Aithiopiká

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The Ethiopica in a manuscript from the possession of Cardinal Bessarion , who is one of the oldest text witnesses. Venice, Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana , Gr. 410, fol. 94v (12th / 13th century)

The Aithiopika ( ancient Greek Αἰθιοπικά Aithiopiká ) or The Adventures of the Beautiful Chariklea is an ancient Greek novel that includes ten books. The adventures of the lovers Chariklea and Theagenes are told. The work comes from Heliodorus from Emesa . For reasons of content and language, it is dated to the middle or second half of the 3rd century.

author

The author of the Aithiopika is called Heliodoros from Emesa. In terms of time, it is classified in the 3rd or 4th century without a precise date. He describes himself as the son of Theodosios Heliodoros and a descendant of Helios . His fame is based on his novel.

content

The work is divided into ten books. The prehistory is analytically revealed in the first 5 books through retrospectives. The starting point of the plot is obtained in the 6th book; From this book onwards, the plot is reproduced stringently without chronological breaks in the narrated time.

Chariklea, priestess of Artemis in the Temple of Delphi and foster daughter of Charikles, meets the young Thessalian nobleman Theagenes at the Pythian Games . She falls in love with him instantly, but does not know how to deal with her feelings. It is only through the persuasion of Kalasiris, a confidante of Charikles' and a former priest of Memphis , that the two find each other and reveal their love. At the Kalasiri's suggestion, Chariklea and Theagenes decide to flee Delphi in order to be able to realize a future together, as Chariklea has actually already been promised to another recruiter. With this decision, the two protagonists and their travel companion Kalasiris begin an odyssey through the Mediterranean region. First they get to the island of Zakynthos , where they interrupt their boat trip to winter. Chariklea and Theagenes have to leave the island before spring, because a pirate, beguiled by Chariklea's beauty, desires it. They are being pursued and ambushed on the high seas. The pirate brings the protagonists and Kalasiris on his ship to Egypt in the Nile Delta . They are freed from the power of the pirates and are captured by other robbers. The travelers get lost and are kidnapped, but meet again in Memphis after further obstacles. The wife of the governor of Memphis, Arsake, desires Theagenes and therefore wants to eliminate Chariklea. Since the two do not bow to Arsake's wishes, they are exposed to numerous intrigues and the Arsake's power games.

Oroondates, the governor of Memphis, learns of his wife's apostate conduct and orders Theagenes and Chariklea to come to the theater of war in Egypt. However, before they arrive there, they are picked up by an Ethiopian tribe and taken to their King Hydaspes. He decides that they are intended for human sacrifice for his native gods as thanks for his victory in the war. Chariklea and Theagenes are taken to the Ethiopian capital Meroë . Before the act of sacrifice is carried out, it turns out that Chariklea is the daughter of the Ethiopian royal couple. The victim is suspended after some discussions and incidents. Chariklea and Theagenes are ultimately united as lovers in Meroë.

Subject

Today the Ethiopica is called an ancient novel. This genre of literature originated in the epoch of Hellenism between 336 BC. BC and 30 BC It was part of the entertainment reading for a rather broad audience and enjoyed great popularity. It tells a fictional story about various people who follow their predetermined fate. The central themes of the novel are love - separation and reunification with a happy ending -, adventure and violence, travel and cultural contacts, fate, religion and myth as well as feminine beauty.

Style of the novel

Aithiopika is the longest of the five traditional Greek novels. The work shows a “complicated compositional technique” that is much more complex here than in the other novels. Like an epic, this novel is the only one to begin in the middle of the exciting events. In retrospect, the previous course of action is woven into the action through stories from various people. Towards the end of the fifth book the starting point of the plot is reached. From this point on, the storyline is structured chronologically. The central style feature is the authenticity of emotion and sentimentality - especially the protagonist Chariklea. In general, the work is characterized by frequent changes of perspective and different narrators.

