Testimonia (test. 4)

43

discussion of the Peloponnesian War in his Samian Chronicle·, see Kebric 1977.
79-80 (although without specific reference to this passage).
For the various traditions having to do with Eupolis’ death (including test.
4-5), see in general Storey 1990. 4-7; Storey 2003. 56-60.

test. 4 K.-A. (= test, iv Storey)
Paus. 2.7.3
μετά δέ τό μνήμα τοϋ Λύκου διαβεβηκόσιν ήδη τον Ασωπόν, έστιν έν δεξιά
τό Ολύμπιαν, ολίγον δέ έμπροσθεν έν άριστερά τής οδού τάφος Εύπόλιδι
Άθηναίω ποιήσαντι κωμωδίαν
After the tomb of Lycus, after one has already crossed the Asopus, the Olym-
pion is on the right. Just before it, on the left-hand side of the road, is a grave
for Eupolis the Athenian, who wrote comedy
Citation context From Pausanias’ description of the sights on the road from
Corinth to Sicyon just after one moves into Sicyonian territory.
Discussion Kaibel 1907 p. 1230.60-3; Storey 2003. 57
Interpretation Just before this, at 2.7.2, Pausanias says that he has no idea
who Lycus was and could find no evidence for a Messenian by the name who
was a pentathlete and victorious at Olympia (Moretti #1014). The additional
information apparently comes from an inscription on the tomb, just as in
the report that follows of Ξενοδίκης μνήμα ... άποθανούσης έν ώδΐσι (“a
grave commemorating Xenodice, who died in childbirth”). Εύπόλιδι Άθηναίω
ποιήσαντι κωμωδίαν is thus most economically explained as drawn from the
inscription on the tomb, although it is not impossible that Άθηναίω ποιήσαντι
κωμωδίαν is a gloss either by Pausanias (who must then have known what he
was talking about) or by a scribe (in which case the connection of the name
with the Athenian comic poet is likely mistaken). For the name of the genre
used in the singular thus, cf. already Ar. V. 1511 τήν τραγωδίαν ποεϊ; Pl. Smp.
223d κωμωδίαν και τραγωδίαν έπίστασθαι ποιεΐν.
Why a cenotaph of Eupolis would have been erected outside Sicyon is
difficult to say. The location on a border between two states suggests a tutelary
function. Among the first sights Pausanias describes in the city itself, on the
other hand, are a theater and a temple of Dionysus (2.7.5), and Sicyon did
have a rich artistic, literary and musical history. The 4th-century comic poet
Sophilos, for example, was from Sicyon, as were Macho and the Neophron
whose Medea allegedly provided a model for Euripides’ homonymous tragedy,