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The Fox and the Grapes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

A. D. Knox
A. D. Knox
Affiliation:
Courns Wood, Hughenden, Bucks
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Extract

Theocritus I. 49:

ἁ δ', ἐπὶ πήρᾳ

πάντα δόλον κεύθοισα, τὸ παιδίον οὐ πίν ἀνήσειν

φατὶ πρὶν ἠ ἀκράτιστὸν ἐπὶ ξηροȋσι καθίξῃ.

For a very long time I have held a view of this sentence which differs very greatly from any which I have seen advocated elsewhere. Mr. Campbell's discussion in the last number of C. Q. will render it possible to abbreviate my presentation of it. For many of Mr. Campbell's criticisms on page 99 are, I believe, sound, if occasionally overstated. Many will agree, with some hesitations, in his methods of disproving the rendering ‘set him breakfasting upon dry stuff’ on page 98. This has always seemed to me a bad rendering for quite other reasons. Unfortunately for my purpose, which is not to expose modern misrenderings, but to find out what ἀκράτωτὸν means, much is immaterial. Mr. Campbell's real objections to ἀκράτιστὸν seem to be confined:

(a) To an alleged ‘active’ sense.

(b) To an alleged equivalence with a ‘present’ participle.

(c) To a violation of a law which he attributes to Mehlhorn.

(d) ‘It is the only occurrence of ἀκρατίζομαι (with congeners) outside Comedy and Late Prose.’

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 25 , Issue 3-4 , June 1931 , pp. 205 - 211
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1931

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References

page 205 note 1 Mr. Campbell's ‘full current sense of a present participle’ is a man of straw. The fox which steals my hens does not wait to see whether I breakfast next day on bacon only, nor whether I eat my porridge standing (Scotice) or sitting (Anglice). The sense demanded is (μὴ) ἀκρατιύμενον or οἷον (μὴ) ἀκρατίζεσθαι. Such an idea is, however, foreign to language; for phrases like οὐχỉ παύσομαι look forward always to a complete and not a future result: ‘till I make thy enemies thy footstool.’ The fox leaves the boy still asleep; it is only the fox of whom we can predicate a state of completion or repletion. Mr. Campbell's suggestion, as he translates it, fails on this most simple canon. Of the three parties—fox, wallet, and boy—it is hardest to refer ἀκράτιτὸν to the boy. The wallet may at least be in a state of depletion at the time of departure. At the time of καθίξῃ, moreover, the boy will be waiting still for breakfast. The nearest phrases are such as in Arr. Epict. II. 16 ἐν βοὸς κοιλίᾳ καθήμενος ἐκδέχου σοȗ τὴν μάμμην μεχρίς σε χορτάση (Herodes VII. 47 sq.). But clearly ‘turn him into one who waits for manna to drop,’ an ‘idler,’ though the only possible sense of pre-breakfast or pre-supper sitting, has nothing to do with Theocritus. If I agree with Mr. Campbell to blow up the Houses of Parliament, it is one thing to remain till the fuse is alight, and quite another to wait till the explosion occurs. The commentators on this passage (Wordsworth included) introduce an unexampled terminus ante post quern unknown elsewhere in the literatures or common parlances of the world. The only exceptions are some who read ἀκρατισμόν. There are three things which can ‘sit’ or ‘be seated’: (a) part of a dish, (b) part of mechanism (as Homer's mills), (c) a ship (Pind., Polyb.). The last is the only sense available. With (c) we have (i.) a poor correction, (ii.) a doubtful case of after ἐπί, (iii.) a tasteless metaphor in the mouth of a terrene animal. But at least we avoid the wild insanity of the terminus ante post quern if we translate ‘till he has sunk the breakfast’ (in his Syrtis of a belly).

page 207 note 1 Assume by some curious juggling with commonsense that ἐπὶ ξηροȋς could mean ‘on nothing’ or ‘on the remains.’ Obviously the boy cannot be said ἀθρόον ἀκρατίζεσθαι τὸ λοιπόν. He might nibble it tearfully.

