Green, 'Images and Ideologies: Self-Definition in the Hellenistic World', Bryn Mawr Classical Review 9510
URL = http://hegel.lib.ncsu.edu/stacks/serials/bmcr/bmcr-9510-green-images

@@@@95.10.5, Bulloch et al., edd., Images and Ideologies

A. Bulloch, E.S. Gruen, A.A. Long, and A. Stewart (edd.),
<i>Images and Ideologies: Self-Definition in the Hellenistic
World</i>.  Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993.  $55. 
ISBN 0-520-07526-9.
  Reviewed by J.R. Green -- University of Sydney
     Richard.Green@antiquity.su.edu.au

  This volume contains the revised and fully annotated papers of
a conference of the same title.  Experts in their fields at
Berkeley selected others to talk about their subjects and the
results were certainly good enough to merit publication.  The
conference was held in April 1988; Zanker points out [212] that
his manuscript was completed and submitted in autumn of the same
year.  Despite what is printed on the reverse of the title page,
the book was not published until well into 1994, as the
publisher's slip also makes clear.

  The structure of the book is simple.  There are five parts,
each introduced by one of the editors, with two papers and then a
Response from a further scholar.  There is a sizeable Select
Bibliography, and an Index, but no general summary or conclusion
and (somewhat irritating given the diversity of fields covered)
no list of abbreviations.

  Part One is concerned with  The Social and Religious Aspects
of Hellenistic Kingship', a title which at once covers both more
and less than it suggests.  Erich Gruen's Introduction [3-6]
reflects on Classical and fourth-century attitudes to monarchy
and thus serves as a useful way of generalising the particular
problems dealt with in the two following essays.  Klaus Bringmann
with  The King as Benefactor:  Some Remarks on Ideal Kingship in
the Age of Hellenism' [7-24] in fact pursues the principles
underlying what he argues is a systematic practice of benefaction
of cities by kings in the Hellenistic world.  They exploit a
mutual advantage by which a ruler, normally in response to a
request, will, as a practical instrument of policy, bond a city
to his own following by making a donation whether directly
financial (for projects such as public works) or in kind (often
in the form of grain).  The system as a whole depends on the
consciousness felt in Greek culture of the power conferred by the
act of giving on the one hand, and on the other of the obligation
felt by the recipient.  The points are well documented and
argued, and the paper is an excellent sample of a larger
enterprise on which Bringmann is engaged.

  Ludwig Koenen,  The Ptolemaic King as a Religious Figure'
[25-115], by contrast complains in his first footnote at being
dragged back to this field.  The result is a very substantial,
carefully annotated and authoritative paper on Greeks and natives
in Egypt, their relationship to each other and to the
king/pharoah.  At the same time he constantly returns to the
theme of whether there developed a mixed culture or two separate
ones which sit, however uneasily, alongside each other.  Indeed
the awkwardness of the relationship presented a particular
challenge to the ruler who responded in a way that was remarkably
successful.  Koenen emphasises the role of cult and festival in
establishing this relationship, and devotes a long section to
arguing that Callimachus reacted in highly sophisticated fashion
by introducing Egyptian motifs and references in his poetry, to
an extant that has hitherto not been appreciated.  The detail of
the argument throughout is handled with skill, and this is a
paper which should serve as a basic point of reference for some
time to come.

  Part Two is entitled  Identity and Crisis in Hellenistic
Literature' [130-151] and one suspects it is a label applied
after the event.  Thomas Gelzer contributes a piece called here
 Transformations' in which he seeks first to define Hellenistic
literature in ancient terms.  He nonetheless takes the radical
step of limiting himself to poetry and, furthermore, of excluding
cyclic epic and New Comedy.  He seeks to determine how these
poets defined themselves, and more particularly what crises led
to this style of poetry and what to its disappearance.  He
consciously attempts to reject the major shifts in political and
social background as determining factors in the evolution of
change in favour of poetry as self-definition, but in the end it
is difficult for him to do so.

