the first time (Cassiodorus, Chroniconp. 128 Mommsen [mistakenly for the year
239 bc]).
With this cultural and political decision, the nobility was quite certainly reacting
to the Roman citizens’ interests. At the same time, it managed to impart Greek mytho-
logy and culture to wide circles in an impressive and effective manner. Not only the
myth about Troy, which the ruling elite had already taken up some time before,
employing it for their political goals and using it to shape the Roman “national aware-
ness” (Gruen 1992), but also other myths were now brought onto the stage in
imitation of the Attic tragedy, with the objective stated. Nevertheless, right from
the outset, specific Roman attitudes were linked with the reception of Greek theater
culture. The comedy never attained Aristophanes’ causticity. Above all, however, the
fabula praetexta, the drama with a serious and Roman content, brought mytholo-
gical, historical, and contemporary topics onto the stage (Manuwald 2001). To
name one example: when metus Gallicusand metus Punicuscombined to form an
enormous complex of fear in 207 bc,with the praetexta Clastidium, Naevius pro-
duced an exemplum virtutisthat was intended to contribute to coping with the
psychological crisis (Bernstein 2000).
The changes in the opening rite of the ludiin the Second Punic War must come
as no surprise. The pompawas based closely on the Greek processions, as a detailed
ancient description shows us (Q. Fabius Pictor, FRH^2 1 frg. 20 = Dion. H.
7.72.1–13). The pompawas opened by the magistrates who held the games and by
Roman youth who were presented as fit for military service, because the junior team
was subdivided in accordance with census classes. First rode up the sons of those
who held the census as equestrians, that is, the sons of the equites; they were fol-
lowed on foot by the sons of the pedites (foot-soldiers), thus the sons of the lower
propertied classes. The youth thus embodied the entire populus Romanus, which was
manifestly being integrated into the public games in this way. In addition, the junior
team was intended to make foreign visitors keenly aware of Rome’s military strength.
However, the Roman people was integrated into the procession far more, as shown
above all by the dancers in armor who were accompanied by flautists and cithara-
players. The dance performed while wearing armor undoubtedly had a long tradi-
tion in the Italic area, but these dancers were now rather under Greek influence,
because they performed the pyrrhiche, a specific form of the dance in armor which
was an important element in the Panathenaic festival. In Athens, the pyrrhichists were
divided into three age groups (IG2/3^2 .2.2311, l. 72– 4). Significantly enough, the
description corresponds with this grouping: it was a matter namely, as it states, of
“choirs of dancers in three sections (first men, then youths and finally children).”
However, generally speaking in Greece, the dance at the festivals was above all a
matter for the citizens. For Athens we know that only certain citizens wearing armor
took part in the procession of the Great Panathenaia. This example was probably
followed in Rome: there, selected citizens or future cives Romaniwere allowed to
perform as dancers in armor. In this way, however, the populuswas being actively
involved in the procession in representative form. The Roman pyrrhichists appar-
ently portrayed the pedites(arranged according to classes[?]) in full armor, who demon-
strated their discipline on the basis of a certainly subtle choreography.
228 Frank Bernstein