page 207 note 2 See Sturz, Lex. Xen. What Mr. Campbell states as a rule has, however, exceptions.

page 207 note 3 It is, I believe, the same word etymologically as it certainly is in use.

page 207 note 4 Who suggested ἀκράστιστον (impugned by Lobeck).

page 208 note 1 With some hesitation. There are many phrases like ἐξ ὑπερτέρας χερός, ἀø' ἡσύχουποδός ἐξ ἑνὸς ποδός, where the preposition more accurately defines what the dative could have expressed (Soph. Phil, 91, Jebb). Including the (possible) ellipse of a part of the body, and actually with ἐπί we have Hes. Op. 750 ἐπ' ἀκινήτοισι κ α θ ί ζ ε ι ν (τοȋς μέλεσι (?)). That this was the sense I do not affirm; but it may be so. ξηρά was in fact the opposite of δάκρυα and you may take as a parallel Eur. fr. 322 (as cited by Plutarch) ἔρως γὰρ ἀργὸν κἀπὶ τοιούτοις ἔøυ (compare Philodemus A.P. v. 120, cited by Meineke), where the facile explanation ‘an ellipse of ἔργοις’ can hardly serve. In Eur. Med. 928 we have γυνὴ δέ θῆλυ κἀπὶ δακρύοις ἔøυ, and here in Thecritus we have the reverse ἐπὶ ξηροȋς. If you insist on supplying ἔργοις in the first (illogically), you can supply δακρύοις here; I do not think you will be right, but any explanation will serve all three places. In Eur. I.A. 541 (the parallel will hold whether the verses are genuine or not) we have ὡς ἐπ' ἐλαχίστοις δακρύοις πράσσω κακῶς. In my view ἐπὶ ξηρȋς. could certainly mean ἐπὶ μηδ' ἐλαχίστοις δακρύοις. But I do not wish to dissuade the reader from an understanding of ἐπί ξηροȋσι by insisting on any one supplement which conflicts with his or her cherished ideas on any or all of such passages. For the sense it matters very greatly whether you accept the equation ξηροȋς = (roughly) ἀδακρύτοις; but after this it matters only slightly whether you supply πράγμασι (τοȋς παροȗσι), ἔργοις (πολεμικοȋς), βλεøάροις, σιτίοις, βλέμμασι, ἑδωλίοις, τροπαίοις or what you will. In all cases no tears are shed, ‘things’ are dry, the meal is a free meal, and the fox gloats.

page 208 note 2 E.g. κάθημαι ἱκέτης, καθίζω τινα ἱκέτην. καθίζω does not of course mean, as Mr. Campbell supposes, to sit, or seat to breakfast. The customs of the Medes and Persians, which C. cites, though they alter not, were not those of the Greeks. Aulus ate his crust from the floor because the guest took his chairs, or else in a flood of tears. (Why does C. conceal the authorship of this poem?) But the rustic boy may can have remembered the rules of decency which bade him sit at meals. The proper citation for Aulus' experience is Horn. h. Merc. 284 ἐπ' οὔδεϊ øῶτα κάθισσε, but at neither place is Ebeling supply (Lex. H. 611a) or Jacobs right in referring to Theocritus. The fox was not running away with the wall, and not even Mark Twain in his most Yankee mood could have alleged so. It should be emphasized that the Greek man sat to row or to gamble, to weep or to wait, to chat or to cobble, to judge or to supplicate, and a hundred other purposes; but to ‘sup’ never, except perhaps on active service. Therefore, if καθίζω could refer to the boy, we should have to take it as a sign of modesty or dejection. For the fox it has obvious applications—to his future (lack of) tears (καθίζειν μή δακρύουσαν for μή καθίζειν δακρύουσαν) and to his good long meal like the κόλαξ σκώληξ, who (Anaxil, . fr. 33Google Scholar) ἐσθίει καθήμενος—really ‘sits down’ to it, though you might take it for the attitude necessary to eat off the wall; but neither Plato (Phaedr, 254c), Xenophon's use of ἀνακαθίζειν, nor Aristotle's συγκαθ. are quite parallel. So in Ael, . N.A. XVII. 9Google Scholar the attitude κάθηται is stressed. There is no difficulty in referring to the fox in terms more apt to mankind, as Babrius often does. Nor is this use confined to Babrius. A beast does not normally καθῆσθαι except on a tree (Ael, . N.A. III. 21, V. 54Google Scholar) or a roof (Herodes III. 41), and the word hence might be supposed to be confined to bears, monkeys, and the like. But it applies constantly to semi-human animals, like the Sphinx in Eur. fr. 540. The fox could not sit down to a meal, for that is of not Greek language or usage. But a beast can (like a man) καθῆσθαι περιμένων (Plut, . Mor. 972cGoogle Scholar), ἐλλοχῶσα (Ael, . N.A. III. 21Google Scholar), or σιγῇ (Myth. Aesop. 176 (Paris)Google Scholar: where rἆλλα μὲν καθῆστοσιγῃ appears to be iambic). So there is no difficulty in a beast sitting κλαίουσα or the reverse.