  His use of the term crisis, too, is not without difficulties. 
His initial  crisis' which at once defines and prompts
Hellenistic poetry is of the best part of 100 years' duration,
since for him the <i>Frogs</i> of 405 both marks the end of great
tragedy and articulates deep-seated concerns about the future of
literature.  He also quotes Choerilus of Samos, writing of "the
man who at that time knew how to sing as servant of the Muses,
before the meadow was mown ..."  The fourth century sees the
establishment of the preconditions for Hellenistic poetry, not
least in the growing appreciation of the great poets of earlier
days: one remembers the public manifestation of this in the
re-production of old tragedies at the Athenian Dionysia from 386
BC, and of old (not Old) comedies from 339, or in the attempt to
establish the tragic texts in the time of Lykourgos.  He also
makes the obvious points about the function of libraries, the
self-consciousness of the new poetry, the closer and more formal
relationship than had existed in earlier periods between poet and
ruler, the importance given to the poet by the king as well as
the poet's dependence on the king, the loss of context for the
old poetry so that it is now only for reading--and that is how it
is used.  It is not easy, however, to see all this as a crisis as
we would normally use the term, and one has to bear in mind
(again) the exclusion of epic, of all prose and of the most
popular and widespread of  literary' forms, drama.

  The crisis of the end is even less clear, although there is
certainly significance to be read into the steady emergence of
anthologies, for example in the first century bc, the collection
of <i>Boukolikai Moisai</i> by Artemidorus and the Garland of
Meleager.

  Peter Parsons ( Identities in Diversity' [152-170]) presents a
wonderfully learned and apposite survey of Hellenistic literature
in which he emphasises the enormous variety of subject, style,
metre, genre, dialect and Greek ethnicity while at the same time
not hiding the very large gaps in our knowledge (one thinks of
non-Menandrian drama, both comic, tragic and satyric, or of such
writers as Eratosthenes or Posidonius).  He begins by emphasising
the diffusion of Greek literature in the eastern Mediterranean
world, and particularly the central role of Athens and Rhodes for
the book trade, and of course the position of Alexandria, its
library and its scholars.  He gives a brief view of just what it
is that is found on third-century and then on second-century
papyri.  One could have wished for much more on this with its
hints on the reception and popularity of works ancient and
modern, even if one recognises that the evidence is partial. 
Parsons also raises the problem of what it was that Hellenistic
writers saw in earlier work and what it was they tried to
imitate.  In the end he claims he has no answers to the range of
questions he raises, even if, a page earlier [169] he suggests
that  the key to the age is a cultural agoraphobia'.  At some
levels this is only too true, but it is primarily at the literary
levels, and at that the poetic.

  The Response from Albert Henrichs [171-195] is useful.  He
makes clear his difficulties with Gelzer's contribution (as had
Parsons less explicitly).  Indeed the reader might be well
advised to jump straight across to this after reading Gelzer's
piece.  He is less good with Parsons.  He then goes on with two
somewhat separate items, one on Menander and the other on
Apollodorus and the problem of the <i>Meropis</i>.  Someone
needed to write about Menander.  It is readily arguable that the
playwright had more impact on more people than any other writer
of the age.  Henrichs wastes some space on whether he should
really be identified as Hellenistic.  There is surely no
question, even putting aside chronology.  It is of course a
nuisance that our lack of anything more than scraps from his
immediate predecessors and contemporaries makes it so difficult
to give him literary context.  [One may note, however, that
Geoffrey Arnott's major work on Alexis is now with the press.] 
It needs to be acknowledged, however, that in terms of staging
the division from Middle Comedy is absolutely clear, with the new
and highly sophisticated range of masks and the new, more
naturalistic style of costume, both archaeologically datable to
the time of Menander.  Writing and directing are two parts of a
single creation.  

