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Making the audience: Ekphrasis and rhetorical strategy in
demosthenes 18 and 19
Article in The Classical Quarterly · May 2015
DOI: 10.1017/S0009838814000901
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MAKING THE AUDIENCE: EKPHRASIS AND
RHETORICAL STRATEGY IN DEMOSTHENES 18
AND 19
Andreas Seram
The Classical Quarterly / Volume 65 / Issue 01 / May 2015, pp 96 - 108
DOI: 10.1017/S0009838814000901, Published online: 02 April 2015
Link to this article: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0009838814000901
How to cite this article:
Andreas Seram (2015). MAKING THE AUDIENCE: EKPHRASIS AND
RHETORICAL STRATEGY IN DEMOSTHENES 18 AND 19. The Classical Quarterly,
65, pp 96-108 doi:10.1017/S0009838814000901
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Classical Quarterly 65.1 96–108 © The Classical Association (2015)
doi:10.1017/S0009838814000901
96
MAKING THE AUDIENCE: EKPHRASIS AND RHETORICAL
STRATEGY IN DEMOSTHENES 18 AND 191
1. INTRODUCTION
In this paper, I intend to explore three examples of ekphrasis – narrative scene painting –
in Demosthenes 18 and 19: the first is Demosthenes’ depiction of the announcement in
Athens of the capture of Elatea by Philip (18.169–73), while the second and third are
descriptions of Aeschines’ (allegedly) failed theatrical performances (18.262 and
19.337–8). Scholars have paid insufficient attention to these descriptive accounts:
there have been a few limited discussions of 18.169 in commentaries but, otherwise,
the use and purpose of these accounts as part of Demosthenes’ rhetorical strategy
have not been widely appreciated.2 This article aims to show that ekphrasis, when skilfully deployed as in Demosthenes 18 and 19, is a powerful weapon in the speaker’s
arsenal that merits thorough investigation. By instructing the audience as to what and
how to think, imagine and remember, orators seek to engage the audience, elicit their
verbal or non-verbal reaction in the law court, create a certain disposition in them
towards the litigants, stir up and manipulate their emotions, and thus affect their verdict.
I argue that ekphrasis in the passages in question is a means of recreating a moment
in the past in the ‘here and now’ of the trial. I should make clear that I am not reading
this process as in any sense an exercise in historical reconstruction. The past in these
cases is at least manipulated (in the case of 18.169–73) or even perhaps fabricated
(in the case of 18.262 and 19.337–8). Whereas the events at Elatea are known to
have ‘happened’ in some sense, notwithstanding Demosthenes’ undoubted manipulation
of them in this passage,3 by contrast, the veracity of the ekphrastic descriptions of
Aeschines’ failed theatrical performances in 18.262 and 19.337–8 is irrecoverable.
The striking hyperbole in 18.262 that Aeschines was wounded by the agrarian produce
1
This is a revised and expanded version of a paper given at two conferences: ‘Theatre of Justice:
aspects of performance in Greco-Roman oratory and rhetoric’, University College London, April 2012
and the Classical Association Annual Conference, University of Reading, April 2013. I am deeply
indebted, as ever, to my Ph.D. supervisor, Chris Carey, for reading and commenting on multiple
drafts. I also owe special thanks to Ian Worthington, Adele Scafuro, Brenda Griffith-Williams and
the audiences of the two conferences, especially Roger Brock, Christos Kremmydas, Eftychia
Bathrellou, Matthew Kears and Laura Viidebaum for their valuable comments. Finally, I also thank
Andrew Morrison and CQ’s anonymous reader for suggesting further improvements to the structure
and content of this article.
2
See, for example, H. Wankel, Demosthenes Rede für Ktesiphon über den Kranz (Heidelberg,
1976), 848; S. Usher, Demosthenes: On the Crown. Greek Orators 5 (Warminster, 1993), 230–1;
H. Yunis, Demosthenes: On the Crown (Cambridge, 2001), 204–5.
3
See W.J. Slater, ‘The epiphany of Demosthenes’, Phoenix 42 (1988), 126–30, at 129, who argues
that the presentation of tranquillity in Athens before the announcement of the messenger is a device
that Demosthenes uses in order to dramatize the change of the moment and then underscore his role as
saviour of Athens. As Slater notes, according to the lacunose information left to us, the Athenians
‘were waiting for news for some time, and it was not really likely that business had been going on
totally as usual’.
MAKING THE AUDIENCE
97
that the audience in the theatre threw at him may indicate that Demosthenes could have
created that description as part of his strategy of exploiting the association of Aeschines
with acting and as an attempt to shape the audience’s memory in such a way as to invite
them to mock his adversary.4 The doubtful veracity of the ekphrastic descriptions of
Aeschines’ failed performances, however, is immaterial for my present purpose, since
it does not invalidate the examination of how these are used to influence the law-court
audience.
2. EKPHRASIS REVISITED: ANCIENT DEFINITION, USE AND FEATURES
Before proceeding to the examination of ekphrasis in Demosthenes 18 and 19, a brief
discussion of that notion, its ancient and modern definitions, use and features, may
be useful. In ancient rhetorical treatises, ekphrasis describes the power of narrative
descriptions to activate the visual imagination of the audience. Two caveats are
necessary.
The first concerns the use and application of that notion, which is mostly confined in
contemporary scholarship to descriptions of works of art. This, however, is not the way
ancient critics use it. Hence, it is useful to revisit that notion through the lens of ancient
Greek rhetorical theory and recent classical scholarship.
Scholarship in the past has tended to emphasize the dominance of art as the single
most significant subject matter of ekphrasis. Some researchers, for example Edouard
Bertrand, Jacques Bompaire, Jaś Elsner and Shadi Bartsch, while acknowledging that
ekphrasis in ancient theory has a wide area of subject matters, nevertheless centre
their analysis exclusively on art. Thus, as Bompaire points out, ‘the most interesting
meaning is the one which treats ekphrasis of the works of art, for example paintings
and buildings, as ekphrasis par excellence’.5 In short, as Ruth Webb rightly notes in
her important work revisiting ekphrasis through the lens of ancient Greek rhetorical theory, the modern definitions of ekphrasis ‘place a central importance on a certain type of
referent: the visual arts. But this was not its ancient sense’.6 Theon (Prog. 118.6–7)
defined it as follows:
A descriptive speech ( periēgēmatikos logos), which vividly brings the matter shown before the
eyes. An ekphrasis may be of persons, and events, and places, and times. Of persons, as in the
Homeric passage: ‘he was round-shouldered, dark-skinned, with curly hair’ [Odyssey 19.246]
and the passage on Thersites ‘he has a pointed head and was lame in one leg’ [Iliad 2.219;
4
See pp. 105–6 below. Harris also casts doubts on the veracity of Demosthenes’ claim in 19.337–8
that his adversary gave up his theatrical career because of the hostility theatrical audiences showed to
him. E.M. Harris, Aeschines and Athenian Politics (New York and Oxford, 1995), 31.
