Page:History of the Literature of Ancient Greece (Müller) 2ed.djvu/159

137 LITERATURE OF ANCIENT GREECE. 137 and approaches more to the tone of common life ; as in the passage* in which the poet declares that " he is not fond of a tall general walking with his legs apart, with his hair carefully arranged, and his chin well shorn ; hut he prefers a short man, with his legs bent in, treading firmly on his feet, and full of spirit and resource." A personal descrip- tion of this kind, with a serious intent, but verging on the comic in its tone, would not have suited the elegy; and although reflections on the misfortunes of life occur in trochaic as well as in elegiac verses, yet an attentive reader can distinguish between the languid tone of the latter and the lively tone of the former, which would naturally be accom- panied in the delivery with appropriate gesticulation. Trochaics were also recited by Archilochus at the banquet ; but while the elegy was an outpouring of feelings in which the guests were called on to parti- cipate, Archilochus selects the trochaic tetrameter in order to re- prove a friend for having shamelessly obtruded himself upon a feast prepared at the common expense of the guests, without contributing his share, and without having been invited t. Other forms of the poetry of Archilochus may be pointed out, with a view of showing the connexion between their metrical and poetical characters. Among these are the verses called by the metrical writers asyiiartetes, or unconnected, and by them said to have been invented by Archilochus : they are considered by Plutarch as forming the transi- tion to another class of rhythms. Of these difficult metres we will only say, that they consist of two metrical clauses or members of different kinds ; for example, dactylic or anapaestic, and trochaic, which are loosely joined into one verse, the last syllable of the first member retaining the license of the final syllable of a verse J. This kind of metre, which passed from the ancient iambic to the comic poets, has a feeble and languid expression, though capable at times of a careless grace ; nor was it ever employed for any grave or dignified subject. This character especially appears in the member consisting of three pure trochees, with which the asyiiartetes often close ; which was named Ithy- phallicus, because the verses sung at the Phallagogia of Dionysus, the scene of the wildest revelry in the worship of this god, were chiefly com- posed in this metre §. It seems as if the intention had been that after ■)• Fragm. 88. The person reproved is the same Perich s who, in the elegies, is addressed as an intimate friend. (See fragm. 1. and 131.) I Archilochus, as well as his imitator Horace, did not allow these two clauses to mn into one another; hut as the comic poets used this liberty (Hephajstion, p. 84. (iaisf.) it is certain that in Archilochus, 'Egao-ftsv'tltj XugiXas, XQ*fii& T <" y&.<>s. It begins as follows (vi. p. 253 ) : — 'fig oi ftiyitrToi to~>i hut kxi QiTa.Toi nrn Toa vraputriv. This poem, by its relaxed and creeping but at the same time elegant and graceful tone, characterizes the Athens of that time far better than many declamations of rhetorical historians.
 * Fragm. 9.