Sophocles Oedipus at Colonus 535

ed. Francis Storr

Table of Contents

Search the Perseus Catalog for:

View: By Scene
← Previous Next →

Oedipus at Colonus. Sophocles. ed. Francis Storr. London. 1912.

Sponsored by Perseus Project, Tufts University.

Funding provided by The Annenberg CPB/Project.

Current edition Experimental

Οἰδίπους ἐπὶ Κολωνῷ (Greek) (Sophocles, Volume 1. Storr, Francis, editor. London; New York: William Heinemann Ltd.; The Macmillan Company, 1912.)

Provisional text from uncorrected OCR; expect errors.

Editions (1)
Greek (Lewis Campbell, 1879) (OCR draft) Experimental (Greek (Lewis Campbell, 1879)) — 535 focus
* αἵδʼ εἴσʼ ἄρʼ ἀπόγονοί τε καὶ
Translations (5)
English (Lewis Campbell, 1906) (OCR draft) Experimental (English (Lewis Campbell, 1906)) — 535 focus
O Heaven!
German (J. J. C. Donner, 1875; OCR review) (OCR draft) Experimental (German (J. J. C. Donner, 1875; OCR review)) — 535 focus
Sie sprossen mit mir aus Einer Frau Schooße.
English (Thomas Francklin, 1758–1759) (OCR draft) Experimental (English (Thomas Francklin, 1758–1759)) — 535 focus
Who 's there ?
English (Robert Potter, 1788) (OCR draft) Experimental (English (Robert Potter, 1788)) — 535 focus
Didst thou, I tremble as I speak it, fill,
English (Sir Richard Jebb, 1904) (OCR draft) Experimental (English (Sir Richard Jebb, 1904)) — 534 focus

Commentary

Commentary (R. C. Jebb) (OCR draft) (Commentary (R. C. Jebb))

mvp-comment-404-1 ἰώ — ἰὼ δῆτα 1

mvp-comment-404-2 γε 2

mvp-comment-404-3 ἐπιστροφαί 3

mvp-comment-405-1 ἄλαστ’ ἔχειν 4

mvp-comment-406-1 οὐκ ἔρεξα 5

mvp-comment-406-2 τί γάρ 6

mvp-comment-407-1 δῶρον 7

mvp-comment-407-2 The MS. ἐπωφέλησα ,

"I benefited,"
or
"succoured"
(cp. 441), cannot be right. The sense required is
μήποτε ὤφελον ἐξελέσθαι
,
"would that I had never won!"
cp. Ph. 969
μήποτ’ ὤφελον λιπεῖν | τὴν Σκῦρον
: Od. 11.548
ὡς δὴ μὴ ὄφελον νικᾶν
: where
μή
, though thus placed, belongs to the infinitives. See Appendix for the attempted explanations of
ἐπωφέλησα
, and for some proposed emendations.

mvp-comment-407-3 I would read the partic. ἐπωφελήσας (which the iambic metre allows), and take ἐξελέσθαι as the absol. infin. expressing a wish:—

"and would that I had never received that choice gift from the city, for having served her."
For this absol. infin., with the subject in the nominative, cp. Aesch. Cho. 363:
ΗΛ. μηδ’ ὑπὸ Τρωΐας
τείχεσι φθίμενος, πάτερ,
μετ’ ἄλλων δουρικμῆτι λαῷ
παρὰ Σκαμάνδρου πόρον τεθάφθαι,
πάρος δ’ οἱ κτανόντες νιν οὕτως δαμῆναι
. Orestes had uttered the wish that Agamemnon had fallen in war at Troy:
εἰ γὰρ ὑπ’ Ἰλίῳ | … κατηναρίσθης
(345 ff.) . Electra modifies it:
"I would not have had thee to perish e'en beneath Troy's walls, and to be buried by Scamander's stream; would rather that the murderers (Aegisthus and Clytaemnestra) had first been slain as they slew thee!"
Here the MSS. have
τέθαψαι
and
δαμῆναι
. On the latter the schol. has
λείπει τὸ ὄφελον
, and on the former
λείπει τὸ ὤφελες
, thus indicating the certain correction of H. L. Ahrens,
τεθάφθαι
. Cp. also Od. 24.376
αἲ γάρ, Ζεῦ τε πάτερ καὶ Ἀθηναίη καὶ Ἄπολλον,
οἷος Νήρικον εἷλον, …
τοῖος ἐών τοι χθιζὸς ἐν ἡμετέροισι δόμοισιν,
τεύχε’ ἔχων ὤμοισιν, ἐφεστάμεναι καὶ ἀμύνειν,
"Ah, would to father Zeus,...that, such as I was when I took Nericus,...in such might, and with armour on my shoulders, I had stood by thee , and had been aiding thee , yesterday in our house!"
A criticism by Wecklein is discussed in the Appendix.

