Pindar's Pythian 2: the riddle of the epilogue

Abstract

ABSTRACT: The final triad of Pindar's Pythian 2 has been the object of particularly close attention by scholars. In this triad, Pindar suddenly switches both the imagery and the intention of the poetic statement itself: he is no longer praising the addressee but instructing him, rebuking certain slanderers, flatterers and envious men—but it is not straightforward accusation. Pindar deploys fable imagery as a vehicle for the censure (a monkey, foxes, a fawning dog, and a wolf). The role of castigator is not unfamiliar to Pindar, but Pythian 2 is unique: only in this ode does Pindar devote an entire triad to denouncing his opponents. The striking contrast between the final triad and the rest of the ode appears to show that the ode has no unity of structure, so scholars and commentators consider the final triad as a pendant of sorts. My hypothesis is that the ode's final triad is not a pendant at all: Pindar is playing with a striking compositional structure, used as a technique by Archilochus in his iambics, so the final triad is a necessary part of the unified poetic structure.