The Practical Irony of the Historical Socrates

Author(s): Lowell Edmunds

Source: Phoenix, Vol. 58, No. 3/4 (Autumn - Winter, 2004), pp. 193-207
Published by: Classical Association of Canada
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4135165
Accessed: 25-02-2016 16:09 UTC

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/
info/about/policies/terms.jsp

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content
in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship.
For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Classical Association of Canada is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Phoenix.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 129.174.21.5 on Thu, 25 Feb 2016 16:09:52 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 THE PRACTICAL IRONY OF THE HISTORICAL SOCRATES

LOWELLEDMUNDS

PROBABLY FROM SOCRATES' OWN TIME, certainlyfrom Aristotle's time, irony

has been a central feature in the descriptionof the philosopher from Alopeke.
The importanceof Socrates'irony is reflectedin the title of an influentialbook,
stemming from influential teaching and articles, by Gregory Vlastos: Socrates:
Ironist and Moral Philosopher.' In Vlastos's discussion, and generally, irony
is assumed to be an exclusivelyverbal phenomenon. The Greeks, however,
down through the fourth century B.C.E., knew of a practicalirony. It was an
irony of manner or more broadly of style. In NicomacheanEthics, Aristotle
uses Spartan dress, i.e., the imitation of Spartan dress by Athenians, as an
example of irony (1127b27-28). Socrates, it will be seen, was associated by
contemporarieswith this particularstyle and thus with practicalirony as defined
by Aristotle.
Aristotle's discussion of irony appearsin a chapteron truthfulness,the mean
between the extremesof boastfulnessand irony.He begins:"letus discusstruthful
persons and untruthfulpersons in words and in practices(rpd~4cat)and in their
claims about themselves"(1127a19-20). An irony of practices,a practicalirony,
is presupposed.Consistentlywith this startingpoint, Aristotle'swhole discussion
of the mean and the extremes looks to public and social context. Theophrastus
follows Aristotle.2 He begins his charactersketch of the ironist: "Ironywould
seem to be ... a pretenseof the worse in practicesand in words"(7npoatnoorlat;
Ti
XEypov7tpdx(c0v K~a X6yov, Char. 5.1 Jebb-Sandys). For a narrower, exclusively
verbalsense of irony, one can comparethe definitionin the roughlycontemporary
RhetoricaadAlexandrum:"Ironyis to say something while pretendingnot to say
it or to call things by the opposite names"(1434a17-18). The author of this
rhetoricaltreatise has formulateda definition in which the notion of practiceis
absent. Irony now has the purely verbal status that it will have in Cicero and
in Quintilian (except for a single intriguing statement to be discussed below,
202).3
Vlastos, thinking of verbal irony, resolutely denied irony in Aristophanes'
Clouds."The anti-hero of the Cloudsis many things to many men, but an ironist
to none."4But with this comedy one can begin to describethe practicalirony of
the historicalSocrates.

1Vlastos 1991.
2Steinmetz1962:8, 36-37. On
ironist,seeBiichner1941:348-349.
Theophrastus'
3Cic. Brut.292; De orat.2.67 (Socratesan example);Quint. 6.2.15, 8.6.54-59, 9.2.44-46
(Socratesan example).
4Vlastos 1991: 29.

193
PHOENIX,VOL. 58 (2004) 3-4.

This content downloaded from 129.174.21.5 on Thu, 25 Feb 2016 16:09:52 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
194 PHOENIX

I. CLOUDS

To talk about Socratesin Cloudsis apparentlyto step into a yes-no cycle that,
startingat the beginning of the nineteenth century,has not run down.5Yes, it is
the historical Socrates.No, it is not the historicalSocrates.A forcefultwentieth
centuryno, that of K.J. Dover in his commentaryon Clouds(1968), only initiated
a new yes phase of the cycle.6 But everyone, including Dover, agrees that the
description of Socratesin lines 362-363 can be taken as historical,and one of
the elements of the descriptioncan be shown, with referenceto Aristotle, to be a
matterof practicalirony.
Their context is as follows. The old farmer,Strepsiades,deeplyin debt because
of his son's obsession with horses, is forced to enter Socrates'school in order to
learn how to defraud his creditors. He asks Socratesto teach him "the unjust
speech."In orderto matriculate,Strepsiadesmust be initiatedinto the religion of
the Clouds, the divinitiesof Socratesand his followers.As partof the ceremony,
Socratesmust invoke the Clouds, who appearand speak to him as one of their
favorites. They say that, when called, they would answer, among present-day
"meteorosophists,"only Prodicusand Socrates-Prodicus becauseof his skill and
intelligence (361), i.e., because of genuine abilities. Why Socrates?Because, say
the Clouds,

t' v tc•otv 60ot; Kco't

&it PEV06MT'& td40(XOaji1
kt6XX' vCXEt ircpad4XX&st,
Kavu368'tOCoKaK Kcu'iljinv
oelgvoitpooortc,.
Youswaggerin the streetsandcastyoureyessideways,
and,goingbarefoot,enduremanyills,andputon a graveface
on ouraccount. (362-363)

They answer Socrates, then, not because of his abilities or inner qualities but
because of externals-his mannerisms and his lifestyle. The description of
Socrates'in these two lines consists of four elements.
1. ppnv06ct. It is coupled with by zc ... Kai, and the two verbs
nrcaptpd•k•gt;
thus seem to form a unit. In Plato's Symposium(221b3-4), Alcibiades couples
the two verbs, citing the passage Aristophanesjust quoted, in a descriptionof
in
Socrates'braveryduring the retreatfrom Delium. "I thought that there as also
here [i.e., in Athens] ... he went along swaggeringand castinghis eyes sideways."
Alcibiades then goes on to provide a gloss on casting the eyes sideways, but
nothing on the verb ppcv6Oo0eoat.
This verb is the most difficult of the four elements in the description of
Socrates. The main reason for the translation"swagger"is context: the phrase
ev raolatv 605o~"inthe streets"in Aristophanesand the verb5taXropE;eC0out "to

5Part I of this articleis a revisedand updatedversionof partof Edmunds 1987.

6Dover 1968; the new yes-cycle (for example):Rossetti 1974; Nussbaum1980; Kleve 1983a.

