E. Fabbro, Le sfide della divinazione nelle commedie di Aristofane,

The practice of divination represented on the comic stage polarises a conflicting dynamic present in the Athenian society itself: on the one hand, a general scepticism coagulated around the practitioners of prophetic art, seers and oracle-mongers, encouraged by the uncertainty of the political situation; on the other hand, the oracles were nevertheless credited with divine expression. The paper aims to reconsider the semantic tensions generated in the Aristophanic comedies by the entry of these figures on the stage. It focuses on the fabulatory potential of a technique that decontextualises oracular material, reinterpreting it extemporaneously on the most disparate occasions, and orients it to personal or political interests. Especially in Knights in the extended confrontation of the oracular ability of the two contenders, each oracle is readily exposed to the malevolent or captious interpretation of the opponent, thus illustrating its inherent manipulative use in the orientation of the public debate in the decision-making processes. Triggering the comic plot, another oracle of a tragic nature stands out: that of a prophesied fate that is fatally fulfilled for Paflagon, despite his attempts to escape it. It is only in Plutus that the oracular art does not suffer parodic aggression but, through the official consultation of the oracle of Delphi, invests the fundamental problem of the relationship between justice and wealth.