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Notes on the Text, Language and Content of Some New Fragments of Pelagonius
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009
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The Ars Veterinaria of the fourth-century writer Pelagonius has hitherto been known only from the MS. Florence, Bibl. Riccardiana 1179 (R), a codex copied in 1485 for Politian from an early (lost) manuscript. Apart from this there have only been some palimpsest fragments from Bobbio.
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References
1 For details of which, see the introduction to Fischer's, K.-D. edition (Pelagonii Ars Veterinaria (Leipzig, 1980)), xf., xviiif.Google Scholar
2 ‘Un nouveau témoin de l'Ars Veterinaria de Pelagonius’, Revue d'Histoire des Textes 19 (1989), 31–56.Google Scholar
3 Codices Latini Antiquiores, vii (Oxford, 1956), no. 876Google Scholar; cf. Corsetti, 38.
4 Full details in Corsetti, 36–8.
5 Beginning at 204; see Corsetti's table of contents, 42.
6 On the Greek translation of Pelagonius, see Hoppe, H., ‘Die Commenta artis medicinae verterinariae des Pelagonius’, Veterinärhistorisches Jarhbuch 3 (1927), 216–19Google Scholar; id., ‘Pelagoniusstudien; I. Die griechische Übersetzung des Pelagonius', Veterinärhistorisches Jahrbuch 4 (1928), 1–6Google Scholar. The text of the Greek is scattered throughout Oder, E. and Hoppe, H., Corpus Hippiatricorum Graecorum, 2 vols. (Leipzig, 1924–1927).Google Scholar
7 For example, at 204.3 the reading of R is ‘… hordeumque pinsitum. uel etiam lactans occiditur’, where a noun seemed to be required with lactans (see Adams, , ‘Pelagonius, Eumelus and a Lost Latin Veterinary Writer’, Centre Jean Palerne, Mémoires, v (Saint-Étienne, 1984), 31 n. 34Google Scholar, suggesting that catulus had fallen out of the text). The reading of E ( of which I have examined a photocopy kindly provided for me by Dr Odo Lang, Stiftsbibliothekar, Einsiedeln) is ‘hordeum pinsitum uel etiam farina erui et fabae mixta. catulus etiam lactans occiditur’. It is now clear that the scribe of R (or a predecessor) jumped from one case of etiam to another.
8 On which disease, see Mul. Chir. 179–81, Veg. 1.7: also Apsyrtus, Hipp. Ber. 96.3, CHG i. 327.17 περιττώματα δ⋯ λ⋯γεται, ὅ ῥωμαιστ⋯ καλουσι ϕαλκ⋯νινα. εἰσ⋯ δ⋯ ⋯κβολα⋯ ⋯ν τῷ σώματι ὅμοιαι δοθιησι κα⋯ με⋯ζονες, κα⋯ πυουνται κα⋯ ἔκρηξιν λαμβ⋯νουσιν αὐτ⋯ματοι See also Fischer, , Pelagonii Ars Veterinaria, p. 138Google Scholar, and particularly now, id., ‘Genera huius morbi maleos numero VII: eine Infektionskrankheit (Malleus) und ihre Unterarten im Spiegel des antiken veterinärmedizinischen Schrifttums’, in Sabbah, G. (ed.), Le latin médical. La constitution d'un langage scientifique (Centre Jean-Palerne, Mémoires x, Saint-Étienne, 1991), pp. 351–65Google Scholar. Some of the terminology at 529 bis is similar to that at Pel. 448.1: note 529 bis ‘toto corpore quasi tubera farsa lateant’ alongside 448.1 ‘ex ipsis tuberculis [picked up by tubera two sentences later] corpus turget et fistulas faciet caecas’. Glanders is a ‘specific, contagious and inoculable disease of the horse family’ (West, G. P. (ed.), Black's Veterinary Dictionary15 (London, 1985), p. 348)Google Scholar. ‘Farcy’ is a form of the disease in which the skin is involved. ‘The lymphatic glands of the affected limb become enlarged, the lymph vessels corded, and usually a chain of farcy buds develops along their course’ (Black's Veterinary Dictionary, p. 349).
