Paolo B. Cipolla
Note:I wish to thank Menelaos Christopoulos, Athina Papachrysostomou and Andreas P. Antonopoulos for kindly inviting me to the International Conference, and David Flynn for revising the English text of my chapter.
Abstract
Aeschylus’ Aitnaiai was produced to celebrate the new foundation of Aitna by Hieron of Syracuse, who in 476 BC replaced the Chalcidian inhabitants of Katane with Dorian soldiers. The plot was based on the myth of the Palici, local Sikel deities, which was reshaped by Aeschylus into a Greek cultural framework. Scholars have interpreted this either as a legitimation of Syracusan dominion over Eastern Sicily or as a message of peaceful coexistence and fruitful integration of different cultural and ethnic components (Sikels, Ionians, Dorians). This chapter attempts to show that the former interpretation is probably the correct one and that the play was perceived by its original audience, especially by the Sikels, as an expression of Greek cultural and political imperialism.
In 476 BC the inhabitants of the two major Chalcidian towns of Eastern Sicily, Naxos and Katane, were forced by Hieron of Syracuse to leave their land and move to Leontini. Naxos remained abandoned,1 Katane received 10,000 new settlers from Syracuse and Peloponnese and was renamed Aitna after the nearby volcano: to its new inhabitants Hieron distributed the land which belonged formerly to Katane and to the neighbouring country. According to Diodorus Siculus, our chief source for these events,2 Hieron’s purpose was to have at his disposal a considerable military force ready for every eventuality and to obtain for himself a heroic cult as oikistes after his death. The new foundation was celebrated by Pindar in his First Pythian and by Aeschylus3 in Aitnaiai4 (The women of Aitna). The drama has not survived, but the plot can be reconstructed from a passage of Macrobius’ Saturnalia:5 it was based on a local Sicilian myth, about which, according to Macrobius, Aeschylus was the first Greek author to write. Zeus abducted the Sicilian nymph Thalia and left her pregnant near the river Symaethus; the nymph then feared revenge from Hera, so she prayed to be swallowed by the earth, which was what happened. When the time of the pregnancy was up, she gave birth to twins: they emerged from the soil and were named ‘Palici’ from πάλιν (‘again’) and ἵκω/ἱκνέομαι (‘to come’), because they had sunk into the earth when they were still in their mother’s womb, and then, after their birth, they ‘came again’ into the light.6 Then, Macrobius goes on illustrating their cult: there are two small volcanic lakes in Sicily, not very far from the place where the Palici were born,7 which are called ‘craters’ and ‘Delli’ by the local inhabitants, and regarded as ‘brothers of the Palici’:8 they are very deep and always seething with a continuous water jet, which appears to be the manifestation of the divine power of the twin deities.9 Therefore, they are worshipped with great honour and their power serves as a trial by ordeal for testing the truth of oaths. When the responsibility for a theft or something similar is disputed, the man whose account needs to be proved approaches the craters and performs an oath by invoking the Palici: if he is telling the truth, he remains unharmed; otherwise, he dies immediately in the lake.10
Then Macrobius quotes the Greek sources of his account, starting with four verses from Aeschylus’ drama (fr. 6 Radt, a stichomythia between two unknown speakers) where the etymology of the name ‘Palici’ is explained:
–Τί δῆτ᾽ ἐπ᾽ αὐτοῖς ὄνομα θήσονται βροτοί;
–Σεμνοὺς Παλικοὺς Ζεὺς ἐφίεται καλεῖν.
–Ἦ καὶ Παλικῶν εὐλόγως μένει φάτις;
–Πάλιν γὰρ ἵκουσ᾽ ἐκ σκότους τόδ᾽ εἰς φάος.
–And which name will the mortals give to them?
–Zeus wants them to be called ‘the venerable Palici’.
–Therefore, the name of the Palici endures reasonably?
–Yes, because they come again [palin hikousi] here to light from darkness.
The second piece of relevant evidence is a fragmentary hypothesis preserved by P.Oxy. 2257, fr. 1.11 According to it, the drama had multiple scene changes (a circumstance quite exceptional in classical Greek tragedy):12 Aitna, Xuthia,13 and again Aitna, Leontini and Syracuse.14 The title of the play has not survived, but the scene was clearly in Eastern Sicily. Aitna is named twice15 and the other places are all related both with the myth of the Palici and with the refoundation of Katane-Aitna by Hieron: this strongly supports the suggestion of the first editor, E. Lobel, that this is the hypothesis of Aeschylus’ Aitnaiai.16
The other fragments safely belonging to the drama17 are limited to single words or indirect references and provide little or no help towards reconstructing the plot. Two more pieces, preserved by P. Oxy. 2256, have been attributed by Fraenkel and others to Aitnaiai:18 fr. 9 (= 281a Radt) is a dialogue between Dike and another speaker, probably the chorus-leader, where Dike explains her role and power. Fr. 8 of the same papyrus (= 451 n Radt) describes the positive effects of peace on the life of a town. Several parallels have been found between these texts and the praise of the new order established by Hieron with his military campaigns in Pindar’s First Pythian; but there is good reason to believe that at least fr. 9 comes from a satyr drama,19 and if so its attribution to Aitnaiai should be regarded, if not with suspicion, at least with circumspection.20 Consequently, I will avoid drawing any inference from them on the content of the play.
