- Discuss the role of Lar Familiaris in Plautus’s Pot of Gold. Continue Reading. Previous ASSIGNMENTS QUESTIONS 2020-21. Next BEGC-101 (Indian Classical Literature).
- THE POT OF GOLD (AULULARIA ) INTRODUCTORY NOTE TO T H E P O T O F G O L D THE character of the miserly old man must have had an ancestry in the Greek Comedy which supplied Plautus with his models; among others, Smicrines in The Arbitration of Menander is a recognizable prototype of.
The Pot Of Gold Lar Familiaris Characters Pictures
In The Pot of Gold, Plautus begins the play with a narration by Lars Familiaris, the household god of Euclio, the central character of the play. Moreover, the entire play takes place before two houses where the main characters live and the shrine of Fides.
Hello, readers! Hope you are liking our blogs so far. It has been almost two months since Just Reader Things have started and we met our readers. Today, this blog will talk about another play, The Pot of Gold, written by Plautus.
Let’s start with a brief introduction of Plautus. He was a Roman playwright of the Old Latin period. His comedies are the earliest Latin literary works to have survived the entirety.
Now let’s start with the play, The Pot of Gold. This play revolves around a pot of gold. It belongs to Eucilo. He is one of the main character of the play. He is a miser. He loses all his sleep and peace, when Lar Familiaris, the household deity, told the secret of pot to Eucilo. He even fears that someone will steal his pot of gold. He doesn’t even tell her daughter, Phaedria, about the pot of gold. He is the pater-familias but he does not care about her daugter. He thinks that she is a virgin but in reality, she is pregnant with the child of Lycondies, who seduced her at the Harvest Eve. He is the nephew of Megadorus, Eucilo’s neighbour. Megadorus wants to marry Phaedria as he thinks she is a virgin. You can now analyse being a virgin, at that time is so important, that even your inner beauty does not matter. Eucilo thinks this marriage as a way for Megadorus to steal his pot.
Eucilo also have a slave, Staphyla. Yeah, at that time having a slave is a normal thing. She is the only one who know about Phaedria, being pregnant. Eucilo always mistreat her and often beat her too. Somewhere in the middle of the play, during the preparation of wedding dinner, Lycondies’ slave steal the pot of gold and even Lycondies talked to her mother, Eunomia, about the seduction, pregnancy and convince her to call off Megadorus’ marriage. Eunomia decides to help him and talk to Megadorus about the matter. While Eunomia and Megadorus were talking, Lycondies went to Eucilo and apologized for his mistake (seducing Phaedria) as she was in labour pain, but Eucilo thought he was apologising about stealing the pot of gold. Lycondies helped Eucilo to get the pot back from his slave and Eucilo thought that that the slave has saved the pot from the robber. When Eucilo got the pot of gold back, he was very happy and understands that this pot of gold is not useful for him, so, he gave that pot of gold to Lycondies and Phaedria and he also agreed for their marriage as well.
This was a happy ending for everyone. But you might be thinking how the turning of Eucilo is so sudden? The answer to this question is that the ending of the play originally written by Plautus is lost, so some other writer, imagining a happy ending for everyone, wrote this last scene and also the transformation in Eucilo’s character.
Now, let’s talk about condition of the women in the pot of gold. Phaedria is the daughter of Eucilo. She is never seen in the play. This is because, she has not followed the norms of the society. She is pregnant even before marriage. The reader hears her voice once in the play, when she was in labour and that too were her cries only. His father also does not care for her. He is so pre-occupied with his fear of pot of gold. She has no one except Staphyla, who helped her in her pregnancy. Her father decided to marry her to Megadorus without, even, consulting Phaedria.
Eunomia is the sister of Megadorus and mother of Lycondies. She is a very calculative women. She wants her brother to marry a girl with good financial status and she should be young as according to the society, at that time, the only purpose of a woman is to serve her body to the man and produce children but Megadorus has other plans. He wants to marry Phaedria. Eunomia, after knowing that Phaedria is pregnant with his son’s child, she asked his brother to cancel off the marriage.
The Pot Of Gold Lar Familiaris Characters Names
Staphyla is the slave of Eucilo. She is very badly treated throughout the play. Eucilo, her master, beats her and even say bad words to her. She is the only one who know about Phaedria’s pregnancy. She also plays a motherly figure for Phaedria. She, in the beginning of the play, wants to hangs herself as Eucilo treats her badly.
We can easily see that women are treated so badly in this play as if they are the minor characters. Phaedria, the one of the main character is also treated as a minor character. This play brings a light upon the condition of women at that time.
Hope, the readers, have liked the play and this blog too. Lets get in a discussion about this play in the comments section.