Man and the Word: The Orations of Himerius 9780520933712

Citation preview

The Joan Palevsky

Imprint in Classical Literature

In honor of beloved Virgil— “O degli altri poeti onore e lume . . .” —Dante, Inferno

The publisher gratefully acknowledges the generous contribution to this book provided by the Classical Literature Endowment Fund of the University of California Press Foundation, which is supported by a major gift from Joan Palevsky.

Man and the Word

THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE CLASSICAL HERITAGE Peter Brown, General Editor I II

Art and Ceremony in Late Antiquity, by Sabine G. MacCormack Synesius of Cyrene: Philosopher-Bishop, by Jay Alan Bregman

III

Theodosian Empresses: Women and Imperial Dominion in Late Antiquity, by Kenneth G. Holum

IV

John Chrysostom and the Jews: Rhetoric and Reality in the Late Fourth Century, by Robert L. Wilken

V

Biography in Late Antiquity: The Quest for the Holy Man, by Patricia Cox

VI

Pachomius: The Making of a Community in Fourth-Century Egypt, by Philip Rousseau

VII

Change in Byzantine Culture in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries, by A. P. Kazhdan and Ann Wharton Epstein

VIII IX X XI

Leadership and Community in Late Antique Gaul, by Raymond Van Dam Homer the Theologian: Neoplatonist Allegorical Reading and the Growth of the Epic Tradition, by Robert Lamberton Procopius and the Sixth Century, by Averil Cameron Guardians of Language: The Grammarian and Society in Late Antiquity, by Robert A. Kaster

XII

Civic Coins and Civic Politics in the Roman East, a.d. 180–275, by Kenneth Harl

XIII

Holy Women of the Syrian Orient, introduced and translated by Sebastian P. Brock and Susan Ashbrook Harvey

XIV

Gregory the Great: Perfection in Imperfection, by Carole Straw

XV

“Apex Omnium”: Religion in the “Res gestae” of Ammianus, by R. L. Rike

XVI

Dioscorus of Aphrodito: His Work and His World, by Leslie S. B. MacCoull

XVII

On Roman Time: The Codex-Calendar of 354 and the Rhythms of Urban Life in Late Antiquity, by Michele Renee Salzman

XVIII

Asceticism and Society in Crisis: John of Ephesus and “The Lives of the Eastern Saints,” by Susan Ashbrook Harvey

XIX XX

Barbarians and Politics at the Court of Arcadius, by Alan Cameron and Jacqueline Long, with a contribution by Lee Sherry Basil of Caesarea, by Philip Rousseau

XXI

XXII

In Praise of Later Roman Emperors: The Panegyrici Latini, introduction, translation, and historical commentary by C. E. V. Nixon and Barbara Saylor Rodgers Ambrose of Milan: Church and Court in a Christian Capital, by Neil B. McLynn

XXIII

Public Disputation, Power, and Social Order in Late Antiquity, by Richard Lim

XXIV

The Making of a Heretic: Gender, Authority, and the Priscillianist Controversy, by Virginia Burrus

XXV XXVI

Symeon the Holy Fool: Leontius’s “Life” and the Late Antique City, by Derek Krueger The Shadows of Poetry: Vergil in the Mind of Augustine, by Sabine MacCormack

XXVII

Paulinus of Nola: Life, Letters, and Poems, by Dennis E. Trout

XXVIII

The Barbarian Plain: Saint Sergius between Rome and Iran, by Elizabeth Key Fowden

XXIX

The Private Orations of Themistius, translated, annotated, and introduced by Robert J. Penella

XXX

The Memory of the Eyes: Pilgrims to Living Saints in Christian Late Antiquity, by Georgia Frank

XXXI XXXII

Greek Biography and Panegyric in Late Antiquity, edited by Tomas Hägg and Philip Rousseau Subtle Bodies: Representing Angels in Byzantium, by Glenn Peers

XXXIII

Wandering, Begging Monks: Social Order and the Promotion of Monasticism in Late Antiquity, by Daniel Folger Caner

XXXIV

Failure of Empire: Valens and the Roman State in the Fourth Century a.d., by Noel Lenski

XXXV

Merovingian Mortuary Archaeology and the Making of the Early Middle Ages, by Bonnie Effros

XXXVI

Quùayr ‘Amra: Art and the Umayyad Elite in Late Antique Syria, by Garth Fowden

XXXVII

Holy Bishops in Late Antiquity: The Nature of Christian Leadership in an Age of Transition, by Claudia Rapp

XXXVIII XXXIX XL XLI

Encountering the Sacred: The Debate on Christian Pilgrimage in Late Antiquity, by Brouria Bitton-Ashkelony There Is No Crime for Those Who Have Christ: Religious Violence in the Christian Roman Empire, by Michael Gaddis The Legend of Mar Qardagh: Narrative and Christian Heroism in Late Antique Iraq, by Joel Thomas Walker City and School in Late Antique Athens and Alexandria, by Edward J. Watts

XLII

Scenting Salvation: Ancient Christianity and the Olfactory Imagination, by Susan Ashbrook Harvey

XLIII

Man and the Word: The Orations of Himerius, translated, annotated, and introduced by Robert J. Penella

XLIV

The Matter of the Gods, by Clifford Ando

Man and the Word The Orations of Himerius

Translated, annotated, and introduced by

Robert J. Penella

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS

Berkeley

.

Los Angeles

.

London

University of California Press, one of the most distinguished university presses in the United States, enriches lives around the world by advancing scholarship in the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences. Its activities are supported by the UC Press Foundation and by philanthropic contributions from individuals and institutions. For more information, visit www.ucpress.edu. University of California Press Berkeley and Los Angeles, California University of California Press, Ltd. London, England © 2007 Robert J. Penella Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Himerius, ca. 310– ca. 390 [Speeches. English] Man and the word : the orations of Himerius / translated, annotated, and introduced by Robert J. Penella. p. cm. — (The transformation of the classical heritage) Includes bibliographical references and index. isbn 978-0-520-25093-2 (cloth : alk. paper) 1. Himerius, ca. 310– ca. 390. 2. Rhetoric, Ancient. I. Penella, Robert J. II. Title. pa4013.h5 808—dc22

2007 2007020213

Manufactured in the United States of America 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 09 08 07 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 This book is printed on New Leaf EcoBook 50, a 100% recycled fiber of which 50% is de-inked postconsumer waste, processed chlorine-free. EcoBook 50 is acid-free and meets the minimum requirements of ansi/astm d5634-01 (Permanence of Paper).

alla memoria dei miei nonni lucani emigranti di Grumento Nova e di Montemurro

Vincenzo Pen(n)ella Vincenza Liuzzi Francesco Buonvicino Maria Pricoli

This page intentionally left blank

Contents

Acknowledgments Abbreviations Introduction

xi xiii

1

the orations 1. Himerius’s Son, Rufinus

19

2. In Praise of Cities and of Men

34

3. In and Around Himerius’s School

66

4. Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

107

5. The Epithalamium for Severus

141

6. Imaginary Orations

156

7. Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

207

8. Miscellaneous Remains

272

Arrangement of Orations and Concordance

279

Bibliography

283

Index

295

This page intentionally left blank

Acknowledgments

I have discovered through two decades of experience that putting Greek oratorical texts into English for the first time and annotating them to my satisfaction is slow work. I am therefore grateful to Fordham University for awarding me a sabbatical semester in the spring of 2001 to support my work on Himerius, which began in 1998. This sabbatical was followed by the generous support of a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship during the first half of 2002. A number of individuals have helped me in one way or another in the course of my work, and I thank them all: Thomas M. Banchich, Timothy D. Barnes, Giusy M. Greco, Edward M. Harris, John Marincola, William H. Race, and Martin West. I am happy to express my gratitude, once again, to Glen W. Bowersock and Christopher P. Jones, both for their general support and for their detailed criticisms, because of which I was able to improve my manuscript in many places. I am also grateful for the comments of the Press’s two readers. It was a pleasant surprise to discover that Constantine Cavafy was inspired to write his short poem Gnwrivsmata (“Distinguishing Marks” in Rae Dalven’s translation) by Himerius, Oration 68.1. At the head of his poem Cavafy quotes Himerius, who refers to “the word and man.” The poem itself has “man and the word”—hence the title of this book, alluding to Himerius via Cavafy. I would be deficient in pietas if I did not end with an acknowledgment of the beginning of it all: Gottlieb Wernsdorff, the founder of modern xi

xii

Acknowledgments

Himerian studies. I have restored his surname, which appears under his portrait facing the title page of his edition of Himerius, to the spelling he used (with a double f ), the spelling with one f having originated from the Latin version of his name, Wernsdorfius. I have in common with him that my own name has suffered a similar fate (see my dedication page). I have been living with and profiting from Wernsdorff’s edition and commentary since 1998, more than two hundred years after its appearance. Wernsdorff died in 1774, at the age of 56, without having been able to interest a publisher in the manuscript of his edition of Himerius, which he had worked on for more than twenty years. It finally appeared, sixteen years after his death, through the efforts of his brother Christian. Christian writes in its preface that “there were even scholars who, when consulted by bookmen, said that it was not very useful to the world of letters to devote one’s energies to the editing of lesser Greek writers; energy is better spent in publishing an ancient classic, such as Thucydides, Xenophon, or Demosthenes.” Wernsdorff’s experience offers yet another example of the delayed gratifications of scholarship! As for the bias against anything not in the classical canon, I hope that we have overcome that.

Abbreviations

CAH

The Cambridge Ancient History.

CPG

E. L. von Leutsch and F. G. Schneidewin, eds. Corpus paroemiographorum graecorum. 2 vols. Göttingen, 1839–51.

DPA

R. Goulet, ed. Dictionnaire des philosophes antiques. Paris, 2000–.

Exc. Neapol.

Excerpta Neapolitana (cod. Neapolitanus Bibl. Nat. gr. II C 32).

Exc. Phot.

Excerpta Photiana (Bibl. cod. 243).

FGrH

F. Jacoby et al., eds. Die Fragmente der griechischen Historiker. Berlin and Leiden, 1923–.

IG

Inscriptiones graecae.

Lex. Lopad.

Lexicon of Andrew Lopadiotes ( = Lexicon Vindobonense).

LIMC

Lexicon iconographicum mythologiae classicae. Zurich, Munich, and Düsseldorf, 1981–99.

LSJ

H. G. Liddell, R. Scott, and H. S. Jones. A GreekEnglish Lexicon. 9th ed., with revised supplement. Oxford, 1996.

xiii

xiv

Abbreviations

OCD3

S. Hornblower and A. Spawforth, eds. The Oxford Classical Dictionary. 3rd ed. Oxford and New York, 1996.

PG

Patrologia graeca.

PLRE

A. H. M. Jones, J. R. Martindale, and J. Morris, eds. The Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire. 3 vols. in 4. Cambridge, 1972–92.

RAC

Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum.

RE

Paulys Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft.

SEG

Supplementum epigraphicum graecum.

SIG3

W. Dittenburger, ed. Sylloge inscriptionum graecarum. 3rd ed. Leipzig, 1915–24.

Introduction

Himerius was a native of Bithynian Prusias (presumably Prusias ad Hypium), the son of Ameinias, whom the Suda calls a “rhetor.”1 He himself became a sophist, a master orator and teacher of rhetoric, in fourth-century Athens, where he had studied rhetoric in his youth. At some point he received Athenian citizenship. At a later date he was made an Areopagite. He had married into a respected Athenian family, fathering a daughter as well as a prematurely deceased son, Rufinus.2 Athenian citizenship was a source of pride to him. The city’s academic traditions had drawn him: “Because of [eloquence] I cast aside the blessed happiness of my native land and have taken up residence by the mystic banks of the Ilissus” (Orat. 10.20). When orating outside of Athens, Himerius’s Hellenism readily took on an Attic tinge.3 Yet he did not forget his native land. When he addressed Prusian students at Athens, he called them 1. Suda I 348 Adler, which gives his native city; Eunapius (Vitae phil. et soph. 14 [494] Giangrande) calls him a Bithynian. Schenkl’s error “Prusa” in RE 8, 2 (1913): 1622 was corrected in RE Suppl. 3 (1918): 1151. For the other Bithynian city known for a while as Prusias, see Ruge, “Kios 1,” RE 11, 1 (1921): 486–87. Wernsdorff believed that Himerius was from this Prusias/Cius rather than from Prusias ad Hypium (Himerii sophistae quae reperiri potuerunt, xl). 2. Rufinus (see chapter 1) was clearly on his way, at the time of his death, to following in the learned footsteps of his father and grandfather. 3. Study at Athens: Orat. 41.2. For education at Athens in the Roman Empire, see now Watts, City and School, esp. 24–78. Athenian citizen: Orat. 7.2–3; cf. Orat. 30. Areopagite: Orat. 25, opening scholion. Marriage: p. 19 below. His daughter: Eunap. Vitae phil. et soph. 14 [494]; cf. Him. Orat. 8.12. Orating abroad: p. 38 below.

1

2

Introduction

“fellow citizens” and hoped that his rhetorical achievements would be an adornment to the city of his birth (Orat. 27). And the orations refer to visits to Prusias: in 12.15 Himerius appears to refer to a postponement of a visit there, in 44 he is about to leave Athens for Prusias, and in 63 he has just returned from there.4 Himerius’s teaching in Athens can be divided into two periods. The first period came to an end soon after early December of 361, when Julian began ruling as emperor from Constantinople. The emperor, who may have met Himerius during his brief stay in Athens in 355 and had, along with his brother Caesar Gallus and the emperor Constantius, been publicly lauded by him perhaps in 351 (Him. frag. 1.6), invited his fellow pagan to join him, and the sophist answered the emperor’s call.5 Not surprisingly, Himerius hailed Julian for having “washed away . . . the darkness [i.e., the Christian throne] that was preventing us from lifting our hands up to the Sun,” for having “raised up temples to the gods, . . . established religious rites from abroad in the city [of Constantinople], and . . . made sacred the mysteries of the heavenly gods introduced into the city” (Orat. 41.8; cf. 65.3?). One should not assume, however, that Himerius’s understanding of paganism and his level of religious fervor were the same as Julian’s. After Julian’s death in 363 Himerius remained somewhere east of Athens (with some time spent in his native Prusias?), not returning until after the death of the Athenian sophist Prohaeresius in 366.6 This return marked the beginning of his second period of teaching at Athens. It was apparently in Constantinople that Himerius, having joined the emperor Julian, delivered the lost oration (51) to Praetextatus, who had just been appointed proconsul of Greece there.7 Oration 41 was also delivered at Constantinople, and Himerius had orated at Thessalonica and Philippi (39 and 40) on his way to Constantinople. The only information we have on Himerius’s activity during Julian’s reign is an enigmatic remark in a passage of the twelfth-century Histories of John Tzetzes (6.46.303–24). Tzetzes names five “secretaries” (grammateis): the elder Cato’s secretary Salonius, the younger Cato’s “secretary” Sarpedon, Brutus’s secretary, “the Julianic [secretary] Himerius,” and “Theodosius’s [secretary] Themistius.” The linkage of the Republican individuals with 4. We cannot be sure, though, that these references are to three separate visits. 5. For the Julianic invitation, see chapter 2. 6. Penella, Greek Philosophers, 83. The Prohaeresian date depends on the chronology of Eunapius’s life. Goulet’s Eunapian chronology puts Prohaeresius’s death in 369 ( JHS 100 [1980]: 63; Antiquité tardive 8 [2000]: 210). 7. See p. 210 below.

Introduction

3

the late ancient figures is peculiar. One would like to know precisely what Tzetzes meant in calling Himerius a grammateus, and what his authority was in this. Tzetzes remarks that Salonius helped the elder Cato with his writings, and Sarpedon is described in imperial texts as the younger Cato’s pedagogue.8 Both points suggest that Tzetzes is thinking of Himerius as someone who put his literary talents at Julian’s disposal—an appropriate role for him to play. The juxtaposition to Themistius suggests a more prominent public role: Themistius was an important Constantinopolitan senator, urban prefect of the city under Theodosius I, and adviser and propagandist to several emperors. Such a role is inherently less likely for Himerius, given his background; and if his role had been more Themistian, we would expect to find some mention of it in late ancient sources. If I am correct, Himerius composed Oration 42, to the praetorian prefect Secundus Salutius, in the years after Julian’s death and before his return to Athens.9 How long his second period of teaching at Athens lasted and when he died we do not know, although Eunapius tells us that he lived to an advanced age (Vitae phil. et soph. 14.2 [494]: pro;ˇ ghvra/ makrw/¸). If the Flavianus of Oration 12, who is there about to assume the proconsulship of Asia, is the younger Nicomachus Flavianus, we would have evidence that Himerius was still active at the beginning of the 380s, since Nicomachus is attested as Asian proconsul in 382–383.10 Other orations might show Himerius active in the 370s, but the pertinent dates of office scholars give for the officials addressed in them are conjectural.11 We have equally little information about the details of Himerius’s first period of teaching at Athens and his earlier life. His birth has been placed as early as 300 and as late as 320.12 Timothy D. Barnes has proposed that Himerius held a teaching position at Constantinople from 343 to 352, before his first Athenian teaching period began.13 There is no solid evidence for this. Barnes has been influenced by a passage in Oration 41: When this learning of mine, after enduring Attic contests and winning the great garlands of the virgin goddess [Athena], had to leave Attica and sow the rest of the earth with the seeds of learning it got there, fate did not take

8. Val. Max. 3, praef. 2b; Plut. Cato Min. 1.10, 3.4–7. 9. See p. 215 below. 10. See p. 212 below. 11. See my comments on Orat. 24, 46–47, and 48 in the introduction to chapter 7. 12. Schenkl, RE 8, 2 (1913): 1622; Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 207–9; Schamp, DPA 3 (2000): 715. 13. CP 82 (1987): 210, 212, 224.

4

Introduction it to the Rhine in the West, nor did it carry it to the fabulous waters of Ocean. No, fate brought it, while still in its prime and sprouting its first beard, to you [Constantinople], so that it might plait together a hymn for the city from still tender buds. (41.2)

All that we can get out of this passage, I think, is that some time soon after Himerius completed his rhetorical studies at Athens, he traveled, not to the West, but to the East and delivered an oration in Constantinople. Oration 62 was also delivered at Constantinople, before 353.14 But two speeches in Constantinople are not evidence enough that Himerius was settled there as a sophist. There is evidence, though, that Himerius was already settled as a sophist at Athens in the middle 340s. Eunapius tells us that Himerius was a sophist in that city when a praetorian prefect of Illyricum named Anatolius organized an oratorical contest there (Vitae phil. et soph. 10.6.6 [491]). Close analysis of Eunapius’s narrative shows that this Anatolius must be the prefect of the middle 340s, not the homonymous Illyrian prefect of 357–360.15 Oration 32 is addressed to a “prefect Anatolius”—probably the prefect of 357–360, by which time Himerius will have reached his full professional stride and had the standing to do those honors. (Socrates 4.26.6 describes Himerius— and Prohaeresius—as having come into full bloom, ajkmasavntwn, when Basil of Caesarea and Gregory of Nazianzus were studying under them in the first half of the 350s.)16 The orations show Himerius traveling within the province of Achaia. Oration 11 was a farewell address he delivered in Athens when he was on the point of departing for Corinth. Oration 30 was delivered in Athens when he returned from Corinth. Photius’s Himerian bibliography lists a second oration (70), completely lost, delivered upon returning from Corinth, and a lost talk (lalia) delivered in Corinth (75). Yet another lost oration (72) was given in “the city of the Lacedaemonians [Sparta], when, in obedience to a dream, [Himerius] went to pray to the god [Apollo] of Amyclae.” Corinth was the seat of the provincial governor, with whom Himerius may, on occasion, have had business to transact. It is not clear how many discrete round-trips from Athens to Corinth are being referred to in the above notices. Nor do we have any information on when these trips occurred.

14. See pp. 38–39 below. 15. Penella, Greek Philosophers, 88–91. 16. For the years when Basil and Gregory were in Athens, see, e.g., Rousseau, Basil, 28; Gallay, La vie de Saint Grégoire, 36–37.

Introduction

5

We have the full text of Himerius’s monody for his son, Rufinus. Unfortunately we do not know when Rufinus died—or the year of Himerius’s marriage. Rufinus seems to have been about twenty years old at the time of his death in Athens. Himerius was away, on the banks of the Melas River. Barnes conjectures that this was the Cappodocian Melas and that Rufinus died in 362, while Himerius was crossing Asia Minor in Julian’s company. I argue below that the Boeotian Melas is meant. Rufinus died perhaps toward the end of Himerius’s first period of teaching at Athens, when the sophist had conceivably been forced out of Athens and to Boeotia because of a professional quarrel.17 The conjectured professional quarrel just alluded to may have been with the Christian sophist Prohaeresius, a rival of Himerius during the latter’s first period of teaching at Athens.18 According to Jerome (Chron., pp. 242–43 Helm), Prohaeresius resigned from his chair when Julian banned Christians from teaching, even though the emperor was willing to make an exception in his case. Eunapius reports the opinion that Julian expressed admiration for Libanius at least in part “to grieve the great sophist Prohaeresius by expressing preference for another” (Hist. frag. 26.2 Blockley [trans.]). And the same writer, in his Lives of Philosophers and Sophists, asserts that Himerius went to the emperor Julian’s court “in the hope that he would be regarded with favor on account of the emperor’s dislike of Prohaeresius” (14 [494], trans. W. C. Wright). This, without being wrong, may be oversimplified: Eunapius had studied under Prohaeresius, and his treatment of him in the Lives is long and laudatory. He has a Prohaeresius fixation. Nonetheless, his remarks on Himerius, brief as they are, are not unappreciative: “He was an agreeable and harmonious speaker. His style of composition has the ring and assonance of political oratory. Sometimes, though rarely, he rises as high as the godlike [Aelius] Aristides” (14 [494], trans. Wright). Sozomen (6.17.1) calls Prohaeresius and Himerius the most highly regarded (eujdokimwtavtoiˇ) sophists of their time in Athens. They may have been; but one should not believe that on the authority of Sozomen, who is extolling them here as the teachers of the great church fathers Basil and Gregory of Nazianzus.19 If, as Eunapius says, Himerius joined Julian in the hope of profiting from the emperor’s 17. For Rufinus’s age at death, my identification of the Melas, and the conjectured professional quarrel, see pp. 21–22 below. See also Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 223. 18. On Prohaeresius, see now Watts, City and School, 48–78. 19. In the parallel passage in Socrates (4.26.6), Prohaeresius and Himerius are merely described as having come into full bloom (ajkmasavntwn) at the time when Basil and Gregory were studying under them.

6

Introduction

dislike of Prohaeresius, he hastened back (hjpeivgeto) to Athens, according to the same writer (Vitae phil. et soph. 14 [494]), on Prohaeresius’s death in 366. His professional future in Athens must have looked brighter with his rival gone. Whatever Photius precisely means when he says that Himerius “headed (prou[sth) the school of rhetoric at Athens” (Bibl. cod. 165.109a), the assertion might hint at a more secure position, one less challenged by rivals, in his second period of teaching there. Himerius had some contact with the great Antiochene sophist Libanius. It is conceivable that they had first met during the period of Libanius’s studies in Athens, 336–339. In 355–356 Himerius, teaching in Athens, was having some problems with land he owned in Armenia. Libanius was aware of what was going on and wrote to an assessor of the governor of Armenia named Gorgonius, asking him to intervene on Himerius’s behalf. “The man is worthy of the highest respect,” writes Libanius (Ep. 469 Foerster), “and he has no small amount of it.” If Gorgonius helps him, Libanius continues, he will honor eloquence and the gods of eloquence. The two sophists had participated in a rhetorical contest at Nicomedia during Libanius’s stay there from 344 to 349. In Epistula 742, written in 362, Libanius recalls a contest, sponsored by Pompeianus, the governor of Bithynia, who “honored true eloquence and exposed bogus eloquence.” The oration that Libanius delivered at this contest survives as Declamation 46, a melet; on an imaginary topic, prefixed by the words “the topic that Pompeianus set.” Now we have, from Photius’s Himerian bibliography, a reference to a lost oration (53) given in Nicomedia, “when [Himerius] was urged on [to come there? to participate in the contest?] by Pompeianus, who was governor there.” This is surely the same contest that Libanius refers to. But there is a complication. In Epistula 742 Libanius writes the following words to his correspondent Celsus, who must have been present at the contest: “Surely you remember how [the governor] poked fun at the splendidly dressed fellow from Athens, attacking him for his reluctance [to compete], for he wanted to reveal his weakness.” The “fellow from Athens” has naturally been thought to be Himerius. If so, what has happened to Libanius’s assessment of the man he praised so highly in Epistula 469? One explanation could be that their relationship had degenerated, so that Libanius was minded in 362 to represent a younger Himerius’s nervousness (and fancy clothes) in a demeaning way instead of courteously glossing over it. Or—to avoid the theory of a change in their relationship—it could be that Libanius said what needed to be said about Himerius in the almost official letter of appeal to Gorgonius, but had no reason to refrain

Introduction

7

from having some fun at Himerius’s expense in the “personal” letter to Celsus, his former student in Nicomedia.20 But Heinrich Schenkl has offered another (and an attractive) way out of the difficulty: “the splendidly dressed fellow from Athens” may not be Himerius at all, but someone else who also participated in the contest. The phrase does not have to mean a sophist teaching at Athens; it could simply refer to one of the many graduates of Athenian schools of rhetoric.21 The Himerian corpus that we have is hardly in ideal condition. It does contain some orations preserved in full. In other cases, where we have a continuous chunk of text, it is not always easy to decide whether we have the whole oration (a short dialexis?) or not. For many of the orations only a series of discrete excerpts is preserved. Finally, there is some text, preserved in only one damaged manuscript, that is lacunose. Himerius comes to us partly in a direct tradition of his own, partly through excerptors and a lexicographer who culled material from his orations.22 Of the manuscripts that directly transmit Himerius, the standard edition by Aristide Colonna relies on three: Parisinus bibl. nat. Suppl. gr. 352 (codex R) of the thirteenth century and, from the fourteenth century, Monacensis gr. 564 (codex A) and Oxoniensis Baroccianus gr. 131 (codex B). Codex R is the most important of these—if for no other reason than simply the amount of text it uniquely preserves. Unfortunately, it has suffered serious damage, and substantial lacunae have been left in a number of the orations. Some of these lacunae can be filled by text that survives in other sources, but, in the end, Orations 23–27, 29, 30, and 33–35 remain badly affected. The more important of the two Himerian excerptors is the ninth-century Byzantine patriarch Photius. In his Bibliotheca, cod. 243, he gives us excerpts, ranging from a few lines to a great deal of text, from more than thirty-five orations.23 Photius has the odd habit of usually telling

20. Schamp, DPA 3 (2000): 726. 21. Schenkl, RhM 72 (1917–1918): 34–40, is still indispensable on the Himerii in Libanius’s letters. See, most recently, Wintjes in Mélanges A. F. Norman, ed. González Gálvez and Malosse, 231–41. 22. For the manuscript sources of Himerius’s text, I rely largely on the introduction to Colonna’s edition. For an Oslo papyrus that contains some of the text of Orat. 46 and some other skimpy and unidentifiable Himerian fragments, see Eitrem and Amundsen, C&M 17 (1956): 23–30. Völker’s review of the text-critical scholarship on Himerius is useful (Himerios, 14–25). 23. I say “more than thirty-five” because one set of excerpts (our frag. 1) is not from a single oration but is a miscellany that could contain text from as many as eight orations.

8

Introduction

us that he is beginning with an excerpt or excerpts from the prooemium, but failing to indicate when he is moving from the prooemium to the main body of the speech. A second set of Himerian excerpts (the Excerpta Neapolitana) is found in the fourteenth-century manuscript Neapolitanus bibl. nat. gr. II C 32.24 Finally, we have some quotations of Himerius in the Lexicon of Andrew Lopadiotes, the so-called Lexicon Vindobonense, from the fourteenth century.25 Photius gives us more than the Himerian excerpts of Bibliotheca, cod. 243. In cod. 165 of the same work, in what I refer to as “Photius’s Himerian bibliography,” he provides a comprehensive list of some seventy titles of Himerian orations, apparently a table of contents of an exemplar available to him. Ignoring here a few complications,26 we can say that the orations that Photius excerpts in cod. 243 come from the first half of the list of orations given in cod. 165, and that, for the most part, the order of titles in cod. 243 coincides with that of cod. 165. The order of the orations in Colonna’s edition is fundamentally that of Photius’s Himerian bibliography. Schenkl, who was working on a critical edition of Himerius that never appeared, was also using Photius’s Himerian bibliography as the basis for ordering the oratorical collection.27 Colonna believes that a ninth-century exemplar, whether Photius actually used it or one or more exemplars derived from it, was the ultimate source, the archetype, not only of Photius’s own Himerian bibliography and excerpts, but also of the subsequent Himerian manuscripts proper, the Excerpta Neapolitana, and the quotations in Lopadiotes’ Lexicon.28 At the end of each oration (or of the excerpts therefrom) translated in this volume, I indicate its source or sources in a general way. For precise line-by-line specifications, however, one should consult the critical apparatus of Colonna’s edition. I have deviated from the order of the orations found in Colonna’s edition in order to allow certain categories of oration to stand out more

24. See, in addition to the introduction to Colonna’s edition, Schenkl, Hermes 46 (1911): 414–30. 25. For three new Himerian fragments from this Lexicon, recently brought to light, see n. 85 to Orat. 23, n. 12 to frag. 12, and frag. 17. I note here, for completeness, one Himerian fragment (our frag. 2) that is preserved by the twelfth-century Homeric commentator Eustathius. 26. E.g., the absence of the titles of Orat. 31 and 32 in Photius’s Himerian bibliography (as we now have it) despite the appearance of excerpts from them in cod. 243. 27. Cf. the list of orations in Schenkl, RE 8, 2 (1913): 1627–30, with the one given by Colonna in the introduction to his edition. 28. See pp. x and xlii of his critical edition.

Introduction

9

clearly. Many of the orations are concerned with the daily life of the school. These are gathered in chapters 3 and 4. The so-called declamations, on imaginary deliberative and judicial themes, and an epideictic oration with an imaginary premise appear in chapter 6. Chapter 7 contains all the orations addressed to Roman officials. The two orations dealing with Himerius’s son, Rufinus, appear in chapter 1. The three orations Himerius delivered in Thessalonica, Philippi, and Constantinople after being summoned to join the emperor Julian belong together; I include with them, in chapter 2, an earlier oration delivered in Constantinople. The epithalamium for Severus, surviving in full, is a valuable example of its genre; I have presented it by itself in chapter 5. Finally, some miscellaneous remains are given in chapter 8. Because most of the orations have more than one textual source, we often have more than one version of the title. I have felt free to select what I judged to be the most appropriate version in such cases. Often what is presented at the head of an oration, most notably in codices R and B, is much more than a normal oratorical title, something that is really a note on the circumstances or content of the oration. I refer to such notes as opening scholia and present the text or portion of text I regard as such in italics directly under the title proper. We do not know the pedigree of these scholia, in which Himerius is referred to in the third person, but I treat them with respect. The titles and opening scholia refer to individual orations with a variety of terms. Two generic terms are logos (oration) and epideixis (oratorical display).29 Sometimes the nature of the oration is precisely specified (e.g., monody, propemptic, epithalamium, melet; [“declamation” on an imaginary theme]). Occasionally we are told that the oration in question was originally delivered extempore. The only two terms for orations in the titles and opening scholia that need discussion here are dialexis (discourse) and lalia (talk). Both terms refer to a simple, informal, typically rather short (although “short” is a relative term), pleasant, and conversational oration, a less ambitious and serious rhetorical composition. Such compositions could stand alone or be delivered as immediate preludes to declamations or other oratorical works, in which case they could be called prolaliai or proagOnes.30 (And

29. Logos is sometimes implied by masculine expressions such as rJhqeivˇ, protrepti-

kovˇ, ejk tou¸, etc. 30. Russell and Wilson, Menander Rhetor, 295; Russell, Greek Declamation, 77–79; Pernot, La rhétorique, 2: 546–68; Korenjak, Publikum und Redner, 23.

