The story of Knemon in Heliodoros' Aithiopika

Abstract

HELIODOROS' Aithiopika is the story of Theagenes and Charikleia: of their falling in love, their elopement from Delphi where Charikleia lives as the adopted daughter of the priest of Apollo, their encounters with pirates, bandits and unwanted suitors, and finally of their arrival in Ethiopia, land of Charikleia's birth, where she is recognised as the daughter of the king and queen, and the lovers' union is sanctioned, sanctified and implicitly consummated after the conclusion of the narrative. It is a commonplace of discussion of the novel to draw attention to the artfulness with which the story is presented, to the temporal dislocations occasioned by beginning the plot (or narration) in the middle of the story, and to the consequent shift which the author has been able to effect from the straightforward, linear, proairetic mode of simple storytelling to a hermeneutic mode which draws the reader into a quest, shared with the characters of the novel, for true understanding of facts of which he is already in possession.