Conclusion

Abstract

While generic differences between different types of aetia are not as clear-cut as one might think, a more promising explanation of the differences between individual aetia is the period of literary history to which they belong. Aetia, in the specific ways in which they are narrated, are very much products of their time. They are also often told at crucial points of a narrative, and they provide privileged places for authorial self-reflection, both in terms of the larger agenda of a work and in terms of its aesthetics. Aetia are able to negotiate between different temporal frameworks, and their capacity to bridge the gap between the text and the world gives them the power to implicate the present in a very complex set of assumptions, beliefs, and convictions or exhortations for the future.