must look at the whole context. Suidas has just been speaking of two changes made by Sophocles in the external form of Tragedy—the addition of a third actor, and the enlargement of the Chorus. It is natural, then, to suppose that here also he is thinking of some definite change in the form or method of exhibition. And this inference is strengthened by the emphasis of the word αὐτός, which seems to lay stress on the personal initiative of the poet. On the whole, I am disposed to surmise—though I do not feel sure—that Suidas himself intended his words in the sense put on them by G. Hermann—that Sophocles forsook tetralogy altogether, and produced only single plays. This, we can now assert with some confidence, Sophocles did not do. Is it, then, a pure accident that Suidas has employed a form of words which, without forcing, yield a different sense, and one quite in accord with all the ancient evidence? I can hardly think so. His article on Sophocles is apparently a string of statements epitomised from older sources. It is not improbable that, in one of the Alexandrian or Pergamene writers on the Attic drama, he had found a passage to the effect that the Sophoclean type of trilogy led practically to play being pitted against play for the prize, instead of tetralogy against tetralogy, as in the earlier period. For the sake of illustration, I may suggest a form of Greek words, as close as possible to those used by Suidas, yet which would express that meaning with rather less ambiguity:—δράματος ἤδη πρὸς δρᾶμα ὁ ἀγὼν
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