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{{Short description|Comic play by Menander}}
[[File:Sikyon ancient theatre.jpg|thumb|right|The ancient theatre of Sikyon
{{italic title}}
'''''Sikyonios''''' or '''''Sikyonioi''''' ({{lang-el|
==Plot==
[[File:Relief with Menander and New Comedy Masks - Princeton Art Museum.jpg|thumb|left|300px|Roman, [[Roman Republic|Republican]] or [[Roman Empire|Early Imperial]], ''Relief of a seated poet (Menander) with masks of New Comedy'', 1st century B.C. – early 1st century A.D., [[Princeton University Art Museum]]]]
''Sikyionioi'' takes place in a street in [[Athens]], outside the houses of Kichesias and Smikrines, two Athenians who have reversed their luck, as the once rich Kichesias has grown poor and the poor Smikrines has become rich. ▼
▲''Sikyionioi'' takes place in a street in [[
In the [[prologue]] speech the divinity has exposed how years before the four-year-old Philumene, together with her nurse and the slave Dromon, was kidnapped by pirates from her father's estate on the coast of [[Attica]] and sold at [[Mylasa]] in [[Caria]] to a wealthy Sicyonian named Hegemon. ▼
▲In the [[prologue]] speech the divinity has exposed how twelve years
The action probably started with a conversation between Theron and his love interest Malthake, during which the audience learns that Theron is the parasite of Stratophanes, a successful mercenary soldier who has lately arrived from Asia Minor taking his lodging in the house of Smikrines. In the first acts Stratophanes starts his search for a young slave girl who had previously been in his family's custody. Belonging to his late Sicyonian father, the girl was educated like a lady and Stratophanes fell in love with her, but now, due to an important law suit lost by his father, her fate is uncertain as the slaves might be transfered to the property of the plaintiff. When the girl is discovered at [[Eleusis]], the old slave in her company claims that she is an Athenian, and a pale beardless young man offers himself as her protector. But then Stratophanes steps up to declare that she belonged to his family. He then implores the Eleusinian assembly to be given more time allowing to prove that she is actually an Athenian, which would be her salvation, but also make it impossible for the Sicyonian to marry her. ▼
▲The action probably started with a conversation between Theron and his love interest Malthake, during which the audience learns that Theron is the parasite of Stratophanes, a
Towards the end of act three, however, Stratophanes is informed by his slave Pyrrhias that his mother has passed away in Sicyon revealing on her dying bed that he was not her natural son, but adopted from an Athenian. When the slave also brings documents to prove his master's descent, Stratophanes exclaims: "At first I thought I too was a Sicyonian; but here is this man who now brings me my mother's testament and the proofs of my true birth. And I myself believe - if I am to infer from what is written here and to credit it - that I too am your fellow-citizen. Do not yet deprive me of my hope; but if I too am proved to be a fellow citizen of the girl whom I preserved for her father, allow me to ask him for her and to get her. And let none of my antagonists get the girl into his power before he is revealed."<ref>Translation by Hugh Lloyd-Jones, Menander's Sikyonios, (1966), p.142.</ref> ▼
When the girl takes refuge in a temple at [[Eleusis]], the old slave in her company claims that she is an Athenian, and a pale beardless young man offers himself as her protector. But then Stratophanes steps up to declare that she belonged to his family. He implores the Eleusinian assembly to be given more time allowing to prove that she is actually an Athenian, which would save her from the Boeotian, but also make it impossible for the Sicyonian to marry her.
Stratophanes then instructs Theron with the search and the parasite tries to cheat him by paying poor Kichesias to act as her father. At first Kichesias rejects the offer, but then the slave Dromon arrives to confirm that he is actually the father of the girl. ▼
▲
In act five Stratophanes confronts Smikrines and his pale son Moschion, who has been his rival with the girl, but at the end of their quarrel, when the proof for his Athenian birth is produced, the family recognizes that he is actually the elder brother of Moschion given away to the Sicyonians by his father Smikrines when he was poor. As Kichesias agrees, Stratophanes is finally free to marry his beloved Philumene.▼
▲Stratophanes then instructs Theron with the search and the parasite tries to cheat him by paying poor Kichesias to act as her father. At first Kichesias rejects the offer, but then
== Notes == ▼
▲In act five Stratophanes confronts Smikrines and his pale son Moschion, who has been his rival with the girl, but at the end of their quarrel, when the proof for his Athenian birth is produced, the family recognizes that he is actually
{{reflist|2}}
==References==
* [http://grbs.library.duke.edu/article/viewFile/11481/4141 Hugh Lloyd-Jones, ''Menander's Sikyonios''
* [http://www.loebclassics.com/view/menander_comic_poet-sikyonioi_sicyonians/2000/pb_LCL460.205.xml Menander, ''Sikyonioi''] Loeb Classical Library (2000)
▲* [http://grbs.library.duke.edu/article/viewFile/11481/4141 Hugh Lloyd-Jones, ''Menander's Sikyonios'',] (1966)
* ''Ménandre, Les Sicyoniens'', Les Belles Lettres (2009)
{{Menander}}
{{Authority control}}
[[Category:Plays by Menander]]
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