Page:The Journal of Classical and Sacred Philology, Volume 1, 1854.djvu/222

 212 Journal of Philology. navovpyoi KaBairtp akuinjZ, which makes the genitive dependent on "k(oi and not on opyais. In accordance with this, Mommsen in his translation of Pindar (Des Pindaros Werke in die Versmaasse des Originals uebersetzt, Leips. 1846), renders the passage as follows : " Dem Beklatschten und Horer zugleich ist blinzelnder Laurer ein tddtlich Leid, gradsweges in seinen Tucken gleichend dem Fuchs." But although there can be no doubt that this is the meaning of the poet, it is equally clear that this meaning is not conveyed by the words as they stand. For there is no instance of the use of t* 411: x f ^ vl "teXr) avtyv, may be taken as exemplifying the usual and idiomatic construction of the adjective. Now no reader of Pindar can be ignorant of the fact that the poet was familiar with the writings of Hesiod, his great country- man. When, therefore, Hesiod had written (Op. et D. 304): KT)i}vc(T<Ti Kodovpots ciKcXos opyqv, it seems to me impossible that Pindar should not have written opyffv 'ikanfKfcratp ueXot, if he meant to say that the calumniators in question were like foxes in their character or disposition. As the i of the dative plural may be elided in Pindar after a double o-, (Hermann. Opusc. I. 250,) we may have akamUeav XkAoi here ; just as we have Kfp8rv into aKaynUto-cr- is, vice versa, a result of the same confusion as that which substituted opyais for opyrjv. But even if the diplomatic probability of the corruption were much less than it is, I would rather adopt the supposition that the text is faulty, than come to some conclusions, which seem to me quite inadmissible ; namely, that jEschylus wrote Spyas arcvcls, when he found opyais artvts in this passage ; and that Pindar "did not know his own language, and wrote opyais aXuntKwv 1k(oi, when he meant dpyr/v akvirUto-o-iv iKtoi, and that too when a poet of his own country, with whose writings he is known to have been familiar,