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Plautus and the Three Princes of Serendip1
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 November 2018
Extract
Adaptability enables folktales to survive for long periods of time. What began as an oral tale may become the basis of later literary works. The tale retains its basic elements while undergoing alterations and embellishments to suit its different contexts, both social and literary. The ‘Inclusa’ is such an example. Stith Thompson reduces the tale to its bare essentials as ‘underground passage to paramour's house. Woman goes from one to the other. Her husband is made to believe that the woman next door is her sister.’ The setting, the characterization of the participants, and the actual mechanics of the action are not given; the individual storyteller supplies these elements, so that variants are produced. Although the origins of the Inclusa remain obscure, its written development can be traced.
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- Copyright © Renaissance Society of America 1976
Footnotes
1
I thank those who read this article in draft and in particular James Tatum and Mary Laura Gibbs for discussing respectively the problems of Plautus and of printed books in Venice during the Renaissance.
References
2 Motif-Index of Folk Literature (Bloomington, 1957), iv, 404, Type K1523. See the examples cited there and by A. Aarne, The Types of the Folktale, tr. and enlarged by Thompson, S., Folklore Fellow Communications, 184 (1964)Google Scholar, second revision, 419, Type 1419E. Note that both omit the Miles Gloriosus from their lists.
3 Duckworth, G., The Nature of Roman Comedy (Princeton, 1952), p. 54.Google Scholar The basic study on reworkings of the Miles Gloriosus was made by Karl von Reinhardtstoettner, Plautus—Spätere Bearbeitungen plautinischer Lustspiele (Leipzig, 1886), pp. 595-680. More recently, see Hanson, J. A., ‘The Glorious Military,’ in Roman Drama, ed. Dorey, T. A. and Dudley, D. R. (London, 1965), pp. 51–85 and 84Google Scholar, n. 1, for bibliography on this topic.
4 Remer, T. G., ed., Serendipity and the Three Princes—From the Peregrinaggio of 1557 (Norman, Okla., 1965), pp. 50–163 Google Scholar; see Appendix III, pp. 184-190, for a history of the editions and translations of the Peregrinaggio. The sixth novella appears there on pp. 135-156.
5 Also Act iv, 969-980 and 1104-1107. For a discussion of this point, see Webster, T. B. L., Studies in Later Greek Comedy (New York, 1970), p. 174.Google Scholar
6 On the use of a second woman instead of a twin sister, see n. 23, below.
7 ‘Parallen zur Entführungsgeschichte im Miles Gloriosus’, RhMus, s. 3, 39 (1884), 1-26. His study has been variously interpreted as providing evidence for contamination or unity of the play. For the former view, see Leo, F., Plautinische Forschungen (Berlin, 1912), pp. 178ff.Google Scholar; for the latter view, Brotherton, B., ‘The Plot of the Miles Gloriosus ,’ TAP A, 55 (1924), 128–136.Google Scholar See also Fraenkel, E., Elementi plautini in Plauto (Plautinisches im Plautus) (Florence, 1960), pp. 245–253.Google Scholar
8 Campbell, K., The Seven Sages of Rome (Boston, 1907), p. xiff.Google Scholar; Zarncke, p. 9ff. Note that in the classical period the labors of Herakles form a group of tales similar to those in the Seven Sages of Rome. Certain labors were canonical, such as Herakles and the Nemean Lion, and frequently had a particular place in the series of Herakles’ exploits. Others, however, varied from list to list. See Preller, L. and Robert, C., Griechische Mythologie (Berlin, 1921), n2, 431–440.Google Scholar
9 The original edition of the Seven Sages of Rome has not survived.
10 The idea of imprisonment of a young beautiful woman in a tower to keep her away from handsome young men is quite common and may be found in such disparate tales as Danae and Rapunzel.
