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UDC 811.14
Philologia Classica. 2016. Vol. 11. Fasc. 1
"HERW[ERDEN] BESSER FORT":
SHOULD HE 'GO', OR IS HE 'BETTER'? EUR. MEDEA 1091
Tatiana VI Kostyleva
Higher School of Economics,
16, ul. Soiuza Pechatnikov, St. Petersburg, 190008, Russian Federation; tkostyleva@hse.ru St. Petersburg State University,
7-9, Universitetskaya nab., St. Petersburg, 199034, Russian Federation; tkostyleva@hse.ru
This note discusses one of the largely superfluous conjectures unearthed by J. Diggle and given an honourable place in his otherwise very succinct and efficient apparatus criticus. Reported by none of the recent editors, and earlier by Prinz-Wecklein and Verrall, Herwerden's leXavoanXayxvoi; in Euripides' Medea 109 is an undesirable change of the sound, if idiosyncratic, mss. reading iieyaXOanXayxvoc;. Diggle, however, having (independently) conjectured the same word, patched together arguments for it. An additional attraction this conjecture gained in his eyes was due to his misreading of the remark (quoted in the heading) Wilamowitz made proofreading the first volume of Murray's OCT in 1901. While Wilamowitz discouraged Murray from reporting this conjecture with his usual "besser fort", Diggle, on passing acquaintance with the letters, took it to mean "Herw. besser fort[asse]", thus corroborating his point. Keywords: Euripides, Medea, Diggle, conjectures, critical apparatus.
(Tp.) toS' skeivo, 9i\oi nalSe^- |ir|Tr|P Kivei KpaSiav, kivei Ss x6A.ov. aneuSeTe Gaaaov Sw^aTo^ e'iaw 100 Kai neAdar|T' o||aTo^ syyui;,
|ir|Ss npoaeXGnT', aAAa 9uMaaea0' aypiov aTuyepdv te 9uaiv 9pevo^ auGdSoui;.
'ite vuv, x^peiG' wc; Tdxo^ e'l'aw. 105 SfjAov an' apx^i si;aip6|iEvov v£9o^ ol|i«yfj(; wc; Tdx' avdtyei |eiZovi 0u|wi- Ti tot' spydaeTai lieyaAOaTCAayxvoi; SuaKaTdnauaTo^ tyuxn SnxGeiaa KaKoiaiv;
109 |e\av6an\aYxvoi Herwerden2.
A foreign language can defeat even a most experienced of souls. Discussing one of the forceful adjectives with which the Nurse describes Medea about to be driven to further ruin by new private woes, J. Diggle dashingly disposes of the ms. reading lEyaXOanXayxvoq in favour of his own conjecture |£\av6anA.ayxvoq ("anticipated" by Herwerden)3, which, to Diggle's mind, ticks all the right boxes. It seems he has been a trifle overconfident and has, moreover, through Lesefehler of his own, made Wilamowitz endorse this conjecture.
1 I humbly offer this trifle to Prof. A. K. Gavrilov on the day of his 75th birthday.
2 I cite Diggle's text and his apparatus criticus (Diggle 1984) every time, if not otherwise mentioned.
3 Diggle 1969, 38-39, reprinted with an addition in Diggle 1994, 10-11.
© St. Petersburg State University, 2016
Medea is inside the house and her wrath is ripening (92 ff.). The Nurse, knowing that once out, it will come down hard and without discrimination, is busy tucking the children away in the safety of the house (we shall not see them again alive): "for what will this haughty (or else, "heaving, or bursting"), difficult to check soul dare when stung by these troubles?" The wording is intricate, though.
The intractability of ^eyaXoanXaYxvoq was pointed out by D. Page, "a medical technical term .. .its use in poetry is extremely venturesome", who, however, did not resort to conjecture, but inclined to the metaphorical usage, with further references to anMyxva as 'soul' or 'depth of the heart' in Aeschylus4. Diggle harps rather tastelessly and unsympa-thetically on this medical condition and its inapplicability to Medea's case, concluding that "Medea's ailment5 is not even metaphorical great-heartedness; rather it is a fit of melancholy, an ailment induced by minimal change of ^eyaAo- to ^eXavo-"6. He provides loci for "the image ^eXavoanXayxvoc;" — mostly combinations with 9p^v, KapSia and Gu^oc;, and this with good reason, for the conjectured compound never occurs by itself and is no real gain for our passage. For one thing, Medea is not "melancholic" (Ktveiv xoAov in 99 means she is angry), and ^eXavoanXayxvoc; would not mean 'melancholic' even if pressed. ^eXa-voanXayxvoq, literally, 'with black viscera', is a state induced by fear (which can well be the case in Aesch. Ch. 412-413 anXayxva Se ^ot KeXatvouxai npo; enoc; KXuouaat, 'my blood is curdling'7 and several other passages quoted every time this perplexing 'blackness' is discussed), or, less often, by sordid 'black' deeds8. What is important here is that the emotion, be it 'fear', 'anxiety', or 'grief and hopelessness' (at Aesch. Ch. 412-413 I would rather suggest 'fits of despair and frustrated eagerness', and not 'grief'), is not rage. But Medea is overweeningly proud9, willful and unstoppable (103-104)10. The Nurse has good reasons to be afraid (93-94): ouSe nauaexat / xoXou, aa^' oiSa, npiv KaraaK^ai tivi (and to moralise on the excesses of royals), she must know her mistress' temper.