This content downloaded from 129.174.21.5 on Thu, 25 Feb 2016 16:09:52 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 PRACTICALIRONY 195

go along"in Alcibiades'description(221b1).7 If, as seems likely, ppev06e0Xat

comes from pp&vOo;,an unknown kind of waterbird, this verb would mean
specifically"towalk like a brenthos," and the gait of this birdwould be implicit in
the etymology proposedby Emile Boisacq.8He reconstructedan Indo-European
root *g"rendh-from which Latingrandisand Old Slavicgrodi"breast"would also
descend. The Greek waterbirdwould thus gets its name from its chest, and the
name would correspondto the English bird name "puffin,"which refers to the
bird'scharacteristicpuffing out of its chest.
2. Casting the eyes sideways. Alcibiades'gloss on tJ0a0cLtg0rnapacdaXXStq
is ilp7ClanrapacKoxrtv Kai tob0 4t•ioug Kai Tobt; roke~4Lou;, (221b4). flpjLia
here can hardly mean "gently." It must refer to a calm, slow glance (LSJ9s.v.
3): thus "slowlyglancing aroundat both friends and enemies."9But what would
such a glance convey? Both Photius, citing Archippus (fr. 52 K = 59 K-A),
a fifth-century comic poet, and Eustathius (204 ad 1l. 2.212), bring this sort
of glance into their definition of "to ridicule or mock."'0 Eustathius
explains that this verb means "to at•,hov,
turn the eyes asideslowly(flp&gca)in depreciation
or ridicule."" With this explanation, it is easier to understandhow Socrates,
as Alcibiades said, used the same mannerismboth on the battlefieldand in the
streets of Athens, towardboth enemies and friends.
The phrase from Cloudsquoted by Alcibiades in praise of Socratesis quoted
once again in Greek literature, this time by someone hostile to Socrates, the
EpicureanPhilodemus.12In the tenth book of On Vices,Philodemuswrites about
varioustypes of the G6rcpilavo;, "the arrogantman." One of these types is the
"theone who affectsgrandeur."Philodemusreports:
Ge&CvoK•67o;,
[Theyusedto saythathe] swaggered (verb3pev06esc0at) andtheyusedto namehimand
still now namehim a swaggerer..., the one who ... looksdownandlooksaskanceat
(r•apflPpX&novTa) everyoneandnodsdownward withhisheadandbelittlesthosehe meets
or thosewhomanyonementions,evenif theyareamongthoseconsidered with
important,
ridiculeanda brief,if any,answerthatrevealshis ownsuperiority andassignsno worthto

7The scholiast on Clouds363 connects the verbwith Socrates'gait.

8Boisacq 1950 s.v. ppeve6oCpat. He was followed by Pokorny (1994 s.v. gwrendh-). This
etymology was abandoned in the etymological dictionariesof Frisk (1960) and Chantraine (1968-
1980).
9Cf. P1. Phd. 103a: Kal' 6 &0Kpd6t7Crl v t KCav
KcLi....
nXapap•Xaov
1'They cite a certainAelius Dionysius. See, in Der KleinePauly,no. 23 s.v. Dionysios: "angeblich
ein Nachfahredes Rhetors ... in hadrianischerZeit."
11I have these references from Lowry 1991: 130-137, where he discusses silloi, the Homeric
Litai and their relationto Thersites, and Socrates'sidelong glances, which he interpretsas squinting.
Cf. P1. Phd. 86d (he opened his eyes wide as he often used to do); 117b (6antep eitei0t tauprl6bv
6ntoPh•XtC&g). Cf. Patzer 1993: 85-86. Borthwick (2001) explains that the adjectiveblepedaimon
is applied to Socratics (at Eust. 206.27) because "it was by their being in thrall to ... Socrates'
insistentlyglaringeyes that their appearanceand behaviourcould, at least in the case of Chaerephon,
be accountedfor"(301).
12Also quoted by Diogenes Laertius(2.28).

This content downloaded from 129.174.21.5 on Thu, 25 Feb 2016 16:09:52 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
196 PHOENIX

anyone else. As Aristophanessaid in his comedy,"He swaggersin the streetsand casts his
eyes sideways." (Col. XXI.13-37 Jensen).13
In this context, the quotation from Clouds implicitly puts Socrates, whom
Philodemus also mentions by name in this treatise,14in the category of the
semnokoros,the man who puts on airs, who is governedby a sense of his own
superiority,which he does nothing to conceal.
A preliminaryconclusionfrom the firstand secondelementsin the description
of Socrates in line 362 of Clouds:Socrates, the public figure (note cv tTaitv
668o•0,"inthe streets"),the Socrateswho couldbe seen in the marketplaceand the
gymnasia,drew attentionto himself by his manner,by the attitudeof haughtiness
he conveyed,which was taken as depreciationand derision.15Socratesmaintained
this attitudeeven when he was on trialfor his life.'6
3. "Barefoot,you enduremany ills"(363). If there is one indisputablehistorical
fact about Socrates, it is barefootedness. Amipsias in his Connus(fr. 9 K = 9
K-A), producedon the same occasion as Clouds,jokes aboutit.'7 In Xenophon's
Memorabilia,Antiphon the Sophist holds it againstSocrates(1.6.2-3). From the
descriptionof Aristodemusat the beginningof the Symposium, one couldconclude
that an enthusiastic follower of Socrateswould alwaysgo barefoot (173b2), as
Socrates did (P1. Phdr. 229a3-4). When Strepsiadesemerges from Socrates'
school in Clouds,his son, Pheidippides,askshim: "Whathaveyou done with your
shoes?"(858).18
In the same context with Socrates'shoelessness, his single threadbarecloak
(himation),alwaysthe same one winter and summer,will be mentioned(Amipsias
ibid.;Xen. ibid.). In Clouds,one of Socrates'scientificdemonstrationsculminates
in the theft of a cloak from a wrestling school (177-179), and in Socrates'school
Strepsiadesis relievedof this garmentas well as of his shoes (856).
So much, then, for the shoelessnessof Socratesand the single cloak. As for
"enduringmany ills," the reference is, of course, to his capacityfor enduring
the deprivationsthat were the result of his chosen poverty (P1.Apol. 31c2-3).
As someone in Amipsias' Connussays,
KaptepIKc6,
y' e& ("you are capable of
endurance,"ibid.). Socrates practicedround-the-clock asceticism,sleeping not
on a bed but a pallet (skimpous,Ar. Nub. 254; Pl. Prt. 310cl).19 Antiphon the
Sophist, again in Xenophon, says to Socratesthat, if his regimenwere imposed
13The ellipsisis in mytranslation;it is nota lacunain thetext.
141n the nextsection(XXI.37-XXIII.37), in whichPhilodemus discussestheeirones.
15I cannot agree with the conclusion of Bergson (1971: 418) thatSocrateswishedto avoidbeing
blamedforbeingsemnos.
'6Cf. Danzig2003.
17SeePatzer1994:60-67 fordiscussionof thefragment.
8sItis possiblethathe gavethe shoesas payment: see Dover1968on 859. Butthe pointof the
jokewouldbe the same:Socratesandhis followersneedshoesandwilltherefore takepaymentin the
formof shoes.
19Cf.Patzer1993:87-88.

