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A new monograph by Aristarchus?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 January 2010

Chad Matthew Schroeder
Affiliation:
University of Michigan

Abstract:

This article argues that the Homeric scholia preserve the title of a lost monograph by the second-century BC Alexandrian scholar Aristarchus on the date of Hesiod's life. Apparent references to the contents of this monograph occur in the Homeric as well as the Hesiodic scholia, and demonstrate that Aristarchus compared the works of the two poets and concluded that Hesiod had lived sometime near 700 BC.

Type
Shorter Contributions
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 2007

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References

1 Erbse, H. (ed.), Scholia graeca in Homeri Iliadem (scholia vetera) (7 vols, Berlin1969–88).Google Scholar For a recent assessment of Erbse and his edition's impact on the field of ancient Homeric criticism, cf. Schmidt, M., ‘The Homer of the scholia: what is explained to the reader?’, in Montanari, F. (ed.), Omero tremila anni dopo (Rome 2002) 159–83.Google Scholar

2 R., Janko (The Iliad. A Commentary 4: Books 13–16 (Cambridge 1992) 71Google Scholar (note ad 13.195–7)) was the first to spot Aristarchus’ Περ⋯ τɱζ πατριίδοζ in the Homeric scholia (schol. A ad Hom. Il. 13.197: Aἵαντε ‹μεμαότε‹ ὅτι συνεχɷζ κέχρηται τολζ δυϊκοὅζ. ἠ δ⋯ ⋯ναφορòζ τ⋯ Περì τλζ πατρίδοζ. ’Aθηναίων γ⋯ρ ίδιον). Aristonicus regularly cites Aristarchus’ works with the formula πρòζ τ⋯ + title.

3 Unnoticed perhaps because in I. Bekker's edition of the Iliad scholia (Scholia in Homeri Iliadem (Berlin 1825) 1.295) he printed πρòζ τ⋯ περì Kιλικίαζ Ἡσιόδου in the last line instead of the reading of Venetus A, correctly printed in Erbse's edition (cf. n.1). The great Aristarchean critic Lehrs, K. (De Aristarchi studiis Homericis (3rd edn, Leipzig 1882) 229)Google Scholar noted the correct reading of the scholion, but did not follow its implication.

4 Scholia such as this normally begin with a reference to the sign Aristarchus used in his marginal notation; none is recorded here, though it was surely a diplê, which I have added.

5 Aristonicus’ biographical entry in the Suda (s.v. Ἀριστόνικοζ (Adler A 3924)) lists the titles of three such commentaries: Περì τὦν σημείων τὦν ⋯ν τὦ Θεογνίᾳ Ἡσιόδυ καì Ὀδυσσείαζ. The fragments of Aristonicus’ Iliad commentary were collect ed by Friedländer, L., Aristonici Περì σημείων Ἰλι⋯δοζ reliquiae emendatiores (Göttingen 1853)Google Scholar, those of his commentary on the Odyssey by Carnuth, O., Aristonici Περì σημείων Ὀδυσσείαζ reliquiae emendatiores (Leipzig 1869).Google Scholar

6 Cf. Schmidt, M., Die Erklärungen zum Weltbild Homers und zur Kultur der Heroenzeit in den bT-Scholien zur Ilias (Munich 1976)Google Scholar; and Schmidt (n.1) 168–9.

7 Proclus, Chrestomathia §7. Cf. Graziosi, B., Inventing Homer. The Early Reception of Epic (Cambridge 2002) 93–4, 100 n.26Google Scholar; Nagy, G., Homer's Text and Language (Urbana and Chicago 2004) 11.Google Scholar

8 Merkelbach, R. and West, M.L. (eds), Fragmenta Hesiodea (Oxford 1967) 167.Google Scholar

9 Diogenes Laertius 5.87 = Wehrli fr. 176 (Wehrli, F., Herakleides Pontikos. Die Schule des Aristoteles 7 (2nd edn, Basel 1969Google Scholar)).

10 Cf. Gell. 3.11.1–5, Paus. 9.30.3.

11 This scholion was assigned to Aristonicus' Περ⋯ τɷν σημείων τɷν ⋯ν τὦ Θεoγoνίᾳ Ἡσιóδoυ by Flach, H.(Glossen und Scholien zur hesiodischen Theogonie mit Prolegomena (Leipzig 1876) 103Google Scholar).

12 Cf. Schmidt (n.6) 226.

13 Schol. b ad Hom. Il. 23.683 b2 repeats these details.

14 Schmidt (n.6, 226–7) doubts that the discussion of Hesiod's date in relation to Olympic nudity can be attributed to Aristarchus because he nowhere else uses absolute chronology for Hesiod's date, and that three hundred years is too wide a separation between Homer and Hesiod. But if Aristarchus had established an absolute date for Homer (cf. n.7), why not for Hesiod as well? There is also nothing inherently implausible about so wide a date between the two poets. Schmidt's argument would require that Aristarchus considered Hesiod to have lived as early as the tenth or ninth centuries BC, which is surely implausible.