Prologue
The prologue explains that there were once two little boys, identical twin sons of a merchant of Syracuse, named Menaechmus and Sosicles. One day the father took little Menaechmus on a business trip to Tarentum but while walking through a carnival together they got separated. A trader from Epidamnus found the little boy and took him home with him. The father fell sick with grief and died. His father i.e. the boys’ grandfather, back in Syracuse, renamed Sosicles Menaechmus (the name of the lost boy, who he had always preferred).
So we have now got identical twins both named Menaechmus, one living with his grandfather, one growing up far away in Epidamnus.
(Incidentally, you can see how the title The Brothers Menaechmus is a pastiche of Elizabethan or olde worlde word order. In modern English it would simply be The Menaechmus Brothers or, if this was a brat pack movie, The Menaechmus Boys.)
The years passed and the boys grew to manhood in their separate cities. Back in Epidamnus, Menaechmus reached manhood and the trader gave him a wife and dowry and, when the trader died, Menaechmus inherited his large estate, where he now lives. Anyway, that’s the back story, and now the play begins.
The plot
Enter Peniculus
Enter Peniculus, a prime example of the stock character, the parasitus. The editor and translator of this edition, E.F. Watling, has previously explained that the best way to understand this character type is as a kind of dinner companion for hire – educated men who go from patron to patron ingratiating themselves, trying to get invitations to dinner where they amuse with their witty conversation (the other characters call him a ‘table companion’).
As a result the parasitus is associated with comic speeches about food and Peniculus is no exception, entering to make a speech on the comic premise that, if you wanted to lock people up, to make them secure, you’d do better to give them stunning feasts each day rather than put them in chains. Who would willingly run off and lose the chance of a daily feast?
Thus Peniculus explains that he is Menaechmus’s ‘bond slave’ but willingly reports for duty at his villa for love of the amazing spreads.
Menaechmus the adulterer
Peniculus arrives just as young Menaechmus emerges from his villa, yelling back through the open door at his wife (a very characteristic position for a Plautus character). This opening speech establishes that he is not a noble character but a bad tempered adulterer. He accuses his wife of asking endless questions about his movements and spying on him. In the next breath he justifies her suspicions by revealing that he’s going to meet his mistress, Erotium, tonight and – in a comic manoeuvre – has smuggled out of the house his wife’s dresses by wearing it under his toga.
It’s at this point that Peniculus comes forward, they greet each other, shake hands and Menaechmus shows off to Peniculus his cunning little prank i.e. displays himself wearing the gown.
Menaechmus’ mistress, Erotium
Scared of Menaechmus’s wife, they move shiftily over to the house next door (as in so many of the plays, the set consists of two neighbouring houses) because, lo and behold, right next door is the house of Menaechmus’s mistress, Erotium. He knocks on the door, she comes out he declares his eternal love for her and gives her his wife’s gown, then declares they’re going to have a party at her place, Menaechmus, Peniculus and her, so can she get her cook to start cooking. And with that Menaechmus declares his off to town and exists, followed by his lackey Peniculus.
Erotium calls out her cook, Cylindrus, gives him three pounds and bids him go to the market to buy grub for lunch. When he hears one of them is Menaechmus’s table companion’ he complains that people like him can do the work of of eight men, but off he goes anyway, grumbling.
Quite obviously Menaechmus having a mistress is not designed to make any highfalutin’ moral or ethical points but to maximise the amount of confusion to be caused by the comic conceit of the identical twins: I predict not only his wife but his mistress will be thrown into turmoil by the arrival of the twin.
Enter Sosicles and Messenio
And sure enough enter Sosicles, or that was his original name until his brother was abducted and his grandfather renamed him Menaechmus. He’s just arrived by ship accompanied by his slave Messenio and a group (number unspecified) of slaves carrying his baggage.
Messenio is the grumpy sort of slave and complains to his master, and thus informs the audience, that Sosicles has been traipsing round the entire Mediterranean searching for his brother, calling in at the Danube, Spain, Massilia, Illyria, all over the Adriatic, the Greek colonies and the entire coast of Italy (p.111).
Messenio goes on to explain that the inhabitants of the place they’ve arrived at, Epidamnus, have a bad reputation.
Obviously they’ve arrived in front of Menaechmus’s villa while Messenio makes a long speech about how they haven’t a hope in hell of finding Menaechmus, he must be long dead. At which point Erotium’s cook, Cylindrus, arrives back from the market. When he sees Sosicles he of course thinks he is Menaechmus, the guest for the planned lunch party, waiting outside his mistress’s house. And so into the first of many comic misidentifications and misunderstandings.