5
J. Bompaire, Lucien écrivain: imitation et création (Paris, 1958), 707: ‘mais le sens le plus
intéressant est celui qui fait de l’ ecphrasis d’œuvre d’art, sculpture, tableau, édifice, l’ecphrasis par
excellence’. See also E. Bertrand, Un critique d’art dans l’antiquité (Paris, 1881), 49–54;
L. Spitzer, Essays on English and American Literature (New York, 1984), 89; J.A.W. Hefferman,
Museum of Words: The Poetics of Ekphrasis from Homer to Ashbery (Chicago and London, 1993),
3; J. Elsner, ‘Introduction: the genres of ekphrasis’, Ramus: Critical Studies in Greek and Roman
Literature 31 (2002), 1–18, at 1–3; S. Bartsch and J. Elsner, ‘Introduction: eight ways of looking
at an ekphrasis’, CPh 102 (2007), i–vi, at i. For critical discussions of these modern definitions of
ekphrasis: S. Goldhill, ‘What is ekphrasis for?’, CPh 102 (2007), 1–19, at 1–3; R. Webb,
Ekphrasis, Imagination, and Persuasion in Ancient Rhetorical Theory and Practice (Surrey, 2009),
28–38.
6
Webb (n. 5), 1.
98
ANDREAS SERAFIM
whole description 2.217–19] and so on, and in Herodotus the appearance of the ibis, of hippopotami, and crocodiles in Egypt. Of events, such as the ekphraseis of war, peace, a storm,
famine, plague, an earthquake. Of places, such as meadow, seashores, cities, islands, deserted
places and the like. Of times, such as spring, summer, a festival and things of this sort.7
For Nikolaos (Prog. 67), ekphrasis is ‘an expository speech (aphēgēmatikos logos), which
vividly (enargōs) brings the subject before the eyes. Vividly is added because it is in this
respect that ekphrasis differs most from diēgēsis (narrative). The latter sets out the events
plainly, while the former tries to make the listeners into spectators.’8 For the Greeks, ekphrasis refers to any descriptive passage or account, which is credited with the ability to present
the matter described before one’s eyes, creating the illusion that one ‘sees’ what is absent or
abstract.9 ‘It can be of any length, of any subject matter, composed in verse or prose, using
any verbal techniques, as long as “it brings its subject before the eyes”.’10
The second caveat is about the diversity of terminology that refers to the potential of
narrative descriptions to create subjects for viewing: in addition to ekphrasis, we find
enargeia, diatypōsis and hypotypōsis, diagraphē and phantasia.11 Each describes the
process of affecting ‘the mind of the listener, evoking an image, thought of as an impression on the soul, and arousing emotion’.12 The lack of any crystal-clear definition of
these terms and explanation of their difference in meaning, use and application amplifies
the ambiguity of the ancient rhetorical terminology, which, as Webb points out, ‘is not
surprising given the ad hoc and personal nature of ancient education’.13 The term
ekphrasis is used throughout this article because it is thoroughly discussed in rhetorical
handbooks, which is the field more relevant to the phenomena that I am particularly
exploring, in contrast to some of the other terms, which are rooted in fields such as
philosophy,14 or, like enargeia, are described in rhetorical sources as being referential
features of ekphrasis.15
7
Trans. Webb (n. 5), 197. See also Ps.-Hermog. Prog. 22; Apth. Prog. 36.
Trans. Webb (n. 5), 202–3.
9
At this point, it is worth noting that the potency of language to bring images before the eyes is
also described in Arist. Rh. 1411b24–5, 35 where it is noted that metaphor can bring its subject
πρὸ ὀμμάτων. Although Aristotle does not expand the discussion, nevertheless, even this brief reference indicates that the power of language ‘to place X before the eyes’, which was discussed systematically later, was recognized in fourth- and fifth-century Athens.
10
Trans. Webb (n. 5), 8.
11
The nearest modern equivalent would be Deixis am Phantasma, a notion used for the first time
by Karl Bühler. Despite the convergences in meaning, use and application between ekphrasis and
Deixis am Phantasma, there are some divergences: ekphrasis refers to any account that brings the
described matter before one’s eyes, whereas a prerequisite for Deixis am Phantasma, at least as generally understood, is normally the use of specific deictic wording, such as the use of demonstrative
words and expressions. See K. Bühler, Theory of Language: The Representational Function of
Language (Amsterdam and Philadelphia, 1990), 141–2; M. Vamvouri-Ruffy, ‘Visualization and
“Deixis am Phantasma” in Aeschylus’ Persae’, QUCC 78 (2004), 11–28, at 13; N. Felson,
‘Introduction: the poetics of deixis in Alcman, Pindar, and other lyric’, Arethusa 37 (2004),
253–66, at 254.
12
R. Webb, ‘Imagination and the arousal of the emotions in Greco-Roman rhetoric’, in S. Morton
Braund and C. Gill (edd.), The Passions in Roman Thought and Literature (Cambridge, 1997),
112–27, at 120.
13
Webb (n. 5), 51–2 n. 51.
14
For example, phantasia, as used by post-classical rhetoric, arises from Stoic philosophy with a
broad sense: it is ‘not merely an act of imagination, but a way of looking at the world’. Bartsch and
Elsner (n. 5), 90.
15
The only crystal-clear information we have on the quality of ekphrasis is about the virtues of
ekphrasis, clarity (σαφήνεια) and vividness (ἐνάργεια), with which the art of bringing the described
object, person or place before the eyes is achieved. See Theon, Prog. 118.7; Ps.-Hermog. Prog. 23.
