David Kovacs

Ovid, Metamorphoses 1.2

The purpose of this paper is, first, to demonstrate to future editors of the Metamorphoses , whether conservative or sceptical, just how improbable is the reading of the majority of MSS, illas , and how strong are the claims of the variant ilia , first recommended by P.Lejay in 1894 and vigorously championed by E.J.Kenney in 1976; and, second, to suggest an interpretation of this reading that is open to fewer objections than the one proposed by Kenney.I have given above the beginning of Ovids longest poem as it ought to stand in all modern editions and as it stands in fact in only one, the French school edition of selections edited by Lejay in 1894: ‘Gods, on my undertakings (for you have changed them as well) breathe your favour.’ To be sure, all of Ovids MSS read illas in line 2, and ilia is attested only as a variant in two of them.But majorities, in textual as in other matters, are frequently wrong.Even before the minority report of the Urbinas had been heard, Lejay adopted ilia , av.1.in the Erfordensis. 1

TWO CONJECTURES IN HORACE: ODES 1.16.8 AND 1.35.25

Most of the above text is straightforward. Horace is explaining that wrath – the reader may think at this stage either of Horaces own wrath expressed in the scurrilous iambi mentioned in 2–3 or that of the woman he addresses – resembles various other things. Thus in 5a wraths effect is compared to that of the Magna Mater on her priests, the Galli (they were driven so far from their senses that they castrated themselves), and in 5b–6 to that of Apollo on the Pythia (the god interfered with her personality so that she could utter his prophecies). In 7a Dionysus’ effect on his maenads provides the analogy (one thinks of Agave and her sisters, who dismembered Pentheus under the delusion that he was a lion). These are good comparisons to the ruinous effects of anger.

Horace, Odes 4-1: a Contradiction Removed

Odes 4.1 is difficult to understand on a literal level. At its beginning Horace is complaining that Venus, after leaving him alone for many years, is attacking him, that is, he is feeling a reawakening of sexual desire. But after suggesting that the goddess go off to visit Paullus Fabius Maximus and describing the rewards the young man will give her, he returns to himself. Now, he says, he is delighted by neither woman nor boy nor by the prospect of mutuality in love, that is, he is not in the grip of eros . Additionally, the use of iuuare , ‘delight’, with a person as subject seems to be without any parallel. These problems disappear if in l. 29 we read mi for me : ‘I no longer have either woman or boy (as lover) nor do I have the hope of mutual affection.’ Horaces having no lover and no hope of one is compatible with his feeling a generalized desire for sex or a desire for someone unattainable. The tone of the last two quatrains is affected as well as the contribution of the poem to the fourth book of odes.

THE END OF SOPHOCLES' OEDIPUS TYRANNUS: THE SCEPTICAL CASE RESTATED

An earlier article of mine, Kovacs (2009a), discussed OT 1424–1530, whose genuineness was impugned most recently by Dawe (2001; 2006). I argued that 1424–67 (which I call A) are genuine, but that 1468–1530 (which I call B) are spurious. Sommerstein (2011), accepting my defence of A, undertook the defence of all but a few lines of B as well, dismantling much of my case against it and adding the argument that the transmitted ending mirrors the plays beginning and is therefore presumptively Sophoclean. The present article, in part a reply to Sommersteins reply, restates some of my earlier arguments and also presents new evidence for the spuriousness of B.

Relativism and Pluralism in Ancient Greece

In the relations of the Greek city-states to each other, David Kovacs finds situations analogous to those that arise in a multicultural society. He tells us how the Greeks at first achieved harmony and then lost it, an experience close to our own. The question that remains is, how are we to re-establish a moral matrix that will bring social peace without sacrificing individual and group distinctiveness? Even though Greek city-states were frequently warring with one another, they managed to achieve a degree of cooperation and commonality. Kovacs believes that equilibrium was maintained because of the bond provided by nomos, customs whose force derived ultimately from religion. He cites evidence from the writings of Herodotus and Euripides to show the extent and strength of this unwritten code. But its strength was diminished over the years, notably by the teachings of Sophists, relativistic philosophers who became the educators of Greek youth. Even though other philosophers including Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle attempted to counter the influence of the Sophists, relativism—and the ravages of war and plague—caused Greeks to lose faith in their touchstone. Kovacs sees in the loss of nomos a parallel to present-day social and moral disintegration resulting from the ascendancy of relativism and deconstructionism. He believes that we need to develop a new kind of nomos—shared beliefs in objective right and wrong—that will provide social glue and moral guidance.

Euripides, Medea 1–17

The text and apparatus below are Diggles. At the end of the article I give, for the sake of the curious, an expanded version, for 11ff., of Weckleins ‘Appendix coniecturas minus probabiles continens’, with references where they are known to me.