Classics 351
March 31, 2022

Examination #2: due Tuesday (4/5) @11:59pm in D2L Assignments

Plautus’s Aulularia/The Pot of Gold (cf. Latin aula, f., "pot")

• Greek source play unknown (cf. Menander’s Dyskolos/The Grouch); misanthrope in Greek New Comedy (asociability; human culture vs. wildness; cf. Euclio & Fides/"Trust" vs. Silvanus in Aulularia); Molière's L'Avare/The Miser (1668)
  
  
• Euclio's reintegration into society at end of play? (fragment: “I never had a moment’s peace—not day or night. Now I am going to sleep”; ancient plot summaries, "... against all hope he finds his pot again and happily betroths his daughter to Lyconides"; "Lyconides informs Euclio of it [the stolen pot]. He is presented by him with the gold, a wife, and a son")
  
  
  
  
• Aulularia a late play, ca. 190-185 BCE: Congrio the Cook’s claim about Bacchants (= Euclio's attack) at 408-409 (cf. senatorial decree of 186 BCE); Megadorus’s misogynistic speeches against women’s expenditures (esp. "wife with a dowry"; cf. Cato the Elder & repeal of lex Oppia in 195 BCE, Casina)
  
  Aulularia 505ff. (Megadorus's rant against the dowered wife)
  Why nowadays wherever you go in the city
  You see more vehicles than you see on a country road.
  But even this is lovlier if compared to when creditors arrive:
  The cleaner, tailor, jeweller and embroiderer,
  The woolifier, linen-maker, fringe-maker, tunic maker,
  Crimson-dyer, brown-dyer, violet-dyer,
  The salesmen ...
  
  
• Megadorus's utopian marriage/dowry plan: misogynistic tirade + enlightened view of marriage between classes; sumptuary laws > curb conspicuous consumption & social divisions
  
  
  Temple of Concordia (dedicated 367 BCE), Roman Forum
  
  
• socio-political play: Eunomia (Lyconides's mother/Megadorus's sister) = "Good Order" (esp. in society/politics) in Greek (= Latin Concordia); setting includes Temple of Fides/"Trust" between houses of Euclio & Megadorus; perennial Roman issue of inequality
  
  
  Lar, 1st Century CE
  
  
• prologue by Lar Familiaris: what do we learn? Phaedria & Lyconides
  
  
  
• Roman play about character-type, monomaniacal psychology of misanthropic miser: cf. Greek historian Polybius 31.27.11,"Their [= Romans] punctiliousness about expenditures is as intense as their compulsion to turn every second of time into profit"; theme taken to Plautine extremes (How cheap is Euclio?); Euclio's antisocial obsession with money at cost of social relationships & humanity
  
  Aulularia 90-100 (Euclio’s instructions to Staphyla in opening scene)
  Take care not to allow a single stranger in.
  Lest someone ask you for a light—put out our fire
  So that there won’t be a chance that anyone will ask.
  If I should find it burning, I’ll extinguish you.
  If anyone should ask you for water—say that ‘it’s run off’. [cf. Roman aquae et ignis interdictio for exiles]
  And knives or axes, mortar, pestle, all the stuff
  That neighbors always come around and ask to use—
  Tell them that thieves have come and robbed it all from us.
  Indeed, while I'm away don't let a single soul
  Come in. And let me even tell you this:
  Should Lady Luck herself appear—don’t let her in!
  
  
  Bona Fortuna, 4th century CE
  

• Euclio's paranoid view of social relationships (e.g., Megadorus?); parable of the ox and the ass (229-235, "... That's the risk when asses try to rise to oxish rank")
  
  
  
  Fides Publica, silver denarius minted by Hadrian, 134-138 CE
  
  
• Euclio’s transfer of treasure from temple of Roman goddess Fides ("Trust"; "Fides is the basis of a justice ...", Cicero, De Officiis 1.23) to grove of Silvanus: Euclio's alienation complete
  
  Aulularia 672-675 (the transfer after a "tip" from a raven)
  Now I must hit upon a lovely spot to transfer this.
  Silvanus’s grove stands far beyond the city walls
  All overrun with willows and weeds—that’s the place.
  That’s it—I’ll trust Silvanus rather than keep trusting Trust.
  

  
  
  The Roman God Silvanus, 2nd century CE

• Euclio’s direct plea (in song) to audience after pot stolen (last of 10 asocial monologues; e.g. clubbing of Staphyla's pet rooster, 467-472)
  
  Aulularia 712-719 (Euclio's aporia)
  I'm killed and I'm dead and I'm finished for ever. To run or to not run—to grab him—but grab whom?
  I don't know—I can't see where I'm going. I'm blind. Oh, where am I? Who am I? I'm totally lost.
  I can't think straight. Please, help me, I beseech on my knees.
  Please, I beg and implore you—just show me who stole it. And what are you saying?
  I'll believe you for sure. Your bearing's so honest, your expression so pure.
  But what is it—why laugh you? I know that you're all crooks here!
  So you're dressed in togas and have the best seats,
  There are crooks 'mongst the mighty—and swindlers and cheats ...
  
  
• confused encounter of Euclio and Lyconides after the treasure is taken by Strobilus, rape of daughter and robbery of pot conflated (aula, "pot", f.), e.g.,“Then why without permission did you lay your hands on my sweet thing?," 745
  
  
  **PERFORMANCE of Aulularia 712-832: Hallie (Lyconides), Mia (Euclio), Viktor (Strobilus)**
  
  
  
• Lyconides confesses to rape, urges Euclio to check on daughter (800ff.); Strobilus appears with pot of gold (text ends)
  
  
• lost final section of play: Euclio recovers treasure and gives it to newlyweds as daughter’s dowry; realizes his daughter is his “real treasure” (?) Final wedding (?)