Laudator Temporis Acti

Now let me state very briefly the difference between being mistaken and lying. You are mistaken when you think what you say is true, and it's because you think it's true that you say it. However, if what you say when you are mistaken were true, you wouldn't be mistaken; if it were not only true, but you also knew it to be true, you wouldn't be lying. So you are mistaken, because it's untrue, and you think it's true; you only say it because you think it's true. There is error in human weakness, but there isn't any in a healthy conscience. But if ever you think that what you assert as true is in fact false, then of course you are lying.

Quid autem intersit inter falli et mentiri, breviter dico. Fallitur qui putat verum esse quod dicit, et quia verum putat, ideo dicit. Hoc autem quod dicit qui fallitur, si verum esset, non falleretur: si non solum verum esset, sed etiam verum esse sciret, non mentiretur. Fallitur ergo, quia falsum est, et verum putat; dicit autem nonnisi quia verum putat. Error est in humana infirmitate, sed non est in conscientiae sanitate. Quisquis autem falsum putat esse et pro vero asserit, ipse mentitur.

Did some kinsman of yours, perhaps, lose his life before Ilion?
Some fine warrior, wife's father or son-in-law, those
who are closest to you after your own flesh and blood? Or was it
a comrade maybe, one especially dear to you,
this fine warrior? For in no way less than a brother
is he who's a comrade and whose mind embraces wisdom.

ἦ τίς τοι καὶ πηὸς ἀπέφθιτο Ἰλιόθι πρὸ
ἐσθλὸς ἐών, γαμβρὸς ἢ πενθερός, οἵ τε μάλιστα
κήδιστοι τελέθουσι μεθ᾽ αἷμά τε καὶ γένος αὐτῶν;
ἦ τίς που καὶ ἑταῖρος ἀνὴρ κεχαρισμένα εἰδώς,
ἐσθλός; ἐπεὶ οὐ μέν τι κασιγνήτοιο χερείων        585
γίγνεται, ὅς κεν ἑταῖρος ἐὼν πεπνυμένα εἰδῇ.

Moreover, concord is accepted to be the greatest blessing in a State, and very commonly in a State the senate and aristocracy call upon the citizens to agree; and everywhere in Greece there is a law laid down that the citizens take an oath to agree, and everywhere this oath is taken. I presume that the purpose of this is not that the citizens may come to the same decision about plays, or praise the same musicians, or choose the same poets, or take pleasure in the same things, but that they may obey the laws; for it is when the inhabitants abide by these that countries become strongest and happiest, but without agreement a State cannot be well organized nor an estate well managed.

ἀλλὰ μὴν καὶ ὁμόνοιά γε μέγιστόν τε ἀγαθὸν δοκεῖ ταῖς πόλεσιν εἶναι καὶ πλειστάκις ἐν αὐταῖς αἵ τε γερουσίαι καὶ οἱ ἄριστοι ἄνδρες παρακελεύονται τοῖς πολίταις ὁμονοεῖν, καὶ πανταχοῦ ἐν τῇ Ἑλλάδι νόμος κεῖται τοὺς πολίτας ὀμνύναι ὁμονοήσειν, καὶ πανταχοῦ ὀμνύουσι τὸν ὅρκον τοῦτον· οἶμαι δ᾽ ἐγὼ ταῦτα γίγνεσθαι οὐχ ὅπως τοὺς αὐτοὺς χοροὺς κρίνωσιν οἱ πολῖται, οὐδ᾽ ὅπως τοὺς αὐτοὺς αὐλητὰς ἐπαινῶσιν, οὐδ᾽ ὅπως τοὺς αὐτοὺς ποιητὰς αἱρῶνται, οὐδ᾽ ἵνα τοῖς αὐτοῖς ἥδωνται, ἀλλ᾽ ἵνα τοῖς νόμοις πείθωνται. τούτοις γὰρ τῶν πολιτῶν ἐμμενόντων, αἱ πόλεις ἰσχυρόταταί τε καὶ εὐδαιμονέσταται γίγνονται· ἄνευ δὲ ὁμονοίας οὔτ᾽ ἂν πόλις εὖ πολιτευθείη οὔτ᾽ οἶκος καλῶς οἰκηθείη.

Fortune is like a playwright who designs a number of parts — the shipwrecked man, the poor man, the exile, the king, the beggar. What the good man has to do is to play well any part with which Fortune invests him. You have been shipwrecked; very well, give a fine rendering of the part 'Shipwrecked man.' You were rich and have become poor. Play the part 'Poor man' as it ought to be played.

Ἡ τύχη ὥσπερ ποιήτριά τις οὖσα παντοδαπὰ ποιεῖ πρόσωπα, ναυαγοῦ, πτωχοῦ, φυγάδος, ἐνδόξου, ἀδόξου. δεῖ οὖν τὸν ἀγαθὸν ἄνδρα πᾶν ὅ τι ἂν αὕτη περιθῇ καλῶς ἀγωνίζεσθαι. ναυαγὸς γέγονας, εὖ τὸν ναυαγόν· πένης ἐξ εὐπόρου, εὖ τὸν πένητα.

We're all worse when there are no restraints.
Everyone wants whatever comes into his head;
he doesn't weigh whether it is good or bad, he goes after it.

nam deteriores omnes sumus licentia.
quod quoique quomque inciderit in mentem volet,
neque id putabit pravom an rectum sit; petet.        485

484-485 secl. Bentley

When you have good fish, naturally soft, with rich flesh,
Just sprinkle it lightly with salt and moisten it with oil.
By itself, within itself, it has the faculty of pleasure.

τὸν δ᾿ ἀγαθὸν μαλακόν τε φύσει καὶ πίονα σάρκα
ἁλσὶ μόνον λεπτοῖς πάσας καὶ ἐλαίῳ ἀλείψας·
τὴν ἀρετὴν γὰρ ἔχει τῆς τέρψιος αὐτὸς ἐν αὑτῷ.

Thucydides, on the other hand, has a dense, thorny, and infinitely complex prose style, loaded with difficult abstractions, offering whole Chinese boxes of subordination in enormously protracted, often page-long sentences that are made to balance on subtly rhetorical nuances involving clause and counter-clause, and straining at the same time to avoid any hint of repetition, whether verbal or constructional, in either his narrative or, more particularly, those elaborately wrought speeches on matters of political debate that he puts at intervals into the mouths of his leading public figures, and that have always proved so mind-numbing a hazard to students hacking their way through his text, for the first time, in the original Greek.

Rather like that sentence, in fact.

The turn of the century witnessed a hotbed of activity in the research on ancient magic, despite the scornful sneers of WILAMOWITZ and his school who repudiated USENER, DIETERICH and their associates as „Verehrer des Aberglaubens“ and their research methods as „Βοtokudenphilologie“.¹¹⁹ DIETERICH, undaunted by WILAMOWITZ' barbs — but also by the great man's almost total neglect of his research (in his 'Glaube der Hellenen' WILAMOWITZ mentions DIETERICH, who after all had produced over 1000 pages of research on Greek religion, only three times) — decided to take a step towards realizing his corpus of magical texts by undertaking a complete re-edition of the great Paris magical papyrus (PGM IV).

¹¹⁹ Quoted by PFISTER in ARW 35 (1938) 183. I have not been able to locate this quote in WILAMOWITZ' œuvre itself, and know it only from PFISTER'S account. The Botocudes are a now extinct tribe of eastern Brazil. Cf. for example, C. NIMUENDAJU, Social Organization and Beliefs of the Botocudes of Eastern Brazil, Southwestern Jnl. of Anthropology 2.1 (1946); ELIADE, Naissances 158.
Cf. the comments made by G. MASPERO, Mémoire sur quelques papyrus du Louvre, Paris 1875, 122, referring to P.Louvre dem. E 3229 (= JOHNSON, Enchoria 7 (1977) 55ff.): «ce qui en reste suffit à montrer qu'il ... renferme des formules magiques sans grand intérêt pour la science». By LENORMANT, Catalogue d'une collection d'antiquités, Paris 1857, no. 1073: «fromage gnostique» (referring to PGM IV). By NILSSON, Religion 155: „elendes Zeug“.

