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Xanthias Rathbunae
Xanthias refers to several characters, notably all slaves, who appear in plays by the Ancient Greek playwright Aristophanes. History In ''The Frogs'', Xanthias is the slave of Dionysus. He delivers the opening line of the play, riding on Dionysus' donkey and debating with Dionysus about what jokes Xanthias can make. He and Dionysus trade barbs throughout the play, with Xanthias generally coming out on top. When they cross the Acheron, Xanthias is forced to carry the luggage around the lake because he was unable to participate in the Battle of Arginusae, allegedly due to pinkeye. In the underworld, Xanthias is forced by Dionysus to trade attire three times, to comedic effect—when Dionysus is dressed as Heracles, he is threatened by Aeacus, the hostess, and an ornery maid, while Xanthias as Heracles is welcomed joyfully by a nice maid. Xanthias also manages to trick Aeacus into whipping both him and Dionysus to avoid having monsters set upon him. Once the confusion about master and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Xanthias Heracles BM VaseF233
Xanthias refers to several characters, notably all slaves, who appear in plays by the Ancient Greek playwright Aristophanes. History In ''The Frogs'', Xanthias is the slave of Dionysus. He delivers the opening line of the play, riding on Dionysus' donkey and debating with Dionysus about what jokes Xanthias can make. He and Dionysus trade barbs throughout the play, with Xanthias generally coming out on top. When they cross the Acheron, Xanthias is forced to carry the luggage around the lake because he was unable to participate in the Battle of Arginusae, allegedly due to pinkeye. In the underworld, Xanthias is forced by Dionysus to trade attire three times, to comedic effect—when Dionysus is dressed as Heracles, he is threatened by Aeacus, the hostess, and an ornery maid, while Xanthias as Heracles is welcomed joyfully by a nice maid. Xanthias also manages to trick Aeacus into whipping both him and Dionysus to avoid having monsters set upon him. Once the confusion about master and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Wasps
''The Wasps'' ( grc-x-classical, Σφῆκες, translit=Sphēkes) is the fourth in chronological order of the eleven surviving plays by Aristophanes. It was produced at the Lenaia festival in 422 BC, during Athens' short-lived respite from the Peloponnesian War. As in his other early plays, Aristophanes satirizes the Athenian general and demagogue Cleon. He also ridicules the law courts, one of the institutions that provided Cleon his power. The play has been thought to exemplify Old Comedy. Plot The play begins with a strange scene—a large net has been spread over a house, the entry is barricaded and two slaves, Xanthias and Sosias, are sleeping in the street outside. A third man is positioned at the top of an exterior wall with a view into the inner courtyard but he too is asleep. The two slaves wake and we learn from their banter that they are keeping guard over a "monster." The man asleep above them is their master and the monster is his father—he has an unusual disease ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Birds (play)
''The Birds'' ( grc-gre, Ὄρνιθες, Órnithes) is a comedy by the Ancient Greek playwright Aristophanes. It was performed in 414 BC at the City Dionysia in Athens where it won second place. It has been acclaimed by modern critics as a perfectly realized fantasy remarkable for its mimicry of birds and for the gaiety of its songs. Unlike the author's other early plays, it includes no direct mention of the Peloponnesian War and there are few references to Athenian politics, and yet it was staged not long after the commencement of the Sicilian Expedition, an ambitious military campaign that greatly increased Athenian commitment to the war effort. In spite of that, the play has many indirect references to Athenian political and social life. It is the longest of Aristophanes's surviving plays and yet it is a fairly conventional example of Old Comedy. The plot of the play revolves around Pisthetaerus, an Athenian who convinces the birds to create a great city in the sky, and thus r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Strepsiades
