Throughout the play, Messenio is running between Menaechmus of Syracuse and Menaechmus of Epidamnus, trying to fulfill their demands. Most prominent in The Brothers Menaechmus is the servus currens stock character, or the “running servant.” Menaechmus of Syracuse’s slave, Messenio, is the embodiment this stock character. While these stock characters existed before Plautus, Plautus redefined these tropes. Stock characters were prominent in both Greek and Roman comedies, and Plautus utilizes them in The Brothers Menaechmus.
Each of these qualities is present in Plautus’ The Brothers Menaechmus, be it in the physical humor present or in the situational comedy that initiates the play then continues until the play’s end. Atellan farce included farcical skits involving crude humor, Greek Old Comedy involved sexual and scatological innuendo and jokes, and Greek New Comedy involved much situational humor. Plautus adapted Atellan farce, Greek Old Comedy, and Greek New Comedy. The term that refers to the adaptation of other works with an original twist is “contaminato,” a feature often utilized by Plautus. Plautus borrowed from and adapted qualities present in Greek and Roman plays preceding him. Traditionally, Plautus’ plays were sung for the majority of their duration, rather than spoken. Plautus’ comedies are the earliest Latin works to have survived in their entirety, and as such, they heavily influenced many other playwrights-including Shakespeare. Terms that we can now extrapolate from the epigraphic evidence.Plautus was a Roman comic playwright, living from approximately 254 BC to 184 BC, and The Brothers Menaechmus is frequently considered to be his greatest work. Question is not entirely Plautine invention) would have used the normative The Greek original (assuming the scene in Peniculus’ carnal desiderata, therefore,Īre couched in Latin terms, two of them patronymic hybrids (cf. Word that appears frequently in the Greek inscriptions mentioned above, and Reference at 211) to be rendered something like “having half a brain.” Sinciput is parallel linguistically to h ê mikraira, a Sinciput is also of Latin origin, and has a comic secondaryĦ33, both instances apply to Peniculus, set up for the joke by the initial However, is not an attested Greek word, and pernon is commonly believed to be a borrowing from Latin. Gratwick argued for Ur-forms glandion and pernon in
Ussing noted, the terms glandionida and pernonida are patronymicae comicae ( Commentarius in Plauti comoedias 1875, reprinted Hildesheim, 1972: ad loc. ThisĪffords new insight into the Menaechmi scene. I conclude that Plautusĭoes not use the normative Greek terms for these and similar meats. In an inscription from southern Attica (SEG XXXV 113, published in 1970,ĭated to the first half of the third century BCE).
That they are Latin versions of cuts also consumed at Greek public festivalįeasts as detailed in Hellenistic Greek sacrificial regulations, especially Are these Greek or Roman meats? I will argue Only by the peculiarity of his words: glandionidam suillam laridum pernonidam aut sincipitamenta porcina (210-211). When the parasite Peniculus requests meat for lunch at Menaechmi scene I.3 (182-218), his lust for pork is exceeded Recognizing how the playwright manipulates the comicĮffect of status foods requires a close examination of how he names them. Masters, and the Art of Authority in Plautine Comedy , The meat theme isĪn additional aspect of the negotiation between what McCarthy calls “theĭegradation of slavery and the wearying labor of mastery” ( Slaves, 2) argued long ago but since the referencesĪre generally made by those who did not have ready access to such expensiveįare, they also remind the audience of that very fact. Reflects a lengthy Roman love affair with the pig, as Fraenkel ( Elementi The abundance of references to pork in particular Holland (University of North Carolina, Asheville)Ĭonsumption of meat is a small but significant signifier of social tensions