“Aeolic verse in stanzas of three lines are naturally attributed to Sappho, since we know of no poems of Alcaeus so composed,
but too little is legible of what was contained in the papyrus here published for the hypothesis to be either confirmed or disproved.”28 Others have said that the poem(s) is (are) by Alcaeus.29 The reasons themselves, seldom explicit, are a nice matter of sexual/textual politics. Snell said the matter was uncertain, but a prayer to Apollo and above all the mention of the Polyanactidae pointed to Alcaeus (1953a, 118). Gomme argued that “it is more likely that Alkaios would use •lisbo- (•lisbodókoisi ?), if either of them did,” and the mention of the Polyanactidae “looks much more like his work than Sappho’s, even though she is said to have reproached a girl from this family for deserting her (fr. 155).”30 Meyerhoff is the
most explicit (1984, 184): “For Sappho the goddess is Aphrodite, while Apollo as addressee makes one think more of Alkaios as composer.
Above all, the attack against the Polyanactidae with the vehemence of the foregoing verses is only thinkable for Alkaios,” though he, too, has to admit that Sappho did address a female member of the family. None of these arguments is of any value. Sappho, of course, addresses Apollo elsewhere (fr. 44A). Himerius’ testimony is explicit (Sappho 208): “Sappho and Pindar, adorning him in song with golden hair and lyres, send him borne by swans to Helicon to dance with the Muses and Graces.”32 As for the second point, what is odd is that the Polyanactidae, supposedly the mark of
Alcaeus, in fact are mentioned only by Sappho and never by Alcaeus (at least in the surviving fragments and testimonia).
The poems are better attributed to Sappho. Both mention the Polyanactidae. In the first Sappho talks about •lisbodókoisi (dildo receivers)33 presumably an insult to the women of the family.34 The second poem (99b) begins waging. Especially interesting here is the prevalence of attacks on the women of the families. Alcaeus, too, attacks Pittacus’ mother
(72; see below). However, Sappho 99b.14–15 (99.23–24) shows a willingness to hold up even the men of the family to public scorn. Attacks on, and control of the women of noble families were a prominent feature of the politics of archaic Greece. Two examples from Athens may serve to illustrate this trend. Megacles changed
his political alliances when Pisistratus insulted his daughter by using her “not according to custom” in order to avoid having children
(Herodotus 1.61). In the next generation, the proximate cause of the assassination of Pisistratus’ son Hipparchus was not the love
affair of Harmodius and Aristogeiton but Hipparchus’ insult to Harmodius’ sister (Thucydides 6.56). Further, the women of the
aristocratic clans were the venue for competitiveconsumption. Sumptuary legislation, directed specifically at women, was a prominent feature of the program of social control by many of the tyrants.36 Kirkwood (1974, 100–101) shows an interesting mixture of commonplaces and insight. He begins with the received contrast of
Alcaeus and Sappho
Williamson (1995, 72) makes much the sameargument: “Although references to comptemporary politics are not completely absent from Sappho’s poetry, they are far fewer and less direct.” We need to be on guard against exactly this type of argumentum ex silentio and we can turn to Alcaeus to see why. Time has dealt harshly with the lyric poets, and the papyri are not a representative cross-section (random survival is not random selection). There are lies (the handbooks)damned lies (the ancient biographies), and statistics. Were it not for a single passage in Horace and a passing mention in Quintilian, we would never know that Alcaeus had written love poetry.37 A poet may have been much talked about in antiquity, but it was usually for the same old things and seldom for anything true.38 Against this undoubtedly public and even political background, we can argue for the possibility at least of a political interpretation of many overlooked fragments. One extremely important, though
neglected, fact is that Sappho wrote both iambics and elegiacs, none of which survive.39 These are not what we think of when we think of Sappho. Elegy is associated with the symposium (Archilochus and Mimnermus), with military and political themes (Callinus, Tyrtaeus, Mimnermus, Solon), and iambics are the medium for satire and invective. These are meters for public matters.40 Sappho was not all sweetness and light. Philodemus commented on her tone: “Even Sappho writes some things iambically.”41 Burnett rightly says this
“refers to the temper, not the metre of certain songs,” as the context shows, but that in itself is significant.42 It is this iambic tone that
causes Horace to compare Sappho and Alcaeus to Archilochus in a much-misunderstood line (Epist. 1.19.28–29): temperat Archilochi
Musam pede mascula Sappho, / temperat Alcaeus, sed rebus et ordine dispar (Manly Sappho tempers the Muse of Archilochus in her verse / so does Alcaeus, but different in subject matter and order).43 Critics leap on mascula with but one thought and ignore Archilochus.44 Sappho is mascula not because she he has sex like a man but because she writes poetry (pede) like a man, in fact like the manly man Archilochus. Sappho and Alcaeus are both invective poets, says Horace, they’re just not as vicious as Archilochus.