Tis the Season to Get Your Cheese On

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Homer, Odyssey, 20.68–69

“…And glorious Aphrodite cared for them
With cheese and sweet honey and pleasing wine.”

…..κόμισσε δὲ δῖ᾿ Ἀφροδίτη
τυρῷ καὶ μέλιτι γλυκερῷ καὶ ἡδέι οἴνῳ·

Xenophanes, fr. 1.9-10

“…and fine tables
Heaped up with cheese and thick honey.”

…γεραρή τε τράπεζα
τυροῦ καὶ μέλιτος πίονος ἀχθομένη·

Literary Papyri, fr. 59 [LCL 360] Anonymous

“There was some cheese. I took it”

….τυρὸς ἦν τις· ἔσπασα

Teleclides, fr. 27

“…to sip honey sweet wine
From a fragrant cup
While snacking on cheese.”

καὶ μελιχρὸν οἶνον ἕλκειν
ξ ἡδύπνου λεπαστῆς,
τυρίον ἐπεσθίοντα.

Still Life with Sausage, Ham and Cheese. Stillleben mit Würsten, Schinken, Käse. Norditalienischer Maler des 17. Jahrhunderts (nordvenezianische Schule, in stilistischer Nähe zur Bassano-Malerfamilie). Öl auf Leinwand. 71 x 91 cm.

Euripides, Cyclops, 226

“My buckets of cheese are all mixed up!”

τεύχη τε τυρῶν συμμιγῆ…

Cratinus, fr. 136

“Once I laid down alongside cheese and mint and olive oil…”

τυρῷ καὶ μίνθῃ παραλεξάμενος καὶ ἐλαίῳ.

Antiphanes, fr. 51

“Do you get it? I am talking about cheese”

 μανθάνεις; / τυρὸν λέγω.

Aristophanes, Wasps 956

“What’s the use, then, if he eats the cheese?”

τί οὖν ὄφελος, τὸν τυρὸν εἰ κατεσθίει;

Eupolis, fr. 361

“Oh, my cheese is hollowed out and gone….”

ὡς οἴχεται μὲν τυρὸς ἐξεγλυμμένος.

Floris van Schooten, Still-Life with Glass, Cheese, Butter and Cake, c. 1580

Hippocrates of Cos, On Ancient Medicine, 20.48

“It is not enough to consider only whether cheese is a bad food, since it provides pain to someone who has eating too much of it. Instead, we need to figure out what the pain is, what causes it, and what part of a person is harmed. There are many other harmful foods and wicked drinks that impact a person in different ways. I would summarize it in this way: “Unmixed wine, when consumed too much, creates a specific effect.” Everyone knows that this is an aspect of wine and that wine is to blame intrinsically and we know what parts of a person’s body are susceptible to these effects.

I wish to bring this kind of truth to light about other things too. Cheese, to use my current example, doesn’t affect all people the same. Some people can gorge themselves on it with no pain and those people gain amazing strength from it. Others don’t do so well. So, the constitutions of these people are different and the difference resides in the part of the body that is inimical to cheese and is irritated and compelled to act upon its appearance. Those who have this humor in their body in greater amounts and with greater influence over their body will naturally suffer more. Yet if cheese were a bad food for the human body universally, then it would hurt everyone. Whoever knows these things true, will not suffer the rest.”

καὶ μὴ ἁπλῶς οὕτως· πονηρόν ἐστιν βρῶμα τυρός. πόνον γὰρ παρέχει τῷ πληρωθέντι αὐτοῦ, ἀλλὰ τίνα τε πόνον καὶ διὰ τί καὶ τίνι τῶν ἐν τῷ ἀνθρώπῳ ἐνεόντων ἀνεπιτήδειον. ἔστι γὰρ καὶ ἄλλα πολλὰ βρώματα καὶ πόματα πονηρά, ἃ διατίθησι τὸν ἄνθρωπον οὐ τὸν αὐτὸν τρόπον. οὕτως οὖν μοι ἔστω οἷον· οἶνος ἄκρητος πολλὸς ποθεὶς διατίθησί πως τὸν ἄνθρωπον· καὶ πάντες ἂν οἱ εἰδότες τοῦτο γνοίησαν, ὅτι †αὕτη δύναμις οἴνου καὶ αὐτὸς αἴτιος·† καὶ οἷσί γε τῶν ἐν τῷ ἀνθρώπῳ τοῦτο δύναται μάλιστα, οἴδαμεν. τοιαύτην δὴ βούλομαι ἀληθείην καὶ περὶ τῶν ἄλλων φανῆναι.

