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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009
In fragment 38 Diels–Kranz, Empedocles turns to describe the creation of ‘everything that we now see’:
γαî τε κα πντος πςλυκμων ἠδ' ὐγρς ρ
ιτν ἠδ' αἰθρ σΦγγων περ κκλον ἂπαντα.
Here, as so often with Empedocles, the influence of Zeller and Diels has proved decisive in determining later interpretations of the text. They understood the words ιτν ἠδ' αἰθρ as meaning ‘and Titan aither’; ‘; the text has been mistranslated ever since. In fact the conjunction ἠδ is never postponed. This means that—as scholars earlier in the nineteenth century well understood—‘Titan” must be an item on its own, distinct from the aither:
earth and wavy sea and moist aer,
Titan and aither binding everything in its circular grip.
1 Zeller, E., Die Philosophie der Griechen, ed. Nestle, W., i.ii6 (Leipzig, 1920), 979Google Scholar n. 5; Diels, H., Poetarum philosophorum fragmenta (Berlin, 1901), 123Google Scholar. So Bollack, J., Empédocle i (Paris, 1969), 263Google Scholar, O'Brien, D., Empedocles' Cosmic Cycle (Cambridge, 1969), 292Google Scholar, Wright, M. R., Empedocles: The Extant Fragments (New Haven, 1981), 169, 196–7Google Scholar, etc.
2 Study of the numerous examples from Homer and Hesiod onwards shows there are no exceptions. In the grammars, cf. e.g. Kühner, R. and Gerth, B., Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache ii.ii4 (Hannover, 1955), 299Google Scholar.
3 For the frequent omission of the copula before the first item in a line where proper or common nouns are being listed cf. e.g. Il. 2.498–502, Hes, . Theog. 339Google Scholar, and further references in West's, M. L. note on Theog. 245Google Scholar. The apparent structural imbalance, of an unqualified noun at the start of the line being followed by another noun which is qualified, is no problem at all: cf. e.g. the line immediately above (γαȋ…), Il. 2.501–2, 739, Hes, . Theog. 245, 246Google Scholar. The alternative of linking ιτν with ρ at the end of the previous line is highly implausible: ρ already has a defining adjective, and the parallels in earlier—and later—epic for omission of the connective must be considered decisive. For the correct translation cf. Karsten, S., Philosophorum graecorum veterum fragmenta ii (Amsterdam, 1838), 107Google Scholar; Mullach, F. W. A., Fragmenta philosophorum graecorum i (Paris, 1860), 6Google Scholar.
4 Cf. Il. 19.398, Od. 1.24, Hes, . Theog. 371–1Google Scholar with West's notes on 134 (γπερονα) and 371, Virg. Aen. 4.119 with A. S. Pease's note ad loc; R. G. Austin on Virg. Aen. 6.725 and the further refs in R. Merkelbach and Totti, M., Abrasax ii (Opladen, 1991), 73Google Scholar; Sturz, F. W., Empedocles Agrigentinus (Leipzig, 1805), 587Google Scholar, Kranz, W., Philologus 105 (1961), 291–5CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
5 Ps.-Plutarch, Placita philosophorum 2.6.3 (82.16–19 Mau) = Emp. A49b Diels–Kranz (aither fire, earth, water, aer); below, §III.
6 Ancient Philosophy, Mystery and Magic: Empedocles and Pythagorean Tradition (Oxford, 1995)Google Scholar, ch. 3.
7 See below, n. 14 ad fin.
8 Persephone (Oxford, 1971), 210–11Google Scholar.
9 ‘With fine weather’, Dengler; ‘so mild the air’, Einarson–Link. The natural implication of κατ' ἠρα if taken in this sense would be that the trees bear different fruits in accordance with changes in the air, but that of course is not Empedocles' point. Theophrastus' discussion (De caus. plant. 1.13.1–3) confirms the plain sense of the fragment, which is that each tree constantly bore the same fruit throughout the year; any attempt to water down or rationalize this sense (as e.g. Wright [above, n. 1], 224: ‘It is botanically impossible…’) is illegitimate.
10 Noted by Zuntz (above, n. 8), 211.
11 So e.g. Diels (above, n. 1), ad loc. (‘propter Theophrasti conexum necessarium’); Bollack (above, n. 1), iii. 516 and n. 4.
