* * * * *
Footnotes:
[1] Meaning, Bdelycleon will thrash you if you do not keep a good watch
on his father.
[2] The Corybantes, priests of Cybelé, comported themselves like madmen
in the celebration of their mysteries and made the air resound with the
the noise of their drums.
[3] Cleonymus had shown himself equally cowardly on all occasions; he is
frequently referred to by Aristophanes, both in this and other comedies.
[4] The cloak and the staff were the insignia of the dicasts; the poet
describes them as sheep, because they were Cleon's servile tools.
[5] An allusion to Cleon, who was a tanner.
[6] In Greek, [Greek: d_emos] ([Greek: d_emós], _fat_; [Greek: d_êmos],
_people_) means both _fat_ and _people_.
[7] A tool of Cleon's; he had been sent on an embassy to Persia (_vide_
'The Acharnians'). The crow is a thief and rapacious, just as Theorus
was.
[8] In his life of Alcibiades, Plutarch mentions this defect in his
speech; or it may have been a 'fine gentleman' affectation.
[9] Among the Greeks, _going to the crows_ was equivalent to our _going
to the devil_.
[10] No doubt the fee generally given to the street diviners who were
wont to interpret dreams.
[11] Coarse buffoonery was welcomed at Megara, where, by the by, it is
said that Comedy had its birth.
[12] To gain the favour of the audience, the Comic poets often caused
fruit and cakes to be thrown to them.
[13] The gluttony of Heracles was a constant subject of jest with the
Comic poets.
[14] The incident of Pylos (see 'The Knights').
[15] The Greek word for _friend of strangers_ is [Greek: philoxenos],
which happened also to be the name of one of the vilest debauchees in
Athens.
[16] The tribunal of the Heliasts came next in dignity only to the
Areopagus. The dicasts, or jurymen, generally numbered 500; at times it
would call in the assistance of one or two other tribunals, and the
number of judges would then rise to 1000 or even 1500.
[17] A water-clock, used in the courts for limiting the time of the
pleaders.
[18] The pebble was held between the thumb and two fingers, in the same
way as one would hold a pinch of incense.
[19] A young Athenian of great beauty, also mentioned by Plato in his
'Gorgias.' Lovers were font of writing the name of the object of their
adoration on the walls (see 'The Acharnians').
[20] [Greek: K_emos], the Greek term for the funnel-shaped top of the
voting urn, into which the judges dropped their voting pebbles.
[21] Racine has introduced this incident with some modification into his
'Plaideurs.'
[22] Although called _Heliasts_ ([Greek: H_elios], the sun), the judges
sat under cover. One of the columns that supported the roof is here
referred to.
[23] The juryman gave his vote for condemnation by tracing a line
horizontally across a waxed tablet. This was one method in use; another
was by means of pebbles placed in one or other of two voting urns.
[24] Used for the purpose of voting. There were two urns, one for each of
the two opinions, and each heliast placed a pebble in one of them.
[25] The Heliast's badge of office.
[26] To prepare him for initiation into the mysteries of the Corybantes.
[27] Who pretended to cure madness; they were priests of Cybelé.
[28] The sacred instrument of the Corybantes.
[29] _Friend of Cleon,_ who had raised the daily salary of the Heliasts
to three obols.
[30] _Enemy of Cleon._
[31] The smoke of fig-wood is very acrid, like the character of the
Heliasts.
[32] Used for closing the chimney, when needed.
[33] Which had been stretched all round the courtyard to prevent his
escape.
[34] Market-day.
[35] He enters the courtyard, returning with the ass, under whose belly
Philocleon is clinging.
[36] In the Odyssey (Bk. IX) Homer makes his hero, 'the wily' Odysseus,
escape from the Cyclops' cave by clinging on under a ram's belly, which
slips past its blinded master without noticing the trick played on him.
Odysseus, when asked his name by the Cyclops, replies, _Outis_, Nobody.
[37] A name formed out of two Greek words, meaning, _running away on a
horse_.
[38] The story goes that a traveller who had hired an ass, having placed
himself in its shadow to escape the heat of the sun, was sued by the
driver, who had pretended that he had let the ass, not but its shadow;
hence the Greek proverb, _to quarrel about the shade of an ass_, i.e.
about nothing at all.
[39] When you inherit from me.
[40] There is a similar incident in the 'Plaideurs.'
