Lesson plan
Timocles
Timocles (Ancient Greek: Τιμοκλῆς, ) was one of the last Athenian comics poets of the Middle Comedy, although Pollux listed him among the writers of New Comedy. Allusions in his surviving fragments to the dispute over Halonnesus between Macedon and Athens (342 BC) and the office of gynaeconomi ("women's overseers", introduced after 317 BC by Demetrius of Phalerum) put his dates of activity in the second half of the fourth century BC. Timocles is known to have won first prize at the Lenaea once, between 330 and 320 BC. The Suda claims that there were two comic poets of this name, but modern scholars equate the two. Unlike most Middle Comedy plays, his works featured a good deal of personal ridicule of public figures, especially orators like Demosthenes and Hyperides. 42 fragments of Timocles works survive. The titles of at least 26, and possibly 28, are known.…
Article summary
Timocles (Ancient Greek: Τιμοκλῆς, ) was one of the last Athenian comics poets of the Middle Comedy, although Pollux listed him among the writers of New Comedy. Allusions in his surviving fragments to the dispute over Halonnesus between Macedon and Athens (342 BC) and the office of gynaeconomi ("women's overseers", introduced after 317 BC by Demetrius of Phalerum) put his dates of activity in the second half of the fourth century BC. Timocles is known to have won first prize at the Lenaea once, between 330 and 320 BC. The Suda claims that there were two comic poets of this name, but modern scholars equate the two. Unlike most Middle Comedy plays, his works featured a good deal of personal ridicule of public figures, especially orators like Demosthenes and Hyperides. 42 fragments of Timocles works survive. The titles of at least 26, and possibly 28, are known.…
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Discussion questions
- Summarise the article in your own words. Which single claim would you verify first, and why?
- Which claim in this article is most likely to be revised as the sources update? How would you check its current status?
- If two sources disagreed about one of these facts, what would you need in order to trust one over the other?
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