Misunderstanding 1 Sosicles and Cylindrus
Cylindrus, of course, thinks Sosicles is Menaechmus arrived for lunch and engages him in casual conversation. Sosicles, of course, is completely bewildered at being addressed familiarly by a strange slave, and when he assumes he (Sosicles) lives next door, with his wife, Sosicles thinks he must be mad and gives him money to buy a sacrifice to make at the shrine of the god of lunatics. Of course, Cylindrus thinks Sosicles is mad – with Sosicles’ slave Messenio chipping in from the sidelines.
Misunderstanding 2 Sosicles and Erotium
Cylindrus goes in the house and is replaced by Erotium who appears and, of course, calls Sosicles ‘darling’ and carries on a normal conversation with him (p.115), reminding him that he a) brought her a gown of his wife’s b) asked her to prepare lunch for him and his table companion (p.116). Obviously, Sosicles thinks she is mad, though is puzzled how she knows his name.
N.B: It’s important to remember that the twins both have the same name. Menaechmus was always the name of the boy who was abducted, the other one, Sosicles, was renamed Menaechmus by his grandfather. So they both have the same name. When I refer to Sosicles in this summary it is to clarify who is who, but he isn’t referred to as Sosicles in the play.
All these confusions give Messenio the opportunity to say he warned his boss about Epidamnus – looks like the reputation is true, it really is full of lunatics.
After conferring with his slave Sosicles takes the decision that he’s going to play along with this pretty woman. If she wants to give him a free lunch and witter on about his non-existent wife, then, sure, he’ll play nice. So he apologises to Erotium for being confused and she, now mollified, invites him into her house. Messenion warns him to watch himself but Sosicles reckons he’s on to a good thing, a free lunch and then maybe some afternoon delight.
Misunderstanding 3 Sosicles and Peniculus
The table companion Peniculus has been at some public meeting all morning and arrives in a bad mood to spy Sosicles emerging from Erotium’s house, obviously drunk, with a laurel wreath at a rakish angle on his head and calling back to Erotium that he promises to take the gown (the one Menaechmus gave her that morning) to a dressmaker’s in town to have it adjusted.
When Peniculus steps forward to castigate Sosicles for starting (and finishing) lunch without telling him, Sosicles, naturally enough, says he’s no idea who he is or what he’s talking about. As in every one of these encounters, they each think the other must be mad. Peniculus vows revenge, swearing he’ll tell Menaechmus’s wife all about his affair.
Misunderstanding 4 Sosicles and the maid
Erotium’s maid pops out of her house and asks Sosicles one more favour. Can he please take these gold bracelets, the ones he stole from his wife and gave to Erotium, to a goldsmith and have some gold added and reshaped. Sosicles is no longer bewildered, he is master of the situation and milking it for all he’s got, so he willingly accepts gold bracelets.
Then the maid takes things a bit further by asking if he can get her some pretty little gold earrings, please. Then next time he pops over she’s be everso nice to him (flutter eyelashes). Sosicles says, Sure, where’s the gold? But when the maid says she doesn’t have any, she was hoping he’d buy her some as a gift he loses interest and, realising it, the maid goes back into Erotium’s house.
At which point Peniculus emerges from Menaechmus’s house with the latter’s wife. He has told her everything. She is furious and asks herself how much longer she has to put up with this insulting behaviour? They spot Menaechmus coming and hide.
Misunderstanding 5 Menaechmus and wife
Sosicles had exited the stage in one direction. Now from the opposite direction enters the real, or original, Menaechmus. He delivers a page long soliloquy about what a pain it is being patron to a number of clients; he’s wasted his whole morning sorting out litigation around a client of his, an obvious crook, but in a patron-client society that’s what you have to do. He laments not having got away earlier for lunch although hopes the gift of the gown he stole from his wife will placate her. His wife is hiding behind a bush and hears him say this!
She steps out and accuses him of being a slimeball, egged on by the irate table companion Peniculus (‘That’s the way to talk to him’). Menaechmus desperately back pedals, disclaiming any knowledge of a mistress or stolen gown. This goes on for some time with Menaechmus until the furious wife finally says he’s not getting back into their house till he returns the gown, and goes into the house slamming the door!
Misunderstanding 6 Menaechmus and Erotium
Oh well, if his wife’s locked him out at least Erotium will give him a warm welcome. She’s pleased to see him back so soon but, of course, when he asks for the gown she is confused: she gave it to him not half an hour ago. His insistence that she give it back infuriates her and she slams the door in his face. Oops. Now he’s locked out of both women’s houses. He says he’ll go back into town looking for a friend to cheer him up.