I mean, God is surely able to make human beings into angels, seeing that he has made horrid, slimy seeds into human beings. What are we going to be? Angels. What were we? It's scarcely decent even to think about; I'm forced to think about it, and I blush to mention it.¹⁸ What were we? What has God made human beings out of?

18. This is Augustine at his least biblical, least attractive, and most typical of the respectable "advanced" opinion of his time.

Potens est enim Deus Angelos homines facere, qui semina terrena et horribilia homines fecit. Quid erimus? Angeli. Quid fuimus! Pudet recordari; cogor considerare, et erubesco dicere. Quid fuimus? Unde Deus homines fecit?

Yesterday a blob of semen; tomorrow, embalming fluid, ash.

ἐχθὲς μὲν μυξάριον, αὔριον δὲ τάριχος ἢ τέφρα.

It is Herodotus's personality that irritates a certain type of intellect: his sunny cosmopolitanism, his open-mindedness over questions of religion, his obvious enjoyment of women (and the large role allotted to them in the Histories), his addiction to anecdotes, his discursive digressions on anything from tribal couvade to the walls of Babylon, his refusal to take up any kind of ideological stance save in the pursuit of freedom (eleutheria), his preference for inductive as opposed to deductive reasoning—that is, amassing bits of evidence to see what, if any, pattern may emerge from them, rather than coming up with a theory first and trying to make the facts fit it.

Do you insist on prejudging the situation before you know the truth?

pergin istuc prius diiudicare quam scis quid veri siet?

The dog, the sack, and the barbed spear
I dedicate to Pan and the tree nymphs,
but I will take the dog back alive to my hut,
to have a companion sharing in my dry morsels.

τὸν κύνα, τὰν πήραν τε καὶ ἀγκυλόδοντα σίγυνον,
    Πανί τε καὶ Νύμφαις ἀντίθεμαι Δρυάσιν·
τὸν κύνα δὲ ζώοντα πάλιν ποτὶ ταὔλιον ἄξω,
    ξηρὰς εἰς ἀκόλους ξυνὸν ἔχειν ἕταρον.

If I abide here and war about the city of the Trojans,
then lost is my home-return, but my renown shall be imperishable;
but if I return home to my dear native land,
lost then is my glorious renown, yet shall my life long
endure, neither shall the doom of death come soon upon me.

εἰ μέν κ᾽ αὖθι μένων Τρώων πόλιν ἀμφιμάχωμαι,
ὤλετο μέν μοι νόστος, ἀτὰρ κλέος ἄφθιτον ἔσται·
εἰ δέ κεν οἴκαδ᾽ ἵκωμι φίλην ἐς πατρίδα γαῖαν,
ὤλετό μοι κλέος ἐσθλόν, ἐπὶ δηρὸν δέ μοι αἰὼν        415
ἔσσεται, οὐδέ κέ μ᾽ ὦκα τέλος θανάτοιο κιχείη.

But, if we turn to the word kleos itself, we find our way into an even richer web of meaning. It goes back to a PIE root *kleu-, which formed words referring to hearing and fame in the various daughter languages, especially in their poetic traditions. As a basic verbal root, it meant “to hear”. But with the ending -os added to it (*kleuos, which—remember the equivalence of u and w—can also be represented *klewos), it was “that which is heard”: in other words, “that which is famous”, or simply “fame”. This form survives not only in Greek kleos but also in Sanskrit śravaḥ (the ś is pronounced like an English sh; the ḥ used to be an s, but it weakened at the end of a word to become a murmured h), and in both traditions it is also associated with an adjective meaning “imperishable” (aphthiton in Greek, akṣita- or akṣiti- in Sanskrit). While the attempt to work out the poetic language of the Indo-Europeans must inevitably be a tentative enterprise,¹⁸ something like ṇdhg^whitom klewos is very likely to have been a phrase that already existed in the parent language in reference to undying fame; it was then inherited as aphthiton kleos in Greek and akṣitam śravaḥ in Sanskrit.

Nor is the *kleu- root restricted to these two languages. It’s also prominent in the personal names found in several other branches as well. While it is most transparent in the numerous Greek names in -cles, such as Sophocles “wise-famous” or Pericles “very-famous”, it also occurs in Slavic languages as the -slav element in Bohuslav or Mstislav. (The change of k to s in Slavic parallels the change of k to ś in Sanskrit.) Further disguised by phonological change, it occurs in Germanic in the name Ludwig, itself a linguistic cousin of French Louis.¹⁹ This requires some further explanation. First, we have to start from a different form, in effect a past participle *klu‑tos or *klū-tos “that which is heard”, which survived in Greek klytos and Latin in-clutus, both “famous”. Second, in Germanic, the initial k sound weakened to an h, as also happened in English heart (whereas the original sound was preserved in Latin cor and Greek kardia), and in this particular phonetic context, the t would soften to a d.²⁰ This means that the equivalent Germanic form ought to have ended up with the stem *hlūd-. In fact, Old English still has words that begin with hl-.²¹ But because the h- was comparatively difficult to articulate in this environment, it was soon lost, leaving just Lud- as the first element in Lud-wig. Within English, hlūd survived as an adjective in Old English, but with the loss of the h and the change of ū to ou in the Great Vowel Shift that occurred at the end of the Middle English period, it became our modern word loud.

¹⁸ For more on the Indo-European poetic tradition, see Chapter 5, as well as the convenient introductions in B.W. Fortson, Indo-European Language and Culture (Malden, MA, 2010), pp. 32-7, and J. Clackson, Indo-European Linguistics (Cambridge, 2007), pp. 180-4.

¹⁹ For still more examples of Indo-European personal names built from words not only for “fame” but also for “god”, “battle”, and the like, see B.W. Fortson, Indo-European Language and Culture (Malden, MA, 2010), pp. 38-9.

²⁰ The change of k to h in Germanic will be discussed more in Chapter 4 in the section on Grimm’s Law.

²¹ Readers of Beowulf may recall the similar cluster hr- in the name of king Hrothgar.

I do not know whether the gods in their kindness or anger have denied them silver and gold.

argentum et aurum propitiine an irati dii negaverint dubito.

Horace is the canniest of classics, able to survive in fragmentary form. He invented some of the pithiest phrases ever coined. Horace’s phrases, lines, and poems have lasted, I reckon, because they’re the opposite of prefabricated or glib. His words are put together with a carpentry or stonemasonry so cunning and precise that nothing can prize them apart. Syllables, sounds, rhythms are locked together with a force that even earthquakes could not budge.

To this day I have never had the same artistic delight in any poet as I was given from the start by one of Horace's odes. In certain languages what is achieved here cannot even be desired. This mosaic of words, in which every word radiates its strength as sound, as place, as concept, to the right and to the left and over the whole, this minimum in the range and number of its signs, the maximum which this attains in the energy of the signs—all this is Roman and, if I am to be believed, noble par excellence. All the rest of poetry becomes, in comparison, something too popular—a mere emotional garrulousness ...

Bis heute habe ich an keinem Dichter dasselbe artistische Entzücken gehabt, das mir von Anfang an eine Horazische Ode gab. In gewissen Sprachen ist Das, was hier erreicht ist, nicht einmal zu wollen. Dies Mosaik von Worten, wo jedes Wort als Klang, als Ort, als Begriff, nach rechts und links und über das Ganze hin seine Kraft ausströmt, dies minimum in Umfang und Zahl der Zeichen, dies damit erzielte maximum in der Energie der Zeichen—das Alles ist römisch und, wenn man mir glauben will, vornehm par excellence. Der ganze Rest von Poesie wird dagegen etwas zu Populäres,—eine blosse Gefühls-Geschwätzigkeit ...

Yet the gods have not revealed all things to men from the beginning,
but by seeking men find out better in time.

οὔτοι ἀπ᾽ ἀρχῆς πάντα θεοὶ θνητοῖς ὑπέδειξαν,
ἀλλὰ χρόνῳ ζητοῦντες ἐφευρίσκουσιν ἄμεινον.

For among all men worldwide minstrels receive their share
of honor and reverence, since the Muse has taught them
the ways of song, and has love for the whole tribe of singers.

