I’m using this thread to keep a record of poems that I’d like to memorize, as a daily intention, and of course to give others the opportunity to post suggestions.
Oxford Book of Greek Verse 185. Theognis. Choosing Friends
Ταῦτα μὲν οὕτως ἴσθι· κακοῖσι δὲ μὴ προσομίλει
ἀνδράσιν, ἀλλ᾿ αἰεὶ τῶν ἀγαθῶν ἔχεο·
καὶ μετὰ τοῖσιν πῖνε καὶ ἔσθιε, καὶ μετὰ τοῖσιν
ἵζε, καὶ ἅνδανε τοῖς, ὧν μεγάλη δύναμις.
ἐσθλῶν μὲν γὰρ ἄπ᾿ ἐσθλὰ μαθήσεαι· ἢν δὲ κακοῖσιν
συμμίσγῃς, ἀπολεῖς καὶ τὸν ἐόντα νόον.
this apo is postpositive and goes with ἐσθλῶν right?
That’s how I took it anyway, saying it to myself. And that’s how it’s accented here.
What I was shaky on was the μέν…δέ of the first line, and what ταῦτα referred to. But after saying it to myself a bit, here’s what I’ve got just now: ταῦτα refers specifically to the wisdom saying of the last two lines, which I take as being even older than the setting. Know this [proverb] this way, and stay away from bad men <…>: “ἐσθλῶν μὲν γὰρ ἄπ᾿ ἐσθλὰ μαθήσεαι…”
Menander and St. Paul repeat a version of this proverb, of course.
I think ταῦτα μὲν οὕτως ἴσθι refers to what precedes:
πέπνυσο, μηδ᾽ αἰσχροῖσιν ἐπ᾽ ἔργμασι μηδ᾽ ἀδίκοισιν
τιμὰς μηδ᾽ ἀρετὰς ἕλκεο μηδ᾽ ἄφενος.
See ll. 29-30.
Reasonable. I’ve just got this extract in the book of verse, and Googling for context ruins the fun, of course.
Ὑψίκομον παρὰ τάνδε καθίζεο φωνήεσσαν
φρίσσουσαν πυκινοῖς κῶμον ὑπὸ Ζεφύροις,
καί σοι καχλάζουσιν ἐμοῖς παρὰ νάμασι σύριγξ
θελγομένων ἄξει κῶμα κατὰ βλεφάρων.
Ἔργον ἐστὶν εἰς τρίκλινον συγγενείας εἰσπεσεῖν,
οὗ λαβὼν τὴν κύλικα πρῶτος ἄρχεται λόγου πατὴρ
καὶ παραινέσας πέπωκεν, εἶτα μήτηρ δευτέρα,
εἶτα τήθη παραλαλεῖ τις, εἶτα βαρύφωνος γέρων,
τηθίδος πατήρ, ἔπειτα γραῦς καλοῦσα φίλτατον.
ὁ δ᾿ ἐπινεύει πᾶσι τούτοις.
Happy Thanksgiving. I hope that everyone has plenty of trochee.
who is this filtaton?
how to scan this? not all of it are trochees.
I imagined the φίλτατον as some loved grandkid…but I have no idea. I will keep a lookout at our Thanksgiving for worthy candidates for all the characters.
Scanning it seems straightforward enough, I think. Here is the base, before anceps and resolutions are sprinkled in:
4 beats gets you into the line, 4 beats gets you out. I don’t know what that’s called, but I’ll bet it starts with “trochaic”. Notice that τρίκλινον is short long long before συγ-. κύλικα is short short short before πρ-.
this filtaton is probably neutrum not masculinum, right?
I cannot scan the even lines, I don’t think they are trochees.
οὗ λαβὼν τὴν κύλικα πρῶτος ἄρχεται λόγου πατὴρ
And so on. Let me know if you need the others too.
I assumed that the φίλτατον is a masculine individual, addressed by the γραῦς, and the subject of the next line. But I may change my mind after I’ve memorized it and said it a few times.
It seems that this is meant to be advice to someone trying to infiltrate a party, about how to recognize everyone?
EDIT: Perhaps the φίλτατον is the old man, father of the grandmother, and he is the subject of the next line. But he’s already had the cup…
Like Joel’s edit, I take φίλτατον to refer to the βαρύφωνος γέρων, the father of the aunt. In the last line he nods in assent. The meter is trochaic tetrameter catalectic.
οὗ λαβὼν τὴν κύλικα πρῶτος ἄρχεται λόγου πατὴρ
You’re right. Strange though. I wonder if that shouldn’t be τηθίς and not τήθη just before then.
Another objection to the identification of the old man, who has apparently already spoken and toasted, is the slight awkwardness of his being one of the πᾶσι τούτοις just mentioned himself.
A third objection is that the ἔπειτα makes this identification a focus. We’ve been led up to this point.
The most obvious candidate other than the old man is the person not mentioned, but who sort of is mentioned: the person in relationship to all these people, the son of the father and mother, etc. He would also be the one throwing the party, hence ἐπινεύει.
But why does his own family need to be identified for him? Why is it a job for him to get into the party?
Because the φίλτατον is actually the identical twin, raised away, of the the beloved relative.
Hey, didn’t Plautus write a play about an identical twin infiltrating a dinner party? What’re the odds?
That’s how I say it aloud, at least, with the exception that the rat-a-tat string of short vowels of κύλικα doesn’t make me feel an ictus on the first syllable. Maybe the second… but I’m hesitant to commit to one in particular. I have found that the important thing to make the short vowels fit in iambics, at least, is to say them very fast and smoothly, rat-a-tat-tat, and the rhythm seems to come out right. Otherwise on long vowels, I stress the ictus.
Γάμος κράτιστός ἐστιν ἀνδρὶ σώφρονι,
τρόπον γυναικὸς χρηστὸν ἕδνον λαμβάνειν.
αὕτη γὰρ ἡ προὶξ οἰκίαν σώζει μόνη.
συνεργὸν οὗτος ἀντὶ δεσποίνης ἔχει
εὔνουν, βεβαίαν εἰς ἅπαντα τὸν βίον.
Are you memorizing these too, Philo? Let me know if you have a particular trick or process. I’m not approaching it with much systemization, though everything seems to stick so far.
Good eye. I see that Olson’s ed. of Athenaeus (where this fragment comes from) prints τηθίς instead of τήθη here. I don’t have editions of the Menander fragments handy, but one could look there too. τηθίς seems right.
Here’s Kassel, who dates the fix to Meineke, for his Attic Comic Poets, I imagine. So I’m somewhat anticipated. I’ve also included 187 due to the fix to τηθίδα in line one.
These next is 30 lines, and I may take a couple of days to memorize it.
Oxford Greek Verse 2. Thersites. Il. 211-42.
the best marriage for a wise man is
to take a useful dowry in the person of a woman
onl ythis gift safeguards the household
he has a companion instead of a lady
well-minded, and reliable, for the rest of his life.
plz indicate prossody
I took χρηστόν as modifying τρόπον: “to take a woman’s good character as dowry”