8
MAKING THE AUDIENCE
99
3. THREE EXAMPLES OF EKPHRASIS
I now turn to the three examples of ekphrasis that I will explore in this article. The first
example, in 18.169, is as follows:
ἑσπέρα μὲν γὰρ ἦν, ἧκε δ᾽ ἀγγέλλων τις ὡς τοὺς πρυτάνεις ὡς Ἐλάτεια κατείληπται. καὶ
μετὰ ταῦθ᾽ οἱ μὲν εὐθὺς ἐξαναστάντες μεταξὺ δειπνοῦντες τούς τ᾽ ἐκ τῶν σκηνῶν τῶν
κατὰ τὴν ἀγορὰν [1] ἐξεῖργον καὶ τὰ γέρρ᾽ [2] ἐνεπίμπρασαν, οἱ δὲ τοὺς στρατηγοὺς
[3] μετεπέμποντο καὶ τὸν σαλπικτὴν [4] ἐκάλουν· καὶ θορύβου πλήρης ἦν ἡ πόλις. τῇ δ᾽
ὑστεραίᾳ, ἅμα τῇ ἡμέρᾳ, οἱ μὲν πρυτάνεις τὴν βουλὴν ἐκάλουν εἰς τὸ βουλευτήριον,
ὑμεῖς δ᾽ εἰς τὴν ἐκκλησίαν ἐπορεύεσθε, καὶ πρὶν ἐκείνην χρηματίσαι καὶ προβουλεῦσαι
πᾶς ὁ δῆμος ἄνω καθῆτο.
It was evening and a messenger arrived bringing to the presiding councillors the news that
Elatea had been taken. They instantly rose from the table in the middle of their dinner, cleared
the people from the booths in the marketplace, and burned the wicker frames, while others summoned the commanders and ordered the attendance of the trumpeter. The whole city was full of
commotion. At daybreak on the next day, the presidents summoned the Council to the Council
House, and you flocked to the place of assembly. Before the Council could introduce the business and prepare the agenda, the whole body of citizens had taken their places on the hill.16
The masterly stylistic construction of this passage, and the use of patterns that draw subtly on tragedy, enhance the vividness of the narrative description, with the aim of creating and then manipulating the memories of the audience to the best rhetorical effect.
Demosthenes recreates the past ‘tragedy’ of the Athenians in the present, relying on their
experience as theatregoers in instructing them to ‘see’ the described event, as if they
were watching a performance before their eyes.17
I begin with a subtle theatrical loan, the use of the participle ἀγγέλλων. In context,
this participle tacitly invites the audience to identify the person who brought the sorry
news to the Athenians with the tragic ἄγγελος. My point here is not that this single word
per se carries tragic evocations; rather, it is that this word in this particular context serves
to bring tragedy to the mind of the audience. To appreciate the effect, it is worth considering the options available to Demosthenes for describing the announcement of the
alarming news. He could, for example, have attributed the announcement of the news
to a plurality of messengers, as Diodorus Siculus does in his account of the same
historical event (16.84):
καταληφθείσης γὰρ τῆς Ἐλατείας ἧκόν τινες νυκτὸς ἀπαγγέλλοντες τὴν κατάληψιν τῆς
πόλεως.
For after Elatea had been occupied, persons came at night to Athens reporting the occupation.18
16
Translation of passages from Dem. 18 is taken from C.A. Vince and J.H. Vince, Demosthenes:
De Corona and De Falsa Legatione (Cambridge, MA and London, 1953) except when otherwise indicated. The translation of §169 is slightly adjusted.
17
The question of the theatrical competence of the ancient Athenian theatrical audiences inevitably
emerges at this point. Aristotle (Poet. 1451b23–6) is sceptical about the ability of the majority of spectators to recall even the most well-known material. For a critical discussion, see M. Revermann, ‘The
competence of theatre audiences in fifth and fourth century Athens’, JHS 126 (2006), 99–124. Yet
despite the doubts about the theatrical competence of the audiences, it can still be argued that the
invited effect (whether or not it was achieved) of theatrical patterns, language register, quotations
or pictorial narrative descriptions is to draw on the experience of the audience as theatregoers in
order to connect what happens in the law court with theatre.
18
Trans. C. Bradford Welles, Diodorus of Sicily (Cambridge, MA and London, 1963), 72–5.
100
ANDREAS SERAFIM
Diodorus uses the passive with a simple genitive of time and has the news brought not
by a single messenger but by many. Later in his account, Diodorus uses the accusative
τὸν μηνύσαντα (not τὸν ἀγγέλλοντα) to designate the messenger who was called by
the generals to describe once again what happened in Elatea. The key point to note
from the comparison between Demosthenes and Diodorus is that the use of the participle
ἀγγέλλων at the beginning of §169 in Demosthenes is not random, but rather seems to
draw on conventions used in tragedy, where the verb ἀγγέλλω and its cognates are used
to describe the duty of bringing news.19
The tragic resonance of this narrative description is heightened by some other stylistic
details. The language pattern used here for the announcement of the alarming news – the
verb ἥκω followed by a participle that denotes the action of bringing news (ἀγγέλλων) –
is also used at the beginning of messengers’ speeches in tragic plays. A noteworthy
example is at Eur. Andr. 1070, where ἥκω is used with a participle that, interestingly,
is similar to the verbal collocation in Dem. 18.169 (οἵας ὁ τλήμων ἀγγελῶν ἥκω
τύχας σοί τ᾽, ὦ γεραιέ, καὶ φίλοισι δεσπότου ‘what a tale of disaster I have come
to tell you, old man, and my master’s friends as well’).20 Whether Demosthenes has specific plays in mind is impossible to say; it can be argued, however, that the use of a language pattern that is deployed in tragic messengers’ speeches, combined with other
aspects of the context that have implications for tragedy, may be an implicit means
of enhancing the tragic potential of this description.
It should be noted, at this stage, that there are some considerable limitations to the
analogy between messengers’ speeches in tragic plays and the condensed message of
the Demosthenic bringer of news in §169. The messenger in tragic plays, on the one
hand, is given a (lengthy) speech of his own, which is full of details about the physical
setting, the characters involved and the actions executed by them,21 and reports ‘at least
one passage of direct dialogue from someone on the scene’.22 Demosthenes’ messenger,
on the other hand, neither has a speech of his own nor gives details about what happened
in Elatea. None the less, the context still legitimizes the suggested link between the
Elatea narrative description and tragedy. It is not argued, of course, that Demosthenes
produces a tragic scenario that mirrors precisely what playwrights do. What is argued
is that the patterns and devices he employs subtly construct his narrative in such a
way as to evoke tragedy in the mind of the audience. Thus, in alluding to tragic messenger speeches, for example, he encourages the audience to envisage a similar scene
to those that they had seen enacted onstage, and which, as de Jong aptly argues, were
19
See Eur. Andr. 1070, Supp. 638, Phoen. 1075, Rhes. 268, Bacch. 658, Tro. 258; Soph.
