Leyla Ozbek presents a volume devoted entirely to Sophocles’ fragmentarily preserved Niobe, which offers an important contribution to our understanding of this tragedy. The centrepiece is Ozbek’s new edition of the relevant papyri (with diplomatic transcription) based on autopsy. It integrates material that is scattered across two different volumes of Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta (TrGF 3 and 4, both edited by Stefan Radt), namely the Niobe section in TrGF 4 (frr. *441–51) and the addenda in TrGF 3 (pp. 575–6), which includes an edition of a papyrus hypothesis (P.Oxy. 3653) that bears crucial implications for reconstructing the plot and, consequently, for ordering the fragments. Thus, although no new papyri have been found since the second edition of TrGF 4 was published in 1999, Ozbek’s new edition is more than welcome. It is preceded by an introduction and followed by a commentary (with metrical analysis) and a translation, as well as an appendix containing four fragments that have been attributed to Niobe by other scholars, but not by Ozbek herself (Soph. inc. fab. frr. 731 and 841 Radt, trag. adesp. fr. 7 Kannicht/Snell and the lyrical fragment PMG fr. 787), a bibliography, a conspectus numerorum (for comparison with TrGF 4), and a useful index of quoted passages.[1]
The introduction covers the usual topics: The myth and its treatment by Sophocles’ predecessors and contemporary colleagues, particularly Aeschylus and Aristophanes, is succinctly presented (section 1.1). However, post-Sophoclean literature is not discussed systematically. The following section (1.2) focuses on the surviving evidence for Sophocles’ Niobe, including both indirect transmission (i.e., testimonies and book fragments) and several papyri containing verses and the above-mentioned hypothesis that were plausibly attributed to the play. Their discovery history is sketched in this section, but a fuller description of the papyri, their provenance, and discovery is provided in section 1.4. In section 1.3, the play’s action is reconstructed as far as possible. That reconstruction includes a discussion of its setting, chorus and other characters, as well as a comparison of the order and numeration which scholars (including Ozbek herself) have proposed for the Niobe fragments. Ozbek justifies her own new numeration by pointing to the papyrus hypothesis and to her convincing reconstruction of the plot, which builds on Barrett’s,[2] but crucially differs from Radt’s, making a novel numeration necessary. Furthermore, she rightly regards Radt’s fragments 446 and 451 as testimonies. Thus, the revised order and numeration of the testimonies and fragments directly reflect the current state of knowledge available for reconstructing the plot.
Beyond the basic information on the play (myth, plot, setting, and characters), the introduction primarily concentrates on the history of research, particularly in the 19th and 20th centuries; papyrological discoveries; and scholars’ hypotheses regarding the plot and other aspects of the play. In contrast to recent scholarly trends, the reception of Sophocles’ Niobe from antiquity onwards is not addressed as a separate topic in Ozbek’s introduction.[3] This may be due to focusing on Sophocles’ play by not allowing, for example, Ovid’s well-known treatment of Niobe in Metamorphoses 6 to take centre stage. However, our understanding of ancient drama, especially of a fragmentary play, depends on its transmission and on its ancient recipients. The most significant fragments of Niobe have been preserved directly on papyrus and offer glimpses into the period during which the play was still available in its entirety. Examining this period of Niobe’s history would have been, arguably, as relevant as the steps of the play’s rediscovery in modern times. Further, the mythographical accounts by Apollodorus and Hyginus are significant, not only for reconstructing Sophocles’ plot, but also in their own right as receptions of his tragedy. On the other hand, less attention could have been given to reconstructions from the early 20th century (Blass and Robert, pp. 10–11), which have since been rendered obsolete by later papyrus finds. Thus, while Ozbek offers a thorough examination of the testimonies and fragments, a deeper exploration of Niobe’s reception over time and its impact on our understanding of the surviving evidence would have complemented her analysis.
