Aesch. Sept. 848 ss.: Fra moderne Cruces e antiche colometrie

The paper is focused on some of the main lexical and metrical problems of the third stasimon of Aeschylus' Seven: in particularly it discusses the constitutio of vv. 848 and 851 f. and the colometry handed down by manuscripts, emended by many scholars who generally extend the iambic rhythm to the entire lyric section. At v. 848 conforms to morphological patterns of poetic language; at vv. 851 f. it is not necessary to athetize, because the first is defended by other loci similes, while the second is perfectly adherent to other examples of tragic polyptota. The analysis of these semantic, metrical and stylistic peculiarities makes the ancient colometry appear not only genuine, but also adequate to reflect the distressed mood of the Chorus.