11 The other versions quoted by Zarncke are basically similar to this tale except for a frequently greater emphasis on the woman's role. Brotherton also analyzes these tales and cites an Albanian version where a priest's wife is the ‘arch-intriguer’ and not her lover (pp. 130-131, 135.) See also Campbell, pp. cix-cxii, and Hilka, A., ‘Die Wanderung der Erzählung von der Inclusa aus dem Volksbuch der Sieben weisen Meister,’ Mitteilungen der Schlesischen Gesellschaft für Volkskunde, 19 (1917), 29–72.Google Scholar
Note that the Inclusa has continued in popularity until modern times. While a study of its later tradition after the Renaissance would be extremely interesting, it is a separate topic beyond the scope of the present discussion. Moreover, the later variants shed little light on the immediate problem of the origins of the sixth novella of the Peregrinaggio. For one modern variant, however, see n. 36, below.
12 Greek and Roman Folklore (New York, 1927), p. 80.
13 For Stith Thompson's summary, see discussion in text and n. 2, above. Pyrgopolynices for the present may be considered a husband. This point will be discussed in more detail below. See n. 23, below, on the problem of a double vs. a twin sister.
14 See n. 11, above, for examples.
15 Three citations of the similarities between the Miles Gloriosus and the Peregrinaggio are known to me: Fischer, H. and Bolte, J., eds., Die Reise der Söhne Giaffers (Tübingen, 1895), p. 219 Google Scholar; Chauvin, V., Bibliographie des ouvrages arabes ou relatifs aux arabes (Liége and Leipzig, 1904), v, 214 Google Scholar; and A. Hilka, p. 50. But they merely note the comparison without analyzing the structure of the two works. See also n. 4, above.
16 Remer, p. 3ff. The Compact Edition of the Oxford English Dictionary (Oxford, 1971), p. 2735, see under ‘serendipity.’ Fischer and Bolte (p. 179) identify Serendip as Ceylon.
17 On the background and history of the Peregrinaggio see Remer, pp. 35ff. and 178ff.; Fischer and Bolte, pp. 177-179; Fick, R. and Hilka, A., eds., Theodore Benfey—Die Reise der drei Söhne des Königs von Serendippo, Folklore Fellows Communications, 98 (1932), 5ff.Google Scholar
18 See n. 9, above.
19 Fischer and Bolte (p. 218) identify the kingdom as Lissär on the southwest shore of the Caspian Sea in Kergän. Furthermore they give the following meanings for the names of the principal characters: Feristeno—angel, envoy, Giulla—rose; Giassemen—jasmine; and Achel—wise, prudent.
20 A false report of the death of a prisoner is another common device and was similarly used by W. S. Gilbert in the Yeoman of the Guard. The method of deliverance differs in the two stories. Giassemen drills a hole in Feristeno's cell and carefully reseals the hole after his escape. Colonel Fairfax, on the other hand, is passed off as the son of Sergeant Meryll.
21 The use of the reed as a hiding place belongs to a long tradition. That was where Prometheus hid the fire he stole from the gods to give to man ( Aeschylus, , Prometheus Bound, 108ff.Google Scholar).
22 Fischer and Bolte (p. 221) compare the floral portraits to the use of puppets in Sicilian folktales.
23 Note that the idea of ‘doubling’ the lover, Feristeno, belongs to this group of elaborations by the teller trying to improve upon his source. That Giulla is not represented as her own twin sister (like the Duke's wife) is not crucial to our discussion. The idea of an exact double is sufficient for the mechanics of the story. On the meaning of doubles in folklore, see Dawkins, R. M., Modern Greek Folktales (Oxford, 1953), p. 376.Google Scholar
24 Note especially Miles Gloriosus, Act iv, 972-980. For a similar explanation see Brotherton, pp. 134-135. She says there that such alterations are ‘due to special social conditions or to necessary manipulations of the action so soon as the formula of the plot substitutes a soldier and concubine for the husband and wife who recur in Zarncke's stories… . To this transfer no objection is ever made.’ Compare also Webster, p. 174.