Misunderstanding 7 Sosicles returns
Menaechmus’s wife looks out the door and sees Sosicles return with the famous gown. She thinks he’s come to make up with her. But when she confronts him, Sosicles is, of course, completely non-plussed and denies any knowledge of her. At which point, understandably, she reverts to her former fury. When she tells him that an hour ago he promised to find the gown and give it back to her he has no idea what she’s on about. All Sosicles knows is he spent a nice time with Erotium who gave him a gown to be altered. Who’s this madwoman ranting at him?
She’s so furious she sends a servant to fetch her aged father. He’ll sort out her faithless husband! When he arrives he tells his daughter off for being a scold and keeping such a tight watch on her husband i.e. he takes Menaechmus’s side. But then…
Misunderstanding 8 Sosicles and the father
Then the father actually confronts Sosicles, thinking he’s Menaechmus and, like everyone else, thinks the latter must have gone mad when he denies all knowledge of him. In fact it occurs to Sosicles that if people keep accusing him of being mad, maybe there’s some advantage to actually behaving mad, so he starts ‘gaping and flinging himself about’ (p.133) and starts to rant and rave and claiming to hear the gods’ instructions telling him to beat this ‘bitch’ and the ‘old goat’ i.e. wife and father.
Terrified, she runs back inside the house leaving her father to grapple with Sosicles who pretends to be hearing instructions from Apollo himself telling him to run the old man over with a (non-existent) chariot and horses. They grapple till Sosicles falls to the floor. The father thinks he’s had a stroke so says he’d better hurry and fetch a doctor. Once he’s gone Sosicles gets up, dusts himself off, declares everyone here is mad, and decides he’d better get back to his boat while the coast is clear.
Misunderstanding 9 Father, doctor and Menaechmus
The father returns, out of breath, with a doctor who is just asking the symptoms of the patient when the real Menaechmus enters. Obviously he knows nothing of the encounter which just ended in which his identical twin feigned madness and fell to the floor. So he hasn’t a clue what the father is describing and the doctor is quizzing him about and answers all the latter’s impertinent questions rudely (‘Jupiter and all the gods blast you and your silly questions’, p.137). But he quickly becomes so angry, and answers so sarcastically, that he does himself appear mad, just like his twin had. So the doctor suggests Menaechmus is brought over to his house so he can supervise his treatment (hellebore seems to be the recommended drug). They exit to go and get some strong slaves to grab, bind and take Menaechmus away.
They both exit leaving Menaechmus alone. He sits down and a) wonders what on earth has possessed these two to accuse him of being mad and b) what the devil is going to happen now he’s locked out by both his wife and mistress.
Misunderstanding 10 Menaechmus and Messenio
Messenio is Sosicles’s slave. Last time he saw his master he told him to see the slaves and baggage settled at an inn, which he’s achieved. Now he re-enters and goes up to Erotium’s door because that’s the last time he saw his master, going in to have lunch with Erotium. But before he can knock on her door, he witnesses the father returning with four strong slaves. And then sees them set on Menaechmus, with a view to binding him and carrying him away.
Menaechmus calls for help and Messenio comes to his rescue and there’s quite a fight with our pair finally getting the better of the foursome who run away. Now, of course, Messenio not only expects Menaechmus to recognise him but asks for a big reward: will he set him free?
(I commented in my review of Captivi how almost all the plays include a slave who performs adroit services for his master and promptly asks to be freed, wondering if this was a reality of Roman life or just a hilarious staple of stage comedy.)
Menaechmus, of course, has now idea who Messenio is and thought he was a good samaritan coming to his aid. He tells him to his face he’s no idea who he is but, by all means, go free. Messenio takes this as meaning he has been liberated and cries tears of joy. He says he’ll go and get the purse of money, baggage and slaves from the inn and rushes off. Menaechmus refuses to be fazed by this but has no idea what he’s talking about.
He knocks on Erotium’s door with a view to trying to get the famous gown back and give it to his wife, completely unaware that Sosicles went off with it some time ago.
Misunderstanding 11
On the way to the inn Messenio has bumped into his real master, Sosicles. Now they enter arguing. Sosicles of course knows nothing about Messenio rescuing him from the four slaves and giving him his liberty. Oh no he bloody well didn’t, says Sosicles.