  On p. 182, Henrichs claims that "Menander's plays entertained
local Athenian theatergoers, whereas the Alexandrian poets had an
audience in mind whose taste was more exclusive and whose
background was more panhellenic".  Without entering into how we
can or cannot know about Alexandrian poets' intentions or
thoughts in regard to their audiences, the evidence of so-called
dramatic monuments (and particularly the cheap terracotta
figurines and models of masks) suggests very clearly that
Menandrian comedy did have a panhellenic function.  It is worth
noting in passing that not all Menander's comedies were set in
Athens either (cf. <i>Leukadia</i>).  Later on the same page, he
questions Parsons' claim that the plays of Menander "reached
Egypt with relative speed".  Again the archaeological evidence
suggests that they did, just as, during the remainder of the
Hellenistic period, Alexandria took on a leading role as a centre
for theatrical performance.  To his references on the
disappearance of Menander in Late Antiquity, one should now add
E. Handley in E. Handley and A. Hurst (eds.), <i>Relire
Menandre</i> (Geneva 1990) 146-8.  These points aside, one would
have no quarrel with Henrich's assessment.

  His comments on Apollodorus and the problem of the
<i>Meropis</i> are to the point, and his argument for a
sixth-century date for the poem is good.

  Part Three,  Self-Definition in Hellenistic Art', has R.R.R.
Smith,  Kings and Philosophers' [202-211] and Paul Zanker,  The
Hellenistic Grave Stelai from Smyrna: Identity and Self-Image in
the Polis' [212-230], preceded by a thoughtful and lively
introduction from Andrew Stewart.  One might wish that Smith had
allowed himself more space in this written version.  As it is he
takes what may seem a rather straightforward look at not only the
styles or types of portrait statue in the Hellenistic period, but
(more importantly) their meanings and how these were achieved
through the manipulation of visual stereotypes.  He uses the
particular examples of portraits of kings and of philosophers,
whom he characterises respectively as the sources of power
external to the polis and the  intellectual spokesmen' of the
polis.  Smith also points out that the visual stereotypes
employed make it impossible to confuse a king with a philosopher
and he highlights some of the more subtle varieties with these
categories.  This is a good account.  What he perhaps does not
stress enough for a general audience, even if he does acknowledge
it, is the absence of any search for photographic likeness: these
so-called portraits are artificially constructed statements about
the individuals concerned, and individuality takes very much
second place to the construction of the public statement.  One
might dare to say that one should not take images at face value.

  Zanker uses a relatively small theme to large effect.  He
takes the series of grave stelai from second-century Smyrna and
develops the theme already begun by Smith, the meanings that can
be deduced from the use of apparently stereotypical elements,
particularly when these elements can be shown to differ from
those of other places and periods.  Indeed it is interesting of
itself that the products of a city like Smyrna exhibit such
regionalism.  Unlike the grave stelai of later-fifth century
Athens, for example, the figures do not exist in an idealised
world of their own but stand frontal, facing the viewer and
therefore in some sense demanding dialogue.  Among many
observations in this rich offering, one may note the frequency
with which book rolls and writing implements are depicted, and
ask what it means.  Zanker reckons that it "reflects the
increased importance attached to intellectual training and
pursuits."  True enough.  What it does not mean is that all these
people necessarily had these skills: they pretended to them. 
Youths are shown as clothed (contrast the nudity of Classical
Athens), though other symbols of the gymnasium are brought into
use.  Athletic training (or, rather, physical fitness) is no
longer the only ideal celebrated; book rolls appear too; and,
from pose as well as dress, a greater modesty than applies to
adult males seems to be regarded as desirable.  The lack of
attention women pay to their children is noticeable, perhaps part
of a public presentation of a statuesque dignity.  Modesty and
restraint are relevant here too (as one also learns from
literature and other art), but the point is that Zanker
demonstrates all this and does not merely develop subjective
readings of the images.  His text was superbly translated by Alan
Shapiro.

  B.S. Ridgway's Response [231-241] shows her skill in rarely
taking anything for granted.  She raises the possibility of
circular argument in the attribution of all these stelai to
Smyrna, points to the problems in constructing any absolute
chronology for them, and then suggests that the similarity and
even the nature of the reliefs may, in part at least, be a
product of their mass-production and the anonymity or lack of
individuality that entails.  I do not find this last a totally
satisfying argument.  For Smith's portraits she not unreasonably
worries about questions of identification, Roman copies and Roman
creation.  She also points out [240] that the anastole and thick
wreath of hair do not only belong to portraits of Alexander. 
True so far as it goes.  As I have since pointed out elsewhere
["The Greeks and their Theatre", (in) A.M. Gibbs (ed.), <i>Masks
of Time. Drama and its Contexts</i> (Canberra 1994) 1-38], the
seminal role of theatre masks in picking up and developing
popular physiognomic stereotypes needs to be given more emphasis. 
The wavy-haired series of masks, and in particular that often
used for the young soldier, have a lot to tell us about the
creation of such images.  Indeed it is hard to see much
difference between the hair of the young soldier's mask as used
by Menander and the hair created for Alexander.