Trach.180. In the majority of the plays mentioned below in n. 20 (except for Electra and
Philoctetes), the character who brings the news is called ἄγγελος.
20
Trans. J. Morwood, Euripides: Hecuba, The Trojan Women, Andromache (Oxford, 2000), 106.
The same pattern, ἥκω followed by a participle, is also used in several other plays; see Eur. Supp. 634:
ἥκω πόλλ᾽ ἔχων λέγειν, Or. 854: ἥκω φέρων + λόγους; Soph. El. 666, Phil. 1267; Aesch. Sept. 40.
This list of examples is based on a quick search through the online TLG database. It should be noted at
this point that this formula – the verb ἥκω followed by a participle – is used only rarely in oratorical
speeches (see Aeschin. 1.122; Dem. 19.223, 45.1, 59.13; Lys. 33.3) and not for describing the action
of bringing news.
21
See M.L. West, Euripides: Orestes (Warminster, 1987), 14; M. Dickin, A Vehicle for
Performance: Acting the Messenger in Greek Tragedy (Lanham, MD, Boulder, New York, Toronto
and Plymouth, 2009), 6–8.
22
R. Rehm, Greek Tragic Theatre (London and New York, 1992), 61.
MAKING THE AUDIENCE
101
familiar to and particularly appreciated by the Athenians.23 The appeal to the recurrent
tragic pattern serves to enhance the vividness of the description by drawing on the familiar experience of the audience.
Mental vision is not the only effect of the exploitation of implications of the tragic
messenger pattern in 18.169; this can also be a means of imposing on the audience a
particular reading of a momentous event (in this case the announcement of the capture
of Elatea) and consequently a means of aggrandizing its pivotal effect. Messenger
speeches often either chart or precipitate a radical change of direction in the plot.24 In
Demosthenes’ speech, therefore, these implications of the role of the messenger in tragic narrative are arguably exploited in order to grasp the attention of the audience by inviting them to
realize that what is described in §169 is as important as the plot-changing announcements of
news-bringers in tragedy. This adds additional impact to Demosthenes’ attempt to trigger loaded reminiscences in the audience’s mind of that moment in the past that did
indeed alter dramatically the situation in Athens.
There is a further indication of the use of patterns that evoke tragedy. A stylistic device
frequently associated with the speeches of messengers in tragic plays is what de Jong
calls the ‘pregnant silence before the storm’.25 The use of this device is evident at the beginning of §169: the Athenians in the law court are invited to ‘see’ their Assemblymen taking
their dinner peacefully, and then to re-experience the sudden reversal when, immediately
after the announcement of the capture of Elatea, the calm disappeared, the presiding councillors stood up shocked and incredulous, and the whole city became noisy. The abrupt
shift from the moment of silence and tranquillity to the onset of turbulence approximates
to the use of a ‘pregnant silence’ before the catastrophe in tragic messenger speeches.
The dramatic change in the situation in Athens is embedded in and reinforced by the
stylistic construction of §169 in a way that enhances the vividness of the narrative.
Instead of treating the capture of Elatea merely as a fact, Demosthenes gives a vivid
description of the panic in Athens and the confusion of the Athenians as to how to
react to the shocking news. This description begins with an indication of time
(ἑσπέρα μὲν γὰρ ἦν), which does not, from a purely factual perspective, add anything
to the gist of the clause; if one were to cut out this first part, the rest of the sentence (ἧκε
δ᾽ ἀγγέλλων τις ὡς τοὺς πρυτάνεις ὡς Ἐλάτεια κατείληπται) would still make perfect
sense. Wankel suggests that this way of commencing the description is ‘almost poetic’.
Although his examples are taken from later authors (for example, Ov. Fast. 2.792,
5.429),26 this intuition is sound. The use of a non-personal subject as an indication of
time as here (cf. §172: ἐκεῖνος ὁ καιρὸς καὶ ἡ ἡμέρα ᾽κείνη ... ἐκάλει ‘that day
and that crisis called’) is a linguistic pattern rare in Greek prose works,27 but common
in verse genres, such as tragedy and epic.28
23
See I.J.F. de Jong, Narrative in Drama: The Art of the Euripidean Messenger-Speech (Leiden
and New York, 1991), 118–19; see also Dickin (n. 21), 1–3.
24
See de Jong (n. 23), 130.
25
See de Jong (n. 23), 147–8. There are several instances of silence before the catastrophe in tragic
messengers’ speeches. See Eur. HF 930, where there is a moment of silence before Heracles’ madness; Bacch. 1084–5, where there is another example of silence before the Maenads attack
Pentheus. On silence, tone and sound in tragedy: de Jong (n. 23), 144–8.
26
(n. 2), 847.
27
J.D. Denniston, Greek Prose Style (Oxford, 1952), 28–34.
28
For example, ἕσπερος: Hom. Od.1.403, 18.306; νύξ: Soph. El. 91, 198, 1684, 1752 (for some of
the few occurrences of this abstract noun as subject indicating time in oratorical speeches, see Andoc.
1.43, 48); Hom. Il. 5.310, 659, 8.488, 9.474, 11.356, 13.580, etc.; Aesch. Pers. 378, 384; σκότος: Eur.
102
ANDREAS SERAFIM
It can also be argued that the seemingly superfluous details given at the outset of
Demosthenes’ description appeal to the visual memory and imagination of the audience.
Much of the pictorial potential of the first clause of §169 would have been lost if
Demosthenes had used a simple genitive of time – for example, ἧκεν ἑσπέρας
ἀγγέλλων τις (as in Hyp. fr. 33) – or a combination of a passive statement with a genitive of time, as used in Diod. Sic. 16.84 (καταληφθείσης γὰρ τῆς Ἐλατείας ἧκόν τινες
νυκτός).29 The construction of the first clause is more masterful: [a] Ἑσπέρα μὲν γὰρ
ἦν, [b] ἧκε δ᾽ ἀγγέλλων τις ὡς τοὺς πρυτάνεις ὡς Ἐλάτεια κατείληπται. The sentence
can be divided into two cola (marked here as a and b): the first presents an image of the
‘usual’ beginning of the night, when the Assemblymen and the Athenians got their supper, the city was tranquil, and there was no sign of the oncoming uproar. The second
colon presents the violent breach of tranquillity and immobility: a messenger arrives
to interrupt the stillness with the alarming news that causes the ensuing turbulence.