As stated in Ozbek’s preface, the commentary aims to tackle textual and papyrological issues alongside lexical, metrical, staging, and character questions, offering hypotheses on critical action points and entire scenes (“problemi testuali e papirologici, così come questioni di lessico, metrica, messa in scena e caratterizzazione dei personaggi, fino a offrire ipotesi in merito alla ricostruzione di snodi fondamentali dell’azione o di intere scene della tragedia”, p. xii). Although staging questions are not systematically covered in the introduction, they are meticulously discussed in the introductory passages on frr. 4–6, and are a fine example of how masterfully Ozbek manages both to collate the range of hypotheses put forward by her predecessors and to present her own judgement in a lucid and reasoned manner.[4] She skilfully navigates previous scholarship, yet there remains room for further exploration of potential interpretations: For instance, when discussing fr. 9, Ozbek deals with suggestions of previous scholars regarding which female figure is speaking here: whether Niobe, one of her daughters, or the nurse. However, she does not expand the range of potential speakers in a systematic way. Thus, she does not consider the possibility that Latona could be speaking (about Apollo), which is probably less likely than Niobe speaking. Yet, it is no less likely than the other two suggestions that Ozbek discusses because other scholars have already brought them up. A stand-alone commentary on a fragmentary drama could (and should?) aim to present all such possibilities systematically and to weigh them up against each other. It is in regard to regarding such minor details that Ozbek could have pushed her commentary even further.
Ozbek’s volume appropriately places Sophocles’ Niobe in the centre, treating it as a drama in its own right—akin to, say, Electra or Antigone—instead of risking it drowning in the crowd of fragments in TrGF 4. Ozbek provides a solid and important re-evaluation of the testimonies and fragments. Her strengths lie particularly in the constitution of the text, the reconstruction of the plot, the philological discussion of individual passages, and comprehensive review of previous scholarship. A closer look at the (ancient) reception of Niobe is, however, missing. This would have further established Sophocles’ play as one of those dramas that were probably among the better known in antiquity (at least, before the canon of the seven tragedies emerged). Nonetheless, Ozbek’s edition, introduction and commentary constitute a significant advance and offer a welcome basis and invitation for others to engage, on solid philological footing, with Sophocles’ Niobe. It should therefore be the starting point for specialists, students, and scholars from other disciplines alike when studying this intriguing tragedy.
Notes
[1] The bibliography does not seem to be as extensive as one would have hoped for such a contribution. Particularly striking is the absence of Ioanna L. Hadjicosti, ‘Tragedy as παιδεράστρια (Sophocles’ Niobe fr. 448 and Aeschylus’ Myrmidones)’: SIFC 99 (2006) 131–5, whose hypotheses on the plot’s reconstruction (especially the action between the death of the sons and that of the daughters) would have been worth discussing and probably should have been challenged. Piero Totaro, ‘La Niobe di Eschilo e Sofocle. Il contributo dei papiri’, in: Guido Bastianini/Angelo Casanova (edd.), I papiri di Eschilo e di Sofocle, Florenz 2013, 1–17 is also missing, as are the titles mentioned in notes 3 and 4.
[2] In Richard Carden, The Papyrus Fragments of Sophocles. An Edition with Prolegomena and Commentary, Berlin 1974, 171–235.
[3] On Niobe’s reception in antiquity cf. Maurizio Ciappi, ‘La letteratura tragica nelle Metamorfosi di Ovidio. L’esempio di Niobe’, in: Luigi Battezzato (ed.), Tradizione testuale e ricezione letteraria antica della tragedia greca, Amsterdam 2003, 149–65 and Patricia E. Easterling, ‘Sophocles. The First Thousand Years’, in: John F. Davidson/Frances Muecke/Peter J. Wilson (edd.), Greek Drama III, London 2006, 1–15.
[4] On Niobe’s staging cf. further Jesús Á. Espinós, ‘Propuestas escenográficas a los frs. 441a–445 Radt, atribuidos a Níobe de Sófocles’, in: Raúl Caballero Sánchez/Carlos Alcalde Martín/Aurelio Pérez Jiménez (edd.), Sófocles el hombre, Sófocles el poeta, Málaga 2004, 287–99 and Matthew Wright, The Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy. Vol. 2, Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides, London 2019, 260–1.