Chirping Like the Swallows: Aristophanes' Portrayals of the Barbarian

Abstract

In this thesis, I examine three specific characters from the extant plays of Aristophanes: the Scythian archer from Thesmophoriazusae, the Thracian god from Birds, and the Persian King's Eye from Acharnians. Through a close analysis of these three characters, I show that Aristophanes portrayed each one in a different manner and with varying degrees of hostility. Aristophanes' portrayals of these foreigners were likely informed by his fellow Athenians' attitudes toward non-Athenians. As I demonstrate, the interactions of foreigners with Greek characters in Aristophanes' plays reveal subtle gradations of Greek xenophobia. The playwright composed his comedies in a period of great cultural change and increasingly diverse perceptions of non-Greeks, and as a result, these xenophobic nuances emerged. Views of barbarians were evolving in the last quarter of the fifth century BCE, and Greek xenophobia was not a monolithic social phenomenon.