[41] A Macedonian town in the peninsula of Pallené; it had shaken off the
Athenian yoke and was not retaken for two years.
[42] A disciple of Thespis, who even in his infancy devoted himself to
the dramatic art. He was the first to introduce female characters on the
stage. He flourished about 500 B.C., having won his first prize for
Tragedy in 511 B.C., twelve years before Aeschylus.
[43] Originally subjected to Sparta by Pausanias in 478 B.C., it was
retaken by Cimon in 471, or forty-eight years previous to the production
of 'The Wasps.' The old Heliasts refer to this latter event.
[44] An Athenian general, who had been defeated when sent to Sicily with
a fleet to the succour of Leontini; no doubt Cleon had charged him with
treachery.
[45] The Samians were in league with the Persians, but a certain
Carystion betrayed the plot, and thanks to this the Athenians were able
to retake Samos before the island had obtained help from Asia.
[46] The towns of Thrace, up to that time the faithful allies of Athens,
were beginning to throw off her yoke.
[47] Who fulfilled the office of president.
[48] Meaning, "Will it only remain for us to throw ourselves into the
water?" Hellé, taken by a ram across the narrow strait, called the
Hellespont after her name, fell into the waves and was drowned.
[49] He is a prisoner inside, and speaks through the closed doors.
[50] This boiling, acid pickle reminds him of the fiery, acrid temper of
the heliasts.
[51] A name invented for the occasion; it really means, _Cleon who holds
the people in his snares_.
[52] When he entered Troy as a spy.
[53] The island of Naxos was taken by Cimon, in consequence of sedition
in the town of Naxos, about fifty years before the production of 'The
Wasps.'
[54] One of the titles under which Artemis, the goddess of the chase, was
worshipped.
[55] Demeter and Persephone. This was an accusation frequently brought
against people in Athens.
[56] An orator of great violence of speech and gesture.
[57] For Philocleon, the titulary god was Lycus, the son of Pandion, the
King of Athens, because a statue stood erected to him close to the spot
where the tribunals sat, and because he recognized no other fatherland
but the tribunals.
[58] A debauchee and an embezzler of public funds, already mentioned a
little above.
[59] Aristophanes speaks of him in 'The Birds' as a traitor and as an
alien who usurped the rights of the city.
[60] A Greek proverb signifying "Much ado about nothing."
[61] A Spartan general, who perished in the same battle as Cleon, before
Amphipolis, in 422 B.C.
[62] Meaning, the mere beginnings of any matter.
[63] This 'figure of love'--woman atop of the man--is known in Greek as
[Greek: hippos] (Latin _equus_, 'the horse'); note the play upon words
with the name Hippias.
[64] A tragic poet, who was a great lover of good cheer, it appears.
[65] Old men, who carried olive branches in the processions of the
Panathenaea. Those whose great age or infirmity forbade their being used
for any other purpose were thus employed.
[66] An obscene pun. [Greek: Choiros] means both _a sow_ and the female
organ.
[67] A celebrated actor.
[68] There were two tragedies named 'Niobé,' one by Aeschylus and the
other by Sophocles, both now lost.
[69] A double strap, which flute-players applied to their lips and was
said to give softness to the tones.
[70] The shell was fixed over the seal to protect it.
[71] A calumniator and a traitor (see 'The Acharnians').
[72] Cleonymus, whose name the poet modifies, so as to introduce the idea
of a flatterer ([Greek: kolax]).
[73] Another flatterer, a creature of Cleon's.
[74] Athenian poor, having no purse, would put small coins into mouth for
safety. We know that the triobolus was the daily of the judges. Its value
was about 4-1/2 d.
[75] A jar of wine, which he had bought with his pay.
[76] A jar with two long ears or handles, in this way resembling an ass.
[77] A well-known flute-player.
[78] We have already seen that when accepting his son's challenge he
swore to fall upon his sword if defeated in the debate.
[79] Pericles had first introduced the custom of sending poor citizens,
among whom the land was divided, into the conquered countries. The island
of Aegina had been mainly divided in this way among Athenian colonists.
[80] The choenix was a measure corresponding to our quart.
[81] A verse borrowed from Euripides' 'Bellerophon.'
[82] i.e. a legislator. The name given in Athens to the last six of the
nine Archons, because it was their special duty to see the laws
respected.
[83] Mentioned both in 'The Acharnians' and 'The Knights.'
[84] The drachma was worth six obols, or twice the pay of a heliast.
