Part I, Short Identifications (7 points each, 49 points total)
running slave: slave who appears onstage, usually breathless, to deliver a piece of news in various plays; Mercury parodies this tired bit in Amphitryon (as also the parasite Ergasilus in Captivi at great length), perhaps by running through the audience, and stresses his divine (vs. servile) status in doing so.
Peniculus: the parasite in Menaechmi, with whom Menaechmus of Epidamnus has a flawed relationship (i.e. Peniculus “rats” on Menaechmus to his wife!), one of several in which Menaechmus's social subordinates get the best of him.
Alcmena: the doubly pregnant wife of Amphitryon in Amphitryon; she appears virtuous and loyal toward her husband, but also is comically characterized as something of a sensualist (by the standards of the ideal Roman matrona) in her affair with Jupiter and as an onstage pregnant character.
tragicomedy: defined by Mercury, who coins the Latin term in the Amphitryon prologue, in terms of social status, i.e. a play that features "high" tragic figures (gods, kings) as well "low" comic slaves; also known as "mythical burlesque" (gods are parodically anthropomorphized, as the lecherous Jupiter) and not to be precisely equated with modern notions of tragicomedy/dark comedy.
instrumentum vocale: “a tool with a voice,” the Roman writer Varro’s description of a slave, an extraordinarily harsh way of describing a human being, but reflecting a cultural preference to institutionalize and naturalize slavery (cf. Captivi); by way of self-contradiction, as the phrase also points to the human nature (i.e. "voice") of slaves legally commodified as property.
Euripides’ Alkmene: strikingly referred to at the beginning of Rudens (with reference to the previous night’s storm) by the gruff rustic slave Sceparnio; metatheatrically serves to signal the play’s running dialogue with tragedy. This tragedy also lies in the Greek background of Plautus's Amphitryon.
Eunomia: Megadorus’s sister--her name means “Good Order” in Greek--in The Pot of Gold; she sets the plot in motion by convincing her brother to marry and she aids her son's marriage interest as well, so as to help bring the two houses (one rich, one poor) together in social harmony.
Palaestrio: clever slave of Miles Gloriosus, who successfully engineers both schemes (i.e. against Sceledrus and the soldier), and is grandiosely compared to a triumphing general.
Micio: city bachelor and "cool dad" in Terence's Adelphoe, sharply contrasted with Demea, his traditionally conservative and severe country brother.
Pamphilus: marries Philumena in Terence’s Hecyra, whom he had raped before their marriage; represented as ready for a happy marriage following Bacchis’s helpful intervention near the end of the play.
Part II, Commentary (20 points each, 100 points total)
Distribution of Points:
(a): 2 points total
(b): 2 points total
(c): 2 points total
(d): 14 points
Passage 1 (Plautus, Amphitryon 50-62)
(a) Plautus, Amphitryon;
(b) Mercury;
(c) the god in the prologue explains the unusual nature of this play to the audience;
(d) some possible talking points for elaboration:
(1) Mercury explains that the play is a tragicomedy (he coins the term here), in that it combines figures of both tragedy (“important people and gods”) and comedy (“there’s a slave’s part”), i.e. it is a mythical travesty or burlesque featuring anthropomorphic and comic gods;
(2)
this is probably the first time a mythical travesty or burlesque has been performed in Rome, and Mercury goes to great length to allay the audience’s possible fear and confusion (e.g. about the genre, peligious impropriety, etc.);
(3)
the play ultimately is a comedy (and subsequently salways so called in the play), albeit a special type of comedy, and Mercury here is also easing spectators into the notion that he and Jupiter will appear as actors in the play proper (i.e. not merely as prologist or deus ex machina).
Passage 2 (Terence, Adelphoe 41-58)
(a) Terence, Adelphoe;
(b) Micio;
(c) in a monologue at the beginning of the play, Micio delineates the differences between his brother and himself as parents;
(d) some possible talking points for elaboration:
(1) Micio establishes not only the sharp personal differences between himself and his brother here, but also the play’s main themes (city vs. country, liberal vs. authoritarian parenting, the role of the paterfamilias within the family, etc.);
(2) we learn of the unusual arrangement whereby Micio has become Aeschinus’s adoptive father, a factor which seems to inform his parenting philosophy, and perhaps the play’s surprise ending, where the boys finally embrace their biological father;
(3) while this early monologue and Micio’s congenial and sympathic character in general lead us to believe that his character and method of parenting will prevail, it turns out that his son has not kept him “in the loop” about something so important as the rape/pregnancy of Pamphila; cf. also the ending, where Micio is forced to make concessions to Demea, and the boys articulate their regard for Demea.
Passage 3 (Plautus, Menaechmi 787-806)
(a) Plautus, Menaechmi;
(b) Senex (Speaker A), Matrona (Speaker B);
(c) Matrona has summoned her father to arbitrate in her marital dispute with her husband, whom she knows he has stolen some of her personal items to give to his mistress;
(d) some possible talking points for elaboration:
(1) Senex’s traditional (patriarchal) Roman conservatism: he has no qualms with Menaechmus I consorting with hookers and partying in general;
(2) Senex’s conservative theory of gender: “real men” in his view are entitled to the male privileges of which Matrona complains, and depriving them of these would thoroughly emasculate them;
(3) what finally gets Senex’s attention here is that Menaechmus is stealing his wife’s possessions and giving them to Erotium, a threat to the family’s finances; the marriage thus seems to be sine manu and Matrona is a "dowered wife", and so this matters to Senex.