''The Clouds'' ( grc, Νεφέλαι ''Nephelai'') is a Greek comedy play written by the playwright Aristophanes. A lampooning of intellectual fashions in classical Athens, it was originally produced at the City Dionysia in 423BC and was not as well received as the author had hoped, coming last of the three plays competing at the festival that year. It was revised between 420 and 417BC and was thereafter circulated in manuscript form. No copy of the original production survives, and scholarly analysis indicates that the revised version is an incomplete form of Old Comedy. This incompleteness, however, is not obvious in translations and modern performances. Retrospectively, ''The Clouds'' can be considered the world's first extant "comedy of ideas" and is considered by literary critics to be among the finest examples of the genre. The play also, however, remains notorious for its caricature of Socrates and is mentioned in Plato's '' Apology'' as a contributor to the philosopher' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Clouds
''The Clouds'' ( grc, Νεφέλαι ''Nephelai'') is a Greek comedy play written by the playwright Aristophanes. A lampooning of intellectual fashions in classical Athens, it was originally produced at the City Dionysia in 423BC and was not as well received as the author had hoped, coming last of the three plays competing at the festival that year. It was revised between 420 and 417BC and was thereafter circulated in manuscript form. No copy of the original production survives, and scholarly analysis indicates that the revised version is an incomplete form of Old Comedy. This incompleteness, however, is not obvious in translations and modern performances. Retrospectively, ''The Clouds'' can be considered the world's first extant "comedy of ideas" and is considered by literary critics to be among the finest examples of the genre. The play also, however, remains notorious for its caricature of Socrates and is mentioned in Plato's '' Apology'' as a contributor to the philosopher' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ecclesiazusae
''Assemblywomen'' ( grc-gre, Ἐκκλησιάζουσαι ''Ekklesiazousai''; also translated as, ''Congresswomen'', ''Women in Parliament'', ''Women in Power'', and ''A Parliament of Women'') is a comedy written by the Greek playwright Aristophanes in 391 BC. The play invents a scenario where the women of Athens assume control of the government and institute reforms that ban private wealth and enforce sexual equity for the old and unattractive. In addition to Aristophanes' political and social satire, ''Assemblywomen'' derives its comedy through sexual and scatological humor. The play aimed to criticize the Athenian government at the time.Zumbrunnen, John. "Fantasy, Irony, And Economic Justice In Aristophanes' Assemblywomen And Wealth." American Political Science Review 100.3 (2006): 319–333. International Bibliography of Theatre & Dance with Full Text. Web. 25 Sept. 2016. Plot The play begins with Praxagora emerging from a house on an Athenian street before daybreak. She ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lysistrata
''Lysistrata'' ( or ; Attic Greek: , ''Lysistrátē'', "Army Disbander") is an ancient Greek comedy by Aristophanes, originally performed in classical Athens in 411 BC. It is a comic account of a woman's extraordinary mission to end the Peloponnesian War between Greek city states by denying all the men of the land any sex, which was the only thing they truly and deeply desired. Lysistrata persuades the women of the warring cities to withhold sexual privileges from their husbands and lovers as a means of forcing the men to negotiate peace—a strategy, however, that inflames the battle between the sexes. The play is notable for being an early exposé of sexual relations in a male-dominated society. Additionally, its dramatic structure represents a shift from the conventions of Old Comedy, a trend typical of the author's career. It was produced in the same year as the ''Thesmophoriazusae'', another play with a focus on gender-based issues, just two years after Athens' catastrophic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Empusa
Empusa or Empousa (; ; ''plural'': ''Empousai'') is a shape-shifting female being in Greek mythology, said to possess a single leg of copper, commanded by Hecate, whose precise nature is obscure. In Late Antiquity, the empousai have been described as a category of phantoms or spectres, equated with the lamiai and mormolykeia, thought to seduce and feed on young men. In antiquity The primary sources for the ''empousa'' in Antiquity are Aristophanes's plays (''The Frogs'' and ''Ecclesiazusae'') and Philostratus's ''Life of Apollonius of Tyana''. Aristophanes The Empusa has been defined in the Sudas and by Crates of Mallus as a "demonic phantom". with shape-shifting abilities. Thus in Aristophane's plays she is said to change appearance from various beasts to a woman. The Empusa is also said to be one-legged, namely, having one brass leg,). or a donkey's leg, thus being known by the epithets Onokole (Ὀνοκώλη) and Onoskelis (Ὀνοσκελίς) which they mean "Donke ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Phrynichus (comic Poet)
