Blumenthal - Callimachus, Epigram 28, Numenius Fr. 20, and the Meaning of κυκλικός

8/13/2019 Blumenthal - Callimachus, Epigram 28, Numenius Fr. 20, and the Meaning of

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Callimachus, Epigram 28, Numenius Fr. 20, and the Meaning of Author(s): H. J. BlumenthalSource: The Classical Quarterly, New Series, Vol. 28, No. 1 (1978), pp. 125-127Published by: Cambridge University Presson behalf of The Classical AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/638715.

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CALLIMACHUS,EPIGRAM28, NUMENIUS FR. 20,AND THE MEANING OF KvuKXcdO'

'EOaipco 7-6doirlpa T7KUvKXht : KUvKXh6n Callimachus' epigram is variouslytranslated 'cyclic' on the one hand, 'hackneyed', 'banal', vel sim. on the other.Thus Cahen2 gives 'cyclique' and Gow-Page,3 referring to A.P. 11.130, take it inthe same way, while Hauvette4 renders 'banale' and LSJ, s.v. KVKXtK6o,I, giveCallimachus' line for the variant meaning 'commonplace, conventional'. Perhapssignificantly they give no other example of the adjective, though they do adducetheir sense IV, where they give the adverb KVKXtKu3econventionally', citingSch. Od. 7.115, a text in which it almost certainly does not have this meaning.Again they give it as a variant, now on the alleged sense 'in common use' ofSchh. Od. 16.195 and 17.25, which, supplying CKSotwith KVKXutK?KVKXtK'?is given as authority for variant readings) they render 'the vulgate'. This isprobably irrelevant to, and at best dubious support for, their version of rd7roilpa rdKVKXtKdV, hich could, however, be right for other reasons.If translations like 'commonplace' are correct, then Callimachus would bedisplaying his, and his contemporaries', predilection for using words in a senseother than their normal one. When KVKXtKdqccurs elsewhere in other than itsliteral sense of 'circular', it seems, with one exception, either clearly or probablyto have its technical sense 'cyclic', pertaining to the post-Homeric poems or theirpoets. So in the Homeric scholia, where for obvious reasons it and its cognatesare most common. Unfortunately, as we have already indicated, the evidence ofthese scholia is not unambiguous. In some texts, which, in spite of LSJ, shouldprobably be treated separately, the word appears without an expressed noun,so in Schh. II. 3.342 and Od. 248, where 7ror7ziC -ai) should be supplied,5 oreven without adequate context, as with the two cases of KvKXtK4?entionedabove, where the reference is fairly clearly to an edition, and could be to oneof, or containing, the cyclic poems.6Some occurrences are reasonably clear, for instance Scbb. II. 6.325, intKVKXtKC(,araKeXyprjat, nd 9.222, KVKXtKCgTepoV,oth linked with acomplaint of inappropriateness, and so likely to take their point from thecommonly impugned shoddiness of the cyclic epics. If KuKXtu6meant 'normal'or 'banal', these comments would hardly apply to an inapposite or conspicuouslyinfelicitous expression.7 The uncertainty which must remain has concerned

Epigr. 28 Pfeiffer = 2 Gow-Page = A.P.12.43; fr. 20 (= fr. 29 Leemans) is desPlaces's numbering, Numinius (Budd edn.,Paris, 1973) used hereafter: the text is fromEusebius, P.E. 11.22.9.2 E. Cahen, Callimaque2(Bud6 edn.,Paris, 1934). While he prints 'cyclique', hisnote on the line implies that he is giving'cyclique' as an interpretation of 'banale':'cette expression, semble-t-il, d6signe ici lepoeme banale des successeurs d'Homre ...'3 A. S. F. Gow and D. L. Page, The GreekAnthology. Hellenistic Epigrams (Cambridge,1965), ii.155.