τυρὸς γάρ, ἐπειδὴ τούτῳ σημείῳ ἐχρησάμην, οὐ πάντας ἀνθρώπους ὁμοίως λυμαίνεται, ἀλλ᾿ εἰσὶν οἵτινες αὐτοῦ πληρούμενοι οὐδ᾿ ὁτιοῦν βλάπτονται, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἰσχύν, οἷσιν ἂν συμφέρῃ, θαυμασίως παρέχεται. εἰσὶ δ᾿ οἳ χαλεπῶς ἀπαλλάσσουσι. διαφέρουσιν οὖν τούτων αἱ φύσιες. διαφέρουσιν δὲ κατὰ τοῦτο, ὅπερ ἐν τῷ σώματι ἔνεστι πολέμιον τυρῷ καὶ ὑπὸ τούτου ἐγείρεταί τε καὶ κινεῖται· οἷς ὁ τοιοῦτος χυμὸς τυγχάνει πλείων ἐνεὼν καὶ μᾶλλον ἐνδυναστεύων ἐν τῷ σώματι, τούτους μᾶλλον καὶ κακοπαθεῖν εἰκός. εἰ δὲ πάσῃ τῇ ἀνθρωπίνῃ φύσει ἦν κακόν, πάντας ἂν ἐλυμήνατο. ταῦτα δὲ εἴ τις εἰδείη, οὐκ ἂν πάσχοι τάδε.

File:Paestum Museum (6120214225).jpg
Carved fruit. Paestum. “Red paint dishes with fruit (pomegranates, grapes, almonds), sweets and cheese”

Epicurus, according to Diogenes Laertius, Epicurus 11

“Send me a little bowl of cheese so that I can fill my belly whenever I like.”

πέμψον μοι τυροῦ,” φησί, “κυθριδίου, ἵν᾿ ὅταν βούλωμαι πολυτελεύσασθαι δύνωμαι.”

Using the Past as a Guide for the Future

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Andocides, On the Peace with Sparta 1-2

“You all seem to me to understand, Athenians, that it is better to make a just peace than to keep going to war. That politicians agree to peace in name but they oppose the acts that foster peace, you do not all perceive this. For they claim that, once peace is achieved, there is the greatest peril for the people that the current regime may be dissolved.

Therefore, if the people of the Athenians had never made peace before with the Lakedaimonians, we might rightly fear this because of inexperience of the process or distrust for them. Since you have often made peace with them previously when you were already ruled as a democracy, how would it not be right for you to first examine the things that happened before. For, it is right, Athenians, to use prior events as a guide about what will happen in the future.”

Ὅτι μὲν εἰρήνην ποιεῖσθαι δικαίαν ἄμεινόν ἐστιν ἢ πολεμεῖν, δοκεῖτέ μοι, ὦ Ἀθηναῖοι, πάντες γιγνώσκειν· ὅτι δὲ οἱ ῥήτορες τῷ μὲν ὀνόματι τῆς εἰρήνης συγχωροῦσι, τοῖς δ᾿ ἔργοις ἀφ᾿ ὧν ἂν ἡ εἰρήνη γένοιτο ἐναντιοῦνται, τοῦτο δὲ οὐ πάντες αἰσθάνεσθε. λέγουσι γὰρ ὡς ἔστι δεινότατον τῷ δήμῳ, γενομένης εἰρήνης, ἡ νῦν οὖσα πολιτεία μὴ καταλυθῇ.

Εἰ μὲν οὖν μηδεπώποτε πρότερον ὁ δῆμος ὁ [τῶν]2Ἀθηναίων εἰρήνην ἐποιήσατο πρὸς Λακεδαιμονίους, εἰκότως ἂν ἐφοβούμεθα αὐτὸ διά τε τὴν ἀπειρίαν τοῦ ἔργου διά τε τὴν ἐκείνων ἀπιστίαν· ὅπου δὲ πολλάκις ἤδη πρότερον εἰρήνην ἐποιήσασθε δημοκρατούμενοι, πῶς οὐκ εἰκὸς ὑμᾶς πρῶτον ἐκεῖνα σκέψασθαι τὰ τότε γενόμενα; χρὴ γάρ, ὦ Ἀθηναῖοι, τεκμηρίοις χρῆσθαι τοῖς πρότερον γενομένοις περὶ τῶν μελλόντων ἔσεσθαι.