4 Page 1938, 76.
5 This "ailment" will send four innocent people to an early grave. Medea is no blunderer in her wish Kai nác; 5ó|ioc; sppoi (114).
6 Diggle 1994, 10 = Diggle 1969, 38. — This (mechanical) corruption of MEAANO- to MErAAO- is in itself suspect. In uncials it is improbable, and in minuscule would involve a curious instance of 'looking-glass' writing.
7 Along with Suppl. 785, Pers. 115-116. — The commentators vary: "the emotion is fear" (Jocelyn 1970, 42), "the emotions of grief and hopelessness" (Sullivan 1997, 65), or "black is a natural symbol for anxiety" (Garvie 1986, 154, ad loc.).
8 For the discussion of these passages, as well as a useful overview of the controversy over the "black" inner organs, see Sullivan 1997, 59-67. See Jocelyn 1970, 42 for a neat explanation of the 'physiopathological processes' behind the blackness of internal organs. Each time the blackness of clotted blood was the most probable point of departure. Quite against the blackness as caused by clotted blood, Kudlien 1973, 54 ff. suggests „daß man sich die Schwarzfärbung im allgemeinen sehr konkret durch einen bestimmten „Stoff" (und nicht durch Blutandrang) verursacht vorstellte". But why introduce some "specific black stuff" (not identified by the author) when blood is at hand?
9 On "psychological terminology" in Euripides in general and on Medea 104 see Sullivan 2000, 13. Her exhaustive and orderly approach is marred at times by facile judgement, as, for instance, on Medea 104: "Euripides introduces a new adjective with phren".
10 See Wilamowitz, a born and bred aristocrat: „warum hat Euripides nicht seine Medea durch Selbstmord enden lassen? <...> die rein menschliche Medea sollte doch den Selbstmord mit den Kindern wenigstens planen. Ja, wenn sie eine Waschfrau wäre. Einem Weibe von wahrhaft überlegener Größe kann der Gedanke gar nicht kommen, ihren Feinden, die sie so gern los wären, den Gefallen zu tun und sich ihnen selbst aus dem Wege zu räumen", Wilamowitz 1906, 178-179.
Now, literally, ^eyaXoanXayxvo; is indeed a condition of an 'enlarged abdomen'11, but anXayxvov in Euripides is used in its literal meaning 'inner parts' only once, in Elec-tra 828, when Aegisthus is reading his doom in the lepa, whereas used metaphorically it occurrs in Alc. 1009 (xp^--- ^o^a; 8' o^x tino anXayxvot; exetv atywvr' meaning 'not to harbour a grudge'), Med. 220 (oaxt; npiv av8poc anXäyxvov ¿K^aöetv aa^w; aruyet 8e8opKw; 'judges prematurely of a man's worth before getting to know his innermost self, Hipp. 118 (ei Tic a' ti^' ^ßnc anXäyxvov evrovov ^epwv 'if one is tense with arrogance of youth'), Or. 1201 (xpovwt ^aXa^etv anXayxvov 'his anger will gradually wear off'). Moreover, -anMyxvo; enters into brave compounds, the best and closest parallel being Hipp. 424: 8ouXot yap av8pa, Kav öpaauanXayxvo; ti; fy, certainly used metaphorically to mean 'even if courageous'. D. Mastronarde simply takes ^eyaXoanXayxvo; to be "a poetic coinage, variation on ^eyäöu^oc, ^eyaX^Twp, ^eyaXo^pwv"12. Thus, ^eyaXoanXayxvo; has good reasons to stay, and was, pace Diggle, preferred by Wilamowitz in his letters to G. Murray13.
