A cupboard of the Pinakes

Comedy

κωμῳδία

Conjectured Inferred class: same register; Tzetzes says Lycophron sorted the comedies; Eratosthenes wrote On Old Comedy.

How to read this cupboard: each hole holds a work the evidence puts in the Library's orbit, at the age it arrived, and an empty hole means a lost work and nothing else. Works written in the city by people not attested as Library scholars lie on the table of the city; works of the Egyptian milieu and witnesses to the city lie on the ledge. The closed door stands for the books no one can now name.

Comedy

Behind this door: what the Library held under this class that no one can now name. Our shelves hold 185 works. The ancient claims for the whole collection run from 40,000 to 700,000 rolls, and modern estimates are much lower (see the Ledger of Numbers). The doors are not drawn to scale.

On the table: written in the city

This class through time

  1. I Founding: 1 in the city, 1 arriving
  2. II Collection: 2 in the city, 1 arriving
  3. III Librarians: 3 in the city, 1 arriving
  4. IV Purge and Fire: 3 in the city
  5. V Roman: 3 in the city
  6. VI Serapeum: 3 in the city
  7. VII Last Schools: 3 in the city

This cupboard in the show

The show has not yet spoken of the comedy rolls.