(Ri)comporre una tetralogia ‘legata’: il caso della presunta tetralogia odissiaca di Eschilo (Ψυχαγωγοί, Πηνελόπη, Ὀστολόγοι, Κίρκη σατυρική)

Stama, F.

2022-01-01

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Abstract

The idea of grouping the four dramas Ψυχαγωγοί, Πηνελόπη, Ὀστολόγοι and Κίρκη σατυρική, documented in the fragmentary production of Aeschylus, into a thematically ‘connected’ tetralogy dedicated to the Odyssean myth dates back to Ulrich von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff. Due to the authority of its proponent, this hypothesis profoundly influenced the opinion of the philological community over the past two centuries: in fact, it has become (also through the mediation of Timothy N. Gantz’s article “The Aischylean Tetralogy: Attested and Conjectured Groups”, AJPh 101 [1980], 133-164) an almost manualistic notion. The aim of the present contribution is to shed light on the content of the fragments that survived from the aforementioned four dramas, investigating the common thread that would have united these pièces into a solid tetralogical structure. Some final remarks are devoted to the concluding slot of this tetralogy and its potential satyric occupants.