ὡς ἔστι δεινότατον… Smyth §2224 δεινός εἰμι functions grammatically as an expression of fear, triggering the fear clause postponed to the end of the sentence (μὴ καταλυθῇ)

 

Image result for Athens treaty with sparta inscription
Segment of the Gortyn Legal inscription

Love as Classroom Management

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Quintilian, Institutio Oratoria 2.9:

Having said much about the duties of teachers I have this one bit of advice for students in the meantime. Students should love their teachers no less than their studies, and should consider them as parents not of their bodies, but of their minds. This devotion can add a lot to their pursuit of knowledge. For thus they will listen happily, believe the precepts they receive, and wish to be similar to their teachers; they will come quickly and happily to their classes, they will not become angry when corrected, they will rejoice when praised, they will become worthy of being most esteemed through their study. For as the duty of teachers is to teach, so is it the duty of students to make themselves teachable. Otherwise, neither is sufficient without the other, and as human offspring come forth from both parents, and you scatter your seed for nothing unless the furrow is softened beforehand to nourish it, so too eloquence is unable to grow unless a sociable concord is achieved between the bestower and the receiver of lessons.

Plura de officiis docentium locutus discipulos id unum interim moneo, ut praeceptores suos non minus quam ipsa studia ament et parentes esse non quidem corporum, sed mentium credant. Multum haec pietas conferet studio; nam ita et libenter audient et dictis credent et esse similes concupiscent, in ipsos denique coetus scholarum laeti alacres conuenient, emendati non irascentur, laudati gaudebunt, ut sint carissimi studio merebuntur. Nam ut illorum officium est docere, sic horum praebere se dociles: alioqui neutrum sine altero sufficit; et sicut hominis ortus ex utroque gignentium confertur, et frustra sparseris semina nisi illa praemollitus fouerit sulcus, ita eloquentia coalescere nequit nisi sociata tradentis accipientisque concordia.

Travel Plans for the Holidays: On to Bethlehem with the Protoevangelium of James

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This is a continuation of the Christmas Story in the apocryphal Gospel of James [also sometimes called the “Infancy” Gospel” or the Protoevangelium of James].

The Gospel According to James 17–18

17. “Then there was a summons from Herod the King [or Augustus] to record how many people there were in Bethlehem of Judea. And Joseph was compelled to return from Nazareth to Bethlehem. So Joseph said, “I will record my sons, but what should I do about the girl? How will I record her? As my wife? I am ashamed to do that. But as my daughter? The sons of Israel know that she is not my daughter. This day of the Lord will accomplish as it wishes.

And he prepared a donkey and put the girl on it and his son led it as [Samuel and] he followed after. Once they came about three miles from the city, Joseph turned and say her looking despondent and said to himself, “Perhaps what is in her is causing her pain.” And then Joseph turned back again and say her laughing and said, “Mary, what is this that I see your face now in laughter and then suddenly in pain?” And she said, “Joseph, I see two people with my eyes, one weeping and mourning and one rejoicing and feeling glory.”

Then they arrived near the middle of the journey, and Mary said to him: “take me down from the donkey, for that which is within me is pressing me to come out.” And he took her down and said to her, “Where will I take you and hide your impropriety, since this place is empty?”

18. Then he found nearby a cave and took her into it and stationed his sons near her as he left to seek a Hebrew midwife in the area near Bethlehem. “Now I, Joseph, was walking and I was not walking. I looked up into the curve of heaven and I saw it stop still. And I looked into the sky and I saw it still, all the birds of the sky had deserted it. And I looked toward the earth and I saw a dish lying there and workmen were placing it there. Their hands were in the vessel. Those who were chewing were not showing and those who were lifting food were not lifting it and those who were pressing something to their mouth were not pressing it. But everyone had their faces looking upward. I saw flocks which were being driven, but the sheep stood still. And The shepherd raised his hand to strike them, but his hand did not come down again. And I looked at the flowing of the river and I saw kids there and even though they had their mouths right next to the water, they did not drink. And then, all of a sudden, everything returned to its normal course.