[85] We have already seen that the Athenians sometimes kept their small
money in their mouth.
[86] Which were placed in the courts; dogs were sacrificed on them.
[87] As already stated, the statue of Lycus stood close to the place
where the tribunals sat.
[88] The barrier in the Heliaea, which separated the heliasts from the
public.
[89] The whole of this comic trial of the dog Labes is an allusion to the
general Laches, already mentioned, who had failed in Sicily. He was
accused of taking bribes of money from the Sicilians.
[90] To serve for a bar.
[91] This was a customary formula, [Greek: aph' Estias archou], "begin
from Hestia," first adore Vesta, the god of the family hearth. In similar
fashion, the Romans said, _ab Jove principium_.
[92] For conviction and acquittal.
[93] On which the sentence was entered.
[94] No doubt the stew-pot and the wine-jar.
[95] The _article_ Bdelycleon had brought.--The clepsydra was a kind of
water-clock; the other vessel is compared to it, because of the liquid in
it.
[96] A title of Apollo, worshipped as the god of healing.
[97] A title of Apollo, because of the sacrifices, which the Athenians
offered him in the streets, from [Greek: aguia], a street.
[98] Bdelycleon.
[99] The formula used by the president before declaring the sitting of
the Court opened.
[100] That is, by way of fine.
[101] A reference to the peculations Laches was supposed to have
practised in keeping back part of the pay of the Athenian sailors engaged
in the Sicilian Expedition.
[102] The [Greek: Thesmothetai] at Athens were the six junior Archons,
who judged cases assigned to no special Court, presided at the allotment
of magistrates, etc.
[103] Thucydides, son of Milesias, when accused by Pericles, could not
say a word in his own defence. One would have said his tongue was
paralysed. He was banished.--He must not be confounded with Thucydides
the historian, whose exile took place after the production of 'The
Wasps.'
[104] When the judges were touched by the pleading of the orator and were
decided on acquittal, they said to the defending advocate, "_Cease
speaking, descend from the rostrum._"
[105] There were two urns, one called that of Conviction, the other of
Acquittal.
[106] Meaning, that he had at first produced pieces under the name of
other poets, such as Callistrates and Phidonides.
[107] Eurycles, an Athenian diviner, surnamed the Engastromythes ([Greek:
muthos], speech, [Greek: en gastri], in the belly), because he was
believed to be inspired by a genius within him.--The same name was also
given to the priestesses of Apollo, who spoke their oracles without
moving their lips.
[108] Some poets misused their renown as a means of seduction among young
men.
[109] Cleon, whom he attacked in 'The Knights,' the first Comedy that
Aristophanes had produced in his own name.
[110] Cynna, like Salabaccha, was a shameless courtesan of the day.
[111] The lamiae were mysterious monsters, to whom the ancients ascribed
the most varied forms. They were depicted most frequently with the face
and bosom of a woman and the body of a serpent. Here Aristophanes endows
them with organs of virility. It was said that the blood of young men had
a special attraction for them. These lines, abusive of Cleon, occur again
in the 'Peace,' II. 738-42.
[112] Socrates and the sophists, with whom the poet confounds him in his
attacks.
[113] He likens them to vampires.
[114] The third Archon, whose duty was the protection of strangers. All
cases involving the rights of citizenship were tried before him. These
were a frequent cause of lawsuit at Athens.
[115] 'The Clouds' had not been well received.
[116] Aristophanes lets it be understood that the refusal to crown him
arose from the fact that he had been too bold in his attack.
[117] To perfume their caskets, etc., the Ancients placed scented fruit,
especially oranges, in them.
[118] The pastimes of love.
[119] At Marathon, where the Athenians defeated the Persian invaders, 490
B.C. The battle-field is a plain on the north-east coast of Attica, about
twenty-seven miles from Athens.
[120] A favourable omen, of course. The owl was the bird of Athené.
[121] An allusion to Cimon's naval victories.
[122] The Cyclades islands and many towns on the coast of Asia Minor.
[123] The tribunals.
[124] The six last Archons presided over the civil courts and were styled
Thesmothetae (see above).
[125] Magistrates, who had charge of criminal cases.
[126] Built by Pericles. Musical contests were held there. Here also took
place distributions of flour, and the presence of the magistrates was no
doubt necessary to decide on the spot any disputes that might arise
regarding this.
