No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
A Note on [Hippocrates], De Morbis II 1, 4a
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009
Extract
In the fourth chapter of the Hippocratic treatise De mortis II 1 an unnamed illness is discussed which arises allegedly from an overabundance of blood in the vessels around the brain. The author of the chapter, however, disputes this aetiology:
- Type
- Shorter Notes
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © The Classical Association 1994
References
1 As is well known, De morbis II consists of what are in fact two separate works, one comprising chapters 1–11 and the other chapters 12–75, which derive (independently, in all probability) from a common model: cf. Jouanna, J., ed., Hippocrate, Tome X, 2e Partie, Maladies II (Paris, 1983), pp. 11–12 and 25–50Google Scholar; idem, Hippocrate. Pour une archéologie de l'école de Cnide (Paris, 1974), 26–126 and 285 n. 1Google Scholar, and Lonie, I. M., ‘The Cnidian Treatises of the Corpus Hippocraticum’, CQ 15 (1965), 6–9CrossRefGoogle Scholar. (Against Jouanna's identification of the common model of De morb. II 1 and 2 with the so-called Κνδιαι γνµαι, however, cf. most recently Volker, Langholf, Medical Theories in Hippocrates = Untersuchungen zur antiken Literatur und Geschichte, Band 34 (Berlin and New York, 1990), pp. 12–36, especially 21–5.Google Scholar) I follow Jouanna's terminology (cf. Jouanna, Maladies II, op. cit, p. 12) and designate chapters 1–11 as De morb. II 1.
2 In the recentiores the tag τρη νοσος is prefixed to the chapter, but the primary witnesses to the text (θ = Vindobonensis medicus graecus 4 (s. x/xi) and M = Marcianus venetus graecus 269 (s. x/xi)) omit these words.
3 Text and punctuation follow Jouanna, Maladies II, op. cit., p. 134, lines 10ff. Potter in the Loeb edition (Hippocrates, Vol. V, with an English translation by Potter, P. [London and Cambridge, MA., 1988], 194Google Scholar) ends the parenthesis after σλθῃ, but this is clearly wrong, since the clause µετεωρζοντα τε γρ αἱ ϕλβες κα σϕζουσι obviously is meant to explain why the vessels seem to be overfilled with blood. With Potter's punctuation the γρ would be unmotivated, and in fact he simply ignores it in his translation. (I express my thanks to CQ's anonymous reader for alerting me to this problem.) On this parenthesis cf. further below.
4 Here and throughout the chapter the MSS (θM) offer forms of ὑπερεµεῖν, which is clearly wrong; the correction to ὑπεραιµσειε etc. is due to Ermerins: see Jouanna, Maladies II, op. cit., p. 134 n. 4 (on p. 216), and cf. LSJ s.v. ὑπερεµω and Lonie, I. M., CQ 15 (1965), 8 n. 1.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
5 Jouanna, Maladies II, op. cit., p. 134; cf. the almost identical translation in Jouanna, Hippocrate, op. cit., p. 47: ‘Mais supposons que ces veinules regorgent au maximum de sang’.
6 Potter, op. cit., p. 195.
7 On this usage see Wankel's note on Demosthenes, De corona 21 (Demosthenes. Rede für Ktesiphon über den Kranz, erlaütert und mit einer Einleitung versehen von Hermann Wankel, Erste, Halbband [Heidelberg, 1976], pp. 217–18)Google Scholar, with the passages and references there cited, especially Stahl, J. M., Kritisch-historische Syntax des griechischen Verbums (Heidelberg, 1907), p. 417Google Scholar, who cites further passages. Cf. also Ast, D. F., Lexicon Platonicum ii (Leipzig, 1836), p. 275Google Scholar. The earliest example of this idiom with ὡς (or ὅτι or τ) µλιστα that I have found (Stahl, loc. cit., cites Homeric examples of a related type with εἰ κα µλα) is in Xenophanes, DK B 34, 3: εἰ γρ κα τ µλιστα τχοι τετελεσµνον εἰπών κτλ. (cf. Verdenius, W. J., Mnemosyne ser. IV, 6 (1953), 197Google Scholar; for a different interpretation cf.Fränkel, H., ‘Xenophanesstudien’, in Wege und Formen frühgriechischen Denkens3 [München, 1968], pp. 345–6Google Scholar = The Pre-Socratics. A Collection of Critical Essays, edited by Mourelatos, A. [New York, 1974], pp. 126–7Google Scholar). But the idiom becomes frequent only in the late fifth and in the fourth centuries B.c. (cf. Antiphon Orator 5. 27 and 62; Andocides 1.113; Lysias 13.52; 22.1 and 10, all cited by Wankel, loc. cit.; for Platonic passages see Stahl and Ast, locc. citt.; for Demosthenic passages cf. Wankel, loc. cit.; I have found no other instances in the Hippocratic corpus). The logical and argumentative force of εἰ ὡς (or ὅτι or τ) µλιστα emerges clearly from the examples in Antiphon, where the author explicitly states that he will adopt the λγος of his opponents, and goes on to show that even on their premise their argument is unconvincing (cf. 5. 27: κἆτ' γ συγχωρ τῷ τοτων λγῳ παρεχµενος µν τοὺς µαρτρας ὡς οὐκ ξβην κ το πλοου εἰ δ κα ὡς µγιστα ξβην κ το πλοου κτλ.; 5.62: ἔπειτα δ' εἰ κα ὡς µλιστα βολετο αὐτν Λυκῖνος τεθνναι — εἶµι γρ κα π τν κατηγρων λγον — κτλ.).
8 On what grounds, the author does not say: οὐ γρ νυστν ὑπεραιµσαι κτλ. (unless we are to suppose that the vessels cannot overflow for the same reason that, even if they did, no disease would result, i.e. because a bad thing cannot come from a good).
9 Since bad (disease) cannot come from good (blood): π γαθο γρ κακν οὐχ οἶν τε γνεσθαι οὐδ' π κακο γαθν γνοιτ' ἄν.
10 In the humoral pathology espoused by the author of De morb. II 1 bile and phlegm are the habitual agents of disease; cf. Jouanna, Hippocrate, op. cit., pp. 91 n. 2 and 92ff.
11 Cf. ad loc. in his edition: Ermerins, F. Z., Hippocratis et aliorum medicorum graecorum veterum reliquiae II (Utrecht, 1862), pp. 184–5Google Scholar, cited by Jouanna, Hippocrate, op. cit., p. 89 with n. 2 and idem, Maladies II, op. cit., p. 134 n. 5 (on pp. 216–17).
12 As can be seen by comparison of De morb. II 1, 4 a with the parallel chapter 17 in De morb. II 2 (Jouanna, Maladies II, op. cit., p. 151, lines 17ff.). Cf. further on this passage Jouanna, Hippocrate, op. cit., pp. 88–92; idem, Maladies II, op. cit., p. 134 n. 5 (on pp. 228–9); Lonie, , CQ 15 (1965), 8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
13 Jouanna, Maladies II, op. cit., p. 134 n. 5 (on pp. 228–9).
14 On the form of the argument cf. Wankel, loc. cit., and especially the informative note o Wilhelm Fox on Demosthenes, De corona 95 (Fox, W., Die Kranzrede des Demosthenes [Leipzig. 1880], n. 73Google Scholar on pp. 300–301)(cited by Wankel).