Show description

Second, his most crucial collaborators are shown to be farmers—those who earnestly tend to generative grounds. Third, his primary actions are manifold: in their metaphoric allusions; in their meta-theatrical associations; and in the poetic models they actively appropriate, adjust and recall. And, these poetic models further raise mythic, tragic and allegorical topics: about provisionally restoring worldly harmony by recovering absent figures; and about protagonists acting with civilizing and just ambitions, but with ambiguous consequences.

1). Ancient Greek inscriptions suggest that the “architect” title came into official use in the two decades prior to the performance of Peace—decades coinciding with the Periclean building program in the 440’s and 30’s. Whereas a few “architect” titles are found on inscriptions in the mid and late fifth century BCE, the title is found more abundantly on inscriptions in the early fourth century BCE (that is, in the decades following the performance of Aristophanes’ Peace and Euripides’ Cyclops).

4 Having reflected on the suggestive peculiarities in the hoisting scene of Peace, as well as on the critical reference to Pheidias and Pericles, a general argument can be made: Trygaeus’ architecting was devised and performed in view of architects and their activities—both visually and speculatively. For, Trygaeus’ actions were not only performed for architects to see (contemporary architects being among the play’s spectators), but were also performed in a special speculative arena—a theatrical and theoretical arena, which played an imperative role in Athenian culture by re-interpreting and re-presenting civic and mythic practices with the aim of comprehending their interdependence.