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Bomolochus

theatrical stock character in ancient Greece

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionDec 14, 2024
Entity authorityQ4940897 ↗
Source-derived summary

In the theatre of ancient Greece, the bômolochus (Ancient Greek: βωμολόχος) was one of three stock characters in comedy, corresponding to the English buffoon. The bômolochus is marked by his wit, his crudity of language, and his frequent non-illusory audience address.

In modern Greek, the word refers to a foul-mouthed person.

See also

Alazôn

Eirôn

References

Sources

Carlson, Marvin. 1993. Theories of the Theatre: A Historical and Critical Survey from the Greeks to the Present. Expanded ed. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press. ISBN 978-0-8014-8154-3

Frye, Northrop. 1957.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Bomolochus” is theatrical stock character in ancient Greece. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Bomolochus, theatrical and stock, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1993, 1957—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. For this dossier, Bomolochus, theatrical and stock is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “theatrical stock character in ancient Greece” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Dec 14, 2024. The linked authority identifier is Q4940897. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1993 and 1957.

Critical limits

The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
Verify next

The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Bomolochus”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Bomolochus primary sources, Bomolochus archive and Bomolochus research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Bomolochus”?
  2. Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
  3. Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Bomolochus” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.