Thersites in Sophokles, "Philoktetes" 445 Huxley, George Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies; Spring 1967; 8, 1; ProQuest pg. 33

Thersites in Sophokles, Philoktetes 445 
George Huxley 

P HILOKTETES enquires of Neoptolemos, H ... there was one 
Thersites ... -do you know if he is alive?" The young hero 
replies: OUK Eloov aUTOV (auTos- Nauck, Burges), nU()0I-'7JV 0' ;T' 

oVTa VLV. aUTov means ipsum here (Paley), 'in the flesh'; the change to 
aUTOS' is needless. Jebb1 comments that here Thersites survives 
Achilles. HBut, according to the commoner legend, he died before 
him ... " Thersites had mutilated the corpse of Penthesilea and 
accused Achilles of loving her; whereupon Achilles killed him. This 
is in fact the early form of the legend, which according to Proklos was 
already given by Arktinos in the Aethiopis. 2 Correctly, the scholiast 
on Philoktetes 445 remarks ToiJTo Trap' tUToptav. 3 

Are we to infer from Neoptolemos' remark, therefore, as J. Schmidt 
suggested, 4 that there was a version of the legend in which Achilles 
predeceased Thersites? Surely not: Neoptolemos is lying,S and the 
audience is meant to know that he is not telling the truth. The lie is 
due less to the dishonourable circumstances in which Achilles killed 
Thersites than to the train of the conversation between Philoktetes 
and Neoptolemos. As Schneidewin pointed out,6 Neoptolemos 
answers as he does to strengthen Philoktetes in his view that in war 
only the wicked survive and prosper. Nestor, it is true, is still alive 
but only as a result of the self-sacrifice of his son Antilochos,7 and he 
too TrpaUUH VVV KaKWS-. The greater Ajax and Patroklos are dead, 
whereas Odysseus and Thersites are alive; and Odysseus, not Neopto­
lemos, is alleged to have the arms of Achilles (365-6). 

Neoptolemos lies in order to strengthen Philoktetes in his convic­
tion that TrOI..EI-'O'; OVOEV' avop' EKWV I atpEL TroV7]POV, the better to win 

1 Sophocles pt. IV: The Philoctetes (Cambridge 1890) p.79. 
2 Chr. p.l05 ed. T. W. Allen. 
3 Schol. vet. ed. Papageorgius p.364. 
" MythLex. 5, col. 667. 
5 Cf. schol. on Philoktete5 1402, p.393 P. 
6 Sophokles (Leipzig 1853) 185. 
7 vv.424-5; cf. Pindar, Pyth. 6.30ff. 

3--G.R.B.S. 33 



34 THERSITES IN SOPHOKLES, PHILOKTETES 445 

the outcast's sympathy. Hence the rather devious reply to the ques­
tion-not a direct Hhe is alive" but HI heard that he is still alive." 
Contrast XOOTOS Te{}VTJKc1s 7jv, said confidently (and truly) of Patroklos 
(435). Philoktetes is intended to take the devious answer as a sign that 
the noble son of Achilles had deliberately avoided the odious Ther­
sites at Troy; it is not, I think, as Wecklein supposed, evidence of the 
obscurity of Thersites. 8 

This is the only passage in the extant plays and fragments of 
Sophokles where Thersites is mentioned by name: perhaps the poet 
regarded him as essentially unbecoming to the dignity of tragedy. 
In a fragment of the 'AAEaSa£ however,9 there may be an allusion to 
him: 7TAoihos is the subject-Kat yap SvuE£Ses uwp,a Kat Svuwvvp,ov I 
yAWUayJ C accursed for his tongue") UOcp6V T{()TjULV EVp,OpcpdV T' lSeLv. In 
this play too, therefore, Thersites may have been said to prosper; nor, 
in spite of Iliad 2, is such prosperity implausible, for he was of royal 
descent, being a son of Agrios son of Porthaon or Portheus,IO and so a 
kinsman of Diomede. 

THE QUEEN'S UNIVERSITY, BELFAST 

November, 1966 

8 Phi/oc. ed. N. Wecklein (Leipzig 1875) ad loco Cf A. Taccone. Sofocle. Filottete (Florence 
1948) 72. "Risposta quanta mai adatta aHa dignita di Neottolemo. Egli aveva avuto ben 
altro pel capo che curarsi di un simile individuo." 

9 fr.88.9-10 Pearson. 
10 Q. Smym. 1.77Off; cf II. 14.115f and Schmidt (supra n.4) 667.