it is οἰωνοῖσί τε πᾶσι in
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0133
but in Homeric Greek by Clyde Pharr, it’s οἰωνοῖσί τε δαῖτα
which is correct?
Hi Mr Zheng, these are two different readings in the tradition – you’ll see with Homer (among others) that this happens a lot!
These two readings have been discussed earlier on this forum, e.g. here:
http://discourse.textkit.com/t/poll-iliad-1-5-or/14469/1
Cheers, Chad
Plutarch seems to quote it with δαῖτα in his essay on studying poetry.
Athenaeus says that it’s from Zenodotus, who he says should have known better than to apply the word to the feasting of beasts:
καὶ ἐπὶ μόνων ἀνθρώπων δαῖτα λέγει ὁ ποιητής, ἐπὶ δὲ θηρίων οὐκ ἔτι. ἀγνοῶν δὲ ταύτης τῆς φωνῆς τὴν δύναμιν Ζηνόδοτος ἐν τῇ κατ’ αὐτὸν ἐκδόσει γράφει
αὐτοὺς δὲ ἑλώρια τεῦχε κύνεσσιν
οἰωνοῖσί τε δαῖτα,
τὴν τῶν γυπῶν καὶ τῶν ἄλλων οἰωνῶν τροφὴν οὕτω καλῶν, μόνου ἀνθρώπου χωροῦντος <εἰς> τὸ ἴσον ἐκ τῆς πρόσθεν βίας. διὸ καὶ μόνου τούτου ἡ τροφὴ δαίς· καὶ μοῖρα τὸ ἑκάστῳ διδόμενον.
The Suda obviously follows Athenaeus:
Δαιτὸς ἐΐσης: ἐξ ἴσου μεριζομένης εὐωχίας. Ζηνόδοτος δὲ τῆς ἀγαθῆς φησιν· ἐπειδὴ ἡ τροφὴ τῷ ἀνθρώπῳ ἀγαθόν. ἐπειδὴ οἱ πρῶτοι ἄνθρωποι, οἷς δὴ οὐ παρῆν ἄφθονος ἡ τροφή, βίᾳ ἥρπαζον καὶ ἀφῃροῦντο τοὺς ἔχοντας, καὶ μετὰ τῆς ἀκοσμίας ἐγίνοντο καὶ φόνοι· ἐξ ὧν λεχθῆναι τὴν ἀτασθαλίαν. ἐν γὰρ ταῖς θαλίαις ἡμάρτανον τὰ πρῶτα οἱ ἄνθρωποι. ὕστερον δὲ διένεμον, καὶ ἦλθεν εἰς κόσμον τὰ δόρπα. ἔνθεν καὶ δαιτρός· καὶ δαίς, ἡ εὐωχία· καὶ δαιτυμόνες. ὅτι ἐπὶ ἀνθρώπων λέγεται δαίς, ἐπὶ δὲ θηρίων οὔ. ἀγνοῶν δὲ Ζηνόδοτος τῆς φωνῆς ταύτης τὴν δύναμιν ἔφη· ἑλώρια τεῦχε κύνεσσιν οἰωνοῖσί τε δαῖτα.
Eustathius also sources it to Zenodotus, but the statement doesn’t really say anything that couldn’t be sourced directly from Athenaeus.
Against the Zenodotus origin, however, is that Aristonicus, quoting Zenodotus for the preceding Iliad line, does not mention anything about δαῖτα. This lends a great deal of support to mwh’s idea that Zenodotus never said this. Although I’d have a hard time swallowing “another Zenodotus”, the Athenaeus story is funny enough that it’s easy to see as a mock-Zenodotian fiction. But in that case, what would explain Plutarch’s version? Later cross-transmission?
Karl Lehrs, in his De Aristarchi studiis homericis, refers to all of the above except for the Plutarch, and mentions the following refutation of Athenaeus/Zenodotus/Zenodotus of ???/mock-Zenodotus from Heynius (Christian Gottlob).
Hi, just to follow up on the Zenodotus point, note also my post on this from the thread linked above:
“west argues that zenodotus took an ionian rhapsode’s copy, full of variants already baked in, e.g. δαῖτα, and produced his edition basically by athetising verses (so that the textual variants aren’t attributable to him, but to the rhapsode who produced the copy that he subsequently athetised) - see chapter 2 of west’s text and transmission of iliad.”
In other words, Zenodotus may not have taken a view on δαῖτα vs πᾶσι at all. Instead, he may have taken an existing version already containing δαῖτα, and basically done the ancient equivalent of strike-through in a word processor (but using a symbol instead). I haven’t read West’s book on this in a while, but that’s my recollection.
Cheers, Chad
That makes sense, Chad. Looking into it a bit more, it appears that Aristonicus is mostly extracted out of the A scholia, which are often (apparently) quoting his “Signs of Homer”. Glancing through his mentions of Zenodotus, they always seem to follow that same pattern: Zenodotus athetizes something, or he presents a variant, as Chad says. I didn’t see any opinions offered as being stated by Zenodotus.
So re-reading what he says on 4-5:
ὅτι Ζηνόδοτος τοὺς δύο ἀθετεῖ· γίνεται δὲ τὸ προοίμιον κόλον. καὶ πρὸς τὰς ψυχὰς ἀντιδιέσταλκε τὸ αὐτοὺς δέ, ἐπὶ τῶν σωμάτων.
“[It’s stated?] that Zenodotus athetizes the two lines, but the proemion becomes a kolon. And he has differentiated “τὰς ψυχάς” from the “αὐτοὺς δέ”, meaning the bodies.”
So “ἀντιδιέσταλκε” isn’t referring to a statement of Zenodotus, which I thought at first, but just describing what Homer is doing. But still, δαῖτα is not mentioned as a variant here, despite a number of Zenodotus’ variants being brought up throughout.
Of course, we have it on no other authority than Homer’s himself that all this athetization is nonsense:
ἔτι δὲ καὶ περὶ τῶν ἀθετουμένων στίχων ἐπηρώτων, εἰ ὑπ’ ἐκείνου εἰσὶ γεγραμμένοι. καὶ ὃς ἔφασκε πάντας αὑτοῦ εἶναι. κατεγίνωσκον οὖν τῶν ἀμφὶ τὸν Ζηνόδοτον καὶ Ἀρίσταρχον γραμματικῶν πολλὴν τὴν ψυχρολογίαν.