Ajax. Sophocles. Robert Potter (Translator). London. 1820.
English (Robert Potter, 1788) (OCR draft) (English) (English (Robert Potter, 1788))
Provisional text from uncorrected OCR; expect errors.
mvp-comment-488-1 κάκιστα καὶ πανωλέθρους 1
mvp-comment-488-2 The last two of these four verses are certainly spurious, as three things show.
mvp-comment-488-3
(1) The poet would not have made the dying Ajax pray that the Atreidae may die ‘at the hands of their offspring,’ unless there had been some legend that they so died. But, according to the current mythology, Agamemnon was slain by his wife and her paramour, while Menelaüs and Helen passed, without dying, to Elysium (
Od. 4. 561
). It is only in later times that we meet with the story of Menelaüs and Helen having been sacrificed by Iphigeneia in the land of the Tauri (
Ptolemy Heph. 4
, cp.
Roscher,
Lex. p. 1951
): a myth which the author of these verses may have had in view. Odysseus, indeed, was slain by Telegonus; but he does not come into account here, unless we make the improbable change of
Ἀτρειδῶν to
Ἀχαιῶν in 838. [As to the double sense of
αὐτοσφαγής, with ref. to one who is slain (1) by himself, (2) by a kinsman, see on
Ant. 56
αὐτοκτονοῦντε .]
mvp-comment-488-4
(2) These two verses confuse the construction, since
ὥσπερ εἰσορῶσ’ ἐμέ (
sc.
ξυναρπασθέντα) refers to what precedes: while
τὼς in 841 refers to
ὥσπερ.
mvp-comment-488-5
(3) The form
φίλιστος occurs nowhere else, except as a proper name.
mvp-comment-488-6
τώς is not elsewhere found in Soph. or Eur. : it is, however, used by Aesch. , not only in lyrics (
Aesch.
Th. 484
,
Suppl. 69, 670, 691), but once, at least, in a trimeter,
Th. 637
ἢ ζῶντ’ ἀτιμαστῆρα τὼς ἀνδρηλάτην. We should not, then, insist on
τώς as a mark of spuriousness: and
ὀλοίατο is, of course, free from objection (
O. T. 1274
γνωσοίατο n.). But the case against 841 f. seems conclusive without them.
mvp-comment-488-7
A more difficult question is whether vv. 839, 840 are also spurious. The schol. in L on v. 841 is as follows:—
τὼς αὐτοσφαγεῖς:
ταῦτα νοθεύεσθαί φασιν ὑποβληθέντα πρὸς σαφήνειαν τῶν λεγομένων. As the lemma,
τὼς αὐτοσφαγεῖς, clearly indicates,
ταῦτα refers only to the two verses 841 f., and not (as Dindorf and others have assumed) to all the four verses 839—842. The surmise was, says the scholiast, that vv. 841 f. were added ‘to make the meaning clearer’;
i.e., to explain the elliptical phrase,
ὥσπερ εἰσορῶσ’ ἐμέ. Such a surmise itself shows that vv. 839, 840 were believed to be older than 841 f. It is indeed plain that all four verses are not by the same author. The incoherent construction noticed above, under (2), was possible for an interpolator whose attention was fixed on
ὥσπερ εἰσορῶσ’ ἐμέ, but hardly for one who was forging vv. 839—842 as a whole. If, then, all four verses are condemned, we must assume two independent interpolations.
mvp-comment-488-8
I incline to think that the two verses 839 and 840 are genuine; because, otherwise, the imprecation on the
πάνδημος στρατός (844) would follow too abruptly on v. 838. The prayer for the destruction of his chief foes, uttered in 839 f., leads up to the more sweeping denunciation of the Greek army.
mvp-comment-489-1 ἴτ’ 2
mvp-comment-489-2 γεύεσθε 3
mvp-comment-489-3 πανδήμου στρατοῦ 4
mvp-comment-490-1 αἰπὺν 5
mvp-comment-490-2 οὐρανὸν διφρηλατῶν 6
mvp-comment-491-1 ἴδῃς 7
mvp-comment-491-2 χρυσόνωτον ἡνίαν 8
mvp-comment-492-1 τροφῷ 9
mvp-comment-493-1 ἦ που 10
mvp-comment-493-2 ἥσει … κωκυτὸν 11
mvp-comment-493-3 ἐν πάσῃ πόλει 12
mvp-comment-494-1 ἔργον 13
mvp-comment-494-2 ἀλλ’ … ἀλλ’ 14
815-865. mvp-comment-530-1 The scene is changed to a wooded place ( infr. 892) not far from the camp ( infr. 874-8), where Ajax is disclosed, somewhat retired, but so that both he and the projecting point of the sword which he has planted in the ground, are visible to the spectators.
844. mvp-comment-548-1 'Flesh yourselves unsparingly on all the populous host.' μὴ φείδεσθε is introduced dià mésou. The πάνδημος στρατός of the Achaeans is contrasted with the Argive chiefs.
847. mvp-comment-549-1 ἐπισχὼν .. ἡνίαν] ‘Checking thy rein.' Instead of saying ἐπέχειν ἅρμα, or ἵππους, the means, or more immediate object, is put into the accusative.
847. mvp-comment-549-2 χρυσόνωτον] ‘Gilded,' viz, having the upper surface studded with gold.
848. mvp-comment-550-1 ἄτας.. ἐμόν] 'My troubles and my fate.' This is not a mere pleonasm. The ἅται may include his first provocation of Athena as well as his wild actions since; the word μόρον is specially applicable to his death.
849. mvp-comment-551-1 τῇ τε δυστήνῳ τροφῷ] Either (1) 'and the unhappy one who nursed my infancy;' or (2) 'and the unhappy one who tends on him.' According to (1) Ajax in thinking of his mother with special tenderness, speaks of her as the one who nursed him at her breast ( ἥ μ' ἔτεχ᾽, ἤ μ᾿ ἔθρεψε, Od. 2. 131.) According to (2) he is thinking of the dreary household at Salamis, where she who had been the wife of Telamon's youth was now the nurse of his declining years. Cp. Od. 24. 211, ἐν δὲ γυνὴ Σικελὴ γρηὺς πέλεν, ἤ ῥα γέροντα | ἐνδυκέως κομέεσκεν ἐπ᾿ ἀγροῦ, νόσφι πόληος.
851. mvp-comment-552-1 Cp. Eur. Med. 1176, εἶτ' ἀντίμολπον ἡκεν ὀλολυγῆς μέγαν | κωκυτόν.
852. mvp-comment-553-1 'But I have nought to do with vain laments for this.' οὐδὲν ἔργον, lit. 'It is no part of the business in hand.'
853. mvp-comment-554-1 σὺν τάχει τινί] 'And that with speed.' The addition of the indefinite pronoun, as in ἀνύσας τι ('with something of haste'), has an effect of peremptoriness.