shows that more often than not the roles of chorodidaskalos and chorus leader (choragos) were distinct. In Athens, for instance, in the dithyrambic and dramatic contests the chorus leader was called the coryphaeus, whereas the term chorēgos was used of the producer of the show.38 Beyond Athens our evidence is scant. In Alcman’s Louvre partheneion the chorus leader is Hagesichora. In all likelihood she, her second in command Agido, and the other members of the parthenaic chorus were trained by Alcman. In the archaic period choral instruction had a pedagogical dimension that went far beyond preparation for a certain performance.39 The pedagogical dimension of choreia was later succinctly formulated by Plato’s: ὁ … ἀπαίδευτος ἀχόρευτος, “the uneducated man is one without choral training,” (Laws 654a).
Was Pindar the chorodidaskalos of the fragment 94b, the partheneion he composed for the Theban festival of Daphnephoria? The leader of the procession, which can be reconstructed to some extent thanks to Proclus’ testimony, was probably the boy Agasicles, the daphnēphoros, escorted by his father Pagondas. The chorus leader was female, perhaps Damaena, Pagondas’ daughter, according to Luigi Lehnus’ widely accepted reconstruction.40 Another female, Andaisistrota, is said to have trained either the chorus leader or some other female choreut (66–75):
Δαμαίνας π̣α[. .]ρ̣ . . […]ωι νῦν μοι ποδὶ
στείχων ἁγ̣έο·̣ […] [τ]ὶ̣ν γὰρ̣ ε̣[ὔ]φρων ἕ̣ψεται
πρώτα θυγάτηρ [ὁ]δοῦ
δάφνας εὐπετάλου σχεδ[ό]ν
βαίνοισα πεδίλο̣ις,
Ἀνδαισιστρότα ἃν ἐπά-
σκησ̣ε μήδεσ[ι.] . [.]τ̣[.]. . []
ἁ δ’ ἔρ[γμ]ασι̣ [– –
μυρίων ε[… … … .]α̣ις
ζευξα[υ υ–
of Damaena, stepping forth now with a … foot, lead the way for me, since the first to follow you on the way will be your kindly daughter, who beside the branch of leafy bay walks on sandals, whom Andaisistrota has trained in skills … and she, with works of innumerable and ( . . . ) having yoked.41
The text is too lacunose to allow certainty concerning the kind of training Andaisistrota offered, but the participle ζευξα[ (perhaps yoking the chariot of song?) as well as the immediate and broader context points to music and poetry. Before the text breaks off in another self-referential statement the chorus mentions nectar (μὴ νῦν νέκτα[ρ … … …]νας ἐ̣μᾶς, 76). Whatever the familial relations between the choreuts’ relations were, it looks as if Pindar offered a glimpse into choral education of young Theban girls by female teachers. The choreuts of Alcman’s Louvre partheneion mention a certain Aenesimbrota who could also have been a chorodidaskalos, but the diction is far more vague than in the Pindaric daphnēphorikon.42
What Alcman’s Louvre partheneion and Pindar’s daphnēphorikon have in common is the gender of the choreuts, for the occasions for which they were composed and consequently their contents are very different. Claude Calame’s reconstruction of the occasion of Alcman’s partheneion has stood the test of time despite challenges to it, i.e., a ritual celebration in song and dance of the transition of the choreuts to female maturity. Pindar’s partheneion, on the other hand, honors Apollo and the members of a prominent family whose male members are praised for their athletic victories, the care they take of foreigners (proxenia), and their devotion to justice (38–65), whereas the female members, some of which are taking part in the song-dance, are praised for their musical gifts.43
It is worth noting, however, that despite their different circumstances both choruses compare their singing to the enchanting singing of the Sirens. In Alcman’s partheneion it is Hagesichora who is compared with the Sirens (96–97). The text is frustratingly lacunose, but in what survives the chorus seem to say that Hagesichora cannot sing better than the Sirens, because they are goddesses, but she can sing as well as a mortal can. In the daphnēphorikon the Theban choreuts assert that with the accompaniment of auloi made of lotus they will imitate with their songs the Sirens’ boast (σειρῆ̣να δὲ κόμπον αὐλίσκ̣ων ὑπὸ λωτίνων μιμήσομ̣’ ἀοιδαῖς, 13–15) whose power is such that it silences the swift blasts of the West wind (Zephyrus) and “whenever with the strength of winter chilling Boreas rages swiftly over the sea … stirs up the blast …” (trans. Race). At this point our text becomes lacunose, but the Hesiodic intertext (fr. 27–28 M.-W) according to which the Sirens enchanted the winds (τοὺς ἀνέμους θέλγειν) indicates a similar boast. Like the song of the Sirens that can conquer the raging North wind, the song that the Theban choreuts are about to reenact in the here and now will prove comparably enchanting. The specification of the material of the auloi as lotus wood intensifies the Odyssean intertext of irresistible enchantment.44 Pindar was well aware of the irresistible power of song. In the Eighth Paean he sang of the wondrous artifact of Hephaestus and Athena, the Kēlēdones, whom the two gods decided to destroy, when they realized the effect their song had on mortals who, unable to resist them and depart, stayed and died in Delphi.45 The Odyssey offered a more viable model of handling enchantment, since Odysseus was able both to enjoy the intense pleasure of the performance of the Sirens and survive it.
In another fragment Alcman identifies the Muse with the Siren (ἁ Μῶσα κέκλαγ’ ἁ λίγηα Σηρήν, “the Muse cries out, that clear-voiced Siren,” 30 PMGF). Anastasia-Erasmia Peponi has drawn attention to Aelius Aristides’ reception of the identification and has offered a very attractive interpretation. We may first look at the interpretation of Aelius Aristides, who evidently had access either to the whole poem or to a substantial quotation (28.51):
And you hear the Spartan saying to himself and the choir:
The Muse cries out, that clear-voiced Siren.
… Add this point too, that the poet, having in the first place requested the Muse herself, so that he might become active under her influence, goes on to say as though he has changed his mind that the choir itself instead of the Muse has become what he says.
(trans. D. Campbell)
According to Peponi “the identification of the Muses with the Sirens is not random from the leading figure’s point of view. If he imagines the voice of the chorus as that of Sirens and in turn identifies these with the Muses, he can be considered as both attracted to and inspired by the chorus that he leads. Or, to put this another way, the poet/choral leader acts out a position that is at once active and passive. He is made to yearn for the voices he hears while drawing from them the power to compose and sing.”46
The choruses’ irresistible appeal to poets/chorodidaskaloi, proposed by this interpretation, underlies a number of Pindaric self-referential choral statements in which the speaker claims a special relationship with the Muses and other deities associated with music. In Pindar’s Fourth Paean, for instance, the male chorus of Ceans makes the following statement (21–24):
ἤτοι καὶ ἐγὼ σ[κόπ]ελον ναίων δια-