πᾶσι γὰρ ἀνθρώποισιν ἐπιχθονίοισιν ἀοιδοὶ
τιμῆς ἔμμοροί εἰσι καὶ αἰδοῦς, οὕνεκ᾽ ἄρα σφέας        480
οἴμας μοῦσ᾽ ἐδίδαξε, φίλησε δὲ φῦλον ἀοιδῶν.

Neither your ears nor your minds wish to hear the rudiments of doctrine repeated. All the same, hearing them does reassure our feeling for the faith, and being reminded of them does somehow or other help us to make a fresh start; nor are we bored by hearing what we already know, because whatever concerns the Lord always gives us pleasure. It's the same with the explanation of the divine scriptures as it is with the divine scriptures themselves; even though they are well known, they are still read out to remind us of what they say.

So too with their explanation; even though it's well known, it's still worth repeating, so that those who have forgotten it may be reminded of it, or those who perhaps didn't hear it may now do so, and as for those who retain what they have been used to hearing, repetition may ensure that they can't ever forget it: I remember, you see, that I have already spoken to your graces about this passage of the gospel. Still, I've no objection to reminding you of the same things, just as there was no objection to repeating the same reading. The apostle Paul says in one of his letters, To write the same things to you is not irksome for me, and is necessary for you (Phil 3:1). In the same way it is not irksome for me either to say the same things to you, and it is good for you.

Nec auribus, nec cordibus vestris rudia repetuntur; reparant tamen audientis affectum, et quodam modo commemorata innovant nos; nec piget ea quae nota sunt audire, quia semper dulcia sunt, quae Domini sunt. Sic est expositio divinarum Scripturarum, sicut sunt ipsae divinae Scripturae; etsi notae sunt, leguntur tamen ad commemorationem.

Sic et expositio earum, etsi nota est, repetenda est tamen, ut qui obliti sunt commemorentur, vel qui forte non audierunt, audiant; et qui tenent quod audire consueverunt, repetendo fiat ut oblivisci non possint. Meminimus enim de hoc capitulo Evangelii iam nos locutos Caritati vestrae. Nec piget tamen eadem vobis commemorare, sicut non piguit eamdem vobis lectionem repetere. Apostolus Paulus dicit quadam in Epistola: Eadem scribere vobis, mihi quidem non pigrum, vobis autem necessarium. Ita et nos eadem dicere vobis, nobis non pigrum, vobis autem tutum.

Men say that a way of life too unswerving leads more to a fall than to satisfaction and is more hurtful to health. That is why I have much less praise for excess than for moderation. The wise will bear me out.

βιότου δ᾽ ἀτρεκεῖς ἐπιτηδεύσεις
φασὶ σφάλλειν πλέον ἢ τέρπειν
τῇ θ᾽ ὑγιείᾳ μᾶλλον πολεμεῖν·
οὕτω τὸ λίαν ἧσσον ἐπαινῶ
τοῦ μηδὲν ἄγαν·        265
καὶ ξυμφήσουσι σοφοί μοι.

But if any word has been spoken that was harsh, may the storm-winds straightway snatch it and bear it away.

                                 ἔπος δ᾽ εἴ πέρ τι βέβακται
δεινόν, ἄφαρ τὸ φέροιεν ἀναρπάξασαι ἄελλαι.

In his poem “What Would Make Me Happy,” he tells his reader that if his youth could return to him again—a thing never to be hoped for—and Jupiter would grant all his wishes, he would choose to live under a just king who would offer him a compliant ear, protect the good, and destroy the bad. “Let me have a little house with a little well, a dim little kitchen lit by an ever-burning hearth, a fat little flock pasturing in a field, some land giving grain and good wine, a hill thick with olive trees, and a wood with trees for cutting, to give me firewood for the rest of my life.”

Then comes the epigram’s pivot. Belying the topos of the simple life, the poet continues: “Let me have these little gifts and one truly great one: a library rivaling that of Pergamum!”

You claim you're second to none of my friends,
but I ask you, Crispus, what do you do to make it so?
When I asked you to loan me a few thousand, you refused,
although your heavy safe wasn't big enough to hold your cash.
When did you give me a peck of beans or grain,
although an Egyptian tenant farmer plows your fields?
When was a short cloak sent to me in the cold winter time?
When did half a pound of silver arrive at my door?
I see no reason to believe in your "friendship" towards me,
Crispus, other than your habit of farting in my presence.

Cedere de nostris nulli te dicis amicis.
    sed, sit ut hoc verum, quid, rogo, Crispe, facis?
mutua cum peterem sestertia quinque, negasti,
    non caperet nummos cum gravis arca tuos.
quando fabae nobis modium farrisve dedisti,
    cum tua Niliacus rura colonus aret?
quando brevis gelidae missa est toga tempore brumae?
    argenti venit quando selibra mihi?
nil aliud video, quo te credamus amicum,
    quam quod me coram pedere, Crispe, soles.

You say, I have no better friend than you:
What do you do, to make me think it true?
I wanted but five pounds, which you deny;
Though you have useless thousands lying by.
From all the fertile harvests of your plain,
When did you send to me one single grain?
When a short cloak, to guard me from the cold?
To line my purse, when a small piece of gold?
I see no mark of friendship on your part;
But, before me you are free enough to fart.

Labels: noctes scatologicae

All else I renounce. You I love with all my heart,
you living fount of the world’s delight.
I worship you, desire you, seek you, breathlessly follow you,
sigh for you to death, and miss you.
Come help one who is broken and say: “Arise,
I shall now heal your illness and lighten your grief,
such that you would recover unhurt and live in joy!”
I judge you sweeter than honey’s true nectar.
There is no drink so sweetly strengthening.
Let it not spoil for him whom it sustains forever!
O you, all of Christ’s creation — sun, stars, moon,
hills and mountains, valleys, sea, rivers, fountains,
tempest, showers, clouds, winds and storms,
heat, hoarfrost, cold, ice, snow, lightning, rocks,
meadow, grove, foliage, forest, grasses, flowers
exclaim “Hail!” and with me greet her tenderly.
I beg not for love’s limit, but that love endure eternally.
Do not show others what I have sent to you alone!

Omnia postpono, te pectore diligo toto,
Tu mundanarum fons vivus deliciarum.
Te colo, te cupio, peto te, lassatus anhelo,
Ad te suspiro moribundus, teque requiro,
Concite succurre ruituro, dicque: 'resurge,        5
Nunc ego sanabo morbum, maestumque levabo,
Tantum convaleas, sospes, laetus quoque vivas!'
Verum praecellis nectar me iudice mellis;
Est potus nullus tanto dulcedine fultus.
Qui non vilescat illi, quem semper inescat        10
Omnis factura Christi: sol, sidera, luna,
Colles et montes, valles, mare, flumina, fontes,
Tempestas, pluvię, nubes, ventique, procellę,
Cauma, pruina, gelu, glacies, nix, fulgura, rupes,
Prata, nemus, frondes, arbustum, gramina, flores        15
Exclamando: vale! mecum praedulce sonate.
Non precor extremum, sed quod perduret in ęvum.
Missa tibi soli multis ostendere noli!

11-15 Anklang an einen bekannten liturgischen Text.

• Some Lines in Lucretius
• Asyndeton Filling Hexameters
• Asyndeton Filling Hexameters in Sidonius
• Verse-Filling Asyndeton
• Verse-Filling Asyndeton: Some Greek Examples
• Another Greek Example of Verse-Filling Asyndeton
• More Examples of Asyndeton Filling Hexameters
• Asyndeton Filling Hexameters in Corippus
• Twelve Gods
• Seven Cities
• A Hexameter Consisting of Nouns in Asyndeton
• More Hexameters Consisting of Words in Asyndeton
• Hexameters Consisting of Words in Asyndeton: Dracontius
• Zopyrus' Victims
• A Latin Hexameter Consisting of Adjectives in Asyndeton
• Hexameters Consisting Entirely of Words in Asyndeton: More Greek Examples
• A Sojourn in the Country
• Destruction
• Hexameters Consisting Entirely of Words in Asyndeton: A Horatian Example
• Asyndeton Filling Hexameters: Bernard of Cluny, De Contemptu Mundi, Book I
• A Good Land
• A Greek Hexameter Consisting of Adjectives in Asyndeton
• Trifles
• Some Hexameters in Heiric of Auxerre's Life of St. Germanus
• Volturnalem Palatualem Furinalem

What does long mean, when the end has come? Nobody can call back yesterday; tomorrow is treading on the heels of today, to get it over with. In this short space let us live good lives, so that we may go to that wide open space where we won't be got over with: Even now as I speak, we are of course getting on with it. Words run on, and time flies; so do our years, so do our actions, so do our honors, so does our unhappiness, so does this happiness of ours. It's all getting on, soon to be over and done with; but don't let's be alarmed: The Word of the Lord abides for ever.

