Saturday, June 17, 2023
Song of Joy
Plautus, Trinummus 1115-1119 (the young man Lysiteles speaking; tr. Wolfgang de Melo):
Friedrich Leo on line 1118:
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LYS (pointing to himself) This man is exceeding all men,At 1115 hic homo reminded me of Greek ἀνὴρ ὅδε, a periphrasis for the first person singular personal pronoun. I see that J.H. Gray in his commentary (Cambridge: At the University Press, 1897), p. 186, made the connection.
surpassing them in pleasures and joys:
so opportunely do the things I wish for happen,
so opportunely does what I'm doing follow, arrive, and occur,
and so much does one joy crowd on other joys.
LYS hic homost omnium hominum praecipuos, 1115
voluptatibus gaudiisque antepotens:
ita commoda quae cupio eveniunt,
quod ago adsequitur, subest, supsequitur,
ita gaudiis gaudium suppeditat.
Friedrich Leo on line 1118:
vocatum accurrit, prope est, pedibus adhaeret (quasi canis)Eduard Fraenkel, Plautine Elements in Plautus, tr. Tomas Drevikovsky and Francis Muecke (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), pp. 10-11, compares Terence, Andria 957 ff., Eunuch 549 ff., and a fragment from Juventius (Ribbeck 2-3):
If all men were to bring their joys into one place,
yet my happiness would surpass them.
gaudia sua si omnes homines conferant unum in locum,
tamen mea exsuperet laetitia.
