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Theodora A. Hadjimichael
Ode 16 (B. 16.31-35) points to an unspoken and remote part of the myth that
the audience is asked to narrate on their own.
Beyond endings and narrative frames, the narrative itself in fr. 60 moves
between two different emotional experiences; the grim and negative feelings
of the women who mourn for their fate and express how death is preferable
to slavery (fr. 60.18-20) are unexpectedly replaced by cries of joy as soon as
their circumstances change (fr. 60.25-37). The transition from grief to joy resembles Ode 17; the youths and the maidens rejoice when Theseus returns
from Poseidon's abode (B. 17.121-129) and this reaction replaces their previous distress when Theseus dives into the sea (B. 17.92-96). The sudden switch
in narrative mood in fr. 60 is presented as the result of divine interference in
the fragment. A deus ex machina is often the reason for the sudden transition
from a distressing situation to a joyful condition in Bacchylides. Croesus in
Ode 3 questions the divine and expresses his desire to die rather than live in
slavery (B. 3.28-31). His daughters grieve for their imminent death and their
grief unexpectedly becomes joy, as divine rain puts out Croesus' pyre (B. 3.47 -58). Likewise, Proteus in Ode 11 prays to Artemis to save his daughters from
the madness that Hera induced in them (B. 11.95-109) and his wish is granted
after the narrative description of their suffering. In all three passages - fr.60
and Odes 3 and 11 - direct speech precedes the divine interference. The speaker
calls upon the divine to be asked for a favor that is subsequently granted, or in
the case of Croesus the speaker questions its power that is later confirmed by its
intervention. In this sense, the change in the characters' fate, which ultimately
alters the narrative situation, could be characterized as a Ocu:a.
The title of fr. 61 is an additional piece of evidence in favor of the ascription
of both fragments to Bacchylides. Despite the semi-paeanic is ie refrain at the
end of fr. 60 and the continuous classification of both fragments in modern
editions as dubia,18 the existence of the title AEYKIHHIAE1 for fr. 61 makes it
plausible that both frr. 60 and 61 are part of Bacchylides' dithyrambic corpus.19
They both seem to be a continuation of the dithyrambs of Bacchylides in the
papyrus at the Britich Library (PLond.Lit. 46 and P.Lond. inv. 733) whose titles
18Snell (n. 10) 46x: "Ipse propter finem fragmenti 60 exclamationem iij exhibentem
paeanibus haec carmina attribuerim (cf. Pind. pae. 1.5, 2.107, 4.62 etc.), fr. 61 autem
rettulerim" L. Kippel and R. Kannicht, "Noch einmal zur Frage 'Dithyrambos oder
Paian?' im Bakchylideskommentar P.Oxy. 23.2368' ZPE 73 (1988) 23, who believe that
the fragment is a paean because of the paeanic refrain.
19 Similarly A. Severyns, Bacchylide. Essai Biographique (Paris 1933) 142, 151; Irigoin
(n. 6) 256; D. Fearn, Bacchylides: Politics, Performance, Poetic Tradition (Oxford 2007)
174-175, n. 34; D'Alessio (n. 4) 127.