The striking change in the narrative pace is an effective way of reinforcing the pictorial
effect of the juxtaposition of these two antithetical cola. ‘The abrupt switch from the
balanced opening clause (– ⏑ – – ⏑ –) to the jarring pace that follows (– ⏑ – – – ⏑),
reinforced by the sense-pause and μέν/δέ, reflects the way in which the tranquil evening
is shattered by the messenger’s sudden arrival.’30
According to Hermogenes (Id. 320), the first period of §169 is an example of rapidity
(γοργότης), since a trochaic metre is used, ‘the rhythm that literally runs in passages
(τρέχει γὰρ ὡς ὄντως ἐν τούτοις ὁ ῥυθμός)’.31 It is difficult to believe that
Demosthenes did not reinforce this quick-fire narrative pace with the use of comparable
techniques in his vocal delivery. For example, the acceleration of his pace of delivering
the first clause of §169 or the action verbs in the next period would have each served to
represent the urgency of the decisions that should have been made for the safety of
Athens. The lack of action verbs in the rest of the Elatea scene by contrast indicates
the retardation of pace, which is also highly likely to have been represented in the speaker’s delivery. This antithesis, from the commotion of the first day to the uneasy silence
of the second, perhaps reflected in Demosthenes’ delivery, adds to the vividness of the
description and energizes the audio-visual imagination of the audience.
This contrast between the two phases of that dramatic night is further repeated in,
and thus strengthened by, the juxtaposition of the participles ἐξαναστάντες and
δειπνοῦντες that follow. The first presents the ‘unusual’ image of the night, while
Hipp. 192, 1444, HF 1216, Phoen. 1453; Hom. Il. 4.461, 503, 526, 5.47, 6.11, 13.575, 672, 14.519,
15.578, 16.316, 325, 607, 20.393, 471, 21.181 (two rather rare uses of that noun as abstract subject in
oratorical speeches are in Dem. 57.9, 13); ἡμέρα: Aesch. Pers. 386 (for two rather infrequent uses of
this abstract subject [Dem.] 59.99: ἐπειδὴ ἡμέρα ἐγένετο; Din. 1.107); ἦμαρ: Soph. El. 199; Ἠώς:
Hom. Il. 1.477, 6.175, 8.1, 9.707, 23.109, 24.695, 788, Od. 2.1, 3.404, 3.491, 4.194, 4.306, 431,
576, 5.228, 8.1, 9.152, 170, 307, 437, 560, etc. This not at all exhaustive list of examples is based
on a quick search through the online TLG database.
29
As mentioned above (see pp. 99–100), Diodorus describes the same historical event. There are
some significant convergences in the content of his account and that given by Demosthenes, since, as
McQueen notes, Diodorus’ narrative description is based on Demosthenes’ one. E.I. McQueen,
Diodorus Siculus: The Reign of Philip II. The Greek and Macedonian Narrative from Book XVI
(Bristol, 1995), 156. There are also, however, some notable divergences in both the content and
the way of presenting the events. Diodorus, for example, telescopes events, while Demosthenes
spins out the moment with circumstantial detail. For more information on the differences between
Diodorus’ description and that of Demosthenes, McQueen, ibid., 156.
30
Yunis (n. 2), 204.
31
Trans. C.W. Wooten, Hermogenes: On Types of Style (Chapel Hill and London, 1987), 69.
MAKING THE AUDIENCE
103
the second presents the image of its ‘usual’ beginning. The tenses of these two participles, as well as their order, merit examination. The present participle δειπνοῦντες indicates a continuous action,32 which is unexpectedly and forcefully interrupted by the
action of the aorist participle ἐξαναστάντες, which comes first even though, in the temporal sequence of actions, it should come second. This order is a means of emphasizing
the violent interruption of one action by another, which is also indicated by the use of
the adverb μεταξύ.33
As well as the use of antitheses, several other stylistic features of §169 are designed
to maximize the pictorial capacity of this narrative description. A distinct feature is the
plethora of action verbs (numbered as 1–4 in the passage cited earlier) that denote quickfire action, motion and commotion (ἐξεῖργον, ἐνεπίμπρασαν, μετεπέμποντο, ἐκάλουν)
and which invite the Athenians in the law court to relive the stressful actions and intense
emotions of their fellows during the turmoil. It should be noted, at this point, that all
these action verbs are in the imperfect. In narrative, the so-called ‘“imperfect of description” often has a dramatic or panoramic force: it enables the reader to follow the course
of events as they occurred as if he was a spectator of the scene depicted’.34
The vivid way in which Demosthenes describes the violent reversal of the situation
in Athens and the emphasis he places on the presentation of the confused response of the
Athenians allows him to recreate the moment within its emotional context. Demosthenes
aims to remove the critical resistance of the Athenians to his own reconstruction of the
past, by inviting them to ‘see’ before their eyes their intense emotions, their fear, panic
and uncertainty at this time of turmoil. This example of ekphrasis is ‘a rhetorical
weapon to leave the listener not just “as if a viewer at events”, but with the destabilizing
emotions of that event’.35
The incitement of an emotional reaction in the audience also forms a part of
Demosthenes’ strategy to elicit their goodwill for himself, as it is he who is presented
in what follows (especially in §173) as being the only one who stood up and spoke
when the city was in danger. It is worth expanding the discussion to consider the
way Demosthenes sets up his own intervention in the Athenian assembly in response
to the crisis. To begin with, the tumultuous actions of the frightened and panic-stricken
Athenians in §169 are sharply contrasted with their presentation in §§170–2 as being
assembled in silence, unwilling to move and speak for the deliverance of Athens.