Given this scanty evidence, an exact interpretation of the play and its meaning is very difficult and problematic. The chief question has to do with Aeschylus’ attitude towards Hieron and his behaviour. Aeschylus had fought at Marathon and Salamis to defend the freedom of his town against the Persians and was then the most representative playwright of democratic Athens:21 nevertheless, he went to Sicily in the years “when Hieron was founding Aitna”22 and produced Aitnaiai “to wish a happy life to those who joined in the settlement of the city.”23 How did he judge Hieron’s tyranny and aggressive colonial policy against the Chalcidian inhabitants of Naxos and Katane, whose forced displacement was expected to cause to an Athenian no lesser pity than the fate of Miletus in 494, due to their common Ionian origin?24 Three possible answers may be given.
a. Hieron’s policy was not as cruel and despotic as depicted by Diodorus, whose account is influenced by the anti-tyrannical and anti-Syracusan bias of his source, Timaeus.25 The tyrant was rather attempting to build a great pan-Hellenic coalition that would include all ethnic components of Eastern Sicily, pre-Greek inhabitants, Ionian-Chalcidian and Dorian settlers, under the unifying power of Syracuse.26 Sikels and Chalcidians would play a relevant role in this project: its inclusive and moderate character would be welcomed by the ‘democratic’ Aeschylus and echoed in the scene changes of Αitnaiai, each introducing the ethnos to which the place was relevant for historical and/or religious reasons. So, according to Garzya:27 (1) Aitna (the volcano) and the myth of the Palici > Sikel indigenous; (2) Xuthia > Aeolians;28 (3) Aitna (= Katane, the town)29 > Dorian soldiers newly settled by Hieron; (4) Leontini > Ionian-Chalcidian settlers; (5) Syracuse would resume, as a common mother town, all these different identities and represent the culminating point where the action of the former parts converged and Hieron’s policy found its glorification. The final part of Eumenides is often recalled as a parallel:30 as in the drama, the chthonic deities changed their attitude towards the city of Athens and became its protectors, granting a future of prosperity and happiness, so in the Sicilian play the local deities were dignified as children of the Greek king of gods and integrated, together with Chalcidian traditions, into the religious system of the new Hieronian realm.
b. Hieron was exactly as brutal and tyrannical as shown by Diodorus: Sikels and Chalcidians were oppressed on racist grounds and deprived of their properties and historical-cultural identity. According to this view, Aeschylus’ Greek genealogy and etymology of the Palici should be rather explained as a form of cultural and linguistic colonialism,31 which destroys local ethnic identity to replace it with a Greek one. The play would be then just a legitimation of Syracusan imperialism, without room for pacific coexistence of different people and cultures. Aeschylus acted here no differently from Pindar: a professional poet writing in accordance with his patron’s guidelines, regardless of his Athenian origin.32
c. Different attempts have been made by scholars to conciliate the two previous hypotheses. While praising Hieron for the new foundation and wishing it a prosperous destiny, Aeschylus would also reserve in the play a decent role for the Ionian component, in order to suggest to Hieron a moderate and inclusive behaviour towards the Chalcidians transferred to Leontini, in accordance with the poet’s religious and ethnic credos;33 or he would have expressed pity and regret (if not complaint) over their fate.34 The Hellenization of the local cult, instead, shall be read as an act of cultural imperialism towards the Sikels, who would play no significant or active role within the new political structure. A different form of mediation has been recently attempted by Thatcher: he acknowledges the brutal and imperialistic nature of Deinomenid territorial policy and maintains that Aeschylus’ interpretatio Graeca of the name and genealogy of the Palici “is still a form of cultural imperialism,”35 but at the same time it could have represented, at least for a part of the audience, a model of cultural integration between Greeks and Sikels.36
In order to evaluate these options, first a methodological aspect should be pointed out, that is, to distinguish between the facts and the narrative of pro-Hieronian propaganda.
The facts are unquestionable: Hieron cancelled two Ionian settlements with a historical background of two centuries and a half, moved their inhabitants to another town, distributed the land of the Katanians to the Dorian settlers of new founded Aitna and added part of the neighbouring land, that is to say, of the Sikel’s land.37 Some scholars believe that the occasion for the new foundation of Katane-Aitna was the eruption of mount Aetna, which is reported to have happened around those years38 and might have encouraged Naxians and/or Katanians to leave their towns without being forced by Hieron.39 But, besides the fact that a close relationship with the eruption is far from certain,40 Hieron was not the Italian Protezione Civile; he was not acting with the euergetic and humanitarian purpose of supplying a new dwelling to the victims of a cataclysm: it would be enough to consider that, if Katane and its surrounding territory had been so badly damaged, Hieron would not have settled the new town in the same place, nor would he have been able to assign it to the Dorian colonists.41