Quid diu est, ubi finis est? Hesternum diem nemo revocat: hodiernus crastino urgetur, ut transeat. Ipso parvo spatio bene vivamus, ut illo eamus unde non transeamus. Et modo cum loquimur, utique transimus. Verba currunt, et horae volant; sic aetas nostra, sic actus nostri, sic honores nostri, sic miseria nostra, sic ista felicitas nostra. Totum transit, sed non expavescamus: Verbum Domini manet in aeternum.

Ill deeds thrive not. The slow catches the swift.

οὐκ ἀρετᾷ κακὰ ἔργα· κιχάνει τοι βραδὺς ὠκύν.

Not only can we see how Constantinople and its food appeared to outsiders. Occasionally we are told how outsiders and their food appeared to those of the City. The adventurers of the Fourth Crusade, though overawed by their first view of Constantinople as Geoffroi de Villehardouin described it, succeeded in seizing the city and its empire in 1204. This is how the Byzantine historian Nicetas Choniates describes them. 'They revelled and drank strong wine all day long. Some favoured luxury foods; others recreated their own native dishes, such as an ox rib apiece, or slices of salt pork cooked with beans, and sauces made with garlic or with a combination of other bitter flavours.' To this meticulous author, filled with bitter hatred for the destroyers of the world he had known, we owe a first precious record of that favourite dish of the wild warriors of southern France, cassoulet.

κώμαζόν τε καὶ ἠκρατίζοντο πανημέριοι, οἱ μὲν βρωμάτων μαγγανείαις προσκείμενοι, οἱ δὲ καὶ ὴν πάτριον ἐδωδὴν παρατιθέμενοι ἐπιδείπνιον, ἥτις ἦν νῶτοι βοείων κρεῶν διαχαλώμενοι λέβησι καὶ συῶν τεμάχη ταριχηρὰ κυάμοις ἀλητοῖς συνεψόμενα, ὥσπερ καὶ τὸ ἐκ σκορόδων ἐπέμβαμμά τε καὶ σύνθεμα ἐξ ἄλλων χυμῶν δριμυσσόντων τὴν αἴσθησιν.

Carousing and drinking unmixed wine all day long, some gorged themselves on delicacies, while others ate of their native food: chine of oxen cooked in cauldrons, chunks of pickled hog boiled with ground beans, and a pungent garlic sauce mixed with other seasonings.

That which is sought
can be found; the unheeded thing escapes.

                               τὸ δὲ ζητούμενον
ἁλωτόν, ἐκφεύγει δὲ τἀμελούμενον.

All things may be achieved by care and work.

ἁλωτὰ γίνετ’ ἐπιμελείᾳ καὶ πόνῳ
ἅπαντ’.

[T]he metaphor of the huntsman's quarry lies in the background.

Please just say what the facts of the matter are, and cut out the abuse!

rem potius ipsam dic ac mitte male loqui.

I'll cut out all the abuse: let's just reckon up the facts.

mitto maledicta omnia: / rem ipsam putemus.

By five John Bois had read his Bible through, by six he could write Hebrew, and he learnt Greek.

[....]

Bois thought of studying medicine but, imagining he had every disease of which he read, gave it up. Yet his constitution was strong. He often walked the 20 miles from college to his mother's house for dinner, reading as he walked if he fell in with tedious company. Throughout his life he was careful of his health. He picked and rubbed his teeth so assiduously that, in his biographer Anthony Walker's phrase, 'he carried to his grave almost an Hebrew alphabet of teeth' (Allen, 147), that is, about two-thirds of his teeth. He ate only dinner and supper, with nothing in between except occasional aqua vitae and sugar for wind, and would allow an hour or more for digestion, either sitting or walking. Following three precepts for health from William Whittaker, a master of St John's for whom he wrote a funeral oration, he always studied standing, never studied in a window, and never went to bed with cold feet.

If health was a fetish, study was a passion. Bois frequently worked from four in the morning until eight at night in the university library; even in old age he studied eight hours a day.

[....]

Taking nothing but his Bible into the pulpit, his ambition was always to be understood by all. Although he published nothing of his own, he remained a scholar and a teacher. At Boxworth he established a weekly study circle with eleven or twelve other ministers. He usually kept a scholar to help with his children's education and that of the poorer local children, and he took in children of gentlemen as boarders and students.

Bois's lasting claim to fame is that he alone of the men who worked on the King James Bible made notes on some of the discussions. Though some of the Cambridge fellows were jealous, thinking they needed no help from the country, Bois was appointed in 1604 to the second Cambridge company to work on the Apocrypha.

[....]

Bois was always a note taker and maker. After hearing a sermon, for instance, he would note the date, text, and preacher and much of the content. His notes of the discussions have the same qualities and are personal memoranda on nearly 500 points in the epistles and Revelation: the text at issue is recorded and the discussion of it summarized with occasional references to his own views if they differed from those of his colleagues. They reveal the highly scholarly nature of discussions which characteristically focused on the meaning of the original. His interest is always in the problem rather than the eventual solution adopted for the English of the 1611 Bible.

Air distends empty wine-skins, self-conceit distends men without wisdom.

τοὺς μὲν κενοὺς ἀσκοὺς τὸ πνεῦμα διίστησι, τοὺς δὲ ἀνοήτους ἀνθρώπους τὸ οἴημα.

                                                                   “Grandpa,”
I said, “what do you do, things being like this?” “All you can,”
He said, looking off through treetops, skyward. “Love
Your wife, love your get, keep your word, and
If need arises, die for what men die for. There aren’t
Many choices.
And remember that truth doesn’t always live in the number of voices.”

Wenn die Leute fragen, wenn die Leute fragen,
wenn die Leute fragen: „Lebt der Hecker noch?“
Könnt ihr ihnen sagen, könnt ihr ihnen sagen,
Könnt ihr Ihnen sagen: „Ja, er lebet noch.“

Er hängt an keinem Baum, und er hängt an keinem Strick,
er hängt an seinem Traum von der freien Republik.
Er hängt an keinem Baum, und er hängt an keinem Strick,
Er hängt an seinem Traum von der freien Republik.

An den Darm der Pfaffen, an den Darm der Pfaffen,
an den Darm der Pfaffen hängt den Edelmann.
Laßt ihn dran erschlaffen, laßt ihn dran erschlaffen,
laßt ihn dran erschlaffen, hängt ihn drauf und dran.

Ja, dreiunddreißig Jahre währt die Sauerei,
wir sind keine Knechte, wir sind alle frei.
Ja, dreiunddreißig Jahre währt die Sauerei,
wir sind keine Knechte, wir sind alle frei.

Schmiert die Guillotine, schmiert die Guillotine,
schmiert die Guillotine mit Tyrannenfett!
Reißt die Konkubine, reisst die Konkubine,
reißt die Konkubine aus dem Pfaffenbett!

Fürstenblut muß fließen, Fürstenblut muß fließen,
Fürstenblut muß fließen, fließen stiefeldick!
Und daraus ersprießen, und daraus ersprießen,
und daraus ersprieß'n die freie Republik.

Ja, hunderttausend Jahre währt die Knechtschaft schon,
nieder mit den Hunden von der Reaktion.
Ja, hunderttausend Jahre währt die Knechtschaft schon,
Nieder mit den Hunden von der Reaktion.

When the people ask, when the people ask,
when the people ask, "Is Hecker still alive?"
You can tell them, you can tell them,
you can tell them, "Yes, he's still alive."

He's not hanging from a tree, he's not hanging from a rope,
he's hanging onto his dream of a free republic.
He's not hanging from a tree, he's not hanging from a rope,
he's hanging onto his dream of a free republic.

