11 MENANDER, the son of Diopeithes and Hegesistrata', and the nephew of the comedian Alexis, was born at Athens in B.C. 3423, while his father was absent on the Hellespont station'. He spent his youth in the house of his uncle, and received from him and from Theophrastus instructions in poetry and philosophy": he may have derived from the latter the knowledge of character for which he was so eminent. In 321 B. C. his first Comedy came out; it was called 'Opyn. He wrote on the whole 105 or 108" comedies, and gained the prize eight times: 115 titles of comedies ascribed to him have come down to us; it is not certain, however, that all these are correctly attributed to him 10. He died at Athens in the year 291 B. C." According to one account he was drowned while bathing in the harbour of the Peiræus 12. It appears from the encomiums which are heaped upon him13, that he was by far the best writer of the Comedy of Manners among the Greeks. We have a few specimens of the ingenuity of his plots in some of the plays of Terence, whom Julius Cæsar used to call a demi-Menander 1. He was an imitator of Euripides, and we may infer from what Quintilian says of him", that his comedies differed from the tragicomedies of that poet only in the absence of mythical subjects and a chorus. Like Euripides, he was a good rhetorician, and Quintilian is inclined to attribute to him some orations published in the name of Charisius 16. The every-day life of his country 13 4. Comp. Ulpian ad Demosth. p. 54, 3. with Dionys. Dinarch. p. 666. 5. Proleg. Aristoph. p. xxx. Diogen. Laërt. v. 36. 6. Proleg. Aristoph. p. xxx. 8. Apollod. ap. Aul. Gell. xvii. 4. Κηφισιεὺς ὧν ἐκ Διοπείθεος πατρός, 7. Euseb. ad Olyn. 114, 4. πρὸς τοῖσιν ἑκατὸν πέντε γράψας δράματα 9. Suidas, γέγραφε κωμωδίας ρη'. 10. Fabricius, II. p. 460, 468. Harles. 12. 11. Clinton, F. H. II. p. 181. A line in the "Ibis" attributed to Ovid is supposed by some to allude to this. (591). Comicus ut mediis periit dum nabat in undis. 13. Quintil. x. 1, 69. Plutarch. tom. ix. p. 387. seqq. Reiske. and Dio Chrysost. xviii. p. 255. 14. Donatus vit. Terentii. 15. X. 1, 69. 16. X. 1, 70. man, and manners and characters of ordinary occurrence, were the objects of his imitation'. His plots, though skilfully contrived, are somewhat monotonous; there are few of his Comedies which do not bring on the stage a harsh father, a profligate son, and a roguish slave'. In his person Menander was foppish and effeminate3. He wrote several prose works. A statue was erected to his memory in the Theatre at Athens3. The date of the birth of DIPHILUS is unknown; it is stated that he exhibited at the same time with Menander". He was born at Sinope', and died at Smyrna. Of one hundred Comedies, which he is said to have written, the names of forty-eight are preserved. The "Casina" of Plautus is borrowed from his Kλnpovμevo; and Terence tells us, that he introduced into the "Adelphi" a literal translation of part 1. Aristoph. Byz. ap. Schol. Hermogenis, p. 38. Manilius, v. 472. 2. Ardentes juvenes, raptasque in amore puellas, Veniebat gressu delicato et languido. Quisnam cinædus ille in conspectu meo Hic est Menander scriptor.-Phædrus, v. i. 9. Prorsus si quis Menandrico fluxu delicatam vestem humi protrahat. 4. Suidas, Μένανδρος. 5. Pausan. i. 21. 1. Tertullian, c. iv. de Pallio. 6. Δίφιλος Σινωπεύς, κατὰ τὸν αὐτὸν χρόνον ἐδίδαξε Μενάνδρῳ, τελευτᾷ δὲ ἐν Σμύρνῃ, δράματα δὲ αὐτοῦ ρ ́. Proleg. Arist. p. xxxi. 7. Strabo, xii. p. 546. 8. Fabricius, II. p. 438. Harles. 9. Clerumenæ vocatur hæc comœdia Græce; Latine Sortientes, Diphilus Hanc Græce scripsit, post id rursum denuo Latine Plautus cum latranti nomine. Prolog. Casinæ. 30-32. of the Συναποθνήσκοντες of Diphilus'. It appears from a fragment of Machon, that he wrote prologues to his dramas, which were probably very like the prologues of the Latin Comedians, though they were, we think, originally borrowed (like all the New Comedy) from the tragedies of Euripides. APOLLODORUS, of Gela, is also called a contemporary of Menander. The "Phormio" of Terence is a translation from his 'Emidika Cóuevos, and the "Hecyra,” which is said in the didascalia to have been taken from Menander, was, according to Donatus, also borrowed from this poet. POSIDIPPUS, the son of Cyniscus of Cassandreia, wrote thirty comedies; the titles of fifteen of these are known, and some of them were latinized like those of the three last men tioned poets'. He began to exhibit in 289 B. c. two years after the death of Menander5. The Greek Comedy properly ends with Posidippus, but there are some writers of a later date called comedians. RHINTHON, of Tarentum, is called a comedian, by Suidas, but his plays seem to have been rather phlyacographies, or tragi-comedies. He flourished in the reign of Ptolemy. The titles of six of his plays are known". SOPATER, of Paphos, was a writer of the same kind; and also SOTADES, of Crete, who flourished about the year 280 B. C., and wrote in the Ionic dialect'. MACHO wrote comedies at Alexandria about the year He was a Corinthian or Sicyonian by birth, and the 230 B.C. 1. Synapothnescontes Diphili comœdiast: Eam Conmorientes Plautus fecit fabulam. 2. Athen. xiii. p. 580. A. " ὁ Δίφιλος, νὴ τὴν ̓Αθηνῶν καὶ θεοὺς ψυχρόν γ', ἔφη, 3. On the two comedies of this name see Clinton, F. H. III. p. 521—2, 4. Aul. Gell. II. 23. 6. Clinton, F. H. III. p. 486. 5. Suidas, Ποσίδιππος. instructor of Aristophanes, of Byzantium'. APOLLODORUS, of Carystus, who is confounded with the Apollodorus of Gela mentioned above, was a contemporary of MACHO. He exhibited at Athens. Of twenty-four comedies which are mentioned under the name of Apollodorus, four are ascribed to the earlier poet, six to the later, and four to both. The remaining ten are quoted under the name of Apollodorus without any ethnic distinction2. 1. Athenæus, vi. p. 241. E. F. xiv. 664. A. |