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294 294 On the Attic Dionysia. like manner as at the Chytri. He himself prefers the first of the two : which however need not detain us, as it cannot be extracted from the Greek words. On the other hand that of Petitus is liable to no other objection on this score^ than that it does not assign a distinct meaning to the epithet e0a- jaiWov^ which, in a writer like the Pseudo-Plutarch, is a very trifling difficulty : nor is dyooi^ ecpafxiWo^ a more censurable redundancy than Plutarch'^s ci/uLXXa evaywvio^^ which he uses on a similar occasion (Solon c. 29). According to this con- struction the passage might seem to favour Ruhnken's opinion, if the revival of the contest at the Chytri is brought into con- nexion with the decay of the Lenaean festival, mentioned by the Scholiast on the Frogs (406 rjv tl^ kol irapd tov ArjvdL- Kov crvGTokrj) on the authority of Aristotle. Hermann adopts the second of the interpretations mentioned by Spanheim, in which ecpdjutWov is referred to ^vrpoi^^ and he conceives that the object of the law was to revive, in a new form and under legal sanction, a species of contest which had before been pri- vately exhibited at the Chytri, but had fallen into disuse. He supposes this exhibition to have consisted, not in the regular dramatic recitations, but in readings, by which the poets sub- mitted their new pieces to the judgement of a select audience. The novelty of the institution lay, not in the season, which was the same as before, but in the right conferred on the successful poet, of exhibiting his play at the ensuing Great Dionysia. That the poets in fact read their plays at the Anthesteria, seems to result from the accounts of the death of Sophocles given by his Greek biographer, who, after mention- ing the singular story told by Ister and Neanthes, that Sopho- cles was choked in eating a bunch of grapes presented to him at the Choes, adds : ^drupo^ Se (prjai, Trjv 'Avriyovriv dvayiy- vvoGKovTa Kai €^ir€GovTa Trept Ta TeXrj vo}]juaTi fxaKpw — aw TTj (pwvrj Kal Tfjv y^vyj]}' d(peLvai» Oi ^e, on /uerd rrjv rod cpa/uLaTOs avayvooatu^ ote vikwv eKYjpv'^Orj^ X^P^ viKrjOek e^eXiTTE. That some such previous trial of the pieces to be produced at the Great Dionysia should have taken place, is in itself extremely probable, and the time of the Anthesteria, which left about a month for the theatrical preparations, was well adapted to the purpose. These trials may have been the dywres '^vrpivoi of Philochorus. We are also informed