On the guts of clergy, on the guts of clergy,
on the guts of clergy hangs the nobleman.
Let him droop there, let him droop there,
let him droop there, hang him right away.

Yes, for thirty-three years the filth has lasted,
we are not slaves, we are all free.
Yes, for thirty-three years the filth has lasted,
we are not slaves, we are all free.

Grease the guillotine, grease the guillotine,
grease the guillotine with tyrant's fat!
Yank the concubine, yank the concubine,
yank the concubine out of the priest's bed!

The blood of princes must flow, the blood of princes must flow,
The blood of princes must flow, flow high as a boot!
And from it sprout, and from it sprout,
and from it sprout the free republic.

Yes, the servitude has already lasted a hundred thousand years,
down with the reactionary dogs.
Yes, the servitude has already lasted a hundred thousand years,
down with the reactionary dogs.

X:1
T: Heckerlied
K:Eb
M:4/4
L:1/8
Q:120
E>EEEE2B,2 | G>GGGG2E2 | B>BBB cBAG | F2B2B2z2 |
E>EEEE2B,2 | G>GGGG2E2 | B>BBB cBAG | F2B2B2B2 |
|: EEEEE2zG | BBBBB2zB | BBBBB2BB | BAGFE2z2 :|
E>EEEE2B,2 | G>GGGG2E2 | B>BBB cBAG | F2B2B2z2 |
E>EEEE2B,2 | G>GGGG2E2 | B>BBB cBAG | F2B2B2B2 |
|: EEEEE2zG | BBBBB2zB | BBBBB2BB | FBAGFE2z2 :|

1. Start with primary material and trust your instincts. This is the origin of your original contribution. If you jump too quickly into the secondary literature, it is easy to get lost in a sea of δόξα.

2. Make lists and folders of possible topics based on these insights, observations, and questions that arise in your reading and teaching. You never know when your καιρός will come.

3. Make commitments. Submit abstracts. Give talks. As I mentioned, abstracts and handouts are wonderful tools to sharpen thinking. In fact, for some topics, I begin with the handout, which, like arranging images for an archaeology lecture, provides a clear outline of the subject.

4. Summon up all of your fortitude and faith when facing the initial write-up. It takes guts, but there is no better means to clarify your ideas and insights than presenting them in writing. It takes nothing less than a leap of faith to believe that a convincing argument will eventually result.

5. Don't try to get everything exactly right the first time; it is impossible and may bring on self-defeating perfectionism. Don't try to paint a Sistine Chapel; you cannot create a vast masterpiece. Just get as many of your relevant ideas down in writing as best you can.

6. Get help. Check with knowledgeable people to make sure you are not inadvertently duplicating what has been done and to help you locate your work in the wider scholarship. They also can help you focus and cut—or delegate to footnotes—distracting material, however brilliant it may seem to you.

7. Submit your best effort, not the last word. Make sure, however, that the copy is clean, with absolutely no typos, misspelled titles, garbled references, or incorrect Greek or Latin. Whatever else we may be, we are also philologists, responsible for accurate knowledge of these languages. If you can, get proofreading from two sources: 1) a good general reader to check its readability; 2) an expert to catch the inevitable technical slips.

8. Be grateful for the feedback of referees and editors. In the 25 years I have been publishing, I have been treated very strictly, but fairly, by referees and editors. Sure, there have been (from my perspective) mistakes, misunderstandings, and certainly hurt feelings. Occasionally, a referee was harsher than necessary or simply dyspeptic. But, overall, this system of blind refereeing has done more than any other thing to sharpen my work, clarify my thought, and challenge me to do better.

9. If an editor gives you the opportunity to revise, take it! Meet the referees at least half way. Say no when you have to, but explain why. Provide a full bill of particulars to the editor. If the door is opened, go through it. I have never regretted following referees' advice as far as I could and have been very well served by their hours of hard work, difficult as it was to face their often dispiriting critiques. Many times I have found that the solution to a criticism simply involved dropping a point or stating it more clearly.

10. The path to publication is long. There are many setbacks and revisions. Do not be discouraged. Even a full professor submitting an article to a refereed journal risks the same rejection you do and, believe me, takes rejection hard.

Stretch your minds, please, help my poverty of language. Whatever I am able to say, listen to it; whatever I am not able to say, think it. Who can grasp a Word that abides? All our words make a noise, and are gone. Who can grasp a Word that abides, except someone who abides in it? Do you want to grasp the Word that abides? Don't follow the river of the flesh.

This flesh is indeed a stream, because it does not abide. Human beings are born, as from some hidden spring of nature, they live, they die; we do not know where they come from, and we do not know where they are going. The water is hidden until it issues from the spring; it flows openly in the river; but again it hides itself in the sea. Let us not think highly of this stream that bubbles up, flows, ceases; let us not think very highly of it.

Extendite corda vestra, adiuvate paupertatem sermonis nostri. Quod dicere potuero, audite; quod non potuero, cogitate. Quis comprehendat Verbum manens? Omnia verba nostra sonant et transeunt. Quis comprehendat Verbum manens, nisi qui in ipso manet? Vis comprehendere Verbum manens? Noli sequi flumen carnis.

Caro quippe ista fluvius est; non enim manet. Tamquam de fonte quodam secreto naturae nascuntur homines, vivunt homines, moriuntur homines; nec unde veniant novimus, nec quo eant novimus. Latet aqua, donec progrediatur ex fonte; currit et apparet in flumine; sed rursus latet in mari. Contemnamus fluvium istum manantem, currentem, desinentem, contemnamus.

For warlike men are a city's tower.

ἄνδρες γὰρ πόληος πύργος ἀρεύιοι.

Atossa
Is then the city of Athens not yet despoiled?
Messenger
No, while her men still live, her ramparts are impregnable.

Ἄτοσσα
ἔτ᾽ ἆρ᾽ Ἀθηνῶν ἔστ᾽ ἀπόρθητος πόλις;
Ἄγγελος
ἀνδρῶν γὰρ ὄντων ἕρκος ἐστὶν ἀσφαλές.

Since a tower or a ship is nothing
if empty of men living together inside.

ὡς οὐδέν ἐστιν οὔτε πύργος οὔτε ναῦς
ἔρημος ἀνδρῶν μὴ ξυνοικούντων ἔσω.

It is men that make a city, not walls or ships empty of men.

ἄνδρες γὰρ πόλις, καὶ οὐ τείχη οὐδὲ νῆες ἀνδρῶν κεναί.

With these thoughts in my mind, I was speeding with the train toward Buffalo, when, near that city, the sight of a workman doing something on the dizzy edge of a sky-scaling iron construction brought me to my senses very suddenly. And now I perceived, by a flash of insight, that I had been steeping myself in pure ancestral blindness, and looking at life with the eyes of a remote spectator. Wishing for heroism and the spectacle of human nature on the rack, I had never noticed the great fields of heroism lying round about me, I had failed to see it present and alive. I could only think of it as dead and embalmed, labelled and costumed, as it is in the pages of romance. And yet there it was before me in the daily lives of the laboring classes. Not in clanging fights and desperate marches only is heroism to be looked for, but on every railway bridge and fire-proof building that is going up to-day. On freight-trains, on the decks of vessels, in cattle-yards and mines, on lumber-rafts, among the firemen and the policemen, the demand for courage is incessant; and the supply never fails. There, every day of the year somewhere, is human nature in extremis for you. And wherever a scythe, an axe, a pick, or a shovel is wielded, you have it sweating and aching and with its powers of patient endurance racked to the utmost under the length of hours of the strain.

As I awoke to all this unidealized heroic life around me, the scales seemed to fall from my eyes; and a wave of sympathy greater than anything I had ever before felt with the common life of common men began to fill my soul. It began to seem as if virtue with horny hands and dirty skin were the only virtue genuine and vital enough to take account of. Every other virtue poses; none is absolutely unconscious and simple, and unexpectant of decoration or recognition, like this. These are our soldiers, thought I, these our sustainers, these the very parents of our life.

Herkunft unklar.

Aucune étymologie.

