[Rogers’ translation]
But some of Aristophanes’ contemporaries stooped far lower than this. In the Wasps he warns the audience not to expect “two slaves scattering nuts among the spectators out of a basket” (vss. 58 f.), animadverting upon a scene in a recent play by Eupolis. Again, in the Plutus (vss. 789 ff.) one of the characters refuses an invitation to have titbits distributed and adds: “It is beneath the dignity of a poet to scatter figs and delicacies to the spectators, and on these terms to force their laughter.” In the Peace (vss. 962 ff.) he ridiculed such practices by providing every spectator with at least one grain of barley! A more drastic parody was perpetrated by Hegemon, who brought a cloakful of stones into the orchestra to be thrown at the spectators! It is only fair to state that Aristophanes did not lower himself by using such unprofessional appeals, but the point which I am urging is confirmed by the practice of his rivals and by the fact that he sometimes explains his own defeats by his unwillingness to resort to their methods.
From the nature of the case, tragedy could exhibit no appeals so undisguised as the above. To judge from Plato’s language, just cited, in some of the tragedies of his day we might have found closer parallels to these artifices of the comic playwrights. Nevertheless, fifth-century tragedy does reveal how the tragic poets tickled the palates of their auditors. They did this in two ways: first, they appealed to national pride by rewriting the mythology in such a way as to assign to Athenian worthies a part which non-Attic tradition did not recognize; and secondly, they aroused the chauvinistic spirit by the sentiments, whether eulogistic of Athens or derogatory to her enemies, which they placed in their characters’ mouths. These points might be illustrated at great length; it will suffice to mention a few examples.
According to Attic tradition, Medea sojourned for a while at Athens. Euripides took advantage of this fact in order to introduce the Aegeus episode into his Medea and thus bring the Attic king into connection also with an earlier part of the Colchian’s career. His character in this play is presented in agreeable contrast to that of both Medea and Jason, and his chivalry in offering Athens to Medea as an asylum from her enemies would bring a thrill of pride to every Attic heart. Furthermore, his presence served to motivate the famous choral ode (vss. 824 ff.) beginning:
O happy the race in the ages olden
Of Erechtheus, the seed of the blest Gods’ line,
In a land unravaged, peace-enfolden,
Aye quaffing of Wisdom’s glorious wine, etc.[305]
[Way’s translation]