ARISTAENETUS, EROTIC LETTERS Writings from the Greco-Roman World David Konstan and Johan C. Thom, General Editors Editorial Board Erich S. Gruen Wendy Mayer Margaret M. Mitchell Teresa Morgan Ilaria L. E. Ramelli Michael J. Roberts Karin Schlapbach James C. VanderKam L. Michael White Number 32 Volume Editor Patricia A. Rosenmeyer ARISTAENETUS, EROTIC LETTERS Introduced, translated and annotated by Peter Bing and Regina Höschele Society of Biblical Literature Atlanta ARISTAENETUS, EROTIC LETTERS Copyright © 2014 by the Society of Biblical Literature All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by means of any information storage or retrieval system, except as may be expressly permit- ted by the 1976 Copyright Act or in writing from the publisher. Requests for permission should be addressed in writing to the Rights and Permissions Office, Society of Biblical Literature, 825 Houston Mill Road, Atlanta, GA 30329 USA. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Aristaenetus, author. Erotic letters / Aristaenetus ; introduced, translated, and annotated by Peter Bing and Regina Höschele. pages cm. — (Writings from the Greco-Roman world ; volume 32) ISBN 978-1-58983-741-6 (paper binding : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-1-58983-742-3 (electronic format) — ISBN 978-1-58983-882-6 (hardcover binding : alk. paper) 1. Aristaenetus. Love epistles. I. Bing, Peter. II. Höschele, Regina. III. Aristaenetus. Love epistles. English. 2013. IV. Series: Writings from the Greco-Roman world ; v. 32. PA3874.A3E5 2013 880.8'.03538—dc23 2013024429 Printed on acid-free, recycled paper conforming to ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992 (R1997) and ISO 9706:1994 standards for paper permanence. Contents Abbreviations vii Introduction xi Text and Translation Book 1 1.1 2 1.2 4 1.3 6 1.4 10 1.5 12 1.6 14 1.7 16 1.8 18 1.9 18 1.10 20 1.11 26 1.12 26 1.13 30 1.14 34 1.15 34 1.16 38 1.17 40 1.18 42 1.19 44 1.20 48 1.21 48 1.22 50 1.23 52 1.24 52 vi contents 1.25 54 1.26 56 1.27 58 1.28 60 Book 2 2.1 64 2.2 68 2.3 68 2.4 70 2.5 72 2.6 74 2.7 76 2.8 78 2.9 78 2.10 80 2.11 82 2.12 82 2.13 84 2.14 86 2.15 86 2.16 88 2.17 90 2.18 92 2.19 94 2.20 96 2.21 98 2.22 98 Notes 103 Bibliography 143 Abbreviations General f. folio fl. floruit, flourished fr(s). fragment(s) scil. scilicet, namely v(v). verse(s) Primary Resources Ach. Aristophanes, Acharnians Am. Amores (Ovid, Pseudo-Lucian) Anth. pal. Anthologia Palatina Anth. plan. Anthologia Planudea Argon. Apollonius of Rhodes, Argonautica Ars Ovid, Ars Amatoria Carm. Carmina (Catullus, Horace, Sidonius Apollinaris) Charm. Plato, Charmides Chron. John Malalas, Chronographia Cod. justin. Codex justinianus Cycl. Euripides, Cyclops Demetr. Plutarch, Demetrius Dial. Court. Lucian, Dialogues of the Courtesans Ep. Epistle(s) (Aelian, Aristaenetus, Synesius) Epigr. Epigrammata (Callimachus) Eph. Xenophon of Ephesus, Ephesiaka Epitr. Menander, Epitrepontes Ethop. Ethopoieiai (Libanius, Severus of Alexandria) Fam. Cicero, Epistulae ad familiares Gyn. Soranus, Gynecology -vii- viii abbreviations Hal. Oppian, Halieutica Her. Ovid, Heroides Hermot. Lucian, Hermotimus Hipp. Euripides, Hippolytus Hymn Apoll. Callimachus, Hymn to Apollo Id. Theocritus, Idyll Il. Homer, Iliad Imag. Philostratus the Elder, Imagines Lys. Aristophanes, Lysistrata Metam. Ovid, Metamorphoses Nat. Child Hippocrates, On the Nature of the Child Nat. Hist. Pliny, Natural History Od. Homer, Odyssey Parm. Plato, Parmenides Phaedr. Plato, Phaedrus Protr. Clement of Alexandria, Protrepticus Pyth. Pindar, Pythian Odes Rep. Plato, Republic Soph. Plato, Sophist Symp. Plato, Symposium Theaet. Plato, Theaetetus Theog. Hesiod, Theogony W. D. Hesiod, Works and Days Secondary Resources Adler Adler, A., ed. Suidae Lexicon. 5 vols. Leipzig, 1928– 1938. CMG Corpus medicorum graecorum. Leipzig/Berlin, 1908–. CPG Corpus paroemiographorum graecorum. Edited by E. L. Leutsch and F. G. Schneidewin. 2 vols. Göttingen, 1839–1851. CSHB Corpus scriptorum historiae byzantinae. Joannis Mala- lae Chronographia. Edited by L. Dindorf. Bonn, 1831. de Boor de Boor, C. Excerpta historica iussu imp. Constantini Porphyrogeniti confecta. Vol. 3. Berlin, 1905. de Falco de Falco, V., ed. Iamblichi theologumena arithmeticae. 2nd ed. Stuttgart, 1975. abbreviations ix Felten Felten, J., ed. Nicolai Progymnasmata. Rhetores Graeci 11. Leipzig, 1913. FGrHist Die Fragmente der griechischen Historiker. Edited by F. Jacoby. Berlin-Leiden, 1923–1958. Garzya Garzya, A., ed. Synesii Cyrenensis epistulae. Rome, 1979. Gow-Page Gow, A. S. F., and D. L. Page. The Greek Anthology: Hellenistic Epigrams. 2 vols. Cambridge, 1965. Helmreich Marquardt, J., I. von Müller, and G. Helmreich, eds. Claudii Galeni Pergameni scripta minora. 3 vols. Leipzig, 1884–1893. Kassel-Austin Kassel, R., and C. Austin, eds. Poetae comici graeci. 