What does he lack of the so-called blessings of human life—
parents, a secure fatherland, friends, family, relatives, wealth?

quid relicuist quin habeat quae quidem in homine dicuntur bona?
parentis, patriam incolumem, amicos, genus, cognatos, ditias.

Socrates used to say that if in the theatre there were an announcement asking for the shoemakers to stand up, they and only they would do so. So with the bronze-smiths, the weavers and all the other professional groups. But if the announcement were 'Will the intelligent, or the honest, people present stand up?' the whole theatre would rise. The greatest damage is done by the fact that the majority think that they are intelligent and are not.

Σωκράτης ἔλεγεν, εἴ τις ἐν θεάτρῳ ὑποκηρύττοι ἀνίστασθαι τοὺς σκυτοτόμους, ἐκείνους μόνους ἀναστήσεσθαι, ὁμοίως εἰ τοὺς χαλκοτύπους, τοὺς ὑφάντας, τοὺς ἄλλους κατὰ γένος· εἰ δὲ τοὺς φρονίμους ἢ δικαίους, πάντας ἀναστήσεσθαι. καὶ ἔστιν ἐν βίῳ βλάπτον μάλιστα τὸ ἀνοήτους ὄντας τοὺς πολλοὺς οἴεσθαι φρονίμους εἶναι.

Just now the reading of the gospel reminded us of a great and divine mystery. Saint John, you see, belched forth this beginning of the gospel, because he had drunk it in from the Lord's own breast.²

2. Once more we must remind ourselves that fourth century Roman and North African sensibilities were not those of twentieth century middle class Europe and North America.

Modo nos admonuit evangelicum capitulum, magnum divinumque secretum. Hoc enim principium Evangelii sanctus Ioannes ructuavit, quia de pectore Domini bibit.

What preaching! What a belching forth of the rich nourishment of the Lord's breast!

O praedicare! O saginam Dominici pectoris eructuare!

• Belching of John the Evangelist
• A Sign of Appreciation
• Who Are We to Demur?

I am not bad in any of the contests where men strive.
I know well how to handle the polished bow, and would be        215
first to strike my man with an arrow aimed at a company
of hostile men, even though many companions were standing
close beside me, and all shooting with bows at the enemies.
There was Philoktetes alone who surpassed me in archery
when we Achaians shot with bows in the Trojan country.        220
But I will say that I stand far out ahead of all others
such as are living mortals now and feed on the earth. Only
I will not set myself against men of the generations
before, not with Herakles nor Eurytos of Oichalia,
who set themselves against the immortals with the bow, and therefore        225
great Eurytos died suddenly nor came to an old age
in his own mansions, since Apollo in anger against him
killed him, because he had challenged Apollo in archery. I can
throw with the spear as far as another casts with an arrow.

πάντα γὰρ οὐ κακός εἰμι, μετ᾽ ἀνδράσιν ὅσσοι ἄεθλοι·
εὖ μὲν τόξον οἶδα ἐύξοον ἀμφαφάασθαι·        215
πρῶτός κ᾽ ἄνδρα βάλοιμι ὀιστεύσας ἐν ὁμίλῳ
ἀνδρῶν δυσμενέων, εἰ καὶ μάλα πολλοὶ ἑταῖροι
ἄγχι παρασταῖεν καὶ τοξαζοίατο φωτῶν.
οἶος δή με Φιλοκτήτης ἀπεκαίνυτο τόξῳ
δήμῳ ἔνι Τρώων, ὅτε τοξαζοίμεθ᾽ Ἀχαιοί.        220
τῶν δ᾽ ἄλλων ἐμέ φημι πολὺ προφερέστερον εἶναι,
ὅσσοι νῦν βροτοί εἰσιν ἐπὶ χθονὶ σῖτον ἔδοντες.
ἀνδράσι δὲ προτέροισιν ἐριζέμεν οὐκ ἐθελήσω,
οὔθ᾽ Ἡρακλῆι οὔτ᾽ Εὐρύτῳ Οιχαλιῆι,
οἵ ῥα καὶ ἀθανάτοισιν ἐρίζεσκον περὶ τόξων.        225
τῷ ῥα καὶ αἶψ᾽ ἔθανεν μέγας Εὔρυτος, οὐδ᾽ ἐπὶ γῆρας
ἵκετ᾽ ἐνὶ μεγάροισι: χολωσάμενος γὰρ Ἀπόλλων
ἔκτανεν, οὕνεκά μιν προκαλίζετο τοξάζεσθαι.
δουρὶ δ᾽ ἀκοντίζω ὅσον οὐκ ἄλλος τις ὀιστῷ.

Odysseus claims to be outstanding as an archer. Despite 216-20, nowhere in Il. does Odysseus fight with the bow (at 10.260 he borrows, but does not use, that of Meriones), and he takes no part in the archery contest in the Funeral Games. Indeed few characters in the Il. use that weapon, which was evidently despised by the true hero; cf. Il. 11.385-90, and see Lorimer 289-301, Stanford, Ulysses theme 16, 71, Bond on Eur. HF 161. We need not conclude that the present passage presupposes a different, and perhaps earlier, tradition from that which underlies the Il. (Page 157-8, Hölscher, Epos 67-72), though, for all we know, Odysseus may have appeared as an archer in other versions of the story; cf. 9.156, 10.262. For Woodhouse 157, 184-5 Odysseus as an archer is a figure of folk-tale, as opposed to the Odysseus of saga. But with the climax of the poem already in mind H. may have attributed to him here a skill that is quite untraditional, at least in the context of Troy.

Chremes, do you have so much free time from your own business that you concern yourself with other people's affairs when they have nothing to do with you?

Chreme, tantumne ab re tuast oti tibi
aliena ut cures ea quae nil ad te attinent?

• Let's Stop Somebody from Doing Something!
• Right Thinkers
• Foolish
• A Prying Busybody of a God
• Against Busybodies and Nosey Parkers
• Recipe for a Happy Life
• Most Hateful of All Names
• Mind Your Own Business
• Our Masters
• Omnipotent Moral Busybodies
• Minding Other People's Business
• Seeking to Make All the World Like Himself
• A Prying Busybody

They stare from daguerreotype with severe reprehension,
Or from genuine oil, and you'd never guess any pain
In those merciless eyes that now remark our own time's sad declension.

Fools and madmen! No
concern for your own lives at all? No sense
to realize that you are not merely near
the deadliest danger, but in its very midst?

ὦ πλεῖστα μῶροι καὶ φρενῶν τητώμενοι,
πότερα παρ᾽ οὐδὲν τοῦ βίου κήδεσθ᾽ ἔτι
ἢ νοῦς ἔνεστιν οὔτις ὑμὶν ἐγγενής,
ὅτ᾽ οὐ παρ᾽ αὐτοῖς, ἀλλ᾽ ἐν αὐτοῖσιν κακοῖς
τοῖσιν μεγίστοις ὄντες οὐ γιγνώσκετε;        1330

1329 αὐτοῖς codd.: ἄκροις Dawe, Diggle

Another Greek-speaking archaeologist called to the camouflaged colours of MI(R) in May 1940 was Nicholas Hammond, a don from Cambridge. He and [John] Pendlebury were sent off on a rushed course in explosives, which became Hammond's speciality: an unlikely qualification for a future headmaster of Clifton and professor of Greek. Hammond was an expert on Epirus and Albania. In London, before their departure, Pendlebury insisted — more in playfulness than paranoia — that as a security measure they should always converse on the telephone in Greek: Hammond in Epirotic dialect and Pendlebury in Cretan.

One that can lie beside some pretty she
and buy two pots of Lesbian liquor, he
is the Wise Man and gets what's called The Good.

ἐξὸν γυναῖκ᾽ ἔχοντα κατακεῖσθαι καλὴν
καὶ Λεσβίου χυτρῖδε λαμβάνειν δύο,
ὁ φρόνιμος <οὗτός> ἐστι, τοῦτο τἀγαθόν.

3 οὗτός add. Kaibel

The land rejoices in the name.

gaudet cognomine terra.

terra Seru. (qui recte cognomine ablatiuum ex adiectiuo ‘cognominis’ interpretatus est: scil. gaudet Palinurus de terra eodem nomine appellata): terrae codd., Non. 378, 17, Tib.

