This paper is an attempt to show that considerations similar to those which have been applied by the present writer to the Suppliants throw more light than is generally admitted on the construction and dramatic value ox the Septem. The criticism of Dr. Verrall, whom I cannot mention without a deep sense of gratitude and sorrow, and the edition by Prof. Tucker, have made it unlikely that any careful student will without argument dismiss the play as uninteresting. We are no longer content to remark that ‘the scene between Eteocles and the Chorus is dramatically unnecessary,’ that ‘in the episode, vv. 370–708, which is the centre and kernel of the Seven against Thebes, we look in vain for action,’ that ‘there is no drama proper except between Antigone and the Herald.’

1. Introduction. Sources of difficulty in the investigation.–II. Dr. Monro′s pitch theory. The passage in Heraclides. Supplementary evidence from the Problems.–III. Prof. Macran′s theory. Evidence against this theory. Prof. Macran′s answer to this evidence. Further objections. Criticism of the evidence in favour of Prof. Macran′s theory.–IV. Prof. Cook-Wilson′s theory. Platonic and Aristotelian evidence against Dr. Monro. Objections to this theory.–V. Recapitulation. Statement of the antinomies in the evidence.–VI. Conclusion. The nucleus of certainty. The Greek, as contrasted with the modern, musical sense.

At the beginning of ch. xxv (3516) Socrates starts once more to prove his contention that courage is a form of wisdom. He begins by asking Protagoras whether pleasure is not always in itself good, pain in itself evil. Protagoras is not prepared to admit this, but he is willing to accept the position as a basis for discussion. Socrates then asks a second question (352a 8): does Protagoras, like most people, think that knowledge has no power or authority in the soul? does he think that knowledge may be present and yet not operative, being knocked about like a slave by the superior force of anger, pleasure, or passion? Must we not rather believe that knowledge can be conquered by nothing and is alone sufficient to salvation?

Like everyone else, I was brought up to repeat that regnauit populorum is a ‘Greek genitive = ’ If one shrinks from depriving examinationpapers of this interesting idiom, he may be consoled by remembering that abstineto irarum and desine querelarum are still left. Why should not populorum depend in a normal manner upon potens (cf. diua potens Cypri) ? Surely the sense is improved by the antithesis pauper aquae, potens agrestium populorum. ‘Where Daunus, scant of water, ruled rustic peoples’ contains a somewhat cold pedantry, which is at least partially relieved by the fuller description. I find it difficult to understand why so many scholars prefer to make ex humili potens refer to Horace himself.

‘The date of the poem has been canvassed with merciless prolixity for the last four-and-twenty years, but the pertinent facts are few.’ So I wrote in 1903 on p. lxix of my edition of the first book of Manilius; and in two octavo pages and a half I collected all those facts, said all that I could find to say on both sides of the questions in dispute, and drew the conclusion that books I and II were written under Augustus and book IV under Tiberius. Ten years have passed, and the prolixity has continued, but the prolix have added no pertinent fact to those which I collected: some of them have even subtracted one, by suppressing the numismatic evidence, which I duly recorded, that Tiberius had Libra for his star.

In the Teubner edition, just published, I had to reduce the apparatus criticus to the smallest possible dimensions. All conjectures that were merely probable and not fairly certain had to be excluded. Some of them that are new may find a place here. There is only one MS. of Festus′ epitome of Verrius. It is now at Naples, and is said to have been found in Illyria. Dr. E. A. Loew, the leading authority on Italian script, tells us that it was written at Rome towards the end of the eleventh century. It must have been rescued (in Illyria?) from a fire; for the outer edges of all the pages are burned away, so that the greater part of the outer of the two columns on each page has been lost. The chief task for editors is to fill up by conjecture these gaps in the outer columns. Scaliger won immortal fame in this work, although many of his conjectures merely followed out a suggestion of his predecessor, Augustini. Ursini and Miiller were of service in adapting to the conditions of space the stop-gaps of Scaliger, and both of them, chiefly Miiller, added excellent conjectures of their own. The conjectural supplements, printed in italics in Müller's edition, have often, especially in German students′ dissertations, been treated as if they were actually part of the text. The Hungarian editor, Emil Thewrewk, who first provided satisfactory manuscript material for Paulus′ epitome of Festus, in order to prevent this error, took the extreme course of omitting these supplements in his edition; although many of them are made absolutely certain by the words of Paulus. I have taken a middle course between Miiller and Thewrewk and have admitted the certain and the probable supplements, leaving blanks elsewhere. The supplements are printed within angular brackets, the merely probable supplements being in italic type.

The last line of the passage was not completed in the quotation.

It has been pointed out above that Festus in his quotations cares more for the completion of the line than of the sense. His normal form is one complete line. So the probability is that Liu. Andr. com. (quoted s.v. Scenam) is an Iambic Senarius, with a dactyl in the first foot and hiatus at the pause in the sense:

Corrúît quasi ictus scéna, haut multósecus.

Thanks to Prof. Leo and to Prof. Lindsay (Classical Quarterly, 1913, p. 1), we know now two important things about this corrupt trochaic line, Simul huic nescio qui turbare qui hue it decedamus. First, that the line announces the coming of the chorus, although this chorus utters no words (so the entry XOPOT in Greek fragments of comedies). Secondly, that instead of turbare the true reading is turbae (the former reading of B), a dative which designates the band of the approaching choreutae. We may guess that the archetype of BCD had turbare, the fault turbre having sprung from an old TVRBAE, in which A had been read R (see my Manuel de Critique verbale, §§ 618 and 1352). The restitution of turbae involves two other emendations; the preceding qui is to be corrected into quoi (of which archaism qui is a common corruption), and the following qui into quae (the error arising from the ambiguous value of a barred q).

THE clue to the meaning and interpretation of this poem, which has long been the despair of critics, is, I believe, to be found in a variant on line 9, faithfully preserved in the Codex Sangermanensis (G) and yet unaccountably neglected hitherto. G's text I transcribe from M. Chatelain's photo-lithograph facsimile of the manuscript (Leroux, Paris, 1890).

In his new edition of II. i.-xii. Prof, van Leeuwen takes áμóv in Z 414, ή τoι γàρ φατέῤ άμòν άφέκτανε δîoς ‘ΑΧιλλεὐς, as = nostrum, i.e. meum et meorum fratrum, adding that the plural used for the singular is alien to epic practice. He refers to A 30, B 486, T 440, H 196, © 360, K 448, N 257, O 224, II 244, Σ 197, T 402, φ;60, 432, ψ84, 413, α 10, β 77 sq., K 99, 334, 525, λ 33, 166, 481, v 358, π300, 442, σ 247, ψ139. The point has often been discussed by commentators and grammarians, but generally with only one or two references, and an obiter dictum thereon.

In 394 Agesilaus, treading in the footsteps of Xerxes, came from Asia by way of Thrace and Macedon into Thessaly, threw off the attacks of the Thessalian cavalry, proceeded without further trouble into Boeotia, and met the enemy at Coronea, where a great battle was fought. The question ought to have been asked before now, why was he not held up at Thermopylae?

The lover of Aeschylus and Verrall, remembering the appendix to Verrall's Seven against Thebes, pricks up his ears at and listens for a verbal equivocation.

Poets should mean at least as much as they say. When Lucan wrote sola futuri Crassus erat belli medius mora. qualiter undas qui secat et geminum gracilis mare separat Isthmos,1 he ought to have been aware (perhaps he was) of the inept juxtaposition of slender and Thick. Did Sophocles mean all that he has implied ? I think so, because , if it has not this implication, is strange, and a feeble excuse for it has to be sought two hundred and fifty lines away.