17.1 Κέλευσις δὲ ἐγένετο ἀπὸ (τοῦ Ἀόστου) Ἡρώδου τοῦ βασιλέως ἀπογράψασθαι, ὅσοι εἰσὶν ἐν Βηθλεὲμ τῆς Ἰουδαίας. (ἠναγκάζετο δὲ Ἰωσὴφ ἀπελθεῖν ἐκ Ναζαρὲτ εἰς τὴν Βηθλεὲμ καὶ εἶπεν) καὶ εἶπεν Ἰωσήφ: ἐγὼ ἀπογράψομαι τοὺς υἱούς μου. ταύτην δὲ τὴν παῖδα τί ποιήσω; πῶς αὐτὴν ἀπογράψομαι; γυναῖκα ἐμήν; ἐπαισχύνομαι. ἀλλὰ θυγατέρα; οἶδαν οἱ υἱοὶ Ἰσραήλ, ὅτι οὐκ ἔστιν θυγάτηρ μου. αὐτὴ ἡ ἡμέρα Κυρίου ποιήσει, ὡς βούλεται. 2 καὶ ἔστρωσεν τὸν ὄνον, καὶ ἐκάθισεν αὐτὴν καὶ ἧλκεν ὁ υἱὸς αὐτοῦ καὶ ἠκολούθησεν Σαμουήλ (αὐτός). καὶ ἤγγισαν ἐπὶ μίλιον τρίτον, καὶ ἐστράφη Ἰωσὴφ καὶ εἶδεν αὐτὴν στυγνὴν καὶ ἔλεγεν: ἴσως τὸ ἐν αὐτῇ χειμάζει αὐτήν. καὶ πάλιν ἐστράφη Ἰωσὴφ καὶ εἶδεν αὐτὴν γελοῦσαν καὶ εἶπεν: Μαριάμμη, τί ἐστίν σοι τοῦτο, ὅτι τὸ πρόσωπόν σου βλέπω ποτὲ μὲν γελοῦντα ποτὲ δὲ στυγνάζον; καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ: Ἰωσήφ, ὅτι δύο λαοὺς βλέπω ἐν τοῖς ὀφθαλμοῖς μου, ἔνα κλαίοντα καὶ κοπτόμενον καὶ ἔνα χαίροντα καὶ ἀγαλλιῶντα. 3 καὶ ἤλθωσεν ἀνὰ μέσον τῆς ὁδοῦ, καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ Μαριάμμη: κατάγαγέ με ἀπὸ τοῦ ὄνου, ὅτι (τ)ὸ ἐν ἐμοὶ ἐπείγει με προελθεῖν. καὶ κατήγαγεν αὐτὴν ἐκεῖ καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῇ: ποῦ σε ἀπάξω καὶ σκεπάσω σου τὴν ἀσχημοσύνην, ὅτι ὁ τόπος ἔρημός ἐστιν;

181 Καὶ εὗρεν ἐκεῖ σπήλαιον καὶ εἰσήγαγεν αὐτὴν καὶ παρέστησεν αὐτῇ τοὺς υἱοὺς αὐτοῦ καὶ ἐξῆλθεν ζητῆσαι μαῖαν ( Ἑβραίαν) ἐν χώρᾳ Βηθλεέμ. 2 ἐγὼ δὲ Ἰωσὴφ περιεπάτουν καὶ οὐ περιεπάτουν. καὶ ἀνέβλεψα εἰς τὸν πόλον τοῦ οὐρανοῦ καὶ εἶδον αὐτὸν ἑστῶτα, καὶ εἰς τὸν ἀέρα καὶ εἶδον αὐτὸν ἔκθαμβον, καὶ τὰ πετεινὰ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ ἠρεμοῦντα. καὶ ἐπέβλεψα ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν καὶ εἶδον σκάφην κειμένην καὶ ἐργάτας ἀνακειμένους, καὶ ἦσαν αἱ χεῖρες αὐτῶν ἐν τῇ σκάφῃ. καὶ οἱ μασόμενοι οὐκ ἐμασῶντο, καὶ οἱ αἴροντες οὐκ ἀνέφερον, καὶ οἱ προσφέροντες τῷ στόματι αὐτῶν οὐ προσέφερον. ἀλλὰ πάντων ἦν τὰ πρόσωπα ἄνω βλέποντα. 3 καὶ εἶδον ἐλαυνόμενα πρόβατα, καὶ τὰ πρόβατα ἑστήκει: καὶ ἐπῆρεν ὁ ποιμὴν τὴν χεῖρα αὐτοῦ τοῦ πατάξαι αὐτά, καὶ ἡ χεὶρ αὐτοῦ ἔστη ἄνω. καὶ ἀνέβλεψα ἐπὶ τὸν χείμαρρον τοῦ ποταμοῦ καὶ εἶδον ἐρίφους καὶ τὰ στόματα αὐτῶν ἐπικείμενα τῷ ὕδατι καὶ μὴ πίνοντα. καὶ πάντα ὑπὸ θῆξιν (θήζει, θίζει, θρίζιν, ἔκπληξιν) τῷ δρόμῳ ἀπηλαύνοντο.