8 vols. Berlin, 1983–. Kühn Kühn, K. G., ed. Galeni Opera Omnia. 20 vols. Leipzig, 1821–1833. Kühner-Blass Kühner, R., and F. Blass. Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache. Vol. 1. 3rd ed. Hannover, 1890– 1892. Littré Littré, E., ed. Oeuvres complètes d’Hippocrate. 10 vols. Paris, 1839–1861. Lobel-Page Lobel, E., and D. L. Page. Poetarum Lesbiorum Frag- menta. Oxford, 1955. Merkelbach-West Merkelbach, R., and M. L. West, eds. Fragmenta Hesio- dea. Oxford, 1967. Patillon Patillon, M., and G. Bolognesi, eds. Aelius Theon, Progymnasmata: Texte établi et traduit. 2nd ed. Paris, 2002. Pfeiffer Pfeiffer, R. Callimachus. 2 vols. Oxford, 1949, 1953. PG Patrologia graeca. Edited by J.-P. Migne. 162 vols. Paris, 1857–1886. PMG Poetae melici graeci. Edited by D. L. Page. Oxford, 1962. Radt Radt, S., ed. Tragicorum graecorum fragmenta. Vol. 3: Aeschylus. Göttingen, 1999. Snell-Maehler Snell, B., and H. Maehler. Bacchylides. Leipzig, 1970. Voigt Voigt, E.-M. Sappho et Alcaeus. Amsterdam, 1971. West West, M. L. Iambi et Elegi Graeci. 2 vols. 2nd ed. Oxford, 1989–1992. Introduction From the Office of Dead Letters: The Rediscovery of the Epistles The year 1492 saw two notable discoveries, one greater and one lesser: Columbus came upon the New World while sailing across the Atlantic, and Janus Lascaris reported that while he journeyed through Apulia he found a manuscript1 containing fifty letters by a previously unknown author. Some years later, this manuscript was bought by the humanist, doctor, and court historian in Vienna, Johannes Sambucus (1531–1584), who published the text for the first time in 1566.2 The manuscript, dating from the twelfth/thirteenth century and coming from the region of Otranto,3 made its way, like many other manuscripts acquired by Sambucus, to the imperial library in Vienna. Known as the Codex Vindobonensis philologi- cus graecus 310, it constitutes our sole witness to the text.4 Its original 1. The coincidence in date is also noted by Arnott (1974, 353). For the text of Lascaris’s reference to the Aristaenetus codex, cf. Müller 1884, 402, and also Bianchi 2008, 138–39. 2. Ἀρισταινέτου Ἐπιστολαὶ ἐρωτικαὶ· Τινὰ τῶν παλαιῶν Ἡρώων Ἐπιτάφια; E Biblio- theca c.v. Ioan. Sambuci (Antwerp: Plantin, 1566). See Mazal 1968 on this and other early editions. 3. A good summary of the manuscript’s character and date is provided by Drago (2007, 9–10). Its terminus ante quem, as well as a link to the vicinity of Otranto, is established by the presence at the end of book 1 (on the verso of f. 40) of two poems by Nicolas Nectarius of Otranto (1155/56–1235), abbot of the nearby monastery of St. Nicolas of Casole between 1219 and 1235. Written in cursive, in a hand roughly contemporary with, or only slightly later than, that of the manuscript, these were first noted and published by Bast (1796, 7–8 n. 2). In the same note, Bast also mentioned a rendering of Aristaenetus, Ep. 1.22, in iambics in the lower right-hand margin of the manuscript (recto of f. 32). Jacob (1988) identified the hand as that of Palaganus of Otranto, datable to the early thirteenth century. 4. On this manuscript and the transmission of the letters, see Lesky 1957. -xi- xii ARISTAENETUS, EROTIC LETTERS cover page is lost, but a copyist seems to have replaced the title (or what he thought the title ought to be) at the top of the first page—obscured though it is by stains and corrections. It appears to read Ἐπιστολαὶ Ἀρισταινετ’,5 which Lascaris and almost all subsequent editors have taken as Ἐπιστολαὶ Ἀρισταινέτ[ου (more on the rationale for this title in a moment). It has hence been customary to call the author of these fifty charming erotic let- ters “Aristaenetus” ever since. Sender Unknown The name Aristaenetus, however, is probably just a placeholder for the more apposite “Anonymous.” For although some have asserted his reality and even attempted to identify him with a particular historical personage,6 “Aristaenetus” seems more likely to have been fictitious, entering the ranks of ancient epistolographers as the result of guesswork, probably because a copyist speculated about the authorship of the collection.7 That precisely this sort of speculation prompted its attribution to Aristaenetus is plausible in light of the following considerations: (1) all but two of its texts start with a heading, listing the letter’s author and recipient; these are overwhelmingly fictional sprechende Namen (signifying names) wit- 5. Cf. Mazal’s (1971) note on the title of book 1 in his apparatus. His reading has been forcefully confirmed by Bianchi (2008, 137–38). By contrast, Vieillefond (1992) (who relied on a microfilm of the manuscript, not autopsy) claims in his apparatus to the title to be able to read no more than the letters “arist …” (or “Arist …”), followed by two characters obscured by a stain—possibly ων—over which appears the correction αι, scil.