Regarding the Sikels, in recent times the ideas of a strong ethnic opposition between Greek and Sikel identity and of a one-way cultural ‘colonialism’ (from Greeks to ‘barbarians’ playing only a passive role) have been abandoned in favour of a ‘middle ground’ approach.42 Interaction with the Greek world and culture is attested already during the archaic age: Sikels adopted the Greek alphabet for the epichoric inscriptions, many of them spoke Greek and had marriage links with Greek families.43 Above all, the myth and the cult of the Palici, perhaps the most important symbol of Sikel identity, are clearly arranged within the framework of Greek cultural influence and categories, at least in the form that we know from Greek sources (that is, from fifth century BC onwards) and archaeological data.44 But this does not mean that Sikels would welcome Hieron’s forced movements and expropriations:45 they would be willing to learn Greek, to establish marriage links with Greek families, to arrange their cults following Greek models, but not to leave their fields to Hieron’s settlers. Their reaction which followed the end of the Deinomenid power in Syracuse in 466 leaves no doubt:46 they got their lands back under Ducetius’ guide, and old Chalcidian inhabitants too came back to Katane from Leontini, drove Dorian settlers away and destroyed the tomb of Hieron.47
The question, then, is not whether Hieron’s policy was aiming to a peaceful mingling and integration of different cultures (for, as we have seen, clearly it was not), but whether it was presented in these terms by the pro-Hieronian propaganda or not. Pindar’s praise emphasizes the legitimacy of the basileia in Aitna, deriving both from Zeus Aitnaios’ authority and from loyalty to Doric laws based on “freedom built by the gods.”48 Here is not the place to recall the debate on the exact meaning of this ‘freedom’ and on the ‘constitutional’ nature (according to some scholars)49 of the royal power that Hieron exercised in Katane-Aitna through his son Dinomenes under the regency of Chromius; I may just mention that ‘freedom’ and ‘peace’ in Pindar are nothing but slogans, just like the pax Romana in Calgacus’ speech reported by Tacitus.50 Apart from this, what matters for our discussion is the fact that the Pindarian ode gives no room to the Ionian element, let alone to the Sikels: it is a ‘pomp and circumstance’ march of Doric pride, and the only pan-Hellenic element is the parallel between the Deinomenid victories over Carthaginians and Etruscans (Himera and Cuma) and Eastern Greek ones over Persians (Salamina and Plataea).51 What of Aeschylus? Concerning the fragment preserved by Macrobius, one may admit that the interpretatio Graeca contains nothing ‘imperialistic’ in itself; it is the customary form of Greek (or better, Hellenocentric) representation of the world. Aeschylus displays other examples of this practice when he derives the name of Rhegium from ῥήγνυμι (because the mountain chain between Sicily and Italy was broken by an earthquake which formed the Strait of Messina)52 or makes the ancestors of African mankind (Libya, Belus and his children Aegyptus and Danaus) descendants of Zeus through his son Epaphus, whose name is derived from ἐφάπτομαι (‘touch’).53 But before him, Hesiod (or whoever wrote the last verses of Theogony) made Circe and Odysseus parents of Agrius and Latinus, who ruled over the Tyrrhenians:54 this foreign ethnos was so given a Greek pedigree. Even ogres like Polyphemus or Antaeus, living in remote lands and symbolising perhaps the hostility of their non-Greek inhabitants towards Greek settlers, bear Greek names and are born from the Greek god Poseidon. It would probably be harsh to explain all these instances as examples of ‘linguistic colonialism’ or ‘legitimations of imperialism’, especially if we consider that the notion and the term of ‘colonialism’ as a systematic and organized conquest of a foreign land by an overseas state is widely inappropriate for early Greek migrations in the Western Mediterranean.55 So Gruen and Thatcher are probably right in dismissing such an interpretation about mythical figures like the Scythian Targitaus,56 and many instances of interpretatio Graeca may be explained as attempts to reduce the unknown to the familiar and to interpret the real world within a Greek cultural framework.57 But when strong political and territorial interests are involved, things are obviously different. Herodotus tells that, before invading Greece, Xerxes sent a messenger to the inhabitants of Argos claiming their common descent from Perseus (who, according to certain traditions, was the ancestor of the Persians),58 to ensure their neutrality during the war. Whether this is true or not,59 either Xerxes or the inventor of the tale clearly made an instrumental use of myth. One of the ancient etymologies of the toponym Gela links it with an eponymous hero, Gelon, son of Aetna,60 and is likely to be an invention of Deinomenid propaganda.61 As a general principle, it should be born in mind that naming (or renaming) things is also a form of exerting power over them, as the case of Katane renamed Aitna by Hieron clearly shows.62 When this is not possible, reinterpreting the existing name is the second best choice. Aeschylus could not (or did not want to) change the name of the Palici, so deeply rooted in local tradition. But this interpretatio Graeca, unlike other ones, is not simply offered, but rather imposed with the authoritative force of a divine command issued by Zeus himself: for it is he, not the humans, who wants them to be called so, and the explanation that follows has obviously the same divine (and thus unquestionable) origin.63 The Sikel deities are subordinated to the Greek father of gods, to whom they owe not only their existence, but also their name and its meaning. What else should one need to speak of ‘linguistic colonialism’?
