BMCR 2025.01.43

A commentary on books 3 and 4 of Achilles Tatius’ Leucippe and Clitophon

, A commentary on books 3 and 4 of Achilles Tatius’ Leucippe and Clitophon. Mnemosyne supplements, 480. Leiden: Brill, 2024. Pp. xviii, 671. ISBN 9789004691520.

Preview

 

Hilton’s commentary on books 3 and 4 of Achilles Tatius’ novel Leucippe and Clitophon is the latest installment in recent of commentaries on the novel of Achilles Tatius.[1]. The novel of Achilles Tatius (2nd c. AD) stands out among the five canonical Greek novels for being a first-person narrative throughout and for its blending of romance, adventure, sophistic mood, and humour. This unique blend, which makes Leucippe and Clitophon an attractive object of research, is presented and carefully dissected by Hilton in his commentary. The latter is termed as “philological in the broadest sense” (p. vii): issues of language and text are discussed alongside a host of other matters that affect the interpretation of these two books. The commentary indeed captures the narrative intricacies and cultural contexts that are central to understanding this part of the novel. Books 3 and 4 notably form the core of the “Egyptian” section of the novel (the account of the adventures of the novel’s heroes in Egypt after they are shipwrecked near Pelusium; Alexandria is the scene of the first half of book 5, but the action moves to Ephesus in the second half), and it is logical that they should be the subject of a single commentary volume.

The commentary starts with a concise but full Introduction to the novel of Achilles Tatius. In the relatively short space of 46 pages, Hilton manages to touch on most important aspects of this novel’s study: date and identity of the author, structure and narrative technique, language, style, and manuscript tradition, intertextuality, and reception. A subchapter on characterisation is, however, missing, and would have been welcome given the current scholarly interest in the nature of novelistic characters (typified or individualised?).[2] The Introduction also presents some of the novel’s major themes and features (realism and ridicule; magic, medicine, and religion). There are some inaccuracies: the novel’s hero, Clitophon, is not “relatively inexperienced in sex”, but in passionate love (Leucippe and Clitophon 2.37.5, which Hilton cites, p. 3, mentions the hero’s experience with prostitutes). It is not exactly accurate that Achilles Tatius came last in E. Rohde’s—now no longer valid—chronological order of the five canonical novelists (p. 10); for Rohde, Chariton could have been later, while the suggested chronological priority of Longus is open to question.[3] Hilton proposes a date for Achilles in the second half of the second century (p. 13), but this is rather late in view of the papyrological evidence. Hilton alludes to the discussion around the earliest papyrus of the novel, P.Oxy. LXVI 3836, which greatly affects the novel’s dating, but omits the verdict of L. Del Corso in favour of an early dating of the papyrus (first part of the 2nd c. AD).[4] The probability that the novel was not immediately fixed in form may explain some elements of content that point to a later date (cf. P.Oxy. X 1250, 3rd c. AD, which indicates a different order of chapters in book 2). Regarding the novel’s dramatic date, a setting in the classical era (p. 17) is difficult, as Hilton’s own contemporary analysis shows; the dramatic date is perhaps better seen as intentionally vague. The different subchapters of the Introduction are, on the whole, interesting and reflect new research (e.g. on contemporary elements; on the handling of speech as part of Achilles Tatius’ narrative technique; on the use of personal names; on language), even if they are not meant as exhaustive treatment of their topics. Subchapter 8 misses geography as an important organizing principle of the novel’s narrative material.[5] Achilles Tatius’ implied awareness of Christianity (p. 40 and passim) deserved further comment, and more could be said about the relationship of Leucippe and Clitophon to modern forms of fiction (subchapter 6), especially with respect to that novel’s tendency towards generic experimentation,[6] while subchapter 13 is limited to Byzantine reception (Achilles Tatius had a significant career in early modern Europe).[7]

The main body of the commentary is introduced by a two-page “Structure” of each book, which reflects the subsequent organization of the material. These schemata are very helpful for grasping the overall action and how it unfolds. The commentary is of a rich mixed form. The sections into which the text is broken are first commented on in running fashion; ancient text and English translation in a convenient tabular form follow; then come the traditional lemmata. This structure allows the author to provide fuller analysis of larger sections, while giving due attention to interpretive detail. The immediate availability of both text and translation is very practical and facilitates the study of the commentary. Hilton states (p. vii) that he mainly follows the text of the most recent edition (Garnaud), while taking into account previous editions. He prints a selection from Garnaud’s apparatus criticus under each textual segment, often presenting variant readings, but without using colons (vel sim.), which would have made the apparatus more easily legible. He further comments on problematic loci, which gives the reader a sense of the complexities surrounding this novel’s textual criticism, even if the latter is not dealt with exhaustively. The translation is faithful, which serves well the pronounced interest of the commentary in the details of the original language.

The commentary addresses the key features laid out in the Introduction and reflects the priorities implied there. Hilton’s meticulous analysis of the language of Achilles, which assumes a certain level of expertise in ancient Greek, builds on significant recent research.[8] Narratological matters are not a primary focus of the commentary, but its structure usefully reflects the succession of the various episodes of the action and digressions; the ecphraseis (of which Books 3 and 4 provide a rich sample) receive detailed discussion. Regarding literary models (pp. 33; 89 ff.), it is worth adding the so far largely neglected possibility that the ecphraseis of the paintings at Juno’s temple in book 1 of Vergil’s Aeneid may have influenced the descriptions of paintings in Achilles Tatius (and the other Greek novels).