Passage 4 (Plautus, Aulularia 90-100)
(a) Plautus, The Pot of Gold;
(b) Euclio;
(c) Euclio reveals his absurdly miserly character early in the play by giving these orders to Staphyla as he is about to leave his house to get a public handout;
(d) some possible talking points for elaboration:
(1) the incivility of the miser Euclio is highlighted by his denial of such basics as fire and water to fellow human beings, as well as his violent threats toward his elderly slave;
(2) his miserliness and fixation on his treasure has led him to suffer a deeply anti-social neurosis that isolates him from individuals and his community altogether;
(3) the paradox of refusing admittance to Lady Luck--especially striking to a Roman audience because Fortuna is a goddess worshipped throughout ancient Italy--shows how this neurosis has developed to such an extent that it causes Euclio to act against both mainstream religion and his own best interests.
Passage 5 (Plautus, Rudens 1235-1253)
(a) Plautus, Rudens;
(b) Daemones (Speaker A), Gripus (Speaker B)
(c) Daemones tells Gripus his general views on honesty, moral probity, etc., regarding ownership of the chest (fished out of the sea by Gripus) near the end of the play;
(d) some possible talking points for elaboration:
(1) Daemones’s uncompromising morality (“theft is theft”) is entirely in line with the just universe described by Arcturus in the prologue, as well as Daemones's markedly virtuous character;
(2) the cynical Gripus presents a more down-to-earth “comic” perspective on morality, which contrasts starkly with the idealistic view of Daemones (who in the past has suffered injustice in real-world Athens);
(3) the metatheatrical debate here reflects the play’s persistent bi-play between tragedy and comedy, serious morality and self-interested pragmatism, et sim., and poses the question, can comedy be didactic and moralizing like tragedy?
Passage 6 (Plautus, Miles Gloriosus 1434-1437)
(a) The Braggart Soldier;
(b) Pyrgopolynices;
(c) the soldier ends the play by confessing the error of his ways in a kind of epilogue;
(d) some possible talking points for elaboration:
(1) Pyrgopolynices’s confession of guilt here seems surprisingly abrupt, given his stock characterization throughout, and is perhaps only brought about by the immediate threats of violence against him (or is a striking example of an arbitrary comic ending);
(2) the typical miles gloriosus—marked by vanity, ignorance, self-delusion—seems incapable of rehabilitation or grasping the inappropriateness of his behavior; hence P.'s surprising expression of self-awareness here (again, possibly for the sake of mechanical closure/the appearance of comic harmony?);
(3) as part of Romanizing the play, Plautus has perhaps stressed the soldier’s complicity in adultery (faux-adultery in this case) and thus created a clear “moral” for the play (in addition to presenting P. as a stereotypical braggart).
Passage 7 (Plautus, Captivi 51-62)
(a) Plautus, Captivi;
(b) the prologue speaker (member of the acting troupe?);
(c) the prologist prepares the audience for the unusually serious Plautine play to be performed;
(d) some possible talking points for elaboration:
(1)
the prologist mostly speaks in earnest, as Captivi turns out to be an ethically challenging play that for the most part is free of the usual cast of New Comedy’s “low” characters;
(2) the surprising assertion that “all battles will take place offstage” alerts the audience to the very serious (i.e. quasi-tragic) implications of some aspects of this play, especially regarding Tyndarus’s enslavement, as well as the non-comic backdrop of war;
(3) the prologist’s claim that “what follows here is fact for us actors” points to the actors’ likely status as slaves in real life, and so is an extremely striking example of Romanization, in so far as it invites the audience to contemplate the relevance of slavery to the Roman acting company (as well as the freeborn and unjustly enslaved Tyndarus, currently to his own father!), and in keeping with Plautus's most unusual tendancy to represent slavery from a slave's point of view.
Passage 8 (Terence, Hecyra 865-868)
(a) Terence, The Mother-in-Law;
(b) Pamphilus (Speaker A), Bacchis (Speaker B):
(c) at the end of the play Pamphilus & Bacchis agree not to reveal the whole story (esp. the rape) to anyone else;
(d) some possible talking points for elaboration:
(1) Bacchis, who has just tied up the play’s loose ends (quasi-dea ex machina), shows herself to be a “hooker with a heart of gold” and one of Terence’s most interesting female characters, who in her loyalty to her former lover/client here defies the stereotype of the harsh and mercenary meretrix;
(2) there is psychological realism in the agreement not to reveal more than is necessary or expedient, which reflects Terence’s overall tendency toward naturalistic depiction of character and situation;
(3) the reference to not doing things as they usually are done “in comedies” is a neat example of how Terence combines metatheatrical devices with plot and character, here to comment on the comparative artificiality of other, more typical comedies that tie up all the loose ends in closure to project a “happy-ever-after” post-play world.
Part III, Essay (50 points total).
The essay obviously can be approached and answered in various ways (and so I can't provide a detailed "key" here). First, always read the question carefully before starting to write. In this case, you wanted to both make generalizations about Plautus and Terence (i.e. regarding their presentation of serious issues), and, most importantly, to be sure to draw specific examples from specific plays by each comedian in order to support these generalizations. Overall, your essays were very thoughtful and well-crafted--thanks for that!