10

Introduction

the word prodialexis is attested in the Glossaria.)31 A number of Himerian orations are titled dialexeis or laliai (22, 38, 40, 42, 44, 45, 46 [tauvthn ejlavlhse], 63, 64, 69, 74, 75). Where titles or opening scholia have feminine singular articles, pronouns, or demonstratives without an expressed noun, dialexis or lalia is doubtless what we should understand (39, 40, 54, 62, 63, 68, 74). Consider Oration 40: the opening scholion has tauvthn ejn Filivppoiˇ dieivlektai, and the title of this oration in Photius’s Himerian bibliography is “The Dialexis in Philippi.” In Oration 63, the opening scholion has tauvthn . . . dielevcqh, and Photius’s bibliography calls this oration a dialexis.32 The opening scholion of Oration 74 says dieivlektai de; aujthvn, and Photius’s bibliography calls this oration a lalia. What is understood in the title protreptikos (35) is logos; what is understood in the title protreptik; (68) is probably dialexis or lalia. Are the Himerian dialexeis and laliai freestanding, or did they serve as preludes (preliminary dialexeis, prolaliai) to something else? We cannot be sure. The word dialexis can refer to either a freestanding or a preliminary piece, and there is no reason why lalia could not be understood to mean prolalia—just as a protheOria is sometimes called simply a theOria (see next paragraph).33 I would argue that Orations 38, 40, 46, and 60 are preliminary dialexeis or prolaliai; so too, perhaps, Orations 39, 62, and 68.34 They may have originally introduced yet one more declamation on an imaginary theme; if so, these preliminary pieces, illustrating Himerius’s life and the life of his school, would have been judged by those responsible for their preservation to have more interest than the orations they introduced. For several Himerian orations all or part of the theOria or protheOria, the “(preliminary) explanatory comment,” survives, in which the orator comments on his own oration. For Oration 9, the whole (pro)theOria is extant; for 1, 3, and 10 we have excerpts from it. One may compare the occasional survival of the (pro)theOria in Themistius and Libanius and for all but one of Choricius’s Declamations.35 Himerius is much given to metaphor (and simile). His metaphors are not original; what is noteworthy about them is their frequency. They have 31. See Thes. Ling. Lat., s.v. “praefatio.” 32. I do not, however, regard dieivlektai, dielevcqh as a technical term for dialexis, but rather as a generic term for speaking. 33. Of course, a (pro)theOria is always preliminary. 34. See my notes on the opening scholia of 38, 46, and 68, and, for Orat. 39, 40, 60 and 62, my comments in the introductions to chapters 2 and 4. 35. Them. Orat. 2, 20, 26; Liban., Orat. 59; id., Decl. 3, 6, 12, 24, 25, 46. Heath (Menander, 238n) identifies what is printed as the protheOria of Liban., Decl. 4, as a mere scholion.

Introduction

11

doubtless caused difficulty for consulters of Himerius’s Greek text, perhaps not entirely familiar with the metaphorical code and already struggling with a frequently fragmentary and sometimes lacunose text.36 Himerius’s students collectively are a “chorus” (Orat. 54.1; 69.6, 9), a “flock” or “drove” (ajgevlh: 10.2, 12.36, 54.2). He frequently addresses them as his pai¸ deˇ—his “boys” or “children” (cf. 10.2 trofivmouˇ, 54.2 qremmavtwn [nurslings]). This implies, of course, that Himerius is their “father,” what Robert A. Kaster calls “one of the most common images of the teacher in late antiquity.”37 Another designation for Himerius’s students, common in the titles and opening scholia of the orations, is eJtai¸roi, literally “friends.” Here the hierarchical “father/boys” is replaced by an egalitarian image that makes both teacher and students coequal members of a friendly community of learners. My translation of eJtai¸roˇ as “student” unfortunately obliterates the ambiguity of the Greek word. Sometimes the Himerian context leaves it unclear whether eJtai¸roˇ means anything more than “friend” (see the titles of 11, 44, and 62). But given the larger context of the oeuvre of a teaching sophist, the reader will forgive me for favoring the meaning “student.” Himerius seems sometimes to use the basic Greek word for “friends,” fivloi, in addressing his students. Oration 27 greets students (eJtai¸roi) from Prusias. In the body of the oration Himerius addresses his audience both as pai¸ deˇ and as fivloi. Unless he is addressing a mixed audience of students and nonstudents, this oration secures w\ fivloi as a substitute for w\ pai¸ deˇ. Oration 16 urges the end of discord in Himerius’s school. It must be directed at his students, whom he addresses as fivloi. Oration 45 celebrates the recovery of Himerius’s head student from illness; those he addresses as fivloi are presumably the other students. Finally, if I am right in understanding Oration 44 to be addressed to one of Himerius’s students on the occasion of the student’s birthday, the others present, addressed as fivloi, are presumably fellow students.38 Himerius sometimes uses the language of religious initiation to describe the act of teaching. What he teaches is described as “our rites.” He initiates his students in mysteries. He shows them the sacred fire.39 36. See Völker, Himerios, 52–68. 37. Guardians of Language, 68. Cf. Walden, Universities, 307–8; Petit, Les étudiants, 33–36. 38. For various ways of referring to students, see Walden, Universities, 296–97; Petit, Les étudiants, 18–42 passim; Völker in Goltz, Gelehrte, 170–71. Libanius addresses his student Anaxentius as fivltate (Orat. 55.1). 39. Orat. 10.4, 34 [3, 7, 20], 35 [3–6, 71], 54.3, 61.4, 69.7–9; cf. Heath, Menander, 242–43.

12

Introduction

The study of philosophy is initiation in “the greatest mysteries” (Orat. 48.21). The metaphor has a Platonic pedigree.40 Eloquence or oratory is a drug (Orat. 16.1), a kind of painting or sculpture (12.2, 5; 23.3; 31.5; 32.12–13; 36.2; 48.16), the provision of a feast (23.9, 59.4). But, more than anything else, it is music or song (and sometimes also dance).41 “Modern” or Asianist sophists, with their poeticized and rhythmic style, had long been said to sing (a[/dein).42 Himerius’s corpus is filled with allusions to eloquence as music or song in general or specifically as the music of the lyre, pipes,43 cicadas, swans, nightingales, and swallows. “[Himerius’s] writings are filled with examples from history and from all sorts of myth, either to prove something or to make a comparison (pro;ˇ oJmoiovthta) or to add pleasure and beauty to what is said.” Thus remarks Photius (Bibl. cod. 165.108b). Many of these stories may be thought of as extended metaphors; they are analogies that illustrate the oratorical situation.44 Sometimes the points of contact between story and actual situation are multiple. Oration 60 ends with a story about Pindar. Some visiting Ionians in Athens encountered him. They wanted him to regale them with his lyric poetry. He was not up to anything more than a short melody, but he promised them an extended orthios nomos the next day. Here Pindar is Himerius, the visiting Ionians parallel the Ionian guests who have come to Himerius’s school, the short melody is a short dialexis Himerius delivered, and the future orthios nomos is a future full declamation that Himerius promises. In Oration 34 Solon, taking his son to see Aeschylus’s plays in Athens (the scene is chronologically impossible) is the addressee Arcadius, taking his son to hear Himerius there. One needs to be attentive to the various points of contact in these stories and to clues that the story may give about the actual

40. Völker, Himerios, 63–68. 41. Dance: Orat. 12.38; 32.1; 46.2, 7; 48.5, 31. 42. Walden, Universities, 233–37; Norden, Die antike Kunstprosa, 294–95, 375–79. Note, e.g., Him. Orat. 38.10: “This is what I sing to you (prosh¸/stai) for now”; 48.2, Himerius in orating is “taking up the Muses’ songs (mevlh).” Norden(428) contrasts Himerius, who held “die Professur der modernen Sophistik,” with Libanius, “der angesehenste Vertreter der archaischen Eloquenz.” It should be noted here, with my passing reference to prose rhythm, that Himerius is an important witness for the change from a rhythm based on vocalic quantity to one based on accent (see Völker, Himerios, 73–78). Prose rhythm, of course, is a phenomenon that is completely obliterated in translation. 43. See Völker, Himerios, 54–61. 44. Cf. Wernsdorff, Himerii sophistae quae reperiri potuerunt, lix: “Nihil tamen magis eius [Himerii] proprium, quam allegoria, cum aut veris historiis aut fabulis utitur ad imaginem quandam suarum rerum adumbrandam.”

Introduction

13

situation. In Oration 65, “To Those Involved a Conflict and Absent from a Lecture,” there is a story about Agamemnon gathering together an assembly, even though Achilles, “the very leader of the Greeks,” was absent. Here Himerius is gathering his students, and the story suggests that his head student is among those absent. Normally, the relevance of a story in Himerius is clear enough. On two occasions, though, needed illumination is provided by the opening scholia of the orations in question. Oration 39 was delivered at Thessalonica. In it Himerius compares Musonius, the vicar of Macedonia, who was present, to Alcibiades. After elaborating on Alcibiades’ qualities, Himerius goes on to say, “Come let us also honor Nicias by our words,” which he proceeds to do in the rest of the paragraph. We would be completely confounded by this “digression” on Nicias were it not for the fact that the opening scholion tells us that the consularis of Macedonia, Calliopius, was present at the oration as well as the vicar Musonius. In praising the cooperation of Alcibiades and Nicias, Himerius is actually praising that of Musonius and Calliopius, without explicitly alluding to the latter. Oration 40 was delivered in Philippi when Himerius was on his way to join the emperor Julian, who had summoned him. The oration ends with an analogous story: Aristotle, summoned by Alexander, stopped at the city of Atarneus to salute the city and his former pupil Hermias with a short composition. In this story Aristotle is Himerius, Alexander is Julian, and Atarneus is Philippi. What about Hermias? His significance would have been lost to us without the opening scholion of the oration, which tells us that Himerius’s former pupil Severus was present when Himerius spoke at Philippi. Himerius’s stories from Greek myth or history allow for numerous flattering comparisons of Himerius himself and his addressees to figures from the past. Himerius is a new Chiron, Achilles’ teacher, and his physician-addressee Arcadius may think of himself as a new Democedes, the famous physician of old (Orat. 34). Himerius replicates Odysseus, torn between Phaeacia and his homeland (44.1). Or his addressee Hermogenes replicates Odysseus, with Himerius himself playing the role of Philoctetes, the addressee ordering the sophist to “shoot”—that is, to orate (48.1–2). Himerius is Achilles, “fac[ing] the contest late” (25 [1–14]). His addressee Ursacius is an Abaris, come from the north (23.4–7). The teacher Privatus, addressee of Oration 29, is a new Anacharsis, come to Greece from abroad, and a new Phoenix. Two of Himerius’s addressees at Thessalonica, as has already been noted, are comparable to Alcibiades and Nicias (39.11–13). Arcadius listening to Himerius is like Solon anachronistically

14

Introduction

watching Aeschylus’s plays (34). Ionian guests visiting Himerius at Athens reenact a visit of “very prominent Ionians” to Pindar there (60.4). Timotheus’s piping for Alexander is mirrored in Himerius’s orating for Flavianus (12.1). Himerius is a new Anacreon, Stesichorus, Ibycus (69.5); he is like Isocrates (33); he mirrors Socrates, luring students away from inferior teachers (35 [9–25]) and derided by men (like Himerius) but approved by Apollo (38.5–7). And the list could go on. This surrealistic world, in which past and present are melded, as in a dream, typical of the Greeks under Rome, is richly on display in Himerius’s orations. What are we to make of it? Such obsessive self-comparison to great figures of the past might suggest that the Greeks of the Empire suffered from a deep sense of insignificance or inferiority. Or it might incline us to accuse them of presumption.45 But this is to look for an explanation of the phenomenon in individual psychology. Without totally discounting individual psychology, I would look first for a cultural explanation of the habit. Devotion to and identification with the past was central to imperial Greek cultural identity, especially among the elite.46 When Himerius likens himself to Socrates or an addressee to Odysseus, he is at least as much reinforcing cultural identity as meeting some psychological need. Almost all of Himerius’s orations have a poetic tone to them; although there is hardly anything unique in this,47 it is remarkable how pronounced that tone is: Eduard Norden referred to the sophist’s eloquence as “Poesie in scheinbarer Prosa,” poetry in what only appears to be prose.48 Himerius’s propensity for metaphor and simile is part of his poetic leaning. There is also the matter of his diction;49 but to detect in his lexicon what his contemporaries would have reacted to as “poetic” requires a 45. Rizzo, RFIC 26 (1898): 515: “quantunque non si possa che sorridere, leggendo che il retore osa paragonar la sua scuola alla scuola d’Isocrate.” 46. See, e.g., Swain, Hellenism, 65–100. The foundational study is Bowie, P&P 46 (1970): 3–41 (revised reprint in Studies in Ancient Society, ed. M. I. Finley [London, 1974]). These studies of the Second Sophistic remain applicable, in essence, to the fourth century. See also the more recent Alcock in Alcock et al., Empires, 323–50. 47. See, e.g., Rohde, Der griechische Roman, 356–61. 48. Die antike Kunstprosa, 429. Cf. Walden, Universities, 235: “Some of [Himerius’s compositions] are as near being on the line between prose and poetry as it is well possible to be”; Schenkl, RE 8, 2 (1913): 1633: “seine alles Maas übersteigende Hinneigung zu poetischem Ausdruck.” Völker (in Amato et al., Approches, 589–612) is essentially in agreement with Norden’s judgment. The orations on imaginary themes (chapter 6) are, in general, more sober. 49. He tells us in the protheOria of Orat. 9 that “the best rule for nuptial orations should be to look to the poets for diction. “

Introduction

15

highly developed sensitivity, and Greek poeticisms are often lost (or ignored) in translation. Another aspect of Himerius’s poetic tone is quite simply his interest in the poets of old: quoting them, echoing them, referring to them.50 One notes, first of all, Homer; but Homer in Himerius is not particularly noteworthy, because Homer is ubiquitous.51 What is worthy of note is Himerius’s interest in the lyric poets: Alcaeus, Alcman, Anacreon, Bacchylides, Ibycus, Pindar, Sappho, and Stesichorus. This interest has secured for the fourth-century sophist a place in the testimonia and fragments of modern editions of these poets. Quotations, echoes, and references are not the whole story: Himerius often also compares himself to them and compares his oratory to the music of the instruments that accompanied the poetry. Sometimes Himerius indicates quite explicitly that Homer is not enough for him; Homer must be supplemented by the lyric poets. In Oration 69.5, after quoting Homer, Himerius exclaims, “Yet why do I need Odysseus? Why do I need Homer and the Cyclops? Come . . . let us rather seek consolation from the Muses and lyric poetry.” He then cites incidents in the lives of Anacreon, Stesichorus, and Ibycus that are comparable to his own current situation. In 27 [24–33] he illustrates his point by appealing not only to Homer, but also to Anacreon, Alcaeus, Simonides, Bacchylides, and Stesichorus. Elsewhere Homer is followed by Pindar, Anacreon, Alcaeus, and Sappho (28.1–2). It was because of Isocrates, Himerius remarks, “that sophists’ tongues scorned those of poets and embraced a law of their own” (Orat. 33 [4–7]). But Himerius did not share that scorn; he calls himself a friend of poets (38.3). He can see himself as a counterpart of poets (9.5, 36.17, 46.6, 47.7, 48.4). We feel that he is almost expressing regret when he tells us that he is not a poet—that, when he speaks his own words, he must speak in prose (9.19–20; 12.25, 32; 27 [33–36]; 46.11; 48.10; frag. 1.7). “The art of rhetoric,” he says in Oration 48.5, “wrongs me in not having taught me to play the lyra or the barbitos, but only to dance this prose dance for the Muses. So I shall let poets be frenzied and shall . . . [speak] in my own way.” Or consider what he says in 47.1: “I would have gladly persuaded my words to become lyrical and poetic, so that I could say something about you that has a youthful verve to it, as Simonides or Pindar did about Dionysus and Apollo.” But he goes right on to add that,

50. See Rizzo, RFIC 26 (1898): 513–63; Cuffari, I riferimenti poetici; Völker, Himerios, 28–32. 51. Cuffari, I riferimenti poetici, 101–2: “sebbene la netta prevalenza di [citazioni] omeriche . . . confermi la centralità di Omero nell’ambito delle scuole retoriche.”

16

Introduction

nonetheless, “my [prosaic] words are proud and hold their heads up high; they frolic without the restraint and beyond the confines of meter.” Himerius is proud of his profession, proud of the traditions of logoi.52 Yet the vatic and aesthetic possibilities of poetry fascinate him. Gottlieb Wernsdorff included a Latin translation in his pioneering edition of Himerius (1790). That translation was reprinted, with revisions, along with Friedrich Dübner’s Greek text (1849). Translations into modern languages were a long time in coming. René Henry’s Budé edition of Photius’s Bibliotheca includes a French translation of the excerpts of Himerius contained therein (1971). But the first modern language translation of the whole Himerian corpus, into German by Harald Völker, did not appear until 2003. My own translation, like Völker’s, is based on the standard critical edition by Colonna. I inform the reader when I deviate from Colonna’s text. Section numbers in the orations are given after a full stop; section 10 of Oration 31, for example, is referred to as 31.10. The lacunose orations generally have only line numbers, not section numbers, in Colonna’s edition. I refer to these lines with square brackets: line 10 of lacunose Oration 24, for example, is referred to as 24 [10]. I use square brackets in the translation to identify quotations or allusions, for short glosses, and when I want the reader to see immediately how I am fleshing out the Greek text. Angular brackets indicate conjectural supplements. Curly brackets are used in the lacunose orations from codex R to suggest what has been lost on its damaged folios. For these suggestions I am almost always indebted to Wernsdorff or to Dübner. In my translation of lacunose passages, occasionally I tacitly leave out a word, phrase, or (at several places) one to three lines from which I can get nothing meaningful. If I omit anything longer, I let the reader know in a footnote. Comment on an individual oration is divided between the notes to the oration and the introduction to the chapter containing the oration. I do not always give a cross-reference to the chapter’s introduction in the notes to the oration. 52. Orat. 35 [65–66]: “For what gift more beautiful than eloquence (lovgwn) could fortune have given the human race?” At 23.3 Himerius remarks that “any attempt to represent something falls short of oratory,” but it is a reference to painting that prompts this remark.

The Orations

This page intentionally left blank

chapter 1

Himerius’s Son, Rufinus

Two orations concern Himerius’s son, Rufinus. The first, Oration 7, Himerius’s plea before the Areopagus for free status for his son, survives only in a few excerpts. The second, Oration 8, Himerius’s lament at the premature death of Rufinus, survives in full. In his brief sketch of Himerius, Eunapius mentions only the Athenian sophist’s daughter, not his prematurely departed son (Vitae phil. et soph. 14.2 [494] Giangrande). She is presumably the “full sister” of Rufinus who is mentioned in Oration 8.12; Himerius there praises Rufinus’s love for and protection of her. The siblings’ mother belonged to a distinguished Athenian family, which is highlighted in both Oration 7 and 8. In 7.4 Himerius identifies Rufinus as “a descendant of Plutarch, through whom you [Athenians] educate the whole world . . . [,] a descendant of Minucianus, who obtained free status for many people on many occasions by means of his eloquence . . . [,] the descendant of Nicagoras.” In 8.21 he laments the fact that his son did not live long enough to outdo his ancestors by speaking “more forcefully than Minucianus, more solemnly than Nicagoras, more eloquently than Plutarch, more philosophically than Musonius, more intrepidly than Sextus.” To list Rufinus’s maternal ancestors, Himerius says, is to make “a list of sophists and philosophers for you, and they are truly the nobility of Attica” (7.4). A sequence of fathers and sons is known for this learned Athenian fam-

19

20

Himerius’s Son, Rufinus

ily: Mnesaeus—Nicagoras I—Minucianus—Nicagoras II.1 Nicagoras II is attested in Egypt in the year 326; he is likely to be the father (conceivably the grandfather) of Himerius’s wife.2 Plutarch and his philosopher nephew Sextus, both Boeotians from Chaeronea, belong somewhere on the family tree before the time of Mnesaeus.3 In an Eleusinian inscription Nicagoras I boasts of his descent from them (SIG3 845). The influential view that in Orations 7 and 8 Himerius is referring to the Minucianus attacked in Hermogenes’ On Issues and that this Minucianus was Mnesaeus’s father has been questioned, on good grounds, by Malcolm Heath.4 If the earlier Minucianus is not a member of Himerius’s wife’s family, then the question to which Minucianus Himerius is referring is eliminated. But the question to which Nicagoras he is referring remains—and whether he is referring to the same Nicagoras in both orations.5 What about Musonius? He may be, not Musonius Rufus, but the Musonius who was a Stoic philosopher teaching in Athens in the early third century, when Longinus was a student.6 Rufinus’s paternal grandfather was a rhetor (Suda I 348 Adler), his father a successful sophist, and the philosophical and rhetorical achievements of his mother’s family were unusual.7 The young man whom death cut off was genetically programmed for extraordinary intellectual and academic success. In Oration 7 Himerius pleaded before the Areopagus for a grant of free status for his son before the latter’s legal age (7.3, pro; h{bhˇ), which was traditionally at the end of one’s seventeenth or possibly eighteenth year in Athens.8 Apparently what Himerius was seeking for his son was

1. See Schissel, Klio 21 (1927): 361–73; Millar, JRS 59 (1969): 16–17; Heath, ZPE 113 (1996): 66–70. Schamp (DPA 3 [2000]: 720–22) is unaware of Heath’s article, as is Völker (Himerios, 9–13). 2. On this Nicagoras, see Fowden, JHS 107 (1987): 51–57. Father of Himerius’s wife: W. Ensslin, “Nikagoras 4,” RE 17, 1 (1936): 216; W. Stegemann, “Nikagoras 9,” RE 17, 1 (1936): 218; PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Nicagoras 1”; Greco, Orpheus 15 (1994): 311n. Grandfather of Himerius’s wife: Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 222. 3. Sextus from Chaeronea: SHA, Marc. 3.2; Suda S 235 Adler. 4. Schissel, Klio 21 (1927): 366; Heath, ZPE 113 (1996): 66–70. Schissel had conjectured that the elder Minucianus had married Sextus’s daughter (Klio 21 [1927]: 363, 365, 371). 5. If 8.21 refers to Nicagoras I, 7.4 with its juxtaposition to;n ejk Nikagovrou . . . to;n ejx ejmautou¸ may refer to the more recent Nicagoras. Cf. Schissel, Klio 21 (1927): 370; Greco, Orpheus 15 (1994): 312. 6. Heath, Eranos 96 (1998): 51. Barnes (CP 82 [1987]: 222) assumes that Himerius means Musonius Rufus. 7. For details on Rufinus’s maternal ancestors’ achievements in paideia, see Heath, ZPE 113 (1996): 66–70, and the articles in RE on the various individuals. 8. I follow Harrison, Law of Athens: The Family, 74; cf. id., Law of Athens: Procedure, 205–7.

Himerius’s Son, Rufinus

21

full citizen rights and cessation of tutelage.9 The assertion that this appeal was made when Rufinus was two years old arose from the assumption that the situation described in 8.15 was the occasion when Himerius sought full citizen rights for his son.10 In that passage Himerius recalls a time when he brought his two-year-old son before the Areopagites. They were impressed by the boy’s behavior. But it seems inherently improbable that Himerius would have sought full citizen rights for Rufinus at such a young age; on that occasion the boy must merely have been in his father’s tow. Furthermore, the remark at 8.9 that “your burial follows my plea for you before the Areopagus, your death follows my obtaining free status for you” would have no point at all if a long chronological gap separated the two juxtaposed events.11 Death in Rufinus’s late teens or early twenties fits the details of Oration 8 well. The early grant of full citizen rights was perhaps made only several years earlier, before Rufinus’s seventeenth or eighteenth birthday, if in fact that was still the age of majority at Athens in the fourth century a.d. Himerius was away from Athens when Rufinus, apparently unusually prone to disease (8.13), died there (8.17). The only indication he gives of his whereabouts at the time is his reference to the banks of the Melas River, where he poured libations for his dead son (8.22). A number of rivers were called Melas in antiquity. Inevitably, there have been conjectures as to which one Himerius means.12 I incline to the only one of them that may be supported by an item in Himerius’s monody. In 8.23 Himerius imagines his son’s soul in the company of Eros, Hymenaeus, Bacchus, and Trophonius. Now Rufinus, marriageable and deprived of marriage by death, suitably consorts with Eros and Hymenaeus, as he does with Bacchus/Dionysus, to whom he was consecrated (8.7). But why does Himerius bring in Trophonius? Perhaps because he was near that god’s oracular shrine at Boeotian Lebadea at the time of his son’s death. That would fit well with (and is itself suggested by) the old conjecture

9. Note Harrison, Law of Athens: The Family, 188: “Sometimes [in classical Athens] the word ejleuv qeroˇ is used in an extended sense for a free man with full citizen rights.” 10. See Wernsdorff in his opening comment on Orat. 7 and on 8.15; Schenkl, RE 8, 2 (1913): 1623; cf. Schemmel, NJbb 22 (1908): 499: “für seinen dreijährigen [sic] Sohn.” 11. The actual Greek at 8.9 is very terse: tavfoˇ meta; Areion [ pavgon, met j ejleuqerivan oJ

qavnatoˇ. 12. For the various Melas rivers, see RE 15, 1 (1931): 438–40; RE Suppl. 8 (1956): 352; cf. Talbert et al., Barrington Atlas, index. In addition to the conjecture I discuss below, note PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Himerius 2” (the Thracian Melas); Schemmel, NJbb 22 (1908): 499, and Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 222–23 (the Cappadocian Melas).

22

Himerius’s Son, Rufinus

that the Melas River in question is the one near Boeotian Orchomenus.13 And why was Himerius in Boeotia rather than in Athens at the time of his son’s death? At 8.2 he asks his dead son, “Why did I separate myself from your embraces?” The answer is, “You were the spoils of an envy aimed at me, an unjust spirit’s accidental victim.” Himerius, it has been suggested,14 had become involved in a professional quarrel—with his rival Prohaeresius?—and was temporarily driven out of Athens.15 Although sheerly conjectural, the notion is plausible. Prohaeresius himself had once been temporarily driven into exile from Athens.16 Himerius’s wife’s family had ancestral ties to Boeotia; it may still have had land there, to which Himerius could have retreated. He could have easily hoped there that his son would visit him from Athens (see 8.2). Oration 8 is not an epitaphios or paramuth;tikos logos, but a monody. The purpose of a monody is to express lamentation, although it also contains praise of the deceased.17 Monodies were commonly delivered over the young; they told of hopes raised and then dashed to the ground, complaining against the divine powers and the injustice of fate.18 Himerius’s loss was made especially bitter because he was not with his son during the latter’s last days, death, and funeral. Oration 8 has a strong tragic coloration and is influenced by the master monodist, Aelius Aristides.19 Himerius praises his son’s virtues and rhetorical skill, underscoring his precocity, his “exceed[ing] the limits of [his] age” (8.12). Precocity seems to have been a common encomiastic theme, whether the individual being praised had died prematurely or not.20 In Himerius’s monody this theme is taken to great heights. When Rufinus was almost three years old and Himerius brought him before the Areopagites, the boy astounded them with his seriousness, “like someone who had already been learn-

13. For this river, see F. Gisinger, RE Suppl. 8 (1956): 352. It does not appear in Talbert et al., Barrington Atlas. Wernsdorff on 8.22 had already suggested that Himerius’s Melas was the Boeotian river. For the possible relevance of the mention of Trophonius, cf. Wilamowitz, Kleine Schriften, 4: 648. 14. Wernsdorff, Himerii sophistae quae reperiri potuerunt, l (“Vita Himerii”). 15. In Wilamowitz, Kleine Schriften, 4: 648, the conjecture has become fact. 16. For Prohaeresius’s exile, see Penella, Greek Philosophers, 86. 17. For the three possible rhetorical responses to someone’s death, see Russell and Wilson, Menander Rhetor, 347. Monody’s purpose: Men. Rhet. 2.16 [434] Russell-Wilson. 18. Men. Rhet. 2.16 [435.2–11, 436.21–22]. 19. For the influence of tragedy and of Aelius Aristides, see the introduction and commentary, passim, in Greco’s forthcoming edition of Orat. 8. 20. Wiedemann, Adults and Children, 49–80 passim, 167–70. Cf. Ael. Aristid. Orat. 31.4, 11 Keil.

Himerius’s Son, Rufinus

23

ing the ancient stories about that court for some time.” Rufinus on that occasion was more silent than his father, more reserved than the Areopagites themselves (8.15).21 No “terrible twos” here. Also, at a young age Rufinus, with special ties to Athena, Dionysus, and the Eleusinian deities (8.7, 8, 13, 18), had an old man’s attachment to the worship of the gods (8.11). And Himerius asserts that Rufinus was already a public speaker when he spoke his first words, in his swaddling clothes (8.4). This, of course, is not intended to be taken literally. But we may accord some credibility, despite exaggeration, to the representation of Rufinus as precocious in eloquence. Himerius contends that, despite the young man’s premature death, he had already outdone his father as a rhetor: “I regarded your words as better than mine. I always preferred your inarticulate speech to my serious efforts.”22 And Himerius had hoped that his son’s eloquence would also eventually outdo that of the latter’s highly learned maternal ancestors (8.21). Eloquence and paideia in general were routinely valued by the upper classes of the Empire and encouraged in their offspring;23 but Himerius portrays his son as a budding rhetor’s rhetor, who would have taken family traditions of excellence in paideia to an even higher level had cruel fate not struck him down.

translations 7. From the Areopagiticus; or, [The Plea] for Free Status for His Son, Rufinus [1] Men [i.e., Areopagites] who long ago made decisions for the gods on who should [legally] prevail and now make decisions for the Athenians on the granting of free status 24 21. Cf. Themistius’s panegyric on the three-year-old Valentinianus Galates: sitting on the speaker’s platform, he was “more still than any old man”; while the rest of the audience fell asleep, he was prepared to sit patiently through the proceedings all day long (Orat. 9.121c). 22. Cf. Aelius Aristides’ praise of his young pupil Apellas: “Nor would Nestor, although an old man, seem still to speak like ‘honey,’ if he were compared to this boy” (Orat. 30.19 Keil, trans. C. Behr). 23. See Schmitz, Bildung und Macht, 105–8. 24. Himerius is thinking of the days when gods heard cases on the Areopagus. See Dem. 23.66; Apollod. Bibl. 3.14.2; Ael. Aristid. Orat 1.45–48 Lenz-Behr; Him. Orat. 6.8; August. De civ. Dei 18.10. These texts specifically mention trials of Ares and of Orestes and make clear that the gods themselves did the judging. Yet Himerius here says that, in those mythological days, “men . . . made decisions for the gods” (cf. Him. Orat. 8.15: “gods pleading their cases before those judges [i.e., Areopagites]”; Liban. Orat. 18.115: “Gods were judged [at Athens] before [a tribunal of ] Athenians”; Amm. Marc. 29.2.19: “[Areopagites], whose justice is said to have resolved even the gods’ disputes”). In Orat. 6.8

24

Himerius’s Son, Rufinus

[2] So, in obedience to the law, I shall speak only with reference to the matter at hand.25 I have been both a sophist and a father among you. You know whether or not I am an accomplished sophist, for I am always speaking, and my life is lived in lecture halls. Whether or not I am an Attic father, the present occasion will show. [3] For I find it intolerable not to call the son of Athenians free. I entrust my son with freedom even before he reaches the legal age. He is mine, he is an Athenian, he belongs to a city that honors its own antiquity as a commonwealth more than others honor their fathers’ old age. [4] This young man is a descendant of Plutarch, through whom you educate the whole world. He is a descendant of Minucianus, who obtained free status for many people on many occasions by means of his eloquence. I have brought before you the descendant of Nicagoras, my own son. [In mentioning these ancestors of my son], I am making a list of sophists and philosophers for you, and they are truly the nobility of Attica.26 [5] I have often spoken as a sophist, now I speak as a father. [6] You have given me a son of the Attic race; accept him now as one made free by your decree. Free my son for me by your decree and let your free voices resound with [his], so that as an Athenian—which is the same as saying as a free man—he may speak and propose laws among you and, if the gods are willing, play a political role in your commonwealth.27 [Exc. Phot.] 8. A Monody for His Son, Rufinus [1] I am utterly wrong in speaking now that Rufinus lies buried; nonetheless I shall speak, since fate has preserved me solely to lament

Himerius has the gods do the judging, but with human Areopagites as their judicial colleagues. If more of Orat. 7.1 had survived, it might have emerged that 7.1 is not at odds with 6.8, for “men who . . . made decisions for the gods” does not necessarily exclude gods deciding along with them as colleagues. 25. Himerius promises to speak eijˇ to; pra¸gma, acknowledging his obligation, for example, to avoid digressing from the issue and to refrain from rhetorical tricks that arouse emotions. See, e.g., Arist. Rhet. 1.1 [1354a11–31]; Lysias 3.46; Lycurg. Contra Leocr. 11–13; Lucian Anachars. 19. Dübner and Colonna assume a lacuna after this opening sentence. 26. For Rufinus’s ancestors, see pp. 19–20 above. 27. “resound with [his]”: or “resound with [mine]”? “propose laws”: gravfh/. Cf. Him. Orat. 4.17, with my note.