4 A. Hauvette, 'Les dpigrammesdeCallimaque', REG 20 (1907), 343.s Cf. also Schhb.II. 19.326 and 23.346and 660, where, as in the notes on II. 3.242we have i7'oopia irap& oMlKVKXhKOlC.6 Cf. W. Dindorf, Scholia Graeca inHomeri Odysseam (Oxford, 1855), ii.267ad Sch. Od. 16.195 which reads O'Xyet]hKVKxKal, ?Xyetq: ch. Od. 17.25 issimilar. T. W. Allen in the apparatus of theO.C.T. tactfully prints editio n KVut(LKfor both lines.7 Cf. also Sch. II. 15.610, and possibly24.628, if KVKXlKL'qChould be read there as

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126 H. J. BLUMENTHALeditorsof the scholia,8andone passage,Sch. Od. 7.115, the veryone that LSJuse to supporttheirtranslationof Callimachus,hasgivenrise to considerabledispute.9The comment,on the descriptionof the treesat the Phaeacianpalace,begins o01KVKXtKJ3CTdeiOera 7rpooepptrrrat,and draws attention to theappropriateness of the epithets. If inappropriateness is a complaint against thecyclic poets, then o) KVKXltK3Could suitably mean 'not as in the cyclic poems',while 'not in a normal, or conventional, way' would hardly fit. So here too'cyclic' would seem to be the more likely rendering. In any case we may say thatin none of these cases is the meaning 'cyclic' impossible, and that in most it isclearly appropriate.10Now the dating of the Homeric scholia is of course sometimes problematic.11But it should not cause too loud a howl of protest to say that while the scholiain question may be Alexandrian, they do not all certainly date back to theAlexandrian period, and so cannot be used to establish 'cyclic' beyond doubt asthe standard Alexandrian sense.12 They may, however, well be evidence for justthat.13 Thus it is likely that Callimachus' use would have been normal if hemeant 'cyclic', and perverse if he meant 'conventional' or 'banal'. He could, ofcourse, have intended both to be understood.The exception referred to above is Numenius, in a passage whose precisemeaningand text is not entirelyclear.The relevantpartreads:1i&tev ycp 76vKvKXUKoviriT70o6r77povpyo6Ttpdalteinrcv AyaOdk7v'.v8 r HloXvreir6&tyaOdviirev &aaOo9 Wav'.t is clearenough,however,fromthe context, thatKVK VLKdhere does mean'commonplace'or 'commonlyused':&yaO6deferringto the Demiurge, n the normalsense, is contrastedwith rdd&yaO6vn theRepublic,clearlynot used in the standardway when it is appliedto the Idea ofthe Good. This contraststandswhetherwithKVKXLK6vne shouldsupplyXy6ov,as didVigierandGifford,'4ord''ya6dv,sMrasprefers.15Numenius hen meansgood in the usual-perhapsuninterestingbecauseun-Platonic ense?-of the word.proposed by R. Merkel,Apollonii Argonautica(Leipzig, 1854), p.xxxi: so too A. Severyns,Le Cycle dpique dans l'dcole d'Aristarque.Bibl. de la Fac. de Phil. et Lett. de I'U. deLiege 40 (Liege/Paris, 1928), p.157.

8 And others; cf. Merkel, op. cit.,pp.xxx-xxxvi.9 See the discussion in Dindorf, op. cit.1.335, ad loc. More recently Severyns,

op. cit., pp.155 f., takes KVKXtKc here asclearly meaning 'in the Cyclic style';L. P. Wilkinson, 'CallimachusA.P. xii.43',CR N.S. 17 (1967), 5, as meaning'conventionally'.1o Severyns, op. cit., pp.155-9, arguesthat KVKXtKC3qn Aristarchus' commentsmeant exclusively 'a la maniere des Cycliques,

comme font les Cycliques'; cf. alsoR. Pfeiffer, History of Classical Scholarship(Oxford, 1968), p.230: he, however, allowsat least the implication of conventionalityand triviality.On this cf. H. Erbse, Scholia Graecain Homeri Iliadem. Scholia Vetera i (Leiden,1969), xii f. Erbse excludes that scbolion onII. 3.242 in which KUKXLKcdppears.

'2 Erbse attributes Scbb. II1. .325a and9.222a to Aristonicus. Severyns, loc. cit.(n. 10) discusses as Aristarchus' Scbb. II.6.325, 15.610, 24.628.3 Dindorf, op. cit. i, p.iii, points out

that those on the later books of the Odysseyare unlikely to be early, but our examplesfrom these are among the less clear anyhow.4 Vigier ap. Mras(see n.15), E. H.Gifford, Eusebii Pamphili PraeparatioEvangelica iv (Oxford, 1903), n. ad 11.22,544 d: Gifford suggests that the referenceis to epitaphs.'s K. Mrasin the G.C.S. edition (Berlin,1956), in apparatu. Given these alternativeswe should clearly follow Mras,making theadditional small change of rd for r70v.Notonly does the passage suggest &-yaO6v,utalso the frequent occurence of the word inthe following lines could mean that itactually stood in the text here and wassimply omitted, as probably happened inline 11 (des Places's lines). But would notro KVKXLKOV,the standard thing', give therequired sense anyhow?



