ABSTRACT
In the Poetics, Aristotle draws a close connection between epic and tragedy, seeing tragedy largely as a development of the Homeric origins of Greek poetry into drama through a merging of the choral traditions of Dionysiac ritual with the mythic and poetic traditions of epic. In ancient times in tragedy at first the chorus alone performed the drama. Later Thespis invented one actor, in order to give the chorus a break, and Aeschylus a second and Sophocles the third and filled out the tragedy. Thespis and Aeschylus would become, for Chamaeleon, not just subjects of biographies, but critical points in the history of tragedy in reference to whom the other figures and developments in early tragedy are considered. In the Poetics, Aristotle refers to the origins of tragedy in choral dithyrambs, phallic rituals, and satyr plays, which we reasonably assume were devoted to, and largely concerned with, Dionysus.