Himerius’s Son, Rufinus

25

this tragedy.28 For it would not be right for me to fail to mourn in words the child of eloquence. And what a glorious subject to speak on! Surely, [my son], glorious fortune has preserved your father’s eloquence for you. I do wish that I had been speaking next to your tomb, that your grave had been my platform—a platform of the thrice-happy. As it is, you have been snatched away from me without having spoken to me, without having addressed me, without having embraced me for the last time. [2] Fate actually seemed to give birth to tragedy before you died, from that day when it deprived me [by my absence] of my enjoyment of you and separated you from my hugs and kisses. But why do I bring a charge against fate? It was I who was responsible for losing you, my child, [by my departure]. Why did I separate myself from your embraces? You were the spoils of an envy aimed at me, an unjust spirit’s incidental victim.29 Oh, what a tragic and cruel day that was! What light shone on me before that, what darkness then took its place! I had stood there every day with my ears ready to take in much-desired news [about my son]. I always kept watch for a messenger who would tell me that Rufinus was coming. What great news that would have been. But what news the [evil] spirit was preparing for me instead! [3] At night I used to think about a bath, a house, and riches for you— about all the things that human beings consider the finest. During the day I worked to provide such things for you. Little did I know, wretch that I was, that I was preparing a tomb for you instead of a bath, a grave and a mound instead of a house, gifts for the tomb—the most tragic offerings there are for human beings—instead of riches and luxury.30 [4] Would that you had not been born at all, my dear son, or at least that you did not shine on me so much and so greatly with your soul, your body, and your virtues. You were already a public speaker as soon 28. “Fate” here is oJ daivmwn, which I usually translate as “the [evil] spirit” in this oration (see Burkert, Greek Religion, 179–81). “Thrice-happy” in sections 1 and 5 is triseudaivmwn. 29. “an envy aimed at me”: For what Himerius might be alluding to here, see p. 22 above. Himerius feels himself, not his son, to be fate’s primary victim. “an . . . incidental victim”: pavrergon. For e[rgon meaning “victim,” see LSJ, s.v. IV 3. 30. Wernsdorff suggested that with the word “bath” Himerius is referring to his son’s future marriage, a ritual bath for bridegroom as well as for bride having being part of the preparations for a wedding (see, e.g., Oakley and Sinos, Wedding in Ancient Athens, 15). But the juxtaposition “a bath, a house, and riches” makes it easy to conjecture that Himerius instead means a private bath, which would have been an aristocratic amenity (Berger, Das Bad, 31–33; Y. Thébert in Veyne, History of Private Life, 1: 380). “Little did I know . . . preparing”: hjgnovoun de; a[ra . . . ajnistw¸ n. With Greco, AAP 42 (1993): 315, I prefer codex R’s ajnistw¸ n to Photius’s ajnistavˇ, which Colonna adopted. R’s reading makes better sense temporally.

26

Himerius’s Son, Rufinus

as you spoke your first words. You made the whole world hang on you with your still unintelligible whimperings. Pericles was the love of elite ears from all over the world, but he became a public speaker only after studying under Anaxagoras; you, on the other hand, were a public speaker right in your swaddling clothes. Alcibiades won over his whole audience with his [physical] beauty, but he was already at the peak of young manhood and in his teens; you had this effect on people when you were still at the breast, taking your mother’s milk.31 Oh calamity worthy of Aeschylus’s grandiloquence! What shall I lament? What shall I praise? I shall say what those who were familiar with you know and what those who hear about you suppose. [5] O you who once were the adornment of the Graces but now that of the Erinyes! Alas, on account of you I have acquired epithets quite opposite to the ones I had: I was once called thrice-happy because of you, but now I am called thrice-wretched. For what land did you not traverse in reputation? What place did you not fill with your fame and your young qualities? Heracles needed to do much traveling and to endure the Twelve Labors, I suppose, in order to get the whole earth to witness his virtue; but you, with your wonders, have gone beyond the Pillars of Heracles for us [in reputation] without even leaving your circle of acquaintances.32 How you have ensnared everyone with your charms! [6] Fathers exalt other children, I think, by commonly and often making up things about them. But in your case the normal situation was reversed: your father was silent or said little about your fine qualities, being apprehensive of fortune’s spite because of the greatness of your virtue. It was everyone else who told your father about your fine qualities! Thus by your wondrous nature you enslaved people of every station and of every age all by yourself. 31. For the beneficial effects of Anaxagoras’s teachings on Pericles’ eloquence, cf. Pl. Phaedr. 269e–70a; Cic. De orat. 3.34 [138]; Plut. Per. 5.1–2, 8.1–2; Them. Orat. 26.329c. Alcibiades: For his physical beauty, see Pl. Protag. 309a– c; Corn. Nep. Alcib. 1.2; Plut. Alcib. 1.4–5, 4.1. 32. Aeschylus’s grandiloquence (megalofwnivaˇ): cf. Basil Ep. 74.2 Courtonne. Erinyes: In the context of this oration the Erinyes may be thought of as goddesses of fate and of death (or of the fate of death) as well as of vengeance; see Roscher, “Erinys,” Ausführl. Lex. 1, 1 (1884–1890): 1327–28; Dietrich, Death, Fate, and the Gods, 91–156. “your young qualities”: tw¸ n nevwn kalw¸ n. I accept Greco’s restoration of codex R’s nevwn over Castiglioni’s conjecture sw¸ n (Greco, AAP 42 [1993]: 316), despite the occurrence of the phrase ta; sa; kalav elsewhere in the oration (sections 6, 14, 21). “beyond the Pillars of Heracles”: i.e., beyond the Straits of Gibraltar or the most southerly coast of Spain west of the straits, depending upon where one located the Pillars. Whatever one understood them to be, they marked the most westerly limit of Heracles’ activities. See Pind. Nem. 3.19–25; Strabo 3.5.5–6 [169–72]; Diod. Sic. 4.18.4–5; Plin. HN 3.1 [4].

Himerius’s Son, Rufinus

27

[7] What [evil] spirit cut off my hearth’s golden lock of hair? What spirit extinguished that most bright fire of my glory? What grave’s dust covers that sacred hair that you began to grow for Dionysus shortly after you were born? What dust covers those eyes that in their beauty almost put the sun’s rays to shame?33 What Erinys carried off the blush of your cheeks and the soft and sweet smile of your face? Alas, Dionysus, how did you put up with the seizure of this young man, consecrated [to you], from your precinct? The Erinyes have erected this trophy both against you and against my hearth. [8] What a gloomy Bacchic festival! Oh, how Cithaeron has been outdone by the misfortunes that I have suffered! Alas, Demeter and Kore, you did not take care of your hearth-initiate. He is being initiated all right, but in an underground precinct, and, I think, with some gloomy and bitter spirit instead of a father as celebrant of the rites. He beholds, not the fire of the daduchs, but the torches of the Erinyes and the Poenae.34 Why did I not pass away first? Why did I, the father, not precede my son in death? Why was I not preparing a place beneath the earth where he could lie, since the envy of the Erinyes deprived him of a bed in this upper world on which he would have lain with a wife?35 For what mourning have I been kept alive! I have dared to speak on every subject, avoiding only laments. I was unaware, of course, that I was being kept alive to lament my own misfortune. 33. “lock of hair”: i.e., adornment. Cf. Ael. Aristid. Orat. 18.9 Keil; Liban. Orat. 61.12; Him. Orat. 31.11. “to grow for Dionysus”: It was a common custom to consecrate one’s hair to and grow it for a god. The unshorn hair would have been cut and offered to the god at puberty or earlier (note Anth. gr. 6.155). See Sommer, Das Haar, esp. 18–34; Rouse, Greek Votive Offerings, 240–45. 34. For Cithaeron as a tragic site, see Him. Orat. 66.6, with my note. Demeter and Kore were the goddesses of the Eleusinian mysteries. “your hearth-initiate”: to;n ajf j eJstivaˇ, i.e., to;n pai¸ da ajf j eJstivaˇ muhqevnta. For this position and its “quasi-sacerdotal functions,” see Clinton, Sacred Officials, 98–114. “instead of a father”: Himerius is alluding to the dedication of a child to Dionysus by his father, such dedicants being called patromuvstai (Merkelbach, Die Hirten, 88–89). “daduchs”: The title of these Eleusinian officials means “torch-bearers.” The punishing Poenae were commonly associated, when not identified, with the Erinyes. See Kruse, “Poine 1,” RE 21, 1 (1951): 1211–13; cf. Him. Orat. 4.24. 35. “A place beneath the earth where he could lie” is to;n kavtw qavlamon, and “a bed in this upper world . . . with a wife” is ta;ˇ a[nw pastavdaˇ. There is play in the word thalamos, which can refer both to the grave and to the bride-chamber. Lurking here too is the idea of the death of an unmarried young person as an ersatz marriage. An unmarried girl could be thought of as “taken” by Hades. A young male, “not having looked upon a bridal bed (nuvmfeia levch)” in life, “descended to the inescapable thalamos of Persephone” (Anth. gr. 7.507b; cf. 7.508). See, e.g., Alexiou and Dronke, StudMed 12, 2 (1971): 819–51 passim; Seaford, JHS 107 (1987): 106–7 and passim; Rehm, Marriage to Death, index s.v. “Hades (as ersatz bridegroom).” Menander Rhetor recommends that, in a monody for a prematurely deceased young man, reference should be made to the marriage he never experienced (2.16 [435.4–5, 436.13]).

28

Himerius’s Son, Rufinus

[9] I am wrapping you in words, my child, since I have been prevented from wrapping you in a shroud. I am building you a sepulchral mound with words, since my absence kept me from heaping up the one over your corpse. And what words I am uttering about you now after the equally noteworthy ones of an earlier occasion! For your burial follows my plea for you before the Areopagus [i.e., Orat. 7], your death follows my obtaining free status for you. Because of you, it seems, the spirits who are neighbors of that court [the Areopagus] remembered their ancient names, being unable to bring any charge or accusation against you.36 [10] For who loved his father as much as you did? Who was more just in his relations with his kin and parents? I and your mother, ill-starred parents that we are, used to compete with one another in our love for you. But you would put an end to that competition, approaching each of us in such a way that we both thought we were winners of the prize. Oh how the words you spoke flowed with honey! What a voice you had, sweeter than the nectar that is praised and celebrated among the gods! [11] Long ago you were giving thought to your departure from this world, long ago you were making clear to those capable of reading the signs that you were too good for life here on earth. For what old man was as attached to the worship of the gods as you were? What seer or priest would run to sacred precincts and altars with such divine inspiration? What sacred pipe sounded hymns more sweetly than your tongue did? What lyra, what kithara played paeans to the gods that were more melodious than what came out of your mouth?37 [12] O you who earlier exceeded the limits of your age in your possession of the virtues and have now done so in your dying! O you who in your love of your sister deserve more praise than the Dioscuri! For they waged war on Helen’s behalf but could not prevent her from being carried off; you, though, were a phalanx for your full sister, stronger than any wall.38

36. The “spirits” are the Erinyes, who had a sanctuary near the Areopagus (Paus. 1.28.5–6). The ancient name alluded to here is the Eumenides (E. Wüst, “Erinys,” RE Suppl. 8 [1956]: 88). This name ascribes eujmevneia, “goodwill,” to them, a quality not consonant with the bringing of accusations. 37. For the philosophical “giving thought” (ejmelevtaˇ) to death, cf. Pl. Phaedo 67e. Lyra (i.e., chelys-lyra) and kithara are two different types of stringed instrument, but lyra can also be used generically: Maas and Snyder, Stringed Instruments, chaps. 3 and 4, and note pp. 79–80. 38. The Dioscuri (Castor and Polydeuces) waged war to recover their sister Helen, which they did, but they had been unable to prevent her original capture by Theseus: see

Himerius’s Son, Rufinus

29

Who, even among the very solemn, was more naturally made for selfcontrol than you? You kept away from what was harmful on your own, often not even waiting for someone to tell you to keep away. Once you knew that something could lead to harm or disease, you would never have touched it, not even with the tips of your fingers, not even if you were drawn to it by thoughts of thousands upon thousands of happy outcomes. And if you did ever come into contact with something harmful in ignorance, it was enough to tell you so, and you would immediately heed the warning. [13] How could one marvel [enough] at your courage? Severe attacks of disease get the better of people who are otherwise invincible. But you, relying only on your soul’s fortitude, always stood firm against all the diseases that attacked you—and they were serious. Perhaps it was for this very reason that that evil and savage spirit, having striven to defeat you and worsted by you so many times, in the end used a treacherous and deceitful contrivance to knock you down.39 Even so, you did not yield to the spirit until the very last, as one can learn [from those who witnessed your death]. You succumbed in body, but not in mind. He kept trying to strangle and overpower you, while you, with a noose around your neck, continued to call out the name of your dear nurse Athena, until he isolated you from all your allies and thus was able to tighten the noose. For he knew that, when your father was present and fighting by your side, he had often gone away defeated. [14] How much time will be needed to end my attachment to your fine qualities? What mix of Egyptian drugs will detach me from them?40 How can I look upon the plain of Athena now that you are gone? What

Isoc. 10.18–19; Diod Sic. 4.63; Plut. Thes. 31–33; Apollod. Bibl. 3.10.7. Himerius specifies that Rufinus had a full sister (th¸ ˇ aujtadevlfou) surely because he adheres here to a view that would deny at least one of the Dioscuri a full sibling relationship with Helen. He is probably assuming here that all three siblings had Leda as their natural mother, but that Zeus fathered Helen and Polydeuces, whereas Tyndareus fathered Castor; this, despite the fact that at Orat. 47.11 Himerius calls Castor the son of Zeus. (Note that in Hymn. Hom. 33 the brothers are “sons of Zeus” and “Tyndaridae” at one and the same time; cf. Theoc. 22.135–37.) Another version has Helen raised by Leda but the natural offspring of Zeus and Nemesis. Yet another version makes Helen the daughter of Ocean and Tethys. See Bethe, “Dioskuren,” RE 5 (1905): 1112–13; id., “Helene 3,” RE 7, 2 (1912): 2826–28. For Himerius, then, Rufinus outdoes the Dioscuri both as a defender of his sister and in the fullness of his relationship to her. “a phalanx”: Greco (AAP 42 [1993]: 318) restores codex R’s “phalanx” in place of Photius’s fuvlax (guardian), the reading adopted in Colonna’s edition. Photius’s reading is a trivialization of the hyperbolic metaphor. 39. “a treacherous and deceitful contrivance”: Himerius seems to be saying that the fatal nature of Rufinus’s final disease was not apparent to anyone. 40. For Egyptian drugs that palliate sorrow, see Hom. Od. 4.219ff.

30

Himerius’s Son, Rufinus

place in the countryside or in the city shall I look upon without immediately being filled with lamentation, tears, and all manner of wailing? If I go to the council-chamber, I shall think that I see you on the speaker’s platform trying to win over the members of the council. If I go before an audience, it will remind me of my gloomy tragedy, for it was before audiences that everyone often praised you en masse. [15] Even the best of the Athenians all let the acclamations go to you alone. It was you alone who caused all alike to rejoice when you outdid them, some because of the goodwill engendered by their love [of you], others perhaps out of fear of what might happen [to you] in the future. The former you won over, the latter you unsettled—no, you carried off the victory prize in every contest in a spirit of goodwill and love. How can I look upon the Areopagus? When you were not yet three years old, you astonished everyone there with your seriousness, like someone who had already been learning the ancient stories about that court for some time. You outdid your father there by maintaining a silence that was more remarkable than his eloquence. You were more reserved and imperturbable than the members of the court. On that occasion one could see the always pensive council smiling for the first time. You touched their souls, and they fell in love with you. Not even gods pleading their cases before those judges had managed to touch their souls in this way.41 [16] How shall I be affected when I look out at audiences who have gathered to hear [my] oratorical displays? It was you who used to convene such gatherings at our home for me, although in your character you gave me something sweeter than all the voices of the world. In the future, the places that I formerly loved the most will be hostile to me; all the places I previously preferred I shall regard as unfriendly. The beautiful grove that I planted for your wedding has become your grave.42 [17] Where will you embrace me if I come [back to Athens]? In our house? But you deserted that house, having left it behind as a reminder 41. “you astonished”: Colonna’s ejxevplhxa must be a typographical error for ejxevplhxaˇ. “seriousness . . . silence . . . reserved”: These were proverbial qualities of Areopagites; see CPG 1.181, 2.146; Wallace, Areopagos Council, 110–11. “Not even gods” etc.: For what Himerius is referring to here—one of the “ancient stories” mentioned above in this paragraph—see his Orat. 7.1, with my note. 42. “all the voices of the world”: the voices of auditors, which had expressed approval of Himerius’s oratory. “The . . . grove that I planted”: Wernsdorff suggested that this grove would have provided the ceremonial branches and torches used in a wedding; see Oakley and Sinos, Wedding in Ancient Athens, index s.vv. “branches (sprigs),” “torches.”

Himerius’s Son, Rufinus

31

of my gloomy tragedy alone. Well, will you embrace me in those sacred groves, thick with trees? I shall find you there, but I shall find you offering me streams of tears instead of kisses. O sweetest child, how you paraded [in death], as they tell it, from the city to a place that was once pleasant but is now more tragic than Cithaeron!43 Not the way you once paraded with your father, sometimes on horseback, sometimes in a carriage. O you who often said things more marvelous than what men have written in serious memoirs! What day went by, what journey or place was there, in which one did not hear your pleasant voice or a well-aimed remark from you? [18] By your death you have barred me from the gates of the city. For how will my eyes be affected if I pass through them? You have barred me from Eleusis. For how shall I, who bring a charge against the goddesses of that place [Demeter and Kore], enter their sacred precinct? How shall I put my trust in a Dionysus who has failed to protect for me my son, who was consecrated [to him]? How shall I sacrifice to Athena, who did not shake her Gorgon [aegis] at that [evil] spirit in defense of you, my child? How shall I pray to the god of our fathers, a father myself in grief over what happened to my son?44 How can I go before a Greek audience to make a lament for you the introduction to my rhetorical displays? How shall I tolerate my suffering when I look at your coevals? How, after setting my eyes on my young students, can I endure my woe? When I was away, you shepherded them for me, guiding all of them by kindnesses rather than words. [19] You were a guard to my years through the love people felt for you; for with you in mind people were ashamed to do any injury to me. They all respected your youth more than my old age. Oh you shameless words! Rufinus lies dead, but you keep pouring forth [from my mouth] with youthful insolence! Oh unfortunate tongue [of mine], previously the instrument of the Muses, but now that of a crude (ajmouvsou) spirit!45 Let this rhetorical display of mine be part of the painful dirge being sung for him. [20] O sweetest son, once much-desired, now lamented more than anyone else. In the past you were the support of my house, now you are its 43. Cithaeron: see section 8 above with my note 34. 44. At Athens, “the god of our fathers” or “our ancestral god” (patrw¸/oˇ) should almost certainly be Apollo, although conceivably Zeus; see Roscher, Ausführl. Lex. 3, 2 (1902–1909): 1714–17. In Orat. 48.33 Himerius does call Apollo at Athens patrw¸/oˇ (but see Dübner’s apparatus criticus). 45. I.e., the spirit or fate (daivmwn) that brought death to Rufinus.

32

Himerius’s Son, Rufinus

dark and gloomiest sorrow. You shone more quickly than the morning star, but you were also quickly extinguished. When the sun first saw you, you showed me a day brighter than all other days; and after I got that tragic and unfortunate news [of your death], you showed me one darker than all others. [21] What shall I say that is worthy of your qualities? What sort of mournful and tragic music shall I compose in order to bewail you as much as I wish? What hopes I had for you! To what bad luck my [evil] spirit has condemned me! I now lament the person who I hoped would speak more forcefully than Minucianus, more solemnly than Nicagoras, more eloquently than Plutarch, more philosophically than Musonius, more intrepidly than Sextus—in a word, more brilliantly and better than all of his ancestors.46 I myself yielded the prize to you when you were still a boy. I regarded your words as better than mine. I always preferred your inarticulate speech to my serious efforts. But the [evil] spirit has robbed me of all this and gone off, letting me have laments and tears instead of you. [22] Accept these libations, then, which I pour out for you by the banks of the Melas [Black] River. The experts would know if this river ever confirmed the appropriateness of its name on some other occasion by the character of its waters. But in the present circumstances it really did turn dark and black for me, more dismal than any a Cocytus or Acheron.47 It is just as if the [evil] spirit waylaid me so that everything would be worthy of the stage and the tragedy—the place, the time, the knowledge of my misfortune. The time was night, the place was the Melas River, the message was that Rufinus was dead. In the middle of this was your father, simultaneously lamenting and writing a speech, torn between my labors and my tears. [23] You, O child, have gone, of course, to the place to which the [evil] spirit led you. But, if possible, you will be immortal [here on earth] through your father’s efforts, even if you now surely observe everything from up there somewhere, frolicking with the gods-—playing with Eros, making merry with Hymenaeus, prophesying with Bacchus, being inspired with Trophonius. (It would not be likely, of course, that such a great soul went down somewhere into the netherworld instead of joining the company of gods.) I shall honor you with funeral competitions,

46. For these ancestors, see pp. 19–20 above. 47. For the Melas River, see p. 21 above. The Cocytus and the Acheron are rivers of the underworld.

Himerius’s Son, Rufinus

33

I shall hand down your name to time, and I shall be more ambitious than the [evil] spirit at least to this end: that, if that spirit has your body and heaven your soul, your repute may be a possession of all humankind.48 [cod. R, with passages also in Exc. Phot.] 48. Bacchus: According to Wernsdorff and Dübner, codex R has Bavkcou; according to Colonna, Bavgcou. Turcan has reexamined the manuscript and determined that it is Colonna who is misreporting its reading (MEFR 79 [1967]: 147–51). Dübner and Colonna both adopted Wernsdorff’s emendation “Branchus,” the mythological founder of Apollo’s oracle at Didyma, who had himself been given the gift of prophecy by Apollo (Conon Narrat. 33 [FGrH 26 F 1]; Lactant. Plac. on Stat. Theb. 8.198). But I am persuaded by Turcan to return to the (true) reading of codex R. Bacchus was, in fact, associated with prophecy (Turcan, 149–50), and Rufinus was consecrated to him (above, section 7). Trophonius: Trophonius was the god of an oracle at Boeotian Lebadea. “Being inspired” (qeoforouvmenoˇ) probably hints at prophetic activity (see Dio Chrys. 10 [11].56; Lucian Philops. 38); thus there are two varied references to love (with Eros and Hymenaeus) and two to prophecy (with Bacchus and Trophonius). “funeral competitions”: Perhaps Himerius means only that he will encourage people to compete in eulogizing his son. For actual funeral competitions in ancient Greece, see, e.g., Pritchett, Greek State, 4: 106–24.

chapter 2

In Praise of Cities and of Men

Apparently sometime after his arrival in Constantinople on December 11, 361, the emperor Julian summoned Himerius to his court. Himerius was not the only pagan man of learning so summoned; and if the philosopher Chrysanthius begged off, the philosophers Maximus and Priscus joined the emperor. Himerius himself decided to leave his school of rhetoric in Athens and to accept Julian’s invitation. Photius’s Himerian bibliography records the title of a lost oration “To the Emperor Julian, When He [Himerius] Was About to Depart” (Orat. 52 Colonna)—apparently delivered at Athens before Himerius left the city. He traveled north, making stops at Thessalonica and Philippi before reaching Constantinople. In each of these cities he delivered at least one public oration. These three surviving orations (39–41) are presented here along with a much earlier oration (62), delivered, like Oration 41, in Constantinople. In the interval between Oration 62 and Orations 39–41 Himerius’s hair had turned gray (62.7, 41.2).1 Himerius arrived in Constantinople some time during Julian’s stay there, from December 11, 361, until the middle of June 362.2 In Oration 41 Julian is not addressed in the second person and was not present 1. Date of Julian’s arrival in Constantinople: Amm. Marc. 22.2.4. Summons of Himerius: the opening scholia to Him. Orat. 39, 40, and 41; Eunap. Vitae phil. et soph. 14.1 [494] Giangrande. Chrysanthius, Maximus, and Priscus: see Penella, Greek Philosophers, 68–69, 119–20. 2. For Julian’s departure, see Bidez, La vie, 274; Bowersock, Julian, 83–85.

34

In Praise of Cities and of Men

35

when it was delivered: Himerius ends the oration by asserting that he must stop speaking and “set my eyes on the emperor” (dovte nu¸ n . . . basilevwˇ qevan poihvsasqai). That means that he was unable to set his eyes on him during the oration.3 When the scholiast in the opening note to Oration 41—an oration that includes praise of Julian—writes that Himerius “delivered his oration to the city and to the emperor” (ei[ˇ te th;n povlin kai; to;n basileva . . . dieivlektai), he is speaking loosely and does not have to be understood to imply Julian’s presence.4 Julian must have been somewhere else in Constantinople when Himerius delivered Oration 41. It is clear from the opening words of that oration that Julian was still in Constantinople when Himerius arrived there: “I have cleansed my soul through Mithra the Sun, and through the gods I have spent time with (suggenovmenoi) an emperor [Julian] who is a friend of the gods.”5 Having finished delivering the oration, Himerius wanted to “set [his] eyes” once again on the emperor, still present in the city—unless Julian had just recently left, and Himerius was about to follow and catch up with him. Himerius’s primary audience for Oration 41 was not the emperor (or a large number of Constantinopolitans), but his fellow Mithraic initiates.6 All four orations, being speeches of arrival (ejpibathvrioi lovgoi) of a

3. It has been suggested to me, though, that Julian actually might have been present during the oration, but sitting behind Himerius, who was looking out at the audience and therefore would not have been able to look at the emperor while addressing them. 4. Cf. the title of Oration 41 found in Phot. Bibl. cod. 165.108a: rJhqei;ˇ ejn Kwnstantinoupovlei eijˇ aujthvn te th;n povlin kai; jIouliano;n to;;n basileva kai; eijˇ th;n Miv qrou telethvn; one can see from the last prepositional phrase that eijˇ here means that the orator is speaking “to a topic,” actually to three topics, one of which is Julian. 5. The only way one could argue that Julian had already left Constantinople when Himerius arrived is to maintain that suggenovmenoi here means only “I have now become a [religious] comrade [i.e., a fellow Mithraic initiate]” of Julian; see LSJ, s.v. suggivgnomai II, 5. Greco, in fact, although without reference to the word suggenovmenoi, has Himerius leaving Athens in July of 362 or June–July of 362 or 363 (Orpheus 15 [1994]: 316, 319). The option 363 should be excluded, which is implicitly done by Greco in a later publication (in Criscuolo, Da Costantino a Teodosio, 153). (I assume that June or July means the end of the academic year [cf. Walden, Universities, 279], before which Himerius presumably would not have wanted to leave Athens. But he could have departed before the end of the term without disrupting his students’ studies by leaving them in the hands of one or more assistant teachers.) Cf. Criscuolo in Filologia, 198: “Imerio lasciò Athene dopo il luglio del 362” (my emphasis). Gärtner also implies that, when Himerius reached Constantinople, Julian was already gone (RAC 15 [1991]: 167: “Im J. 362 reiste er [Himerios] nach Antiocheia zu Kaiser Julian”). Cf. Schemmel, NJbb 22 (1908): 499: “Reiste [Himerius] auf Einladung des Kaisers Julian nach Antioch, traf ihn aber nicht mehr an.” 6. “But for our [fellow Mithraic] initiates let me propose an oration as a thank-offering since Apollo and the Sun [ = Mithra], I think, are one and the same, and words are children of Apollo” (41.1).

36

In Praise of Cities and of Men

sort, praise the cities in which they were delivered.7 That praise is generally predictable and unremarkable. Himerius lauds the virtue of Thessalonica (39.4–5) and the wisdom of both Thessalonica and Philippi (39.5, 40.2). The “whole of learning” (a{panteˇ lovgoi) is a friend to Constantinople (41.2). Himerius specifies that philosophy especially thrives there, and he notes the city’s complete attentiveness to it (41.12). He is thinking of Themistius, among others.8 In his earlier oration in Constantinople (62), he had remarked that “everything everywhere [there] is brimming with the Muses’ arts and has been adorned because of them” (62.7). Philippi is praised for its antiquity (ajrcaivan) and its good fortune (40.2).9 Moving now to more tangible urban features, we find Himerius highlighting Constantinople’s geography in Oration 41: he tells the city that it is “almost a complete continent that has given rise to a city . . . you are the beginning of Europe [cf. Him. Orat. 62.3] and also its end, and you have been allotted the same role in Asia.” The city’s position allows it to enjoy the Black Sea, the Bosporus, and the Aegean (41.4–5; cf. 62.3–4). Both Thessalonica and Constantinople can be proud of their size. But in both cases Himerius insists that the cities are beautiful as well as large. In Thessalonica Himerius singles out for their beauty “places of assembly (ajgoraiv ), . . . baths, colonnades . . . , and religious shrines”; in Constantinople, “gold . . . [the city’s] senate-house . . . , its baths . . . , its theaters” (39.6–7, 41.6–7). He had earlier told the Constantinopolitans that their city had a “heavenly beauty” that outdid Rome’s (62.2, 5). And in Oration 41 he also praises the city’s population: it is large and divine (41.11, 13). The Hellenism of the three cities, though, is of special importance. Himerius’s references to their virtue, wisdom, and learning, noted above, certainly imply Hellenism.10 Thessalonica displays virtue and wisdom, “even though it is surrounded by people who almost all speak foreign

7. For speeches of arrival, see Men. Rhet. 2.3 [378.2, 382.10ff.] Russell-Wilson. A lost speech, Orat. 72 Colonna, whose title is preserved in Photius’s Himerian bibliography (“To the city of the Lacedaemonians [i.e., Sparta], when [Himerius], in obedience to a dream, went to pray to the god [Apollo] at Amyclae”) was presumably also encomiastic. 8. See Them. Orat. 6.84a; Demegoria Constantii 21a. 9. For the compliment “ancient,” cf. Robert, Études anatoliennes, 303–4. 10. And there is nothing implicit about Him. Orat. 40.2: “Through the Athenians [Philippi] got wisdom.” Cf. Flinterman, noting, in his discussion of Apollonius of Tyana as an advocate of Hellenism, the ethical nature of Greek identity in Apollonius’s letters and “the unproblematical identification of wisdom with Greekness” in Philostratus’s Life of Apollonius (Power, Paideia, and Pythagoreanism, 97–98).