mvp-comment-407-4 ἐξελέσθαι 8

Commentary (Lewis Campbell, 1879) (OCR draft) (Commentary (Lewis Campbell, 1879)) focus

535. mvp-comment-297-1 κοιναί γε γε assents to what the chorus were about to say, which Oedipus emphasises by the words κοιναί γε πατρός. On κοιναί, see Essay on Language p. 95. Own sisters of their own sire.

536. mvp-comment-298-1 ἰὼ δῆτα Cp. Εl. 842, ΗΛ.

536. mvp-comment-298-2 φεῦ. ΧΟ. φεῦ δῆτ᾽· ὀλοὰ γάρ: Eur. Troad. 1230, ΕΚ. οἴμοι. ΧΟ. οἴμοι δῆτα σῶν ἀλάστων κακῶν.

536. mvp-comment-298-3 μυρίων γ᾽ ἐπιστροφαὶ κακῶν Everrenewed onset of unnumbered woes. The image is that of an enemy who harasses an army by returning repeatedly to the attack with fresh forces. Cp. infr. 1045, δαΐων ἀνδρῶν .. ἐπιστροφαί, Αr. Eq 244, ἐπαναστρέφου. For the nominative after the interjection, cp. Tr. 1046-1047, ὦ .. μοχθήσας ἐγώ.

537. mvp-comment-299-1 I have suffered woes that will not be forgotten.' ἄλαστα is first governed by ἔπαθον, then ἔχειν is added pleonastically, and ἄλαστα is resumed. Sc. ἔπαθον ἄλαστα, ὥστε ἄλαστα ἔχειν τὰ παθήματα.

539-541. mvp-comment-300-1 I received a gift, which would that I, the much-enduring one, had never so benefited the state as to receive from her the privilege of choosing.' i. e. Would that I had not benefited the state so as to be honoured with the choice gift of Jocasta. In this rendering. which takes the words in a natural order, it is assumed that μή, with the past tenses of the indicative in a relative clause, may express the wish to reverse a fact in past time. Cp. Aesch. Cho. 363-366, μηδ' ὑπὸ κ.τ.λ. .. τέθαψαι. The analogy of the uses of the historical tenses with εἰ, ἄν, ἵνα, ὡς, ὅπως, to express an impossible supposition, inference, motive, or result, is all that can be urged in favour of this, except the comparison of a passage which has generally been thought corrupt, infr. 1713, ἰώ, μὴ γᾶς ἐπὶ ξένας θανεῖν ἔχρηζες. It may be further suggested, that in both these instances the unusual construction is assisted by an echo (or harmonic) of ὤφελον in ἐπωφέλησα, and of ἐχρῆν in ἔχρηζες. If this hypothesis is rejected, we must fall back on Hermann's interpretation of the words: Accepi, inquit Oedipus, donum, uxorem dicens, quod ego ut nunquam a civitate debuerim accipere, ei profui, i. e. quod ut mihi non unquam daret civitas, merui. quum eam a Sphinge liberavi. ταλακάρδιος is a poetical expansion of τάλας: cp. πυκνόπτερος, μελάμφυλλος, etc.