CHAPTER II
Menander's use of certain types of words, supposedly Characteristic of the Koine, tested by their use in other writers
In addition to the words to which the grammarians definitely take exception, and to those of which they approve, we naturally find in Menander a good many other words which do not appear in the extant works of good writers of the classical period. Some of these words are doubtless missing in the approved writers merely by accident, because, for example, those authors did not happen to have occasion to use them in the books which have come down to us. A writer's vocabulary is of course governed very largely by the subject of which he treats. An example of this, if one be needed, may be found in the excessive proportion of adjectives having the termination -ικός in those plays of Aristophanes which satirize the philosophers,[1] as compared with the plays which deal with other topics. Hence many words which were in good use in the best period of Greek do not happen to appear in the pages of the approved authors.
It is often difficult to decide where to draw the line in such cases. Instances which seem certain to one judge may appear doubtful in the eyes of another. The decision must be in part subjective. Among the examples of these words are ἀνδρεϊστέος, ἀριστόδειπνον, ἀρτικροτέομαι, ἀσκοπυτίνη and ἀττικουργής.
Other words of Menander which are missing in classical writers are strange compounds like ἀντλιαντλητήρ, which were probably used nowhere else; mere coined words, for comic effect, of which there are many instances in Aristophanes and other comic writers.[2] E. g.
σκοροδοπανδοκευτριαρτοπώλιδες, Ar. Lys. 458.
κυμινοπριστοκαρδαμόγλυφος, Ar. Vesp. 1357.
γαστροχάρυβδις, Cratinus 397K.
δειπνοπίθηκος, fr. adesp. 321 K.
Even the casual reader of Menander will notice that such
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