Damascius: lectures on Philebus wrongly attributed to Olympiodorus

170 Pages·1959·4.233 MB·English

by  Leendert Gerrit Westerink

DAMASCIUS
LECTURES ON THE PHILEBUS

QAMASCIUS~
LE~C TURES ON THE PHILEBUS
WRONGLY ATTRIBUTED TO OLYMPIODORUS
TEXT, TRANSLATION, NOTES AND INDICES
BY
L. G. WESTERINK
1
1959
NORTH-HOLLAND PUBLISHING COMPANY - AMSTERDAM

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint,
microfilm or any other means without written permission from the publisher.
Publication subsidized by the
Netherlands Organization
for Pure Research( Z W.O.)
Printed in the Netherlands

PREFACE
The author's name on the title-page requires a word of justification. The
liberty taken with tradition is not so great as it would appear at first sight,
for the lectures have come down to us, not under the name of Olympiodorus,
but anonymously. An anonymous work is an awkward thing from the point
of view of bibliography, and the text, thus presented, would inevitably con
tinue to be cited as a work of Olympiodorus, with whom it has nothing to
do. The evidence in favour of Damascius will be found strong enough, I
trust, to warrant the decision taken.
My thanks are due to the Nethe;lands Organization for Pure Research,
which has generously subsidized the preparation as well as the publication
of this book. I also want to express my gratitude to Signora T. Gasparrini
Leporace, Directress of the Biblioteca Marciana, for information on the
J.
San Marco codex ; to my colleague Dr. H. Drossaart Lulofs, for his never
J.
failing helpfulness: and to Mr. T. Saunders for checking my English.
Finally I owe an apology to Professor Dodds, whose edition of the Elements
I have unscrupulously plundered for English terminology.
VII