He rejoices in the land called-after-him.

John D. Moore (died 1808), father of
John D. Moore Jr. (1768-1837), father of
Elizabeth A. Moore (1797-1847), mother of
John B. Wagner (1819-1862), father of
Emily M. Wagner (1842-1913), mother of
Elmer B. Gilleland (1864-1941), father of
Roy E. Gilleland (1886-1941), my grandfather

To get the point I'm making, dearly beloved, set before your eyes two people. There was a careless little boy wanting to sit where they knew there was a snake lurking in the grass. If he sat there, he would be bitten and die. The two people knew this. One said, "Don't sit there"; the child ignored him; he jolly well will go and sit there, go and perish. The other said, "This kid refuses to listen to us; we must speak severely to him, grab him, drag him away, give him a good slap; we must do whatever we can to avert the destruction of a human being." The first said, "Leave him alone, don't hit him, don't hurt him, don't harm him."

Which of these two is really kind? The one who spares him, to die of snake-bite, or the one who's rough with him, so that a human being is saved?

Constituite vobis, carissimi, ante oculos, ut planius intellegatis quod loquor, homines duo. Puerulus quilibet incautus volebat sedere, ubi noverant in gramine latere serpentem. Si sederet, morderetur, et moreretur: noverant hoc homines duo. Ait unus: Noli ibi sedere. Contemptus est; ibit sedere, ibit perire. Ait alter: Non vult nos iste audire; corripiendus, tenendus, avellendus, colapho est percutiendus: quidquid possumus faciamus, ne hominem perdamus. Ait alius: Dimitte, noli ferire, noli offendere, noli laedere.

Quis horum misericors? Parcens, ut homo a serpente moriatur; an saeviens, ut homo liberetur?

Occasionally, however, a different method is adopted of alluding to the wealth and variety of food served at a meal: through the representation of its debris. The type of mosaic known as asarotos oikos, or 'unswept room', goes back to a Hellenistic conceit devised, as Pliny tells us, by the mosaicist Sosos at Pergamon.⁶⁵ This original itself is lost, but a handful of later mosaics imitate or adapt the concept, the earliest of the first century BC.

65. Plin. HN 36.184.

• Ehud Fathy, "The asarotos oikos Mosaic as an Elite Status Symbol," Potestas. Revista de Estudios del Mundo Clásico e Historia del Arte 10 (2017) 5-30
• Joshua J. Thomas, Art, Science, and the Natural World in the Ancient Mediterranean, 300 BC to AD 100 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021), pp. 191-197 ("Sosos's Unswept Room")
• Ehud Fathy, "In the Guise of the Popular: the Deceptive Image of the asarotos oikos Mosaics," Eikón Imago 11 (2022) 31-46

'Well, when the weather, sir,' he said, 'is fair.
When there's no wind or movement in the air,
Then have a cart-wheel brought into this hall,
But see the spokes are fitted — twelve in all,
A cartwheel has twelve spokes — then, by and by,
Bring me twelve friars. You will ask me why?
Well, thirteen make a convent, as I guess,
And this confessor here, for worthiness,
Shall bring the number to thirteen, my lord.
Then they shall all kneel down with one accord;
To each spoke's end a friar, I propose,
Shall very seriously lay his nose.
Your excellent confessor, whom God save,
Shall put his nose right up under the nave,
And then the churl, with belly stiff and taut
As drum or tabor, hither shall be brought,
Set on the wheel thus taken from the cart
Above the nave, and made to let a fart.
Then you will see, as surely as I live,
And by a proof that is demonstrative,
That equally the sound of it will wend,
Together with the stink, to the spokes' end,
Save that this worthy friar, your confessor,
Being of great honour, they of lesser,
Shall have the first-fruits, as is only right.
A noble custom, in which friars unite,
Is that a worthy man should first be served
And certainly it will be well-deserved.
Today his preaching did us so much good,
Being beneath the pulpit where he stood,
That I'd allow him, if it fell to me,
First smell of every fart, say up to three,
And so would all his convent I am sure,
His bearing is so holy, fair and pure.'

"My lord," quod he, "whan that the weder is fair,
Withouten wynd or perturbynge of air,        590
Lat brynge a cartwheel heere into this halle;
But looke that it have his spokes alle, —
Twelve spokes hath a cartwheel comunly.
And bryng me thanne twelve freres. Woot ye why?
For thrittene is a covent, as I gesse.        595
Youre confessour heere, for his worthynesse,
Shal parfoune up the nombre of his covent,
Thanne shal they knele doun, by oon assent,
And to every spokes ende, in this manere,
Ful sadly leye his nose shal a frere.        600
Youre noble confessour — there God hym save! —
Shal holde his nose upright under the nave.
Thanne shal this cherl, with bely stif and toght
As any tabour, hyder been ybroght;
And sette hym on the wheel right of this cart.        605
Upon the nave, and make hym lete a fart.
And ye shul seen, up peril of my lyf,
By preeve which that is demonstratif,
That equally the soun of it wol wende,
And eke the stynk, unto the spokes ende.        610
Save that this worthy man, youre confessour,
By cause he is a man of greet honour,
Shal have the firste fruyt, as resoun is.
The noble usage of freres yet is this,
The worthy men of hem shul first be served;        615
And certeinly he hath it well disserved.
He hath to-day taught us so muche good
With prechyng in the pulpit the he stood,
That I may vouche sauf, I sey for me,
He hadde the firste smel of fartes thre;        620
And so wolde al his covent hardily,
He bereth hym so faire and hoolily."

Labels: noctes scatologicae

[1] Here is another incident that is supposed to have taken place at the time. In fleeing from Greece, Xerxes bequeathed his paraphernalia to Mardonius. The story goes that when Pausanias saw all these things, fitted out with gold and silver and embroidered hangings, he told Mardonius' bakers and chefs to prepare the kind of meal they had made for Mardonius.

[2] They did so, and then, when he saw the gold and silver couches with their fine coverings, the gold and silver tables, and the magnificent feast, he was amazed at all the good things spread out there and, for a joke, he told his own servants to prepare a typical Laconian meal.

[3] When the food was ready, Pausanias was amused to see the huge difference between the two meals, and he sent for the Greek commanders. Once they were all there, he pointed to the two meals and said, 'Men of Greece, my purpose in asking you all here is to show you just how stupid the Persian king is. Look at the way he lives, and then consider that he invaded our country to rob us of our meagre portions!' That is what Pausanias is supposed to have said to the commanders of the Greek forces.

[1] λέγεται δὲ καὶ τάδε γενέσθαι, ὡς Ξέρξης φεύγων ἐκ τῆς Ἑλλάδος Μαρδονίῳ τὴν κατασκευὴν καταλίποι τὴν ἑωυτοῦ· Παυσανίην ὦν ὁρῶντα τὴν Μαρδονίου κατασκευὴν χρυσῷ τε καὶ ἀργύρῳ καὶ παραπετάσμασι ποικίλοισι κατεσκευασμένην, κελεῦσαι τούς τε ἀρτοκόπους καὶ τοὺς ὀψοποιοὺς κατὰ ταὐτὰ καθὼς Μαρδονίῳ δεῖπνον παρασκευάζειν.

[2] ὡς δὲ κελευόμενοι οὗτοι ἐποίευν ταῦτα, ἐνθαῦτα τὸν Παυσανίην ἰδόντα κλίνας τε χρυσέας καὶ ἀργυρέας εὖ ἐστρωμένας καὶ τραπέζας τε χρυσέας καὶ ἀργυρέας καὶ παρασκευὴν μεγαλοπρεπέα τοῦ δείπνου, ἐκπλαγέντα τὰ προκείμενα ἀγαθὰ κελεῦσαι ἐπὶ γέλωτι τοὺς ἑωυτοῦ διηκόνους παρασκευάσαι Λακωνικὸν δεῖπνον.