page 210 note 1 Mr. Campbell may be right in objecting to ἤ after πρίν. If so, I would suggest that it is part of a note, e.g. σημειωτέον ἡ ἀκράτστος; ‘note ἀκράτιστος feminine.’ More probably it is in serted because some one dreamt of ἀκρăτιστς, as did several Renaissance scholars.

page 210 note 2 On ἀκράτιστὸν I would observe that it is probably intended pictorially. His stomach, now lean and hungry, is to be fattened. But I cannot be as certain as is Mr. Campbell of the passive sense. We have no knowledge as to whether ἀκρατίζεσθαι in Doric would be middle or passive; it is merely a matter of dialect, as in the case of αὐλίζεσθαι. On the accent I am rather uncertain, but all such words may be of only two genders, and this is the main point.

page 210 note 3 The reasons for supposing the boy to be the subject and the fox the object of καθίξῃ with ἀκράτιστὸν (or-ιν) predicated of it, whatever ἐπί ξ may mean, may be summarized as follows:

(a) In normal Attic prose (as opposed to Ionic ?) the subject of the subordinate clause is normally the latest available noun. I say ‘available’ so as to include relative sentences where the latest noun may be taken up in an oblique case of the relative. In Theocr. XXV. 263 the accusative is the subject of the πρίν clause (inf.).

(b) The boy is already sitting, and cannot be further or otherwise seated. Examples of καθίζειν ‘glue to seats’ are not relevant to καθιξ, which should give a motion to a seat.

(c) As in the most famous saying with πρίν ἂν (Hdt. I. 32 οὔκω σε [ὄλβιον] λέγω πρίν ἂν τελευτήσαντα καλῶς τὸν αἰῶνα πύθωμαι with πρὶν δ' ἂν τελευτήσῃ ἐπισχέειν μηδὲ καλέειν κω ὄλβιον and most versions) we expect the main important word to come first and receive only slight modifications. πρὶν ἢ ἀκρཱτιὰτ. κ.τ.λ. must = πρὶν ἂν ἀκρατίσηται (τις), and there may be a secondary sense predicate (as [roughly] προῖκα and καλῶς above). Now the only person who gets a real ἀκρατισ μός is the fox. If ἐπὶ ξηροῖσι (roughly ‘on little or nothing’) is the true predicate, it should come first, ἀνάριστον would (pro tanto) be conceivable, but I believe it has no authority whatever.

(d) πρίν is temporal, and the only person whose ‘supping’ bears any relation to the time of relaxation of the fox's vigilance is the fox itself. The fox does not care three hoots when the boy eats.

This issue of time seems to me all important. The time is such period, after the boy's dozing off, as will allow the fox either to sup up (ἀκράτιστιν) or to have been soused with (ἀκράτιστὸν) what she is after. Without precisely agreeing with Mr. Campbell or with others, I prefer to leave the issue as to which of the two forms is correct, whether even ἀκράτστὸς glosses a word meaning ‘supped,’ and what, when and where the fox hopes to eat, undiscussed.