IGII34 507 Choregic dedication from Anagyrous

Choregic dedication from Anagyrous

IG II³ 4 507 Date: Mid-4th cent. BC

With a chorus of sweet laughter, [he] once [was victorious] at the Dionysia, and [he set up] this gift to the god as memorial of victory, an ornament for the deme and an object of emulation for his father, garlanded with ivy; for even before him [he won] the crown-bearing [contest].^[1]

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References:

IG II³ 4 507 (Translated text) (IG Online)

IG II² 3101 (PHI)

CEG 2, no. 773

Agelidis, Weihgeschenke 63

Bultrighini, Demi della Paralia, 48-50

Csapo and Wilson II, 79-81

Translation by: Stephen Lambert, Claudio Huayna Avila

Monument type: Base

Inscription type: Dedication (choregic)

Findspot: Near Vari (Aghioi Pantes church) = Ancient Anagyrous (In situ)

Transliterations on Places on

[1] Built into the altar of the church of Aghioi Pantes near the ancient necropolis of the deme Anagyrous, this choregic dedication commemorates a victory at the Dionysia "with a chorus of sweet laughter" (1), i.e. in comedy (the same epithet, "with sweet laughter", is used in reference to comedy on the gravestone of the comic actor, and poet?, Euthias, IG II² 11387), and alludes to another (prior, or subsequent) victory by the dedicant’s father. The text comprises four hexameter verses, which is rather unusual for choregic inscriptions (cf. IG I³ 833bis and 1027bis) and the poetic language presents interpretative puzzles, which might have been easier to resolve if the monument had been fully preserved (Csapo-Wilson note that there must have been text elsewhere on the monument naming the father and son referred to, and that text might also have supplied further information about the context of the victories). Some (e.g. Whitehead, Demes of Attica, 1986, 46 n. 32, 234-5) have understood the context to be the City Dionysia, but Csapo and Wilson follow others in arguing (attractively) for the Anagyrasian "Rural" Dionysia, as making better sense of l. 3 (“ornament for the deme”) and as most likely also supplying the context of another dedication, IG I³ 969 (see also the inscribed theatre seat, IG II³ 4, 1714 which likely derived from Anagyrous). This is therefore one of a number of cases where it is becoming clear that monuments from the demes once thought to commemorate the City Dionysia are actually evidence for a flourishing theatrical and performance culture in the demes themselves in the fifth and fourth centuries BC. In general on choregic monuments of the "Rural" Dionysia, see IG II³ 4, 498. We follow Wilson in interpreting ll. 4-5 as implying that the dedicant followed in his own son's footsteps as choregic victor, in a reversal of the usual pattern of son following father, but Csapo and Wilson also consider the opposite interpretation, taking zēlon as "an object of pride", rather than "an object of emulation", "for the father, garlanded with ivy; for even before him (the son) he (the father) won the crown-bearing contest.”

Added: 9 May 2022
Updated: 22 Feb 2023
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