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Euripides, Hippolytus 88

Author(s): M. L. WestSource: The Classical Review, New Series, Vol. 15, No. 2 (Jun., 1965), p. 156Published by: Cambridge University Presson behalf of The Classical AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/708290.

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I56 THE CLASSICAL REVIEWEURIPIDES, HIPPOLYTUS 88

JvaS---0oS yVp SE(71dTas KXadPaeW Y.'LoRD-(I address you thus because) it isthe gods whom one should call master.' SoBarrett, wrongly. Why should the slaveabstain from using the word 'master' in itsproper, everyday sense? No reason. Whatis more appropriate about 'lord'? Nothing.The meaning is, 'for we should call ourmasters gods'. Outside poetry, dvra survived

only as an appellationof deities. That Hip-polytus'servantshould addresshim as vafis a normaltraditionalusageof poetry;butto a fifth-centuryar it suggestedan addressto a god. Euripides ustifies t by an ad hocphilosophical eflection: he master s a godto the slave.University ollege,Oxford M. L. WEST

PLATO ON PRIESTS AND KINGS IN EGYPTPlato, Politicus,290 d-ewarc 7ept jay Afyvir'rov otS' iEfEGT iauata

xwps LEpaTLKqS apXELV, IAA' idv Jpa KalTVX?ITpdpov E5 iAAovcvovs filaiUFcdro,VOTEpov rvay oraOv Els 700j70 Elt77EAErWaLL

a7d0v 7E yivos. IJ. B. Skemp, Plato's Statesman (London,1952), 190o,n. I, rightly says that in Egypt'the King was by virtue of his office also apriest',' and this statement justifies Plato'sfirst dictum unless one rigidly makes it con-form with the second by translating (withSkemp), 'in Egypt none can be king unlesshe belongs to the priestly class'. PerhapsXOpis iEpa7TK1gneed not imply power con-ferred simply by caste, although royal birthoften brought priestly functions, eventually,with it. Such functions had to be formallyassumed, however. In Urkundendes NeuenReiclhs, v. I57. 9, Tuthmosis III speaks ofthe time 'before I was initiated to becomea prophet'.2 In the 21st Dynasty (c. Io85-950 B.c.) a special situation prevailed atThebes in that the priests of Amfin becamethe sole rulers in what was tantamount to atheocracy. Kienitza has suggested that thistheocracy may be reflected in Plato's state-ment, as well as in the picture given by

Diodorus Sic. i. 70 r ft. of a kingship whichwas confined by priestly rules and itselfperformed some priestly functions. EduardMeyer* rightly found a more general signifi-cance in the statements; to him they showa desire toportraya monarchic Utopia, muchas Xenophon created a Utopian picture ofPersian life in his history of Cyrus. 'DasIdealbild des aigyptischen K6nigtums' isMeyer's appropriate designation of what isimplied. Chronologically he would place itsorigins as far back as the late Ramesside era,with a gradual elaboration in the sub-sequent period.s

The second part of Plato's statement hasappeared to be so un-Egyptian in referencethat commentators have doubted its validityas applied to Egypt. Skemp asks, 'Whocould such usurpers be?' and goes on,'Hardly the Persian Achaemenids,... forthere is no evidence of their becomingpriests'.6 He wonders whether the Hyksosare meant. Meyer, op. cit. 44 suggests thatthe sudden throne-changes of Plato's time,under the dynasties which rose against thePersians, may be reflected. More appositethan these nationalist anti-Persian affirma-tions would be instances in Egyptian history

' Cf. H. Kees, Das Priestertumm igypti-schen Staat vom .VeuenReich bis zur Spitzeit(Leiden, 1953), I: 'Priestertum ist inAgypten K6nigsdienst.'2 I owe this reference to Dr. Dieter Miiller.a Die politischeGeschichteAgyptens om7. biszum 4. Jahrhundert(Berlin, 1953), 49 ff.Gernl in Parker, A Saite OraclePapyrusromThebes in the BrooklynMuseum (Providence,

1962), 36, describes it as 'a sacerdotal statewith Amon-rf' as its head and his HighPriest in a position not much below that ofa real king'.* Geschichte es Altertums, i. 2 (Stuttgart,

1931), 42 if.s There is no valid reason why a stillearlier tradition may not be implicated. BothMeyer and Kienitz assume, by the way, thatDiodorus is following Hecataeus of Abdera.W. Spoerri, SpiithellenistischeBerichte iiberWelt,KulturundGCtterBasel, I959) has shownthat this is unlikely; cf. the present writer'sreview in J.H.S. lxxxii (1962), 182 f.6 A. D. Nock in A.J.A. liii (1949), 283,n. 40, wondered whether the Achaemenidsin a Persian background were not behindthe description ('a reflection of what wasnow believed of the Persian king').