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CALLIMACHUS,EPIGRAM 28, NUMENIUS FR. 20 127Since Numenius does not otherwise seem to have been a great coiner of newwords or significations of words, such a use by him would suggest that he had a

precedent, and a clear case of such a precedent is, as will appear from theprevious discussion, not easy to find in the extant material. Callimachus couldprovide one. The epigrams were widely circulated in later antiquity,16 andAthenaeus, roughly contemporary with Numenius, tells us that they were readby schoolchildren.17 Numenius was familiar with at least some Greek poetry.There are frequent allusions to Homer,18 and one or two to Hesiod.19 ifCallimachus can be added to his reading list, that is interesting as evidence forthe Greek elements in the intellectual make-up of this cultural hybrid. From thepoint of view of Callimachus we can then note that the less obvious meaning ofKVKXuK6qas already taken in the late second- /early third-century period.20 Itmay then have come down in the ancient tradition, and is thus more likely tobe what the poet himself meant. That still leaves open the possibility that theepigram is a denigration of, inter al., the cyclic poets, and not of the work ofCallimachus' contemporaries.21 He may, as suggested above, have wanted bothsenses to be understood, equating the cyclic epics with banality and lack offreshness, as suggested by the comparison with the promiscuous boy in thefollowing lines. Thus Callimachus, who here as elsewhere expresses his distastefor the well used and well known,22 is perhaps actually introducing a new senseof KVKXtK6C-weightconveyhis full meaningby translatingthe trite cyclicpoem'.Since emantichanges osometimes aveafixedand dentifiablestarting-point,his poem and the discussion t reflectscould have been it.23Inany casethe unqualifiedentries n LSJaremisleading,andshould beappropriatelynnotatednourmargins.24Center for Hellenic Studies, Washington, D.C. H. J. BLUMENTHALand University of Liverpool

16 Cf. H. Herter, 'Kallimachos 6', REsupp. v (1931), 430 and 451 f.17 Ath. 15.669 C.18 Cf. the index in E. -A. Leemans,Studie over den WijsgeerNumenius vanApamea, met uitgave derfragmenten,

Ac. R. de Belg. Cl. des Lett. Mdm. 37.2(Brussels, 1937).9 Tb. 775-7 in fr. 36 (= Test. 48Leemans), where Hesiod is named, andperhaps Op. 471 in fr. 11 (= 20 L). Theremay be an echo of Sophocles, O.T. fr. 25.123 (= 2L); cf. des Places, ad loc.

20 It may possibly have been implied inthe condemnation of K6KXhotn theHadrianicepigram by Pollianus, A.P. 11.130, 1 f.: roi' KvKhvovC od0rovqrokCa&rrcprnetra Xd-yov-racaoc, where theprimary meaning must, however, be 'cyclic':thus Gow-Page, loc. cit. (n.3), take this asevidence for 'cyclic' in Call. Epigr. 28;cf. also Severyns, op. cit., pp.158 f.

2 For a recent discussion of who, andwhat, was the target of this epigram seeT. M. Klein, 'The concept of the BigBook ', Eranos 73 (1975), 23-5: heargues that Callimachus disapproved of thecyclic poets and not of Apollonius.

22 Cf. now A. Barigazzi, 'Amore ePoetica in Callimaco (ep. 28 e 6)', RFIC 101(1973), 186-94, and the references giventhere; but Epigr. 6 (= 55 G.-P.) on theCapture of Oecbalia is not, as Barigazzi takesit to be, 193 f., evidence for Callimachus'negative attitude to the Cycle: cf. Gow-Page,ad loc.

23 Another possibility-no more-shouldbe mentioned: since the text of Eusebiuswhich provides the Numenius fragment isnot unblemished, there could be more amissthan has been thought. So if KUKXK6vweresimply wrong-not very likely, given itsrarity-there would be no clear case of itsmetaphorical meaning, which does not ariseobviously from either the literal, or technicalone, except perhaps through reflection onthe unsatisfactory qualities of the cyclicpoets.

24 I am grateful to Dr. F. T. Griffiths fordiscussing these matters with me, and to thisjournal's referee for a number of helpfulsuggestions, not all of which I have followed.This note was written during the tenure of aLeverhulme Research Fellowship.


Blumenthal - Callimachus, Epigram 28, Numenius Fr. 20, and the Meaning of κυκλικός

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