In Praise of Cities and of Men

37

languages”—Paeonians, Illyrians, Moesians, and Thracians. Here the contrast between virtue and wisdom, on the one hand, and foreign languages, on the other, is tantamount to that between Hellenism and barbarism; and Himerius goes on to say explicitly that Thessalonica “maintains the Greek language like a golden center point and keeps it free of contamination by any neighboring tongue” (39.5). In another explicit mention of Thessalonica’s Hellenism, Himerius can say that “everything about this city is Greek—its language, its walls, its dress” (39.6). Coming right after this assertion, the reference in 39.7 to the city’s agorai, baths, colonnades, and religious shrines gives proof of its Hellenism as well as its beauty. It enjoys not merely good fortune, but a Greek fortune (39.8). In Philippi, Himerius tells his audience that their city once received an influx of Attic colonizers; it was through them that the Philippians got their wisdom and the Attic dialect. This was “the work of Callistratus,” the Athenian politician who, in exile, persuaded the Thasians to found the colony of Crenides on the mainland in 360/59 b.c. Philip II of Macedon took it in 356, renaming it Philippi. Callistratus’s founding, however, included no influx of Attic colonizers. Nonetheless, Himerius saw himself at Philippi as a “nightingale with her Attic odes, . . . remind[ing] those who speak Attic Greek of Athens” (40.2–3). That he actually heard much pure Attic Greek spoken there may be doubted.11 He also told the Constantinopolitans in 362 that Athens was their mothercity (41.2–3). That claim is found in Ammianus Marcellinus as well, unelaborated in both texts (Amm. Marc. 22.8.8: “Constantinopolis, vetus Byzantium, Atticorum colonia”). In his earlier oration (62.2), Himerius had applied the phrase “the support of Greece,” which Pindar (frag. 76 Snell) had used of Athens, to Constantinople. Using a common panegyrical technique in Oration 41, Himerius makes Constantinople outdo the city with which it is flatteringly linked: comparing the emperor Julian, a native of Constantinople, to Cecrops, the first offspring of Athens, Himerius exclaims, “O city that brought into the light a child who was even better than one whom your mother-city itself brought forth!” (41.3). Again, as Himerius explains (41.11), the earth-bound condition of the inhabitants of Byzantium/Constantinople, derived from their purported Athenian colonizers, whose mythical founder Cecrops was earth-born, was improved by the entrance of Julian’s family, or more generally of

11. On all of this, see my note on Orat. 40.2.

38

In Praise of Cities and of Men

Constantius Chlorus’s descendants, into Constantinople’s life, for they made the city “a reflection of some heavenly world.” Whenever he could, Himerius preferred to be an enthusiast of cultural Atticism rather than of a more generic Hellenism. He says in Oration 41 that, after having studied rhetoric at Athens and left the city, he felt himself bound to “sow the rest of the earth with the seeds of learning” he got there (41.2). Himerius saw himself as a latter-day Triptolemus; that mythological figure had scattered literal seed throughout the earth from his flying chariot upon leaving Attica.12 Himerius must have been thoroughly smitten with the prestige of the Harvard or “Oxbridge” of his day. It was precisely that academic idolizing of Athens that Themistius, who had no ties to Athens, combated in his Oration 27, “On the Need to Give Thought, Not to Where [We Study], but to the Men [Who Will Teach Us],” in which he exclaimed, “Do you think that the city where eloquence first made its appearance [i.e., Athens] is the only fitting place to be educated?” (336c– d)13 Himerius may have found it hard to answer no. In any case, his Hellenism seems to narrow readily to Atticism. In the four orations under consideration, Himerius praises individuals as well as cities. Indeed, in Oration 41 he speaks of the laudation of Constantinople as “a prelude to the hymns of praise to be offered to [the emperor]” (41.2). Let us look now at the individuals praised in, and at some problems connected with this aspect of, the four orations. We begin with the earliest, Oration 62. In that oration, Himerius told the Constantinopolitans that the Muses were especially pleased that “a man who takes his name from them and has rejoiced in their rites is governing the city” (62.6). This governor is described as the “creature of the Muses,” but he is also compared to their leader Apollo. He is encouraging cultural achievements in Constantinople and is responsible for Himerius’s visit to the city at a time when the latter could still describe his eloquence as “youthful” (62.7). The man’s name must have been either Musonius or Musonianus. He held the proconsulship of Constantinople, an office that became defunct late in 359. If his name was Musonius, there are two obvious candidates, the proconsul of Achaia or the vicar of Macedonia (see below). But scholarly opinion has favored Strategius Musonianus, who held the Constantinopolitan proconsulship be-

12. See my note on Orat. 41.2. 13. Not actually a question in the Greek text, but I follow my own syntactical remake in Private Orations, 170.

In Praise of Cities and of Men

39

fore 353.14 The title of Oration 62 given both by codex R and in Photius’s Himerian bibliography says that Himerius published it (ejxevdwken) for eJtaivrw/ Kwnstantinoupolivth/. Does eJtaivrw/ mean “a friend” or “a student”? Heinrich Schenkl understood it to mean “a friend,” specifically Musonianus himself.15 Perhaps, instead, Himerius saw to the oration’s proper publication at the prompting of a “Constantinopolitan student” of his in Athens, who would have had a special interest in his teacher’s earlier ties with the city on the Bosporus. Next, Oration 39. Here is its opening scholion: [Himerius] delivered this [discourse] in Thessalonica when, upon the summons of the emperor Julian, he was hastening to the East. He was officially invited by the city and [two] dignitaries, the vicar [of the diocese of Macedonia] and former sophist Musonius, and the consularis [of the province of Macedonia] Calliopius. He addressed the end of the oration to the Musonius who had been proconsul of Greece [Achaia] and was present on the occasion.

The vicar Musonius is addressed in the second person in the course of Oration 39 and was surely present in the audience (39.8–10). Some words are devoted to the second Musonius, the former proconsul of Greece, toward the end of the oration (39.14–15), as the opening scholion notes; although this Musonius is not addressed in the second person, the scholion tells us that he was present, too. In line with a common, if annoying, sophistic habit, neither Musonius is explicitly named by Himerius. The second Musonius is introduced as follows, after an allusion to the Homeric Alcinous: “Yet how much more worthy of respect than Homer’s Alcinous is your own—I mean to;n oJmwvnumon [the man with the same name, the homonymous fellow].” The opening scholion allows us to see that Himerius means “with the same name as your vicar Musonius,” not “with the same name as Alcinous.”16 Perhaps the two Musonii were sitting together in Himerius’s audience, and Himerius gestured to the second one as he called him to;n oJmwvnumon. What about Calliopius, consularis or governor of the province of Macedonia, which is part of the 14. Seeck, Die Briefe, 282; Keil, Hermes 42 (1907): 552n; Schenkl, RE 8, 2 (1913): 1623; Seeck, “Strategius 1,” RE 4A, 1 (1931): 182; K. von Fritz, “Musonius 18,” RE 16, 1 (1933): 899; PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Strategius Musonianus”; Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 220; Greco, Orpheus 15 (1994): 311; Schamp, DPA 3 (2000): 727. 15. RE 8, 2 (1913): 1623. 16. Wernsdorff (ad loc.) believes that Himerius is calling Musonius a second Alcinous; he “translates” to;n oJmwvnumon as “virum Alcinoo dignitate similem.” Dübner (ad loc.) calls Wernsdorff’s interpretation “incredibilis” but prints his translation of to;n oJmwvnumon nonetheless. But he suggests to;n oJmwvnumon.

40

In Praise of Cities and of Men

vicariate of the same name? After comparing the vicar Musonius to Alcibiades, Himerius says, “But since Alcibiades . . . [has] been mentioned, come let us also honor Nicias by our words—Nicias, who was Alcibiades’ colleague “ (39.12). Himerius then goes on to tell how well Alcibiades and Nicias cooperated with one another. Surely “Nicias” is Calliopius, who was doubtless also in the audience. I suspect that he was sitting or standing close to the vicar Musonius and that, once again, Himerius gestured to him as he made the initial reference to Nicias quoted above. Cooperation would have been a desirable quality between vicars and the governors in their vicariate. One would expect the vicar Musonius and Calliopius to have been present to hear Himerius: they were in local office and (according to the scholion) had both invited Himerius to speak. Hence the scholion bothers to comment explicitly only on the presence of the ex-proconsul Musonius.17 The vicar Musonius received high praise at Thessalonica (39.8–11): “An Attic Muse shepherds the city,” Himerius proclaims. “The sophist’s chair has embellished the vicar’s chair.” The point is that Musonius taught rhetoric at Athens before entering the Roman civil service.18 In making Musonius the Macedonian vicar, the emperor “has taken the single most beautiful possession he has and has given it as a gift to this victorious city,” thereby demonstrating “how the Greeks, who once conquered everyone with their weapons, now do so with the virtues of their men in office.” In lauding Musonius, Himerius is also insisting on the importance of a rhetorical formation for those in office. But he must make the additional point that Musonius is not all words and no action; this he does through a comparison of Musonius to Achilles, Pericles, Themistocles, and Alcibiades. All these Greeks of old, like Musonius, combined “deeds and actions with . . . words.” The comparison to Achilles, Pericles, and Themistocles is very briefly made. A much lengthier picture of Alcibiades is drawn, as military victor as well as skilled speaker. The praise of “Nicias”—that is, of the governor Calliopius—that immediately follows (39.12–13) focuses on the latter’s ability to work cooperatively with Musonius or, more generally, on the ability of each to cooperate with the other. Once again, Himerius’s remarks on the relationship of Alcibiades and Nicias, which is a type of that of Musonius

17. For the two Musonii and Calliopius, see PLRE, vol. 1, s.vv. “Musonius 1,” “Musonius 2,” “Calliopius 2”; Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 214, 216. 18. PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Musonius 2” and my comments in Greek Philosophers, 129, 138–39.

In Praise of Cities and of Men

41

and Calliopius, is drawn out, this time even more so than his remarks on Alcibiades’ mix of deeds and words. This fleshing out of the pictures of Alcibiades and Nicias, combined with the passing references to Pericles and Themistocles, may be a product of Himerius’s Athenian preoccupations, as is his insistence that in Musonius Thessalonica has a specifically Attic Muse. The Himerian Alcibiades and Nicias are faultless, and their cooperative relationship is idealized: “They were rivals of one another, when doing so was to the benefit of the city”; they worked together “just as when waters that emerge from a single source split into two rivers in the course of their flow but are connected with one another by the beauty of their nature.” Although the two men in fact were generals together and could collaborate to avoid ostracism, Thucydides and Plutarch stress their rivalry and differences.19 But the panegyrist’s needs and purposes are different from those of the historian or biographer. Finally, Himerius offers some words of praise to the ex-proconsul Musonius at the end of Oration 39 (14–15). Musonius is more worthy of respect than Homer’s Alcinous, friendly, and ready to meet whatever fortune brings. He is “a man who has honestly guided the rudders of the Greeks [i.e., served as proconsul of Achaia] in the company of a sweet Siren; for persuasiveness always sits upon his lips.” Here, then, is another example of an ideally formed official, who combines eloquence with action. We also have here another reference to the Athenian model Pericles, for with his comment on Musonius’s persuasiveness Himerius is echoing a well-known remark of Eupolis’s (frag. 94.5 Kock) about the fifth-century statesman. We move on now to Oration 40, beginning again with the opening scholion: [Himerius] delivered this [discourse] extempore in Philippi when, having been summoned by the emperor Julian, he went off to the court. The first part of the speech [is aimed] at the city, the last part at [Himerius’s] pupil Severus, who arranged for the oratorical display to be given.

The Severus who is here called Himerius’s pupil (eJtai¸ron) is apparently the same person as the “newly arrived” (nevhlun) Severus to whom Oration 21 was addressed when he first entered Himerius’s school. Oration 9 is the epithalamium that Himerius wrote for him. He was young at the time of his marriage: “Very recently he was a reveler in the camp of the 19. On Alcibiades and Nicias, see nn. 50 and 51 below.

42

In Praise of Cities and of Men

Muses [i.e., in Himerius’s school],” Himerius says, “then he suddenly leaped away from my precincts and took his merrymaking to Aphrodite” (9.5). Oration 24 shows that Severus went on to have a successful career in imperial administration.20 His wife’s fatherland, according to Oration 9, was “a Thracian city (povliˇ . . . Qra/kw¸ n) named after King Philip. . . . Her family . . . traced their most distant roots back to kingly stock” (9.13; cf. 17). Himerius goes on in the quoted passage to allude to members of her family who were still preeminent among the Thracians. Severus’s wife’s city has plausibly been identified as Philippopolis.21 But it may have been Philippi instead.22 Using “Thrace” in a loose geographical sense, Himerius could have thought of the area west of the Nestos River, where Philippi was located, as Thracian rather than Macedonian.23 If Severus’s wife was from Philippi rather than from Philippopolis, an inevitable conjecture follows: Severus arranged Himerius’s speaking engagement at Philippi, as the opening scholion to Oration 40 tells that he did, with the assistance of his wife’s prominent family there. The opening scholion to Oration 40 says that “the first part of the speech [is aimed] at the city, the last part at [Himerius’s] pupil Severus.” Himerius does indeed begin with the city, praising it and delighting in its friendship, which he says he is repaying by his display of eloquence. Not a word in the oration, however, appears to be spoken about or directed at Severus. Gottlieb Wernsdorff could not accept this anomaly. He contended that there is a hidden address of Severus in the oration.24 In telling the Philippians that he is paying them back for their friendship by a display of his eloquence, Himerius explains that he is following an ancient law “that one should pay back those who have initiated a friendship from the resources one has” (40.3). Then he gives examples: the husbandman pays back with grain, the grape-presser with grapes, the hunter 20. Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 212–13. 21. Seeck, Die Briefe, 276; PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Severus 6”; Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 212–13. 22. Both Wernsdorff and Dübner (in his critical apparatus) on Orat. 9.13 assumed that the city was Philippi, without even considering Philippopolis. Völker (on Orat. 9.13) considers both Philippopolis and Philippi and opts for Philippopolis. 23. See Casson, Macedonia, Thrace, and Illyria, 37–42; E. Oberhummer, “Thrake 3,” RE 6A, 1 (1936): 395–96. Note Amm. Marc. 17.5.5, referring to a phase of history when the Strymon River, west of Philippi, was the boundary between Macedonia and Thrace. Philip had originally fortified Crenides/Philippi against the Thracians (App. Bell. civ. 4.105; Theophrast. De causis plant. 5.14.6). In Orat. 39.5, Himerius says that “Thrace borders so closely on this city of yours [Thessalonica] that it touches its suburbs.” Thessalonica is southwest of Philippi. 24. In his opening remark on Orat. 40: “tecta allocutione Severi . . . quem imagine Hermiae adumbrat.” More on Hermias below.

In Praise of Cities and of Men

43

with his bag, birds and cicadas with their songs; then—returning to his own resources—Odysseus at Ogygia and Phaeacia and Gorgias of Leontini at Plataea and Athens with their eloquence. Now, one final example in sections 6–7 of the oration: Aristotle showed his love for his pupil Hermias of Atarneus by verbally saluting the city of Atarneus and Hermias himself when, on one occasion, he was passing by the city. Himerius fleshes out this last example, noting Hermias’s virtue and thorough training in eloquence. Wernsdorff wants us to see in Atarneus and Hermias a hidden reference to Philippi and Severus, one that the Philippians and Severus, present at Himerius’s oration, would presumably have readily appreciated. Wernsdorff may be right,25 but one still might have expected Himerius to have addressed Severus explicitly, or (if he was not present) at least to have referred to him, before the oration ended. We should therefore consider the possibility that a part of this oration that was explicitly aimed at Severus has been edited out in the course of transmission— in other words, that we have only a portion of Oration 40. It is, after all, only 58 lines long in its present form. I can declaim it in Greek at an unhurried pace in less than ten minutes. If I am right, then in the lost portion of Oration 40 Himerius will have continued the praise that (if Wernsdorff is correct) he obliquely gives to Severus in his remarks on Hermias, praise given in part in gratitude for Severus’s having arranged for Himerius’s oration at Philippi. But another explanation may be offered for the brevity of Oration 40. Its opening scholion refers to it in the feminine (tauvthn dieivlektai [ JImevrioˇ]). That should imply either dialexis or lalia; and, in fact, Photius’s Himerian bibliography does refer to the oration as a dialexis. It may have been a preliminary dialexis (or, to use another term, a prolalia),26 introducing the main oration, which perhaps was on an imaginary theme (see chapter 6). This would then explain Oration 40’s brevity. The interesting occasional piece was more likely to be preserved than one more melet; on an imaginary topic. Of course, having suggested that Oration 40 is a preliminary dialexis, I should do the same for Oration 62 (69 lines) and perhaps also for the longer Oration 39 (131 lines); like Oration 40, both are referred to in their opening scholia in the feminine singular (tauvthn). 25. The situation here would be somewhat different from the one I laid out for Oration 39. There the vicar Musonius is addressed and explicitly compared to Alcibiades; thus the audience was made ready, when Himerius introduced Alcibiades’ colleague Nicias, to see in him a type of Musonius’s colleague Calliopius. In Oration 40, on Wernsdorff’s explication, the audience would have to have appreciated the hidden reference without a cue. 26. See pp. 9–10 above.

44

In Praise of Cities and of Men

On the other hand, I do not believe that there was anything preliminary about Oration 41, which seems to have been the centerpiece oration on the occasion of the Mithraic initiation of Himerius and others. Interestingly, its opening scholion refers to it by the unspecific term ejpivdeixiˇ. Photius, in his Himerian bibliography, thinks of it simply as a lovgoˇ, for he refers to it in the masculine singular ( rJhqeivˇ).27 When Himerius finally reached Constantinople, he offered praise to the emperor Julian, in Oration 41. The description of this speech, in its opening scholion, as an “oration to the city and to the emperor” is confirmed in the text itself, in which Himerius says that he is delivering “an oration for the emperor and the city” and refers to the praise of the city as “a prelude to the hymns of praise to be offered to [Julian]” (41.1–2). Himerius here praises Julian for his fortune and his virtue (41.2, 3, 8). The emperor is lauded in some detail for his various benefactions to Constantinople: for the buildings he has erected there, his restoration of pagan worship, his introduction of foreign rites into the city— Himerius is thinking here of the Mithraic mysteries28—and for his enhancement of Constantinople’s reputation and the protection he affords it (41.8–10). Most interesting, though, is the suggestion in section 9 that Julian should be extolled as a kind of founder or transformative hero of Constantinople. According to Himerius, Julian is to Constantinople as Romulus is to Rome, Theseus to Athens, Danaus to Argos,29 Lycurgus to Sparta, and Brasidas to Amphipolis. On Theseus, Himerius remarks that “if anyone should ask the Athenians why they are so much more high-spirited than other people, they begin with Theseus and trace their long line of successes from him.” Lycurgus, Himerius says, “was the beginning of Sparta, for before his time people almost refused to live there.” The Lacedaemonian Brasidas captured Amphipolis during the Peloponnesian War. The city had been settled by the Athenian Hagnon, but the Amphipolitans came to regard Brasidas as their founder, Hagnon having suffered a damnatio memoriae (Thuc. 4.102, 5.8–11). Himerius explains that the Amphipolitans “reassign[ed] their city from Hagnon to Brasidas.” There is just a hint here that the Constantinopolitans might

27. Mras’s misunderstanding of Orat. 41’s opening scholion led him to call the oration a prolalia (WS 64 [1949]: 77–78). 28. See, in addition to the opening scholion quoted above, Liban. Orat. 18.127, where I would understand tw¸/ th;n hJmevran a[gonti qew¸/ to be Mithra ( = the Sun). 29. Danaus’s name is conjecturally restored in Himerius’s text. For Danaus as Argos’s Egyptian founder, see Paus. 2.16.1, 19.3–4; Apollod. Bibl. 2.1.4; cf. Him. Orat. 6.3, where “founders” is apparently meant to include Danaus’s daughters.

In Praise of Cities and of Men

45

want to reassign their city from Constantine to Julian. “Julian as Constantinople’s founder” joins “Athens as Constantinople’s mother-city” (41.3) as fitting propaganda for the reign of the Hellenic apostate.30 Oration 41 does not end before offering praise to a second person, the urban prefect of Constantinople (41.14–15). Actually, the prefect is praised outright only for his eloquence; Himerius otherwise offers him a series of seven exhortations: “Let him be gentle. . . . Let him be mild in his words but quick in his actions. . . . Let him build up the city. . . . ,” and so on. Then, after the exhortations, comes this statement: “It is reasonable to expect that he will be properly motivated if he is of noble birth, has been raised with a proper education and exposure to good literature, has plenty of royal standards to guide him, has so great an emperor as a witness to virtue, and receives the honor of office as a reward for his justice and not for a payment of gold.” Himerius, I think, is saying that the prefect does have the qualities enumerated in the if-clause but has not been in office long enough yet to have displayed them in action. Hence, too, the series of exhortations: the prefect is at the beginning of office and has not yet built up a record of achievements that Himerius can praise. The first urban prefect of Constantinople, Honoratus, was appointed in December (or September) of 359. After reaching Antioch on July 18, 362, Julian appointed Domitius Modestus to the office, and Gilbert Dagron regards this Modestus as the prefect referred to by Himerius. But the Himerian prefect may have been a tertius quis who held office briefly between Honoratus and Modestus. Holding this plausible view, Thomas Brauch attempts valiantly to revive the argument that the Himerian tertius was none other than Themistius.31 I am not persuaded to accept the identification, the positive evidence for which is a few Byzantine and Arabic texts of dubious value, and I believe that there is a strong point to be made against it: Himerius, in his remarks on his prefect, says nothing about devotion to philosophy. Philosophy was central to Themistius’s identity;32 if the Himerian prefect were Themistius, Himerius would not have failed to say that his prefect was a philosopher, especially given Himerius’s statement in section 12 of Oration 41

30. See Greco in Criscuolo, Da Costantino a Teodosio, 157–60. 31. Honoratus and Domitius Modestus: PLRE, vol. 1, s.vv. “Honoratus 2,” “Modestus 2”; Dagron, Naissance, 215–17, 240–44. Date of Julian’s arrival in Antioch: Bidez, La vie, 277 with n. 1; Bowersock, Julian, 96. Brauch’s argument is in Byzantion 63 (1993): 37–78. Wernsdorff (on Orat. 41.15, 16) already believed that the Himerian prefect was Themistius. 32. See my comments in Private Orations, 4–5.

46

In Praise of Cities and of Men

that philosophy was thriving at Constantinople. There is no positive evidence that the urban prefect was present to hear Oration 41: Himerius does not address him in the second person. Himerius’s Orations 39–41 show their declaimer making good use of the time spent in traveling from Athens to Constantinople to join the emperor Julian. With the help of influential friends, he put his eloquence on display along the way, probably taking advantage of an already existing reputation as well as exploiting the opportunity to enhance it. The friends to whom he was indebted were rewarded with public praise. The pagan emperor he hoped to serve was publicly celebrated. And he felt confident enough of his status to offer some words of advice to the new Constantinopolitan prefect. Throughout it all, he remained a champion of Hellenism, proud of his ties to Athens. Where Triptolemus had scattered seed, Himerius scattered logoi.

translations 62. The [Talk] He Published for a Constantinopolitan Student 33 [1] I hear that the Ethiopian stone [statue] wondrously makes music when the light of day appears. (The Ethiopians themselves call this stone statue Memnon, saying that it is named after Memnon the son of Day.) According to the Ethiopians, when the statue first sees dawn smiling, it suddenly breaks its silence and makes music, producing melodies for its mother. Now is it right, my friends, for me to seem musically inferior to Memnon? Is it right for me to behold this city [Constantinople] in silence, without mobilizing every piece of music and every Siren for it?34 [2] I think that I shall take up Pindar’s lyre and, with it, make music for this city. It will not be enough to call the city the support of Greece, the phrase that Pindar used with reference to Athens; rather it is the sweetest glory of every land that the sun shines on. Poseidon, king of the sea, surrounds you with his bluish waves, as if you were a Naiad 33. On the title, see p. 39 above. The codex has simply tauvthn, Photius’s Himerian bibliography simply h}n—so understand laliavn or diavlexin. 34. For the stone statue of Memnon, see Plin. HN 36.11.58; Paus. 1.42.3; Philostr. Vita Apoll. 6.4, Imag. 1.7.3; Callistr. Stat. descript. 1.5, 9. But by the fourth century the statue was silent—since the days of Zenobia, if Bowersock’s conjecture is correct (BASP 21 [1984]: 21–32). Note that here and in Orat. 19.6 the Memnon statue is wrongly placed among the Ethiopians rather than among the Egyptians (as in Orat. 44.5); so, too, Philostr. maj. Imag. 1.7.3 and Callistr. Stat. descript. 9. The enchanting song of the Sirens can be a metaphor for charming speech (Philostr. Vitae soph. 502; Liban. Orat. 18.20; Eunap. Vitae phil. et soph. 6.5.2 [465]).

In Praise of Cities and of Men

47

nymph; he embraces you on every side and rejoices in you. Choruses of sea-purple Nereids, leaping on the surface of the waves, dance around the whole of you in a circle. Your lover is not some alien river, like those boasted of in certain poetic utterances about cities. No, it is divinely possessed emperors who love you; it is they who put the golden diadem [of walls] around you and added a kind of heavenly beauty to your earthly features.35 [3] It would not be a lie to call you the apex of all Europe, for Europe begins from you and stretches to the very ocean and to the shores of the Atlantic. Every kind of sea displays itself around you. On one side, the Aegean comes up onto your beaches right through the middle of the Hellespont; on the other side, a narrow strait [the Bosporus] assumes the form of a river, as if contracted so that, through its agency, it can bring close to you, as a gift, the continent [of Asia]. And, in another part of the region, the Cyanean [rocks], which tragedy has called the Symplegades, close off the Propontis and send forth the great [Euxine (Black)] Sea from where they are located. [4] So I find fault with Homer because, when wishing to write about Poseidon’s marriage, he makes a river’s wave his bridal chamber. He should have put the god’s bedroom on your shores, where he would have been able to have not a small amount of water, but the whole sea all around him—not a wave mimicking the sea, but the whole surging ocean around his bedroom.36 [5] You alone have outdone the city of Romulus in the wonder you instill; you have combined such beauty with your size that the inhabitants of [Rome] have nothing to match with your beauty.37 Merchantmen sail to you from everywhere and from all harbors, in need of no Tiber to get to your fortifications; they put in immediately from the sea and tie their cables right to your walls.

35. “the support of Greece”: Pind., frag. 76 Race. “diadem [of walls]”: krhvdemna. For the expression, see Heubeck et al. on Hom. Od. 13.388. Himerius is referring to the Constantinian walls, which Constantine’s son Constantius continued to work on (see Janin, Constantinople, 26–31; Dagron, Naissance, index s.v. “murailles [de Constantin]”; Jul. Orat. 1.41a). 36. The Cyanean rocks are off the northern end of the Bosporus on the European side. “tragedy . . . Symplegades”: Eur. Androm. 794, Med. 2. For the river’s wave as bridal chamber, cf. Him. Orat. 9.6. “not a wave . . . sea”: Colonna has ouj ku¸mav ti mimoumevnhn [sc., pa¸ san . . . th;n qavlassan] pelavgion, the last word being Castiglioni’s emendation. With Dübner I read ouj ku¸mav ti mimouvmenon pevlagoˇ. (The manuscript, according to Colonna, has ouj ku¸mav ti mimoumevnhn pevlagon.) See Hom. Od. 11.241–45, which refers to the river’s “wave” (ku¸ma). 37. This is an important text for the development of the notion of Constantinople as a new Rome.

48

In Praise of Cities and of Men

[6] Since the Muses too must honor this city along with the other gods, they all gather here from everywhere, not only from Helicon and Pieria, and not only the ones who inhabit Pangaeum, but also those whom Attic meadows rear. They seem to me always to love this city and gladly to establish their choruses here, but to be delighted to dance here much more now because it happens that a man who takes his name from them and has rejoiced in their rites is governing the city.38 [7] Thus I believe what Simonides has proclaimed about the Muses in his songs. This is what he says. The Muses always dance, and these goddesses love to be engaged in music and song. But whenever they see Apollo beginning to lead the dance, then they prolong their melody more than before and broadcast from Helicon an elaborately harmonious sound. One can see this happening now in the city under you, for everything everywhere is brimming with the Muses’ arts ( mousikh¸ ˇ) and has been adorned because of them. It was your great yearning [for me] that caused my eloquence to travel before its hair turned gray in Attic meadows and that brought it here and now persuades it to display its youthful beauty in public.39 [8] But accept the first-fruits [of my oratory] with a tranquil countenance, O most excellent creature of the Muses [i.e., the “man who . . . is governing the city”]—for it is good to use such language of you. Please look upon my eloquence in this way, just as it expected when it undertook the present contest. [cod. R] 39. [The Discourse in Thessalonica] [Himerius] delivered this [discourse] in Thessalonica when, upon the summons of the emperor Julian, he was hastening to the East. He was officially invited by the city and [two] dignitaries, the vicar [of the diocese of Macedonia] and former sophist Musonius, and the consularis [of the province of Macedonia] Calliopius. He addressed the end of the oration to the Mu-

38. Mt. Helicon was sacred to the Muses and their frequent haunt. Pieria was their birthplace (see Him. Orat. 39.1, with my note). Pangaeum, or Mt. Pangaeus, in Thrace, refers to Thracian, and therefore Constantinopolitan, Muses. Himerius himself represents Attic Muses. For the “man who takes his name from” the Muses, see p. 38 above. 39. Simonides: no. 578 in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 3: 463. “your great yearning”: The Greek is merely o{soi pov qoi, but Himerius is clearly referring to the yearning of the “governor” of Constantinople, whom he addresses in the next sentence.

In Praise of Cities and of Men

49

sonius who had been proconsul of Greece [Achaia] and was present on the occasion.40 [1] Once, when Simonides was hastening to Pisa to honor Zeus with a hymn, the Eleans got hold of his lyre, and the populace publicly ordered him to sing of Zeus’s city [Elis] before singing of Zeus himself. So what, friends, tell me, what do you order me to do? Do you want me to interrupt my hurried course for a short while and give you a taste of my Attic pipe? This is certainly what some of you are praying for, and they are true neighbors of Pieria.41 [2] Well, then, I gladly submit to your command, and I regard your pressuring me to be to my advantage; for nothing that the beloved does is a burden or troublesome to his lover. When Anacreon was on his way to Polycrates’ court, he was glad to address the great Xanthippus [at Athens first], and Pindar was pleased to salute Hieron before addressing Zeus.42 Alcman, who joined the Dorian lyre with Lydian song, happened 40. The opening scholion serves as the title in cods. R and B. It has simply tauvthn dieivlektai in the opening line, hence diavlexin (cf. n. 55 below) or laliavn. The Excerpta Neapolitana have the title “To Julian,” which could pass for Orat. 41 but does not fit Orat. 39. Why Colonna confected the title Lalia; eijˇ jIouliano;n kai; eijˇ Mouswvnion for Orat. 39 is not clear to me. For the individuals mentioned in this scholion, see pp. 39–40 above. 41. “Once . . . Zeus himself”: = Simonides no. 589 in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 3: 471. “Zeus’s city”: The whole territory of Elis was sacred to Zeus (Strabo 8.3.33 [357–58]). “before singing of Zeus”: pro; Diovˇ, pro; being an emendation of provˇ; cf. “before addressing Zeus” (pro; tou¸ Diovˇ) in section 2. Himerius has stopped at Thessalonica on his way to Julian. He gives five exempla of poets and a piper who keep Zeus, Polycrates, or Alexander waiting in order to greet some individual or a city. “true neighbors”: not because of their geographical proximity to Pieria, but because their desire to hear Himerius speak shows that they reverence the Muses, born in Pieria (Hes. Theog. 53–54, with West’s comment on 53; G. Herzog-Hauser, “Pierides 1,” RE Suppl. 8 [1956]: 495–96). 42. “the beloved . . . his lover”: For use of the language of love to describe the relation between a speaker and the city he is praising, cf. Them. Orat. 24.302c– d, 306a; Him. Orat. 41.16; and p. 213 below. “When Anacreon . . . addressing Zeus”: = Anacreon no. 493 in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 2: 135. Himerius says that Anacreon was detained [at Athens] to address Pericles’ father Xanthippus. Xanthippus apparently fathered Pericles in the middle or late 490s b.c. (Podlecki, Perikles, 1). His appearances in the historical record occur between 490 and the early 470s (Kirchner, Prosopographia Attica, no. 11169; Podlecki, Perikles, 2–7). Polycrates was tyrant of Samos probably from the 540s till his death ca. 522 (Shipley, History of Samos, 74–80). It is chronologically possible, but difficult, to imagine Anacreon detained by Xanthippus during Polycrates’ tyranny; cf. Wilamowitz, Kleine Schriften, 4: 647. “and Pindar was pleased” etc.: Colonna refers the reader here to Pind. Ol. 1. The reference is derived from Wernsdorff, who has this comment: “Respicitur . . . ad Pindari Oden I. Olymp. v. 14 ubi Jupiter dicitur a poetis laudari, ad palatium Hieronis confluentibus. Sequitur v. 36 laudatio ipsius Hieronis senioris . . . et tandem v. 151 canitur ipsum Olympicum certamen, ut omnino ante Olympium Jovem videatur Hiero ornatus.” But I cannot see any clear saluting of Hieron prior to an addressing of Zeus in Ol. 1. Perhaps Himerius is referring, not to a text, but to an incident that supposedly occurred at Hieron’s court.