  The illustrations for this Part were poorly and muddily
reproduced.  Furthermore, those responsible for layout were
lamentably over-enthusiastic in their cropping, creating ugly
imbalances and worse: Aristotle (Fig. 2a) and Demosthenes (Fig.
4d) lost the tops of their heads.  The pictures for Zanker's
contribution were reproduced at a small scale (no heights given)
while leaving a lot of white on the page.  Given the eventual
quality, it would have been helpful and easy to have them larger.

  Part Four,  Self-Identity in Politics and Religion', is
introduced by Bulloch.  Folkert van Straten leads off with
 Images of Gods and Men in a Changing Society: Self-Identity in
Hellenistic Religion' [248-264].  He defines his theme as issues
of community and individuality in the pursuit of religion in the
Hellenistic period and, as one would expect given his interests,
he uses votive reliefs as his primary evidence, comparing
classical Athenian with Late Hellenistic and Roman from Asia
Minor.  The validity of the comparison is not self-evident and he
goes to some pains to justify it.  An interesting aspect is that
of the perceived closeness or distance between worshipper and
divinity, with the not-unexpected greater distance in the later
periods (but how much is it also a matter of culture and local
tradition?).  He looks in passing at the animals depicted as led
to sacrifice on the later reliefs (pigs, sheep, cattle) and notes
that they imply a greater expenditure than in classical Athens
(more of the more expensive animals), and takes this as a sign of
greater affluence.  But one should ask if the pictures are to be
taken literally--or do they depict what one would like to
sacrifice in the best of all possible worlds?

  Again the photographic illustrations are not of good quality,
and the author has taken up the deplorable habit of the French
vase iconologists of giving line drawings taken from photographs,
in the process losing the style and who knows what by way of
significant detail.

  Adalberto Giovannini,  Greek Cities and Greek Commonwealth'
[265-286], tackles a number of difficult problems, not least that
of the definition of the term  polis'.  He prefers to take it as
something more like  community' than as a term which necessarily
carries with it concepts of independence and autonomy.  An
underlying theme is the nature of Greekness and of Greek
communities, and to this end he emphasises the importance of
gymnasium and theatre: while the function of the gymnasium
shifted through time (especially, one might add, through the
disappearance of the citizen militia and, with it, the public
necessity for physical fitness and sharp reflexes), frequenting
the gymnasium was a privilege restricted largely to citizens and
therefore had a function of defining Greekness.  Compare Zanker,
above.  He also comments on the social and civic role of theatre,
but in a limited fashion.  More interesting is his emphasis on
the continuation and development of the networks between
communities/poleis in the changed Hellenistic world and the
importance of mutual support in adverse circumstances.  He looks
too at the importance of the panhellenic festivals (although some
greater elaboration of their changing nature would have been
worthwhile) as part of what he sees as the homogeneity of the
Greeks at this period.

  The Response from Albrecht Dihle [287-295] carefully avoids
putting the others to shame but suggests a number of important
qualifications.  He points out that much of what Giovannini
discusses concerns the upper classes and not the less privileged,
and that he is talking about urban communities, not rural (about
whom we know depressingly little, except, of course, from papyri
in Egypt).  He also takes up the issue of the relationship of the
individual to the ruler, and the political as well as the social
aspects of Hellenistic life.  There are valid points, too, about
the special quality of Hellenistic kings (see also Koenen,
above), and about the nature of Hellenistic religion: despite the
emphasis put on the new cults by modern scholars who find them
intrinsically interesting, "the mainstream of political and
religious life originated from the old Olympian gods, even in
Hellenistic times".