One of the most significant contributions of Hilton’s commentary is the placing of Achilles Tatius’ work in its broader cultural and historical context. Hilton had done previous work on this.[9] His interest in the novel’s contemporary relevance pervades the commentary, e.g. the discussion of the Roman historical background of the episode concerning the Egyptian boukoloi and the awareness of Christianity in the description of Leucippe’s false sacrifice in Book 3 and the possible allusions to Roman Egypt in Book 4. He also comments on the novel’s interest in psychology and on the development of the main characters, Leucippe and Clitophon, during these books. (Consider, for example p. 215 on Leucippe; who speaks the first words of 4.1.5? Vilborg and Garnaud assumed Leucippe, but Hilton, p. 220, implies Clitophon, without comment.) The commentary could perhaps have emphasised more the author’s skill in combining erudition and entertainment in his treatment of eros and the heroes’ toils and sufferings; Achilles Tatius plays with the conventions of the Greek romance and subjects familiar literary devices and themes to ridicule.

The volume ends with four useful Appendixes. The first one, a collection of the passages from Ps.-Eustathius that mimic Achilles Tatius, constitutes a concrete sample of the reception of the novel’s fourth book in Byzantium. The rest of the Appendixes are not limited to the part of the novel treated by the commentary but concern the whole novel. Appendix 2 is a checklist of the characters that feature in the novel with brief summaries of their role in the plot, a welcome mnemonic and study aid (even if this novel is not as long and complex as, say, Heliodorus’ Aethiopica). The Maps and Illustrations of Appendix 3 are aesthetically pleasing and help readers to locate in space and visualize, to an extent, the novel’s action. The fourth and final Appendix includes some original statistics on Achilles Tatius’ novel: neat tables present the comparative length of the novel’s eight books and of book chapters, and the novel’s longest words; graphics are also used. Some statistics are provided for all five canonical novels, namely tables and graphics relating to length of words and sentences, which may aid a detailed linguistic analysis. Lastly, the statistics of the speakers’ discourse in Achilles Tatius and his “predecessors”, Xenophon of Ephesus and Chariton, are of narratological interest (linked with subchapter 7 of the Introduction).

The References are inevitably a selection from the ever-increasing secondary literature on the ancient novel in general and Achilles Tatius in particular. The author cites most of the important sources, but there are two omissions: N.N. Schmid-Dümmler, Achilleus Tatios, Leukippe und Kleitophon. Rhetorik im Dienst der Verführung (Trier 2018), a book-length study of the novel’s rhetorical aspects; and Y. Yatromanolakis’ commentary (n. 4), published 34 years ago but still the most recent full commentary on Leucippe and Clitophon. Overall, the book is nicely produced, even if not entirely free from errors (for example, “BCE” is sometimes erroneously used instead of CE; pp. 10–13, 15–17 top, 95, etc.).

Some readers may find the commentary’s analysis too dense, especially those unfamiliar with the novel’s linguistic and rhetorical features. However, the structure and conciseness of the Introduction, the layout of the commentary, and the Appendixes make the volume one of the most user-friendly books of its kind. At the same time, Hilton’s volume is a thorough and essential resource for scholars and students of Achilles Tatius, the Greek novel, and the Second Sophistic period. It provides a comprehensive and insightful analysis of Achilles Tatius’ work, shedding light on its literary and cultural dimensions. Hilton’s analysis, though focusing on only two books of one novel, broadens our knowledge and appreciation of a much larger context.

 

Notes

[1] E.g., Whitmarsh, T. 2020. Leucippe and Clitophon Books I-II, Cambridge. See also B. Bentel’s 2022 PhD dissertation at the University of Cape Town on Book 6: http://hdl.handle.net/11427/36768

[2] De Temmerman, K. 2014. Crafting Characters. Heroes and Heroines in the Ancient Greek Novel, Oxford, sparsely cited by Hilton, is central to this debate.

[3] Rohde, E. 19143. Der griechische Roman und seine Vorläufer, Darmstadt, p. 522; pp. 535–536.

[4] Del Corso, L., 2010. “Il romanzo Greco a Ossirinco e i suoi lettori: Osservazioni paleografiche, bibliologiche, storico-culturali,” in: G. Bastianini and A. Casanova (eds), I papiri del romanzo antico, Florence, p. 257.

[5] Cf. Yatromanolakis, Y., 1990. χιλλέως Ἀλεξανδρέως Τατίου, Λευκίππη καὶ Κλειτοφῶν, Athens, pp. 70–77.

[6] Noted in Whitmarsh, T. and Morales, H., 2001. Achilles Tatius, Leucippe and Clitophon, Oxford, p. xiv.

[7] Ricquier, K. 2018. “The Early Modern Transmission of the Ancient Greek Romances: A Bibliographic Survey.” Ancient Narrative 15, pp. 1–34.

[8] Esp. Gammage, S.M., 2018. Atticism in Achilles Tatius: An Examination of Linguistic Purism in Achilles Tatius’ Leucippe and Clitophon, diss. KwaZulu-Natal.

[9] Hilton, J. 2009. “Contemporary Elements in Achilles Tatius’ Leucippe and Clitophon.” Acta Classica 52, pp. 101–112.