The catastrophe
In classical literary theory, the catastrophe is:
the final resolution in a poem or narrative plot, which unravels the intrigue and brings the piece to a close. (Wikipedia)
It’s at this moment, just as Sosicles is telling his slave Messenio he has no idea what he’s talking about, that Menaechmus walks out Erotium’s front door and comes face to face with his identical twin, Sosicles. The comedy is dramatised by being seen through the eyes of a third party, Messenio.
The two brothers are slow to recognise each other but it is Messenio’s comic intervention, claiming to be the slave of each in turn and getting them muddled up, which is played for a few more laughs.
In fact it is Messenio who takes Sosicles aside and points out that this other fellow may well be his long lost twin brother. He suggests they ask him a few more questions and Sosicles readily agrees. The play then mutates into a kind of courtroom drama with Messenio playing the role of interrogating counsel as he asks Menaechmus a series of questions which confirm that he is indeed the little boy from Syracuse who lost his father in a crowd, was kidnapped and adopted by a stranger who raised him here in Epidamnus.
At each answer Sosicles cries out in wonder with Messenio impatiently telling him to wait his turn to question the witness. Presumably a) the conceit of being a courtoom was meant to be funny as was b) the idea of a slave like Messenio impersonating a magistrate.
There’s still a smidgeon of doubt at which point Menaechmus asks Sosicles what their mother’s name was. Sosicles replies Teuximarcha. All doubts are removed, they both realise they are each other’s twin brother and embrace in tears.
The resolution
If you remember, Sosicles has been on a vast 6-year-long odyssey round the Mediterranean looking for his long-lost brother. Now that quest is at an end. Menaechmus resolves to accompany him back to the family home in Syracuse. He says he’ll quickly sell up all his property here then they can depart. Oh and Menaechmus asks Sosicles to give Messenio his freedom, as a favour to him, seeing as how he stoutly defended him in the battle of the four slaves.
1. It is very striking that the catastrophe did not involve either of the women, Menaechmus’s wife or mistress. Surely there was a world of comic potential, not to mention some kind of reconciliation with his wife, waiting to take place here. But it simply doesn’t happen. As if the women really are just pawns in the plot, who can be dispensed with as soon as they’re not needed; as if the only reconciliation which counts is male, among men, between the brothers, and to some extent Messenio.
2. The very last passage of the play is when Messenio cheekily asks the brothers if he can be their auctioneer, they say yes, and this gives Plautus the opportunity to show the cheeky slave impersonating an auctioneer, using his patter to quickly describe the contents and effects of Menaechmus’s house – everything must be sold off, including his wife (‘should there be any purchaser’) – before quickly bringing the play to an end with the traditional request for the audience’s applause.
Roman slavery
As in most of the other plays the thing which catches my attention most is the ubiquitous condition of slavery, of ordinary, everyday, commonplace slavery which everyone took for granted. Messenio is given a speech in which he describes how he’s made a conscious decision to be a good slave, which he defines as one who attends to his master’s welfare, plans his business and organises his affairs as effectively in his absence as in his presence. OK. Then goes on describe what life has in store for slaves who are worthless, idle or dishonest, namely:
floggings, chains, the treadmill, sweating, starving, freezing stiff. (p.138)
Is this an accurate description? It brings home the way a master would be friendly with, spend most of his life with, joke, laugh, cry, share his ups and downs with a person who he also order to do everything for him, run errands, fetch and carry, serve and please and who, if he (all the slaves in these plays are men) upsets, irritates his master or falls short, can be submitted to a staggering range of physical punishment and abuse.
And, as in so many of the plays, the top thing on Messenio’s mind was winning his freedom. As soon as he’s helped Menaechmus fight off the four slaves, he asks for his freedom. Is this what it was like? Did slaves think all the time of how to get free, and pester their masters for requests to be freed? Did they ever make such requests? Was there a recognised time or occasion which might merit it? Were there social conventions and forms of words?
Interestingly, Messenio says that, if he is freed, his one-time master becomes his patron. Is that how it worked. Was ‘freedom’ the exchange from one recognised form of hierarchical relationship for another? Did a freed slave remain within the orbit and indeed the service of his master/patron, only with freedom of action?
Messenio, after he thinks Menaechmus has freed him, hurries to say he still wants to take his orders and go home with him and carry on living with him. Was this meant to be funny because it indicated what a poor notion of freedom Messenio had? Or was it a commonplace situation, that freed slaves continued to live in their former master’s houses but on new terms? How was that managed by everyone concerned, not least the other slaves who remained in their unfree condition?
Credit
Page references are to the Penguin paperback edition of The Rope and Other Plays by Plautus, translated by E.F. Watling and published by Penguin in 1964.
Books & Boots 