50

In Praise of Cities and of Men

to be carrying his songs through Sparta on his way to the shrine of Zeus Lycaeus; but he did not pass by Sparta before greeting both the city itself and the Dioscuri.43 [3] I also hear a story about Ismenias the piper, who was summoned from Thebes by Alexander [the Great] to make the latter’s victory celebration resound with song after a slaughter of the Persians. Ismenias learned in Phocis that the Delphians were celebrating the Pythian games with sacrifices. When a Delphian embassy promptly approached him and asked him not to pass by their festivities in silence, he welcomed the embassy and honored the city with song. This was a favorable sign for the king [Alexander] since [Ismenias’s song] was a victory prize for Apollo.44 [4] We, then, would not sail past a city that is brimming with so much virtue; for silence is not Attic, nor is it worthy of the talkative city [of Athens]. Xerxes, admiring the foliage of a plane tree in Lydia, bedecked it with gold. He did not know how to speak; he was as poor in eloquence as he was rich in gold. But from us it is only reasonable that your city demand the gifts that our rulers have at their disposal.45 43. “Alcman . . . Dioscuri”: = Alcman no. 24 in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 2: 415. “Alcman”: Himerius actually writes Alkmaiv j wn. Cf. the entry Alkmev j wna: to;n Alkma¸ j na in Hesychius; the variant Alkmaiv j wn for Alkmav j n in a scholion (ed. E. Schwartz) to Eur. Troad. 210; the form “Alcmaeon” (variant “Alcmeon”) in Jer. Chron. 658 b.c., p. 94b Helm. “who joined (keravsaˇ) . . . Lydian song”: Wernsdorff thought that Himerius was referring here to a blending of musical modes, but more likely he is simply saying that Alcman was a Lydian who composed in Doric Greek. The ancients were divided over whether Alcman was a Lydian or a Laconian: see Alcman, testimonia 1–9, 18 (scholion) in Campbell, 2: 336–45, 352–53; Lefkowitz, Lives of the Greek Poets, 34–35. On his dialect, see Calame, Alcman, xxiv–xxv. “the shrine . . . Lycaeus”: in Arcadia (Paus. 8.2, 8.38.2–6). “the Dioscuri”: For their connection with Sparta, see Roscher, “Dioskuren,” Ausführl. Lex. 1 (1884–1890): 1164–67; Bethe, “Dioskuren,” RE 5 (1905): 1099. 44. Ismenias was remembered as an accomplished piper (e.g., Plut. Reg. et imp. apophth. 174f; Apul. De deo Socr. 21 [169]; Aelian Var. hist. 4.16; Diog. Laert. 7.125). The Alexander Romance has him playing and pleading at the feet of Alexander in the hope that he could convince the king to spare a rebellious Thebes. But Alexander was unbending and even ordered Ismenias to play while Thebes was being destroyed. See Historia Alexandri Magni 1.46a, pp. 54–62 Kroll (2nd ed.); “Scholium de Amphione et Zetho” in O. Smith, ed., Scholia graeca in Aeschylum, 2: 2 (Leipzig, 1982) 9; John Tzetzes Hist. 7.397–401, 10.404–5. “since [Ismenias’s song] . . . Apollo”: Wernsdorff understood “since [the Pythian games] were a victory prize for Apollo,” those games having been founded to commemorate the god’s killing of the monster Python (Strabo 9.3.10 [421]; Ov. Met. 1.438–51). My understanding of the ellipsis is textually easier. Ismenias played in honor of Apollo’s victory over Python and offered his song to the god as a victory prize; he apparently played the traditional Pythikos nomos or something like it (see West, Ancient Greek Music, 212–14, 337). The text allows but does not require us to understand, as Wernsdorff did, that Ismenias actually competed in the games. Himerius says that Ismenias’s celebration of Apollo’s victory over Python portended more victories for Alexander over the Persians. 45. For the plane tree, cf. Hdt. 7.31; Aelian Var. hist. 2.14. “the gifts . . . disposal”: A subject’s “gift”—in this case, eloquence—in some sense belongs to the emperor; cf. section 9 below, where a talented man is called the emperor’s possession.

In Praise of Cities and of Men

51

[5] Such gifts suit this city of yours because of all its virtuous behavior and not least of all because of the zeal that it displays for wisdom, even though it is surrounded by people who almost all speak foreign languages. To the north the Paeonians press upon it. The next neighbors of the city are the Illyrians, who in turn pass that role on to the Moesians. Thrace borders so closely on this city of yours that it touches its suburbs. Your city, in isolation, maintains the Greek language like a golden center point and keeps it free of contamination by any neighboring tongue. Thus I censure and find fault with the Thracian tale that robs this city of Orpheus, Calliope, and awards him to the mountains of Thrace. Because there are no human beings there to listen to him, the tale creates an assembly of wild animals for him.46 [6] So everything about this city is Greek—its language, its walls, its dress. It begins high in the mountains, lifting the ridge above it, like a peak, high up into the middle of the heavens. It then comes down to the shore, where it divides itself into countless cities, scattered round about, but it peoples the central area with one city.47 It rides at anchor on the very waves, as if annoyed because the adjacent sea does not allow it to spread out as much as it wishes. [7] Your city, of such great size, is adorned on all sides: here there are places of assembly (ajgoraiv) ,48 nearby there are baths, colonnades are found throughout the city, and religious shrines everywhere. One would be unable to decide what to marvel at first. Just as those who observe the vernal sky have to look at every single part of it because of the beauty of the sight, and whatever first overpowers an observer holds his attention, so too this city astonishes people both as a whole and in all its individual parts. [8] But I have not yet proclaimed the greatest feature of the city’s Greek fortune. An Attic Muse shepherds the city. The sophist’s chair has embellished the vicar’s chair; rhetorical skill has given more grace to the good luck [of office] than it has got from it. For a helmet is more glori46. “The next neighbors . . . Moesians”: ejcomevnwˇ de; jIlluriw¸ n kai; Musw¸ n paradidovntwn to; geivtosin ei\nai th¸ ˇ povlewˇ. I would adopt Wernsdorff’s emendation Musoi¸ ˇ. The Muse Calliope was commonly said to be Orpheus’s mother. The Thracian Orpheus enchanted animals with his music. See E. Wüst, “Oiagros 1,” RE 17, 2 (1937): 2082–83; K. Ziegler, “Orpheus,” RE 18, 1 (1939): 1219–20, 1228–38, 1247–49. Himerius would have preferred that Orpheus had been associated with Greek Thessalonica. 47. Cf. Menander Rhetor’s advice (1.2 [351.17–18]) in his discussion of how to praise a city (the passage concerns a city “built partly in the plain and partly on hills”): “You will try . . . to show that it is like many cities in one” (trans. D. Russell and N. Wilson). Cf. Ael. Aristid. Orat. 17.11 Keil. 48. Vickers, without citing this passage, suggests that Thessalonica had at least two agoras ( JHS 92 [1972]: 163).

52

In Praise of Cities and of Men

ous when it protects a glorious head, a shield when it covers an Ajax’s chest, a tribunal when a Cyrus gives judgment from it, a lyre if a Pindar or an Anacreon plucks its strings. [9] Look all around you, by the gods, and see how the Greeks, who once conquered everyone with their weapons, now do so with the virtues of their men in office. The advantage of having every city guided by the Muses’ rudders for the whole world. But since this was impossible, he has taken the single most beautiful possession he has [i.e., Musonius] and has given it as a gift to this victorious city. In so doing he has aroused my rhetorical skills more than they say that the olive crown aroused the Olympic victor Cylon. That man wanted to be a tyrant but fell short of his desire; but you, [Musonius], have conquered by surrendering yourself to an emperor, and even before having armed yourself.49 [10] In representing the life of Achilles, Homer has him take up the lyre on one occasion and the spear on another; and you too, [sir], have intermingled your deeds and actions with your words. This is how Pericles led the people; this is how Themistocles governed. The platform held the orator, and the arena of war held the general. Oratory stood before the assembly, and trophies stood in the face of the enemy. [11] I understand that just such a mix of talents characterized Alcibiades. When he was full of the Lyceum and of what he had learned in the Lyceum, the image he projected was that of a very skilled speaker. He dazzled everyone into submission to himself. After leaving the Lyceum, he gave himself to the vicissitudes and activities of a public life. When he gave as much effort to arms as he had given to his studies, he became a military victor. The Hellespont saw his name inscribed on two trophies. The great king [of Persia], the Macedonians, Thrace, and all humankind saw him

49. “An Attic Muse”: i.e., Musonius, vicar of the diocese of Macedonia, a sophist who taught rhetoric in Athens before holding imperial office (cf. p. 40 above). “Muse” alludes to his name as well as to his learning (cf. Him. Orat. 62.6). The word for “vicar” here is u{parcoˇ. The high style of oratory disallowed the Latin bikavrioˇ, which is what we find in the opening scholion. ( { Uparcoˇ is commonly “praetorian prefect.” But cf. how e[parcoˇ can also apparently be used either of a praetorian prefect or of a vicar: Mason, Greek Terms, 13, 139, 155; Jones, Hermes 125 [1997]: 211.) “a Cyrus”: Cyrus the Great, idealized in Xenophon’s Cyropaedia. “”: cf. Dübner’s Latin text. “he . . . has given it as a gift to this victorious city”: cf., above, “an Attic Muse shepherds the city.” Musonius, of course, is a gift to, and shepherds, all the cities of his diocese. But if Thessalonica was the vicar’s seat at the time of this oration (cf. Piganiol, L’empire chrétien, 14; Demandt, Die Spätantike, 249), then he could be thought to have a special relationship with that city. “this victorious city”: nikhfovrw/, playing on the name Thessalonica. For Cylon’s attempt to seize power at Athens, see Hdt. 5.71; Thuc. 1.126. An olive crown was awarded to Olympic victors (J. Wiesner, “Olympia,” RE 18, 1 [1939]: 31). “even before having armed yourself”: i.e., before taking up office.

In Praise of Cities and of Men

53

get the better of everyone—now militarily, now verbally. That is why he was the only general deemed worthy of a Pythian proclamation.50 [12] But since Alcibiades, eloquence, Athens, the Lyceum, an Attic sophist [i.e., the vicar Musonius], and auditoria filled with his presence have been mentioned, come let us also honor Nicias by our words—Nicias, who was Alcibiades’ colleague, and whom we revere as a good general over the whole course of his life. Rather, if it is agreeable to all of you, I will give you a full account of him. When the city of the Athenians was at its height, with the Lacedaemonians lying dead at Pylos and the [Athenian] people directing everything, Alcibiades and Nicias shared the generalship. They were rivals of one another, when doing so was to the benefit of the city. [13] With such a pair in control of everything, the city was filled with true happiness. The council deliberated under the guidance of the laws, there was prosperity in the marketplace, sacred processions were held and divine rites celebrated, vice was nowhere in sight, the rule of law and the rudder of reason were everywhere. Alcibiades spoke, and Nicias drafted laws. The one was general in the city, the other sailed around the Peloponnesus. Alcibiades was quick to understand [what the situation demanded], and Nicias was skilled at converting those views into a finished piece of legislation. They jointly held the generalship and jointly manned the rudders—just as when waters that emerge from a single source split into two rivers in the course of their flow but are connected with one another by the beauty of their nature.51 [14] Well, I would love to remain among you for a year and keep com50. “In representing . . . the spear on another”: cf. Him. Orat. 21.1, frag. 1.6; Hom. Il. 9.443. Himerius gives an entirely favorable assessment of Alcibiades, who represents the vicar Musonius, to suit his panegyrical needs here. For faults that could have been imputed to him, see Thuc. 6.15; Corn. Nepos Alcib. 1.4; Plut. Alcib. 16; id. Syncrisis Coriolan. et Alcib. 1.3, 2.1–2, 2.6, 3.1, 5.2. “the Lyceum”: Socrates, who had a great impact on Alcibiades, is sometimes found in the Lyceum in Plato (Euthyphro 2a; Lys. 203a–b; Euthyd. 271a, 303b). It was a place where, according to some, one could have heard a work of Protagoras read aloud during the latter’s lifetime (Diog. Laert. 9.54). Wernsdorff understood “Lyceum” here “pro omni eruditione attica.” For Alcibiades’ skill as a speaker, see Corn. Nepos Alcib. 1.2; Diod. Sic. 12.84.1; Plut. Alcib. 10.3–4; Gribble, Alcibiades, index, s.v. “Alcibiades, rhetorical ability.” I know of no text that illuminates Himerius’s allusion to a “Pythian proclamation.” 51. “Nicias” is surely the consularis Calliopius mentioned in the opening scholion; see p. 40 above. Himerius’s portrayal of Nicias, like that of Alcibiades and again to suit his panegyrical needs, has no hint of criticism in it—no reference to the charge that Nicias was dilatory and too cautious or even cowardly (Thuc. 7.42.3; Plut. Alcib. 21.8; id. Nic. 7.3, 8.2, 14.2–3, 16.9). Although Alcibiades and Nicias were generals together (along with others) and could collaborate to avoid ostracism (Kagan, Peace of Nicias, 143–47), Thucydides and Plutarch stress their rivalry and differences (Thuc. 5.43.2, 5.45.3, 6.15.2; Plut. Alcib. 14, 17.2–3, 18.2–3, 20.1–3; id. Nic. 11.1–5, 12). Himerius has created an idealized exemplum of cooperation for the edification of officials in his audience (cf. Wernsdorff ).

54

In Praise of Cities and of Men

posing speeches. For whether one is seeking the islands of the blessed or an Ethiopian meadow of boundless fertility or the horn of Amaltheia, your city would satisfy everyone’s desire. And so I forgive and pardon Odysseus for having composed a very long speech at Alcinous’s palace; by prolonging his stay there he was delighting in his love of the place.52 Yet how much more worthy of respect than Homer’s Alcinous is your own—I mean the man with the same name [as your vicar]. [15] Despite the remarkable qualities of this city, who will not [also] praise a man who has honestly guided the rudders of the Greeks in the company of a sweet Siren; for a persuasiveness always sits upon his lips.53 Who is warmer in friendship? Who is as well-suited for whatever fortune may bring? Who is as great when fortune comes with favorable winds, but no less stately if the breeze dies down? [16] Wait! The sound of chariots seems to strike me; “the din of swiftfooted horses strikes my ears” [Hom. Il. 10.535]. I seem to hear the emperor saying, “Think of your great-hearted return [to Constantinople], glorious Odysseus.” So accept this cup of friendship for now, however little it contains. If the gods ever permit me to return, I shall address the city again after seeing the emperor, as I have now done before seeing him.54 [cods. R and B, with passages also in Exc. Neapol. and Lex. Lopad.] “with the Lacedaemonians lying dead” etc.: a reference to the Spartan surrender at Sphacteria, the island off of Pylos, in 425 b.c. One hundred and twenty-eight Lacedaemonian hoplites had perished there (Thuc. 4.38.5). “the [Athenian] people directing”: i.e., Athens was a democracy. Alcibiades and Nicias were generals together from 418/17 to 415/14 (Fornara, Athenian Board of Generals, 62–64). “the other [i.e., Nicias] sailed around the Peloponnesus”: Is Himerius thinking of the Athenian capture of Cythera and assaults on the southern coast of the Peloponnesus in 424 (Thuc. 4.53–56)? If so, Wernsdorff already noted that Alcibiades was not a general in that year (Fornara, 59). “Alcibiades was quick . . . demanded”: cf. Plut. Alcib. 10.4, Alcibiades was “most capable of coming up with and perceiving what was required.” 52. “the horn of Amaltheia”: i.e., the horn of plenty. See Roscher, “Amaltheia 1,” Ausführl. Lex. 1 (1884–1890): 263–65; CPG 1: 8; 2: 54, 685. “a very long speech”: i.e., books 9–12 of the Odyssey. “by prolonging . . . the place”: th/¸ pleivoni diatribh¸/ to;n ejkei¸ pov qon drepovmenoˇ. Dübner in his critical apparatus suggested lwtovn for pov qon. Wernsdorff suggested oi[kou for ejkei¸, understanding the Greek to mean “dum longiore dissertatione desiderium patriae fallere studuit.” For ejkei¸ I would read ejkei¸ or ejkei¸. For pov qon drepovmenoˇ, cf. Pind. frag. 123.1 Snell, ejrwvtwn drevpesqai. 53. “the man . . . vicar”: i.e., Musonius the former proconsul of Greece; see p. 41 above. “[Y]our own [Alcinous]” here is a metaphor for “the man (or one of the men) among you who is hosting me.” “a sweet Siren”: The Sirens represent the charm of oratory (see n. 34 above). “for a persuasiveness . . . his lips”: Himerius is echoing Eupolis’s remark (frag. 94.5 Kock) about Pericles, whom he has just mentioned in section 10 as one who blended eloquence with action; cf. Them. Orat. 2.37b; Jul. Orat. 1.33a. 54. “swift-footed horses”: who will take Himerius forward on his journey to Constantinople. “Think of . . . Odysseus”: The first part of the line, novstou dh; mnh¸ sai mega-

In Praise of Cities and of Men

55

40. The Discourse (Diavlexiˇ) in Philippi [Himerius] delivered this [discourse] extempore in Philippi when, having been summoned by the emperor Julian, he went off to the court. The first part of the speech [is aimed] at the city, the last part at [Himerius’s] pupil Severus, who arranged for the oratorical display (ejpideivxewˇ) to be given.55 [1] Sometimes the swan sings by the ocean and, with its melody, outdoes the loudly resounding sea. Sometimes it sings by the eddies of the Cayster River and the waters of the Hermus or the Hyllus.56 On occasion it finds a small spring of pure and translucent water; it is delighted by the spring and, after washing its wing, honors the waters with song. [2] Will a sophist, then, appear to be less vocal than a swan? Will he rush past an ancient city in silence? Philippi, you know, was a city [of the] ancient [world] even before Philip. Its population was Attic. It was the work of Callistratus, who gave the city the language it deserved. Rather, let me say that, given that there are two blessings universally held in high regard, wisdom and good fortune, your city has obtained one of these from each of your two founders; through the Athenians it got wisdom, and through Philip it took pride in its power and good fortune.57 quvmou, is Hom. Il. 10.509; the rest is, e.g., Od. 10.251. Himerius is “returning” to Constantinople, i.e., this will not be his first visit there (see Orat. 62). “I shall address the city again”: Similar sentiments end Orat. 40 and 41. 55. The opening scholion serves as the title in cods. R and B. “This [discourse]” is simply tauvthn. Photius’s Himerian bibliography has diavlexiˇ ejn Filivppoiˇ, which I use as the title. 56. The Cayster, the Hermus, and the Hyllus are rivers of Asia Minor. For the Cayster’s swans, cf. Hom. Il. 2.460–61; Anacreontea 60.8 West; Ov. Met. 5.386–87; Sil. Ital. Pun. 14.189–90; Philostr. maj. Imag. 1.11.3, p. 311 Kayser. In Orat. 47.4 and 48.7, Himerius again mentions the Cayster’s swans. 57. The Athenian politician Callistratus, in exile, persuaded the Thasians to found the colony of Crenides on the mainland in 360/59 b.c. In 356 it was seized by Philip II of Macedon and renamed Philippi. See Kirchner, Prosopographia Attica, no. 8157; Collart, Philippes, 133–60; Hammond and Griffith, History of Macedonia, 2: 187–88, 234–36, 246–50. Himerius erroneously believes that Crenides was colonized by Athenians. Cf., in a proverb explained by Zenobius, Cent. 4.34 (CPG 1: 94): “Callistratus, exiled from Athens (Aqhv j nhqen) , persuaded the Athenians to colonize the land across from [Thasos].” But Bühler, following others before him, correctly emends “Athenians” here to “Thasians,” the reading that is found in other versions of the proverb, and suggests that the error “Athenians” arose from Aqhv j nhqen (Zenobii Athoi proverbia, 4: 164–71). Himerius imagines the Attic language—and, more generally, the “wisdom” associated with Athenian culture— to belong to Philippi’s heritage, as does the fortune of having been part of the powerful Macedonian state. But how much Attic Greek did Himerius actually hear spoken in Philippi (see section 3)? Note the comments of Lemerle, BCH 59 (1935): 126–27. “Philippi . . . a

56

In Praise of Cities and of Men

[3] Come, then, let me set up a krater here for Zeus, god of friendship. Let me pay back the altar of Zeus, god of hospitality, with a gift of eloquence. For this is an ancient law, that one should pay back those who have initiated a friendship from the resources one has. The husbandman honors others with sheaves of grain, the grape-presser with bunches of grapes, the hunter with his bag; all honor others with all the things from which they make a living. The guest swallow comes with her melody, the cicada with his song, the nightingale with her Attic odes, no doubt to remind those who speak Attic Greek of Athens.58 She does not judge locations in which to exercise her voice on the basis of their size; she is happy with any grove that can resound with her songs. [4] Of course, even Homer knew this law to which I am referring. Thus, wishing to inscribe this law on everyone, he imposes wandering on no one but an orator, so that [that orator], Odysseus, may, by speaking, make the ordinance unshakable. So Odysseus spoke on Ogygia and filled the great island with his eloquence. Again, he spoke among the Phaeacians and made Alcinous’s city great by means of his oratory. [5] When Gorgias of Leontini—for, as it advances, my oration has discovered that a sophist and not a poet was the originator of the law we are considering— when Gorgias went on an embassy from Sicily to Athens, he amazed the city with his oratory. He had to proceed from Athens through Boeotia, but he did not pass by Plataea before addressing that ancient city.59 [6] Now since our rule has been ratified by the customary practice of city . . . before Philip”: The Greek literally says “Philipppi was an ancient city even before Philip,” but Himerius hardly means that Philip considered it ancient. My fleshing out of the text conveys what Himerius intended. For the compliment “ancient,” cf. Robert, Études anatoliennes, 303–4. 58. “god of friendship . . . god of hospitality”: the common epithets philios and xenios; see H. Schwabl, “Zeus,” RE 10A (1972): 341, 371. “the nightingale . . . Athens”: According to Him. Orat. 74.5, the nightingale of myth is of Attic origin. Cf. Liban. Decl. 2.27: “the Attic nightingale.” 59. “[that orator], Odysseus”: For Odysseus and other Homeric figures as orators, see the testimonia collected in Radermacher, Artium scriptores, 6–9. Odysseus on Ogygia: This is not a well-chosen example of eloquence requiting hospitality. Calypso is hospitable to Odysseus on the island of Ogygia, but she keeps him there against his will. When we hear him speaking on Ogygia, it is to ensure that Calypso is really going to let him go, as he desires. See Hom. Od. 1.13–15; 5.130–36, 151–58, 165–224, 233–68; 7.255–60. Odysseus’s long speech among the hospitable Phaeacians is Od. 9–12. For Gorgias’s embassy of 427 b.c. on behalf of Sicilian Leontini and the Athenians’ admiration of his speaking, see Thuc. 3.86 with Pl. Hipp. maj. 282b, and Diod. Sic. 12.53. Again, Himerius adduces a less than ideal example of requiting hospitality with eloquence: although Gorgias also spoke privately in Athens, his oratory there as ambassador is more readily thought of as a means by which to persuade Athens to give Leontini military aid than as a thank-offering for hospitality. Himerius is the only source that mentions a stop by Gorgias at Boeotian Plataea. (In 427, Plataea surrendered to Sparta after having been under siege since 429; then, after

In Praise of Cities and of Men

57

a sophist and the utterance of a poet, come let us also get the approval of philosophy. There was a man named Hermias, of the stock of Atarneus. Atarneus is a city of the Mysians, not large but a splendid place to see, and named after a Mysian king. Now Hermias was a pupil of the Stagirite [i.e., Aristotle], one of those most closely attached to him. With all the virtue Hermias possessed, he affected his mentor deeply, causing Aristotle to love him from the bottom of his heart. Aristotle gave many indications, as one can hear told, of his love of Hermias. He trained him thoroughly in eloquence and taught him virtue, and Hermias was the only one of Aristotle’s pupils whose death he honored with an elegiac poem.60 about a year [Thuc. 3.68.3], in 426, it was totally destroyed, not to be rebuilt till the late 380s b.c. [E. Kirsten, “Plataiai 1,” RE 20, 2 (1950): 2306–9].) “my oration has discovered that a sophist” etc.: Himerius has not seriously changed his mind here (note the opening of section 6). He is just playfully complimenting his own profession. 60. For Hermias, tyrant of Atarneus and environs and friend and pupil of Aristotle, see Wormell, YCS 5 (1935): 57–92; Bidez, Académie royale de Belgique, Bulletin de la classe des lettres 29 (1943): 133–46; Düring, Aristotle, 272–83; Guthrie, History of Greek Philosophy, 6: 26–36, 44. The sources reveal both a favorable and an unfavorable tradition on Hermias. “of the stock of Atarneus” ( Atarneu; j ˇ gevnoˇ) : cf. Aristotle in Diog. Laert. 5.8: “the nursling (e[ntrofoˇ) of Atarneus.” Theopompus called Hermias a Bithynian (in Didymus Chalcent. In Dem. col. 4.69, p. 13 Pearson-Stephens); so did Demetrius of Magnesia (in Diog. Laert. 5.3). Other texts, probably erroneously and maliciously, call him a barbarian. “named after a Mysian king”: Himerius appears to be the only ancient source that offers this information. In a treaty Hermias signed with Erythrae, an Atarneus is mentioned as the eponymous hero of the city (SIG3 229). “a pupil of the Stagirite”: Gnwvrimoˇ here and below (“pupils”) can be “pupil” or “friend.” For Hermias’s special closeness to Aristotle, cf. Didymus Chalcent. In Dem. col. 5.62–63, p. 18 Pearson-Stephens; their friendship was discussed by many ancient writers (Euseb. Praep. evang. 15.2.13 des Places). The high Himerian tone implicitly refutes the charge that Hermias and Aristotle had a sexual relationship (cf. Chroust, Aristotle, 1: 42). “the only one . . . an elegiac poem”: Reading Wilamowitz’s conjecture qavnaton, “death” (Aristoteles und Athen, 2: 405n), unreported in Colonna’s edition, we can see here a reference to Aristotle’s elegiac poem in honor of the dead Hermias, which is preserved in Didymus Chalcent. In Dem. col. 6.39–42, p. 21 Pearson-Stephens and Diog. Laert. 5.6. If we retain the transmitted reading qavlamon, “bedchamber,” i.e., “marriage” (thus Wernsdorff and Dübner), then Himerius will agree with an entry in the Suda that gives Hermias a wife (E 3040 Adler sub fine) but will be the sole extant ancient source that refers to a poem by Aristotle in honor of their marriage. (A number of texts call Hermias a eunuch, but that may be nothing more than malevolent fabrication. Some sources refer to a daughter of Hermias; others specify that this was only an adopted daughter: Harpocration, s.v. JErmivaˇ; Diog. Laert. 5.3; Euseb. Praep. evang. 15.2.12, 14 des Places.) The one attraction in retaining the reading qavlamon is that it sets up a nice parallel: just as Aristotle had honored his pupil Hermias’s marriage with a poem, so too Himerius had written an epithalamium (viz. Orat. 9) in honor of the wedding of his former pupil Severus, the very man who had arranged for him to speak in Philippi (see the opening scholion of Orat. 40) and to whom Himerius may intend us to see a reference in the figure of Hermias (see next note, ad fin.). V. Rose (Aristotelis fragmenta [Leipzig, 1886], frag. 674) retains qavlamon but understands it to have the sense “tomb” (cf. Him. Orat. 8.8), obtaining a meaning close to that which Wilamowitz obtained through an emendation. The difficulty with this solution is that Aristotle’s elegiac poem honored a statue of Hermias at Delphi, not his tomb (Diog. Laert. 5.6). Hermias was captured by the Persians and perished in their country. Another emendation of qavlamon was proposed by

58

In Praise of Cities and of Men

But let me tell you now about the strongest evidence Aristotle gave of his devotion to Hermias. [7] The great philosopher happened to be summoned to Asia by Alexander [the Great] to be both herald and observer of his Persian victories. When in the course of his journey he reached Atarneus and saw that the whole of that small city was thirsting for virtue and wisdom, he did not pass by it in silence but saluted the city and Hermias with a short composition.61 [8] This, O friends, is my thank-offering for your hospitality. If the gods permit it, I shall set up fuller kraters for the city on another occasion.62 [cods. R and B, with passages also in Exc. Neapol. and Lex. Lopad.] 41. [The Oration in Constantinople] [Himerius] went to give a display of his eloquence in Constantinople when he was traveling to the emperor Julian’s court, to which he had been summoned. He was initiated in the Mithraic mysteries before giving his oratorical display (ejpideivxewˇ). He then delivered his oration to the city and to the emperor who had established the initiatory rite [in Constantinople].63 [1] I have cleansed my soul through Mithra the Sun, and through the gods I have spent time with an emperor [Julian] who is a friend of the Bernays, inspired by the tradition that Hermias was a eunuch: for qavlamon movnw/ he proposed qladivan movnon (i.e., “he honored the only eunuch among his pupils with an elegiac poem”); see Usener, Gesammelte Abhandlungen von Jacob Bernays, 294. 61. It is not clear whether Himerius regards Hermias as alive or dead at the time of this incident. If alive, then he is chronologically confused, for Hermias died probably in 341 b.c. (Guthrie, History of Greek Philosophy, 6: 35), whereas Alexander did not begin his push east until the late 330s. If Himerius regards Hermias as dead here, Aristotle’s “short composition” is apparently the philosopher’s extant “hymn” to virtue in honor of the dead Hermias; see V. Rose, Aristotelis fragmenta (Leipzig, 1886), frag. 675, and Wormell, YCS 5 (1935): 86. (The hymn is preserved in Didymus Chalcent. In Dem. col. 6.23ff., pp. 19–20 Pearson-Stephens; Athen. 15.696b – d; and Diog. Laert. 5.7–8.) Wilamowitz (Aristoteles und Athen, 2: 405n) surmised that Gorgias’s stop in passing at Plataea (section 5, above) and Aristotle’s similar stop at Atarneus were Himerius’s own inventions, intended as analogues to his own stop in passing at Philippi. The unhistorical notion that Aristotle was with Alexander during his Persian campaigns is found in the Aristotelian biographical tradition: Vita Marciana 23, Vita vulgata 23, Vita Latina 23 (in Düring, Aristotle, 100, 135, 154). For Aristotle accompanying Alexander on his expeditions, see also Hertz, Abhandl. der philos.-philologischen Cl. der königl. Bayerischen Akad. der Wissenschaften 19, 1 (1891): 26–36, 90–103. For the possibility that one is meant to see in Hermias a reference to the Severus mentioned in the opening scholion of this oration, see p. 43 above. 62. Cf. the opening of section 3 above. 63. The opening scholion serves as the title in cods. R and B. The Excerpta Neapolitana have the title “To Constantinople.” The title in Photius’s Himerian bibliography is

In Praise of Cities and of Men

59

gods. So let me now light not a torch, but an oration for the emperor and the city. Attic law commands initiates to carry light and stalks of grain to Eleusis as signs of a civilized life. But for our [fellow Mithraic] initiates let me propose an oration as a thank-offering, since Apollo and the Sun, I think, are one and the same, and words are children of Apollo. Having begun, then, with the gods, let us now address the city.64 [2] Again there are Attic Muses [i.e., Himerius] in your midst; again Athens addresses its own progeny. It seems to me that the whole of learning is a friend of this city. That is why, when Constantinople was about to bring forth a man divinely fated to be emperor [i.e., Julian], the city left it to the Muses to be the midwives of his character, so that he might surpass [all] those who had ever prided themselves on the good fortune [of the imperial throne]—surpass them, I mean, in virtue rather than in [mere] good fortune. My own learning was destined, as if by some better fate from on high, to belong to this city. Let me tell you what the greatest proof of that is. When this learning of mine, after enduring Attic contests and winning the great garlands of the virgin goddess [Athena], had to leave Attica and sow the rest of the earth with the seeds of learning it got there, fate did not take it to the Rhine in the West, nor did it carry it to the fabulous waters of Ocean. No, fate brought it, while still in its prime and sprouting its first beard, to you, so that it might plait together a hymn for the city from still tender buds. But when its hair turned gray, when it got gray locks, it praised the emperor on his own, so that this city might again be a prelude to the hymns of praise to be offered to “[An Oration] Given (rJhqeivˇ) in Constantinople for the City Itself, for the Emperor Julian, and for the Mithraic Initiation.” Barnes (CP 82 [1987]: 222) has asserted that it was Julian himself who initiated Himerius in the Mithraic mysteries (so too Brauch, Byzantion 63 [1993]: 66–67). But neither this scholion nor the text of the oration provides any grounding for that assertion. 64. While I agree with Smith, Julian’s Gods, 124–37, 163–71, that the role of Mithraism in Julian’s religiosity has been exaggerated and that “the notion that Julian promoted Mithraism as a feature of his imperial policy may be discarded,” I still maintain (as Smith does) that Julian was a Mithraic initiate. In the opening scholion to this oration, “had established the initiatory rite” must mean “in Constantinople.” I would compare Liban. Orat. 18.127, which I, with others, understand as a reference to a Mithraeum that Julian built in the palace at Constantinople, where he is described as “initiated and initiating.” Note also section 8 below: “[Julian] has established religious rites from abroad in the city [Constantinople], and has made sacred the mysteries of the heavenly gods introduced into the city.” Turcan (Mithras, 113–14), who denies that Julian was a Mithraist, must reject the opening scholion of Orat. 41, claiming that there is misinformation in it, deduced with misunderstanding from the text of the oration. He also dismisses the pertinence of the reference to Mithra in section 1, viewing it as nothing more than a hackneyed literary way of naming the Sun. For light (torches) and stalks of grain on the road to Eleusis, note Mylonas, Eleusis, 256, 275–76. The common equation Mithra = Sun = Apollo allows a nice transition from the question of initiation to that of the oration at hand.

