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Άμπρακιώτις (Amprakiotis)
(‘Ambracian Woman’)

Discussion Kock 1884 11.138; Edmonds 1959 11.48—9; Webster 1970. 77;
Kassel-Austin 1991 11.241; Sanchis Llopis et al. 2007. 242
Title This play is the only known example of the title, although titles of
this sort are common; Webster 1970. 77 compares Samia (Anaxandrides;
Menander), Olynthia (Alexis), Boidtia (Theophilus; Webster follows Kock in
reading Boidtis) and Milesia (Alexis). Plays with ethnics as titles seem to have
formed a small portion of Anaxandrides’ output; in addition to this play and
Samia, he wrote a Locrides and a lhettaloi.
Ambracia was a Corinthian colony founded ca. 625 BC in southern Epirus,
just north of the modern Gulf of Arta; in the fourth century, it seems not
to have been much involved in the politics of the Greek world as a whole,
although fear of Philip Il’s expansionist tendencies forced it to ally itself with
Athens in the late 340s BC before becoming a Macedonian dependency fol-
lowing Chaeroneia. In general, cf. Hirschfeld 1894. 1805-7; Hammond 1967.
For the spelling, cf. St. Byz. a 265 εϋρηται καί διά τού π αντί τού β, δθεν καί
τό Αμπρακιώτης κτλ.
Content of the comedy Like most similarly titled comedies, the obvious
assumption is that the plot bore some general resemblance to Menander’s
Samia·, such speculation can be neither proven nor disproven.
Date The title is known only from the fragmentary list of Anaxandrides’
plays in test. 5; it seems to have been his last to take second place at the Lenaia,
perhaps in the 350s or early 340s BC.