt, these tablets were of small size and simple workmanship; but in course of time, with the growth of luxurious habits, they began to assume a more elaborate form. For instance, the monument set up by Xenocles in 306 was about fourteen feet high, the tablet being enclosed in a magnificent architectural structure, with columns and entablature.180 The paintings and reliefs upon the tablets were no less variable. Some of them depicted masks, or crowns of victory, or similar emblems; others contained representations of Dionysus or Silenus. Sometimes groups of figures were portrayed, such as a chorus of singers with the choregus in the centre. Sometimes a scene was inserted from the tragedy or comedy in which the victory had been obtained.181 But though the tablets differed in magnificence, the inscriptions upon them were generally simple and concise, and consisted merely of the names of the poet and choregus, and of the archon for the year, with the addition in later times of the name of the actor. The record inscribed by Themistocles in honour of his tragic victory in 476 ran as follows:182—
Choregus, Themistocles of Phrearria:
Poet, Phrynichus:
Archon, Adeimantus.
As regards public memorials, we can hardly doubt that from the earliest period records of the different contests were preserved in the official archives. But in addition to these documentary registers, elaborate monuments of stone were erected by the state in or near to the theatre of Dionysus. Considerable fragments of these monuments have been discovered by recent excavations. They may be divided into three classes. The first class consisted of records of all the contests at some one particular festival. Such records were of the most general description, and contained merely a list of victors’ names. Fragments have been discovered of the records of the contests at the City Dionysia during the fifth and fourth centuries.183 The style is the same throughout. The boys’ choruses are mentioned first, then the choruses of men, then comedy, and tragedy last of all. In the dithyrambic contests the names of the victorious tribe and choregus are given; in the dramatic contests the names of the victorious choregus and poet. The only difference between the earlier and later portions of the record is that towards the middle of the fifth century the name of the tragic actor begins to be appended.
The second class of public monuments was devoted to the record of one particular kind of contest at a particular festival. Records are extant of tragedy at the Lenaea in the fifth century, and at the City Dionysia in the fourth; also of comedy at the Lenaea in the third century, and at the City Dionysia in the second.184 The names of all the competing poets are given, together with the titles of the plays they produced, and the names of the actors who performed them. At the end comes the name of the actor who won the prize for acting. If there was any reproduction of an old tragedy or comedy, the name of the play is given, together with the name of the actor.
The third class of monument consisted of lists of tragic and comic actors, and tragic and comic poets, with numerals after each of them, denoting the number of victories they had won in the course of their career. There were separate lists for the City Dionysia and the Lenaea. There were consequently eight lists in all, four for each festival. Numerous fragments have been discovered, but unfortunately the most interesting parts are not always the best preserved.185 Still, they throw light upon several small points in connexion with the drama. One fragment confirms the statement of Diodorus, that the number of Sophocles’ victories was eighteen. At any rate that is proved to have been the number of his victories at the City Dionysia. Cratinus is represented as having won three victories at the City Dionysia and six at the Lenaea. This tallies exactly with the account of Suidas, who gives the total number of his victories as nine.186
None of the public monuments, of which fragments have been recovered, appear to have been erected before the third century, or, at the earliest, the latter part of the fourth century B.C. But there can be no doubt that similar monuments existed at a much earlier period. These earlier records, together with the choregic inscriptions and the documents in the public archives, must have been the source from which Aristotle derived the information contained in his two books about the contests at the Dionysia. Of these two books the first was called ‘Dionysiac Victories’, and though it is never quoted by ancient writers, it probably contained the same sort of information as the first and third classes of public monuments. The other book was called the ‘Didascaliae’, and is very frequently referred to and quoted from.187 It contained lists of the poets who competed at each festival, together with the names of the plays they produced. It was therefore similar to the second class of monuments. ‘Didascalia,’ in its dramatic sense, meant originally the teaching and training of a chorus. It then came to denote the play or group of plays produced by a poet at a single festival.188 Lastly, it was used to denote a record concerning the production of a play or group of plays. It is in this sense that Aristotle used it as the title of his book. The work would not be a mere compilation from existing records and monuments. It must have required some care and research. For instance, when a poet had his plays brought out vicariously, we cannot doubt that the name of the nominal author was entered in the public records, and not that of the real poet. Aristophanes usually brought out his plays in this manner. Then again a poet’s plays were sometimes brought out after his death in the name of his son. In these and similar cases it would be the duty of the compiler of a work like Aristotle’s to correct the mistakes of the public records, and to substitute where necessary the name of the real author of the play. Corrections of this kind were no doubt made by Aristotle and his successors. The Didascaliae of Aristotle is the ultimate source of our information as to the production and the success of the plays of the great Athenian dramatists. Callimachus, the grammarian of Alexandria, wrote a book of a similar kind, based upon Aristotle’s work.189 It was from Callimachus that Aristophanes, the grammarian, derived the information which he incorporated in his Arguments to the Greek plays.190 The existing Arguments are mainly fragments of the work of Aristophanes.191 Thus the process of derivation from Aristotle can be traced step by step. The list of victors at the City Dionysia for the year 458, which was dug up at Athens a few years ago, tallies in every particular with the facts recorded in the Argument to the Agamemnon of Aeschylus.192