We could say the same regarding the genealogy. Between the Palici and Targitaus there are two differences: first, not only was the latter’s birth from Zeus invented by the Scythian themselves, but Herodotus labels it as unconvincing.64 One would say that in this case an attempt of spontaneous cultural assimilation by the Scythians was rejected by the Greeks, because they were not interested in it. The reason lies in the second difference: Sicily was not Scythia. The Piana di Catania, with its mild climate and fertile soil, was for the Greeks much more attractive and strategically relevant than cold and remote Scythia: in this case a genealogical forgery (by Greeks, not Sikels!) can hardly be disjunct from political purposes. It would be useful, in evaluating the extent of this forgery, to know more of the pre-Aeschylean version of the myth; unfortunately, this is made difficult by the meagreness of the remains of the play and the lack of textual evidence before the fifth century. Moreover, as shown by Cusumano,65 although the Palici are explicitly labelled as epichoric deities, the only elements surely indigenous are their name and their relationship with the craters. All that remains, from their divine birth through the abduction of a nymph, from their emergence from the underworld,66 their oracular power, the organization of the cult, is widely paralleled in Greek religion and thus is likely to be the product of Greek cultural influence. We don’t know with certainty who was their father in ancient Sikel tradition, nor if they had one at all:67 their birth from Adranos, attested in Hesychius,68 may be either a later development69 or a trace of the original version of the myth.70 In the first case, it is likely to have been invented to match Dionysius the Elder’s propagandistic interests (he founded the town of Adrano near the temple of the god and was exercising, unlike his predecessor, a pro-Sikel policy):71 if so, this cannot be regarded as anything other than a reassessment of the epichoric character of the cult correcting the previous (i.e. Aeschylean) version of the myth, which was felt as (and really was) a form of cultural appropriation (or rather, expropriation)72 by most indigenous ears. If, on the contrary, Adranos’ paternity represents genuine local tradition and Aeschylus deliberately altered it, then this cultural expropriation would have appeared even more heavy and invasive.73 If he wished to give the myth a respectful and conservative treatment (that is: to pay the greatest acknowledgement to local traditions), he would have integrated into Greek pantheon not only the Palici, but also their Sikel father (and possibly the eponym nymph of mount Aetna, who in some sources74 is their mother; another relic of pre-Greek tradition?);75 he could give him a kinship with Zeus, or Hephaestus, or some other Olympian god. At least, he could even present him as Thalia’s father in place of Hephaestus.76 Instead, he simply suppressed him in favour of Zeus. Why? The most obvious answer is: because Zeus was the lord of Mount Aetna, worshipped in the new cult introduced by Hieron,77 and the patron of διοτρεφέες βασιλῆες, ‘kings nourished by Zeus’,78 like Hieron’s son Dinomenes, basileus79 of Katane-Aitna. The poet may also have noticed a similarity between the Sikel twins and the Greek pair of the Dios-kouroi.80 In general, Aeschylus’ treatment of the myth appears not to be a mere ‘translation’ of Sikel tradition into Greek: it is a radical reshaping of it according to Greek culture and Hieronian political ideology.
The succession of scenes in the drama, too, is difficult to interpret without the text. The mention of Xuthia has produced hypotheses pointing not only to Aeolian mythical tradition, as we have seen, but also to Ionian (where Xuthus is the husband of the Athenian princess Creousa)81 and Dorian ones (Xuthus’ grandfather Hippotas identified with a Heraclid).82 The Aeolian tradition seems to be supported by archaeological evidence, which displays similarities between pre-Greek culture in the area of Palagonia/Leontini (Molino della Badia, Metapiccola) and Italic culture, to which Aeolus is linked for having married Cyane, daughter of Liparos, son of the Italic Auson;83 but the reasonable objection is that the Aeolians did not play any role in Sicily in historic ages.84 The Ionian tradition is what we would expect to be followed by an Athenian poet seeking mythical precedents of Ionian settlements in Eastern Sicily. The Dorian tradition is the most attractive, as it would point to a legitimation of Syracusan control over the plain of Lentini. Unfortunately, we do not know what Aeschylus had in mind; it seems safe then to avoid speculation and to settle for the fact noted above, that the places mentioned in the hypothesis are all linked to the myth of the Palici and/or belong to Hieron’s dominion.
Finally, a relevant point to consider is the following: which kind of audience was the drama addressing? Were there any Ionian-Chalcidians or Hellenized Sikels sitting in the theatre (or any other place) together with those Dorians who had deprived them of their land? We do not know. It could be that some of them were cooperating with the regime, and thus obtained a privileged status; they would be suitable recipients for reading the integration of the Palici into Greek mythology as an invitation to accept the new status of things and to encourage ‘peaceful’ mingling. But we can only speculate on this: what is certain is that, whether the drama was staged in Katane-Aitna or Syracuse (or both),85 the main addressees were Hieron, his court, the Dorian settlers of Katane and/or the Dorian inhabitants of Syracuse. To this audience Aeschylus’ interpretatio Graeca would sound like nothing but a legitimation of imperialism and a model of integration where the weaker has no other chance than assimilating and subordinating himself to the stronger: the Sikels have the right to exist within Hieron’s dominion not as Sikels but as Hellenized Sikels, just like their gods, the Ionians can live only where Hieron allows them to live. If we may judge from their reaction after 466 BC, we can assume that most (if not all) Sikels and Ionians, if they ever knew anything of the drama, understood it exactly in this sense. The ‘middle ground’ is surely a useful hermeneutic paradigm for the interactions between Greeks and Sikels as a whole; but it may result in misinterpretation when mechanically applied to single events with the aim of finding a form of ‘mediation’ in every case.
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Notes
1
See Vinci (2010) 207.
2
Diod. Sic. 11.49.1–2.
3
In this chapter, all Aeschylean fragments and testimonia are quoted from Radt (1985).
4
The Medicean Catalogue (Aesch. Test. 78d.1-a.2 Radt) records both Αἰτναῖαι γνήσιοι (the ‘genuine’ Aitnaiai) and Αἰτναῖαι νόθοι (the ‘spurious’ Aitnaiai); of the second drama we know practically nothing, and it is generally assumed among scholars that all quotations and references belong to the first. The title Αἰτναῖαι occurs also in Hsch. α 1955 and κ 4041 Latte and is adopted by almost all modern scholars and editors (see Radt [1985] 126, with further bibliography); other attested variants are Αἶτναι (Schol. Hom. Il. 16.183b [IV 209.52 Erbse]; Steph. Byz. π 1 [IV 6.3 Billerbeck; but Meineke conjectured Αἰτναίαις, printed by Billerbeck]), Αἴτνη (Laur. Lyd. De mens. 4.154), Aetna (Macrob. Sat. 5.19.24). In the Vita Aeschyli (ch. 9 = Test. 1.34 R.) some manuscripts have Αἰτναίας, others Αἴτνας.