expenditure

  • Heliodori Aethiopicorum libri 10. Collatione mss. Bibliothecae Palatinae et aliorum, emendati et multis in locis aucti. Hieronymus Commelinus, Heidelberg 1596.
  • Hēliodōru Aithiopikōn Biblia Deka. Edited by Adamantios Korais . Eberart, Paris 1804, 2 vols.
  • Heliodori Aethiopicorum libri decem. Edited by Christoph Wilhelm Mitscherlich . Greek and Latin. Two volumes. Typographia Societatis Bipontinae, Strasbourg 1798.
  • Heliodori Aethiopicorum libri X. Ed. By Immanuel Bekker . Teubner, Leipzig 1855.
  • Guillelmus Adrianus Hirschig: Erotici scriptores. Didot, Paris 1856.
  • Heliodori ethiopica. Edited by Aristide Colonna . Typis Regiae Officinae Polygraphicae, Rome 1938. 2 vol.
  • Héliodore: Les Éthiopiques (Théagène et Chariclée), ed. by Robert M. Rattenbury and Thomas W. Lumb, trans. by Jean Maillon, 2nd edition Paris 1960 (1st edition 1935).

Translations

  • Aethiopica historia. Translation by Johannes Zschorn. Strasbourg 1559. Reprint: Lang, Bern et al. 1984, ISBN 3-261-03177-8 .
  • Theagenes and Charikleia. A novel from the Greek of Heliodores. Translated by Karl Wilhelm Göttling . Andrea, Frankfurt a. M. 1822.
  • Heliodor's ten books of Aetheopian history. Translated from the Greek by Friedrich Jacobs . Publishing house of JC Metzler'schen Buchhandlung, Stuttgart 1837.
  • Heliodorus: Ethiopian Stories. Translated from the Greek by Theodor Fischer. 2 vols. Hoffmann, Stuttgart 1867–1868.
  • Heliodorus: The Ethiopian Adventures of Theagenes and Charikleia. Translation by Horst Gasse. Reclam, Stuttgart 1972, ISBN 3-15-009384-8 .
  • Heliodoros: The Adventures of Beautiful Chariklea. Translation by Rudolf Reymer (1950). Artemis & Winkler, Munich 2001 (Library of the Old World), ISBN 3-7608-4087-6 . With an afterword by Niklas Holzberg .
  • Heliodorus: Aithiopikà. Translation by Rudolf Reymer, Zurich 1950. In: Bernhard Kytzler (Ed.): Im Reiche des Eros. All the love and adventure novels of antiquity. Albatros, Düsseldorf 2001, Vol. 1, pp. 224-512.

literature

  • John William Birchall: Heliodoros Aithiopika I: A Commentary with Prolegomena. Dissertation, University of London 1996 ( online ).
  • Tomas Hägg: The Novel in Antiquity. Basil Blackwell, Oxford 1983.
  • Tomas Hägg: Eros and Tyche. The novel in the ancient world (= cultural history of the ancient world . Volume 36). Philipp von Zabern, Mainz 1987.
  • Massimo Fusillo: Heliodoros 8. In: The New Pauly (DNP). Volume 5, Metzler, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-476-01475-4 , Sp. 288-291.
  • Martin Antonius Menze: Heliodors “classic” eccphrase. The literary visuality of the "Aithiopika" in comparison with their forerunners in Homer and Herodotus and their reception in Miguel de Cervantes. Aschendorff Verlag, Münster 2017, ISBN 978-3-402-14457-2 .

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Kytzler: In the realm of Eros , p. 224.
  2. ↑ Cf. Fusillo: Heliodoros , DNP online.
  3. ↑ See ibid., 152 f.
  4. ↑ See ibid., 148.
  5. ↑ See ibid., 148.
  6. ↑ See ibid., 148.
  7. ↑ See ibid., 140.
  8. ↑ See ibid., 153.
  9. ↑ Ibid., 74
  10. ↑ See Hägg: The novel in antiquity, p. 54.
  11. ↑ Cf. Hägg: Eros and Tyche, 153.