Aristophanes Three - the Median Bird.

#aristophanes #birds #greekcomedy #chickens #roosters

Aristophanes is one of the first if not the first Western writers to mention Roosters.

Line 275

EEE Zeus another truly outlandish bird is here
the next line about muse-prophet summit travelling bird is probably a parody of an other dramatist

Chickens were relatively new to Greece, not quite as exotic as peacocks but still regarded as ...foreign.

The Hoopoe King calls him a Median bird. Median was used interchangeably with Persian.

Chickens had already reached Egypt and the Near East.

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One character argues that Persians were ruled by Roosters and compares the King of Kings tiara to a roosters crest ...also that the Rooster was one of the Birds that once ruled the world and further proof is still the roosters morning song awakes workers, smiths, potters, and others.

Do try to look up the greek text, maybe in a Loeb, if your Greek is limited, and sound out the text.

It sounds so much more poetic in Greek !

Some notes on the Aorist Passive

Some notes on the Aorist passive

1)   THETA MARKER

2) the theta is an Aspirated sound  t h not a fricatve which is why

3) the ending of a stem changes as well as the theta being added

so you get kh+ th

4) Because its aorist you will also get METATHESIS of a stem
such as BAL > BLEE

5) Why use passive?

Consider these statements.

The Greeks defeated the Persians by using strategy.

The Persians were defeated by the Greeks using strategy.

Passive allows word changes.

Very useful for rhetoric making use of sound effects to convey emotion and fact and poetry based on metre and syllable length.

Oh if you're planning to see the latest 300 movie please go and reread or read for the first time Aeschylus' description of the naval battle at Salamis or read Herodotus?