5
5.19.15–24. Macrobius’ trustworthiness has been questioned by Sampson (2018); but see my objections in Cipolla (2022, forthcoming).
6
Macrob. Sat. 5.19.18 appellatique sunt Palici ἀπὸ τοῦ πάλιν ἱκέσθαι, quoniam prius in terram mersi denuo inde reversi sunt. A roughly similar account of the myth is also found in Servius ad Aen. 9.581 (p. 359.9–19 Thilo), where the nymph is named Aetna (but the ‘Danieline’ Servius has also Thalia as an alternative). The alleged etymology of Palici is of course impossible (the name is surely pre-Greek), but no convincing alternative has been found yet; for a brief survey on attempts made by modern scholars see Meurant (1998) 21 n. 39.
7
The site has been identified with Rocchicella di Mineo (not very far from Leontini), where until the 30s of the twentieth century two small circular lakes, named ‘Naftia’, could be seen near some ancient ruins; unfortunately, they were dried to allow extraction of carbon dioxide from the soil. Archaeological evidence offers a strong confirmation: the site was inhabited since the Palaeolithic era, but from the seventh century BC onwards there are remains of important buildings, perhaps linked to the cult, and in the mid fifth century the whole area was rearranged with the building of a hestiaterion (see Maniscalco and McConnell [2003]; Maniscalco [2015]).
8
Macrob. Sat. 5.19.19 quos incolae crateras vocant et nomine Dellos appellant fratresque eos Palicorum aestimant. The name Delli has been connected with italic *duelli, the ‘twins’, since the Palici are the Sikel equivalent of the Indo-European ‘divine twins’ (Witczac and Zawiasa [2004/2005]); see Presle (1845) 571 (but already Preller [1838] 128); Ziegler (1949) 110.7–10; Croon (1952) 118. For alternative explanations see Bello (1960) 93–94; Meulder (2017) (who proposes “eaux jaillissants”, “water jets”, from a root gwelH- related to βάλλω).
9
On the lakes, see also Lycus of Rhegium BNJ 570 F 11a; Diod. Sic. 11.89.1–8; Strab. 6.2.9; ps.-Arist. Mir. 834b7–17; and the other sources quoted by Macrobius in the following chapters (Sat. 5.19.25–29 = Callias BNJ 564 F 1; Polemon fr. 83 Müller).
10
On the Palici and their cult, see Ciaceri (1911) 10–15, 23–32; Ziegler (1949); Crohn (1952); Bello (1960); Cusumano (1991); (2006) esp. 129–137; Meurant (1998); Witczac and Zawiasa (2004/2005).
11
First published by Lobel (1952) 66–68; I follow the text of Arata, Bastianini and Montanari (2004) 22. The term ‘hypothesis’ is used here in a wide sense: perhaps it was, rather, a commentary (Arata, Bastianini and Montanari [2004] 27).
12
In Aeschylus’ Eumenides we have only one relevant change, from Delphi to Athens (a minor one occurs at l. 566, when the scene moves from Athena’s temple, mentioned at l. 242, to Areopagus); however, the exceptional circumstances under which Aitnaiai was staged (a celebratory drama written for a non-Athenian audience) may account for such anomalies, Taplin (1977) 418; but see already Lobel (1952) 68, who thinks of a postclassical play falsely assigned to Aeschylus (the ‘spurious’ Aitnaiai of the Catalogue?), where such changes would be at home and suit perfectly a division in five acts.
13
According to Diod. Sic. 5.8.2, this was the name of the land of Leontini; it was there that the shrine of the Palici stood and the inhabitants of Naxos and Katane were settled by Hieron. On the meaning of the toponym I shall return later.
14
κ(ατὰ) μ(ὲν) γ(ὰρ) τὸ πρῶτον μέ̣ρ[ος] | αὐ̣τοῦ ἡ σκην̣ὴ ὑ(πό)κει̣τ̣(αι) Αἴτνη̣, κ(ατὰ) δ(ὲ) τὸ δεύτ(ερον) | Ξουθία, κ(α)τ(ὰ) δ(ὲ) τ̣ὸ̣ τρίτο̣ν πάλιν̣ Αἴτνη, εἶτ’ ἀ|πὸ ταύτης εἰ[ς Λε]ο̣ν̣τίνους μ(ε)τ(α)βάλλει καὶ γί(νεται) ἡ | σκηνὴ Λεον[τ(ίνων) χῶ(ρος)], μ(ε)τ(ὰ) δ’ αὐτὸν Συρακοῦσσαι | καὶ τὰ λοιπὰ .[ ± 8].ηι δ(ια)περαίνετ(αι) – “In its (scil. of Aeschylus’ play) first part the scene is Aitna, in the second Xuthia, in the third again Aitna, then it changes to Leontini and the scene becomes (the land of) Leon(tini), after it Syracuse, and the remaining part is brought to a conclusion in …, which is a place … .” In the lacuna of last line Pfeiffer (in Lobel [1952] 68) restores [ἐν Τεμενίτ]ηι (‘on the Temenite’), the hill above Syracuse, with the well-known theatre.
