This work is part of the Fragmenta Comica series which aims to provide commentaries and
translations to all the surviving fragments and testimonia of the comic poets of ancient
Greece. This volume offers the first scholarly commentary and sustained study of several late
fourth-century BCE poets of the so-called New Comedy - among them Philippides of Athens a
writer and dramatist highly esteemed in antiquity known especially for his acrimonious clashes
with Athenian demagogues and his influential friendship with foreign kings. All fragments are
subject to close textual linguistic and stylistic analysis and are interpreted against the
wider literary social and historical background of the period. This volume will be a valuable
reference work for scholars and students of ancient comedy as well as anyone interested in
ancient literature more generally and the broader historical and cultural contexts in which
these texts were written.