This content downloaded from 129.174.21.5 on Thu, 25 Feb 2016 16:09:52 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 PRACTICALIRONY 197

on a slave,the slavewoulddeserthis master(Mem.ibid.). This raptepi{aor

"endurance" of Socratesis thethemeof muchofAlcibiades' of Socrates
description
in the Symposium (219d7,220al, a6, c2). Alcibiadesgivesa senseof its effect
on ordinarypeople. He tells how, in the winter weather at Potidaea, Socrates
went aboutbarefootandin his usualcloakwhilethe otherswerefreezing."The
soldierslookedat him suspiciouslyas if he wereshowingcontemptfor them"
(•o• ao4v, 220cl). The shoelessnessof Socratesthusbelongs
to a Kacrapovowvta
of
style self-deprivation alreadydiscussed
andthis style,likethe mannerisms
(elements one and two), could convey to others an attitudeof superiority.
4. "Youput on a graveface." What is a graveface, and how did Socrates
put on sucha face?Xenophon'sSymposium providesa clue. Eachof the guests
in turnis askedwhathe prideshimselfon. Socrates'responseis precededby a
changein his facialexpression:Ls a ocsgv6;&vaanadcTacq t6bn7p6oonov,"very
haughtilydrawingup his face"(3.10).Thenhe saysthathe prideshimselfon the
tradeof being a procurer,and everyonelaughs.20But how did he drawup his
face?Of the two setsof facialmusclesthatcan"drawup the face,"one is around
the nose, and the otheris in the brow. When XenophondescribesSocratesas
"veryhaughtilydrawingup his face,"he probablyrefersto raisingthe eyebrows
(andnot to tiltinghis facebackwards so as to look downhis nose). Someone
in a three-wordfragmentof Cratinusis describedas&vehrKzcai 6&p6otcacgv6v,
"haughty with raisedeyebrows" (fr.355 K = 348 K-A).A fourth-century comic
poet, Amphis, described Plato as Zdt 64pGU, "withhaughtily
a&•tv&iIn1pTIpKn)
raisedeyebrows" (fr. 13 K = fr. 13 K-A).21In aECtvonpoaoneir, then,in Clouds
363, therearetwo notions,raisedeyebrowsandhaughtiness,or perhapsbetter
superciliousness(fromsupercilium, "eyebrow"),a traithe sharedwithAnaxagoras,
whosenotionof mindasthe causeof allthingsattracted himwhenhe wasyoung
(Pl. Phd.96a6-99d2).22
The superciliousness of Socratesbecameproverbial froman earlytime.In the
Pedetaiof Callias,which can be datedto the earlyyearsof the Peloponnesian
War (on the basisof frs.20-21 K-A), someone(Euripidesin drag?Euripides'
Muse?a personifiedtragedyof Euripides?)is askedwhy she is haughty(semne)
andpresumptuous (4povEi;....~iya)?23 The answer:"Becauseit's allowedme.
Socratesis responsible" (fr. 15 K-A). (The speaker'sreasoningis apparently:
Socratesis the causeof this traitin me and that'smy authority-that'swhy
20At 4.56-60,Socrates' askforandgetanexplanation
interlocutors of hisbizarreassertion.
Vlastos
(1991:30-31) citesthispassageas anexampleof "complex irony."
21Bato(thirdcentury)usesthisphraseof philosophers (fr.5.13K-A),asJeffreyHenderson pointed
out to me. Cf. Menanderfrs.34, 395 KoerteandSic.160;Imperio1998a:127. Socrateswas the
originatorof thisidentifying of thephilosopher.
characteristic
22On this traitin Anaxagoras, see Turato 1995: 20. Empedocleswas said to haveimitated
Anaxagoras' haughtystyle(D.L. 8.56 = Pythagoras A 5 D-K).
23Forthe veryproblematic of the character,
identification see Imperio1998b:223;Patzer1994:
56. For4povic ... cya,xseeLSJ9s.v.4povio II.2.b.

This content downloaded from 129.174.21.5 on Thu, 25 Feb 2016 16:09:52 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
198 PHOENIX
it's allowed me.)24 At the end of Aristophanes'Frogs(405 B.C.E.), the chorus,
explaining Dionysus' choice of Aeschylus over Euripides,sings a song in praise
of the man of true intelligence,who would shun associationwith Socrates;only a
crazy man, says the chorus,would waste time on hair-splitting,pretentious(adj.
semnos)words in the companyof Socrates(1491-99). Lysias,in a speechwritten
for a client prosecutedby a follower of Socrates,Aeschines of Sphettus,refersto
the latter's"manypretentious(adj.semnos)discoursesaboutjustice andvirtue"(fr.
1.2 Thalheim), with the obviousimplicationthat Aeschines'wordswere hollow.25
To conclude, the four elements of Socrates'style describedin Clouds362-363
have a common denominatorin his projection,throughvariousmannerisms,of
an attitude of superiority. One of these elements, however, the third one, was
considered a kind of irony, the kind which I am calling practicalirony. It is
the example of Spartandress, mentioned above,in Aristotle'sdiscussionof irony
which opens this particularperspectiveon Socrates'karteria.