15
It is not clear whether the mountain or the town is meant; Grassi (1956) 209; Garzya (1977) 405–406 and others assume that the first time the name refers to the mountain, the second to the town (Garzya [1977] 411 consequently adopts the title Aitnai, ‘the [two] Aetnas’). Poli Palladini (2001) 292, however, rightly observes that πάλιν in the hypothesis can mean nothing but ‘again’ (not ‘in turn’), so if the first is the mountain, the second must be the same.
16
Lobel (1952) 67.
17
Frr. 7–11 Radt.
18
Fraenkel (1954) 75; Pohlenz (1954) 198–200; Cataudella (1964/1965) 378–395; Lesky (1972) 153; Corbato (1996) 69–70; Stewart (2017) 106–107, and others (see Poli-Palladini [2001]; Cipolla [2010] for further bibliography). Totaro (2011), though cautious, appears open to this hypothesis; so also Sommerstein (2008) 277–279, but with more hesitation.
19
So the first editor, Lobel (1952) 39; Sutton (1983); Wessels (1999); Poli Palladini (2001); Cipolla (2010); O’Sullivan and Collard (2013) 299; and now Juan Lopez (2017).
20
It is generally assumed that Aitnaiai was a tragedy, and Macrobius labels the play as tragoedia. However, if it was staged in Katane-Aitna, a propagandistic satyr play would be not wholly unsuitable for an audience chiefly consisting of soldiers: one might recall Python’s Agen, staged in Alexander the Great’s camp on Hydaspes in 326 BC (Ath. 13.586 D, 595 E–596 B), a context which was not very different from a military colony of 10,000 mercenaries. Macrobius’ statement may be slightly inaccurate, for surely he did not draw directly on Aeschylus’ full text: he knew that Aeschylus was a Greek tragedian, and that was enough (that he was aware of the fact that tragedians also wrote satyr plays is at least doubtful). But if Aitnaiai was a satyr play, it had a chorus of satyrs: who were then the ‘women of Aetna’? Perhaps Thalia and her fellow-nymphs? Or should we adopt one of the attested variants for the title (Αἴτνη/Aetna or Αἶτναι)? If we consider this problem (and others that would inevitably arise), it is safer to maintain the traditional view that it was a tragedy.
21
“Prophet of democracy”, according to Sommerstein (1996) 413 and 421.
22
Vita Aeschyli 9 = Test. 1.33 Radt Ἱέρωνος τότε τὴν Αἴτναν κτίζοντος. The interpretation of this passage is controversial: since we know from another passage of the Vita that Aeschylus, prompted by Hieron, restaged his Persians at his court and met with great success (ch. 18 = Test. 1.68 Radt φασὶν ὑπὸ Ἱέρωνος ἀξιωθέντα ἀναδιδάξαι τοὺς Πέρσας ἐν Σικελίᾳ καὶ λίαν εὐδοκιμεῖν), most scholars put his Sicilian journey after 472 BC, and Aitnaiai around 470 BC. This would be consistent with the (probable) date of Pindar’s First Pythian (474 or, better, 470 BC), while the delay between the foundation of the city and its celebration could be explained as the time needed to (re)build houses and public buildings and to assign lots of land among new settlers (see e.g. Cataudella [1964/1965] 375–376; Boehringer [1968] 72; Garzya [1977] 402). Others opt for an earlier date (476/475 BC), assuming that Aeschylus originally wrote Persians for a Sicilian audience before 472 BC (the scholiast on Ar. Ran. 1028, when speaking of this Sicilian staging, uses the simple διδάξαι; see Bosher [2012b] esp. 103); but, as Cataudella rightly observes, it is more logical to link Aeschylus’ great success with Persians to his first performance in Sicily and consider Aitnaiai slightly later. Moreover, if Persians was first written on Hiero’s request, why did Aeschylus celebrate the battle of Salamina instead of the Deinomenid victories at Himera or Cuma? On the problem, see Smith (2017) 12–14.
23
Vita Aeschyli 9 = Test. 1.34 Radt οἰωνιζόμενος βίον ἀγαθὸν τοῖς συνοικίζουσι τὴν πόλιν.
24
Cf. Basta Donzelli (2008) 43‒44; Rehm (1989) 32.
25
Boehringer (1968) 71.
26
Cf. Cataudella (1964/1965) 396; Garzya (1977) 409; Culasso Gastaldi (1979) 66; Anello (1984) 28; Debiasi (2008) 104 n. 156.
27
Garzya (1977) 409.
28
Garzya (1977) 408 derives the name from Xuthus, son of Aeolus Hippotades (Diod. Sic. 5.7–8), king of winds and the Aeolian Islands (Hom. Od. 10.1–12); see Anello (1984) 30–31.
29
This is rather improbable (see above, n. 15).
30
Cf. already Schneidewin (1845) 74 (who noticed the similarity a century before the papyrus hypothesis was published); Grassi (1956) 209; Thatcher (2019) 76.
31
Dougherty (1991); (1993) 89–90; see also Cusumano (1990) 126; Cusumano (2006) 129; Luraghi (1994) 343; Braccesi and Millino (2000) 85–87; Poli-Palladini (2001) 319–321; Bonanno (2010) 142–147.
32
Poli Palladini (2001) 324–325.