9 The manuscript has regidis for rigidis, querentem for gerentem, scripsimos for scripsimus, tercium for tertium, negare for necare, furis for furfures, minulae for minute, seminis for semine, bagi for bacis, adonatis for adunatis, and frecas / frecantes for fricas / fricantes.
10 See Adams, , ‘The Uses of Neco II’, Glotta 69 (1991), 110–12.Google Scholar
11 Corsetti did not propose the change sanguis to sanguine in his published article, but he has suggested it to me in a private communication.
12 Corsetti (private communication) suggests the deletion of the first aut as an anticipation of the second. I can see no reason for such a deletion. Two clear alternatives are expressed by means of an aut … aut construction. The subject of both verbs in this construction is omne uirus, which accordingly comes before the first aut. Once sanguis is changed to sanguine, the sentence makes perfect sense without further alteration. The Greek lacks the theoretical precision of the Latin (see below for details), and does not help much with establishment of the Latin text (except in supporting the change to sanguine).
13 Cf. now in E 524 decoquis simul.
14 In R tunc occurs 28 times, tum only once, in a quotation of Columella (21.2).
15 TLL I.1108.5ff.
16 See in general Olcott, G. N., Studies in the Word Formation of the Latin Inscriptions (Rome, 1898), p. 227Google Scholar. For hibernalis, see TLL VI.3.2684.50ff.; for uernalis, see Pel. 454.
17 I owe this idea to H. D. Jocelyn, who when reading the passage for the first time in my presence without his glasses on saw apa as aqua.
18 Cibo is used both as an active = ‘feed’ (e.g. Mul. Chir. 287 ‘apio uiride uel lactuca cibabis’) and as a middle = ‘take food’ (e.g. Mul. Chir. 406 ‘qui enim hoc uitio tenebitur, si coeperit non cibari’). See TLL III.1037.46ff. (de bestiis).
19 An anonymous reader suggests that et might be deleted.
20 Cf. 33.1, 34.2, 47, 140.1, 183, 210.2, 267.2, 287.
21 Cf. 34.3, 139, 183 (note §2 ‘sed in his tam similibus signis passionum sunt [tanquam] tamen quaedam longe separata atque aliena, quae facilius poteris recognoscere, si diligentior fueris’), 210.1, 267.1, 287.
22 See Adams, , The Vulgar Latin of the Letters of Claudius Terentianus (Manchester, 1977), p. 56.Google Scholar
23 Cf. (for negated examples) Lact. Mort. 15.6 ‘Maximianus libens paruit per Italiam, homo non adeo clemens’, Mul. Chir. 182 ‘cibum non tam libenter sumet nee potum’, 328 ‘si esuriet, non tam uehementer uexabit’, 431 ‘cibum non tam libenter appetiet’.
24 24.3, 24.4, 34.1, 44.2 (twice), 141.2, 269.2, 363 (3 times), 448.1.
25 Full details will be found in my article ‘Pelagonius and Columella’, forthcoming in Antichthon.
26 TLL V.2.1460.30ff.
27 A minor exception to this general rule seems to be found at 34.3, where Pelagonius refers to the diagnosis of fever ‘from the veins’. The source Apsyrtus, at least as preserved in the Greek Hippiatric Corpus (Hipp. Ber. 1.8, CHG i.3.10–13), does not mention veins. The Greek does, however, refer to various other parts of the body used in diagnosis. Pelagonius has made a minor addition: see Adams, , ‘Notes on Pelagonius’, CQ 40 (1990), 530CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Alternatively, the version of Apsyrtus in the Hippiatric Corpus at this point may not retain the original wording.