This vivid antithesis is then supplemented by a further pair of equally vivid contrasting
images in §§170–2 and §173. The attention paid to the silence and complete lack of
motion in §§170–2 is contrasted with the decisive intervention by Demosthenes in
§173: ἐφάνην τοίνυν οὗτος ἐν ἐκείνῃ τῇ ἡμέρᾳ ἐγὼ καὶ παρελθὼν εἶπον εἰς ὑμᾶς
‘well, I was the man who came forth on that day and addressed you’.36 Demosthenes
expertly places before the audience two antithetical images: on the one hand, the
Athenian leaders stood motionless in their seats, while, on the other hand,
Demosthenes emerged abruptly out of the mass (ἐφάνην), ascended the βῆμα
(παρελθών) and came forward to speak for the deliverance of Athens.
32
H.W. Smyth, Greek Grammar, revised by G.M. Messing (Cambridge, 19592), 419, §1872a3.
LSJ s.v. μεταξύ.
34
Smyth (n. 32), 425, §1898.
35
Goldhill (n. 5), 6.
36
Trans. Usher (n. 2), 109. On this passage as an example of Demosthenes’ masterly self-portrayal:
H. Yunis, Taming Democracy: Models of Political Rhetoric in Classical Athens (Ithaca and London,
1996), 269–75.
33
104
ANDREAS SERAFIM
In context, the emphatic first-person verb ἐφάνην that indicates the suddenness of
Demosthenes’ advent serves to reinforce the dramatic dimension of the description
and enhance its vividness. The image of Demosthenes appearing to resolve masterfully
a seemingly intractable problem concerning the safety of Athens approximates to a coup
de théâtre, as Yunis rightly argues,37 and has affinities with the dramatic device of the
deus ex machina. These affinities are reinforced by the fact that the verb φαίνομαι and
its cognates are used to describe the epiphanies of heroes and gods in tragic and comic
plays.38 Although the convention of the deus ex machina is at most a hint here, this
could still be seen as a risky strategy in that it could imply that Demosthenes saw himself as akin to a superhuman agent, isolated from and superior to the audience. In context, however, this risk is largely minimized by the careful phrasing that underscores
Demosthenes’ role as citizen and politician who cares for and defends the interests of
the Athenian dēmos. In §172, he points out:
But, it seems, that day and that crisis called not only for the patriot and the rich man, but for the
man who had followed the course of events from the beginning, and had calculated correctly the
reason and purpose of Philip’s actions. For anyone who had not grasped those purposes, or had
not studied them long beforehand, however patriotic and however wealthy he might be, was not
the man to appreciate the needs of the hour, or to find any counsel to offer to the people.
The emphatic predicative οὗτος (§173: ἐφάνην τοίνυν οὗτος … ἐγὼ) refers to the political qualities that anyone who wanted to stand up against Philip should have: he should
not only be a rich and patriotic citizen, but also a well-informed political genius able to
follow the reasoning behind Philip’s strategy.39 Any Athenian has the potential to perform this role but none of their leaders was actually prepared to do it – only
Demosthenes himself. In attributing praiseworthy civic qualities to himself, however,
he is careful not to alienate the audience with overt and arrogant self-praise, and studiously avoids anything which might look like an accusation of inaction against the common people, many of whom might have been in the law court. Instead, he carefully
targets the Athenian leaders – thus underscoring his own dynamic role as a patriotic political leader, capable of defending Athens. The implications of the device of the deus ex
machina, in context, serve to reinforce the vividness of the narrative description – thus
stimulating the audience’s mental vision of Demosthenes as a leader determined to
defend his polis in a time of danger.
This goal is also served by the antithesis between stillness-speechlessness and action,
which turns the account of a past event into an ‘I–You’ contrast between Demosthenes
and Aeschines. The latter is presented (tacitly in §§170–2 and explicitly in §180) as
being useless and incapable of defending the polis in a crisis, while also, as one of
the most passionate supporters of the Peace of Philocrates, being responsible for whetting Philip’s imperialistic appetite. In §173, the contrast with Demosthenes, whose
‘advent alters the drastic situation in a stroke’,40 is sharp, but it becomes even sharper
in §180: σοῦ πλείονος ἄξιος ὢν ἐφάνην τῇ πατρίδι ‘I was seen to be worth more to
this country than you [Aeschines]’. This zero-sum contrast between Demosthenes and
37
Yunis (n. 2), 207.
See Eur. Hec. 37, 110; Ar. Ach. 567, Eq. 458, 836. Secondary sources: Wankel (n. 2), 863–4;
Slater (n. 3), 126–8. For a comprehensive discussion of the convention of the deus ex machina:
Rehm (n. 22), 68–73.
39
See also W.W. Goodwin, Demosthenes: On the Crown (Cambridge, 1904), 109; Yunis
(n. 2), 207.
40
Yunis (n. 2), 207.
38
MAKING THE AUDIENCE
105
Aeschines is designed to invite the audience to side with the leader who defended the
polis in the time of danger.
My second example of ekphrasis is in §262, where Demosthenes describes the
onstage acting of his adversary:
οὐ κατῄσχυνας μὰ Δί᾽ οὐδὲν τῶν προϋπηργμένων τῷ μετὰ ταῦτα βίῳ, ἀλλὰ μισθώσας
σαυτὸν τοῖς βαρυστόνοις ἐπικαλουμένοις [ἐκείνοις] ὑποκριταῖς Σιμύκᾳ καὶ Σωκράτει,
ἐτριταγωνίστεις, σῦκα καὶ βότρυς καὶ ἐλάας συλλέγων ὥσπερ ὀπωρώνης ἐκ τῶν
ἀλλοτρίων χωρίων, πλείω λαμβάνων ἀπὸ τούτων ἢ τῶν ἀγώνων, οὓς ὑμεῖς περὶ τῆς ψυχῆς
ἠγωνίζεσθε· ἦν γὰρ ἄσπονδος καὶ ἀκήρυκτος ὑμῖν πρὸς τοὺς θεατὰς πόλεμος, ὑφ᾽ ὧν
πολλὰ τραύματ᾽ εἰληφὼς εἰκότως τοὺς ἀπείρους τῶν τοιούτων κινδύνων ὡς δειλοὺς
σκώπτεις.
You entered the service of those famous players Simmykas and Socrates, better known as the
Growlers. You played small parts to their lead, picking up figs and grapes and olives, like an
orchard-robbing costermonger, getting more profit from these than from the plays in which
you acted at the peril of your lives.41 For there was no truce or armistice in the warfare between
you and your audiences, and your casualties were so heavy, that no wonder you taunt with
cowardice those of us who have no experience of such engagements.
