Ovid, Metamorphoses, 3.511-73

Ingo Gildenhard, Andrew Zissos

Description

This extract from Ovid's 'Theban History' recounts the confrontation of Pentheus, king of Thebes, with his divine cousin, Bacchus, the god of wine. Notwithstanding the warnings of the seer Tiresias and the cautionary tale of a character Acoetes (perhaps Bacchus in disguise), who tells of how the god once transformed a group of blasphemous sailors into dolphins, Pentheus refuses to acknowledge the divinity of Bacchus or allow his worship at Thebes. Enraged, yet curious to witness the orgiastic rites of the nascent cult, Pentheus conceals himself in a grove on Mt. Cithaeron near the locus of the ceremonies. But in the course of the rites he is spotted by the female participants who rush upon him in a delusional frenzy, his mother and sisters in the vanguard, and tear him limb from limb.

The episode abounds in themes of abiding interest, not least the clash between the authoritarian personality of Pentheus, who embodies 'law and order', masculine prowess, and the martial ethos of his city, and Bacchus, a somewhat effeminate god of orgiastic excess, who revels in the delusional and the deceptive, the transgression of boundaries, and the blurring of gender distinctions.

This course book offers a wide-ranging introduction, the original Latin text, study aids with vocabulary, and an extensive commentary. Designed to stretch and stimulate readers, Gildenhard and Zissos's incisive commentary will be of particular interest to students of Latin at AS and undergraduate level. It extends beyond detailed linguistic analysis to encourage critical engagement with Ovid's poetry and discussion of the most recent scholarly thought.

Sujets

• Ovidio
• Vocabulary
• Metamorphoses
• Latin literature
• Commentary
• Ovid
• Metamorphoses (album)
• Myth

Informations

• Publié par: Open Book Publishers
• Date de parution: 05 septembre 2016
• Nombre de lectures: 1
• EAN13: 9781783740857
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 4 Mo

Extrait

OVID, METAMORPHOSES , 3.511–733


Ovid, Metamorphoses , 3.511–733
Latin Text with Introduction, Commentary, Glossary of Terms, Vocabulary Aid and Study Questions
Ingo Gildenhard and Andrew Zissos






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© 2016 Ingo Gildenhard and Andrew Zissos.


This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license (CC BY 4.0). This license allows you to share, copy, distribute and transmit the text; to adapt the text and to make commercial use of the text providing attribution is made to the authors (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work). Attribution should include the following information:
Ingo Gildenhard and Andrew Zissos, Ovid, Metamorphoses, 3.511–733. Latin Text with Introduction, Commentary, Glossary of Terms, Vocabulary Aid and Study Questions . Cambridge, UK: Open Book Publishers, 2016. http://dx.doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0073
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This is the fifth volume of the Classics Textbooks series:
ISSN: 2054-2437 (Print)
ISSN: 2054-2445 (Online)
ISBN Paperback: 978-1-78374-082-6
ISBN Hardback: 978-1-78374-083-3
ISBN Digital (PDF): 978-1-78374-084-0
ISBN Digital ebook (epub): 978-1-78374-085-7
ISBN Digital ebook (mobi): 978-1-78374-086-4
DOI: 10.11647/OBP.0073
Cover image: Central panel of the Pentheus mosaic depicting Pentheus being killed by Theban maenads, an episode in Euripides’ play The Bacchae , excavated in Nîmes in 2007, 2nd half of 2nd century AD/3rd century AD, Nîmes Archaeology Museum. Photo by Carole Raddato, https://www.flickr.com/photos/carolemage/16382722126 , CC BY-SA 2.0.
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Contents
Acknowledgements
vii
Abbreviations
ix
Symbols and Terms
ix
Reference Works
ix
Grammatical Terms
x
Ancient Literature
x
Introduction
1
1.
Ovid and His Times
3
2.
Ovid’s Literary Progression: Elegy to Epic
9
3.
The Metamorphoses : A Literary Monstrum
13
3a.
Genre Matters
14
3b.
A Collection of Metamorphic Tales
16
3c.
A Universal History
19
3d.
Anthropological Epic
25
3e.
A Reader’s Digest of Greek and Latin Literature
27
4.
Ovid’s Theban Narrative
31
5.
The Set Text: Pentheus and Bacchus
39
5a.
Sources and Intertexts
39
5b.
The Personnel of the Set Text
45
6.
The Bacchanalia and Roman Culture
65
Text
69
Commentary
115
511–26: Tiresias’ Warning to Pentheus
119
527–71: Pentheus’ Rejection of Bacchus
135
531–63: Pentheus’ Speech
137
572–691: The Captive Acoetes and his Tale
163
692–733: Pentheus’ Gruesome Demise
207
Appendices
223
1.
Versification
225
2.
Glossary of Rhetorical and Syntactic Figures
235
Bibliography
241