25
Miles Gloriosus, Act II, 86-87, ‘
Graece huic nomen est comoediae, / id nos Latine “gloriosum” dicimus.’
26 Leo, pp. 115, 178.
27 It is always possible that this solution should be put back one more step and applied instead to the Greek version, the Alazon. See Zarncke, p. 25.
28 Remer, pp. 48-49.
29 Fischer and Bolte, pp. 179.
30 Halliday (p. 105ff.) presents Alexandria as one of the places of exchange and cites other Greek examples indebted to Indian sources. I would like to suggest tentatively that the group of stories commonly known as Milesian tales may be an example of this kind of transmission. See also n. 43, below.
31 Zarncke, p. 25. He is supported by Hilka, pp. 71-72.
32 Halliday, p. 109.
33 The Folktale (New York, 1946), p. 375ff.
34 Halliday, p. 113. Campbell, pp. xiff., xvf., xviiff.
35 Hilka (pp. 51-52) pursues a similar line when he postulates a new version, independent of the Miles Gloriosus, beginning in the Middle Ages.
36 There is a modern Greek folktale of the Inclusa type, called the ‘Goldsmith's Wife,’ which does include the jewelry episode (Dawkins, pp. 376-383, No. 60). This version probably belongs to the second wave of transmission and is independent of the Miles Gloriosus. Nonetheless the longevity of the tale is underlined. See also n. 11, above.
37 For a discussion of the variants of the Inclusa, see among others Campbell, pp. cix-cxii, and Zarncke.
38 Remer, pp. 50-51.
39 Even if a Christopher the Armenian is eventually identified, the argument presented below will hold true. He, not just Tramezzino, would have been familiar with the Miles Gloriosus. The case for Tramezzino, however, is particularly convincing.
40 Fick and Hilka, p. 10ff.
41 Remer, p. 51.
42 Schanz, M. and Hosius, C., Geschichte der römischen Literatur, HdA, 8, Pt. 1 (Munich, 1927), 86.Google Scholar The manuscript tradition of the Miles Gloriosus shows that the play was extant in Italy from at least 1429 ( Hammond, M., Mack, A. M., and Moskalew, W., eds., T. Macci Plauti—Miles Gloriosus [Cambridge, Mass., 1963], pp. 56–60 and 63Google Scholar, with bibliography).
Indirect corroboration of the connection between the later Oriental tales and classical works may come from the Dolopathos, the earliest extant form of the Seven Sages of Rome. Its eighth tale, the Inclusa, is related by none other than Vergil. (Campbell, p. xxi.) See also n. 44, below.
43 Note that there may be purely literary parallels between the two works, but that study lies beyond the scope of this treatment of plot-motifs.
44 The ‘Widow of Ephesus’ is a Milesian tale which clearly demonstrates the process of adaptation followed by a writer. It appears in both Petronius (111-112) and Phaedrus (Appendix Perottina xiii). The former, however, alters the basic tale recounted by Phaedrus in order to suit his own purpose: a parody of the affair between Dido and Aeneas in the Aeneid (iv.1-172), that is, like the sixth novella, an adaptation of one literary work to fit another. Thus Petronius uses the character of the servant (=Anna) to urge the bereaved and chaste widow (=Dido) to accept the advances of the soldier (=Aeneas) who abandons his duty for his love. Unlike Aeneas and Dido, the soldier and the widow presumably live happily ever after. This story is particularly important for the present discussion, because like the Inclusa it was also one of the standard tales in the Seven Sages of Rome and could have followed a similar pattern of transmission. For a discussion of later variants, see Campbell, pp. ci-cviii, with bibliography on p. ci, n. 1. See also Thompson, Motif-Index of Folk Literature, K2213.1, and Sage, E. T. and Gilleland, B. B., Petronius—The Satiricon (New York, 1969), pp. 229–230.Google Scholar
It should be noted that the Inclusa fits the type of story that the Milesian tales told. It may be possible then that the ultimate origin of the plot of the Miles Gloriosus was a Milesian or similar tale.