Volume 155, Issue 1 -

The fragment 140 a S.-M. = G 8 Ruth. is likely to deal with two different feats of Herakles. The lines b 21–b 33 seem to concern Cycnus (ξενοδαΐκτης βασιλεύς), an impious hero killed by Herakles by order of Apollo (the identifications of the ξενοδαΐκτης βασιλεύς with Laomedon or with an anonymous king of Paros are extremely unlikely). The rest of the fragment seems to concern the beginning of Herakles’ expedition against Laomedon. I think Pindarus presupposes a legend according to which Herakles spent the most part of his life in Thebes; such an interpretation might explain both the obscure expression πέραν ἰσϑμὸν διαβαίς and other details. The opinion the fragment belonged to the Paianes is in my view right.

The term dikē has a wide range of meanings in tragic poetry (revenge, retribution, retaliation, punishment, penalty, charge, trial, order, balance, fairness, righteousness, justice). However, we could identify two distinctively or predominantly Euripidean trends that are closely associated with the use of dikē and are actually interdependent. Heracleidae, Suppliants , and Phoenissae are good test-cases in that regard. Whilst the plays bear strong resemblances to Aeschylean and secondarily Sophoclean dramas, the treatment of dikē is differentiated. 1) By contrast with Aeschylus and secondarily Sophocles, dikē in these Euripidean plays is viewed in connection to socio-political values and institutions that are essentially humanly constructed. The focus is shifted to the nature and role of these human conventions and the way(s) in which they interact with deeply-rooted, traditional patterns of conduct. The plays explore the difficulties, complications or failures that can arise in practice, in the frame of the quest for dikē. 2) Despite the occasionally strong individualization and interest in characterization, Euripides focuses on the consequences of the disturbance of dikē for the community as well as on the difficulties involved in the execution of dikē , rather than the rigid, and somewhat abstract, demand for the execution of dikē itself. Individual actions of doubtful justification are largely viewed and assessed in the light of their consequences for the polis . A major, pertinent issue is both the necessity and the limitations of vengeance or punishment, both on an individual and on a collective scale.

In Platonic dialogues the author’s reflections and intention are to be found not only in the statements of particular characters, but in the arrangement of the text as a whole. Not only does Plato decide what his main character says but he also chooses the reactions of his interlocutors, the progress and results of the conversation and whether his characters consider these results to be final answers. It seems that a Platonic dialogue could tell his reader more than what the interlocutors tell each other. In my paper I try to reconstruct from discernible phenomena what the Meno is intended to tell us. My starting point is the question how the topics of this dialogue are connected with each other. Why did Plato present the question whether ἀρετή is teachable, the theory of recollection, the method of hypothesis and the distinction between knowledge and opinion in the same dialogue? Is the Meno to be considered as a collection of philosophical topics independent of each other, or did Plato see an interconnection between them? And how could this interconnection be described?

The question of the nature and the scope of Theophrastus’ Characters is one of the most intricated and most desperate puzzles of classical studies. Today many scholars are either sceptical about the possibility of giving a univocal answer to this vexatissima quaestio or prefer not to take position about it. Among the most various interpretations four principal theses arise. According to them, the Characters represent respectively: 1. a complement to a treatise of moral philosophy; 2. a literary work written in an artistic prose with a humorous intention; 3. a rhetorical exercise for training in schools of rhetoric; 4. the appendix to a treatise of poetical theory. Through a historical survey of the relevant scholarship, I will show that the first two positions cannot reasonably be held any more. The last two ones, instead, conserve most of their scientific value and should be used in the next future as a new hermeneutical basis for a possible solution or semplification of the ‘Theophrastean question’.

Several ancient texts treat Diogenes’ life, or at least central aspects of it. The present article gives a survey of some of the most important passages dealing with the question for which purposes Diogenes was used in these texts: In the Sale of Diogenes and in Epistle 7 he serves as a Cynic role model. Cercidas venerates him in a funeral poem as a celestial dog, and Dion of Prusa uses him for a political statement. Furthermore, for Maximos of Tyre Diogenes symbolizes the Golden Age, while Lucian depicts him as a deterrent philosopher whose teaching has no value for human life. For emperor Julian the Cynic finally is a true representative of the old pagan religion. Some biographical data are only preserved in the oriental tradition. They originate from Greek sources, i.e. they were part of the introductions to the philosophy of Aristotle which were read in the late antique universities like Athens or Alexandria. From this we may infer that the life and teaching of Diogenes itself was part of the late antique curricula, a fact, for which the Greek tradition gives no evidence.

As is well known, Lucian’s masterpiece Verae Historiae can be read as a travesty of Homer’s Odyssey . The present paper argues that with his fantastic voyage Lucian reacts not just to the Odyssey itself but also to the recent interpretation of the Odyssey by the Middle Platonic and Neopythagorean philosopher Numenios of Apameia. Lucian’s purpose, therefore, in writing the Verae Historiae was presumably to give back to Odysseus some of the resilience that interpretations like that of Numenios had taken away from him, and in general to set mythological poetry free once again from the constraints the philosophers had laid on it.

A comparison with south-Italian folklore can be an interesting key to interpret some aspects of ancient culture. For instance, Theocr. id . 10, 11 χαλεπὸν χορίω κύνα γεῦσαι could be explained as “it’s a risk for a dog to taste a doggy placenta”, on the basis of Geopon . 19, 2, 17; also numerous evidences of the superstitious practices of dog ‘magic binding’ support this interpretation. In the famous scene of Aeschylus’ Choeph . 894–924 Clytaimestra shows her breast in front of Orestes: I suggest here a different set from the suppliant’s one. In fact, in south-Italian folklore, to show the breast in front of a son is the traditional set of a mother’s malediction. In Varro rust . 1, 37, 2 the text of all manuscripts decrescente luna is correct: cutting the hair is to be avoided on waning moon, as well as it is widely believed in ancient and modern folklore.

The authority of great scholars such as Fraenkel and Wilamowitz means that any mistakes they make tend to be accepted even when the evidence adduced is weak. Fraenkel’s interpretation of ego, quem vocas in Odes 2. 20. 6 as “I, whom you invite to dinner” has apparently silenced all debate. Yet Bentley construed non ego, pauperum sanguis parentum, non ego, quem vocas as a single idea, “I, the man you call the offspring of penniless parents.” (He suggests the further improvement of writing vocant for vocas .) For various reasons this seems preferable to Fraenkel’s rendering. Likewise, Fraenkel has silenced doubts about 3. 30. 10–14, where he takes qua violens obstrepit Aufidus et qua pauper aquae Daunus agrestium regnavit populorum with dicar although this implies the boast that Horace will be famous in Apulia, a spatial restriction hard to square with the limitless temporal vistas of 1–9. Unless we alter the text, the words cited above have no anchoring point in what follows, but potens in 12 seems for various reasons dubious and should be replaced by, e.g. editus .

Prudentius’s hymn on St. Eulalia suffers from an interpolated stanza ( perist . 3, 171–175): the carnifices ’s flight caused by the dove, i.e. the soul, leaving the mouth of the dying saint is an exaggeration not found anywhere else in the ancient acts and legends of the Christian martyrs. It disturbs the poem’s composition and violates the tenderness of its poetical invention. The spurious lines, though patched up with material borrowed from the author, show some weakness in expression and offer the problem of differentiating between satelles and lictor , a differentiation that was never made by the poet himself. The forged stanza was made up and included by an interpolator who wished to complete the poem’s storyline specifying a motive which had only been alluded to in the authentic poem ( perist. 3, 13–15).