60

In Praise of Cities and of Men

him. Let us now, then, first address the city, beginning with what it is proud of and rejoices in.65 [3] O city that lit the torch of freedom for all humankind! O city that conceived and brought forth a fortunate infant! O city that brought into the light a child who was even better than one whom your mother-city itself brought forth! For the first offspring of your mother-city was Cecrops. He was not yet a genuine human being, since, from the waist down, he had his mother’s [serpentine] coils, and he did not yet speak Attic Greek.66 But your offspring, of course, has an unmixed nature. In him there is a conjunction of the highest good fortune and the highest virtue; both shaped his birth, I think, and they were present, not in half measure, but in full. [4] All lyres have made the island of Delos, which had the honor of being the place of Apollo’s divine birth, the subject of poem and song, even though it is a small island, almost hidden by the waves. But you are not what people call an island or an [ordinary] city; you are almost a complete continent that has given rise to a city, and what poet or prosewriter would not hymn you with good reason? I marvel and am amazed

65. “Again there are Attic Muses”: Himerius seems to be referring to his earlier orating in Constantinople, Orat. 62 and below “fate brought [my learning], while still in its prime . . . , to you.” “Athens addresses her own progeny”: Himerius propagates the view that Byzantium/Constantinople was a colony of Athens, as in section 3 below. Cf. Amm. Marc. 22.8.8: “Constantinopolis, vetus Byzantium, Atticorum colonia.” “to bring forth a man . . . midwives of his character”: Julian was born and had his earliest upbringing in Constantinople and studied grammar and rhetoric there after his exile at Macellum: Bidez, La vie, 5–54; Bowersock, Julian, 21–27. Note Zos. 3.11.2. “had to leave Attica and sow the rest of the earth”: Himerius is comparing himself to Triptolemus, who scattered seed throughout the earth from his flying chariot upon leaving Attica (Ov. Met. 5.642ff.; Apollod. Bibl. 1.5.2; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.36 Lenz-Behr; Hygin. Fab. 147). “to the Rhine . . . Ocean”: Himerius may be alluding to the visit of Prohaeresius, his rival at Athens, to emperor Constans in Gaul: Eunap. Vitae phil. et soph. 10.7.1–3 [492]; Penella, Greek Philosophers, 88–90. Barnes (CP 82 [1987]: 208), putting the visit to Constans in ca. 343, sees a reference in “Ocean” to that emperor’s British expedition of 342/43. Schamp warns, though, that Himerius’s reference to graduates of schools of Greek rhetoric going west may have “une portée générale” (DPA 3 [2000]: 716–17). Even if Himerius himself is thinking specifically of Prohaeresius here, Schamp rightly wonders whether anyone in the Constantinopolitan audience would have appreciated the allusion. “so that it might plait together a hymn”: i.e., deliver an oration. “it praised the emperor on his own”: “On his own” is kaq j eJautovn. Himerius seems to be alluding to the lost oration (52) he gave in praise of Julian before he left Athens. Having devoted an oration exclusively to Julian, he can now couple praise of Julian with the city of Constantinople and its prefect, beginning with the city. But for scholarly hesitation and emendation, see the critical apparatus in Dübner’s and Colonna’s editions. “might again be a prelude” (my emphasis): i.e., as it has been in other orations that various individuals have given during the emperor’s stay in Constantinople? 66. Cecrops, the first king of Attica/Athens, was born of the earth, represented by his lower serpentine half: Ar. Vesp. 438, with schol.; Eur. Ion 1163–64; Apollod. Bibl. 3.14.1; Hygin. Fab. 48. “he did not yet speak”: With Wernsdorff, I emend fqeggomevnhn to fqeggovmenoˇ.

In Praise of Cities and of Men

61

at all your other features, too. For you are the beginning of Europe and also its end, and you have been allotted the same role in Asia. With you the billowy [Euxine (Black)] Sea comes to a halt, and the Aegean issues forth from you. [5] The great Bosporus is your neighbor—straits that all poets and all orators vie with one another in praising, straits that calmed the sea for Zeus’s beloved [Io] and, in my opinion, prophesied that they would nurse in their bosom an emperor sprung from Zeus. For it is said that it was by Zeus’s decision that Inachus’s daughter Io was transformed from a maiden into a cow and swam these waters, giving the straits their name as an indication of what her fortune had been on that occasion.67 [6] Who could find great or beautiful enough words with which to hymn your great size or beauty? This city begins to be bathed by the waters that are almost halfway across the straits. It extended itself quite a distance to the west, making a great city out of the mainland that welcomed it and leaving not even its crannies vacant nor the that circumscribes whole peninsula. Once spread out over the whole shoreline and all the plains, it then actually turned the sea itself into part of the mainland and forced it to become part of the city; it has turned what by its nature is rolling and constantly on the move [i.e., the sea] into something immobile. [7] Now when Homer wanted to make Sparta’s great size clear in his poetry by giving it an appropriate epithet, he call it khtwvessan, meaning “of considerable magnitude.” If this really is the right word to use to describe a city’s size, then I should apply it to you, [Constantinople], not Homer , although this city, in my view, does not have size . For just as in a necklace gold the gems, so too Constantinople combines the flower of beauty with its great size. Hence the city’s gold causes people to look now here, now there. The wonders of its craftsmanship attract those who behold them. Its senate-house shines forth, its baths are enchanting, its theaters also win people’s favor. Everything here is, quite simply, Aphrodite’s kestos!68 67. Delos: For Apollo’s birth there, see Him. Orat. 64.1, with my note. Io, driven into flight by Zeus’s jealous wife Hera, at one point crossed the Bosporus, giving it its name (understood to mean “cow-crossing”). (Not all ancient sources agreed that Inachus was her father [Eitrem, “Io,” RE 9, 2 (1916): 1732–33]). Zeus had turned Io into a cow in an attempt to hide his affair from Hera. Himerius takes the Bosporus, named for an incident in which Zeus prominently figured, as an omen for the birth of an emperor at Constantinople, “sprung from Zeus” being an epithet applicable to any monarch (see Them. Orat. 2.34d, 6.79b, 15.188b). For the story of Io, see Aesch. PV 561–886; Ov. Met. 1.583–746; Apollod. Bibl. 2.1.3. 68. “its crannies”: lagovnaˇ. Or “the flanks of its hills” (on which see Janin, Constantinople, 4–6 with the “carte hypsométrique”). The text here is keno;n de; ajfh¸ke povlewˇ oujd j o{son eijˇ lagovnaˇ kai; th;n kuvklw/ periptuvssousan nh¸ son a{pasan meriv zetai. I despair

62

In Praise of Cities and of Men

[8] I have not yet mentioned the greatest and most beautiful ornament of the city, an ornament that shines on the city’s splendor more brightly than any gold and makes its beauty more colorful than any artificial dye. I am referring to the divine emperor. The city that brought him forth is every day the recipient of countless favors from him, and countless ornaments and crowns from him wreath its head. He does not favor it merely with great and beautiful buildings. He has also washed away by his virtue the darkness that was preventing us from lifting our hands up to the Sun and has thereby given us the gift of raising us up to heaven as if from some Tartarus or lightless life. He has raised up temples to the gods, has established religious rites from abroad in the city, and has made sacred the mysteries of the heavenly gods introduced into the city. He did not heal everything gradually, as those with human skills heal the sick, but all at once with benefits of [spiritual] health that took immediate effect. After all, one would have expected someone who links his nature with the Sun both to give light and to reveal a better life.69 [9] He also builds up the reputation of the city by his daily actions and deeds, just as the deeds of Romulus exalt Romulus’s city, and the famous trials of virtue endured by Heracles exalt Heracles’ city. If anyone

of th;n kuvklw/ . . . a{pasan. Wernsdorff has “nihil vacuum urbe relinquitur, neque ipsum illud spatium, quod partim praerupta collium latera, partim circumfusae undique insulae occupant.” Dübner altered “circumfusae undique insulae occupant” to “cingens undique insula occupat.” I tentatively propose that something like paravlion th;n has fallen out after periptuvssousan. Nh¸ son would have to be understood as “peninsula”; see LSJ Rev. Suppl., s.v. nh¸ soˇ. “it . . . turned the sea itself into part of the mainland”: cf. Zos. 2.35.2; Sidon. Apoll. Carm. 2.57–58. khtwvessan: Hom. Il. 2.581, Od. 4.1. Homer applies the adjective to the whole of Lacedaemon. Both the reading and the meaning of the Homeric word were disputed in antiquity; see Heubeck et al. on Od. 4.1. “not Homer . . . ”: a corrupt passage, for which I attempt to reconstruct the general sense. See Wernsdorff’s and Dübner’s editions. Aphrodite’s kestos: apparently a breast halter or kind of brassiere; see Janko on Hom. Il. 14.214–17, and Sider on Philodem. Epigr. 17.3 It is associated with allurement and seduction. Themistius(Orat. 6.83d–84a) also calls Constantinople Aphrodite’s kestos. Aelius Aristides uses the term of Corinth, with the remark “whatever this object is through which the goddess chains all men to herself” (Orat. 46.25, trans. C. Behr). 69. “the darkness”: a Christian throne. In Jul. Contra Heracl. 229c, Julian is revealed to be the Sun’s child. The Sun was very important in Julian’s religiosity (see Athanassiadi, Julian, index, s.v. “Helios”). Smith (Julian’s Gods, 158–59, 165) has rightly reminded us that many gods are identified (or partially identified) with the Sun and that we should not always assume the equation Mithra = Sun; but it is hard not to think of Mithra in this paragraph, given the mention of “Mithra the Sun” in section 1 above. “religious rites from abroad (xevnaˇ)”: i.e., Mithraism (see p. 44 above). I would raise the possibility, which I do not favor, that Himerius means xevnaˇ more generally: “rites alien [to Christian Constantinople].” This interpretation will be attractive to those who stress the Christian character of the Constantinople that Constantine founded and passed on to his son Constantius (e.g., Barnes, Constantine, 222).

In Praise of Cities and of Men

63

should ask the Athenians why they are so much more high-spirited than other people, they begin with Theseus and trace their long line of successes from him. is an ornament to the Argives, just as Lycurgus is to the Spartiates. Lycurgus was the beginning of Sparta, for before his time people almost refused to live there. The Amphipolitans, reassigning their city from Hagnon to Brasidas, pride themselves more on the virtue of that Laconian [i.e., Brasidas] than on the marvelous features of their land that nature has given them. What better ornament is there for this city than such a great emperor, who is so proud of his native land?70 [10] In building up [a verbal picture of ] an Assyrian city [i.e., Babylon], the Carian Muse—I mean Herodotus’s Muse [Hdt. 1.178–80], almost superior to poetry71—divides and walls the city by means of a barbarian river [i.e., the Euphrates]. But your wall is a great emperor and the sea, the emperor making a wall of arms for the city and the sea protecting it with its waves. [11] The population of a city of such size had to be proportionately large. For if the stars are an adornment to the heavens, a city’s glory is its inhabitants. Those who call themselves a race sprung from their native land trace their cities’ origins back to a mythical founder. They invent stories that go against the laws of nature because they lack any connection with higher beings. This was your condition. But a family that derived from the gods mated with unstable humanity and by mating produced a family of heroes. This stock commingled with you and truly made this city a reflection of some heavenly world.72 70. “Heracles’ city”: his native Thebes (Him. Orat. 6.3, with my note). For Danaus, see also Him. Orat. 6.3, with my note. Amphipolis: During the Peloponnesian War the Lacedaemonian Brasidas captured Amphipolis, which had been settled by the Athenian Hagnon. The Amphipolitans came to regard Brasidas as their founder, Hagnon having suffered a damnatio memoriae. Brasidas had died while fighting the Athenians at Amphipolis (Thuc. 4.102, 5.8–11). “reassigning their city from Hagnon to Brasidas”: There is a hint here that the Constantinopolitans might want to reassign their city from Constantine to Julian. 71. Cf. Herodotus as the “prose Homer”: Lloyd-Jones, ZPE 124 (1999): 2–3, 10–11. 72. “a race sprung from their native land”: One thinks of the Athenians (Him. Orat. 6.2). “a mythical founder”: apparently Cecrops (see n. 66 above). “stories that go against the laws of nature”: i.e., birth from the earth. “This was your condition”: i.e., you lacked a direct connection with higher beings, because Athens was your mother-city (sections 2 and 3 above). I do not accept the conjectural supplement ouj that Wernsdorff proposed. Traditional praise of Athens, of course, affirmed connections with the divine in her mythhistory (see Him. Orat. 6.4–8). But here Himerius criticizes certain features of Athenian myth-history (cf. section 3) because he wants to elevate Constantinople over Athens. “a family that derived from the gods”: Julian’s family or more generally the descendants of Constantius Chlorus.

64

In Praise of Cities and of Men

[12] Consequently—and given that the whole city is so attentive to it—philosophy dwells among you, both foreign-born and native philosophy. Like a good bee from undefiled meadows making honey, it feeds on the whole city. Now it buzzes in the theaters and through its personal efforts unites you to the Academy and to Ariston’s son [Plato]; then it fills the souls of the young with the whole of virtue, just as they say that Pythagoras did when he was fortifying Italy against the Lyceum.73 [13] When poets were building Athena’s ship the Argo, the first vessel and the one that opened up your shores, they favored it, I think, with a divine cargo; for this vessel, which alone was the work of Athena, had to be rowed by heroes.74 Like the Argo, you too, [Constantinople], have a divine crew—not the crew of a single trireme, but that of a whole city. The nature of this cargo of yours is such that from beginning to end it is made pure by the gods. [14] And where in the chorus shall we place [i.e., the prefect] of this city? Clearly in first place. Think, for comparison, of a circular shield: whatever point you touch along the edge that runs around it is regarded as the first. Thus it is clearly quite essential that he who will sit at the rudders of the city be a master helmsman. If a city is small, then a man who is a counterfeit governor and uninitiated in the art of governing is only a small danger; for any damage he does, minimized by the city’s fortune, is hidden from general view. But I think that a city of high rank needs a person of high rank to steer such a great sea of a city. Let the city’s helmsman be gentle (h[pioˇ), to use Homer’s word, so that he may have this paternal designation that comes to him. Let him be mild in his words but quick in his actions so that he will not give offense by shouting but will be seen in action before people even expect any action to be taken. Let him build up the city, but only if its inhabitants rejoice in his projects and are not distressed by their cost; for if the city rejoices in his projects, it will not have the feeling that any money is being spent. Let him deepen the harbors and surround them with porticoes,

73. “philosophy dwells among you”: cf. Them. Orat. 6.84a; Demeg. Constantii 21a: “all men from everywhere have unanimously conceded that [Constantinople] is supreme in philosophy”—both passages in contexts that implicitly and explicitly, respectively, praise the efforts of the Constantinopolitan philosopher Themistius. “Pythagoras . . . Lyceum”: i.e., Pythagoras’s philosophical efforts in southern Italy rivaled Athenian philosophy and learning, which “Lyceum” stands for. 74. For the role of Athena in the building of the Argo, see Apoll. Rhod. Argon. 1.18–19, 110–11, 526–27; Apollod. Bibl. 1.9.16. For the Argo as the first ship, Jessen, “Argo 1,” RE 2 (1896): 722–23; Herter, RhM 91 (1942): 244–49. The Argo “opened up” the site of Constantinople by sailing from the Aegean into the Black Sea.

In Praise of Cities and of Men

65

which are a welcome relief for sailors from their toils at sea. Let him build temples to the gods; may he propitiate the higher powers and make them friendly to the city. Let him extend the portico whose royal character is confirmed, I think, by its beauty and size.75 Let him shun unjust gain because of an inclination to be just, not out of fear of the laws; for the latter motivation is a mark of cowardice, whereas the former is a mark of temperance. [15] It is reasonable to expect that he will be properly motivated if he is of noble birth, has been raised with a proper education and exposure to good literature, has plenty of royal standards to guide him, has so great an emperor as a witness to virtue, and receives the honor of office as a reward for his justice and not for a payment of gold. Homer has represented the man of Pylos [i.e., Nestor] as having a sweeter voice than the other speakers at Troy. But this [urban prefect of ours], who holds such a great office, governs such a great city, and keeps the whole senate subject to his scepter, has a voice sweeter than honey, whomever he talks to. Thus he clearly outdoes Nestor, because, however much he is outdone by Nestor in age, he is superior to him in the charm of his eloquence.76 [16] Well, I have yielded to my love of the city, and I see that my words are leaping without restraint around their beloved. I fear that, if they stay here longer, they may suddenly end up suffering from forgetfulness, as if among some Lotus-eaters. So let me, let me now skillfully corral them in and set my eyes on the emperor. And let my love [of the city] be stirred up once again, [on another occasion], by all the arrows it wants to be the target of.77 [cods. R and B, with passages also in Exc. Neapol. and Lex. Lopad.]

75. “this paternal designation”: The point is that Homer uses h[pioˇ to describe a father (Il. 24.770, Od. 2.47, 2.234, 5.12, 15.152; cf. Od. 14.138–41). Indeed in Orat. 48.32 Himerius describes another official with the full Homeric phrase path;r d jw}ˇ h[pioˇ h\en. For the “royal” portico, see Janin, Constantinople, 91–92. 76. “not for a payment of gold”: cf. Them. Orat. 31.353b– c, with reference to his own Constantinopolitan prefecture of 384. For old Nestor’s eloquence, see Hom. Il. 1.247–52. “senate subject to his scepter”: For the urban prefect as head of the senate, see Dagron, Naissance, 230–31, 283; cf. Chastagnol, La préfecture urbaine, 68–69. For the view that the urban prefect praised in this oration is Themistius, see p. 45 above. 77. The Lotus-eaters gave lotus to Odysseus’s men, which caused them to want to remain with their hosts and to forget about the task of getting back home (Hom. Od. 9.82ff.). “And let my love [of the city]” etc.: au\qiˇ de; pavnta ei\nai toi¸ ˇ ejrw¸ sin, o{sa kai; bouvlontai kaq j eJautw¸ n bevlh kuklwvsasqai. Wernsdorff translates: “Alio rursus tempore cuncta amoris tela, quaequnque expetetis, in vos effusius vibrare licet” (and similarly Dübner and Völker). He understands toi¸ ˇ ejrw¸ sin to mean the city, Himerius’s beloved, or the city’s love of Himerius. I understand it to mean Himerius’s love of the city, as in the first sentence of this paragraph. “arrows”: of Eros (Cupid).

chapter 3

In and Around Himerius’s School

Many of Himerius’s orations illustrate various features of the daily life of his school. Arrivals and departures of students (and of Himerius himself ) were often noted in the orations. Pieces on arrivals and departures are collected in chapter 4. Orations bearing on various other school issues are gathered here.1 Two of the orations presented here, 34 and 35, concern the recruitment of new students. Oration 34 is addressed to the physician and comes Arcadius, who is considering enrolling his son in Himerius’s school. Himerius approves of the care Arcadius is taking in selecting a teacher for his son: many fathers “risk their dearest charges on a toss of the dice,” but Arcadius is showing the concern (and discrimination) that Peleus did in selecting Chiron as Achilles’ teacher. Himerius tells two stories that apply to the situation at hand. First, in a chronologically impossible story, he recalls that Solon, although already well-seasoned in wisdom, improved himself even more by attending the plays of Aeschylus upon returning to Athens after traveling around the world. Solon was accompanied by his son when he saw Aeschylus’s plays. Next, Himerius notes that Democedes, already famous as a physician and having practiced in

1. Actually, several orations in this chapter do touch on arrivals and departures, but only in passing: Orat. 44.1–2, 61.4, 69.8–9. Orat. 35 greets students who have defected from other sophists, but I place it in this chapter as illustrative of one way by which students were recruited.

66

In and Around Himerius’s School

67

Persia, returned to Greece to soak up the wisdom of Pythagoras, valuing it more highly than the wealth of the Persian court. Solon, his son, and Aeschylus are analogues of Arcadius, his son, and Himerius respectively. Arcadius’s son was probably present when Himerius delivered this oration before Arcadius. Himerius remarks that Aeschylus was “still young” when Solon attended his plays; this may (or may not) mean that Himerius still regarded himself as young when he delivered Oration 34. The second story, which parallels Democedes and Pythagoras to Arcadius and Himerius, is especially appropriate, since both Democedes and Arcadius were physicians. These historical analogies flatter both Arcadius and Himerius himself. As both the opening scholion and the opening lines of Oration 34 indicate, Arcadius had already got a taste of Himerius’s eloquence, having heard him deliver an epithalamium. But Oration 34 courts Arcadius directly. Not all fathers of potential pupils would have been so courted and honored. But Arcadius was no ordinary father; he had been awarded the imperial title comes. If courting the fathers of potential students was one way of augmenting class size, another way was to receive the disaffected students of other sophists. The young man mentioned in the opening scholion of Oration 26 (see chapter 4), “who had become [Himerius’s] pupil and was attending his school against the wishes of his parents,” may have been one such student. Oration 35 is addressed to just such a group of students. They have left other sophists and have transferred to Himerius’s school. He welcomes them. Comparing himself to Socrates, he notes that some of Socrates’ own students—among them, apparently, Plato himself—had consorted with lesser teachers before finding a true master. Oration 35, though, is not exclusively concerned with the circumstances that led its addressees to Himerius. Himerius goes on to give the newly enrolled students a lecture on the importance of stylistic variety (poikiliva). The point is made by noting the universality of variety (resourcefulness, versatility) in every human and natural sphere—beginning with Plato’s “multifaceted learning.” What to make of the remains of the lacunose Oration 29 is not immediately obvious. It is addressed to “Privatus, the Teacher of the Proconsul Ampelius’s Son.” Ampelius was proconsular governor of Achaia (Greece) in the years 359–360.2 Oration 31 (see chapter 7) is the

2. PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Ampelius 3.”

68

In and Around Himerius’s School

propemptic speech that Himerius delivered at the end of Ampelius’s proconsulship. I am assuming that Ampelius’s son was with his father in Greece during the latter’s proconsulship; Athens itself may have been where the boy was studying under Privatus, unless it was the administrative capital, Corinth.3 What survives of Oration 29 consists of three historical vignettes. They are clearly intended as analogues to the situation at hand, although the points of comparison are not made explicit. We first have a picture of Anacharsis the Scythian, drawn, in his love of wisdom, to Athens. At Athens “he immediately became Attic in speech and gave up the Scythian language,” immersing himself in all of the city’s cultural riches and seeking instruction from Solon. Anacharsis is an analogue of Privatus, whom the title of Oration 29 describes as a Roman, ROmaios, perhaps meaning that he is from the city of Rome (or at least from Italy?).4 Privatus must have transplanted himself from Italy to Greece, where he taught Greek literature, just as Anacharsis had come from Scythia to Greece. We next get a picture of the Samian Polycrates as a youth eager to learn lyric poetry. His father supports that eagerness by arranging for Anacreon to teach his son, and “the boy worked hard on the lyre to achieve kingly virtue.” We are to think here of Ampelius encouraging his son’s education. Finally, we get a laudatory picture of Achilles’ teacher Phoenix, an analogue to Privatus, the teacher of Ampelius’s son.5 Why these flattering representations of Privatus? Privatus is said in the title of Oration 29 to be Ampelius’s son’s teacher (paideuvonta). Wernsdorff speculated, in his opening remarks on the oration, that Privatus was the boy’s pedagogue. Perhaps, instead, he was the boy’s secondary teacher or “grammarian.” Himerius might have been hoping to recruit Ampelius’s son when the latter was ready to leave Privatus for advanced rhetorical study, and Privatus may already have directed students to Himerius.6 If this reconstruction is correct, then we may group Oration 29 with 34 and 35, all concerned in one way or another with recruitment. Two of the orations presented here, 61 and 69, mark the recom-

3. Note the opening scholion of Orat. 33. 4. Cf. Magdalino’s comments on the implications of the Byzantine name ROmaios in Cameron, Fifty Years of Prosopography, 49–50. 5. I am in accord with Wernsdorff in my understanding of the analogies. Völker (Himerios, 227 n. 18) thinks that Himerius sees himself in Solon, Anacreon, and Phoenix. 6. For the “channeling” of students from grammarian to sophist, see Kaster, Guardians of Language, 133, 202.

In and Around Himerius’s School

69

mencement of studies after a break. Oration 61 was perhaps delivered at the beginning of the regular academic year, “the season for eloquence” (61.1). Himerius makes the simple point that celebrating the commencement of his students’ studies by giving a display of eloquence is appropriate, because it is precisely eloquence that they are hoping to acquire in his school. He acknowledges two individuals in the audience who have come from abroad: the one, a visitor, who apparently had once been Himerius’s classmate; the other, a student from Pamphylia. He tells the student a story that suggests that his study at Athens will redound to the glory of his homeland. The opening scholion of Oration 69 informs us that it was delivered “after [Himerius’s] wound healed, when studies were [re]commencing.” The oration begins by asserting that “[i]t is time to open the lecture hall . . . , since the Muses are giving eloquence its season.” We may be at the regular beginning of the academic year or of a segment of it, which on this occasion followed closely on Himerius’s recovery from a wound. Sections 3–4 can only mean that Himerius was a victim of academic violence7— or, as he puts it, of “envy’s fight against eloquence” (69.2). We know from Libanius how dangerous the life of a fourth-century professor at Athens could be (Orat. 1.85). One sophist there was assaulted and had his face rubbed in the dirt. Another was seized and taken to a well; he would have been thrown in had he not agreed to leave the city. Besides commenting on his wound and his readiness now to resume teaching, Himerius offers special greetings to some recently arrived students from Asia Minor and Egypt, apologizing for his tardiness in doing this (69.1, 8–9). There is also some general advice for all his students: apply yourselves to your studies, and do not be distracted by amusements and pleasures.8 Oration 44 was delivered to honor the birthday of an eJtai¸roˇ, which I take to mean “a student” and not merely “a friend.” The individual is in Athens, presumably studying under Himerius, and had come there from Egypt, whose wonders Himerius praises in this oration. In implicitly comparing himself and the addressee of Oration 44 to Xenophon and Cyrus the Younger respectively, Himerius says that Xenophon “provided Cyrus

7. Cf. Wernsdorff’s opening remarks on this oration; Walden, Universities, 313–14; Norman, Libanius’ Autobiography, 153; Völker, Himerios, 352 n. 2 8. For student laziness and distraction, see Liban. Orat. 1.5; 3.6, 10–14; 34.10–12; 43.10; 62.6, 19; id. Ep. 175.4, 666.2 Foerster; Walden, Universities, 319ff.

70

In and Around Himerius’s School

with an excellent arena in which to be schooled” (44.6); Himerius will have done the same for the addressee of Oration 44. Menander Rhetor (2.8) gives instructions for the composition of a birthday speech, and in the piece under discussion we can see Himerius following one of Menander’s instructions, to praise the season of the year in which the honoree was born. But Himerius does not write the full encomium recommended by Menander. This is because Oration 44 is only a short lalia. Himerius explicitly acknowledges that he is speaking briefly and promises that he will say more about the honoree at some future time. In addition to the expected praise of the individual whose birthday is being celebrated, including the assertion that he is greater than a mere mortal, we also find that Himerius does not let the occasion pass without underscoring the importance and excellence of his own oratory, despite some obligatory self-deprecation. In a comparison of himself to Odysseus (44.1–2), he can see even this short birthday talk as “a memorial of himself,” worth an investment of effort even though he is on the verge of leaving Athens for his native Prusias. Although in one passage he tells the honoree that “you outstrip my eloquence by your resources of character” (44.7), in another he invites a comparison of his “modest Muse” to the wonders of Egypt. Finally, the comparison of himself to Xenophon in section 6 includes the detail that Xenophon “outdid swarms of bees in his eloquence,” inviting the hearer or reader to assume the same for Himerius himself. In their in loco parentis role, sophists must have often got involved in one way or another when their students became ill. Libanius mentions attending to sick students as a routine part of his activities. The Athenian sophist Prohaeresius intervened on behalf of the health of Eunapius, his student-to-be, before even meeting him: Eunapius was still regaining his strength after an illness that had struck him on the sea voyage to Athens, so Prohaeresius asked his students to be gentle with the new recruit during his hazing.9 In Oration 45 Himerius is celebrating the recovery of an eJtai¸roˇ from illness. It is clear from section 3 of this talk (lalia) that the eJtai¸roˇ in question was Himerius’s “head student” or student leader. His recovery will have demanded notice more pressingly than that of an ordinary student. The opening scholion to this talk notes that it “includes a treatment of envy,” a theme that is illustrated mythologically (45.4). What is meant here is the envy of fortune, which strikes at and brings down

9. Liban. Orat. 36.8; Eunap. Vitae phil. et soph. 10.2 [486] Giangrande.

In and Around Himerius’s School

71

those who prosper, although in this case Himerius can rejoice in the fact that the student has recovered from the misfortune that had struck him. Three pieces presented here, Orations 16, 65, and 66, are concerned with student disorders. Oration 66 is addressed to students (foithtw¸ n) who, in some way, have been rebellious or unbridled (ajfhniav zein). Himerius tells them an Aesopic story about Apollo and the Muses. Apollo was leading the Muses in a chorus of music and dance when a group of nymphs showed up and joined them. But these nymphs, who “may have been utterly wicked . . . , leaped to the sound of the music . . . in disaccord with Apollo’s lyre” (66.2). Apollo got angry at them but refrained from shooting at them with his arrows; instead, he “change[d] from a gentle to a harsh melody” (66.4). A personified Mt. Helicon also protests against the nymphs, urging them to give up their self-destructive madness, which, in fact, they show signs of doing. The point of the story is transparent enough. The nymphs represent Himerius’s rebellious students. Apollo’s refraining from shooting at the nymphs represents Himerius’s rejection of the use of physical punishment, a policy he announces explicitly in Oration 54.2; Himerius rebukes the students only verbally.10 And the signs that the nymphs are reforming represent Himerius’s hopes that his rebellious students will do the same. This is an appropriate place to note the lost oration “To the Followers of Quintianus, Who Had Been Disorderly Auditors When [Himerius] Was Speaking Extempore” (Orat. 67 Colonna). The title alone survives, in Photius’s Himerian bibliography. It has been assumed that Quintianus was a rhetor.11 He may actually have been one of Himerius’s own students, the ringleader of a group of students who misbehaved in class. The title of Oration 16 describes the occasion of the speech with the words ejpi; th¸/ kata; th;n diatribh;n stavsei. The word stavsiˇ is also used in section 5, and the word e[riˇ (strife) in section 1. I translate the phrase in the title as “when discord arose within his school.” It is possible, though, that it means “when discord [between his own students and those of another sophist] arose within his school.”12 Eunapius describes the fighting between Julianus’s and Apsines’ students as intestine war, ejmfuvlion 10. On sophists’ use of physical punishment, see Walden, Universities, 324–25; Marrou, History of Education, 272–73; Festugière, Antioche, 111–12; Booth, EMC 17 (1973): 107–14. Libanius eventually came to feel that it was counterproductive (Orat. 58.1). 11. By Colonna; cf. Völker, ad loc.; also PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Quintianus 1.” “Quintianus” (Kuntianovn) is Colonna’s emendation of the transmitted Kutianovn. 12. Cf. Liban. Ep. 715.3: “In my view [Athenian teachers] are forming soldiers rather than orators, and I saw many boys who bore scars from their wounds in the Lyceum” (trans. S. Bradbury).