Emphasis is placed on the (alleged) hostility of the theatrical audience towards
Aeschines. The hostility was so great that, according to Demosthenes, Aeschines was
hissed by the audience and pelted with agrarian produce, which he collects like a fruitseller.42 The simile ὥσπερ ὀπωρώνης aims to deconstruct the persona of
Aeschines; the fruit-seller/stealer has affinities not with Aeschines’ trade as tragic
actor but with primitive comic mime (see Ath. 14.621d–e).43 It is also included by
Pollux in his list of ‘lives by which one would be disgraced’ (6.128: βίοι ἐφ’ οἷς ἄν
τις ὀνειδισθείη).44
The derision is underscored by the ironic statement that Aeschines gets more from
what the audience threw at him than from prizes for the performances that he acted at
the danger of his life.45 There is ‘a pun on the two meanings of ἀγών and
ἀγωνίζομαι, fight and play’.46 The final period of §262 develops even further the subtle
irony expressed in the pun. The hostile audience response registered by throwing fruit
41
Translation is slightly modified; the underlined clause (‘getting more … lives’) is taken by Usher
(n. 2), 143. The translation of Usher underscores Demosthenes’ subtle irony and his implicit attempt to
ridicule the military record of his opponent.
42
Pickard-Cambridge notes that the Athenians ‘kept themselves refreshed throughout the performances with wine and dried fruits and confectionery, which might also be used to pelt actors
whom they do not like’: A. Pickard–Cambridge, The Dramatic Festivals of Athens (Oxford,
19682), 272. See also P.D. Arnott, Public and Performance in the Greek Theatre (London and
New York, 1989), 6.
43
Secondary bibliography: A. Pickard-Cambridge, Dithyramb, Tragedy, and Comedy (Oxford,
1962), 134–6; Yunis (n. 2), 257.
44
For a detailed discussion of the figure of the fruiterer: Goodwin (n. 39), 162; Wankel
(n. 2), 1154.
45
Yunis (n. 2), 257 suggests a less persuasive analysis of this sentence. For him, the simile ὥσπερ
ὀπωρώνης ἐκ τῶν ἀλλοτρίων χωρίων is an indication that ‘Aeschines took the opportunity to steal
fruit from the fields like a thieving small fruit-seller’ and the next clause πλείω λαμβάνων …
ἠγωνίζεσθε that ‘Aeschines’ performances were so bad that he earned less from them than from
his fruit-thieving’. If we accept Yunis’ approach, however, then the last clause (ἦν γὰρ ἄσπονδος
… ὡς δειλοὺς σκώπτεις) does not make good sense. The use of the particle γάρ at the beginning,
which indicates that this clause clarifies what precedes it, makes clear that Aeschines acquires the
fruits and other agrarian produce as a consequence of the audience’s hostility, i.e. that he was pelted.
46
Goodwin (n. 39), 162; LSJ s.v. ἀγών.
106
ANDREAS SERAFIM
becomes a total war between Aeschines and the audience and causes wounds
(τραύματα) for the hapless actor. Goodwin is right to note that figs, grapes and olives
cannot have put Aeschines and his fellow actors in any real danger.47 This exaggeration,
combined with the meticulous choice of words that draw subtly on the imagery of wars –
τῶν ἀγώνων … ἠγωνίζεσθε, ἄσπονδος καὶ ἀκήρυκτος πόλεμος, τραύματα – is designed
to belittle and ridicule not only the acting career but also the impressive military performance of Aeschines (at least according to what he himself claims in 2.167–9).
Demosthenes relocates Aeschines’ martial bravery from the battlefield to the theatrical
stage and degrades his campaigns against the enemies to a fight against spectators armed
with fruit.
The implied analogy between the reaction of two audiences, the theatrical and the
law-court audience, aims to encourage the latter to relive and experience Aeschines’
onstage failure in the same way that the former (allegedly) did, sharing its hostile
mood and expressing the same contempt for Aeschines, and thus nullifying the impact
of his considerable personal presence and delivery. The caricatured description of
Aeschines is designed to provoke laughter: ‘once the playful is exceeded, laughter is
invariably regarded in Greek texts as having a human object or target, and it is the
intended or likely effect of “pain”, “shame” or “harm” on this target’.48Demosthenes’
description brings before the eyes of the judges and onlookers the image of
Aeschines as a ridiculous stage buffoon and invites them to laugh at him and display
the same contempt as the earlier audience allegedly had.49 To incite and manipulate
this non-verbal reaction of the audience is to attempt to create a sense of community:
laughter often unites two of the three parties involved in a trial (i.e. the prosecutor,
the defendant and the audience) against the third party.50 Hence, Demosthenes aims
not only to estrange his opponent from the goodwill of the viewers/hearers, but also
to insinuate himself into their favour.51
My third example of ekphrasis comes from Demosthenes 19. In §337–8,
Demosthenes claims that Aeschines played the role of Thyestes and the figures from
the Trojan War in a failed performance that made the audience hiss him and almost
stone him:
[A] καίτοι καὶ περὶ τῆς φωνῆς ἴσως εἰπεῖν ἀνάγκη· πάνυ γὰρ μέγα καὶ ἐπὶ ταύτῃ φρονεῖν
αὐτὸν ἀκούω, ὡς καθυποκρινούμενον ὑμᾶς. [B] ἐμοὶ δὲ δοκεῖτ᾽ ἀτοπώτατον ἁπάντων
ἂν ποιῆσαι, εἰ, ὅτε μὲν τὰ Θυέστου καὶ τῶν ἐπὶ Τροίᾳ κάκ᾽ ἠγωνίζετο, ἐξεβάλλετ᾽
αὐτὸν καὶ ἐξεσυρίττετ᾽ ἐκ τῶν θεάτρων καὶ μόνον οὐ κατελεύεθ᾽ οὕτως ὥστε
τελευτῶντα τοῦ τριταγωνιστεῖν ἀποστῆναι, ἐπειδὴ δ᾽ οὐκ ἐπὶ τῆς σκηνῆς, ἀλλ᾽ ἐν τοῖς
κοινοῖς καὶ μεγίστοις τῆς πόλεως πράγμασι μυρί᾽ εἴργασται κακά, τηνικαῦθ᾽ ὡς καλὸν
φθεγγομένῳ προσέχοιτε.
47
Goodwin (n. 39), 162–3.