  Part Five is  Intellectuals and Images of the Philosophical
Life'.  It begins with a good and analytical introduction by A.A.
Long, invaluable for someone as inexpert in Hellenistic
philosophy as this reviewer.  From such a standpoint, Fernanda
Decleva Caizzi's  The Porch and the Garden: Early Hellenistic
Images of the Philosophical Life' [303-329] is a challenging and
skilled analysis of the images created by Hellenistic
philosophers and their public reception, in other words, of the
philosophers' performance aspect.  She notes that in the
biographical literature, external features and behaviour are
often related to the philosophical theory involved.  She
concentrates on Zeno, but also looks at Epicurus.  This is a
difficult area, not least because of the nature of the evidence,
but it is an important one since, as she demonstrates, the
attitudes of the greater public to figures such as these were as
often moulded by externals as by the details of the philosophies
they espoused or developed.  Christopher Gill,  Panaetius on the
Virtue of Being Yourself, [330-353], outlines two principal aims,
to examine the framework underpinning the advice to be oneself
and to capitalise on one's natural abilities, and then to
reconstruct the main lines of Panaetius' <i>Peri euthumias</i>. 
He sees the latter as a synthesis of a number of approaches. 
Gill remains conscious of the overall theme of the conference and
book, and ultimately asks the interesting question whether
Hellenistic culture itself displays any such notion as
self-definition.

  The Response from Julia Annas [354-368] is substantial and
makes a number of detailed comments that are well taken.  In the
context of Decleva Caizzi's paper, she points out that there are
no comparable stereotypes of either Plato or Aristotle.  This
creation of public image is new to the period, and if we find
such stereotypes of Socrates, it is because a number of the
schools of this period claimed him as a figurehead.

  The lack of a general Conclusion is perhaps not a bad thing. 
It certainly prompts the reader to think back and indeed to read
again--as many of these papers deserve.  Some themes emerged
which might have been better developed with more explicit
cross-reference, such as the growing definition of appearance in
relation to personality in Decleva Caizzi and Annas on the
philosophers, in Smith also on the philosophers as seen in
portraiture, and sadly only alluded to in the literary section
with regard to theatre.  It might have been useful to see
something more explicitly focussed on the employment and
manipulation of accepted stereotypes, appearing as they do across
the range of poetry, drama, thought, art and probably political
activity too.  A recurrent theme worth pulling together also, was
the practice of monarchy, raised by Gruen at the very beginning. 
Inevitably effort was put into defining  Hellenistic', some might
think too much effort.  Categorization is always a tempting
occupation and there is no doubt that the establishment of
definitions can itself reveal a great deal both about the subject
and about the views of those formulating the definitions. 
Nonetheless the better essays seemed to me those which pursued
the more essential theme of self-definition and the
ideologically-motivated creation of an image.

  An additional and useful function of this collection is the
way that it reminds one of what is not treated here and could
usefully be explored.  The section on art aside, the emphasis
throughout is largely on the traditional historico-literary
evidence.  Issues of orality and literacy in what is too readily
assumed to be a literate age need more than the passing
references they received.  Performance received some lip-service
(apart, that is, from the valuable contribution by Decleva
Caizzi), but it is a subject which deserves a whole other
volume--whether we think of the performance and/or distribution
of poetry, or of the various and rapidly-developing modes of
non-traditional theatrical performance, an area massively
underplayed in this collection, and of the evolution of popular
entertainment in general.  What better definers of images and
ideologies?  In the same direction one thinks of religious
expression, cult performance and processions and the massively
important role of such displays in cultural formation, but not
really covered here in the section on religion.  Or one may think
of architecture as a state performance and self-expression,
whether the permanent buildings bearing the names of their
donors, or, perhaps still more significantly, the temporary, such
as Ptolemy's Banqueting Pavilion, a subject well treated for
example by von Hesberg, "Temporaere Bilder oder die Grenzen der
Kunst.  Zur Legitimation fruehhellenistischer Koenigsherrschaft
im Fest", <i>JdI</i> 104, 1989, 61-82. Others will think of other
themes, and it is to this book's credit that they will be
prompted to do so.