28 This is a topic in itself, with which I shall deal elsewhere in detail. I offer just one illustration here. At 141.2, discussing the causes of dysuria, or stranguria (the two conditions are not adequately distinguished), Pelagonius says that it may arise ‘interdum et nimio otio, descendens enim acrior umor urinam prohibet’. This is an allusion, of a type very rare in the text, to the theory of humours (cf. 152.2, a passage based on Apsyrtus), but what is the point of the remark? To find out it is necessary to go to the source (Apsyrtus, Hipp. Ber. 33.5, CHG i.166.23–167.3): ἒσθ᾽ ὃτε δ⋯ κα⋯ δι⋯ τ⋯ ⋯στ⋯ναι κα⋯ μ⋯ λυμν⋯ζεσθαι γεννᾷ χυμοὺς δριμυτ⋯τους, οἵτινες ϕερ⋯μενοι ⋯π⋯ τ⋯ν κ⋯στιν δηγμ⋯ν παρ⋯χουσι τῇ δι⋯δῳ της οὐρ⋯σεως, κα⋯ δι⋯ τουτο στραγγουριᾷ. The inactivity generates sharp humours (which Pelagonius fails to point out). These humours are carried to the bladder (not mentioned by Pelagonius) and cause pain in the passage of urine (again not mentioned by Pelagonius), which in turn causes strangury. Pelagonius' ‘descendens enim acrior umor urinam prohibet’ is so truncated as to be incomprehensible without the Greek; Apsyrtus presents a coherent physiological theory, the precision of which is entirely abandoned in the Latin.
29 Cf. TLL VII.1.2097.79ff. for a small collection of examples.
30 Cf. the Greek translation of the passage at Hipp. Ber. 38.9, CHG i.202.7, containing ⋯νεπαισθ⋯τως, which is classified by LSJ, s.v. ⋯νεπα⋯σθητος 2 under the active meaning of the adjective = ‘not perceiving’.
31 An anonymous reader plausibly suggests ex tensione for extensione. For the phrase ex tensione, cf. Mul. Chir. 316.
32 See von Wartburg, W., Französisches etymologisches Wörterbuch X.251Google Scholar; it was *renio which generated the words for ‘kidneys’.
33 FEW, X.248, and 251 on the semantic development of the word.
34 See Black's Veterinary Dictionary, pp. 435f.
35 See the diagram in Black's Veterinary Dictionary, p. 97.
36 For this sense of dissolutus, see TLL V.1.1496.73ff., citing numerous examples.
37 There is a transitional case as early as Col. 6.30.4: ‘nam oleum immixtum uino supra ilia et renes infunditur’. The oil mixed with wine is poured ‘over, above the renes’. The reference must be to the external part located over the kidneys. It would be no great shift for renes to be used of that external part.
38 The symptoms described would fit inflammation of the muscles of the quarters. See Black's Veterinary Dictionary, p. 514Google Scholar: ‘Inflammation of muscle, or myositis, may arise as the result of injury through kicks, blows, falls, etc … The muscles affected are held relaxed … When handled, they contract and become hard to the touch’ (my italics).
39 See Black's Veterinary Dictionary, p. 349.Google Scholar
40 Black's Veterinary Dictionary, loc. cit.
41 Information from Dr J. R. Baker, Department of Veterinary Pathology, University of Liverpool.
42 As suggested to me by Dr Baker.
43 See Feltenius, L., Intransitivizations in Latin (Uppsala, 1977), p. 127.Google Scholar
44 See e.g. Löfstedt, E., Philologischer Kommentar zur Peregrinatio Aetheriae (Uppsala, 1911), pp. 183f.Google Scholar, Svennung, J., Untersuchungen zu Palladius und zur lateinischen Fach- und Volkssprache (Uppsala–Leipzig–The Hague–Paris, 1935), p. 543n.Google Scholar, Väänänen, V., Introduction au latin vulgaire3 (Paris, 1981), p. 222 with bibliography.Google Scholar
45 Önnerfors, A. (ed.), Physica Plinii Bambergensis (Hildesheim–New York, 1975).Google Scholar
46 See Cockayne, T. O. (ed.), Leechdoms, Wortcunning and Starcraft of Early England (London, 1864–1866), ii. 250Google Scholar. See further Adams, J. N. and Marilyn, Deegan, ‘Bald's Leechbook and the Physica Plinii’, forthcoming in Anglo-Saxon England.Google Scholar
47 Cf. Hofmann, J. B. and Szantyr, A., Lateinische Syntax und Stylistik (Munich, 1965), pp. 641f.Google Scholar, Svennung, Unt., p. 513 on the later construction, attested from Celsus and Columella onwards.
