Μίνως δὲ, ὁ τῶν Κρητῶν βασιλεύς, θαλαττοκρατῶν κατ’ ἐκείνους τοὺς χρόνους καὶ πυθόμενος τὴν Δαιδάλου φυγὴν εἰς Σικελίαν, ἔγνω στρατεύειν ἐπ’ αὐτήν ... ὁ δὲ Κώκαλος, εἰς σύλλογον προσκαλεσάμενος καὶ πάντα ποιήσειν ἐπαγγειλάμενος, ἐπὶ τὰ ξένια παρέλαβε τὸν Μίνω. λουομένου δ’ αὐτοῦ, Κώκαλος μὲν παρακατασχὼν πλείονα χρόνον ἐν τῷ θερμῷ τὸν Μίνωα διέφθειρε, καὶ τὸ σῶμα ἀπέδωκε τοῖς Κρησί, πρόφασιν ἐνεγκὼν τοῦ θανάτου διότι κατὰ τὸν λουτρῶνα ὠλίσθηκε καὶ πεσὼν εἰς τὸ θερμὸν ὕδωρ ἐτελεύτησε. (Diodorus, iv. 79.)
The story is told somewhat differently in Zenobius iv. 92. There Minos, in order to discover Daedalus, goes about the world offering large rewards to anyone who can run a linen thread through a spiral shell, being convinced that no one but Daedalus would be able to do such a thing. When he comes to Sicily, Cocalus, in order to gain the reward, gives the shell to Daedalus, who bores a hole at the end, ties the linen thread to an ant, and so does what is required. λαβὼν δὲ ὁ Μίνως τὸν λίνον διειρμένον ᾔσθετο εἶναι παρ’ ἐκείνῳ τὸν Δαίδαλον καὶ εὐθέως ἀπῄτει. Κώκαλος δὲ, ὑποσχόμενος δώσειν, ἐξένισεν αὐτόν. ὁ δὲ λουόμενος ὑπὸ τῶν Κωκάλου θυγατέρων ἀνῃρέθη ζέουσαν πίσσαν ἐπιχεαμένων αὐτῷ.—This is the version of the story followed by Sophocles in the Camici. (Cp. Fr. 301, 302.)
It is worth noticing that Daedalus, according to Diodorus, iv. 78, made a cave at Selinus, in which patients were treated by being subjected to a gradually-increasing temperature. (τρίτον δὲ σπήλαιον κατὰ τὴν Σελινουντίαν χώραν κατεσκεύασεν, ἐν ᾧ τὴν ἀτμίδα τοῦ κατ’ αὐτὴν πυρὸς οὕτως εὐστόχως ἐξέλαβεν ὥστε διὰ τὴν μαλακότητα τῆς θερμασίας ἐξιδροῦν λεληθότως, καὶ κατὰ μικρὸν τοὺς ἐνδιατρίβοντας μετὰ τέρψεως θεραπεύειν τὰ σώματα, μηδὲν παρενοχλουμένους ὑπὸ τῆς θερμότητος.) It is, perhaps, not impossible that Aristophanes may have described Minos’ death as occurring in this cave.
[235] By the word “plot” as here used, must of course be understood merely the erotic incident. That the action was not confined to one subject of this kind is obvious to every reader of Aristophanes. Whatever may have been the treatment of the erotic element, there can be practically no doubt that this element was only one, perhaps not the most important one, among the many that went to make up the play.
[236] Fr. 4 seems to suggest that there may have been a regular trial instituted, as in the Vespae (cp. Vesp. 807 seqq. with Cocal. Fr. 12), at which Daedalus was accused of complicity in the murder, and his services to Cocalus as a builder (Fr. 5; cp. Diodorus, iv. 78) urged on his behalf. This trial may well have had features in common with the last scene in Euripides’ Andromeda.
[237] The fact that this play led to the abandonment of certain nocturnal orgies is, of course, no proof that such habits altogether ceased, even for a time; indeed, it is notorious that they did not.
[238] Even if it could be proved that the play ended with a wedding—such endings are, as we have seen, not uncommon in Aristophanes—and that this is what the grammarian means by his τἄλλα πάντα ἃ ἐζήλωσε Μένανδρος, this would not, in itself, be enough to make the play a romantic one after the manner of the later works. The marriage would have to be an act of reparation inspired by love, and it need hardly be remarked how utterly foreign any such feeling would be to the work of Aristophanes. Such a difference in spirit and motive, however, important and obvious as it seems to us, may very well have escaped the ancient critics, whose criticism of art was well-nigh exclusively concerned with its external and superficial qualities. Hence, if by any chance Aristophanes’ characters were despatched off the stage to the sounds of a wedding march, it is easy to see how clear a proof this would have seemed to them that the Cocalus belonged to the same phase of art as the plays of Menander, when, in reality, it did nothing of the kind.
[239] Cp. infra, [p. 189 seqq.]
[240] Thus, to quote one instance among many, the habit, common among the writers of the Empire, of describing Vergil as not only a supreme, but also a universal, genius, is sufficiently familiar. (Cp. Mart. viii. 18, &c.)
[241] τὸν μέντοι Κώκαλον, τὸν ποιηθέντα Ἀραρότι τῷ Ἀριστοφάνονς υἱεῖ, Φιλήμων ὁ κωμικὸς ὑπαλλάξας ἐν Ὑποβολιμαίῳ ἐκωμῴδησεν. (Clem. Alex. Strom. vi. p. 267 [628].)