“Ideas-Men” (Gnômotupoi Andres)

This paper addresses the fifth-century comic coinage gnômotupos, which has not otherwise received scholarly attention. Translators of Aristophanes and Aristotle have typically glossed it into English as “maxim-coining” (with equivalents in other languages). This is a sensible inference from a fourth-century use of γνώμη, “maxim”, and the verb τύπτειν, “stamping”. It also tracks the importance of maxims to Sophistic-era adoption of wisdom-culture and the lore of the Seven Sages. Nevertheless, this typical gloss is incorrect. The term instead emphasizes “idea”, as an insight, technique, or view relevant to some matter. “Stamping” (τύπτειν) an idea means coming up with an apt idea and giving it shape and articulacy. In a characteristic use of the adjective, Aristophanes speaks of gnômotupoi andres (Frogs). These are men who are skilled at “fashioning ideas”, coming up with their content and their form. My claim is that Aristophanes has captured something crucial about the period we call the Sophistic movement or Greek enlightenment. The formulation, circulation, and competition of ideas is a matter of increasing self-consciousness in Athens. So too are those who formulate, circulate, and compete in them: intellectuals or, as gnômotupoi andres might be translated, “ideas-men.” I even contend that those referred to as “sophists”, sophistai, may in many ways be understood as gnômotupoi andres.