[127] This, says the Scholiast, refers to magistrates appointed for the
upkeep of the walls. They were selected by ballot from amongst the
general body of Heliasts.
[128] The demagogues and their flatterers.
[129] The battle of Artemisium on the Euboean coast; a terrible storm
arose and almost destroyed the barbarian fleet, while sparing that of the
Athenians.
[130] A mantle trimmed with fur.
[131] A rural deme of Attica. Rough coats were made there, formed of
skins sewn together.
[132] An effeminate poet.
[133] He compares the thick, shaggy stuff of the pelisse to the
intestines of a bullock, which have a sort of crimped and curled look.
[134] An Attic talent was equal to about fifty-seven pounds avoirdupois.
[135] He grumbles over his own good fortune, as old men will.
[136] Lamia, the daughter of Belus and Libya, was loved by Zeus. Heré
deprived her of her beauty and instilled her with a passion for blood;
she is said to have plucked babes from their mothers' breast to devour
them. Weary of her crimes, the gods turned her into a beast of prey.
[137] Theagenes, of the Acharnian deme, was afflicted with a weakness
which caused him to be constantly letting off loud, stinking farts, even
in public--the cause of many gibes on the part of the Comic poets and his
contemporaries.
[138] He had been sent on a mission as an armed ambassador, i.e. as a
common soldier, whose pay was two obols.
[139] The [Greek: pankration] was a combined exercise, including both
wrestling and boxing.
[140] All these names have been already mentioned.
[141] Each time Philocleon takes up the song with words that are a satire
on the guest who begins the strain.
[142] King Admetus (Euripides' 'Alcestis') had suffered his devoted wife
Alcestis to die to save his life when ill to death. Heracles, however, to
repay former benefits received, descended into Hades and rescued Alcestis
from Pluto's clutches.
[143] A famous epicure, the Lucullus of Athens (see 'The Acharnians').
[144] A parasite renowned for his gluttony.
[145] A town in Thessaly.
[146] Because of his poverty.
[147] Four lines in 'The Knights' describe the infamous habits of
Ariphrades in detail.
[148] That is, it ceases to support it; Aristophanes does the same to
Cleon.
[149] Referring to Lysistratus' leanness.
[150] A tragic actor, whose wardrobe had been sold up, so the story went,
by his creditors.
[151] He enters, followed closely by the persons he has ill-used, and
leading a flute-girl by the hand.
[152] Meaning his penis.
[153] Dardanus, a district of Asia Minor, north of the Troad, supplied
many flute-girls to the cities of Greece.
[154] Pointing to the flute-girl's _motte_.
[155] He tells his son the very story the latter had taught him.
[156] The name of the baker's wife.
[157] Or Agoranomi, who numbered ten at Athens.
[158] The disciple of Socrates.
[159] Lasus, a musician and dithyrambic poet, born about 500 B.C. in
Argolis, was the rival of Simonides and thought himself his superior.
[160] Ino, the daughter of Cadmus and Harmonia. Being pursued by her
husband, Athamas, whom the Fury Tisiphoné had driven mad, she threw
herself into the sea with Melicerta, whereupon they were both changed
into sea-goddesses.--This is the subject of one of Euripides' tragedies.
[161] A famous town in Magna Graecia, south coast of Italy.
[162] A celebrated physician.--Philocleon means, "Instead of starting an
action, go and have yourself cared for; that is better worth your while."
[163] The dances that Thespis, the originator of Tragedy, interspersed
with the speaking parts of his plays.
[164] A verse borrowed from an unknown Tragedy.
[165] As was done in the stadia when the races were to be started.
[166] The ancients considered it a specific against madness.
[167] Phrynichus, like all the ancient tragic writers, mingled many
dances with his pieces.
[168] Tragic poet. His three sons had also written tragedies and were
dancers into the bargain.
[169] Carcinus, by a mere transposition of the accent ([Greek:
karkívos]), means _crab_ in Greek; hence the pun.
[170] Carcinus' sons were small and thin.
[171] The third son of Carcinus.
[172] Meaning, the three sons of Carcinus, the dancers, because, as
mentioned before, Phrynichus often introduced a chorus of dancers into
his Tragedies.
[173] Carcinus himself.
[174] The Greek word is [Greek: triorchoi]--possessed of three testicles,
of three-testicle power, inordinately lecherous; with the change of a
letter ([Greek: triarchoi]) it means 'three rulers,' 'three kinglets.'