Aristophanes
c. 446–c. 386 BCE · Ancient Greece
“Brekekekex koax koax!”
Peak-work percentile in the canon.
The lineage through Aristophanes
Drew From(4)
who shaped Aristophanes
via The Oresteia
- Aristophanes resurrects Aeschylus to defend the Oresteia in person
- The Frogs' great poetry contest turns on it — Euripides cross-examines the trilogy's prologue word for word, and the play's torchlight finale mirrors the Oresteia's
- Reading Aeschylus first lets the joke land: you have to know the grandeur being put on trial to enjoy watching it defend itself
via The Histories
- Dikaiopolis's big speech is a direct send-up of the proem to Herodotus's Histories
- Where Herodotus blames the war between Greeks and Persians on abducted women — Io, Europa, Medea, Helen — Aristophanes blames the Peloponnesian War on a stolen prostitute and two of Aspasia's girls
- The joke only fully lands if you've read the solemn original it's mocking — go meet Herodotus first
- When Lysistrata recalls her husband telling her "war shall be the business of menfolk," she's echoing Hector's farewell to Andromache in Iliad 6
- Aristophanes takes Homer's most famous statement of separate spheres and detonates it — the women make war their business and end it
- Knowing the original line lands the joke: he's quoting the canon to overturn it
- The Theogony is the cosmogony The Birds is sending up — Aristophanes lifts Hesiod's primordial lineup (Chaos, Erebus, Night, Eros) and reshuffles it for laughs
- In the bird-chorus's parabasis, Hesiod's genealogy of the gods gets inverted so the birds come first and the Olympians arrive late
- Read Hesiod's solemn version first and the comic reversal snaps into focus
Inspired(1)
who Aristophanes shaped
- Aristophanes put Socrates on stage as a fraud — suspended in a basket, studying the heavens, teaching young men to argue wrong into right
- That caricature stuck for a generation, and it's why the historical Socrates ended up on trial
- The Clouds is the comedy that the Apology spends its opening pages trying to undo
Portraits
Tight head crop of the same Uffizi herm — cleaner framing of the standard Aristophanes portrait type, well suited to a thumbnail/likeness slot. Idealized Roman-tradition likeness.
A double-headed marble herm: Aristophanes facing one direction, Menander the other — the masters of Old and New Comedy joined back-to-back as a single sculptural object.
A bearded marble head of Aristophanes mounted on a herm, mouth slightly open as if mid-speech; inscribed in Greek 'Aristophanes, son of Philippides, the Athenian'.
Famous Quotes
“Brekekekex, ko-ax, ko-ax!”
“We women have the salvation of Greece in our hands.”
“Socrates: I walk on air and look down on the sun.”
“I am traversing the air and contemplating the sun.”
About Aristophanes
Ancient Greek comic playwright, the greatest representative of Old Comedy. His eleven surviving plays are bawdy, politically sharp satires of Athenian public life. Lysistrata, The Clouds, and The Frogs remain staples of the theatrical canon for their wit and fearless targeting of politicians, philosophers, and fellow playwrights.
Aristophanes, Ranked
According to 
- 22The Clouds423 BCAristophanesModerate·Short·50 pagesInfluence66Popularity4Ancient GreeceComedyAncient Greek
- 117Wasps422 BCAristophanesModerate·Short·51 pagesInfluence26Popularity3Ancient GreeceComedyAncient Greek
- 122Lysistrata411 BCAristophanesModerate·Quick·44 pagesInfluence65Popularity52Ancient GreeceComedyAncient Greek
- 132The Frogs405 BCAristophanesModerate·Short·64 pagesInfluence67Popularity4Ancient GreeceComedyAncient Greek
- 164The Acharnians425 BCAristophanesModerate·Quick·42 pagesInfluence25Popularity2Ancient GreeceComedyAncient Greek
- 192The Birds414 BCAristophanesModerate·Short·58 pagesInfluence26Popularity3Ancient GreeceComedyAncient Greek
- 194Peace421 BCAristophanesModerate·Short·45 pagesInfluence25Popularity2Ancient GreeceComedyAncient Greek