II. ARISTOTLE EN 4.1127A13-B32

Truthfulness in the sense of sincerity or matter-of-factness,i.e., to claim

neither more nor less than one has, is the mean between ironyor self-deprecation
and its opposite, boasting(alazoneia).Aristotlegives one namedexampleof irony:
Socrates.As P. W. Gooch has shown, Socratesis not for Aristotlejust an isolated
example but the model that controls his entire analysis.26And it is this analysis
that, for the first time, allows ironyboth a degree of truthfulnessand a degree of
gracefulness,freeing it from its earlierconsistentlypejorativesense.27Elsewhere,
Aristotle'sview of irony is mainlynegative,in keepingwith what might be called
the common-sense understandingof the matter.28This understandingpersisted
long afterAristotle. It reappearsin Epicurus'negativeevaluationof Socraticirony
(Cic. Brutus292),29which is continuedby his followersPhilodemusand Colotes,
for whom irony is still indistinguishablefrom alazoneia,as it was for Strepsiades
in the fifth century.30
Irony is not, however, the virtue which Aristotle is discussing, but one of
the extremesbetween which the virtue in question lies, and it is necessaryto be

24Cf. D.L.2.24: jv 2.27: '

ci•dtp~cTS K'v aE•tLVO;; ostv6vvto xin•tj Ecsi4q.
25Cf.deVries1944-45, whofindsthatsemnos
andcognate in
orunfavorable
wordsareironical
Plato(twenty-eight
of thirtytimes).
26Gooch1987.
27Cf.Ribbeck 1876:388;Bergson 1971:413-414.
28Gooch 1987:98. Contrary to whatGoochsuggests in n. 7 on thispage,irony,asassociated
withthe megalopsuchos
(1124b29-31), wouldnothavea simplypositivesensebutwouldreferto
haughtiness.
29IronywastheEpicureans' mainobjection to Socrates:
cf.Riley1980andKleve1983b.Long
(1988:152)cautions:
"ironycannot a dominant
besaidto constitute featureof Socrates
whenweare
roleinthemainstream
hispositive
considering ofHellenistic
philosophy."
30Inthe sectionof De vitiison irony,Philodemus speaksof the ironistas a typeof alazon
Plut.Adv.Col.1117d:
(21.37-38). 16youV. used&•Xa6vt;
Socrates atAr.Nu.449.
Cf.Strepsiades

This content downloaded from 129.174.21.5 on Thu, 25 Feb 2016 16:09:52 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 PRACTICALIRONY 199

precise about where, according to Aristotle, Socrates stands in relation to the

virtue. While it looks as if Socrates is the paragon of proper irony, Aristotle
gives an example of improper irony (Spartandress) which applies perfectly to
Socrates,althoughAristotle seems not be awareof this fact. This contradictionin
Aristotle'saccount,to be explainedbelow, is one more puzzling trait in a chapter
alreadypuzzling in crucialways.31
oi 6' F'.p(ovE;ni U6EXazrrov
X yov'S XatptiorEpot
&Ptv TdzijOr
01 tavovorat-0o yydpKiep-
6ou; EVeKCL 6oKoGotXEyetv,&dOd (e6yovET Tb 8& Kai ou6ot Td
sdtkto(yT
; boiet. 6YK*1p6v"
Ev6o4(a &a(pvov-rat, otov Ka\ ZoKpdlpa11S o0i
'&8 tgtKpM K•I [Xpoo-
OayVEpd&
Iotougjevot] IPtUKO•(XVOupyotXcyovat K~t 6uKatra(povr16JTpotiotv. Kat Mv(oT&
aX aoveia otov i1
e?iv AaKvov t K\c
taiv•cat, KOtLydp 6nEpPo'fl fj XiaV
XX&tytC kaXaovtK6v. o0 6A •Ocic. Eip(veiE
Xp(csEvot Ka- tItaepi r'rt Xl
i Mav
j8teprpimc T,
6 ,xaC(Ov
tlno08ov K(a't4avcph Eipowcu6•sEvot xapiEVlE• ~civovLrat. avtt•&taOat 8'
CiVaratLrip Xeipyv ydap. (1127b22-32)
Xi0eurtK"'
I offer a paraphrase,with brief comments: Ironists, speakingin understatement,
are, as such, alreadycloser to the virtuous mean than boasters (cf. 1127b7-8).
They present a more graceful character. Ironists do not speak for the sake of
gain, as, Aristotle has just shown, boasters sometimes do. They seek to avoid
pompousness.Especiallydo ironistsalsodenythings generallyapprovedor in good
repute (zr 'v6o5a), as Socratesalso used to do.32 (I shall returnto the question
of what these endoxaare.) Those, on the other hand, who deny things that are
trivialand obvious are affecteddevils (the word is a hapaxand
pauKonoavoupyot
sounds like slang or something from a comedy) and rathercontemptible. And
sometimes it (their behavior) is imposture (as I shall here translatealazoneia),
for example, Spartandress. For excess and excessive deficiency are impostures.
Those who use irony moderatelyand who are ironic with respect to that which
is not too commonplace and obvious appear as graceful, while the impostor
(alazon) appearsto be the opposite of the truthfulperson, for he is worse (than
the ironist). (The ironist, then, is not completely the opposite of the truthful
person.)
The word endoxaoccurs six times in EN, twice in the masculine plural, of
persons, and twice in a well-known programmatic passage, where it means "things
generally admitted" (1145b2-7). The other two occurrences are in the passage
under discussion.BecauseAristotle begins his descriptionof the ironistwith two
referencesto irony as speech (1127b22-23, 24) it seems that Socrates'denial (verb
must also be a matterof speech and not a practicalrefusal.Then
&•rapvcao0at)
Socrates is, on Aristotle's account, denying or disclaiming (that he has) things
generally approved(as good or desirable). The main such thing that Socrates

31Gooch 1987:98: "Wewerenotprepared ... to haveAristotle's

schemeendupwitha putative
viceviciousonlyin the measurethatit harbours
its opposingvice.Thatis puzzling."
32The verbnotno is "usedin the secondclause,to avoidrepeatingthe Verbof the first"
(LSJ9s.v.).

