Patrick FINGLASS
University of Nottingham, Classics
ABSTRACT: Sophocles fr. 583, from Tereus, is one of the most moving passages of extant Greek tragedy; almost certainly delivered by Procne, it explores the sorrow of marriage as seen from a woman’s perspective. The publication in June 2016 of a papyrus from the early second century, P.Oxy. 5292, which overlaps with this quotation, is therefore a major event in Sophoclean scholarship. The papyrus allows us to locate Procne’s speech within the play, to infer how much she knows about her sister’s fate when she speaks the lines, and to see how Sophocles prepared for the dramatic meeting between the two sisters. In this paper I demonstrate how the papyrus transforms our knowledge of this fragmentary drama, and set the play alongside others that feature unhappily married women, bringing out relevant similarities and differences, and thereby assisting our understanding of the presentation of women in Greek tragedy.
Greek Drama V 