48 For which usage, see e.g. TLL V.1.62.18ff. (a mixed bag of examples), Hofmann–Szantyr, p. 126, Ahlquist, H., Studien zur spätlaleinischen Mulomedicina Chironis (Uppsala, 1909), p. 78.Google Scholar
49 In Corsetti's text the comma which he correctly adopted has been obliterated in the printing.
50 See Adams, , The Latin Sexual Vocabulary (London, 1982), pp. 246–8.Google Scholar
51 Presumably for uetustissimi: for laridum uetustissimum, see Marc, . Med. 9.68.Google Scholar
52 For the senses of the word, see André, J., Lexique des termes de botanique en latin (Paris, 1956), pp. 220f.Google Scholar; Oxford Latin Dictionary, s.v. nucleus, 1.
53 On such collective singulars, see, e.g., Svennung, , Unt., p. 169.Google Scholar
54 The Greek passage (Hipp. Ber. 49.3–4) cited by Corsetti along with Mul. Chir. 486 is rather less precise: CHG i.226.4–6 εἰ δ⋯ μ⋯ πα⋯ηται, πνρ⋯α οὔρῳ θερμῷ παιδικῷ, ὑποτιθε⋯ς μυλ⋯τας λ⋯θους πεπυρωμ⋯νους, ἕως ὑπ⋯ τ⋯ν λ⋯θων οἱ μηρο⋯ ἱδρώσονσι. At Mul. Chir. 486 the hot millstones are unambiguously placed in urine (to create steam). Does the Greek mean that the millstones are placed in οὖρον παιδικ⋯ν; or, as a second process, are the heated stones placed under the horse on the ground, to make it sweat; or are the heated stones on the ground under the animal sprinkled with οὖρον παιδικ⋯ν to fumigate the belly? In connection with this third possibility, note the process clearly stated at Veg. 2.79.16 (a passage derived from Mul. Chir. 456 or Pel. 151, and by them from Apsyrtus, Hipp. Bet. 33.8, CHG i. 168.23–169.3): ‘ut animalia a collo usque ad pedes inuoluantur de sagis suppositisque carbonibus uiuis addito castoreo suffumigentur, ut totum uentrem testiculosque eorum castorei fumus uaporet’ (the animal is completely covered, hot coals are placed beneath it, then castoreum (a secretion of the beaver) is put on the coals so that the uenter may be fumigated by the steam of the castoreum). Note too Veg. 2.113.2 (based on Mul. 380–1, where there are textual difficulties) for much the same process: ‘lapides molares non minus pondera V in ignem imponuntur, animalis caput copulatur ad pedes; cum bene canduerint, sub eius naribus apponuntur et perfusi oleo suffumigant os nares et oculos’.
55 For this means of fumigation, see Mul. Chir. 523 ‘lapides molares plures candefacito. ubi bene calebunt, caput operito et uas plenum loteo adponito, unum lapidem candentem mittito, ita facito ex his omnibus omnes de loteo uapores ut equo in os eant’ (= Veg. 2.28.5).
56 This and a small number of other examples, some as early as Vitruvius, are quoted at TLL I.525.70ff. Note too Veg. 4.4.11 ‘aliqui uero II lib. ex uinaceis ad focum torrent’; also the similar idiom at Pel. 85.2: ‘intepescat contra focum potio’.
