IEleus 53 Choregic dedication from Eleusis commemorating victorious performances directed by Aristophanes and Sophocles

Choregic dedication from Eleusis commemorating victorious performances directed by Aristophanes and Sophocles

I Eleusis 53 Date: 414/3-386/5 BC

Gnathis son of Timokedes and Anaxandrides son of Timagoras, serving as sponsors (chorēgontes), were victors in comedy: Aristophanes directed (edidasken); another victory in tragedy: (5) Sophokles directed (edidasken).^[1]

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References:

I Eleusis 53 (Translated text) (PHI)

IG II² 3090 (PHI)

IG I³ 970 (IG Online)

Agelidis, Weihgeschenke 90

Tracy, Athenian Lettering, 152

Csapo and Wilson II, 93-95

Translation by: Stephen Lambert, Feyo Schuddeboom

Images: Cornell - (1, 2)

Monument type: Base

Inscription type: Dedication (choregic)

Findspot: Eleusis (Eleusis Museum E 946)
Findspot: Eleusis (Eleusis Museum E 254)

Transliterations on Places on

[1] This dedication from Eleusis was erected to commemorate a victory in a competition in comedy by two theatrical sponsors (choregoi), both, it seems, demesmen of Eleusis, and a second victory (on a later occasion?) in tragedy (ll. 4-5). The winning performances were directed (and "direction" in the Athenian theatre at this period usually implies authorship) by two of the most famous names in Greek theatre, Aristophanes in comedy, and Sophocles in tragedy, though it is not certain that the older Sophocles is meant rather than his like-named grandson. The only firm indicator of the date of the inscription is that it is a work of Tracy's "Cutter of IG II² 17", whose working life spanned the years 414/3-386/5 BC (coincidentally he ended his career at about the same time as Aristophanes), and who was the most prolific cutter of his time. It is not clear from the text whether the victories were won in city festivals (i.e. the City Dionysia for the tragedy and the Lenaia for the comedy), or the local Dionysia at Eleusis. The joint sponsorship (synchoregia) implied by our text has been seen as favouring the latter, since synchoregia at the City Dionysia was apparently limited to the year 406/5 BC (Aristotle F630 Rose, cf. E. Capps, Hesp. 12, 1943, 5-9), and is not attested at all at the Lenaia, and in 405 BC Sophocles was dead and his like-named grandson was not yet active. This argument is emphasised most recently by Csapo and Wilson, 94-95 (see also Humphreys Kinship, 1118), who also point to other evidence linking the family of Gnathis (l. 1) to the Dionysia at Eleusis: a Gnathis, most likely son or grandson of our sponsor, was demarch of Eleusis ca. mid-iv BC, and I Eleusis 70 shows that the Eleusinian Dionysia in his year of office was a "particularly illustrious occasion"; and Timokedes son of Timasios, a member of the same family, was co-dedicator to Dionysos at Eleusis on I Eleusis 79. On the prosopography see also Whitehead, Demes, p. 410 no. 11, pp. 427-28 nos. 160, 169, 170; Humphreys Kinship, 1124-25. As for the plausibility of "big names" putting on plays at local Attic Dionysia cf. the anecdote at Aelian VH 2.13 recounting that Socrates would go down to the Piraeus theatre when a play of Euripides was performed there. Cf. also IG I³ 969 and IG II³ 4, 498, with notes.

LL. 3 and 5, recording the names of Aristophanes and Sophocles, are in smaller letters. The base supported a column which in turn probably carried another object (a statue?). A series of small holes in the top of the base probably received metal rods to support decorative features (crowns?) or to serve as a protective grille.

For other dedications relating to the Dionysia at Eleusis see IG II³ 4, 504 and IG II³ 4, 509.

If this inscription does relate to the Eleusinian Dionysia, it is the earliest evidence for it. Eleusis famously hosted the Mysteries and the Eleusinia, but these festivals were administered by the city rather than the deme Eleusis, whose major festival (as typically in other demes) was its local ("Rural") Dionysia (cf. IG II³ 4, 498, with notes). Performances will have taken place in the local theatre of Dionysos, traces of which were noted by early travellers, apparently on the south side of the "Akris" (the hill on which the sanctuary of Demeter and Kore was located) facing the sea and looking across to Salamis, but whose precise site (and that of the putatively adjacent sanctuary of Dionysos) is not known (see Csapo and Wilson, 88-92, who, building on a theory of H. R. Goette, in E. Csapo et al. eds., Greek Theatre in the Fourth Century BC, 84 with n. 8, suggest that there may in fact have been two theatres at Eleusis). On the decrees of the deme Eleusis see I Eleusis 68, with notes. For deme decrees of Eleusis honouring Thebans resident in the deme (pipe-players and -teachers?) for their contribution to the Dionysia in mid-iv BC see I Eleusis 70 and 71. Funding choruses (for a dithyrambic competition?), one of boys, one of men, i.e. in effect acting as choregoi, seems to have been their main contribution. It is apparent from these decrees that the deme, like the city and other demes, awarded the privilege of seats of honour in the theatre (proedria) to officials and benefactors (I Eleusis 68?, 70, 71, 72, 80, 84, 96, 99, 101); announced honours at the Dionysia at the tragedies (I Eleusis 68?, 70, 72, 80, 84, 99, the honours awarded by the Kerykes and Eumolpidai, ca. 229/8-203 BC, I Eleusis 201, are also to be announced then); and might set up its inscribed decrees there (I Eleusis 70 "Dionysion", 71 "theatre of the Eleusinians", 72?). Except for I Eleusis 201, all these decrees are datable ca. 350-300 BC. The Eleusinian Dionysia reappears in the epigraphical record in mid-ii BC, perhaps in circumstances of revival, see I Eleusis 229, with n. 7.

In addition to these decrees and the three choregic dedications there are two other inscribed dedications to Dionysos from Eleusis, I Eleusis 79, commemorating the crowning of four men by the deme, and IG II³ 4, 970, by the daughter of a man from Pithos, in circumstances which are unclear. On the religious connections between the cults of Demeter and Kore and of Dionysos at Eleusis (in the context of the Mysteries more commonly identified as "Iakchos") see Csapo and Wilson, pp. 87-88. [SDL]

Added: 14 Apr 2021
Updated: 25 Jan 2024
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