Image result for joseph and midwife in bethlehem

Fearful Care and Careful Fear

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H.W. Fowler, A Dictionary of Modern English Usage (s.v. ‘meticulous’)

meticulous. What is the strange charm that at one time made this wicked word irresistible to the British journalist? Did he like its length? Did he pity its isolation (for it has no kindred in England)? Could a Latin scholar like him not get meticulous out of his head? Could so accomplished a Frenchman never be sure whether meticuleux or m. was the word he knew so well? Or what was it? It is clear, first, that the word is not a piece of latinity that cannot be forgotten. ‘Ante- and post-classical’ say Lewis and Short: that is, you may read your Cicero and Virgil and Horace and Livy through and never meet it, and when it is unearthed in Plautus or somewhere it means not what the journalists made it mean, but just frightened. It is the word for the timid hare, or the man who is gibbering with fear (Nullust hoc meticulosus aeque… Perii, pruriunt dentes – Was ever man in such a funk? … Lord, how my teeth chatter!).

Some centuries ago m. had that meaning, comprehensible enough through the Latin metus (fear) to all who have learnt any Latin, but not to others, since metus by some odd chance has given no common words in English. But the word died out, and when it was resuscitated in the 19th c., it was given a new sense for which it was not in the least needed, and freely used as an unwanted synonym for careful, exact, punctilious, scrupulous, precise, etc.

It would be idle to try to put it back into an etymological strait-jacket and to apply it only to the care that has its origin in terror of being caught breaking rules or misstating facts, but if it is to escape the reproach of being a SUPERFLUOUS WORD it should at least be confined to a degree of care, not necessarily excessive or fussy – we have pernickety for that – but greater than what is implied by punctilious or scrupulous.

The first of the two examples that follow illustrates the legitimate use; the second is ludicrous in that it excludes not merely the idea of great care but even that of any care at all. Gone is the wealth of m. detail with which he loved to elaborate his finely finished pictures. / Mr. —-, who has succumbed to the wounds inflicted upon him ten days previously by a pet lion, had his fate foretold with m. accuracy more than 2000 years ago by the greatest Greek dramatists.

Cool Guys vs. Public Eyes

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Cicero, Tusculan Disputations 5.36:

We should understand, then, that popular glory is not to be sought in and of itself, nor is disgrace to be feared. ‘I came to Athens,’ says Democritus, ‘and no one knew me there!’ A firm and serious man, who glories in being so far from glory! Do flute players and those who play on stringed instruments direct their playing by the judgment of the mob and not their own; should a wise man endowed with a much greater skill than music ask not what is most true, but what the rabble want? Or is there anything more foolish than to consider those, whom you condemn individually as mere laborers and barbarians, to be something when taken together as one? He will despise our ambitions and our fluency, and will repudiate the honors of the people voluntarily offered him; yet we know not how to despise them before we begin to feel regret.

Intellegendum est igitur nec gloriam popularem ipsam per sese expetendam nec ignobilitatem extimescendam. ‘Veni Athenas’ inquit Democritus ‘neque me quisquam ibi adgnovit.’ Constantem hominem et gravem, qui glorietur a gloria se afuisse! An tibicines ique, qui fidibus utuntur, suo, non multitudinis arbitrio cantus numerosque moderantur, vir sapiens multo arte maiore praeditus non quid verissimum sit, sed quid velit vulgus, exquiret? An quicquam stultius quam, quos singulos sicut operarios barbarosque contemnas, eos aliquid putare esse universos? Ille vero nostras ambitiones levitatesque contemnet honoresque populi etiam ultro delatos repudiabit; nos autem eos nescimus, ante quam paenitere coepit, contemnere.

Seneca on Why Presents Should be Opened RIGHT AWAY

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Seneca, De Beneficiis 2.2

When the spirit is worn out and begins to hate a benefit while it waits for it, is it possible to still be grateful? Just as it is the most bitter cruelty which makes a punishment last longer and that killing quickly is a kind of mercy since torment supplies its own final end and the time which comes before death is the greatest period of suffering, so too gratitude for a gift will be greater the shorter the duration of suspense.

