Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-8ctnn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T08:20:11.894Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Statius on parade: performing Argive identity in Thebaid 6.268–95

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 February 2013

Helen Lovatt
Helen Lovatt
Affiliation:
University of Nottingham
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

In book 6 of the Thebaid, Statius puts on a funeral for a baby prince (Opheltes) accidentally crushed by the flick of a giant serpent's tail, while his nurse is busy telling her life story to the leaders of the Argive army on their way to Thebes. The Argives hold full-scale funeral games, which represent an opportunity to play with epic predecessors and create a new world between Greece and Rome, epic and reality. At 268–95, nine days after Opheltes' funeral pyre has burnt out, after the crowd have arrived for the games and before the chariot race, Statius stages a procession. I give the full passage:

exin magnanimum series antiqua parentum

inuehitur, miris in uultum animata figuris.

primus anhelantem duro Tirynthius angens

pectoris attritu sua frangit in ossa leonem.

haud ilium impauidi quamuis et in aere suumque

Inachidae uidere decus. pater ordine iuncto

laeuus harundineae recubans super aggere ripae

cernitur emissaeque indulgens Inachus urnae.

Io post tergum, iam prona dolorque parentis,

spectat inocciduis stellatum uisibus Argum.

ast illam melior Phariis erexerat aruis

Iuppiter atque hospes iam tunc Aurora colebat.

Tantalus inde parens, non qui fallentibus undis

inminet aut refugae sterilem rapit aera siluae,

sed pius et magni uehitur conuiua Tonantis.

parte alia uictor curru Neptunia tendit

lora Pelops, prensatque rotas auriga natantes

Myrtilos et uolucri iam iamque relinquitur axe.

et grauis Acrisius speciesque horrenda Coroebi

et Danae culpata sinus et in amne reperto

tristis Amymone, paruoque Alcmena superbit

Hercule tergemina crinem circumdata luna.

iungunt discordes inimica in foedera dextras

Belidae fratres, sed uultu mitior astat

Aegyptus; Danai manifestum agnoscere ficto

ore notas pacisque malae noctisque futurae.

mille dehinc species, tandem satiata uoluptas

praestantesque uiros uocat ad sua praemia uirtus.

(Thebaid 6.268-95)

Type
Research Article
Information
The Cambridge Classical Journal , Volume 53 , 2007 , pp. 72 - 95
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s). Published online by Cambridge University Press 2007

