Petronius’s Third Critique

Abstract: This article offers a close reading of Trimalchio’s “Homeric” performance during the Cena in Petronius’s Satyricon (59.2–60.1), arguing that it articulates a previously overlooked “third critique” beyond the established satirical targets of Trimalchio’s nouveau riche pretensions and Roman Hellenophiles’ elite notions of paideia . Trimalchio’s substitutions in retelling Trojan War myths—culminating in the Ajax-waiter scene—expose the ideological underpinnings of the Homeric tradition and their role in reproducing an elite society. Rather than worrying about names or narrative fidelity, Trimalchio foregrounds the circulation of wealth, the commodification of women, and other social structures that he keenly recognizes stand at the core of the Homeric world. This third critique is available whether or not it was intended by Trimalchio or Petronius, and the question of intent reveals that the critique stands even if both character and author retreat from the implications of their exposures of inherited ideologies. My analysis situates this passage in dialogue with modern theories of myth and materialist critique, showing how the Satyricon both participates in and resists the ideological reproduction of the “classics.” Ultimately, the third critique illuminates how selective, materially attuned forms of reading were available in the past that can prefigure contemporary critiques of liberal humanism and the cultural authority of canonical texts.