Talk:Pan (god)

God of theatrical criticism

Is Pan indeed the god of theatrical criticism?

I cannot find anything on the web about it, or in any other sources. I could not find it in the cited source here, either: Alfred Wagner, Das historische Drama der Griechen, Münster 1878, p. 78. https://archive.org/details/dashistorisched00wagngoog/page/n82

Is this the correct page number? Year 78 and page 78 suggest that something was confused.

With Pan being the God of pure natural instinct, loving rustic music, sex and easily panicked, I find it also a bit out of character for him to be a theatre critic – something much more in the realms of Dionysus and Apollo. Note that Pan is often confused with the Satyrs, who accompanied Dionysus, and who were central to Greek theatre. They had an entire Satyr play, as addition to the trilogy of tragedies, often commenting on the trilogy to lighten up the mood. Is this confusion what is happening here? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2604:2000:1280:C50F:AC6E:6A80:AE71:D655 (talk) 18:51, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

I suspect you're right, but unfortunately I can't understand Greek or German at all, and my Latin is woefully deficient. Google Translate does a credible job on German, but not so much on Latin or Greek. The copy on Archive.org appears to have half the text missing from the page cited. This copy on Google Books is intact. It's definitely saying something about drama, but I can't make out what it is. I don't see where Pan is mentioned, but I could easily have missed it. The statement was added to the article by an IP editor on June 3, 2009, and that IP has no other edits to Wikipedia. Could someone who can make sense of the text verify whether or not it supports the statement? Perhaps it says it, perhaps not, and maybe it's relevant to the article, but the statement about it needs to be rewritten. P Aculeius (talk) 19:29, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

I cannot get you a source right now, but in Athens he was indeed invoked as a god of theatrical criticism. (Or so I've heard from someone who tends to do their research.) The history behind it is somewhat complicated, and yes it was indeed out of character. Then again,I might not be remembering that correctly, or read that on this wiki and assigned it to them instead. If I'm wrong, I'll just cross this out. 216.56.145.37 (talk) 17:20, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

side note, my IP seems to keep changing, so I may get an account soon to keep my talk posts straight — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.56.145.37 (talk) 17:22, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

I deleted the comment on theatrical criticism a while ago. There was no mention of Pan from the original citation. Someone has changed it back since then and has added two new sources. I was able to verify one of them but it was hardly a primary source and since this was added well over a decade ago, it could be a feedback loop. I would like to think that Cambridge Press would be above that but it can’t be assumed. I’m not changing it again but I don’t trust the information and I’m putting that out there for anyone that might want to look into it. Vitleysa (talk) 22:40, 12 January 2021 (UTC)

I'm calling it bogus. The citation names three sources: Minchev, which is too new to be searchable on Google Books, but the citation seems to be claiming that it's cited by Braund et al., which it doesn't appear to be. That book says, "Pan was also considered a patron of theatrical criticism and impromptus," citing Seyffert, not Minchev (although Minchev is cited for other things on the same page). So Minchev is irrelevant to this claim. A check of Seyffert, however, fails to justify the statement in Braund et al. Here's the English version of "Pan", and here's the German original. I may have missed something, but I don't see anything remotely connected to "theatrical criticism and impromptus" in the article that's cited for the claim, in the only source that appears to make it.

So, if the source cited by Braund et al. doesn't support the claim, what do we have? Poor research? Erroneous citation? Wishful thinking? An academic mountweasel? I could have seen Pan connected with the theatre, but why theatrical criticism in particular? It's a bit like having a patron god of encyclopedia salesmen or frequent flyer miles. Sure, we could figure out which god would naturally be assumed as a patron—but in the absence of evidence that the Greeks had a patron god for something, it's just a modern inference. And if classical encyclopedias don't bother mentioning this unexpected connection, does Pan's Wikipedia article suffer if it's omitted due to reasonable doubts about where the claim comes from? Given how improbable it sounds, I think we need some statement in support of it from a Greek or Roman author. P Aculeius (talk) 00:16, 13 January 2021 (UTC)

I also read it in an academic book (Cambridge University Press), and a quick Google Books search listed several more, but only in newer publications. After a further deep dive, I found that it's probably from the TV sketch Rinse the Blood Off My Toga. A video is here – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rR_5h8CzRcI –, where the line occurs shortly after the 0:50 mark. So I guess the inclusion in this article was a humorous fake entry. It's actually quite funny, so I suggest: why not reinstate it? Wikipedia could use a little humor… a small "U-Boot", as they say in Germany. :) Rixkölln (talk) 08:38, 2 November 2025 (UTC)

Nice research, thanks, but we don't even keep transparently obvious and utterly hilarious falsehoods in our articles, per WP:V and WP:NOT. NebY (talk) 13:36, 2 November 2025 (UTC)

An idea: maybe we could add a reference at the end in the "Influence" chapter? I mean a reference to the Wayne & Shuster sketch? It was mentioned in Jennifer Drouin, "Wayne & Shuster’s Shakespearean slapstick on Canadian radio and television", in: Alexa Alice Joubin (ed.), Contemporary Readings in Global Performances of Shakespeare, London 2024, p. 256–81 (261): "In the opening sequence, when Johnny-as-Flavius-Maximus says that the Julius Caesar caper began during the Ides of March, right after the ‘festival of Pan, the god of theatrical criticism’, the joke is funnier if the audience knows that Pan is the ancient Greek god of wind, not theatre, and at a minimum the audience must be familiar with the expression ‘to be panned by the critics’." After that we could add a note that this joke had found its way into WP as an encyclopedic hoax, with some scientists picking it up and republishing it in scholarly and peer-reviewed books & articles. There are a couple of prominent examples, but it doesn't seem to have spread far. But it could prevent further spread. Or is it too inconsequential to be added to the article? Or it could be added to the "Legacy" section in the article on "Rinse the Blood Off My Toga". (As I said; just an idea.) Rixkölln (talk) 11:17, 3 November 2025 (UTC)

It's a good joke, but literally just a passing mention, and therefore trivial. If Pan were somehow important to the work, rather than just mentioned in passing, then there might be an argument. Here that does not seem to be the case. Also, Pan is not usually regarded as "the ancient Greek god of wind". You may be thinking of Æolus, or one of the four winds he governed. As for being a notable hoax, that might be worth keeping if the article or a major portion thereof were a hoax; but here it escaped notice as a brief note that was seemed just plausible enough to evade notice by experts in an otherwise long and detailed article. For what it's worth, this discussion will be part of the article's archive, and that will preserve the fact that the claim was inserted, and that it survived unquestioned for several years. P Aculeius (talk) 11:53, 3 November 2025 (UTC)

👍 Rixkölln (talk) 11:55, 3 November 2025 (UTC)

Another source

Here's another recent source: Robichaud, Paul, Pan: The Great God's Modern Return (2021) ISBN 978-1789144765. Esowteric + Talk + Breadcrumbs 09:18, 22 December 2023 (UTC)

Might help if you indicated precisely what it's a source for. It's an extensive article with lots of sources, ancient and modern, so general sources aren't really needed. If it says something about a specific fact or set of facts that aren't already adequately covered or cited, feel free to cite this in the article itself. P Aculeius (talk) 11:08, 22 December 2023 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: F24 Introduction to Mythology

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 19 August 2024 and 14 December 2024. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Smith.Matty1789 (article contribs).

— Assignment last updated by Smith.Matty1789 (talk) 04:37, 26 November 2024 (UTC)