This content downloaded from 129.174.21.5 on Thu, 25 Feb 2016 16:09:52 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
200 PHOENIX
denied or disclaimed, to judge by Plato and Xenophon, was wisdom.33 The
inferior ironists, again on Aristotle's account, deny or disclaim that they have
qualitieswhich areunimportant.At this point, however,just whereAristotle says
that their irony can turn into its opposite, i.e., alazoneia,he uses an examplethat
takes the discussionout of the realmof verbalirony. Spartandressis a matterof
what someone does, not what someone says.
Although Aristotle uses Socrates, in the passage under discussion, as an
example of proper, verbal irony, which is attractiveand is closer to the virtue
under discussion than is irony'sopposite (alazoneia),it happensthat, in his own
time, Socratesappearedto demonstrateAristotle'sexcessiveirony,which becomes
its opposite, i.e., alazoneia,jumping over the virtuousmeanwith which Aristotle
wants to associate Socrates. It was preciselyin the matterof dress that Socrates
went to this opposite extreme. His single cloak has alreadybeen mentioned. Its
connotation would have been obvious to his fellow-Athenians,who were well
awareof philo-Laconian, anti-democraticcirclesin their midst who went in for
boxing and hard exercise(P1.Gorg.515e8-9; Protag.342b6-c2). The single cloak
was unambiguouslySpartan.From the age of twelve, the Spartanswore a single
cloak throughout the year (Xen. Lac. 2.4, on the Lycurganeducationalsystem).
The Spartanking Agesilaus was highly esteemed for his moderation,of which
a simple cloak (tribon)was an aspect (Plut. Ages. 14.4). Socrates'shoelessness,
alreadymentioned, also connoted Sparta.In the same passagein which he refers
to the young Spartans'single cloak,Xenophon saysthat they were requiredto go
without sandals(14.3).
Aristophanes explicitly links Socrateswith the Spartanstyle as practicedin
Athens. In Birds, the verb awKopactiv, "to be a Socrates,"is synonymouswith
.aKcovoiaveLv, "to be possessed by Laconomania," "to be philo-Spartan," which
is also specified as to go without a haircut, to be hungry, and to be dirty (Av.
1281-82; cf. Nub. 440-442 [Strepsiades'expectationsconcerninglife in Socrates'
school], 833-837 with schol.).34A freshlybathed and well-shod Socrateswas a
rare sight (P1. Symp.174a3-5; cf. Ar. Nub. 837); his food was generallyof the
poorest kind (Xen. Mem. 1.6.2; this passagewas cited above in connectionwith
Socrates'capacityfor endurance).
Cloudsprovides a good example of how Socrates'particularstyle could be
perceived as alazoneia or imposture. When, at the beginning of the play,
Strepsiadestries to persuadePheidippidesto enter Socrates'school, it turns out
that Strepsiadesdoes not even know Socrates'name (just as in Plato's Laches
old Lysimachus,Socrates'fellow demesman, knows nothing about Socratesand
his activities [180b7-el]). Pheidippides, however,who is more au courantthan
his father, says: "I know them. You mean the alazones, the palefaces, the
33Gooch1987:101-102:one couldadda goodmemory,rhetorical skill,andargumentative
skill,
allof whichthe PlatonicSocratessometimesdeniesthathe possesses.
34CitingAv. 1281-82,Lipka(2002:122)suggeststhatit wasbecauseof thesingle,never-changed
cloakthatthe Spartans(andtheirAthenianimitators)lookeddirty.

This content downloaded from 129.174.21.5 on Thu, 25 Feb 2016 16:09:52 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 PRACTICALIRONY 201
ones who go without shoes, like the godforsaken Socrates and Chaerephon"
(102-104). (Similarly, Laches' sons know who Socratesis [180e4-181a3].) In
Pheidippides' mind, alazoneia and going barefoot are closely connected and
belong to the essentialdescriptionof Socrates.Pheidippides'spontaneousremark
gives the common-sense version of Aristotle'spropositionthat irony of the kind
exemplifiedby Spartandress could seem to be an imposture.
Aristotle'sexample of Spartandress, then, happensto fit the case of Socrates
perfectly,though not the case of Aristotle'sown Socrates.Further,this example
shows that Socrates'style of self-deprivationcould be perceivedas practicalirony.
A case of this irony and its effect has alreadybeen cited abovein Part I: Socrates
at Potidaea barefoot and wearing only his usual cloak, which his fellow-soldiers
took as a sign of contempt (P1.Symp.220c1).

III. SOCRATIC IRONY IN PLATO

Joseph Cotter has arguedthat dp(povderivesfrom the Spartanipi7v (= Attic

e'prlv, "youngSpartansoldier"),whose trainingnotoriouslyincludedthe system-
atic use of paramilitarydeception. To the base of this word was added the suffix
-Wv, a common way of creatingepithets and nicknames.If Cotter is right, then
in its origin E•lpov has to do at least partly and perhapswholly with practical
irony.35 As Vlastos observes, in the earliest uses of eironeiain Aristophanes
and down through Theophrastus in the fourth century B.C.E.,the word often
denotes "sly, intentionally deceptive speech or conduct."36Deception is indeed
the common denominatorof the earliestuses ofclpov and words formed on this
base, which have such connotations as pretext and trickery(Ar. Vesp.174-176;
note rcXvo0?6vou) and feigned ignorance and mockery (Ar. Av. 1208-11; note
Iris' mocking repetition of Pisetaerus'words).37 But alreadythe word refers to
verbalbehavior(as most clearlyin Strepsiadeslist of variouspejorativesterms for
clever,deceptive speakersat Ar. Nub. 449), and one can see why Vlastos, having
mentioned ironic "conduct,"neverreturnedto this matter.38
As for irony in Plato, it seems to be a foregone conclusion that it is a verbal
phenomenon, even if, as the discussion of Clouds362-363 showed, both Plato
and Xenophon preservetraits of Socratesthat amount to a practicalirony. The
persistentverbalirony of the Platonic Socrates,of which all readersare aware,is
what matters. It can be shown, however, that, in at least one attestationof the
verb eipcvce6otc0 t in Plato-and an importantone-, practicalirony is part and
perhaps all of the meaning.

in the nameof the Thraciantribe'Ahka

35Cotter1992. Cf. the possibleoriginof 0k•XaOv ivEc
(Hdt.4.17.52):Bonfante1936.
36Vlastos1991: 25.
37Ar.Pax623 hasthe samecommondenominator.
probably The generalization
(tetpcov6,Evot)
aboutAristophanes
byNehamas(1998:58)overlooksthepatentsenseof mockery
atAr.Av. 1208-11.
3 Vlastos 1991: 25.

