SPOILER ALERT. Here’s a translation (mine) of the newest poem. Don’t look at it if you want to figure out the Greek for yourself!
“ … (one or more stanzas lost)
But you’re always wittering on about Charaxos coming, along with a full ship. That’s something Zeus knows about, I reckon, and all the gods, but you shouldn’t have this on your mind,
no, you should be sending me and telling me to earnestly plead with Queen Hera for Charaxos to get here with his ship safe
and find us in good shape. Everything else let’s put in the hands of the gods. For clear weather comes suddenly after mighty squalls.
Those whose daimon the King of Olympus wants to turn from toils to be a supporter(?) are blessed, and super-wealthy;
and we, if Larichos lifts up that head of his and finally becomes a man, would be suddenly freed from our deep distress.”
Is Sappho saying “Stop asking Zeus to bring us financial success – anybody who he’s going to help out of trouble is already wealthy – and instead ask Hera to bring Charaxos home safe. We wouldn’t even be in this mess if Larichos would stop moping.”?
Thanks chad. Now that the dust has settled, I think the only significant textual point in question in the newer one is what I gave as ἐπάρωγον in 14. The primary reading in the papyrus is επαρηγον, i.e. ἐπαρήγον(α) (adjective agreeing with δαίμονα and presumably predicative), with ω written above η (a variant reading rather than a correction?), i.e. ἐπάρωγον (noun), with much the same meaning. But the expression seems awkward. I proposed that επαρηγον should rather be επαρηιον (iota misread as gamma), i.e. ἐπ’ ἄρη(ι)ον (lesbian for ἄρειον), “(turn their fortune around) to the better,” and West independently conjectured effectively the same, ἐπ’ ἄρηον. This is still resisted, and strenuously, but I think it must be right. It admirably suits περτρόπην (περιτρέπειν) and εκ κακων.
Richard Janko took the addressee to be Sappho’s daughter, and construed 5-6 differently. Ηe translated “but escort me to offer many entreaties to queenly Hera, that she shall give order that Charaxos reach home, …” That seems impossibly contorted to me. Perhaps he’s recanted.
It’s also been suggested that Sappho is actually addressing her young brother Larichos, who pops up out of nowhere in the final stanza. A nice idea, but I favor her mother, as does West and I think most others.
I confess to disappointment in this family-centered poem.
Not “anybody who he’s going to help out of trouble is already wealthy,” at any rate. It’s a riff on the standard idea that those whom the gods favor prosper. If he wants to (remember the Iliad’s Διὸς βουλή?), Zeus can turn people’s fortune around, from troubles to happiness. This, like the maxim it follows (in asyndeton, note), can be referred back to Charaxos and also forward to the family on Lesbos, which is evidently going through a rough patch.
Rolling in obols?! δαιμονα is object of περτροπην (περιτρέπειν), which is the infinitive with βολληται (βούληται). εκ πονων is adverbial with περτροπην.
Sure, πολύολβος, rolling in obols. One of my best, I have to say.
So I am with you on βολλήται δαίμονα περτρόπην, except that I thought that in accusative δαίμονα could be the subject for περιτρέπειν. Like “νομίζω γὰρ ὑμᾶς ἐμοὶ καὶ πατρίδα καὶ φίλους.”
EDIT:
I also stumbled on this from Hecuba when I was trying to figure out “ἐπαρωγόν” and it made me wonder if something similar would be the case in the Sappho poem.
apologies if this was already linked, but here’s an interesting article by obbink that gives a scan of the papyrus itself, looks at this question above and gives both interpretations suggested above including the euripides hecuba reference. i thought that mwh’s conjecture was the best one, this hecuba reference now makes me wonder…
Thanks for the link cb. Looking at it like this, I get the feel for mwh’s idea more now – it flows nicely and is poetical. (I’ve been reading a lot of Anabasis without spaces, and my reading flow has been going way up: http://greek.io/texts/anabasis2.html) But why doesn’t this work?