Age-grade initiation and gender ambiguity in Plautus' Casina

In the play Casina, Plautus turns the comic romantic plot on its head by removing the young lovers, Euthynicus and Casina, and opting to instead spotlight Euthynicus’ father, the senex amator Lysidamus, who replaces his son in a fake wedding orchestrated by his wife Cleostrata. In his new role as an adulescens, Lysidamus experiences an increasingly disorienting day that culminates on his ‘wedding night’, wherein he is assaulted by a male slave cross-dressing as a bride. Having been taught a lesson on age-appropriate behaviour, he returns to his original stock role as an old man in the last lines of the play. In this paper, I argue that Cleostrata’s machinations force Lysidamus into re-enacting a transition into adulthood via an age-grade rite of passage (van Gennep 1960). Furthermore, I propose that Lysidamus’ initiation ritual is grounded on episodes of gender ambiguity, such as his fixation on scent, throughout the play.

This paper develops from character studies of Lysidamus as a senex amator and the consequent power relationships between him and various members of his household (see especially McCarthy 2000 and Cody 1976, but also Dutsch 2008, Franko 1999, and Forehand 1973), as well as discussions on the significance of scent on defining identity (Connors 1997) and its effectiveness as a costume (Allen 2015). Moreover, this paper takes a unique approach in interpreting the senex’s re-transition ritual from young to old as one that triangulates his gender, social, and comic identities.

This study is organized into two parts: I begin by identifying elements of the stage action that align with van Gennep’s three phases of age-grade initiation: separation, liminality, and reaggregation. More specifically, I argue that separation is represented by the merging of country and city in Lysidamus’ strategic use of his neighbour’s house (781-3). Furthermore, liminality is expressed in the old man’s assault by the cross-dressed bride, as well as in Cleostrata’s infliction of fear (621ff.) and hunger (754-5, 764-6, 772-7, 786-7, 801-3) upon her husband. Then, reaggregation occurs in the return of Lysidamus’ cane and cloak (1009) – two symbols that define him as an old man, and which he lost in the assault.

The second part of my analysis focusses on the destabilization of Lysidamus’ identity during the liminality phase and how it is anchored by two acts of gendered transformation: the olfactory costume that he takes on in his entrance scene (217 ff.) and the male slave’s bridal disguise. I propose that the old man’s artificial odour of sweet-smelling perfumes aligns him with women in Roman Comedy (Wyke 1994), particularly in his need to appear pleasing (lepidum at lines 223 and 226; placeam, placeo at line 227) and in the fact that scent is associated with female characters in the play (Connors 1997). Additionally, I argue that the dichotomy of Lysidamus’ artificial odour and his natural odour introduces the tension between generations that lies at the crux of his age-grade initiation. I conclude by exploring Lysidamus’ oscillating sexual roles as both bride and groom on his ‘wedding night’.