33
Basta Donzelli (1996) 93–97. See also Manganaro (1996) 32–3 (Aeschylus wishing for fraternity between Ionians and Dorians, but not for the Sikels); Coppola (1995) 64 (according to her, in the 470s Hieron attempted to establish amiable relationships with Ionian-Chalcidian towns such as Cuma, because he needed their support against the Etruscans); Bonanno (2010) 147.
34
Rehm (1989).
35
Thatcher (2019) esp. 71, 77–78.
36
This would be possible thanks to the ‘multivocality’ of Greek tragedy, i.e. the possible coexistence in the text of different senses and points of view suitable to different audiences (Thatcher [2019] 68; on the concept see Pelling [1997] 13–17). In his interpretation, Thatcher focuses mainly on the relationship Greeks-Sikels, leaving aside the one between Ionians and Dorians.
37
At 11.49.1 Diodorus says ἀλλὰ καὶ πολλὴν τῆς ὁμόρου προσθεὶς κατεκληρούχησε (‘but he also added a large portion of the neighbouring land and distributed it’); that this ‘neighbouring land’ belonged to the Sikels is confirmed by what he says later (11.76.3) about Ducetius, the leader of Sikel rescue, who was angry with the new inhabitants of Katane because they had occupied the lands of the Sikels. See Manganaro (1996) 32; Bonanno (2010) 134–135.
38
479/478 BC according to the Parian Marble (IG 12.5.444, 52.69a), 476/475 BC according to Thucydides (3.116: he records an eruption in 425 by saying that there had been another one fifty years earlier).
39
Boehringer (1968) 71–72; Forsyth (1982) 53–56.
40
See Basta Donzelli (1996) 77 n. 16; Vinci (2010) 209.
41
Deinomenids, and Western Greek tyrants in general, were not new to such enterprises: Gelon had destroyed Kamarina, Megara and Euboea and transferred their populations to Syracuse together with part of that of Gela; wealthy and rich Megarians and Euboeans received Syracusan citizenship, while the demos was enslaved and sold outside Sicily (Hdt. 7.156). Anaxilas of Rhegium occupied Zancle and settled colonists there, mainly from doric Messene, whence the city changed its name (Thuc. 6.4.5).
42
See McConnell (2009) esp. 102; Cusumano (2015) 31–37; Thatcher (2019) 68. The expression was coined by White (2011) with regard to relationships between Europeans and Native Americans; cf. also Gruen (2011) (and the right criticism by Broder [2011]).
43
Manganaro (1996) 26–28.
44
The hestiaterion of fifth century implies a Greek model and the adoption of Greek practice of ritual meals by the Sikels (Thatcher [2019] 69), and archaic remains of seventh century already show similarities with Geloan architecture (Maniscalco [2015] 170–171).
45
As White himself declares (2011) XII, “force and violence are hardly foreign to the process of creating and maintaining a Middle Ground.” It is to be noticed that the rearranging of the sanctuary dates around the mid-fifth century, i.e. in the time of Ducetius, after Aeschylus’ drama and the fall of the Deinomenid tyranny. In this context, it should perhaps be read as a competitive emulation of a (superior) foreign cultural model rather than as a simple assimilation of it. Such an ambivalence underlies the attitude of Christian Church Fathers towards pagan Greeks: they adopted Greek cultural categories and literary genres in order to make Christian faith culturally stronger.
46
See Basta Donzelli (1996) 96.
47
Strab. 6.2.3.
48
Pyth. 1.61 θεοδμάτῳ σὺν ἐλευθερίᾳ.
49
So for example Kirsten (1941); Boehringer (1968) 73–75; but see the objections of Basta Donzelli (1996) 79–83.
50
Tac. Agr. 30.7 ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.
51
Pind. Pyth. 1.71–80.
52
Aesch. fr. 402 Radt.
53
Aesch. Suppl. 313–324.
54
Hes. Theog. 1011–1016.
55
See Hall (2012) esp. 22–25.
56
According to Herodotus 4.5.1, Targitaus was born by Zeus and a daughter of the river Borysthenes; the tale is presented as a local Scythian story, so it was not invented by the Greeks for ideological purposes (Thatcher [2019] 75, relying on Gruen [2011]).
57
A similar process can be seen in the Old Testament: in Genesis the first woman receives a Hebrew name etymologized as ‘the mother of all the living’ (3.20), with the implicit assumption that the ancestors of humankind spoke Hebrew, and the Greeks are called the descendants of Javan, son of Iaphet son of Noah (10.2).
58
Hdt. 7.150; cf. 7.61–62, where also the Medians are said to have derived their name from Medea.
59
Herodotus, 7.150.1 reports it as a vox populi: Ἔστι δὲ ἄλλος λόγος λεγόμενος ἀνὰ τὴν Ἑλλάδα.
60
Hellanicus BNJ 4 F 199 and Proxenus BNJ 703 F 4 (quoted by Steph. Byz. γ 45, I 412 Billerbeck).
61
Rightly so Poli Palladini (2001) 301–302.
62
In Genesis (2.19–20) God brings all animals before Adam, to see how he will name them, because he wants to give him support and aid: in fact, animals are intended to be used by man. Then God creates woman, and, after original sin, Adam chooses her name. In ancient societies, slaves were usually renamed by their masters; the Greeks often used generic ethnic names such as Σύρος, Φρυγία and Μανῆς.
63
Fr. 6.2, above. This detail has generally passed unnoticed.
64
Hdt. 4.5.1 ἐμοὶ δὲ πιστὰ οὐ λέγοντες (scil. Σκύθαι).
