Plato's Homer

Author(s): George M. Bolling

Source: The American Journal of Philology, Vol. 76, No. 1 (1955), pp. 82-85
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/291709
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82 JAMES W. POULTNEY.

b
b 27
27can
canonly
only
be accusatives
be accusatives
in apposition
in apposition
with t(e)io andwith
must t(e)io
be
beininthe
thesame
same
sentence
sentence
with thewith
wordsthe
preceding.
words Possibly
preceding.
the P
natural word order would be *teio subocau Dei Graboui suboco
'thee I invoke Jupiter Grabovius (as) the one invoked,' suboco
being placed before the deity's name for the sake of the figura
etymologica.
JAMES W. POULTNEY.
THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY.

PLATO'S HOMER.

L'Homere de Platon by Jules Labarbe (1949) was publ

too late for use in the preparation of my Ilias Athenie
(1950). It is an impressive volume; and if I ever pre
revised edition of my Ilias, I shall study it to see if I ca
reason for some changes in the wording of its text. That w
if at all, far in the future. Meanwhile I will take note of
another problem, less extensive but more important-the ques-
tion of the numerus versuum.
Thus my interest in Plato is at the moment strictly limited.
What I am seeking to learn from him is the numerus versuum
in the 5/4th century manuscript(s) that he used. For this
Plato is-naturally enough-a bad witness. He had, of course,
no interest in broadcasting such information. He does not
testify often; and when he is on the stand, he sometimes leaves
us uninformed on this point, or at least without information
definite enough to be utilized by an editor of Homer.
Labarbe's treatment of the problem rests on a postulate which
he does not state. Such procedure is always dangerous. The
risk is that one may fall himself-and lead others-into the
trap of believing that what he has asked to be conceded without
proof has been established by some proof or other.
I will state the postulate: bar one inherited haplographic
blunder (saute du meme au meme) Plato's manuscript(s) of
the Iliad agreed line for line with Aristarchus. Some may fancy
that I should say with the medieval manuscripts. That would
be a fault, cf. the quotation from Wilamowitz in Ext. Ev. 42,
and for the general principle, the clear statement in P. Maas,
Textlcritik2 (1950), p. 14: "wahrend doch 100 Handschriften,

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 PLATO'S HOMER. 83

die auf eine zuriickgehen, weniger Gewicht haben als

und nicht mehr Gewicht haben als eine die nicht auf
zuriickgeht." I would not be justified in imputing th
Labarbe without a more extended study of his work
time to make.
Among the passages to be considered I take up first those
about which two and only two things are known: each was in
the edition of Aristarchus, and it is not in Plato.
Plato paraphrases A29, 30, 32. Labarbe is (p. 357) of the
opinion that Plato chose to say nothing of verse 31. It is obvious
that Plato had no choice in the matter unless line 31 was before
him. Of that there is not the slightest indication.
Plato quotes I, 308-10, 312 f. Labarbe (pp. 50-3) pushes the
cause of the omission further back. If a forebear of Plato's
MS read:

310 Wa7rep s8 Kpav&) Tre KTX. (as Plato quotes)

311 (s l,u .Luo Tpvgre KrX. (as Aristarchus reads)
there would have been a temptation to haplography-and a cor-
rupt text could have reached Plato. There is the same trouble
here: there is no indication of the existence of I, 311 at the
time assumed.

Plato quotes I, 496-7, 499-501. Labarbe (p. 150) explains

that Plato has chosen to omit line 498. Again it is a mere as-
sumption that the line was before Plato to give him a choice
in the matter.
There are a couple of places in which the known facts are
more: a line is in Aristarchus; it is not visible in Plato; Plato
has something else (more or less) equivalent.
2 528 (Labarbe, pp. 274-81) is the simpler of the two. Aris-
tarchus read:

527 8oLol yap TE 7rtoL0 KaraKelaTat Ev Atos OVESL

528 Swpo)v ota 8t8W0r KaK(OV, cTepog 6E EaXDV.

For the second line Plato reads:

Kr)pWV i7ra?tOLt, o6 {uv E'oAkV, avT'ap o ?LACXv.

Labarbe accepts the fact of the variant reading, and that (not
what is to be done with it) is all that is of concern at present.
With , 293 begins a scene which Plato condemns as unsuit-

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84 GEORGE M. BOLLING.

able for a young man to hear. His final objection is t

putting into the mouth of Zeus a couplet addressed to He
is not quoted, but paraphrased. Put back into the poetic
it reads:
ou' TE TO Trp(rTv Irep E tolyoIle' ev (Xo'riA rL
elS EVV;7V (fOtTWVTfE LtXA0ovs XOOVTrE TOKrjas.

The couplet is not in Aristarchus, so there is not here line by

line agreement between him and Plato. The least possible
divergence will be secured by assuming that in Plato's manu-
script the couplet stood before E 328. Thirty years ago I saw
that and could not see a possibility of going farther. Since then
I have learned to see better, but that is not relevant to the
present discussion. Labarbe meets the situation by finding in
Plato "un certain nombre de bevues" (p. 395), each of which
seems an illusion.

I turn now to places in the Iliad of which Plato speaks

without giving usable information about the numerus versuum
in his manuscript(s). Thirty years ago I examined them to
see what, if anything, could be learned from them. The results
reached can be judged best from my edition. A23, r 8-9 (A
421-2), A 218-9, Z 402-3, X 16-19 are all in my text without
mention of Plato in the commentary; A [515] is judged a plus
verse on other evidence, and nothing is said about Plato. An-
other verse, , [95], is to be judged a plus verse on internal as
well as on external evidence. Plato is of interest only as show-
ing the date of its intrusion. I say that perhaps (fortasse) it
was not in Plato's manuscripts.
I may mention another place, though the matter is not at
present germane. In Aristarchus there is a long plus passage,
II [432-58], from which Plato quotes lines 433-4, thus giving
a terminus ante quem for the insertion.
Then ria ovjl/a4ivovTa and the postulate do not fit together.
Plato and Aristarchus are not in perfect agreement. They are
only in extensive agreement. The reason for the fact can be
presented most briefly by the use of symbols and round numbers.
For the numerus versuum the score in the Iliad is:

Plato == II + x == 14,600 + x
Aristarchus = H + y = 14,600 + 1,000.

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 PLATO'S HOMER. 85

The value of x can only be gue

various reasons, be assumed th
furthermore that a goodly major
the y's of Aristarchus. It follo
speak of the Iliad, he will muc
40:1) talk of some of the 14,60
of the (say) 300 or 400 other
manuscript(s). Divergence betw
be observable only when: (a)
and (b) when a y has got in
which Plato has quoted.
I have cut the argument to
issues and speaking of others
a revised edition, the numerus
a result of L'Homere de Platon.
GEORGE M. BOLLING.

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