References
Bierl, A., Calder III, W. M., Fowler, R. L. (eds.) The Prussian and the Poet: The Letters of Ulrich von Wilamo-
witz-Moellendorff to Gilbert Murray (1894-1930). Hildesheim, Weidmann, 1991. Diggle, J. Marginalia Euripidea. PCPS 1969, 15, 38-39. Diggle, J. (ed.) Euripidis fabulae I. Oxford, OUP, 1984. Diggle, J. Euripidea. Oxford, OUP, 1994. Garvie, A. F. (comm.) Aeschylus Choephori. Oxford, OUP, 1986. Jocelyn, H. D. Euripides, Medea 108-10. PCPS 1970, 16, 42-43.
Kudlien, F. 'Schwärzliche' Organe im frühgriechischen Denken. Medizinhistorisches Journal 1973, 8, 53-58.
Mastronarde, D. J. (ed.) Euripides: Medea. Cambridge, CUP, 2002.
Murray, G. (ed.) Euripidis fabulae I. Oxford, OUP, 1902.
Page, D. L. (ed.) Euripides Medea. Oxford, OUP, 1938.
Sullivan, S. D. "Dark" Mind and Heart in Aeschylus. RBPh,1997,75, 59-67.
Sullivan, S. D. Euripides' Use of Psychological Terminology. Montreal, McGill-Queen's UP, 2000.
Valgiglio, E. (comm.) Euripide Medea. Torino, Loescher, 1959.
Weil, H. (expl.) Euripide Medee. Paris, Librairie Hachette, 31914.
Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, U. von (Übers., Komm.) Griechische Tragödien, III. Berlin, Weidmann, 1906.
For citation: Kostyleva T. V. "Herw[erden] besser fort": should he 'go', or is he 'better'? (Eur. Medea 109). Philologia Classica 2016, 11(1), 170-173. DOI: 10.21638/11701/spbu20.2016.116
11 Induced by (excessive) drinking of sweet wine, Hipp. De diaet. in morb. acut. 50.
12 Mastronarde 2002, 183. Before him Weil 1914, 14 ad loc.: magnanima and Valgiglio 1959, 27, ad loc.: "Il primo agg. significa 'dale grandi viscere' (con valore tecnico, in Ippocrate), in senso metaforico".
13 See Bierl et al. 1991, 37: „109 Herw. besser fort: ich weiß nicht, daß dies medicinisch ist, cf. Hippokrates n. 8iairr|c ö^swv 53 (15 Littre)". The letter itself is typed, but the appendix is in hand, and Murray, who must have reported Herwerden's conjecture in the proofs, withdrew it from the apparatus. What happened is that Diggle had read it as "Herw. besser fort[asse]" and was happy to learn that the great man had "commended" his idea back "in 1894" (in fact some seven years later, for the appendix came with the letter of 16, June 1901). When editing his miscellany to publish in the Euripidea, Diggle introduced this as an additional proof, see Diggle 1994, 11. I thank my reviewers for bringing to my attention the drawbacks of this hasty sketch and for helpful suggestions which I have done my best to adopt, and Mikhail M. Pozdnev who met this nuisance with sympathy and encouragement.
"HERW[ERDEN] BESSER FORT:
«УБРАТЬ» ЕГО ИЛИ ОН «ЛУЧШЕ»?" (EUR. MEDEA 109)
Татьяна Владимировна Костылева
Критический аппарат издания Дж. Диггля в серии ОСТ (1981-1994) славится точностью, полнотой и изысканной краткостью. Тем удивительнее найти в нем конъектуру всеми забытую — в самом факте «забытости» ничего предосудительного нет, Диггль часто скрупулезно восстанавливает и защищает авторство филологов прошлых веков, — а главное, неудачную. Конъектура Херверде-на lisXavoanXayxvoi; к ст. 109 «Медеи» Еврипида, упомянутая лишь в изданиях Принца—Векляйна и Верролла, была вновь (независимо) сделана Дигглем в 1969 г. и внесена в аппарат к тексту «Медеи». Дополнительный аргумент в ее пользу Диггль обнаружил уже после выхода первого тома (1984 г.), когда познакомился с опубликованными в 1991 г. письмами У фон Виламовица к Г. Мюррею. В письме от 16 июня 1901 г. сохранились комментарии Виламовица к тексту «Медеи», подготовленному Мюрреем (ст. 40-380). Поняв комментарий к ст. 109 «Herw. besser fort: (далее — выражение сомнения)» как «Herw. besser fort[asse]», Диггль нашел «авторитетное подтверждение» своего мнения. Ключевые слова: Еврипид, Медея, Диггль, Виламовиц, Херверден, критика текста.
Received: 18.04.2016 Final version received: 20.05.2016
