Y a-t-il une codification musicale dans le théâtre de Plaute?

Resumo

This article demonstrates that, in a codified theatre play, what would have appeared either as a deviation, or as the expression of the author’s free inventiveness (“fantaisie” or “variété”), needs to be reassessed and understood as a mere variation. In two instances of musical silence in Plautus’ comedies, we show how variations from the convention expected by the audience are the basis and essence of the codification, some of the variations even prompting laugh; this then allows us to develop, in a second, theoretical, part, a notion of codification, not as a system of rules, but instead as a combination of variables set in variation.