Ekphrastic poikilia in Triphiodorus’ Sack of Troy: Towards a Late Antique Poetics of Similarity
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Saskia Schomber
Abstract
Triphiodorus’ Sack of Troy features an elaborate ekphrasis of the wooden horse, unparalleled in any other extant account of the Trojan War. This article argues that the ekphrasis — oscillating between divergent aesthetic approaches to description — serves as a mise-en-abyme of the poem’s poetics, which continually negotiate varying degrees of proximity to and distance from its literary models. While the description of the horse engages with epic intertexts and the rhetorical tradition of ἔκφρασις, it also incorporates epigrammatic modes of ekphrasis. At the same time, it reflects distinctly Late Antique perspectives on visuality, manifested within the so-called Jeweled Style. Drawing on recent cultural theory, the article situates Triphiodorus within the broader landscape of later Greek literature — particularly in relation to Nonnus’ Dionysiaca — and argues for similarity as a paradigm that helps to capture the complex ways in which Late Antique Greek epic poems navigate their literary self-positioning.
Abstract
Triphiodorus’ Sack of Troy features an elaborate ekphrasis of the wooden horse, unparalleled in any other extant account of the Trojan War. This article argues that the ekphrasis — oscillating between divergent aesthetic approaches to description — serves as a mise-en-abyme of the poem’s poetics, which continually negotiate varying degrees of proximity to and distance from its literary models. While the description of the horse engages with epic intertexts and the rhetorical tradition of ἔκφρασις, it also incorporates epigrammatic modes of ekphrasis. At the same time, it reflects distinctly Late Antique perspectives on visuality, manifested within the so-called Jeweled Style. Drawing on recent cultural theory, the article situates Triphiodorus within the broader landscape of later Greek literature — particularly in relation to Nonnus’ Dionysiaca — and argues for similarity as a paradigm that helps to capture the complex ways in which Late Antique Greek epic poems navigate their literary self-positioning.
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Foreword V
- Contents VII
- List of Figures IX
- List of Abbreviations
- Introduction 1
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Part I: Ekphrasis and Hellenistic Poetics
- Poets’ Signatures and Ekphrasis in Inscribed Greek Epigrams 15
- Leonidas of Tarentum and Hellenistic Ekphrasis 45
- Pictures in Motion: Descriptive Performance in Hellenistic carmina figurata 69
- Aratus’ Ekphrastic Skies: Between the Dragon and the Stars Without Name 89
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Part II: Ekphrastic Visualization In and Out of the Mind
- The Lover is the Perfect Artist: Praxiteles and the Cnidian Aphrodite in Greek Ekphrastic Epigram 117
- Imagined Spaces, Imagined Buildings, and the Idea of Architectural Representation: Phantasia in the Wall Paintings of the 2nd Style in Rome and the Vesuvian Cities 141
- A Library of Memory in a Ptolemaic Reading Primer (P. Cairo J.E. 65445) 193
- Learning from Illusion: Myron’s Heifer and the Stoic Poetics of Ekphrasis 217
- Can You Feel It? Ekphrasis and Mind-Reading in Hellenistic Epigram 255
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Part III: Developments in Late Antique Ekphrasis
- Patchwork Voices: Poetics and Aesthetics of Ekphrasis in Ancient Greek Cento-Poetry 275
- Exegete or Ecstatic Visionary? On the Self-Fashioning of the Poet in the Ekphrasis tabulae mundi of John of Gaza 289
- Ekphrastic poikilia in Triphiodorus’ Sack of Troy: Towards a Late Antique Poetics of Similarity 313
- A Guided Tour through a Poetic Collection of Statues: Observations on Christodorus of Coptus’ Ekphrastic Practice 339
- List of Contributors 361
- Index Nominum
- Index Rerum
- Index Locorum
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Foreword V
- Contents VII
- List of Figures IX
- List of Abbreviations
- Introduction 1
-
Part I: Ekphrasis and Hellenistic Poetics
- Poets’ Signatures and Ekphrasis in Inscribed Greek Epigrams 15
- Leonidas of Tarentum and Hellenistic Ekphrasis 45
- Pictures in Motion: Descriptive Performance in Hellenistic carmina figurata 69
- Aratus’ Ekphrastic Skies: Between the Dragon and the Stars Without Name 89
-
Part II: Ekphrastic Visualization In and Out of the Mind
- The Lover is the Perfect Artist: Praxiteles and the Cnidian Aphrodite in Greek Ekphrastic Epigram 117
- Imagined Spaces, Imagined Buildings, and the Idea of Architectural Representation: Phantasia in the Wall Paintings of the 2nd Style in Rome and the Vesuvian Cities 141
- A Library of Memory in a Ptolemaic Reading Primer (P. Cairo J.E. 65445) 193
- Learning from Illusion: Myron’s Heifer and the Stoic Poetics of Ekphrasis 217
- Can You Feel It? Ekphrasis and Mind-Reading in Hellenistic Epigram 255
-
Part III: Developments in Late Antique Ekphrasis
- Patchwork Voices: Poetics and Aesthetics of Ekphrasis in Ancient Greek Cento-Poetry 275
- Exegete or Ecstatic Visionary? On the Self-Fashioning of the Poet in the Ekphrasis tabulae mundi of John of Gaza 289
- Ekphrastic poikilia in Triphiodorus’ Sack of Troy: Towards a Late Antique Poetics of Similarity 313
- A Guided Tour through a Poetic Collection of Statues: Observations on Christodorus of Coptus’ Ekphrastic Practice 339
- List of Contributors 361
- Index Nominum
- Index Rerum
- Index Locorum