For the expectation of good things is upsetting too and since most gifts bring relief from some kind of thing, if anyone allows someone else to be tortured for a while when he was able to free him of burden or if he is slow to rejoice, he has added a punitive slap to his good deed. All generosity should move quickly—someone who acts quickly is someone who acts voluntarily. If someone drags his feet day to day, he does not act according to his spirit. He has thus lost two precious things: time and the demonstration of willing friendship. Consenting slowly is an indication of someone who is unwilling.”

Ubi in taedium adductus animus incipit beneficium odisse, dum expectat, potest ob id gratus esse? Quemadmodum acerbissima crudelitas est, quae trahit poenam, et misericordiae genus est cito occidere, quia tormentum ultimum finem sui secum adfert, quod antecedit tempus, maxima venturi supplicii pars est, ita maior est muneris gratia, quo minus diu pependit. Est enim etiam bonarum rerum sollicita expectatio, et cum plurima beneficia remedium alicuius rei adferant, qui aut diutius torqueri patitur, quem protinus potest liberare, aut tardius gaudere, beneficio suo manus adfert. Omnis benignitas properat, et proprium est libenter facientis cito facere; qui tarde et diem de die extrahens profuit, non ex animo fecit. Ita duas res maximas perdidit, et tempus et argumentum amicae voluntatis; tarde velle nolentis est.

Gift Meme

Somebody to Drink With: Anacreon’s Epitaph and Some Poems

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Greek Anthology 7.26, Antipater of Sidon

“Stranger passing by the humble grave of Anakreon,
If my books were of any use to you,
Pour some wine on my ashes, pour it out in drops
So that my bones can smile, refreshed a bit by wine,
so I, who loved the shouting raves of Dionysus,
so I, who was a partner of music matched to drink,
may not lie dead apart from Bacchus in this place below,
the land which all the race of mortals one day must know.”

Ξεῖνε, τάφον παρὰ λιτὸν ᾿Ανακρείοντος ἀμείβων,
εἴ τί τοι ἐκ βίβλων ἦλθεν ἐμῶν ὄφελος,
σπεῖσον ἐμῇ σποδιῇ, σπεῖσον γάνος, ὄφρα κεν οἴνῳ
ὀστέα γηθήσῃ τἀμὰ νοτιζόμενα,
ὡς ὁ Διωνύσου μεμελημένος εὐάσι κώμοις,
ὡς ὁ φιλακρήτου σύντροφος ἁρμονίης
μηδὲ καταφθίμενος Βάκχου δίχα τοῦτον ὑποίσω
τὸν γενεῇ μερόπων χῶρον ὀφειλόμενον.

Fr. 395

“Hades’ hall is horrifying
And the passage there is hard.
Worse: it is decided that
who ventures there does not return.”

Ἀίδεω γάρ ἐστι δεινὸς
μυχός, ἀργαλῆ δ᾿ ες αὐτὸν
κάτοδος. και γὰρ ἐτοῖμον
καταβάντι μὴ ἀναβῆναι

Anacreon. Marble. Roman copy of the 2nd century A.D. after a Greek original of the 5th century B.C. Inv. No. 491. Copenhagen, New Carlsberg Glyptotek.

Anacreon fr. 2

“I don’t love the man who while drinking next to a full cup
Talks about conflicts and lamentable war.
But whoever mixes the shining gifts of Aphrodite and the Muses
Let him keep in mind loving, good cheer.”

οὐ φιλέω, ὃς κρητῆρι παρὰ πλέωι οἰνοποτάζων
νείκεα καὶ πόλεμον δακρυόεντα λέγει,
ἀλλ’ ὅστις Μουσέων τε καὶ ἀγλαὰ δῶρ’ ᾿Αφροδίτης
συμμίσγων ἐρατῆς μνήσκεται εὐφροσύνης.

Fr. 428

“I love and again do not love
I am insane and yet sane too”

ἐρέω τε δηὖτε κοὐκ ἐρέω
καὶ μαίνομαι κοὐ μαίνομαι

This last fragment recalls (the much later) Carmen 85 of Catullus:

“I hate and I love: you might ask why I do this–
I don’t know, but I see it happen and it’s killing me.

