οἱ τὸν Σάμιον Πυθαγόραν ἐπαινοῦντες τάδε ἐπ᾽ αὐτῷ φασιν: ὡς Ἴων μὲν οὔπω εἴη, γένοιτο δὲ ἐν Τροίᾳ ποτὲ Εὔφορβος, ἀναβιοίη τε ἀποθανών, ἀποθάνοι δέ, ὡς ᾠδαὶ Ὁμήρου, ἐσθῆτά τε τὴν ἀπὸ θνησειδίων παραιτοῖτο καὶ καθαρεύοι βρώσεως, ὁπόση ἐμψύχων, καὶ θυσίας: μὴ γὰρ αἱμάττειν τοὺς βωμούς, ἀλλὰ ἡ μελιττοῦτα καὶ ὁ λιβανωτὸς καὶ τὸ ἐφυμνῆσαι, φοιτᾶν ταῦτα τοῖς θεοῖς παρὰ τοῦ ἀνδρὸς τούτου, γιγνώσκειν τε, ὡς ἀσπάζοιντο τὰ τοιαῦτα οἱ θεοὶ μᾶλλον ἢ τὰς ἑκατόμβας καὶ τὴν μάχαιραν ἐπὶ τοῦ κανοῦ:
I don’t know how to account for the nominative here: ἡ μελιττοῦτα καὶ ὁ λιβανωτὸς καὶ τὸ ἐφυμνῆσαι. Is this an anacoluthon or numinativus pendens or anything else?
Yes, anacolouthon—strict syntax would require accusative. With the nominatives you expect eg φοιτῷεν, but he suddenly switches the construction back to acc + inf. Philostratus is famous for this sort of thing. It’s intentional and stylistically affected.
I read it like this: καὶ καθαρεύοι … θυσίας … ἀλλ᾿ ἡ μελιττοῦτα καὶ ὁ λιβανωτὸς καὶ τὸ ἐφυμνῆσαι
I believe ἀλλά = ἀλλ’ ἤ here, per the LSJ example: οὐδέ τις ἄλλη / φαίνετο γαιάων, ἀλλ᾿ οὐρανὸς ἠδὲ θάλασσα
Respectfully, I don’t follow the logic here
And he avoided (was clean from) sacrifice, except for the honeycake and the frankincense and the chanting.
It’s mostly parallel to the καὶ καθαρεύοι βρώσεως, ὁπόση ἐμψύχων, with the accusative explanation about blood interjected.
The nominatives, among other things, don’t work in that reading. As I said above, Philostratus is known for this sort of stylized anacolouthon. The grammar is clear.
The ὁπόση ἐμψύχων pulled us into nominative case a moment ago. We’re in the same verb and it’s still available to the speaker.
It’s “anacolouthon” and “the grammar is clear” seem to be somewhat conflicting statements to me. You seem to mean “that’s just his style”. But I’m afraid that I don’t know how much time you’ve spent with this author, so it’s hard to evaluate, nor have you listed other examples of his doing the same, which would allow us to evaluate.
For what it’s worth, I agree with phalarkos and I don’t understand Joel’s explanation at all. I can’t see how ἡ μελιττοῦτα καὶ ὁ λιβανωτὸς can possibly be parallel to ὁπόση ἐμψύχων [εστι] or how ἡ μελιττοῦτα καὶ ὁ λιβανωτὸς can be within the scope of καθαρεύοι, as βρώσεως, ὁπόση ἐμψύχων, καὶ θυσίας is. There’s no verb to switch from what Pythagoras is rejecting to what he’s advocating – just the anacolouthon ἡ μελιττοῦτα καὶ ὁ λιβανωτὸς etc., which makes the point effectively.
Last one from me on this. Constantinus had it right with anacoluthon/nom pend. καθαρεύειν doesn’t apply to the clause starting ἀλλὰ ἡ μελιττοῦτα. You find this stylized, asyntactic (but perfectly clear) nominative used in “second sophistic” authors, above all Philostratus. Atticizers of this ilk sought out rare/anomalous Attic usage and fashioned them into markers of high register. For examples the classic is Schmid, “Der Atticismus…” Of course, no one has to take me at my word, even if in my view this is a perfectly straightforward matter.
I highly recommend Philostratus’s Heroicus for anyone interested in Homeric reception, ancient literary criticism, second sophistic, etc.
I highly recommend Philostratus’s Heroicus for anyone interested in Homeric reception, ancient literary criticism, second sophistic, etc.
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yea i think i should read it after apollonuis
Well Schmid is quite amazing (though I had no idea until now of the extent of German insanity). He calls this an absolute nominative, used here “like a heading standing in front.” (pg. 113, vol 4), and gives a few examples. Most closely, it seems to me:
κῆποι δὲ ὁπόσοι τρωκτοὶ καὶ ὁπόσοι ἀνθέων κῆποι, βρύειν αὐτὸ καὶ λιμένας μεστοὺς γαλήνης ἐν αὐτῷ εἶναι.
Yes, it does look just like that.
(His examples of this don’t generally seem to fall into acc. + inf. Ie., just falling into an accusative object of a finite verb: ἡ δὲ ὕλη τῆς ἐσθῆτος ἔριον αὐτοφυὲς ἡ γῆ φύει. But TLG doesn’t use his numbering system, so I’m only looking at the ones he thought important enough to quote.)