~94
Theodora A. Hadjimichael
The fragmentary poetic lines that are drawn from the extant part of the
vn56vq a suggest an occasion and performance context for the Kassandra.
The beginning of the poem presumably refers to the goddess Athena (AOrvdq),
and the performance of the poem that was accompanied by the sounds of auloi
(a5uv nvodt) apparently takes place at or near a temple (of Athena), or at a
sacred space (icpdv dwnoo[v]... Tx Fvo).5 The rest of the Kassandra is lost,
but the poem has been identified as one of Bacchylides' dithyrambs. The assumption that the vn56vq a refers to one of Bacchylides' poems is based on a
testimony of Porphyrio.52 Porphyrio comments how Proteus in Horace's Ode
1.15 foretells the future Trojan War as Cassandra does in one of Bacchylides'
poems (Porphyrio ad Hor. c. 115).53
Hac ode Bacchylidem imitatur; nam ut ille Cassandram facit vaticinari futura belli Troiani, ita hic Proteum.
Dionysius also classified the poem as a paean), or to Aristarchus' criticism of Callimachus and his classification of the poem as a dithyramb (i.e. Dionysius also criticized
Callimachus and classified the poem as a dithyramb).
" In CLGP 1.4 (n. 34) 298 Maehler suggests that the lemma could also read either
[T6 nav]ELov TEcvoq or [T6'EpFX]ELov TFpEvoq both of which are connected with
Athena, the Panathenaic or the Erechthean respectively.
52 Maehler (n. 6, ed. 2003), H. Maehler, Die Lieder des Bakchylides. Zweiter Teil.
Die Dithyramben und Fragmente (Leiden 1997) 268-271, and Bacchylides: A Selection
(Cambridge 2004) in the apparatus fontium of fr. 23, includes both the scholia to Pi.
P. 1.100 and Servius ad Verg. Aen. 11.93 assuming that they refer to Bacchylides' Kassandra. Both sources create a link between the commented passage and Bacchylides'
dithyrambs - Helenos' prophecy to send Philoctetes to Troy in order to besiege the city,
and the shields the Arcadians are described as holding in the particular passage in the
Aeneid are similar to the ones they hold in Bacchylides' dithyrambs respectively. The
above sources however do not explicitly refer to Bacchylides' Kassandra; they merely
create a link between aspects and features of the Trojan War and Bacchylides' dithyrambs, which ultimately generates the scholarly need to assume that the reference is to
his Kassandra. The inclusion of both these passages could be based on the comment
of F. Blass, Bacchylidis Carmina cum Fragmentis (Leipzig 1899) ad fr.8, that actually
includes the text of Servius ad Verg. Aen. 11.93: "Non omisi, quamvis cum Neuio putem
ad frg. chart. p. 158sq (Kaocnvopa), pertinere. Nam Servii 'sicut habuisse Arcades' referenda ad illa 'propter numina illic depicta'; Arcadum autem mos ideo memoratur Bacchylidesque eius testis advocator, quoniam eidem apud Vergilium quoque inducuntur."
53 Cf. Scholia Lactantii Placidi ad Stat.Theb. 7.330-331 (Sweeney, Vol.1: "... hic Bacchylides Graecus poeta est, quem imitates est Horatius in illa ode [1.15] in qua Proteus
Troiae futurum narrat excidium"
