Conjectures in Sophocles' ‘Philoctetes’

Extract

187 βαρεῖα δ᾿ ἀθυρόστομος codd. In the corresponding place of the strophe (176–7) we observe interlinear hiatus, ἀντέχει / ὦ: at this point of the antistrophe, therefore, a metrical period must be marked; there can be no run-over from βαρεῖ to -α δ᾿ ἀθυρόστομος. ἁ δ᾿ ἀθυρόστομος is absolutely required by the metre, and we are left with βαρεῖ- at the end of the preceding sentence. Taken as an adjective with λιμῷ, it is called ‘awkward and feeble’ by Jebb: harsher terms are appropriate, for we must emphatically deny that this adjective can be separated from its noun by the plump participial phrase ἀνήκεστα μεριμνήματ᾿ ἔχων.