Odi et amo. quare id faciam, fortasse requiris.
nescio, sed fieri sentio et excrucior.

Pyrrho on Homer and the Eating Pig

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Diogenes Laertius, Lives of the Philosophers 9.11 on Pyrrho

“But Philo the Athenian, who was his friend, used to say that he often called to mind Democritus and then Homer, wondering at him and constantly saying “just as the generation of leaves so are the generations of men”. And he liked the fact that Homer compared human beings to wasps, flies and birds. He also used to add these lines: “But, friend, die too: why do you mourn like this? / Patroklos also died and he was much better than you.” He would recite that along with all the passages which attested to the uncertain and empty pursuits, the childish simplicity of humankind.

Poseidonios also passes down a certain story like this about him. When his shipmates were exceedingly anxious because of a storm, he was calm and unshaken in his spirit. After he pointed to a piglet on the boat who was eating, he said that it was right for a wise person to settle into such an untroubled state.”

ἀλλὰ καὶ Φίλων ὁ Ἀθηναῖος, γνώριμος αὐτοῦ γεγονώς, ἔλεγεν ὡς ἐμέμνητο μάλιστα μὲν Δημοκρίτου, εἶτα δὲ καὶ Ὁμήρου, θαυμάζων αὐτὸν καὶ συνεχὲς λέγων, “οἵη περ φύλλων γενεή, τοίη δὲ καὶ ἀνδρῶν·”

καὶ ὅτι σφηξὶ καὶ μυίαις καὶ ὀρνέοις εἴκαζε τοὺς ἀνθρώπους. προφέρεσθαι δὲ καὶ τάδε·

ἀλλά, φίλος, θάνε καὶ σύ· τίη ὀλοφύρεαι οὕτως;
κάτθανε καὶ Πάτροκλος, ὅ περ σέο πολλὸν ἀμείνων·

καὶ ὅσα συντείνει εἰς τὸ ἀβέβαιον καὶ κενόσπουδον ἅμα καὶ παιδαριῶδες τῶν ἀνθρώπων.

Ποσειδώνιος δὲ καὶ τοιοῦτόν τι διέξεισι περὶ αὐτοῦ. τῶν γὰρ συμπλεόντων αὐτῷ ἐσκυθρωπακότων ὑπὸ χειμῶνος, αὐτὸς γαληνὸς ὢν ἀνέρρωσε τὴν ψυχήν, δείξας ἐν τῷ πλοίῳ χοιρίδιον ἐσθίον καὶ εἰπὼν ὡς χρὴ τὸν σοφὸν ἐν τοιαύτῃ καθεστάναι ἀταραξίᾳ.

Image result for medieval manuscript piglet
Luttrell Psalter, British Library Add MS 42130 (medieval manuscript,1325-1340), f59v

Such, Such Was Democritus

~ Erik ~ Leave a comment

Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy (Preface):

Democritus, as he is described by Hippocrates and Laertius, was a little wearish old man, very melancholy by nature, averse from company in his latter days, and much given to solitariness, a famous philosopher in his age, coaevus with Socrates, wholly addicted to his studies at the last, and to a private life: wrote many excellent works, a great divine, according to the divinity of those times, an expert physician, a politician, an excellent mathematician, as Diacosmus and the rest of his works do witness. He was much delighted with the studies of husbandry, saith Columella, and often I find him cited by Constantinus and others treating of that subject. He knew the natures, differences of all beasts, plants, fishes, birds; and, as some say, could understand the tunes and voices of them.

In a word, he was omnifariam doctus, a general scholar, a great student; and to the intent he might better contemplate, I find it related by some, that he put out his eyes, and was in his old age voluntarily blind, yet saw more than all Greece besides, and writ of every subject, Nihil in toto opificio naturae, de quo non scripsit. A man of an excellent wit, profound conceit; and to attain knowledge the better in his younger years, he travelled to Egypt and Athens, to confer with learned men, “admired of some, despised of others.” After a wandering life, he settled at Abdera, a town in Thrace, and was sent for thither to be their lawmaker, recorder, or town-clerk, as some will; or as others, he was there bred and born. Howsoever it was, there he lived at last in a garden in the suburbs, wholly betaking himself to his studies and a private life, “saving that sometimes he would walk down to the haven,” “and laugh heartily at such variety of ridiculous objects, which there he saw.” Such a one was Democritus.

File:Portrait of Democritus Junior in Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy, 1628, 2nd edition.jpg - Wikimedia Commons