12 Both of these points refute Bollack's assertion that ‘c'est pour cette expression [i.e. κατ' ἠρα] que Théophraste cite le vers’ (op. cit., iii. 516). For Theophrastus' repeated use of the term aer in the same context compare e.g. De caus. plant. 1.13.5–11.
13 An even more imposing parallel than the one cited by Zuntz, (Euripides, , Electra 498)Google Scholar is Nicander, , Theriaca 69Google Scholar, ε Φλλοισι κατορης, of tufted thyme ‘always provided with leaves’. The alternative conjecture κατορα (see Lobeck, C. A., Pathologiae sermonis graeci [Leipzig, 1843], 269Google Scholar and n. 35; Wilamowitz, , Kl. Schr. i [Berlin, 1935], 501)Google Scholar is also a possibility but, as Zuntz notes, not so immediately attractive.
14 It first seems to have appeared in the 1550 Paris edition of De causis plantarum I. I follow the information provided in their 1976 Loeb edition by B. Einarson and G. Link; see also Lobeck, loc. cit. (‘codices praebent κατρα’). Zuntz's slightly inaccurate statement (as above, n, 8, 210 and n. 4) that the MSS. read κατ' ἦρα was a result of his being misled by the apparatus to Dengler's, R. E. edition (Theophrastus: De causis plantarum I [Philadelphia, 1927])Google Scholar. In spite of Dengler's edition, and even after the publication of Zuntz's Persephone, editors of Empedocles persist in giving κατ' ἠρα as the reading of the MSS. (J. Bollack, C. Gallavotti, M. R. Wright, B. Inwood, G. Imbraguglia et al.).
15 Stob. i. 195.18 Wachsmuth (not in ps.-Plutarch) = Parmenides A37a Diels–Kranz.
16 Tarán, L., Parmenides (Princeton, 1965), 240Google Scholar n. 31. Cf. also Daiber, H., Aetius Arabus (Wiesbaden, 1980), 382Google Scholar.
17 Emp. A30, A60.
18 See esp. Stob. i. 196.29–197.1 Wachsmuth = Philolaus A16 (τ ὐποsigma;ληνν τε κα περγειον μρος); Plutarch, Quaest. conviv. 745b with Heinze, R., Xenokrates (Leipzig, 1892), 75–8Google Scholar and Pfeiffer, E., Studien zum antiken Sternglauben (Leipzig, 1916), 119–20Google Scholar; Olympiodorus, , In Gorg. 245.7–10Google Scholar Westerink; and for the origins of the tripartite division of the cosmos in Stobaeus' report on Parmenides—sublunar world (τ περγεια), heaven and the region beyond heaven—Burkert, W., Lore and Science in Ancient Pythagoreanism (Cambridge, MA, 1972), 245Google Scholar with n. 36.
19 Kahn, C. H., Anaximander and the Origins of Greek Cosmology (New York, 1960), 148Google Scholar.
20 See Lanza's, D. judicious comments, Anassagora: testimonianze e frammenti (Florence, 1966), 67, 131–2, 192–3Google Scholar.
21 270b24–5, 302a31–b5.
22 Meteor. 339b21–4. Thurot's now popular κκενου ς for κκȋνος ruins the argument and, anyway, the MSS. reading is corroborated by the parallel κεȋνος in 369b4–15.
23 DK 59 B15; cf. also Arist, . Meteor. 369b14–15Google Scholar, De caelo 270b22.
24 Schofield, M., An Essay on Anaxagoras (Cambridge, 1980), 71Google Scholar.
25 Simplicius, Phys. 171.31–177.17 Diels.
26 Cf. e.g. the papers in Studies in Presocratic Philosophy, ed. Allen, R. E. and Furley, D. J., ii (London, 1975), 276, 305–11, 314–15Google Scholar (F. M. Cornford), 333–41 (G. Vlastos), 371–2 (C. Strang).
27 Cornford (as in n. 26), 308, Schofield (as in n. 24), 128.
28 For Aristotle cf. e.g. O'Brien (above, n. 1), 63, 208–9, Kingsley, P., Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 53 (1990), 250CrossRefGoogle Scholar n. 30; for Theophrastus, G. M. Stratton, Theophrastus and the Greek Physiological Psychology before Aristotle (London, 1917), 60–2Google Scholar and, in general, Baltussen, H., Theophrastus on Theories of Perception (Utrecht, 1993), 132–94Google Scholar, plus Kingsley, , Phronesis 39 (1994), 235–54CrossRefGoogle Scholar with n. 2, and CQ 44 (1994), 316–24CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