[3] ὡς δὲ τῆς θοίνης ποιηθείσης ἦν πολλὸν τὸ μέσον, τὸν Παυσανίην γελάσαντα μεταπέμψασθαι τῶν Ἑλλήνων τοὺς στρατηγούς, συνελθόντων δὲ τούτων εἰπεῖν τὸν Παυσανίην, δεικνύντα ἐς ἑκατέρην τοῦ δείπνου παρασκευήν, "ἄνδρες Ἕλληνες, τῶνδε εἵνεκα ἐγὼ ὑμέας συνήγαγον, βουλόμενος ὑμῖν τοῦδε τοῦ Μήδων ἡγεμόνος τὴν ἀφροσύνην δέξαι, ὃς τοιήνδε δίαιταν ἔχων ἦλθε ἐς ἡμέας οὕτω ὀϊζυρὴν ἔχοντας ἀπαιρησόμενος." ταῦτα μὲν Παυσανίην λέγεται εἰπεῖν πρὸς τοὺς στρατηγοὺς τῶν Ἑλλήνων.

Better is due measure in all things.

ἀμείνω δ᾽ αἴσιμα πάντα.

That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying,
I will open my mouth in parables;
I will utter things which have been kept secret from the foundation of the world.

ὅπως πληρωθῇ τὸ ῥηθὲν διὰ τοῦ προφήτου λέγοντος·
Ἀνοίξω ἐν παραβολαῖς τὸ στόμα μου,
ἐρεύξομαι κεκρυμμένα ἀπὸ καταβολῆς [κόσμου].

13.35 ἀπὸ καταβολῆς [κόσμου] {C}

It can be argued that the shorter reading, attested by representative witnesses of the Alexandrian, Western, and Eastern types of text, was original, and that κόσμου was added by scribes from 25.34, where the text is firm.

On the other hand, since the preponderance of the external evidence was taken to support the inclusion of κόσμου, a majority of the Committee was reluctant to drop the word from the text entirely and therefore decided to enclose it within square brackets.

I think that the other interesting word, necessary to understand what Matthew is doing in 13:35 with ἐρεύγεσθαι, is καταβολή. My earlier translation of the verse ["I will belch/vomit up hidden things from the stuffing down"] wasn't all in jest, and "stuffing down" has some reasoning behind it.

Beginning with semitic Greek, καταβολή only occurs once in the LXX (meaning foundation there, presumably a buried gravel type for a house), but shows up in Philo frequently with the meaning of laying down (sowing) seed. This meaning only occurs once in the New Testament, at Heb. 11:11, referring to Sarah's pregnancy.

In the NT, καταβολή picks up a new usage with the frequent Christian phrase "καταβολὴ κόσμου" referring to the "foundation of the world". Again, remember that this usage dates from an age where foundations are buried gravel, and that the base meaning continues to be related. This phrase is so frequent in the NT that "κόσμου" even gets tacked on to Matthew 13:35 by the copist of Codex Vaticanus. Despite the phrase apparently not having any pre-Christian foundation [pun], καταβολὴ κόσμου is used by various authors of compositionally separate parts of the NT: Matthew, Luke, the John of the Gospel, Paul, the Hebrews author, Peter, and the John of Apocalypse. The phrase would therefore seem to date to the pre-NT early Christian community's shared vocabulary.

But Matthew 13:35 isn't καταβολή κόσμου, it's just καταβολή. And you can see why Matthew has chosen the word. It's highly alliterative to παραβολή earlier in the verse, where he does not update the LXX translation. And παραβολή is a rarer and more functional word prior to Matthew's (together with the other evangelists) popularizing of the term, causing the κατα- to rather contrast the παρα- in Matthew's translation. And καταβολή, whether indicating the creation through a buried gravel "foundation" or by an initial laying down or burying seed, is the perfect word to sharply highlight the "eruption" signalled by ἐρεύγεσθαι. Matthew has turned a Psalm about ancient secrets being uttered into a verse that poetically describes Jesus as personally causing hidden buried things to erupt, making it another example of the resurrection imagery the early Christians liked to see in the OT.

The punishment should come at once to all
who who would act outside the laws—
death. Then crime would not abound!

χρῆν δ᾽ εὐθὺς εἶναι τήνδε τοῖς πᾶσιν δίκην,
ὅστις πέρα πράσσειν τι τῶν νόμων θέλει,
κτείνειν· τὸ γὰρ πανοῦργον οὐκ ἂν ἦν πολύ.

"Most modern readers find these lines intolerably flat, and Dindorf cut them out as an interpolation; but there is no strong objection to them on the score of style or language . . . a little more weight attaches to the absence from tragedy apart from 1505 of the use of εὐθύς that is found in the phrase εὐθὺς ἀπ' ἀρχῆς:. . . An editor has a duty to signal doubt, but the grounds for excision seem to us not quite strong enough to compel us to place the lines between brackets, as Dawe does . . . " (Sophoclea). I find such an approach a model of caution in murky waters. There is one questionable use of language which seems to have gone unnoticed, namely τοῖς πᾶσιν as antecedent to ὅστις. Kaibel remarks ad loc.: "An den Plural τοῖς πᾶσιν schliesst sich in bekannter Weise der Singular an (z. B. Eur. El. 934)," and that, of course, is perfectly correct. Jebb also cites a few parallels; for the sense construction see further K.-G. 1:56-57. However, the normal combinations are πᾶς ὅστις and πάντες ὅσοι. See LSJ s.v. ὅστις I ad fin.: " . . . in Trag. and Att. sts. strengthd. by an antec. πᾶς, but only in sg., ἅπας δὲ τραχὺς ὅ. ἂν νέον κρατῇ A. Pr. 35, cf. Th. 8.90 (πάντες ὅσοι being commonly used in pl., not πάντες οἵτινες; but πᾶσιν . . . ὅστις ἐρωτᾷ IG I².410)." There are several prose examples of a plural form of πᾶς followed by a singular form of ὅστις: Thuc. 7.29.4 πάντας ἑξῆς, ὅτῳ ἐντύχοιεν . . ., Xen. Cyr. 5.3.50 πάντας . . . ὅτῳ τι προστάττοι, 8.2.25 παρεῖχε πάντα ὅτου ἔδει. (IG, loc. cit., is a hexameter verse from an elegiac couplet.) Thus the sequence . . . πᾶσιν . . . ὅστις, while not unparalleled, is unusual and, so far as I know, it would be unique in tragedy. However what we actually find here is not πᾶσιν . . . ὅστις, but τοῖς πᾶσιν . . . ὅστις. That sequence, article and all, is absolutely unique, and, to my ear at least, inelegant. Can it really be Sophoclean?

However, sometimes Avarice does have some sort of excuse for refusing to spend generously on the poor from its abundant resources, trifling though it may be and quite unacceptable and objectionable to the ears of the faithful. She says to herself, you see, "If I give something away, I won't have it myself, and by giving a lot away I will be in need myself, and later on I will be looking for someone whom I myself can receive things from. I simply have to have a lot, not only for food and clothing and my house and family, but also to stand me in good stead, for example, to pay off a blackmailer, to have the means of buying my way out of a jam. Human life is a very chancy business; I must save up for myself against a rainy day."

Sed aliquando, etsi nugatoriam et improbandam et respuendam ab auribus fidelium, tamen habet aliquam excusationem avaritia nolens erogare pauperi ex eo quod abundat. Dicit enim sibi: Si dedero, non habebo; et multum dando, egebo: et postea requiram, a quo et ipse accipiam. Debet mihi abundare, non solum ad victum et tegumentum, et domui meae et familiae meae, sed etiam propter bonos casus, ut habeam quod calumniatori impendam, ut habeam unde redimam: casibus plenae sunt res humanae; debeo mihi servare, unde me possim liberare.

In thy foul throat thou liest.

All things in human life age naturally
and reach an end of their appointed time,
except it seems for shamelessness alone.
The more the race of mortals is increased,
the more she becomes greater day by day.

ἅπαντ’ ἐν ἀνθρώποισι γηράσκειν ἔφυ
καὶ πρὸς τελευτὴν ἔρχεται τακτοῦ χρόνου,
πλὴν, ὡς ἔοικε, τῆς ἀναιδείας μόνον.
αὕτη δ’ ὅσῳπερ αὔξεται θνητῶν γένος,
τοσῷδε μείζων γίγνεται καθ’ ἡμέραν.        5

2 τακτοῦ Buecheler: τὰ τοῦ codd. Stobaei 3.32.14
3 μόνον codd.: μόνης Meineke