Phrynichus (; grc-gre, Φρύνιχος) was a poet of the Old Attic comedy and a contemporary of Aristophanes. His first comedy was exhibited in 429 BC. He composed ten plays, of which the ''Recluse'' was exhibited at the City Dionysia in 414 along with the ''Birds'' of Aristophanes and gained the third prize. His ''Muses'' carried off the second prize at the Lenaia in 405, Aristophanes being first with the ''Frogs'', in which he accuses Phrynichus of employing vulgar tricks to raise a laugh, of plagiarism and bad versification, and of lowbrow politics. Surviving titles and fragments The surviving 86 fragments of his work may be found in Theodor Kock, ''Comicorum atticorum fragmenta'' (Teubner, 1880). *''Ephialtes'' ("Ephialtes") *''Konnos'' *''Kronos'' ("Cronus In Ancient Greek religion and mythology, Cronus, Cronos, or Kronos ( or , from el, Κρόνος, ''Krónos'') was the leader and youngest of the first generation of Titans, the divine descendants of the prim ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peace (play)
''Peace'' ( grc-gre, Εἰρήνη ''Eirḗnē'') is an Athenian Old Comedy written and produced by the Greek playwright Aristophanes. It won second prize at the City Dionysia where it was staged just a few days before the validation of Peace of Nicias, which promised to end the ten-year-old Peloponnesian War, in 421 BC. The play is notable for its joyous anticipation of peace and for its celebration of a return to an idyllic life in the countryside. However, it also sounds a note of caution, there is bitterness in the acknowledgment of lost opportunities, and the ending is not happy for everyone. As in all of Aristophanes' plays, the jokes are numerous, the action is wildly absurd and the satire is savage. Cleon, the pro-war populist leader of Athens, is once again a target for the author's wit, even though he had died in the Battle of Amphipolis just a few months earlier. Plot Short summary: Trygaeus, a middle-aged Athenian, miraculously brings about a peaceful end to the Pelopon ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Knights
''The Knights'' ( grc, Ἱππεῖς ''Hippeîs''; Attic: ) was the fourth play written by Aristophanes, who is considered the master of an ancient form of drama known as Old Comedy. The play is a satire on the social and political life of classical Athens during the Peloponnesian War, and in this respect it is typical of all the dramatist's early plays. It is unique, however, in the relatively small number of its characters, and this was due to its vitriolic preoccupation with one man, the pro-war populist Cleon. Cleon had prosecuted Aristophanes for slandering the polis with an earlier play, ''The Babylonians'' (426 BC), for which the young dramatist had promised revenge in ''The Acharnians'' (425 BC), and it was in ''The Knights'' (424 BC) that his revenge was exacted. ''The Knights'' won first prize at the Lenaia festival when it was produced in 424 BC. Plot ''The Knights'' is a satire on political and social life in 5th-century BC Athens. The characters are drawn from real ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Slave
Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perform some form of work while also having their location or residence dictated by the enslaver. Many historical cases of enslavement occurred as a result of breaking the law, becoming indebted, or suffering a military defeat; other forms of slavery were instituted along demographic lines such as Racism, race. Slaves may be kept in bondage for life or for a fixed period of time, after which they would be Manumission, granted freedom. Although slavery is usually involuntary and involves coercion, there are also cases where people voluntary slavery, voluntarily enter into slavery to pay a debt or earn money due to poverty. In the course of human history, slavery was a typical feature of civilization, and was legal in most societies, but it is no ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