57 See further (e.g.), Pel. 384, 386.1 (ad lentos carbones in both cases). At Veg. Mul. 3.22.2 (‘haec ad carbones lentis uaporibus decoquuntur’) lentis should surely be changed to lentos. Examples of this kind, which are transitional between the meanings ‘on / at’ and ‘by means of’, will in their turn have provided the starting point for the development of a purely instrumental use of ad, as exemplified by Veg. 4.5 ‘melius creditur, si ad acutam cannam exseces ranulam’. For this usage, see Hofmann–Szantyr, op. cit. (n. 47), pp. 127, 220 (with literature).
58 So Ahlquist, op. cit. (n. 48), p. 61.
59 Adams, , The Latin Sexual Vocabulary, pp. 66f.Google Scholar
60 For lexical variation between the two manuscripts, note e.g. 218 laeserit R, uexauerit E, 234 stercore R, fimo E, 254 foueri R, fomentari E.
61 On whom see my article, cited above, n. 7. The new sentence provides an example of connective -que, which is rare in Pelagonius but a very distinctive mark of the passages quoted from the lost writer (Adams, op. cit. (n. 57), p. 11).
62 Adams, op. cit. (n. 57), p. 14.
63 This new attestation of coleatus is of some interest. Previously the word was found only in Pomponius (40, 69) and a gloss (CGL 11.103.28). In Pomponius it has the appearance of a humorous coinage (Adams, op. cit. (n. 59), pp. 20,66–7), but it now becomes likely that the word had some currency at a subliterary level.
64 There are of course two alternative possibilities: either a scribe may have introduced coleatus for something else, or Pelagonius himself may have put it into the quotation. If the latter, we are still left with Pelagonius as a writer prepared to admit basic sexual terminology. I cannot convince myself that a scribe would have introduced an unusual word like coleatus.
65 Adams, op. cit. (n. 59), p. 233.
66 Review of Fischer, K.-D., Pelagonii Ars Veterinaria, in LCM 7.4 (04, 1982), 58.Google Scholar
67 Adams, op. cit. (n. 59), p. 246.
68 For details, Adams, op. cit. (n. 59), pp. 245f. It is worth noting that in the heading to c. 24 (§ 302) in E mingunt is found where R has meiant. Nevertheless there are no grounds for supposing that the scribe of R was responsible for the introduction of meiare: note 308 (E) ‘qui sanguinem aut cacant aut meiant’ (so R).
69 Details in Adams, op. cit. (n. 59), pp. 231–3.
70 Details in Adams, op. cit. (n. 59), pp. 60f.
71 Adams, op. cit. (n. 59), pp. 52f.
72 For ellipse of such an object, see Adams, , ‘A Type of Sexual Euphemism in Latin’, Phoenix 35 (1981), 124.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
73 Adams, op. cit. (n. 59), p. 46.
74 See TLL IV.926.54ff., V.2.1113.58ff., Ahlquist, op. cit. (n. 48), pp. 82f., Milham, Mary E., ‘Case and Prepositional Usage in Apicius’, Glotta 39 (1961), 286Google Scholar. The usage was idiomatic in recipes.
75 For a comment on Latin usage in a Greek veterinary writer, see n. 8.
76 See in general on the conditions in question Fischer, , Pelagonii Ars Veterinaria, 124Google Scholar (on 278), Skupas, M., Altgriechische Tierkrankheitsnamen und ihre Deutungen (Hanover, 1962), pp. 32f.Google Scholar
77 Black's Veterinary Dictionary, p. 102; cf. 281, s.v.Google Scholar
78 Black's Veterinary Dictionary, p. 697.Google Scholar
79 Black's Veterinary Dictionary, p. 731.Google Scholar
80 See Fischer, loc. cit.
81 It is possible, as an anonymous reader suggests, that the Greek translator misread marmorosus as if it were arma or a derivative. What such a derivative might have been is not clear to me, but I would agree that the headings both in Pelagonius and the Greek translator are not to be relied on.
82 Information from Dr Baker.