INTRODUCTION
I. The Text
The archetype. All the commentaries on Plato rightly or wrongly published
under the name of Olympiodorus have been preserved for us by one
manuscript, M arc i anus gr. 196 Z., a vellum codex of about 900 A.D. M
There is a description of it in N orvin' s edition of the commentaries on the
Phaedo (Leipzig 1913, pp. V-VII); I shall repeat it here, in so far as it is
relevant to the question of the authorship of the Philebus commentary, with
a few necessary additions.
As Norvin has already pointed out, the manuscript, though written entirely
by the same copyist, is derived from two different exemplars, one containing
commentaries by Olympiodorus on the Gorgias, Alcibiades and Phaedo, the
other a different set, anonymous owing to the loss of some leaves at the
beginning, on the Phaedo and the Philebus. This appears from the separate
numbering of the quires as well as from the state of the first pages in part II.
The two parts are :
I. ff. 1-241v (quires numbered a'-Xf3') Olympiodorus on the Gorgias,
Alcibiades, Phaedo A (pp. 1-83 Norvin). In the Phaedo commentary, the
exemplar was defective at pp. 1, 73 and 83, so that both the title and the
colophon are missing, but there is a contemporary note in M attributing the
commentary to Olympiodorus. The plan of the three commentaries is the
same : each lecture is headed 1tpcif.lc;o uv 8E<t)a nd is divided into a general
introduction to the pericope (8E(&)p(a)a nd a discussion of the text (Xef.tc;).
II. ff. 242r-337v ( quires numbered a'-lf3') Anonymous notes on the
Phaedo BCD (pp. 84-244 Norvin) and on the Philebus. At present, about
13 leaves are missing after f. 337 (second half of Philebus, from § 156, 3
f>laf3a(voVTaE lc;' ITIVt i'tJX~Vo nward), but the text is extant in the transcripts
V and R. so that the loss must have occurred comparatively late. The be
ginning of Phaedo B was already missing in the exemplar, and numerous
blanks on f. 242r-v show that its first extant leaf was also damaged. In the
lost part of M there were similar blanks, caused by illegibility of the exem
plar, in Phil. §§ 219-220, 224-225, 255. The commentaries in part II consist
of short numbered sections, each opening with the usual l:S-rol r an interro
gative ; the beginning of a new lecture is marked throughout by the astro
nomical symbol for the sun ( d); there is no systematic division between
8E(&)p(aa nd Xef.tc;.
N orvin, going by the section numbers, has subdivided the contents of
part II as follows :
1) ff. 242r-263v Phaedo B, covering Phaedo 61 E-72 E. In spite of the
missing first pages, the sections are numbered a'-of>' in the margin.
2) ff. 263v-272v Phaedo C I. nEpl -roO &ito -r&v tvcxvr((&)vX 6you f>lCx
'taf.lc; 'to0 ~µE-repou Ka8riyEµ6voc;, -r6 -rE tvf>Ex6µEvov -r6 -rE d:Xri8tc; -roO
X6you f>laoC:,touoa (Phaedo 69E-72E). Sections numbered a'-µE'.
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3) ff.272v-290v Phaedo C II (72E-106C). Sections a'-oL~'. (Subtitles:
•o
a' KecpaXaLa i:oO l K i:c3v avaµvfioe('.l)V X6you, p'(.' 11:epl dpµovCac;
X6y0t;.)
4) ff. 290v-299v Phaedo C III (107 C118). Elc; i:ov µ08ov. Sections
a'-il;'.
5) ff. 300r-319v Phaedo D. Etc; -rov Cl>aCt>c,.c,vmao -roO1 1:epl- rc3vl vav-r(('.l)V
X6you (69 E-118). Sections a'-pvl;'.
6) ff. 320r-337v Philebus. Elc; -rov Cl>(Xri~ovO. riginally a'-ovc;', now
breaking off in pvt>'.
The case of B, however, proves that the numbering can hardly be older
than M, as Norvin himself saw 1). Otherwise the only clear break in the
Phaedo commentaries indicated by the manuscript is after C III, where a
simple decoration marks the end of the commentary, and the rest of f. 299
( some six lines) has been left blank ; there is nothing of the kind between
B and C. This, if traditional, suggests the following grouping : ( i ) Phaedo
BC : ( 2) Phaedo D ; ( 3) Philebus.
A much more important clue is provided by the division into 11:paE,ELt;.
As it was overlooked by Norvin, I shall list the places where the symbol d
occurs:
Phaedo B e', Lf>',K c;', oy', 11:c;'t,i 8', pLT]',p Ke', p)l.c;', pµ'(.', poa', 1p 'ltT]',
ptic;'.
i
C I a'.
C II 6', Ly', Ka', AE', µe', vri', oW, m;', tie', pt/, pKe', pXe', pµ8', pve',
p~t>', pf.8', pori', ptia'.
C III L8', X', AT]', µ'(.', E,y', E,8', ori', 11:T]'.
D 6', Lf>',L E', Kl>', K8', Xe', µe', vri', 1,6', pri', plf>', pK0', pµ', pµri'•
Philebus LT]',K c,', X8', µ1')', .E,a', o', 'It', tie', pt,', pla', pl8', pKE', pX~'.
pXri', pµc,', pv&'; and in V at pE,y', p'ltT]', oa.', oµ'. But V is certainly in
complete, for in the part of the Philebus extant in M it repeats the symbol
only at E,a', 11:',p c,', pLa', pXW, pAT]', pµl;', i.e. 7 times out of 16. R neglects
it except at LT]',o ', 'It', pXW, pAT)', pv&'.
The meaning of the symbol can be gathered from some marginal notes
serving to restore the correct order of the lectures. They occur ( 1 ) at
ft
Phaedo B p1ta' : atrti, 11:pciE,Lµce;- ra 'IT)Vlc peE,~ca; nd p'ltT]': aOi:ri 11:poi:epa;
er: ft
( 2) at C II a.Oi:ri -rtpciE,lt;µ e,:a 'IT)Vl cpeE,~c;a nd &' : atrti, 11:po,:epa;
ft
( 3) at Philebus µ0' : aOi:ri 11:pcxE,lat;v cxyv('.l)OTEa1 1:po~ c; · 11:po a.u~c;.
where the note must' ref er to section µ11', against which the sign is written.
As a matter of fact the true order is, in Phaedo B, p11:T]'-p1,ep',1 ta'-p1tl;', in
C II, 6'-L~', a'-y', in the Philebus, µ11'-E,',X 8'-µl;'. In the case of Phaedo B
and Philebus this arrangement will be found to correspond to the text of the
dialogue, in the case of C II, to the parallel text D 6'-l&'.
A word remains to be said about the scholia, or rather· marginalia, for they
seldom explain the text, but mainly consist of diagrams, headings, etc. They
are frequent in Olympiodorus and in Phaedo B, but almost completely absent
from Phaedo C and D and Philebus. A few are more detailed than the
text and therefore probably contemporary: Gorg. p. 48, 18; 228, 9; 244, 20;
Alcib. p. 21, 17; 71, 7; 145, 12; Phaedo A p. 31, 21 (cf. Proleg. phil. Plat.
1) Olympiodoros fra Alexandria, Copenhagen 1915, p. 24.
X