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

WORKS CITED

Barchiesi, A. (2005) ‘Learned eyes: poets, viewers, image-makers’, in Galinsky, G. K. (ed.) The Cambridge companion to the age of Augustus, Cambridge, 281–305.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beard, M. (2003) ‘The triumph of the absurd: Roman street theatre’, in Edwards, C. and Woolf, G. (eds.) Rome the cosmopolis, Cambridge, 21–43.Google Scholar
Beard, M. (2004) ‘Writing ritual: the triumph of Ovid’, in Barchiesi, A., Rüpke, J. and Stephens, S. (eds.) Rituals in ink, Munich, 115–26.Google Scholar
Beard, M., North, J. and Price, S. (1998) Religions of Rome, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Bettini, M. (1991) Anthropology and Roman culture, tr. Van Sickle, J., Baltimore.Google Scholar
Boyd, B. W. (1995) ‘Non enarrabile textum: ecphrastic trespass and narrative ambiguity in the Aeneid’, Vergilius 41, 71–90.Google Scholar
Brown, J. (1994) ‘Into the woods: narrative studies in the Thebaid of Statius with special reference to books IV-VI’, PhD thesis, University of Cambridge.Google Scholar
Cancik, H. (1965) Untersuchungen zur lyrischen Kunst des P. Papinius Statius, Hildesheim.Google Scholar
Cropp, M. J. (ed.) (2000) Iphigenia in Tauris, Warminster.Google Scholar
Dominik, W. J. (1994) The mythic voice of Statius, Leiden.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Duncan, T. S. (1914) The influence of art on description in the poetry of P. Papinius Statius, Baltimore.Google Scholar
Elsner, J. (ed.) (1996) Art and text in Roman culture, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Elsner, J. (ed.) (2002) ‘The genres of ekphrasis’, Ramus 31, 1–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Feldherr, A. (1995) ‘Ships of slale: Aeneid 5 and Augustan circus spectacle’, Classical Antiquity 14, 245–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Flower, H. I. (1996) Ancestor masks and aristocratic power in Roman culture, Oxford.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fortgens, H. W. (ed.) (1934) P. Papinii Statii de Opheltis funere carmen epicum, Theb. Lib. VII–295, versione Batava commentarioque exegetico instructum, diss., Zutphen.Google Scholar
Fowler, D. (1991) ‘Narrate and describe: the problem of ecphrasis’, JRS 81, 25–35.Google Scholar
Fowler, D. (2000) ‘Even better than the real thing: a tale of two cities’, in Roman constructions, Oxford, 86–108.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gale, M. (1997) ‘The shield of Turnus’, Greece & Rome 44, 176–96.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gerber, D. (ed.) (1982) Pindar's Olympian one, Toronto.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hardie, P. R. (1986) Virgil's Aeneid: cosmos and imperium, Oxford.Google Scholar
Harris, H. A. (1972) Sport in Greece and Rome, London.Google Scholar
Harrison, S. (1997) ‘The survival and supremacy of Rome: the unity of the shield of Aeneas’, JRS 87, 70–6.Google Scholar
Harrison, S. (1998) ‘The sword-belt of Pallas: moral symbolism and political ideology (Aen. 8.630–728)’, in Stahl, H.-P. (ed.) Vergil's Aeneid: Augustan epic and political context, Swansea, 223–42.Google Scholar
Henderson, J. (2002) ‘A doo-dah-doo-dah-dey at the races: Ovid Amores 3.2 and the personal politics of the Circus Maximus’, Classical Antiquity 21, 41–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hill, D. E. (ed.) (1983) P. Papini Stati Thebaidos libri XII, Leiden.Google Scholar
Horsfall, N. (ed.) (2000) Virgil, Aeneid 7: a commentary, Leiden.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Horsmann, G. (1998) Die Wagenlenkerder römischen Kaiserzeit. Untersuchungen zu ihrer sozialen Stellung, Stuttgart.Google Scholar
Hubbard, T. (1987) ‘The “cooking” of Pelops: Pindar and the process of mythological revisionism’, Helios 14, 3–21.Google Scholar
Humphrey, J. H. (1986) Roman circuses. Arenas for chariot-racing, Berkeley.Google Scholar
Instone, S. (ed.) (1996) Pindar: selected odes, Warminster.Google Scholar
Köhler, J. (1996) Pompai: Untersuchungen zur hellenistischen Festkultur, Frankfurt am Main.Google Scholar
Kurke, L. (1991) The traffic in praise: Pindar and the poetics of social economy, Ithaca.Google Scholar
Kyle, D. G. (1987) Athletics in ancient Athens, Leiden.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Legras, L. (1905) Étude sur la Thébaïde de Stace, Paris.Google Scholar
Lovatt, H. V. (2002) ‘Statius' ekphrastic games’, Ramus 31, 73–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lovatt, H. V. (2005) Statius and epic games: sport, politics and poetics in the Thebaid, Cambridge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McKay, A. G. (1998) ‘Non enarrabile textum? The shield of Aeneas and the triple triumph in 29 BC’, in Stahl, H.-P. (ed.) Vergil's Aeneid: Augustan epic and political context, London, 199–222.Google Scholar
McNelis, C. (2007) Statius' Thebaid and the poetics of civil war, Cambridge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mitchell, S. (1990) ‘Festivals, games and civic life in Roman Asia Minor’, JRS 80, 183–93.Google Scholar
Nagy, G. (1990) Pindar's Homer, Baltimore.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Novara, A. (1987) ‘Imagines de l'Élysée virgilien’, in Hinard, F. (ed.) La mort, les morts et l'au-delà dans la monde romain, Caen, 321–49.Google Scholar
O'Brien, M. J. (1988) ‘Tantalus in Euripides' Orestes’, RM 131, 30–45.Google Scholar
Putnam, M. C. J. (1998) Virgil's epic designs: ekphrasis in the Aeneid, New Haven.Google Scholar
Rice, E. E. (1983) The grand procession of Ptolemy Philadelphus, Oxford.Google Scholar
Ripoll, F. (1998) La morale héroïque dans les épopées latines d'époque flavienne: tradition et innovation, Louvain and Paris.Google Scholar
Rogers, G. M. (1991) The sacred identity of Ephesos: foundation myths of a Roman city, London.Google Scholar
Shackleton, Bailey D. R. (2000) ‘On Statius' Thebaid’, HSCP 100, 463–76.Google Scholar
Shackleton, Bailey D. R. (2003) Statius Thebaid, Cambridge, Mass.Google Scholar
Stewart, A. (1993) Faces of power: Alexander's image and Hellenistic politics, Berkeley.Google Scholar
Thomas, R. F. (1998) ‘The isolation of Turnus: Aeneid book 12’, in Stahl, H.-P. (ed.) Vergil's Aeneid: Augustan epic and political context, Swansea, 271–302.Google Scholar
Thompson, D. J. (2000) ‘Philadelphus' procession: dynastic power in a Mediterranean context’, in Mooren, L. (ed.) Politics, administration and society in the Hellenistic and Roman world, Leuven, 364–88.Google Scholar
Thuillier, J.-P. (1996) Le sport dans la Rome antique, Paris.Google Scholar
Versnel, H. S. (1970) Triumphus: an inquiry into the origin, development and meaning of the Roman triumph, Leiden.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vessey, D. W. T. C. (1973) Statius and the Thebaid, Cambridge.Google Scholar
von Stosch, G. (1968) Untersuchungen zu den Leichenspielen in der Thebais des P. Papinius Statius, Dusseldorf.Google Scholar
West, D. (1990) ‘Cernere erat: The shield of Aeneas’, in Harrison, S. (ed.) Oxford readings in Vergil's Aeneid, Oxford, 295–304.Google Scholar
West, M. L. (ed.) (1987) Euripides Orestes, Warminster.Google Scholar
Wheeler, S. M. (1999) A discourse of wonders, Philadelphia.Google Scholar
Willcock, M. M. (1973) ‘The funeral games of Patroclus’, BICS 20, 1–11.Google Scholar
Williams, R. D. (1990) ‘The sixth book of the Aeneid’, in Harrison, S. (ed.) Oxford readings in Vergil's Aeneid, Oxford, 191–207.Google Scholar
Wray, D. (2007) ‘Wood: Statius' Silvae and the poetics of genius’, Arethusa 40.2, 127–44.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Young, D. C. (1993) ‘Something like the gods: a Pindaric theme and the myth of Nemean 10’, GRBS 34, 123–32.Google Scholar