This content downloaded from 129.174.21.5 on Thu, 25 Feb 2016 16:09:52 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
202 PHOENIX
For Socrates'irony, Vlastos finds a "keysentence"in the speech of Alcibiades
in Symposium:"He spends his entire life eironeuomenos and jesting with people"
(216e4).39 Vlastos's procedureis to use another, later sentence to explain this
one (218d6-7: Socrates spoke eironikos).These places are crucial to Vlastos's
interpretationof Socrates'irony as free from any untruthfulnessor deceit, so that
Socrateswill play a "criticalrole in the mutationof eironeiainto irony."40Socrates
is not deceitful because he both means and does not mean what he says, so that
his irony is a teaching device. His interlocutorshave to figureout what he really
means. Vlastos'sname for this device is "complexirony."41
A year afterthe publicationof Vlastos'sbook on Socrates,AlexanderNehamas
in his Sather Lectures(1992-93) offered a critiqueof Vlastos'sinterpretationof
Socrates'irony.42He arguedthat "[t]he simple contrastbetweentruthfulnessand
lying cannot captureeither Socrates'characteror his way of doing philosophy."43
In his earlierreview of Vlastos, Nehamas had said more strongly: "Takinghis
[Socrates']disavowalsas complex ironies robs him of his strangenessand in fact
eliminateshis irony."44Nehamas stressedthe elementof concealmentin Socrates'
irony, which "introducescomplexity even in the simplest cases of irony."45He
also emphasized the sense of superioritythat is "irony'sconstant companion,"46
the sense that, I have suggested,lies behind the practicalironyof Socrates.
Nehamas discussed the second of the two passages in the Symposiumjust
mentioned at length (218d6-219a4). As for the first passage,Nehamas was well
aware that practicalirony is presupposed,and he cited this passage aproposof
Quintilian'sobservationon Socrates'"wholelife"as ironic (9.2.46), on which he
acutely observed that, on this account, it "does not even depend on words."47
But the first passageNehamas did not discuss at length, and its implicationsfor
practicalirony remainto be drawnout.
The context of 216e4 (eironeuomenos) is Alcibiades'accountof his attempted
seductionof Socrates,a distinctsectionof his speechwhich beginsat 216c4.48Like
39Vlastos 1991: 33. The translationis Vlastos's.
40Vlastos1991: 31.
41Vlastos 1991: 31: "In 'simple'
irony what is saidjust isn't what is meant: taken in its ordinary,
commonly understood,sense the statementis simplyfalse. In 'complex'ironywhat is said both is and
isn't what is meant: its surfacecontent is meant to be true in one sense, false in another.Thus when
Socratessays that he is a 'procurer'he does not and yet does, mean what he says."
42Nehamas 1998: 46-69. Vlastos'sbook also provokeda spateof articleson Socrates'irony. For a
bibliography,see Vasiliou 1999: 458, n. 6, to which add Vasiliou2002.
43Nehamas 1998: 59.
44Nehamas [1992]1999: 102.
45Nehamas 1998: 62.
46Nehamas 1998: 62.
47Nehamas 1998: 56.
48A paragraphindentation in the OCT correctly indicates the beginning of this section of
Alcibiades' speech. Cf. the outline of the speech in Dover 1980: 164-165. Dover also sees the
beginning of a new section at 216c4.

This content downloaded from 129.174.21.5 on Thu, 25 Feb 2016 16:09:52 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 PRACTICALIRONY 203

all the restof the speech,this sectionis guidedby the imageof Socratesas satyr,
morepreciselya carvedfigureof Marsyasthatopensup to revealimagesof the
gods inside(215a6-216a2).The outsideandthe insidehaveoppositequalities.
With the outer erotic Socrates, Alcibiades contrasts the inner sophrosyne of
Socrates. Vlastos's"keysentence"appearsin Alcibiades'characterizationof this
sophrosyne:
• tc ij oU K
Ka6U
oXtt i'X8t aOtL oi6~v, &xXhL Kaa~tpovet 6oov
O• TtEE "oooot9ov
oi6'1Uv Et; &(9 E,oit' o'Sr' ci ~irlv rtv& rtti v
6Xov r&ov
vrc6
Oi0•hi ritc;
- X0o6motoF,
TaGZtrX t&KTJgilzar o65cvb z &lUC4M
irXi00oucgClK(CptogCV)V flyCitOtta6cdLvZtX ta Kotl x
o6i8v ivatcu-Xiyo 6{iv--ipo--pvCu6sgvog 6 Koit dvrta zrv fiovtpbo robg
. i:r?ciov
a&vOptrnouc
ttcxarXs
I cantell you thathe doesn'tcareat all if someoneis good-looking,but he disdains[it]
morethan anyonemight think, nor does he careif someoneis rich or has any other
honorof thoseesteemedby the multitude.He considersallthesepossessionsasworthless
and thatwe arenothing--I'mtellingyou-and eironeuomenos andin playfulnesstoward
hespendsallhislife. (216d7-e5)
mankind
Firstof all,the innerSocratesis anythingbutobsessedwithbeautifulyoungmen.
He scornsthis beauty.Second,this scornextendsto everythingelse that most
peoplevaluehighly.The twoparticiples, eironeuomenos andpaizon(translated "in
playfulness"), can be taken as summingup the attitudeAlcibiades has described,
andeironeuomenos will havethe connotationof scornfulsuperiority (note"weare
nothing"). This attitude could of course be expressed as
verbally, I shallshowin a
moment, but it also took the visible form of Socrates' In
irony. particular,
practical
his chosenpovertyshowedhis contemptforpossessions,andhis Spartandressin
particularshowedhis contemptfor someof the endoxa,the thingsesteemedby
others.
The participlewhichI at firsttranslated "inplayfulness"
functionsexegetically
(the two participles can be construed as the
sharing prepositionipp6;,"toward")
andthusmeans"makingfun of,"or, morestrongly,"inmockeryof' mankind.49
Socrates'interlocutors in PlatoandXenophonsometimesfeel thatit is mockery
that they are suffering. "Mockery" is the word used by the young Glaucon,
who wiltsunderSocrates'questioning(Mem.3.6.12: by Alcibiades
in FirstAlcibiades Phaedrus in the oFa•rsopatt);
(109d6);by eponymousdialogue(264e3).50
Hippiasin the Memorabilia accusesSocratesof "laughingat"others(4.4.9).51
Socratescommentson the extremedistressof Protagorasand says that he
changedthe tone of his questioningof the greatsophist(P1.Prt. 333e2-5).
49Contrast milder"jesting
Vlastos's withpeople."Forthecollocation
of mockery
and"playfulness,"
cf. ps.-Pl. Theag.125e4, where Theages says to Socrates: ctp6d ;te ("youare
Ka narst;
aKc•trtc;
mocking me and making fun of me").
50Cf. ps.-Pl.
Eryx. 399c7.
s5 Cited by Vlastos (1991: 32-33) as evidencethat the Xenophontic Socratesis not ironic.

