A New Fragment of the Hesiodic Catalogue of Women?

Mnemosyne 72 (2019) 647-651

brill.com/mnem

Stefano Vecchiato Scuola Normale Superiore, Pisa, Italy [email protected]

Received September 2018 | Accepted November 2018

ξυστὸν τό τε ἀκόντιον ὡς παρ’ †ἡσιόδω† (codd., Ἡροδότῳ Vulcanius) ἐν τῷ πρώτῳ (Hdt. 1.52), καὶ τὸ οἰκοδόμημα ὡς παρὰ Ξενοφῶντι ἐν Οἰκονομικῷ (X. Oec. 11.15).1

xyston (means) both ‘javelin’, as in Hesiod’s (?) First Book, and ‘building’, as in Xenophon’s Oeconomicus.2

The gloss printed above is from Klaus Nickau’s most recent edition of the lexi- cographical work De adfinium vocabulorum differentia of Pseudo-Ammonius. As far as the first part of the gloss is concerned,3 it should admittedly be noted that the neuter noun ξυστόν (literally ‘polished shaft’, cf. LSJ9 s.v. ξυστόν, 1) never occurs in the extant Hesiodic corpus, despite its being well attested in archaic epic hexameter poetry (specifically in the Iliad), where it means, by synecdoche, ‘lance’ or ‘javelin’.4 On the basis of this absence, and possibly also of the prima facie unusual association between the expression ἐν τῷ πρώτῳ and Hesiod’s name, Bonaventura Vulcanius conjectured Ἡροδότῳ in place of

1 Ps.-Ammon., Diff. 340, p. 88.11-13 Nickau. 2 The translation is mine. 3 The second part of the gloss is not problematic, for the term ξυστόν is in fact attested in a passage of Xenophon’s Oeconomicus (11.15) with the meaning ‘arcade of a private residence’, that is, a building (as stated by Ps.-Ammonius himself); see further LSJ9 s.v. ξυστός, I.1. 4 Cf. Hom. Il. 4.469; 11.260, 565; 13.497, with Kirk 1985, 387-388; Janko 1994, 110 and LfgrE III s.v. ξυστόν, B1 (B. Mader).

ἡσιόδω,5 the unanimous reading of the mss. that transmit the gloss6 (essentially followed by all the editors of Pseudo-Ammonius including Nickau). Vulcanius therefore thought that Pseudo-Ammonius here refers to Hdt. 1.52, because this is the only passage in Herodotus’ Histories in which the term ξυστόν appears in the singular. At first sight, Vulcanius’ choice seems very reasonable, even more so if one considers (i) that the mistake ‘Hesiod’ for the correct ‘Herodotus’ seems to have occurred in other textual traditions,7 and (ii) that the pair- ing Hesiod/Xenophon seems to be an unicum, whereas the pair Herodotus/ Xenophon is well attested in several other contexts,8 although the two histo- rians are never mentioned together in any other gloss of Pseudo-Ammonius’ work.9 With these caveats in mind, and granted that certainty does not seem attainable in one way or another, it is nonetheless possible, in my view, to de- fend the paradosis on the basis of the following combination of factors:

1) To the best of my knowledge, it has not been observed that the phrasing of the gloss παρ’ Ἡσιόδῳ ἐν τῷ πρώτῳ is not problematic in itself, for, despite its similarity with introductory formulas of quotations of words or passages from Herodotus’ Histories (Herodotus’ name + ἐν + book number),10 it recalls

5 Vulcanius 1600, 110. 6 Namely: the hyparchetype γ (whose readings are reconstructed on the basis of two lost subarchetypes, θ and η, respectively represented by Ald + B + C + D, and by E + G) and the ms. N (= Marc. gr. 620, s. XV). The other two hyparchetypes of the Pseudo-Ammonian tra- dition, π and M (= Marc. gr. 490, s. XV), omit the whole gloss: cf. Nickau 1966, 33, and, on the relationship between the various preserved and reconstructed mss., pp. XVIII-XXIV, XXVII (on the terminology of the sigla of the mss. see also p. LXXV). 7 Cf. for example Plin. HN 15.3 = Hes. fr. 347 M.–W. (perhaps Hdt. 5.82.2 is meant, but the issue is very uncertain), Arist. HA 601b = Hes. fr. 364 M.–W. (cf. Hdt. 1.106.2, and see Huxley 1965), Str. 1.3.18 C 59 = Hes. fr. 368 M.–W. (cf. Hdt. 2.10.3). 8 I owe this point to the anonymous referee. 9 Regardless of whether Herodotus or Hesiod was cited in the gloss, it is surprising that Ps.-Ammonius (or one of his sources) did not select a Homeric instance (see above) in order to exemplify the meaning ‘javelin’ of ξυστόν: Homer is by far the most frequently cited author in Ps.-Ammonius’ work (see the index auctorum in Nickau 1966, 177-179, s.v. ‘Homerus’). It would be tempting to suppose a saut du même au même, and write e.g. ὡς παρ’ <Ὁμήρῳ ‘οὔτησε ξυστῷ χαλκήρεϊ, λῦσε δὲ γυῖα’ (Il. 4.469), καὶ παρ’> Ἡσιόδῳ ἐν τῷ πρώτῳ κτλ. 10 Pseudo-Ammonius cites Herodotus five times; in the only occurrence among these in which he mentions the Histories with the book number, he does so using the femi- nine form (implying the term ἱστορία): 128, p. 33.11 Nickau: διόπερ Ἡρόδοτος ἐν τῇ τετάρτῃ (4.115.2)· ‘ἡμέας ἔχει φόβος τε καὶ δέος’, although, as indicated by Nickau (1966, 33, in app. ad l. 11), the masculine reading ἐν τῷ τετάρτῳ is attested in a single ms., N (= Marc. gr. 620, s. XV). However, the two forms are interchangeable, and they could both be used in the same work, cf. e.g. Harp. λ 25 Keaney = p. 194 Dindorf Λογοποιός· ὁ ὑφ’ ἡμῶν ἱστορικὸς

Mnemosyne 72 (2019) 647-651