Secondly, although much that I have written is necessarily well known to classicists, still, since I have striven to incorporate the results of the latest investigations and have arranged under one co-ordinating principle phenomena which are usually regarded as unrelated, and since I have combined points of interpretation which are scattered through scores of books and monographs, I venture to hope that my discussion will not be without interest even for specialists.
Inasmuch as the comedies of Plautus and Terence are but translations and adaptations of Greek originals, and since Seneca’s tragedies are constructed upon the Greek model, I have not hesitated to cite these Latin plays whenever they seemed to afford better illustrations than purely Greek productions.
I must express my constant indebtedness to such invaluable storehouses of data as Müller’s Lehrbuch der griechischen Bühnenalterthümer (1886) and Das attische Bühnenwesen (1902), Navarre’s Dionysos (1895), and especially Haigh’s The Attic Theatre, third edition by Pickard-Cambridge (1907); also to Butcher’s Aristotle’s Theory of Poetry and Fine Art, fourth edition with corrections (1911), and Bywater’s edition of Aristotle’s Poetics (1909).
I desire to thank the editors for permission, graciously granted, to use material which I have already published in Classical Philology, V (1910), VII (1912), and VIII (1913), the Classical Weekly, III (1910), VIII (1915), X (1917), and XI (1918), and the Classical Journal, VII (1911) and X (1914). Needless to state, these papers have not been brought over into the present volume verbatim, but have been curtailed, expanded, revised, and rearranged according to need. Furthermore, fully two-thirds of the book are entirely new.
Permission to quote from Mr. A. S. Way’s translation of Euripides in the “Loeb Classical Library,” Dr. B. B. Rogers’ translation of Aristophanes, and Professor J. S. Blackie’s translation of Aeschylus in “Everyman’s Library” has been courteously granted by William Heinemann, London (G. P. Putnam’s Sons, New York), G. Bell & Sons, and J. M. Dent & Sons, respectively.
To my friends, Professor D. M. Robinson of Johns Hopkins University and Dr. A. S. Cooley of Bethlehem, Pa., I am indebted for having placed at my disposal their collections of photographs of Greek theaters. My colleague, Professor M. R. Hammer of the Northwestern University College of Engineering, has put me under deep obligation by supervising the preparation of several of the drawings.
In conclusion, my heartiest thanks are due to Professor Edward Capps, who first introduced me to the study of scenic antiquities. Several parts of this book, when originally published as articles, have enjoyed the benefit of his invaluable suggestions and criticisms. It is unnecessary to add, however, that he must not be held responsible for any part of them in their present form.
Roy C. Flickinger
Evanston, Ill.