Deiknūnai tēn phūsin : valider l’identité filiale dans le Philoctète de Sophocle
When, in Sophocles’ Philoctetes, Neoptolemus returns Philoctetes’ bow, which he had previously stolen, to him, Philoctetes testifies to the sameness of Neoptolemus’ and Achilles’ moral standards: “I agree, son: you showed (edeixas) the phusis from which you sprang” (1310-11). The character of Neopto...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Anthropologie et Histoire des Mondes Antiques
2016-04-01
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| Series: | Cahiers Mondes Anciens |
| Online Access: | https://journals.openedition.org/mondesanciens/1671 |
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| Summary: | When, in Sophocles’ Philoctetes, Neoptolemus returns Philoctetes’ bow, which he had previously stolen, to him, Philoctetes testifies to the sameness of Neoptolemus’ and Achilles’ moral standards: “I agree, son: you showed (edeixas) the phusis from which you sprang” (1310-11). The character of Neoptolemus is in fact built upon a cultural model widespread in ancient Greek texts (a son is expected to resemble his father to the utmost degree); the way in which Philoctetes confirms the resemblance between Neoptolemus and Achilles fits into a schema shared by other narratives: they center on the necessity for a hero to prove his filial identity, which usually requires the validation of an external judge in a precise setting. The semantic analysis of the expression ten phusin d’ edeixas suggests that we should not differentiate, in this case, between the idea of “showing” and that of “demonstrating”: phusis refers, at once, to a moral character, a genealogical tie and a visible aspect. |
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| ISSN: | 2107-0199 |