65
Cusumano (1990) 128–138.
66
Thatcher (2019) 72 considers the birth of the Palici from the ground as an indigenous feature, because it “fits uneasily with Greek narrative patterns”; but compare for example Erichthonius’ birth from the earth (see Loraux [2000] 30–31), the cyclical to and fro of the Dioscuri between Olympus and Hades (see Cusumano [1990] 135), and the anodos of Kore from the underworld (though this is not strictly speaking a ‘birth’, it can be considered as a re-birth). An overlap with Eleusinian myth and cult seems far from improbable: Demeter, like the Palici, is sometimes connected to (hot) water (she is labelled Θερμασία, ‘warm-bringing’, at Paus. 2.34.7 and 12, and according to Hesychius ε 4898 in Laconia there was a Demetriac festival named Ἐπικρήναια, ‘water-spring festival’; for archaeological evidence in Sicily see Caputo [1937]). Kowalzig (2008) 144–145 suggests the possibility that the goddess appeared in Aeschylus’ drama. This cannot be proved, but is at least very attractive: it would mean that Hieron was trying to attract the indigenous chthonic cult of the Palici into the sphere of the Hellenic Eleusinian Mysteries, whose hierophantic priesthood was a hereditary task of the Deinomenids since their ancestor Telines (Hdt. 7.153; Schol. Pind. Ol. 6.158a, 191.14–16 Drachmann). Had he succeeded, it would have easily resulted in a further legitimation of his dominion over the Sikels and their land.
67
La Rosa (1974) 157 does not exclude the existence of divine genealogies in the culture of the Sikels before the arrival of the Greeks.
68
Hsch. π 176 Hansen. On the god Adranos and his cult see Ciaceri (1911) 8–14; he was regarded as indigenous, cf. Aelian. NA 11.20 Ἀδρανοῦ νεώς, ἐπιχωρίου δαίμονος and Plut. Timol. 12.
69
Ziegler (1949) 120.1–15, who supposes that Aeschylus invented ex novo the myth on the basis of the etymology (ibid. 118.32–34); see also Basta Donzelli (1996) 88.
70
Ciaceri (1911) 30–31; see also Thatcher (2019) 74.
71
Cusumano (2000) 134–135.
72
Otherwise Thatcher (2019) 74.
73
Witczac and Zawiasa (2004/2005) 103–104 assume, based on comparison with other mythical ‘divine twins’ in indoeuropean area, that the Palici had a double paternity like the Dioscuri: the Sky-god (the Zeus of the Greeks) was their divine father, the hero Adranos the mortal one. But Adranos was not a mortal hero like Tyndareos, he was a god; it is easier, then, to assume that the two paternities were not originally concurrent and that one superseded the other. And even if they were both ancient, Aeschylus’ choice of suppressing Adranos and leaving only the divine father, naming it Zeus, would be equally significant.
74
Silen. BNJ 175 F 3; Serv. ad Aen. 9.581. Conversely, Aeschylus’ Thalia bears a wholly Greek name clearly alluding to the fertility (< θάλλω, ‘flourish’) of volcanic soil.
75
Galvagno (2004) 52.
76
Adranos is usually considered the Sikel equivalent of Hephaestus (see e.g. Cusumano [1990] 132; Meurant [1998] 19; Thatcher [2019] 74); but the two deities were not wholly identical, because Adranos was represented as a warrior (Ciaceri [1911] 13; his statue had a spear according to Plut. Timol. 12.5). At any rate, if Aeschylus in the genealogy of the Danaids retained the Semitic Belus (= Baal) without replacing him with a Greek equivalent, why could he not have done the same with Adranos?
77
See Pindar Pyth. 1.30.
78
Hom. Il. 2.196, etc.
79
Pindar Pyth. 1.60.
80
Varro (quoted by Serv. ad Aen. 9.581) called the Palici nauticos deos: since they have no known relationship with the sea and navigation and their sanctuary was not near the sea, this clearly reflects the attempt to find a (forced) parallel with the Dioscuri (Ciaceri [2011] 26; Cusumano [1990] 134–137, esp. 136), and may ultimately derive from Aeschylus himself.
81
Mazzarino (1966) 555 n. 110; Coppola (1995) 64 (Xuthia was an homage to Ionians and an sanction of the new settlement of Katanians in Leontini); Manganaro (2012) 4.
82
Apollod. 2.8.3; see Poli Palladini (2001) 299–301; Smith (2012) esp. 132–133. La Rosa (1974) 157–159 regards Xuthia as the indigenous name of the region where the sanctuary of the Palici stood; see also Thatcher (2019) 78. This may be true or not, but it is beyond doubt that a Greek poet would have derived it from an eponymous Xuthus (Poli-Palladini [2001] 292).
83
Diod. Sic. 5.7–8. On the identification of Xuthia see Rizza (1962) esp. 6 (Colle di Metapiccola; see now Frasca [2012]); La Rosa (1974) 162–163 (Molino della Badia).
84
Basta Donzelli (1996) 90.
85
On the problem, see Poli-Palladini (2001) 316–317 (she leaves it open); Lamari (2017) 29 (Syracuse or Katane, but perhaps rewritten and reperformed in Athens when Aeschylus came back; this would explain the presence of the double title in the Medicean catalogue, see above, n. 4). The question of a reperformance after the fall of the Deinomenid power is now thoroughly discussed in Caroli (2020) 37–52.