Amphitryo, Asinaria, Aulularia, Bacchides, Captivi Amphitryon, The Comedy of Asses, The Pot of Gold, The Two Bacchises, The Captives

Produced by Ted Garvin, Louise Hope and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net






[Transcriber’s Note:
Footnotes are collected at the end of each play. Where a footnote refers
to an omitted passage, the verses before and after the omission have been
numbered in parentheses:
(182)
(184)
All other line numbers are from the original text.]

       *       *       *       *       *


                 P L A U T U S

        With an English Translation by

                  PAUL NIXON
        Dean of BOWDOIN COLLEGE, Maine



                In Five Volumes


        I

        AMPHITRYON
        THE COMEDY OF ASSES
        THE POT OF GOLD
        THE TWO BACCHISES
        THE CAPTIVES




          Cambridge, Massachusetts
          HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS

                    London
            WILLIAM HEINEMANN LTD


             _First printed_ 1916

       *       *       *       *       *

                   CONTENTS


     Greek Originals of the Plays........vii
     Introduction.........................ix
     Bibliography.......................xvii
  I. Amphitruo, or Amphitryon..............1
 II. Asinaria, or the Comedy of Asses....123
III. Aulularia, or the Pot of Gold.......231
 IV. Bacchides, or the Two Bacchises.....325
  V. Captivi, or the Captives............459
     Index...............................569

[Transcriber’s Note:
The Index of Proper Names is not included in this e-text.]

       *       *       *       *       *


THE GREEK ORIGINALS OF THE PLAYS IN THIS VOLUME


In this and each succeeding volume a summary will be given of the
consensus of opinion[1] regarding the Greek originals of the plays in
the volume and regarding the time of presentation in Rome of Plautus’s
adaptations. It may be that some general readers will be glad to have
even so condensed an account of these matters as will be offered them.

The original of the _Amphitruo_ is not now thought to have been a work
of the Middle Comedy but of the New Comedy, very possibly Philemon’s
Νὺξ μακρά. A clue to the Greek play’s date is found in the
description of Amphitryon’s battle with the Teloboians,[2] a battle
fought after the manner of those of the Diadochi who came into
prominence at the death of Alexander the Great. The date of the
Plautine adaptation of this play, as in the case of the _Asinaria_,
_Aulularia_, _Bacchides_,[3] and _Captivi_, is quite uncertain, beyond
the fact that it no doubt belongs, like almost all of his extant work,
to the last two decades of his life, 204-184 B.C. The _Amphitruo_ is
one of the five[4] plays in the first two volumes whose scene is not
laid in Athens.

The Ὀναγός of a certain Demophilus,[5] otherwise unknown to us, was
the onginal of the _Asinaria._ The assertion of Libanus that he is his
master’s Salus[6] is thought to be a fling at the honours decreed
certain of the Diadochi, who were called, while still alive, Σωτῆρες.
This possibility, together with the fact that the Pellaean[7] merchant
and the Rhodian[8] Periphanes travel to Athens-- northern Greece and the
Aegaean therefore being pacified and Athens at peace with Macedon--would
indicate that the Ὀναγός was written while Demetrius Poliorcetes
controlled Macedon, 294-288 B.C.

Very slender evidence connects the _Aulularia_ with some unknown play
of Menander’s in which a miser is represented δεδιὼς μή τι τῶν ἔιδον
ὁ καπνος οἴχοιτο φερων. Euclio’s distress[9] at seeing any smoke
escape from his house seems at least to suggest that Plautus may have
borrowed the _Aulularia_ from Menander. The allusion to _praefectum
mulierum_,[10] rather than _censorem_, would seem to show that in the
original γυναικοι ομον had been written; this would prove the Greek
play to have been presented while Demetrius of Phalerum was in power
at Athens (317-307 B.C.), where he introduced this detested office,
which was done away with by 307 B.C.

Ritschl[11] has shown clearly enough that the original of the
_Bacchides_ was Menander’s Δὶς ἐξαπατῶν. The fact that Athens, Samos,
and Ephesus are at peace, that the Aegaean is not swept by hostile
fleets, that one can travel freely between Athens and Phoeis, together
with the allusion to Demetrius,[12] lead one to believe that the Δὶς
ἐξαπατῶν was written either between the years 316-307 or 298-296 B.C.

The original of the _Captivi_ is quite unknown, while the war between
the Aetolians and Eleans gives the only clue to the date of this
original. Hueffner[13] considers it probable that the war was that
between Aristodemus and Alexander, and the Greek play was produced
shortly after 314 B.C. Others[14] assume that the scene of the play
would not be Aetolia unless Aetolia had become an important state,
and that the war was therefore one of the third century B.C.

  [Footnote 1: See especially Hueffner, _De Plauti Comoediarum Exemplis
  Atticis_, Göttingen, 1894; Legrand, _Daos_, Paris, 1910, English
  translation by James Loeb under title _The New Greek Comedy_, William
  Heinemann, 1916; Leo, _Plautinische Forschungen_, Berlin, 1912.]

  [Footnote 2: _Amph._ 203 _seq._]

  [Footnote 3: Produced later than the _Epidicus._ Cf.