Acknowledgements
The present volume joins other commentaries in the OBP Classics Textbook Series, which is designed to offer support and stimulation to student-readers. We would like to express our gratitude to Alessandra Tosi for her patience throughout a longer gestation period than she must have initially hoped for and Inge Gildenhard for supplying the illustrations. A special thanks goes to John Henderson, who twice, virtually overnight, supplied us per litteras with copious notes of nonpareil insight. We have incorporated a number of his notes into the Introduction and the Commentary, attributing these simply to ‘John Henderson’ (to be distinguished from A. A. R. Henderson, whose commentary on Metamorphoses 3 we occasionally cite as ‘Henderson 1979’). He tried his best to inject the project with an appropriate dose of Dionysiac spirit, and if readers don’t find the final product as tipsy as it ought to be, the blame’s on us.
* * *
Note on translations : unless indicated otherwise, translations of Greek and Latin texts are from the Loeb Classical Library, often somewhat modified.


Statue of Ovid in Constanţa, Romania. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Constanta_-_Ovid-Platz_-_Statue_des_Ovid.jpg


Abbreviations
Symbols and Terms
§
Indicates a section (e.g. of the Introduction or of a reference work).
*
Indicates a term defined in either Appendix 1 (Versification) or Appendix 2 (Glossary of Rhetorical and Syntactic Figures).
⌣
Indicates a syllable that scans short (for details of scansion, see Appendix 1 ).
—
Indicates a syllable that scans long (for details of scansion, see Appendix 1 ).
CE/BCE
Common Era/Before Common Era (a designation for the calendar year, equivalent to AD/BC). In this volume CE should be assumed when no indication is provided.
Comm.
Refers to the Commentary in this volume.
Intro.
Refers to the Introduction (normally with following section specification).
n.
Refers to an entry in the Commentary (normally with preceding line specification).
Reference Works
AG
Allen and Greenough’s New Latin Grammar for Schools and Colleges , edited by J. B. Greenough, G. L. Kitteredge, A. A. Howard, and B. L. D’Ooge (Boston, 1903).
CIL
Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum (Berlin, 1862).
L-S
A Latin Dictionary , edited by C. T. Lewis and C. Short (Oxford, 1879).
LSJ
A Greek-English Lexicon , 9th edition, with Supplement, edited by H. J. Liddle and R. Scott, revised by H. S. Jones (Oxford, 1968)
OLD
Oxford Latin Dictionary , edited by P. G. W. Glare (Oxford, 1968–82).
TLL
Thesaurus Linguae Latinae (Leipzig, 1900).
Grammatical Terms
abl.
ablative (similarly nom. = nominative; gen. = genitive; dat. = dative; acc. = accusative)
act.
active voice (similarly pass. = passive voice)
fut.
future tense (similarly perf. = perfect; pres. = present; etc.)
indic.
indicative (similarly subjunct. = subjunctive)
part.
participle
pers.
person
pl.
plural (similarly sing. = singular)
Ancient Literature
Apollod.
Apollodorus, Bibliotheca (Library)
Ap. Rhod.
Apollonius Rhodius, Argonautica
Apul.
Apuleius
Met.
Metamophoses (or Golden Ass)
Arat.
Aratus
Phaen.
Phaenomena
Cat.
Catullus, Carmina (Poems)
Cic.
Cicero
Fam.
Leg.
Nat. D.
Epistulae ad Familiares (Letters to his Friends)
De Legibus (On the Law)
De Natura Deorum (On the Nature of the Gods)
Enn.
Ennius
Ann.
Annales (Annals)
Eur.
Euripides
Bacch.
Bacchae
Hdt.
Herodotus, Histories
Hes.
Hesiod
Op.
Opera et Dies (Works and Days)
Hom.
Homer
Il.
Od.
Iliad
Odyssey
Hor.
Horace
Carm.
Epod.
Carmina (Odes)
Epodes
Hyg.
Hyginus
Fab.
Fabulae
Hymn. Hom.
Homeric Hymns
Liv.
Livy, Ab urbe condita
Luc.
Lucan, Bellum Civile (Civil War)
Lucr.
Lucretius, De Rerum Natura
Mart.
Martial
Ep.
Epigrams
Ov.
Ovid
Am.
Ars
Fast.
Her.
Met.
Trist.
Amores
Ars Amatoria (The Art of Love)
Fasti
Heroides
Metamorphoses
Tristia
Plaut.
Plautus
Cas.
Merc.
Casina
Mercator
Plin.
Pliny (the Elder)
NH
Naturalis Historia (Natural History)
Plut.