‘Imprison Cleon, Kill the Dead!’

Abstract

Cleon was killed in the battle of Amphipolis in 422 BCE, but he is referred to as alive in the first parabasis of the Clouds (591–594). This reference is customarily understood as simply a remnant of the first version of the play, which the author failed to integrate seamlessly into the surviving, revised version. Comparison with Pylaemenes, an Iliadic character of Paphlagonian origin, who is killed in Book 5 but reappears alive in Book 13, renders the reference to Cleon intelligible as an allusive joke.