Euripides’ Cyclops is the only complete example of satyr drama extant from the ancient world. Like all satyr plays of the fifth century BCE, it was a mythological burlesque written by a tragedian and performed after a trilogy of tragedies. It was staged in Athens at the City Dionysia (an important religious festival in honor of the god Dionysus), and the chorus was made up of Dionysus’ attendants, a group of half-man/half-horse satyrs. The precise date of the Cyclops is unknown, but linguistic and literary evidence suggests that it was probably composed at some point between 411 and 406, in the last five years of Euripides’ life. It is one of nine Euripidean plays which were preserved only by chance in a fourteenth-…
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Citation: Shaw, Carl. "Cyclops". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 12 December 2012 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=34703, accessed 21 November 2024.]
