The Gorgons’ Lament: Auletics, Poetics, and Chorality in Pindar’s Pythian 12

Abstract

This article offers a fresh reading of Pindar’s Pythian 12, an ode composed for a victorious aulete, which demonstrates its engagement in current musicological debates concerning innovations in instrumentation, relations between the musical and vocal elements in choreia , and the status of the pipes. In ways that intersect with these issues, Pindar anticipates a motif that resurfaces in later Attic drama and other texts concerning the origins of choral lyric and that identifies women’s lament as the prototypical form of song.

Weaving a Song. Convergences in Greek Poetic Imagery between Textile and Musical Terminology. An Overview on Archaic and Classical Literature

“…39. On the aulos revolution of early 5 th century BC and the role of Pindar in it see Prauscello 2012;Steiner 2013;LeVen 2014, 81-83 with further bibliography. 40.…”

Genealogies of τέχνη

“…Following Snell and, more recently, Clay 1992, Segal 1995, and Steiner 2013, pace Gentili and Luisi 1995, I prefer the manuscript's ἄϋσε(ν) to Boeckh's ἀνύσσεν. For weaving a melos, cf.…”

“…Pindar is explicit about Athena's craft: she invented (ἐφεῦρε, 7) aulosplaying by weaving (διαπλέξαισ' , 8) the lament of the Gorgons into song.18 In 13 Throughout I cite the text of Snell-Maehler 1987; block quotations are drawn, and shorter translations adapted, from Race 1997. 14 Steiner 2013, 195. I follow Köhnken 19711976, 264-265 The myth of Perseus's slaying of the Gorgon is also recounted at P. 10.44-48, though without any mention of music.…”

Pindar’s Twelfth Pythian: Gorgonsisters and Auletics

“…Естественно, что внимание комментаторов и исследовате-лей так или иначе привлекают вопросы, связанные с музы-кальным аспектом этого эпиникия. В одной из последних работ ее автор Д. Стайнер (Steiner 2013) стремится отыскать в пинда-ровском тексте отражение событий музыкальной жизни Греции начала V в. до н. э. Стайнер солидаризируется с точкой зрения, согласно которой Пиндар был не консерватором и традициона-листом, но продолжал новаторскую деятельность авлистов VI в. до н. э. (Steiner 2013: 174) 2 .…”