This content downloaded from 129.174.21.5 on Thu, 25 Feb 2016 16:09:52 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
204 PHOENIX
Socrates'mockerywas connected, in the biographicaltradition,with one of the
charges on which he was condemned. The scholiast on Plato Apologia 18b
reports that Anytus, one of Socrates'accusers,was "a lover of Alcibiades and a
rich man from his leatherbusiness;mocked for this by Socrates,
he therefore bribed Meletus to bring a charge (oK•conrt6jevov)
of impiety against Socrates."52
To return to Alcibiades' speech, in order to illustrate Socrates' sophrosyne,
Alcibiades proceeds to tell an anecdote from his youth, when he attemptedand
failed to seduce him. Here what I would add to Nehamas's discussion is the
force of this speech as a speech act as Alcibiadeslater understoodit. Alcibiades
prefaces Socrates'speech with three adverbs:Socratesspoke (1) "veryironically"
(mala eironikos),(2) "sharply"(sphodra),and (3) "characteristically of himself'
(eiothotos,218d6-7).53 All three modify the verb of speaking. The first two
can be taken to refer not to the propositionscontained in Socrates'speech but
to qualities of the speech as an act, i.e., to the performativeaspect of what he
says.
But the speech act did not succeed.Alcibiadesdid not heara refusalin Socrates'
words, and he proceeded to lie down next to him. It is only now, at the time
Alcibiades is telling the story,that he understandswhat Socratesreallymeant:no
exchange of knowledgefor sex. With this presentunderstanding,he can describe
Socrates'words as malaeironikos,a phrasewhich, it turnsout, has a meaningclose
to that of eironeuomenos in 216d7-e5, which, takenwith the participlewith which
it is paired, meant "in haughtiness"or "in mockery."As Alcibiadessays a little
later, "He was so superior,he scorned[verbkataphronein; cf. 216d7-e5 and 220cl
quoted above] and derided [verbkatagelan;cf. Xen. Mem. 4.4.9 cited above] my
bloom, and was arrogant[verbhubrizo]"(219c3-5).

IV. CONCLUSION

Though Vlastos recognizesthe element of mockeryin eironeiain the earliest,

Aristophanic usages and in Plato,54this element is marginalin his definition.
Losing the clue of mockery, he fails to see irony as a dimension of Socrates'
hybris,to borrowAlcibiades'description(Pl. Symp.215b7, 219c5, 221e3, 222a8),
52The scholiastcites the Apologiesof
Lysiasand of Xenophon and also Aristoxenus'life of Socrates
(fr. 60 Wehrli). In Xen. Apol.29-31 Socratespredictsthat the son of Anytuswill not continuelong in
"the servileoccupation"to which his fatherhas consignedhim. In this passage,Socratesis denigrating
the occupation of Anytus (though his main point is the educationthat would be appropriatefor the
son), whereas in the scholiast on P1.Apol. 18b it may be that Socrateswas also mocking Anytus as a
lover of Alcibiades, as the upstartleather-dealerin love with an inaccessibleyoung aristocrat.
53For the use of rT in this tripartitephrase,see Denniston 1966: 500 b.a. Vlastos (1991: 34 and
36) translatesthe phrase as if it were bipartite: "most eir6nik6sin his extremelycharacteristicand
habitualmanner,"takingthe second adverbas modifyingthe third,whereasall three modify the verb
of speaking.
54Vlastos 1991: 21, 25, 28, 29.

This content downloaded from 129.174.21.5 on Thu, 25 Feb 2016 16:09:52 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 PRACTICALIRONY 205
which was manifested to his contemporariesin his mannerismsas well as in his
words. This hybris is the common denominatorof the verbal and the practical
irony of Socrates. Vlastos's"complexirony"may be a philosophicallyinteresting
kind of irony, and indeed it provokeda large discussion,but (Nehamas is right)
it is not a kind that was known to Socratesor his interlocutors.It is the manner
of Socratesas interpreted byAristotle(on the basis of the Platonic dialoguesand/or
hearsay from Plato and others) that causes the change in the meaning of irony.
Socrates is thus appropriatedfor a new sense of irony that will ever after be
read back into the Platonic dialogues, where it is absent. Indeed the relevant
chapter of NicomacheanEthics seems to be the origin of the notion of "Socratic
irony."ss55
What remains of Vlastos's work on Socrates' irony is the insight, which
was hardly original with him but needed to be recuperated, that irony is
central to the personality of Socrates, that Socrates is, in short, an ironist.
This insight rewrites the history of irony: there was a philosophic irony, in
Socrates, beforethere was irony as a rhetoricalfigure and before the Romantic
(re)discoveryof philosophic irony. The central contribution of Nehamas has
been the aspect of concealment in Socrates' irony, a constant surd element.
Obiterdicta of Nehemas, cited above, show that he is aware that, as in the
cardinal statement by Alcibiades, this irony was a way of life and not only
verbal.56I have tried in this paper to specify the non-verbalirony practicedby
Socrates.
Irony is ultimately the vanishing point at which the social-historicalline of
researchconductedhere convergeswith the philosophicline. Maddening though
it may be, one cannot penetratethe mask createdby Socrates'irony.57But the
mask-or could one say the life of Socrates?-is worth studyingfor its own sake.
A corroboratingreasonfor studyingthe life is suggestedby Aristotle, again, as in
Part ii above, in spite of himself. In Metaphysics1078b34-1080a8, he discusses
Socrates as a predecessor of Plato. Socrates, it turns out, did not "separate"
the Forms but only sought general definitions through inductivereasoning. On
Aristotle's somewhat belittlingview of Socratesas philosopher,58it seems at first
glance to be impossibleto explain Socrates'impact on Plato, on the other writers
of Sokratikoilogoi, and on those who went off to other cities in Greece and
elsewhere to found philosophic schools. What Aristotle leaves out, of course, is
Socratesthe person, and it is this Socrateswho must have caused the enormous

55Gooch 1987: 95, n. 1.

56Cf. Nehamas 1998: 68: "not as a rhetoricalfigurebut trulyas a way of living."
570n irony as a mask, see Nehamas 1998: 67-68.
58As Field ([1930]1967: 203) comments, Aristotle's"historicalsketchesare neverundertakenfor
their own sake, but as a preliminaryto the developmentof some positive view of his own .... He
is always... anxious to show that his own philosophyis the final consummationof previouslines of
thought ....