72

In and Around Himerius’s School

povlemon (Vitae phil. et soph. 9.2.2 [483] Giangrande); from one perspective, all students in Athens belonged to a single category, and all conflict between them was “civil war.” In any case, the excerpts surviving from Oration 16 give no details on the nature of the strife that Himerius was facing. What they stress is his belief that his oratory could quell that strife. His words will have the same power that Helen’s words had on her sorrowing guests, that Timotheus’s music had on Alexander the Great. They will be as calming as the Zephyr on the ocean, as eloquent as Alcibiades’ words. “Won’t an Attic rhetor with his Greek eloquence put an end to discord merely by expressing himself?” (16.5). Our Oration 65 must be an excerpt from something longer. If my explanation of the allusions in section 3 is correct, it was delivered, presumably in Athens, early in Julian’s reign, before Himerius left to join the emperor. Here we do seem to be dealing with a conflict between Himerius’s students and those of another sophist. The situation is illustrated metaphorically in section 1: Agamemnon gathers together his army, lamenting the physical wounds they have suffered from their opponents; he was made sadder still by the absence of Achilles, “the very leader of the Greeks,” due to the latter’s psychological wound. We are to understand that Himerius has gathered his students and is lamenting the fact that some of them were wounded in a conflict with the students of another sophist and are therefore absent: the title is “To Those Involved a Conflict”—the Greek actually says “the conflict,” th¸/ sumplhgavdi —“and Absent from a Lecture.” Probably one of the absentees is Himerius’s head student, the analogue to Achilles.13 In section 2, Himerius applauds the general who “rejoices with soldiers when they are winning and grieves with them when they are not doing well”—therefore, we infer, the sophist should do the same with his students. But the sympathetic tone quickly changes: the injured students who are absent from class are retarding the performance of the class as a whole. “We enjoy listening to cicadas, but only when all of them produce their summer song together.” Himerius can sympathize with his students’ wounds, but he must urge them to get over the disruptive incident and return to class as soon as possible. It will be noted that, in Colonna’s judgment, the alternate title of this oration, a title that appears in Photius’s Himerian bibliography, is “A Rebuke of 13. Cf. Greco, Prometheus 24 (1998): 270. Note that Wernsdorff in his opening remarks on this oration infers that it was directed “maxime in nobiliorem quendam discipulum”— for “nobiliorem quendam discipulum” I would say the head student. For the physical violence of student fights and their description in military language, see Liban. Orat. 1.19, 21; id. Ep. 715.2–3; Eunap. Vitae phil. et soph. 9.2.1–2 [483].

In and Around Himerius’s School

73

Those Who Are Carelessly Following His Course of Instruction [i.e., by nonattendance].” Oration 21 (included in chapter 4, because it seems to have been concerned primarily with the arrival of a new student, Severus) also addressed itself to some sort of student conflict. The version of its title preserved in Photius’s Himerian bibliography refers to a sumplhgavdi that Severus had turned his attention to or come upon, sumplhgavdi being the same word that we find in the title of Oration 65.14 In the fragments of Oration 21 Himerius reminds Severus that “Achilles . . . did not forget his lyre even while battles were going on” (21.1), apparently making the point that Severus likewise should not neglect rhetoric because of the student conflict. Himerius also remarks, in another fragment (21.2), that Athena and Poseidon did not use violence in their strife over Athens, apparently urging Severus to imitate them in this regard. “Choruses of Muses and Apollo play in soft meadows,” says Oration 21.3; perhaps the point here was to differentiate meadows from battlefields. Finally, the remains of five orations on a variety of themes (13.1–5; 19; 22; 68; and 74) are also included here. Two, 13.1–5 and 68, are referred to in their titles as “protreptic” orations;15 Oration 74 advertises its protreptic intentions by its use of the word protrevpei in section 1. In Orations 19.10 and 68.8, 11, Himerius clearly identifies his audience as students by addressing them as his “boys” (pai¸ deˇ); in 68.11 they are said to have “tossed [their] books aside.” We can be fairly confident that an oration arguing that “one must always be in [rhetorical] training”— namely, 74—was addressed to a student audience. The remains of Oration 13.1–5 give no indication of who the audience was. The one surviving excerpt from Oration 22 gives no hint of its theme, let alone its audience. Although the title of Oration 13.1–5 does not announce its theme, it is clear from the first three excerpts what it must have been. Himerius here urged that his listeners take advantage of opportunity (kairovˇ), that they act “in season,” “at the right time.” If, as is likely, he was addressing his students, he may have been telling them specifically to take advantage of their years of study and not to waste their time on trivial pursuits (cf. Orat. 69.7). The title of Oration 19 does announce its theme: “Fine Things Are

14. See my note on the title of Oration 21. 15. Orat. 68 is called a “protreptic [talk]” in codex R and a protrophv in the version of its title in Photius’s Himerian bibliography.

74

In and Around Himerius’s School

Rare Things.” We value highly—in this case, Himerius’s oratory—what we do not see or experience regularly, what we are deprived of for stretches of time (cf. Him. Orat. 30 [20ff.]). Conversely, “familiarity breeds satiety” (19.8, 10). Himerius speaks of the arrogance of satiety, in a kind of personification of the fact of overexposure to something, an overexposure that is full of itself. How to understand excerpts 1–5 of Oration 19 is not immediately apparent. Excerpts 1, 4, and 5 are preserved, in that precise order, in Photius (cod. 243). Excerpts 2 and 3 survive in the Excerpta Neapolitana; Colonna placed them between 1 and 4. In these short fragments Himerius remarks that the Persians are always preoccupied with their bows and arrows; these weapons of theirs are always present, even when they are feasting. Excerpt 4 says, “I praise the custom. It is a fitting test of industriousness.” Excerpt 5 affirms the oration’s theme: “For it is proper that things held in honor be rare.” Himerius is praising the Persians’ skill with and constant focus on their bows and arrows. This focus must be the “custom” to which he refers; he approves of their industrious application to these weapons. The further point, made in the lost text, presumably was that Persian skill in archery was highly regarded precisely because it was not common.16 Oration 68 announces itself, in its title, as a protreptic that encourages “variety,” poikiliva, in oratory, a theme also found in the protreptic Oration 35. Himerius presents himself at the beginning of Oration 68 as God’s rhetorical gift to Athens, who came there to relieve the city’s oratorical “drought”; if his “boys” really believe this, they will take his advice very seriously indeed. The argument proceeds, as it does in Oration 35, by noting the ubiquity of variety. We might have assumed from the title that Himerius implies that variety can be achieved simply by using all the existing rhetorical devices. That assumption is doubtless not incorrect. Yet the one specific injunction Himerius gives urges that one should (also) achieve variety through innovation: we should “refuse always to be satisfied with the ancient models and instead . . . keep coming up with new works of art to fashion” (68.3). Himerius practiced what he preached here in Oration 10 (see chapter 4), in which he apparently sees himself innovating by composing a propemptic oration that consists largely of an imaginary dialogue. “The treatment we give to common themes,” he explains in that oration’s protheOria, “is what makes them our own.” 16. Cf. Völker on Him. Orat. 19.5.

In and Around Himerius’s School

75

At the end of Oration 68 Himerius mentions that his students have constructed some sort of makeshift auditorium for him. He cleverly links this activity of theirs to the main theme of the oration by pointing out that in turning from study to construction they have already opted for (a kind of ) variety. But they should not neglect their studies too long. They should imitate Amphion, who combined lyre-playing ( = oratory) with wall-building. They will thus be displaying variety of activity and, if they follow the advice of this oration, the literary/rhetorical variety that it advocates as well. Finally, Oration 74 is on a theme that is very appropriate for students: that one must always be in training, that practice makes perfect. The opening scholion notes that this talk was delivered in the summer.17 That may have a direct relevance to the theme: that one should not let even the heat of summer put an end to rhetorical training. It was in that spirit that Libanius urged his student Calycius to use the summer to review and refresh what he had already learned before resuming studies under him in the next academic year (Ep. 379.5, 9). Himerius’s oration on the theme “That One Should Certainly Not Announce Lectures Publicly” (73 Colonna) is lost. We know of it from Photius’s Himerian bibliography. The title probably refers to lectures that were intended only for the ears of Himerius’s students. The orations included in this chapter and the next reveal how frequently Himerius chose to orate formally before his students. Whether or not the situation was inherently ceremonial and readily invited an oration (e.g., a birthday, the opening of the academic year or a segment of it, arrivals or leave-takings), all the pieces are concerned with “real-life” issues of the school.18 They should thus be differentiated from the orations on fictitious themes (in chapter 6) that the sophist gave to model those central academic exercises for his students. For them, of course, school life was real life; the sophist’s orating on the daily business of the school reinforced the idea that eloquence had practical uses in communal life. His communicating in the school through formal oratory rather than informally gave all the more examples of accomplished eloquence and reinforced, in its many references to the canonical authors and the Greek past, the classical encyclopedia that those aspiring to the highest level of culture needed to master.

17. I note that both Wernsdorff (ad loc.) and Keil (Hermes 42 [1907]: 556) questioned the textual soundness of the phrase “in the summer” (ejn qerinai¸ ˇ). 18. Cf. Liban. Orat. 3, 34, and 58, all on various issues in the life of the school.

76

In and Around Himerius’s School

translations 13.1–5. From Another Protreptic Oration19 [1] Lysippus, you know, was clever of mind as well as of hand. He used his mind to create such daring works of art. He enrolled Opportunity (Kairovn) among the gods, then made a statue of him and explained his nature by how he represented him. To the best of my memory, this is what the statue looks like. Lysippus represents Opportunity as a boy of graceful form, at the peak of adolescence. He has hair on his temples and forehead, but, from there back, he is hairless. He is armed with iron in his right hand and is extending his left hand toward a balance. His ankles are winged, not to be lifted way up above the ground into the air, but so that, while appearing to touch the ground, he may escape notice as he stealthily desists from resting on the ground. 20 [2] Glaucus, waylaying, as I think, the very opportuneness (to; kaivrion) of the contest, in which the prize was a crown, just showed up and was the first to get the crown. 21 [3] For everything is good in season (ejn kairw/¸), and the archer who knows how to shoot his arrows at the right time (kaivria) is the one who hits his mark. 19. “From Another Protreptic Oration” is the title of these excerpts in Phot. Bibl. cod. 243. Colonna regards the three fragments from the Excerpta Neapolitana under the title “To the Newly Arrived Followers of Poseidon” (13.6–8)—with “Poseidon” emended to “Piso” from the uncorrupted version of this title that appears in Photius’s Himerian bibliography—as part of Oration 13. I keep them separate and place them in chapter 4. There is nothing in their content that argues that they should be joined with 13.1–5. Colonna’s joining of 13.1–5 and 13.6–8—which, of course, might be right—results from his desire to keep the order of the titles in Photius’s Himerian bibliography (Bibl. cod. 165) as well aligned as possible with the order of the excerpts in Phot. Bibl. cod. 243. 20. For the statue by Lysippus, sculptor of the fourth century b.c. from Sicyon, see esp. Anth. Plan. 275 and Callistr. Stat. descript. 6; also Pollitt, Art, 53–54; Stewart, Greek Sculpture, 1: 187–88; P. Moreno, “Kairos,” LIMC 5, 1 (1990): 920–26. The youthful beauty of Opportunity/ Time teaches that “beauty is always opportune and that Opportunity is the only artificer of beauty” (Callistr., trans. A. Fairbanks). One can grab Opportunity by the hair as he approaches, but not after he has passed by. “iron”: i.e, the razor with which he was equipped. “extending . . . balance”: zugw¸/ th;n laia;n ejpevconta. The Greek cannot mean “holding a balance in his left hand,” pace Pollitt, Moreno, and Völker (ad loc.). The participle must mean either “extending toward” or “resting on.” Opportunity’s winged feet denote his swiftness. He stands on tiptoe because he is always running (Anth. Plan. 275) 21. Glaucus was a famous Greek athlete of old (Kirchner, “Glaukos 33,” RE 7, 1 [1910]: 1417). Colonna reads the transmitted h|ke . . . movnoˇ, “was the only one who showed up”; I adopt Dübner’s emendation h|ke . . . movnon, “just showed up.” A contest consisting of one contestant is hardly a contest. Rather Glaucus, sensing his opportunity (e.g., knowing ahead of time that the other contestants would be easy to beat), merely had to show up to win.

In and Around Himerius’s School

77

[4] Nightingales fly from earth into the sky; for myth dares to lift birds up into the sky itself because of their song. 22 [5] So they came to the swan, which was in a vernal meadow and just about to surrender its wings to the Zephyr and to sing. 23 [Exc. Phot.] 16. From the Extempore Oration Given When Discord Arose within His School [1] What drug is there in my words, my friends, that is capable of stilling strife? Does my rhetorical skill aim at achieving the kind of dazzling result that Homer hints at through Helen’s mixing bowl, which that daughter of Zeus sets up in Menelaus’s palace for guests who were overcome by tears? Isn’t it true that Helen’s drug was not an herb, that she did not have an Egyptian’s ability to prepare a drink that would banish sorrow? Rather, her remedy was sweet and all-wise speech, which, like a drug, is able to extinguish emotions that swell up from the depths of the heart. [2] Homer’s poem puts the story [of Helen’s acquisition of the drug] in distant Egypt in order to hint at the fact that that land is the mother of wise words. 24 [3] Once the king [Alexander the Great] was having rather base thoughts. Timotheus would not allow this; instead, by means of his music he lifted Alexander’s mind heavenwards. [4] The king’s anger intensified beyond the point of moderation; Timotheus came to his side and removed the excess of emotion through his melodies. The king was disheartened; Timotheus immediately made him smile. Alexander surrendered himself to pleasures, but you would have seen him turn serious immediately after hearing Timotheus’s music. In a word, one could see

22. As Wernsdorff suggested, “to lift . . . into the sky” is probably meant figuratively (i.e., “to praise”) as well as literally here. 23. For the swan’s song being caused by the wind, see Him. Orat. 63.3, with my note. 24. Himerius is referring here to Hom. Od. 4.219–32. In that passage, Helen, daughter of Zeus and wife of Menelaus, is stilling the tears of her guests Telemachus and Nestor’s son Pisistratus by means of a drug that she mixed with wine. Homer says that an Egyptian woman gave drugs to Helen; Himerius understands this to have taken place in Egypt (cf. Hdt. 2.116; Philostr. Vita Apoll. 7.22; see Clader, Helen, 39). For Himerius’s view that it was Helen’s words, not a drug, that soothed her guests, cf. Plut. Quaest. conv. 614c; Macrob. Sat. 7.1.18–19. For the renowned wisdom of Egypt, mentioned also in Him. Orat. 34 [25–27] and 48.8, cf., e.g., Hdt. 2.160; Joseph. Ant. Jud. 8.42; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 3.180 Lenz-Behr, 26.73 Keil; Aelian De nat. animal. 12.7; ps.-Callisth. Hist. Alex. Magni 1.1.1 Kroll.

78

In and Around Himerius’s School

that king take on whatever mood Timotheus caused in him through his piping. 25 [5] The Zephyr calms the ocean’s waves with its breezes. Won’t an Attic rhetor with his Greek eloquence put an end to discord merely by expressing himself? [6] Xenophon went on military campaign, for he had taken up the spear after associating with Socrates. 26 [7] For what is of good natural disposition is well-tempered. [8] Alcibiades lived a voluptuous life when among the Athenians. In Lacedaemon he was grave. He alone outdid the Persians in luxury. But whenever he had to think out a speech and exercise himself in philosophy, he would turn everything into a Lyceum and an Academy through his conversations. 27 [9] They, working hard on an account of these men [10] We shall be so advanced in wisdom 28 [Exc. Phot. (1–9), Exc. Neapol. (several lines of 4 and 10)] 19. Fine Things Are Rare Things From the oration he gave on the occasion when, having been asked to give an oratorical display (ejpivdeixin), he held off for a while and then spoke. 25. On the aulete Timotheus and the effect of his music on Alexander, see Chares of Mytilene in Athen. 12.538f; Chrysippus in Athen. 13.565a; Dio Chrys. Orat. 1.1–8; Him. Orat. 12.1; Suda A 1122 Adler. Dio Chrysostom believes that Alexander was affected by Timotheus’s music more because of Alexander’s temperament than because of the music’s power. Expecting his own oratory to be compared to the music of a piper, he insists on the superiority of the former to the latter. Himerius too is making some sort of comparison in this part of Orat. 16 between music and eloquence, but not necessarily to the detriment of the former. 26. After associating with Socrates, Xenophon took up the hoplite’s spear and became a mercenary for Cyrus, claimant to the Persian throne (Anderson, Xenophon, 20–33, 73–80). 27. “lived a voluptuous life”: aJbrovˇ, precisely the word used of Alcibiades by the anonymous comic poet quoted in Athen. 13.574d (Adesp. frag. 3 Kock); see Gribble, Alcibiades, 69–79. On Alcibiades’ ability to assume the way of life of those among whom he found himself outside of Athens, cf. Satyrus of Callatis in Athen. 12.534b; Corn. Nepos Alcib. 11; Plut. Alcib. 23.3–6, Quomodo adulator 52e; Aelian Var. hist. 4.15; Jul. Orat. 1.13b – c; Gribble, esp. 26–27, 35–36. Plutarch, Aelian, and Julian do not regard this as an admirable trait. For Alcibiades’ skill in speaking, see Corn. Nep. Alcib. 1.2; Plut. Alcib. 10.3–4, 16.4; in the passage under discussion, Himerius adds a reference to philosophy, thinking of Alcibiades’ association with Socrates. “a Lyceum and an Academy”: i.e., a school of philosophy. 28. Cf. Pl. Euthyd. 294e.

In and Around Himerius’s School

79

[1] The Persians busy themselves with the bow, and their whole life consists of the quiver and arrows.29 [2] Whenever he [a Persian] is feasting, arrows will not be lying far from the mixing-bowl; and, in a word, their bows are weapons for them if they have to fight and ornaments when they are at peace. [3] The [Persian] king himself trains in the use of the bow.30 [4] I praise the custom. It is a fitting test of industriousness. [5] For it is proper that things held in honor be rare. 31 [6] Nature knew this law before the Persians [did]. A person would never have thought seeing the ocean to be something worthwhile, unless he had embraced the ends of the earth after fleeing from its middle regions. What repute would the pyramids have, if they were not a spectacle far removed from us? What repute would the stone statue of Memnon among the Ethiopians have, if his mother [Eos] had not placed it, too, inland beyond the view of most people? It is because of the statue’s location that we believe what they say about it to be true and not a mere myth—namely, that, once it has come into contact with the sun, it sounds forth and speaks like a human being.32 [7] Nature also gives human beings the rose bit by bit. It does not spring up and blossom all at once; rather it remains inside of its bud during much of its prime, emerging and breaking forth only after a long period [of concealment]. Nor can people gather the harvest whenever they want to; if you want apples or wish to pluck ripe figs, you must wait for the harvest season, which takes its very name from the word for harvest.33

[8] Time hated the bronze gong at Dodona because it resounded endlessly, and so it reduced the device to mere story.34 For familiarity has the power to breed a sense of satiety and, by its overbearingness, to sully what is available to us.

29. For Persian skill with the bow, see, e.g., Aesch. Pers. 86; Hdt. 1.136. 30. Guida, reexamining the Excerpta Neapolitana, which preserve this fragment, corrects the misreported reading oujde; basileuvˇ to oJ de; basileuvˇ (in Bianchetti, POIKILMA, 590). He notes that Aeschylus (Pers. 556) calls the Persian king toxarch. 31. For my understanding of excerpts 1–5, see p. 74 above. 32. “Nature knew this law”: i.e., that “fine things are rare things.” “seeing the ocean”: Himerius is alluding to the belief in an outer ocean that surrounds the inhabited world. For the statue of Memnon, cf. Him. Orat. 62.1, with my note. 33. “Gather the harvest” is ojpwriv zein. O j pwvra is “fruits,” “harvest,” or “late summer/ autumn.” 34. On the gong of Dodona, which was proverbial for loquacity, see Cook, JHS 22 (1902]): 5–28. When Himerius says that the gong has been reduced to mere story, he presumably means that it no longer exists.

80

In and Around Himerius’s School

[9] The sun, too, often annoys us because we get too much of it. [10] When we live on land, we seek the sea; conversely, when sailing, we look around for fields of grain. The seaman thinks that the farmer is lucky, and the man at the plow has the opposite view: he believes that it is the sailor who is happy. This is all the sport of satiety. Familiarity breeds satiety. Let us flee from satiety, my boys. In its arrogance it often shoots its arrows even at lovers. I heard this once in a proverb.35 [2, 3, 9 exclusively in Exc. Neapol.; 1, 4–8, 10 in Exc. Phot., with some of these sections also, wholly or partly, in Exc. Neapol.] 22. From a Talk (Laliav) Whenever the Muses dance together on Mt. Helicon, everything is filled with sound for me. The cicada sounds forth and, in its song, calls to mind a tale: “I,” as it says, “was always singing when I was a human being; and when I gave up one nature for another, I did not abandon my desire to sing along with a particular form of life.”36 The race of nightingales and that of swallows, as well as groups of swans, dance together around the goddesses [i.e, the Muses]. [Exc. Phot.] 29. To the Roman Privatus, the Teacher of the Proconsul Ampelius’s Son37 Desire for the Eleusinian fire even led Anacharsis the Scythian to the mysteries. This Anacharsis was wise and a lover of virtue. Although he was Scythian both in outer appearance and in what he had tasted of eloquence, he immediately became Attic in speech and gave up the Scythian language; that is how remarkably well his disposition overcame what had been customary for him and how effectively his love of virtue transcended an35. The notion that satiety breeds arrogance (or “overbearingness,” section 8) became proverbial (Theogn. 153; Solon in Arist. Ath. pol. 12.2; CPG 1: 308, 2: 218). “I heard . . . in a proverb”: The proverb speaks of arrogance destroying love (Liban. Ep. 801.1, 922.1 Foerster). Himerius means the arrogance of satiety. 36. Himerius is referring to the story of the old Tithonus’s transformation into a cicada (Davies and Kathirithamby, Greek Insects, 126–27). Eustathius (on Hom. Il 11.1) links the cicada’s vocalism specifically to Tithonus’s numerous petitions to be freed from his decrepit old age. I suggest a lacuna before the last sentence of this excerpt. 37. For Ampelius, see p. 67 above.

In and Around Himerius’s School

81

cestral habit. He also busied himself attending to the rest of the Athenians’ marvels—their handiwork, their language, their crafts, their learning, and their laws [10]. Nothing escaped this lover of learning, not a [single Athenian] street, holy precinct, or story. . . . gave, and he came to know about how Poseidon contended for it. . . . {He learned about the olive branch} that prevailed, and the wave that resounded on the crest [of the Acropolis], just as . . . causes . . . to make noise.38 {. . . Then Anacharsis went} to Solon—for Solon’s fame had reached him, the belief that [Solon] . . . {could} speak like someone divinely inspired. What gave him this {fame}, I think, was. . . . When he was inside [Solon’s] house, Anacharsis . . . the story . . . [Solon] was bringing [Anacharsis], enamored [of his wisdom] up to that point, back to a Scythian mentality, and he summoned him . . . , {although?} previously {he} often {. . . him} to poetry [20], so that Anacharsis too might. . . . and to tell some other stories, by which one might better. . . . Polycrates was a youth. This is the Polycrates who [subsequently] was not only king of Samos, but also of the whole Hellenic [Aegean] sea, by which the land [of Asia Minor] is bounded. Anyway, this Polycrates loved the music and songs of Rhodes and persuaded his father to support him in his love of music. His father sent for the lyric poet Anacreon and gave him to his son to teach him what he desired to learn. Under Anacreon the boy worked hard on the lyre to achieve kingly virtue, and he would fulfill the Homeric prayer [30] for his father by becoming better [than everyone else] in all respects.39 38. For Anacharsis’s interest in things Greek, his visit to Athens, and, in the next paragraph, his relationship with Solon, see Plut. Solon 5; Lucian Scyth. 1, 3–4, 6–8; Diog. Laert. 1.101–3, 105. Lucian’s Anacharsis is a dialogue between Anacharsis and Solon. Also note Ep. Anachars. 1, 2, 10. “Eleusinian fire”: cf. Him. Orat. 60.4, with my note. According to Lucian Scyth. 8, Anacharsis was initiated in the [Eleusinian] mysteries. For Athena’s and Poseidon’s contention for Athens, see Him. Orat 6.7, 21.2. They made an olive tree and seawater appear, respectively, on the Acropolis as tokens of their claim to the land. 39. This problematic paragraph is Anacreon no. 491 in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 2: 134. See Barron, CQ 14 (1964): 219–23, with the literature cited there; Sisti, QUCC 2 (1966): 96–99; West, CQ 20 (1970): 207–8. “by which the land [of Asia Minor] is bounded”: Campbell suggests that this is a quotation from Anacreon (cf. Barron, 222). “the music . . . of Rhodes”: This phrase is troublesome, despite Colonna’s attempt, ad loc., to make sense of it by citing Athen. 8.360a. To read the Greek to mean “this Polycrates of Rhodes loved music and song” is also troublesome. For a solution that entails the conjectural deletion of the reference to Rhodes, see Labarbe, AC 31 (1962): 186 n. 125. “the Homeric prayer”: Il. 6.476–79. “for his father”: I have deleted “Polycrates” after “father.” Colonna accepts codex R’s tw¸/ patri; Polukravtei (against the Excerpta Neapolitana’s tw¸/ patri; Polukravthˇ), which would mean that Himerius believed that the name of the father of the young Polycrates of this passage, the famous Herodotean tyrant, was also Polycrates (instead of Aeaces). This is precisely the tradition we find in Suda I 80 Adler, where “Polycrates, father of the tyrant”—read oJ Polukravthˇ tou¸ turavnnou pathvr —surely

82

In and Around Himerius’s School

And Homer marvels at Achilles’ teacher Phoenix for teaching the young man how to act and speak when Achilles was in Thessaly—for it was there, in company with Achilles, that Phoenix taught him virtue— and for being everything to him in loco parentis when Achilles was at Troy, for he was with him there, too.40 Thus this hero became so great in deeds and words that he was almost solely responsible for the making of Homer’s great poem [the Iliad]. [cod. R, with passages also in Exc. Phot. and Exc. Neapol.] 34. To Arcadius, the Physician and Comes [Himerius] addressed these words to Arcadius the {physician and comes} . . . Arcadius happened to have previously heard [Himerius’s] epithalamium; and wanting {to put him to the test [as a possible teacher for his son]?} . . . , to which [Himerius] addressed himself.41 . . . {Why} don’t we give {him} a taste of our own {lyre}? Why don’t we show him our own armed Muse, under whose aegis {we undertake} to initiate. . . . For [our Muse] just now gave an account of young people playing around the bedroom and outdoing the grace of poets with their charms. But now we are faced with another contest, another racecourse, and a Muses’ precinct open to holy initiates. For the unhallowed set their sights on a vulgar initiation . . . {and on initiators} who will show {them the unsanctified instead of?} the holy. But the soul brought up with every kind of learning [10] {desires}, like . . . , to seek out {the Muses’ fonts} so that it may draw from them to its fill.42 Now many fathers, {misled} by the number {of sophists}, risk their means “Polycrates, father of the famous tyrant of the same name” (cf. Barron, 223). But Guida (in Benedetti and Grandolini, Studi, 394–98) reexamined codex R and reports that its reading is actually Polukravtou. His suggestion, which I adopt, is that Polukravtou/ Polukravthˇ in line 30 is an intrusive gloss. On this reconstruction, there is no reference to the name of the famous Polycrates’ father in Himerius. 40. See Hom. Il. 9.434–605. “how to act and speak”: cf. Il. 9.443. 41. “wanting {to put him to the test}”: Colonna suggests boulovmenoˇ dok{ei¸ n}. Perhaps instead dok{imav zein}. 42. “our own armed Muse”: perhaps “armed” (i.e., with their instruments) like Athena, in whose city Himerius teaches. “an account of young people” etc.: a reference to the epithalamium mentioned in the opening scholion. “open to holy initiates”: While Himerius himself will initiate a new student in rhetoric in his school (“a Muses’ precinct”), the new student must already be initiated enough in learning so that he is ready to benefit from Himerius’s teaching. Other sophists give a vulgar initiation, but Himerius offers the Muses’ fonts.

In and Around Himerius’s School

83

dearest charges on a toss of the dice; and, as you might expect, they are very quickly punished for their ignorance through what befalls their children. {Peleus?} . . . , and likewise he was the one who procured for his son [Achilles a teacher who would have] such great authority over him, since he trusted no one but himself [in this matter]. . . . There were many Centaurs at the time of Chiron. Peleus, though, sent his son, not to any of the others, but to Chiron. Some Athenians at Athens initiated {their sons?} in . . . as well as in [the mysteries of ] Eleusis and Demeter, but the father [20] . . . sent {his son?} to Athens to participate in these rites [here].43 I want to tell a story that applies to the business at hand. They say that Solon, who was a lover of wisdom, traveled around the whole world, always hunting down some bit of wisdom. He came to Lydia, was also seen by the Ionians after being among the Lydians, and then went on to the land of the Egyptians—and what wisdom did he not learn among them, what excellent learning did he not bring to the Greeks from there? When he reached the Greeks, he found Aeschylus. The latter was still young; and, after Thespis and those who produced tragedy before Thespis, he was just then lifting [tragic] poetry way up off the ground [30], so that he would be able to address the spectators from on high. Solon marveled at tragedy and often went, along with his son, to see Aeschylus’s plays, so that the two of them might learn the tragic stories from those plays.44 They also say that, when Democedes, that famous man of Croton and

43. “risk . . . dice”: cf. Pl. Protag. 313e; Jul. Orat. 9.190b Rochefort. “{Peleus?} . . . over him”: For th¸ ˇ toiauvthˇ hJgemonivaˇ e[mporoˇ tw¸/ paidi; givnetai (“he was the one . . . such great authority”) Wernsdorff and Dübner have “per se ducendi filii sui negotiationem exercuit.” Wernsdorff suggested that the lost subject of this sentence is Nestor, the son being Antilochus. But Himerius may already be talking about Peleus and Achilles. “Some Athenians” etc.: The end of the paragraph is too lacunose to make any certain sense of it. Choice of cult seems to be used here as a metaphor for choice of teacher. “the father”: whose father? 44. “I want to tell a story”: actually, two stories, one about Solon and one about Democedes. Both show adults still interested in learning and discriminating—as Arcadius will be in sending his son to Himerius. Democedes was a physician, as is Arcadius. Solon actually went to Egypt before going to Lydia (Hdt. 1.29–30; Plut. Solon 26–27; Diog. Laert. 1.50–51). The more basic problem with the story of this paragraph, however, is that Solon was dead before Aeschylus was even born! “tragedy before Thespis”: cf. [Pl.] Minos 321a; Suda Q 282 Adler. “just then lifting . . . the ground”: If this is not meant metaphorically, it applies better to an elevated stage (cf. Hor. Ars poet. 279) than to high buskins (cf. Hor. Ars poet. 280; Philostr. Vitae soph. 492, Vita Apoll. 6.11; Them. Orat. 26.316d). See Lai’s discussion of Himerius’s story about Solon and Aeschylus in AION 20 (1998): 179–88; Greco’s comments on Him. Orat. 8.4 (on Aeschylus), in her forthcoming edition of that oration.

