How would you find the quantity of “Briseide”?
Well, I look it up:
Brīsēis ~idos f. FORMS: (accusative) ~ida PROP. 2.8.35; ~idem VAR. Men. 368; ~idam HYG. Fab. 106.1. The slave and concubine of Achilles.
HOR. Carm. 2.4.3; cum e complexu ~idos iret Achilles PROP. 2.22.29; OV. Am. 1.9.33; SEN. Tro. 222; MART. 11.43.9; —(used appellatively for any attractive girl) suam ~idem producere VAR. Men. 368.
Glare, P. G. W. (Ed.). (2012). Oxford Latin Dictionary (Second Edition, Vol. I & II). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
But how do they figure it out? From how it scans in poetry.
I need a better dictionary because I couldn’t even find the name in mine.
Thank you by the way!
This is from the online app “Logeion”:
Brīsēïs, ĭdos (acc. Briseïda, Prop. 2, 8, 35; Ov. A. A. 3, 189 al.: Briseïdam, Hyg. Fab. 106; voc. Brisaeï, Ov. A. A. 2, 713), f.,
I= Βρισηΐς, Hippodamia, daughter of Brises, and slave of Achilles, from whom she was taken by Agamemnon: Varro, Sat. Men. 63, 4; Prop. 2, 22, 29; Hor. C. 2, 4, 3; Ov. Am. 2, 8, 11; id. H. 3, 137.
Logeion is an app maintained by the University of Chicago and features several dictionaries: Lewis & Short, Gaffiot (French), Lewis, LaNe (Dutch), Here’s a link to the entry for Briseis:
https://logeion.uchicago.edu/Briseis
For the iPad or iPhone, you can find it in the App Store.
I couldn’t find it in the Google Play Store, but the Lewis & Short Dictionary is there as an app.
Barry’s dictionary, the Oxford Latin Dictionary, is the best for Classical Latin and someday I’m either going to break down and buy the hard copy for ($232.00 US) or somehow figure out how to obtain online access.
Also very handy is Latinitium:
For Android, Aard2 (free) or GoldenDict (commercial) could be an option. They can read Lewis & Short and many other Latin dictionaries as well.
Oxford Latin Dictionary is here, but only for owners of paper copy.
I tried the link, which led me to Godmy’s site, who has done some fine work making older dictionaries searchable. I did not spot the OLD. Meanwhile, the price for the hard copy continues to rise, now $347US on Amazon, $748US on Abebooks. OUP lists it as out of stock, with a list price of $450US. So far, all I’ve been able to discover is that to access it online, you have to be a subscriber to the Oxford Scholarly Editions. That is where I’m stymied-at least in the US, subscriptions seem to be only available to libraries, not to individuals. I haven’t contacted OUP directly though, so there might be other options.
My question is, Why would you want to find the quantity of Briseide? You’re most unlikely to find Briseide outside of verse (indeed, you put your post on the Latin Poetry board), so if you have a verse with Briseide in it all you need to do is to read the verse. Then the quantities will reveal themselves.
For example, in Ovid’s famous Militat omnis amans elegy (Am.1.9) there’s this hexameter:
ardet in abducta Briseide magnus Achilles.
So you need to be able to read dactylic hexameters, that’s all.
Sure, you can go the Hofstetter route and look up the quantities in a dictionary (provided you have the right dictionary), but you shouldn’t need to do that, and anyway, to learn the quantities in isolation of their metrical context would be sterile and stultifying. It’s the meter that determines the quantities in the first place. So if you can’t read poetry metrically, you’re losing something of its very essence.
And it gets more interesting if you look at Greek, for the quantities of the name in Latin echo the Greek. The Iliad introduces us to Briseis and Chryseis, both in the same passage, early on in the first book. Agamemnon has had to give up Chryseis, and threatens to take Briseis from Achilles in compensation. Here’s the passage:
(Agam.): Μυρμιδόνεσσιν ἄνασσε, σέθεν δ᾽ ἐγὼ οὐκ ἀλεγίζω,
οὐδ᾽ ὄθομαι κοτέοντος: ἀπειλήσω δέ τοι ὧδε:
ὡς ἔμ᾽ ἀφαιρεῖται Χρυσηΐδα Φοῖβος Ἀπόλλων,
τὴν μὲν ἐγὼ σὺν νηΐ τ᾽ ἐμῇ καὶ ἐμοῖς ἑτάροισι
πέμψω, ἐγὼ δέ κ᾽ ἄγω Βρισηΐδα καλλιπάρῃον
αὐτὸς ἰὼν κλισίην δὲ τὸ σὸν γέρας ὄφρ᾽ ἐῢ εἰδῇς
ὅσσον φέρτερός εἰμι σέθεν, στυγέῃ δὲ καὶ ἄλλος
ἶσον ἐμοὶ φάσθαι καὶ ὁμοιωθήμεναι ἄντην.
Briseida is metrically identical to Chryseida and occupies the same position in the verse, directly following the caesura.
So know not only do you know what the quantities of Briseida are, you know why they are what they are.
Thanks, Will. I see what’s happening. When I pull up the page, I don’t see the private area. When I clicked on your link, I did see the entry for the OLD, but was required to log in. Apparently I need to register.
Thanks for your help.
I was reading a poem by Ovid. I’m currently trying to learn Latin verse and I’m not skilled enough to get all the quantities just from reading it. I need more practice!
Did you ever succeed in accessing the OLD online? The screenshot showing the list of Latin dictionaries shows the OLD at the bottom of the list, but when I follow the link to that page, the OLD is not on the list. Aetos said he figured he needed to register. But how do you register? I know it says you can only access it if you already own a paper copy of the OLD. I’ve got mine right here two feet away. So if it’s really available at all, I probably have to prove I have the paper copy. Does anyone know how I can actually access the OLD at the given site, or how I prove I’ve got the paper copy? And/or how do I register?
Hi Dave,
Sorry to report that I never could register on that site. I can’t even access it anymore. I believe the “private area” is restricted to folks in the European Union. I’ve run into the same problem trying to buy e-books from Germany. I have no problem purchasing hard copies; however, e-book sales are restricted. As for the OLD, I haven’t tried contacting the OUP directly, but at some point I probably will, in order to access more of OUP’s online content. There must be a way!
That’s too bad. It would be so great to have access to a digital, searchable copy!