S. Halliwell, ‘The uses of laughter in Greek culture’, CQ 41 (1991), 279–96, at 283.
Mockery by ones’ enemies was a powerful fear in Greek culture attested in prose and verse texts,
such as Eur. Med. 1049–50; Lys. 3.9. See S. Halliwell, Greek Laughter (Cambridge, 2008), 19–38.
50
On this ‘relation-building’ potential of laughter: C. Carey, ‘Structure and strategy in Lysias
XXIV’, G&R 37 (1990), 44–51, at 49; E. Hall, The Theatrical Cast of Athens: Interactions between
Ancient Greek Drama and Society (Oxford, 2006), 388.
51
In this case, laughter is also used to dispel Aeschines’ strong argument about Demosthenes’ lack
of military achievements that cannot otherwise be refuted. To quote Aristotle (Rh. 1419b7), ‘as for
jests, since they may sometimes be useful in debates, the advice of Gorgias was good – to confound
the opponents’ earnest with jest and their jest with earnest’.
48
49
MAKING THE AUDIENCE
107
And in fact I perhaps need to say something about his voice; I hear he also prides himself very
much on that, in the belief that he will overcome you by his acting. But when he was performing
the troubles of Thyestes and the men at Troy, you used to drive him away and hiss him out of
the theatres and all but stone him to death, so that in the end he gave up being a tritagonist. And
now that he has brought about thousands of troubles, not on the stage but in the city’s most
important public affairs, I think it would be a very strange thing indeed if you were to pay attention to him on this occasion as being a good speaker.52
This passage can be divided into two sections (marked here as A and B) with one common addressee, the law-court audience, which the speaker aims to estrange from his
opponent. The first section presents Aeschines’ law-court speech as a theatrical performance with no reality behind it. A notable feature of the first section is the use of the
phrase ὡς καθυποκρινούμενον ὑμᾶς: the participle is unattested elsewhere and it is
plausibly suggested that it was coined by Demosthenes.53 Although the formation
(the κατά-compound) and syntax (ὡς followed by participle) are common,54 this compound form, unlike other (plain or compound) forms of the verb ὑποκρίνομαι, is transitive, meaning ‘he will overcome you by acting’. Language here underlines the
extravagant emphasis that Demosthenes places on the impact upon the audience of
Aeschines’ political acting.
The second section consists of a vivid description of a (recurrent) theatrical performance by Aeschines. Particular attention is paid to the reaction of the theatrical audience.
The verbs ἐξεβάλλετε ‘drive away’ and ἐξεσυρίττετε ‘hiss’ present regular aspects of
the response of the audience within a theatrical context, and therefore invite the lawcourt audience to ‘see’ the viewers in the theatre reacting in an aggressive way against
Aeschines, their normal response to poor acting.55 As in the case of 18.262, the description here, I argue, is not just about a past incident, but it is rather an attempt to create a
manipulated version of the past in the present: Demosthenes tries to make the contemptuous response of the theatrical audience a model for the law-court audience. The invited
alignment of the law court with the theatrical audience aims to stir θόρυβος as an
expression of the audience’s disapproval for Aeschines.56 Demosthenes’ attempt to
stir the reaction of the members of the audience serves his permanent purpose to create
a certain disposition in them towards his opponent, by instructing them to ‘see’ him in a
negative way when he takes the rostrum.
52
Translation of 19.337–8 is from Douglas M. MacDowell, Demosthenes: On the False Embassy.
Oration 19 (Oxford, 2000), 335.
53
MacDowell (n. 52), 352. The verb recurs only in later works, such as Dion. Hal. Dem. 53;
Lucian, Dial. D. 13.2; Philo 2.280, 520.
54
Smyth (n. 32), 473–4, §§2120–2.
55
On the manner Athenian audiences proclaim their preferences and put pressure on the judges, see
primary sources: Thuc. 4.28.1–4; Arist. Rh. 2.1400a9–11; Pl. Leg. 659a, 700c–701b, 876b1–6, Resp.
492b5–c1; Hyp. 1.20; Dem. 18.52; Ar. Vesp. 912. Secondary sources: Pickard-Cambridge (n. 42),
275; V. Bers, ‘Dikastic thorubos’, in P.A. Cartledge and F.D. Harvey (edd.), Crux: Essays presented
to G.E.M. de ste Croix on his 75th Birthday (Devon, 1985), 1–15; Hall (n. 50), 363–6; D.K. Roselli,
Theater of the People: Spectators and Society in Ancient Athens (Austin, 2011), 48–51; R. Thomas,
‘And you, the Demos, made an uproar: performance, mass audiences, and text in the Athenian democracy’, in A.P.M.H. Lardinois, J.H. Blok and M.G.M. van der Poel (edd.), Sacred Words: Orality,
Literacy, and Religion, vol. 8: Orality and Literacy in the Ancient World (Leiden and Boston,
2011), 161–87, at 171–85.
56
Θόρυβος is any vocal expression (for example, the shouts of praise or blame) directed from the
judges (dicastic θόρυβος) or the bystanders (coronal θόρυβος) to the speaker. Bers (n. 55), 1–15; see
also Thomas (n. 55), 171–85.
108
ANDREAS SERAFIM
4. CONCLUSION
In the examples of ekphrasis I have discussed here, manipulated versions of the past are
created in the present in a way that enables the speaker to give the audience a sense of
involvement in (real or fabricated) events distant in time, while simultaneously eliciting
their verbal or non-verbal reaction and manipulating their emotional responses, whether
of admiration, contempt or hostility. Demosthenes uses ekphrasis in a flexible and
diverse way to enable him to accomplish several goals: to elicit the goodwill of the audience for himself, to lambast his opponent, and to invite the audience to hate, despise and
ridicule him.
By examining the use, form and purpose of these examples of ekphrasis, therefore,
this article has sought to show both that it is feasible to reconstruct a general sense of
how an orator might use ekphrastic descriptions as part of his rhetorical strategy to win
over judges and onlookers, and that this is an important oratorical device that has yet to
be fully explored by modern scholarship on the ancient Greek orators. In elucidating in
some detail the use of ekphrasis as a rhetorical strategy in Demosthenes 18 and 19, this
paper also establishes a framework within which the use of similar strategies in the
works of other Greek orators might be explored.
University College London
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ANDREAS SERAFIM
andreas.serafim.10@ucl.ac.uk