This content downloaded from 129.174.21.5 on Thu, 25 Feb 2016 16:09:52 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
206 PHOENIX

effect on others which his philosophic activity, at least on Aristotle's account,

could hardly explain. To the person, then, or to its mask, one is compelled to
return.59

DEPARTMENT OF CLASSICS
RUTGERS UNIVERSITY
NEW BRUNSWICK, NEW JERSEY08901-1414
U.S.A. edmunds@rci.rutgers.edu

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Belardinelli, A. M. et al. (eds.). 1998. Tessere:Frammentidellacommediagreca:studi e

commenti.Studi e commenti 12. Bari.
Bergson, L. 1971. "Eironund Eironeia,"Hermes99: 409-422.
Boisacq, E. 1950. Dictionnaireetymologiquede la languegrecque.Heidelberg.
Bonfante, G. 1936. "Etymologiedu mot grec alazon,"Bulletinde la SocihttdeLinguistique
deParis 37: 77-78.
Borthwick, E. K. 2001. "Socrates,Socratics,and the Word Blepedaimon,"CQ N.s. 51:
297-301.
Btichner,W. 1941. "Uberden Begriff der Ironeia,"Hermes76: 339-358.
Chantraine, P. 1968-80. Dictionnaireetymologique de la languegrecque:Histoiredes mots.
Paris.
Cotter, J. 1992. "The Etymology and EarliestSignificanceofsYptov," Glotta70: 31-34.
Danzig, G. 2003. "Apologizingfor Socrates:Plato and Xenophon on Socrates'Behavior
in Court,"TAPA 133: 281-321.
de Vries, G. J. 1944-45. "Eegtv6cand Cognate Words in Plato,"Mnemosyne3rd ser. 12:
151-156.
Denniston, J. D. 1966. The GreekParticles2.Oxford.
Dover, K. J. 1968. Aristophanes:Clouds. Oxford.
- 1980. Plato:Symposium.Cambridge.
Edmunds, L. 1987. "I1Socratearistofaneoe l'ironiapratica,"QUCC N.s. 26: 7-21.

59The methodfollowedin thisarticlecouldideallybecalled"triangulation"

(Nehamas[1992]1999:
89). WheneverI couldfindagreement amongthree(thoughsometimesit wastwo)of ourfourmain
sourcesfor Socrates-Aristophanes, Plato,Xenophon,and Aristotle-I assumedthat it was the
historicalSocratesaboutwhomtheywerespeaking.The objectionsto this methodof combination
havelongsincebeenmadedear:thedubiousindependence of AristotlefromPlatoandtheshakiness
of"Fitzgerald'scanon"; thedubiousindependence ofXenophonfromPlato;thefictionalizing premises
of the formsin whichPlatoandXenophonwrote;theineluctable distortionof theportrait
of Socrates
in the comedyClouds.These objectionshavearisen,however,in discussionof the philosophyof
Socratesandhavebeenmadeagainstthosewhointendedto establishwhatSocratesthoughtandhow
he argued.I, formypart,havefocusedon the non-verbal behavior of Socratesandon others'reactions
to him.The kindsof detailsforwhichI havelookedin the sourcesarenotoneswhichthesesources
wouldhavehadanyreasonto invent.Further,in thepassages whichI havecited,I canseeno pointat
whichone is echoingorborrowing fromanother.(Alcibiades' quotationof Aristophanesis presented
of Socratesis corroborated.)
as a quotation,andits description
JeffreyHenderson,VictorBers,andSaraRappesentmevaluable commentson thisarticle.

This content downloaded from 129.174.21.5 on Thu, 25 Feb 2016 16:09:52 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 PRACTICAL IRONY 207

Field, G. C. [1930]1967. Plato andHis Contemporaries:A Studyin Fourth-Century Life and

Thought3.London.
Frisk, H. 1960. Griecbischesetymologisches Worterbuch. 2 vols. Heidelberg.
Gooch, P. W. 1987. "SocraticIrony and Aristotle'sEiron: Some Puzzles,"Phoenix41:
95-104.
Imperio, 0. 1998a. "Lafiguradell'intellettualenella commediagreca,"in Belardinelliet al.
1998: 43-130.
1- 998b. "Callia,"in Belardinelliet al. 1998: 195-254.
Kleve, K. 1983a. "Anti-Doveror Socratesin the Clouds,"SymbolaeOsloenses 58: 23-37.
- 1983b. "ScurraAtticus: The EpicureanView of Socrates,"in EYZHTHEIE: Studi
sull'Epicureismogrecoe romano offertia Marcello Gigante.Naples. 227-253.
Lipka, M. 2002. Xenophon'sSpartanConstitution: Introduction,Text, Commentary. Berlin.
Long, A. A. 1988. "Socratesin Hellenistic Philosophy,"CQ N.s. 38: 150-171.
Lowry, E. R. 1991. Thersites:AStudyin Comic-Shame. New York.
Nehamas, A. 1998. TheArt ofLiving: SocraticReflections from Plato to Foucault.Berkeley.
- [1992]1999. "Voicesof Silence: On GregoryVlastos'Socrates."Review of Vlastos
1991 in VirtuesofAuthenticity:Essayson Plato and Socrates.Princeton. 83-107 (orig.
pub. in Arion 2 [1992] 157-186).
Patzer, A. 1993. "Die Wolken des Aristophanes als philosophiegeschichtlichesDoku-
ment,"in P. Neukam (ed.), Motiv undMotivation.KlassischeSprachenund Literaturen
27. Munich. 72-93.
- 1994. "Sokratesin den fragmentender Attischen Komidie," in A. Bierle, P. von
M6llendorf, and S. Vogt (eds.), Orchestra, Drama,Mythos, Stuttgart.50-81.
Pokorny,J. 1994. Indogermanisches etymologisches Worterbuch3. 2Ba•ne.
vols. Tfibingen.
Ribbeck,0. 1876. "Uberden Begriffdes cIpov," RM 31: 381-400.
Riley, M. T. 1980. "The EpicureanCriticismof Socrates,"Phoenix34: 55-67.
Rossetti, L. 1974. "Le Nuvole di Aristofane: Perch6 furono una commedia e non una
farsa?,"RCCM 16: 131-136.
Stark,R. 1953. "Sokratischesin den V6geln des Aristophanes,"RM N.F. 96: 77-89.
Steinmetz, P. 1962. Theopbrast: Cbaraktere 2. Das Wort der Antike 7. Munich.
Turato, F. ed. 1995. Aristofane:Le nuvole.Venice.
Vasiliou,I. 1999. "ConditionalIrony in the SocraticDialogues,"CQ N.s. 49: 456-472.
- 2002. "Socrates'ReverseIrony,"CQ 52: 220-230.
Vlastos, G. 1991. Socrates:Ironistand MoralPhilosopher. Ithaca.
de Vries, G. J. 1944-45. "Ecgv6; and Cognate Words in Plato,"Mnemosyne3rd ser. 12:
151-156.

This content downloaded from 129.174.21.5 on Thu, 25 Feb 2016 16:09:52 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions