The donkey's shadow

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Sculpture by Peter Lenk (based on Wieland's “ The Trial of the Donkey's Shadow ”) on the market square in Biberach

The donkey's shadow is a story about an absurd trial in Abdera , the "ancient Schilda ". The oldest version of the story comes from antiquity and is attributed to Demosthenes , who transferred the well-known phrase for fighting for the shadow of a donkey to court rhetoric .

Demosthenes

The ancient orator Demosthenes spoke before the Athenians and was prevented from finishing his speech. Then he began to talk about an Athenian who had rented a donkey and wanted to rest in the donkey's shadow in the midday heat. The donkey driver, however, prevented him from doing so because he had rented the donkey to him, but not its shadow. However, the Athenian claimed to have rented the Shade as well. Then Demosthenes stopped talking. When the Athenians asked him to finish his speech, he told them:

“ So you want to hear about the shadow of a donkey, but you don't want to hear me talk about serious things! "

Text source : The text comes from the 3rd / 4th centuries. Century AD, the author is unknown. It is located in the vitae decem oratorum = life of ten speakers who once Plutarch awarded and in his Moralia were mitüberliefert, therefore pseudo-Plutarch called. The source of the text: Plutarch (pseudo-Plutarch), Moralia 848A / B (= vitae decem oratorum, chapter 8, Demosthenes).

Original text , Plutarch, Moralia, 848A / B: λέγειν δέ ποτε κωλυόμενος ὑπὸ Ἀθηναίων ἐν ἐκκλεσίᾳ, βραχὺ ἔφη βούλεσθαι πρνς αὐἰτὺς ερνς αὐἰτὺς εενς. τῶν δὲ σιωπησάντων, νεανίας, εἶπε, θέρους ὥρᾳ ἐμισθώσατο ἐξ ἄστεος ὄνον Μεγάραδε · μεσούσης δὲ τῆς ἡμέρας καὶ σφοδρῶς φλέγοντος τοῦ ἡλίου ἑκάτερος αὐτῶν ἐβούλετο ὑποδύεσθαι ὑπὸ τὴν σκιάν · εἴργον δὲ ἀλλήλους, ὁ μὲν μεμισθωκέναι τὸν ὄνον οὐ τὴν σκιὰν λέγων , ὁ δὲ μεμισθωμένος τὴν πᾶσαν ἔχειν ἐξουσίαν. καὶ ταῦτα εἰπὼν ἀπῄει. τῶν δὲ Ἀθηναίων ἐπισχόντων καὶ δεομένων πέρας ἐπιθεῖναι τῷ λόγῳ , εἶθ 'ὑπὲρ μὲν ὄνου σκιᾶς, ἒφη, βούλεσθε ἀκούειν, λέγοντος δὲ ὑπὲρ μὲν σπουδαίων πραγμάτων οὐ βούλεσθε.

Translation , Plutarch, Moralia, 848A / B: but once prevented from speaking in front of the Athenians in the people's assembly, he (Demosthenes) said he wanted to tell them something brief. When they were silent, he said: “A young man rented a donkey from the city (Athens) to Megara during the summer . But in the middle of the day and when the sun was burning hard, each of the two wanted to sit in the shade (of the donkey). They pressed each other, but one said he had rented the donkey, not the shadow, the other said that he had rented the right to have everything. ”And after he (Demosthenes) had told this, he went away. But when the Athenians stopped him and asked to add the end of the story, he said: "Oh, you want to hear something about the shadow of the donkey, but when I talk about important state affairs, you don't want to (listen)."

Wieland

The same story is told by Christoph Martin Wieland in his Abderites . A dentist rents a donkey for a day for a trip . As he lies down to rest in the shade of the donkey, the owner who accompanies him demands another rent for the shade. The lawyers are happy about the following legal dispute:

"Well, sir, what are you doing there," said the donkey driver, "what is that supposed to mean?" - "I sit down a little in the shade," replied Struthion, "because the sun hits my skull quite unbearably." - “Nah, my good lord,” replied the other, “we did not act like that! I rented the donkey to you, but not a word of the shadow was thought of. "

With this, Wieland sketches a satirical picture of contemporary political developments in the 18th century by precisely describing ancient society.

There is also the Singspiel Des Esels Schatten by Richard Strauss .

Dürrenmatt

Friedrich Dürrenmatt wrote the radio play The Trial of the Donkey's Shadow , with which he made his debut as a radio play author on Swiss radio in 1951. At Dürrenmatt, the dispute becomes a trial, the trial becomes a political issue and the political issue becomes a civil war that devastates the city of Abdera. Dürrenmatt wants to demonstrate the absurd consequences that “ greed for enrichment ” can have.

Others

The judge Egon Schneider gave the case to his trainee lawyers and wrote an essay about it in the jurist newspaper (JZ). He criticized the trainee lawyers because they worked on the case legally, although the dispute was not a "proper subject of (legal) scientific discussion". Other judges contradicted this in the JZ.

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The earliest evidence for the phrase is Aristophanes Wespen 191 from the year 422 BC. Chr. ("What is your fight against us?" - "About the shadow of a donkey" / περὶ τοῦ μαχεῖ νῷν δῆτα; - περὶ ὄνου σκιᾶς.), Aristophanes is also used in fr. 199 PCG , the comedy writer Archippus, gave a comedy of unknown content the title Shadow of a Donkey (Ὄνου σκιά), and Plato gives an imaginary speaker in Phaedrus 260c who this time does not give a speech in praise of the shadow of a donkey. A Byzantine Scholias claims in his commentary on the Wasps that the story of Demosthenes' speech was known to Aristophanes as a running gag even before Demosthenes .
  2. ↑ Archive link ( Memento of the original from January 9, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.gottwein.de
  3. ↑ Christoph Martin Wieland : History of the Abderites in the Gutenberg-DE project
  4. ↑ Peter Blickle: Ownership of the donkey's shadow - Wieland's Upper German experience as a political theory. In: Bookmarks, Festschrift for Peter Rusterholz on his 65th birthday, Francke 1999, pp. 143–160.
  5. ↑ http://www.klassika.info/Komponisten/Strauss_R/Oper/TrV_294/index.html
  6. ↑ Des Esels Schatten, JZ 1961, 212 (table of contents from JZ 1961). Retrieved May 26, 2015.
  7. ↑ Schneider's essay is quoted by Heribert Waider: The meaning of the doctrine of the subjective justification elements for the methodology and systematics of criminal law. Berlin, De Gruyter 1970, ISBN 978-3-11-000998-9 , p. 38.
  8. ↑ Editor: Brightness on the donkey's shadow. JZ 1961, 484. Retrieved May 26, 2015.