84

In and Around Himerius’s School

the first to bring Greek medicine to barbarians, went to hear Pythagoras after he had been to Susa and among the Medes, he marveled more at the bliss of Pythagoras’s wisdom than at the [Persian] king’s wealth.45 [cod. R, with passages also in Exc. Phot. and Exc. Neapol.] 35. From a Protreptic Oration Addressed to the Students Who Came Over [to Him] 46 A protreptic oration addressed to the students who came over to him [i.e., Himerius] from other sophists and on the question of [stylistic] variety. . . . . . . {we see them now?} looking closely at my rites. So where were these young men initiated in [the mysteries of ] the Muses? Why {didn’t they from the first enter} the open {doors of my school}? Well, then, let us lead these initiates forth now; let us show them the mystic fire now.47 But before . . . I want to sing a preliminary song. Let this song be a sacred image that explains to them where the [true academic] home of young men is to be found . . . {In the past} it took some time for people in Athens to find the Lyceum and to begin their studies with Socrates [10]. They were busying themselves here and there {with study} . . . but [still] were not tasting true learning and philosophy. When by good fortune, like . . . , they looked upon Socrates’ philosophy, they threw away all other instruction and, like . . . , gave themselves over to his teachings. So just as when, on the stage, engineers position {cranes for a change in the action}, one could observe how those men too, after beginning to associate with Socrates, {were changed} . . . in their lives, their learning, and quite simply in every way. He who had a high-spirited soul came to be called courageous by tempering his emotions with reason. He who led a luxurious life achieved self-control by moderating his nature [20]. By removing the mist from his soul he acquired a different kind of sophistication and . . . {learned} 45. For Democedes in Persia and his return to Croton, see Hdt. 3.129–37. Democedes a Pythagorean: Iambl. Vita Pyth. 35 [257, 261]. Cf. Him. Orat. 64.2. “to barbarians”: I read the variant para; barbavrouˇ instead of para; barbavroiˇ. 46. This is the title in the Photian excerpts and Photius’s Himerian bibliography, except that in the former “protreptic” has been corrupted to “propemptic.” The longer scholion below the title, which begins with the same words as the title, is from codex R and contains a 16-space lacuna. 47. For the “mystic fire,” cf. Him. Orat. 60.4, 69.7.

In and Around Himerius’s School

85

to honor his oath and to reverence the gods. For what person who had learned to swear by a dog or a plane tree would not subsequently have become much more piously cautious when swearing by the gods? And it was only after Alcibiades left the sophists that he filled the whole world with his trophies.48 It was at that time that {Plato} rightly learned to love . . . , and {he . . .} Philolaus, who appears as a genuine lover [of knowledge] in Socrates’ conversations [Pl. Phaedo 61d] . . . {not?} only the theaters, but also wrestling-schools and byways and drinking-parties . . . and it was not his habit to be very concerned with astronomical phenomena [30], as was the case with other [philosophers] . . . {But just as} musicians, by giving expression to their skills on a whole range of instruments, entice every one of their listeners by [appealing to] the appropriate part of their souls, so too did [Plato] capture every ear that heard him . . . {by offering} a multifaceted learning.49 That the sophist Orpheus perhaps also had a similar talent {is hinted at} in the stories about him . . . [Myth] gathers for him an audience of every kind of creature, I think, to hear him play the lyre, convinced that his resourcefulness and versatility {would enchant} his listeners. And Homer, in his admiration of Odysseus, has made clear the many sides of Odysseus’s skillfulness [40] by means of one utterance: “Tell me, O Muse, of a resourceful man” [Od. 1.1]. For lack of versatility creates a dryness in everything. {Wise men have even found a multiformity in} the laws of nature. For

48. Lyceum: Socrates in the Lyceum: Pl. Euthyphro 2a, Lys. 203a–b, Euthyd. 271a, 303b. “engineers . . . cranes”: The reference is to the deus ex machina, who resolves a difficulty in the play’s action. “by removing the mist”: a metaphor of Homeric origin (Hom. Il. 5.127; Pl. Alc. II 150d–e; Them. Orat. 21.247d, 22.267d). “a different kind of sophistication”: eJtevran sofivan, i.e., true wisdom. “to honor his oath” etc.: For the transmitted oi\kon (household) I accept Wernsdorff’s conjecture o{rkon (oath). I understand “to honor his oath and to reverence the gods” to mean “to honor an oath sworn by the gods.” People learned to swear by a dog or a plane tree from Socrates. The point seems to be that, if a person had learned to swear by a dog or a plane tree to avoid too lightly invoking the Greek gods, then, when he did swear by the gods, he certainly would have kept his word. See CPG 1: 152–53; scholion to Pl. Apol. 22a. “Alcibiades left the sophists”: What is implied is “and associated with Socrates.” 49. It seems clear that this lacunose paragraph is referring to Plato. There is apparently a reference to his abandoning theaters, wrestling-schools, byways, drinking-parties— and the pre-Socratic Philolaus—for Socrates. This is in line with the theme of the previous paragraph. For Plato’s early interest in writing and staging tragedies and in wrestling, see Diog. Laert. 3.4–5; Aelian Var. hist. 2.30; Him. Orat. 48.21; Riginos, Platonica, 41–51. For Plato’s connection with Philolaus (and the charge that he plagiarized from him), see Riginos, 62–63, 170–74; Huffman, Philolaus, 4–5, 12–14. “Philolaus . . . conversations”: I follow Völker’s understanding of this passage.

86

In and Around Himerius’s School

they divide time into a variety of seasons, and they divide . . . the motion of the heavens. They traditionally separate the soul into three parts, and this whole universe . . . of various elements. {Even} the governor of this whole universe in the heavens, who the leading wise men declare {is called} either Apollo or the Sun, {is multifaceted} . . . , he who delights the choruses of human beings as he appears to them in {various} forms. If you desire a musical lyre, {his tunes} sound forth (?) nearby. {If some} ailment {plagues you}, the Paean Apollo is at hand. If the earthly medium is weary, the song sent [to him by Apollo] is not weary [50]. If {you want to see} the heavenly torch [i.e., the sun] . . . , he favors everyone with it. (But I suspect that the Cimmerians, a dejected people who do not have the sun and live in a [perpetual] night, have actually come to hate the sun they have never seen.)50 The meadow owes its sweetness to the fact that it teems with every kind of flower, and it is the necklace {graced by} a beauty gathered {from stones of various kinds} that is valued. Why do people marvel at the peacock more than at other birds? Isn’t this because peacocks are so variegated in their coloring. . . . And Sybaris is famous because of the variety of its cuisine. The sea, too, varies its nature and takes on many forms. It becomes wine-colored when it flattens out the waves into a calm surface, but it takes on a dark look when it is stirred up and provoked by the winds [60]. At one time it . . . with white foam, {at another time} it surges . . . Don’t we marvel at Alcinous’s royal palace and the Phaeacian gardens because {in their hospitality . . .}? Homer’s {poem} allows their land, through a variety of blessings, to have the fruits of all the seasons in one season and to enjoy the horn of Amaltheia. {Their land} has been honored . . . by those who perhaps {regard} those blessings, too, to be a metaphor for eloquence. For what gift more beautiful than eloquence could fortune have given the human race? {It is varied}, as was Socrates’ voice, and so was Homer’s poetry, Pythagoras’s music, Herodotus’s history, and {Mt. Helicon’s sounds, for to Mt. Helicon} the Muses brought {all} kinds of instruments from everywhere and made the sound of all of them the valley’s lyre [70] . . . {and} because of Socrates {men?} imitated the [Muses’?] rite.51 50. “three parts [of the soul]”: i.e., reason, spirit (qumovˇ), and appetite, according to Plato. Apollo’s roles as Sun, musician, healer, and prophet are well-known. The Cimmerians live in perpetual darkness (Hom. Od. 11.13–19). 51. Sybaris: The variety of its cuisine was part of its generally luxurious style of living (Diod. Sic. 8.18.1; Athen. 12.518c–21d; Aelian Var. hist. 1.19). “the fruits of all the seasons in one season”: see Hom. Od. 7.117–18. “the horn of Amaltheia”: i.e., the horn of

In and Around Himerius’s School

87

But, as [I] have said, it is time to light the fire.52 [cod. R, with passages also in Exc. Phot. and Exc. Neapol.] 44. On the Birthday of His Students A talk (laliav ) on the birthday of his students, which [Himerius] presented when about to depart for his fatherland [Prusias]. [1] Although Homer’s Odysseus was longing for his fatherland and the memory of his kin, Alcinous the game-master induced him to display his prowess in return for the hospitality shown to him. The festivities were a public event; the sport was being dedicated to the gods; and in the midst of everything were all the Phaeacians, clad in white. Now Odysseus was present only in body, because yearning for the land that had reared him was taking hold of his mind. Still, he did not shrink from the competition, preparing himself to perform while the king [Alcinous] was watching him. The explanation of his frame of mind is as follows: although he loved his alone, the inducement he found for [prolonging further] his absence [from his fatherland] when he was thus summoned to action [among the Phaeacians] was that he would be leaving a memorial of himself behind.53 [2] Now, my friends, isn’t my situation the same as that of Odysseus?54 Couldn’t our predicaments be similarly represented? Come, then, let me, with one and the same effort, both celebrate a birthday and make my separation [from home] less painful, as I emulate in word that man of Ithaca, who long ago competed in deed. A display of the voice’s music is similar, I think, to a demonstration of the body’s strength. [3] O most beautiful and revered season of the whole year, in which Demeter and Bacchus, [who represent] the choice products of the land,

plenty (cf., e.g., Athen. 11.497c). “has been honored . . . by those who . . . {regard}”: I propose {lambav }nousi . . . tetivmhtai. 52. “as [I] have said”: cf. the first paragraph of this oration. 53. “longing . . . kin”: patrivda poqou¸ nta kai; tw¸ n oijkeivwn th;n mnhvmhn: With Wernsdorff and Dübner, I assume that a second participle has fallen out after mnhvmhn. “although he loved . . . alone”: For the manuscripts’ filw¸ n th;n monhvn I adopt Wernsdorff’s suggestion filw¸ n th;n movnhn. Himerius is referring in this paragraph to the opening pages of Homer’s Odyssey 8. It was actually Alcinous’s son Laodamas, not Alcinous himself, who induced Odysseus to display his prowess. 54. I.e., Himerius must have been on the verge of leaving Athens for a visit to his native city, Prusias.

88

In and Around Himerius’s School

join together! Demeter has already been working at the threshing-floor and is bringing her work to an end; Bacchus begins before she finishes and causes his gift [the grape] to succeed hers. Hail to these two stewards of life, who have assigned a single time of the year [to their work]! This [young] man of mine belongs in their company, in third place. I am ashamed to refer to him as a mortal, yet I refrain from calling him a god; the latter would subject me to the charge of brazenness, the former would be putting forth a lie. I’ll call him a hero, and I am convinced that I shall thus be able to give him both mortal and divine praise.55 [Young man], your mind takes no delight in pretending that praises that belong to others are yours. [4] You do not have, as a distinguishing mark, the ivory shoulder of the descendants of Pelops. We cannot praise you for the very sharp swiftness of foot that belonged to the descendants of Perseus. Your badge is not the golden knot of hair worn at the top of the head by the descendants of Cecrops. No, what you have is self-respect, grace, and nobility of character.56 [5] Now if you deemed Egypt worthy of your birthday and [yet] are celebrating this pleasant festivity here [in Athens], [at least] hear about what is most excellent in that land. And what would that be? What is it that has adorned that land? You are familiar with the Nile’s love life, for you have heard the sound of his waters and furthermore have seen that marvelous river with your own eyes. You are familiar with the Nile’s consort too, who carries in her womb and brings forth all manner of fruit. The greatest aspect of their relationship is that, when the river recedes, it does not withdraw so much that it cannot still love and be loved by its consort. Also, people have stood to contemplate the size of the pyramids, and they have marveled at Apis, in the form of a bull, as he predicts the future. Meroe’s sound and the din of the Cataracts would often detain travelers by their wondrousness. That marble statue of Memnon, which produces through an inanimate sound an animate utterance, has been regarded as a divinity who salutes the divine Sun.57

55. “This [young] man of mine belongs in their company”: i.e., his birthday occurs when the grain has been harvested and the grape harvest is beginning. “a hero”: Heroes are “midway between divine and human nature” (Him. Orat. 9.10). 56. For the mark of Pelops’s descendants, cf. Jul. Orat. 3.81c Bidez; Them. Orat. 6.77b, 21.250b; Greg. Naz. Orat. 4.70. Perseus’s feet were provided with wings (Ov. Met. 4.614ff.; Apollod. Bibl. 2.4.2–3). For the Athenian-Ionian knot of hair, see Him. Orat. 60.1, with my note. “Golden” refers to the gold cicada-pin that, according to Thuc. 1.6.3, fastened the knot. 57. The Nile’s consort is the land of Egypt; cf. Him. Orat. 9.8. Himerius is referring to the annual receding of the Nile’s floodwaters. On Apis, see Dio Chrys. 15 (32).13; Aelian

In and Around Himerius’s School

89

These are the great excellences of Egypt; these are what adorn your [birthday] celebration. [6] Add to these wonders my modest Muse, if you wish, a Muse that may be pleasing to many but prefers one person alone. Tradition holds that the most sweet-sounding Xenophon, he who outdid swarms of bees in his eloquence and imitated oozing honey in his narrative, did not regard the hero Alcibiades as a friend, even though the son of Cleinias [i.e., Alcibiades] was his classmate and loved [him] alone and had heard Socrates’ teachings together with Xenophon. Tradition also holds that Xenophon was not keen on associating with the magisterial Plato, for he knew that Plato had many friends in his philosophical circle and would transfer his love [from the resourceless] to the wealthy. Xenophon would associate only with Cyrus, and he provided Cyrus with an excellent arena in which to be schooled. I don’t know from my own experience whether Cyrus recognized Xenophon’s worth. But I do find that Cyrus is constantly honored by Xenophon.58 [7] Now, most excellent fellow—for you outstrip my eloquence by your resources of character—do not judge this thank-offering of mine by its length, but rather by its intention; ascribe the weakness of my song solely to the [limited] time I have for it. The men of Andros, a people not unversed in expressing gratitude, once experienced kind fortune from Apollo. When they subsequently wanted to pay the god back, they merely lit a fire, since they had no better sacrifice to make.59 The god was pleased with their manner of thanking him, accepted the fire’s flame alone, and preferred this symbol of their homage to a drink-offering. I, O friends, speak only a few words, but there are greater sentiments within me to De animal. 11.10; Amm. Marc. 22.14.7–8. For the deafening noise of the Cataracts, see Cic. Rep. 6.19; Sen. Quaest. nat. 4A.2.4–5; Plin. HN 6.35 [181–82]; Amm. Marc. 22.15.9. Meroe was between the fifth and sixth Cataracts. For the statue of Memnon, see Him. Orat. 62.1, with my note. It is actually made of a sandstone conglomerate (Blümner, “Basalt,” RE 3 [1899]: 38). 58. “one person alone”: Himerius prefers the person whose birthday is being celebrated, as Xenophon preferred Cyrus. “he who outdid . . . bees”: The Suda X 47 Adler says that he was called “the Attic bee.” “loved [him] alone”: Wernsdorff suggested “loved alone.” With the charge that Plato was attracted by the wealthy, cf. the accusations that he was an avaricious parasite and a glutton (Riginos, Platonica, 70ff.). For tension in Xenophon’s relationship with Plato, see Diog. Laert. 2.57, 3.34; Athen. 11.504e–505b (contrast Aul. Gell. 14.3). “and he provided Cyrus . . . schooled (th¸ ˇ Kuvrou gevgone paideivaˇ kalo;n ejrgasthvrion)”: i.e., by militarily supporting Cyrus the Younger’s rebellion. Literally, “he became an excellent laboratory of Cyrus’s schooling.” The wording makes us think of the Cyropaedia. But the only way to save Himerius from conflating Cyrus the Great and Cyrus the Younger is to suppose that he is referring to the latter from here through the end of the paragraph. 59. Note the anecdote about their penury in Hdt. 8.111.

90

In and Around Himerius’s School

which I am giving birth. I hope to present them to you, [young man], when they are mature and it is the season for them. [cods. R and B, with passages also in Exc. Neapol. and Lex. Lopad.] 45. A Talk (Laliav ) Given upon His Student’s [Recovery of His] Health60 The talk includes a treatment of envy. [1] The swallow opens the theater of its voice after the winter’s cold and does not hide the song produced by its beautiful tongue once it sees that luscious spring has bloomed again. Cicadas sing in the walks once the month hostile to budding passes, the month I have heard poets call “leaf-shedding.”61 [2] Thus it is not unfitting for me to play my appropriate role too and once again to greet those I love with song after they have been ill. What a day that was that recently presented itself to me, when an attack of fever seemed to plague everything! I shared in the suffering, my friends; I got a taste of the disease through my love [of its victim]. I was not physically ill, but my mental suffering was worse than any physical suffering. And I cannot fault my mind for having been in that state [3]; for, as Demosthenes said, when the head is ill, every ailment suddenly befalls you. So too, when the helmsman is ill, the whole ship suffers with him; and when the leader of a chorus lies sick, the chorus remains joyless. So naturally at that time I beheld the sun rather dimly. The Nile seemed to me to be dejected, even though it was in flood. It was as though I had exchanged my present existence for the very dark life of the Cimmerians.62 But now we have dismissed the envy [of fortune], and festivity takes over the future. [4] My friends, I want to tell you a story that has a bearing on what has happened. Dionysus was still young, and the race of “Telchines” 60. “His student” here is to;n eJtai¸ron, which could also be rendered as “his friend.” But see pp. 69–70 above. 61. “walks”: Restore the transmitted drovmoiˇ instead of the conjecture drumoi¸ ˇ; cf. Diog. Laert. 3.7. “poets”: literally, “sons of poets.” For this expression, see LSJ, s.v. pai¸ ˇ I, 3. “leaf-shedding [month]”: fullocovon. See Hes. frag. 240 Rzach; Callim. frag. 260.12 Pfeiffer; Apoll. Rhod. 4.217; Nonnus Dionys. 38.278. 62. “the head”: th¸ ˇ kefalh¸ ˇ, but Himerius is thinking of the head student (see Walden, Universities, 296–97). For “head” applied to persons, see Lampe, Patristic Greek Lex., s.v. kefalhv II B. Himerius is remembering Dem. 2.21, 11.14.

In and Around Himerius’s School

91

sprung up against the god. Bacchus started growing up, and all the Titans were bursting with envy. Finally, not able to contain themselves, they wanted to tear the god apart. They prepared snares and readied drugs and the stings of slander against him and tried to trick him about who they were. They hated Silenus and Satyrus, I believe, and they called them sorcerers because they pleased Bacchus. So what happened as a result of this? Dionysus lay wounded, I think, and bemoaned the serious blow he had suffered. The vine was dejected, wine was sad, grapes seemed to be crying, and Bacchus’s ankle was not yet in any condition to move. But crying did not win out in the end, nor did victory go to the enemy. For Zeus the overseer had his eye on everything. He got Dionysus back on his feet, as we are told, and let the myths drive the Titans off.63 [cods. R and B, with passages also in Exc. Neapol.] 61. As Studies Began64 [1] Let us honor the season for eloquence with an oration, so that, as if under the auspices of a lyre of the Muses, we may open Hermes’ doors with a song. For if the pipe opens the doors of a bedchamber, if trum-

63. This mythological story “has a bearing on what has happened” because the Titans, whom Himerius metaphorically calls Telchines, malicious and envious figures, in the end did not prevail against Dionysus-Bacchus, just as “the envy [of fortune]” did not prevail against Himerius’s head student; see Lobeck, Aglaophamus, 569n; Herter, “Telchinen,” RE 5A, 1 (1934): 205–7. In the ordinary version of the story, the Titans do, in fact, “tear the god [Dionysus-Bacchus-Zagreus] apart.” See J. Schmidt, “Zagreus,” in Roscher, Ausführl. Lex. 6 (1924–1937): 532ff.; Guthrie, Orpheus, 107ff., 130–33; Burkert, Greek Religion, 297–98. “They prepared snares”: The Titans (or Hera) distracted Dionysus with a mirror and/or toys: Clem. Alex. Protrep. 2.17.2 Mondésert; Arnob. Adv. nat. 5.19; Firmic. Matern. De err. profan. relig. 6.1–5; Nonnus Dionys. 6.173. “tried to trick . . . they were”: ejmelevtwn . . . fuvsewˇ magganeuvmata. They disguised themselves by smearing chalk on their faces: Harpocrat. s.v. ajpomavttwn; Nonnus Dionys. 6.169–70. “they called them sorcerers”: The Titans, who accuse Silenus and Satyrus of binding Dionysus to themselves by magic, were themselves, as “Telchines,” thought of as sorcerers (Herter, RE 5A, 1 [1934]: 205). Silenus was Dionysus’s tutor (Firmic. Matern. De err. profan. relig. 6.1–5). “the vine . . . grapes”: Dionysus, of course, is the wine god. “[Zeus] let the myths drive the Titans off” ( Tita¸ naˇ ejpoive i para; tw¸ n muv qwn ejlauvnesqai) : After the dismemberment of Dionysus-Zagreus, Zeus tortured and killed the Titans (Clem. Alex. Protrep. 2.18.2) or struck them with a thunderbolt (Firmic. Matern. 6.1–5) or struck them with a thunderbolt and hurled them into Tartarus (Arnob. Adv. nat. 5.19). Himerius’s ejlauvnesqai reminds us of Hes. Theog. 820: ajp oj ujranou¸ ejxevlasen Zeuvˇ. (Zeus drove the Titans from heaven into Tartarus after the Titanomachy.) Indeed, Wernsdorff proposed adding ajp j oujranou¸ (“from heaven”) to Himerius’s text. 64. If Colonna is correct in seeing the words eijˇ tou;ˇ eJtaivrouˇ scevdion rJhqevn in Photius’s Himerian bibliography as an alternate title of this oration, then we obtain the additional piece of information that it was delivered extempore.

92

In and Around Himerius’s School

pets go in procession before agonothetes, and if pastoral melodies escort a flock of sheep, then surely, as the season for eloquence begins, it will bid eloquent words honor it.65 [2] Besides, I have often heard from other craftsmen, those who use their hands as well as literary craftsmen, that, before beginning instruction, they create examples of their art for those who come to learn it from them, so that the young may thereby learn the arts more easily. The painter is equipped with a tablet that has just been prepared and is ready to be sketched on. The sculptor displays wax figures and small statues as an introduction to his art. [3] The piper teaches the student of piping by playing a tune on the reed instrument first himself, and the lyre-player teaches the student of the lyre by sounding the instrument himself before the students do. A boy holds onto the rudder with the aid of an old man, and the youth who is learning how to shoot fingers the arrow with the aid of an Indian archer. When birds lead their young out of the nest, don’t they teach them to venture on flying by spreading their own wings? The teacher of eloquence does the same thing so that he may teach the young to venture on speaking by lifting up their souls, just as people get nonswimmers to swim by supporting them with their hands.66 [4] What I am saying is not inappropriate to our present situation. For we have two foreigners in our midst. One of them was a comrade of eloquence long ago and now comes here as an ambassador and agonothete; where the Hellespont runs between Asia and Europe, splitting and separating them with its waves. The other individual is still young; he came here from abroad because he wished to taste of our rites. [5] Come, then, let us tell him a story concerning his own country.67 Before Cimon, the Pamphylians were not genuinely Greeks; they still sided with the Medes and were followers of Xerxes and the Persians. But when Cimon defeated Pamphylia in a double victory, not only was the

65. Hermes is the god of eloquence (cf. Him. Orat. 64.3; Liban. Orat. 11.183, 58.4; Jul. Orat. 11.132a–b Lacombrade; Choric. Orat. 7.49 Foerster-Richtsteig). “opens . . . bedchamber”: apparently at a wedding. 66. “ready to be sketched on”: i.e., by the painter, as an example for students. “the reed instrument”: tw¸/ kalavmw/, referring to the main pipe, made of reed (West, Ancient Greek Music, 86; Mathiesen, Apollo’s Lyre, 183). For Indian archers, see p. 138 n. 95 below. “just as . . . with their hands”: cf. Ael. Aristid. Orat. 3.243 Lenz-Behr. For the thought of this paragraph, cf. Him. Orat. 54.3. 67. “a comrade of eloquence”: He had been Himerius’s classmate? “an ambassador and agonothete”: i.e., advanced enough in eloquence to hold positions of responsibility; meant metaphorically. “his own country”: Pamphylia.

In and Around Himerius’s School

93

Eurymedon celebrated more than the Nile, but the Pamphylians also sided with the Athenians, and our city’s name was extolled even among them.68 [cods. R and B] 65. To Those Involved a Conflict and Absent from a Lecture69 [1] At one point Homer gathers together an assembly, even though Achilles is absent from it; but it is small and sullen, as though, it seems to me, the poet wants to show that he convenes this meeting reluctantly and unwillingly. Consider that spectacle and what the poet thought about it. The king [Agamemnon] was depressed about the current situation and blamed fortune for having caused his whole army to be wounded. Of his soldiers and generals, one showed the effects of a blow to the forehead, another had been struck on the head, one had an injured hand, another had a missile lodged in his leg. So the sight of his army was painful to the king. For the poem shows us that he loved his soldiers very much. He was grieved and made sadder by the fact that the very leader of the Greeks [Achilles] had been forced by a serious wound to remain absent from battle.70 [2] Let us approve of this attitude of the king, my boys; for I do think that, if a person rejoices with soldiers when they are winning and grieves with them when they are not doing well, we can take this as an indication that he has the mind of a general. For a person who accepts an unpleasant performance from dancers is certainly not skilled in [directing] a dance; no one who tolerates ineptness in sailors is skilled in seamanship.71 The lyre does not sound its song if even one string is not prop-

68. For Cimon’s double victory at the Eurymedon River in Pamphylia, see Thuc. 1.100; Diod. Sic. 11.61. The Pamphylians had contributed thirty ships to Xerxes’ fleet (Hdt. 7.91). 69. Colonna (and already Wernsdorff ) regards the title “A Rebuke of Those Who Are Carelessly Following His Course of Instruction (toi¸ ˇ rJaquvmwˇ ajkrowmevnoiˇ tw¸ n lovgwn) [i.e., by nonattendance]” in Photius’s Himerian bibliography as a variant on the title given to this piece by codex R. 70. “Homer gathers together an assembly”: For the ascription to the poet himself of his characters’ actions, cf. Him. Orat. 9.4, with my note. For the content of this paragraph, Wernsdorff directed the reader to the opening of Iliad 9 and to accounts of the wounding of Greeks in 11.250ff. (and 8.323ff.). Greco points also to Iliad 19.40ff., noting that Himerius displays here “una metodologia alquanto libera nell’utilizzo dei dàti fornitigli dal racconto epico” (Prometheus 24 [1998]: 268–70). Achilles’ “serious wound” is the psychological wound that had caused him to withdraw from fighting. 71. “dancers . . . dance”: tw¸ n coreutw¸ n, corou¸. These words can also mean “students” and “class”: LSJ, s.v. coreuthvˇ; Petit, Les étudiants, 21–22. For Himerius’s change of tone here, see p. 72 above.

94

In and Around Himerius’s School

erly tuned. We enjoy listening to cicadas, but only when all of them produce their summer song together. [3] But perhaps this is not the time to continue in a sullen vein. Fortune demands a recantation from me. Come, then, let us put this gloomy talk aside and hymn the gods’ victory. Let us pray that victory may attend [my oration] here. O golden-winged Victory, Victory, daughter of great Zeus, child of a noble father, and lover of laughter—for these are the epithets by which poetry exalts you—be propitious and grant that we may sacrifice to you again, as we have in the past, in celebration of a victory over barbarians.72 [cod. R] 66. An Extempore Speech to Some Students Who Seemed to Be Rebellious [1] Again I shall use story with reference to the present situation. Again I shall call upon Aesop to come and help me. I have found for you, not a Libyan or an Egyptian tale, but one that comes right from the midst of the excellent Phrygians, among whom story first appeared—I found it among the very delights of Aesop—and I want to narrate this tale to all of you.73 [2] When Apollo was tuning his lyre for a song—and it is my belief 72. “the gods’ victory”: Is this a reference to the accession of Julian the Apostate? If so, then the date of the oration must be sometime after Julian’s accession but before Himerius left Athens to join him. Wernsdorff, in his opening remarks on this oration, saw in the word “gods” a reference to holders of imperial power, thinking either of Constantius II and his Caesar Gallus or of Constantius II and his Caesar Julian. “O golden-winged Victory” etc.: Cf. the last two lines of Menander’s Dyscolus (968–69), where Victory (Nike) is also called “child of a noble father” and “lover of laughter.” The same two epithets are applied to Athena in a scholion to Ael. Aristid. Orat. 13.180 Dindorf = 1.322 Lenz-Behr: h}n Dio;ˇ pai¸ da proseipei¸ n eujsebevˇ. There was, in fact, a cult of Athena-Nike. Nike could have come to be thought of as Zeus’s daughter either through her identification with Athena or through her association with Zeus. See Bernert, “Nike 2,” RE 17, 1 (1936): 290–91, 295–96; Gomme and Sandbach on Men. Dysc. 968–69. For Nike’s golden wings, see Ar. Av. 574. “a victory over barbarians”: What is Himerius thinking of here? 73. For geographical categorization of fable, see Theon Progymn. 4 [73] Patillon, with the editor’s note 169. Himerius calls the fable that follows Phrygian because it is from Aesop, whom he believes to have been Phrygian (see sections 4 and 5 below); cf. Aelian Var. hist. 10.5: “This story is Phrygian, for it is from the Phrygian Aesop.” For the tradition that Aesop was Phrygian, see Testimonium 4 in Perry, Aesopica, 1: 215; id., Babrius and Phaedrus, xl–xlii. “among whom fable first appeared”: Himerius presumably means “in the person of Aesop.” If Babrius could say (prol., pt. II) that Aesop was the first to tell fables to the Greeks, Quintilian (5.11.19) and Theon (Progymn. 4 [73] Patillon) insisted that this was not the case. Himerius’s tale is Fab. gr. 432 in Perry, Aesopica, 1: 492.

In and Around Himerius’s School

95

that he is always tuning his lyre, because he is nothing but lyre and word— the Muses came from all directions and stood around him, forming a chorus for the lyre. But another group also showed up as an audience for the song, some Dryad and Hamadryad nymphs. They were mountain spirits, and they may have been utterly wicked. When they expressed a desire to dance with the Muses, they seemed to be goddesses and were regarded as Muses. But when they leaped to the sound of the music in a boorish and sorry way and in disaccord with Apollo’s lyre, he got angry. Why shouldn’t he have got angry when he saw a most unrefined (ajmousotavtou) chorus prancing around? Yet he did not immediately resort to his arrows and quiver.74 [3] Aesop, you see, does not tell the kinds of story about Apollo that Homer dared to tell in the Iliad. Homer often tells lies about the gods in his desire to curry favor with his audience. Consequently, I shall not readily believe that the gods have the characteristics that Homer assigns to them. I shall beg the Homerids to forgive me if I do accept such assertions about the gods. For how would it be possible for me to believe that Apollo, a god and leader of the Muses, always gets as angry as Homer wants him to get, or that he changes his looks in conformity with night, or that he takes hold of his arrows even to shoot a Greek subject [Il. 1.44–52]? Let us refuse to accept such assertions from Homerids and from any other poet who wishes so loosely to tell lies about the gods. Let us believe Aesop instead. [4] Aesop does summon the gods to his tale and lets his reproach ascend to the heavens; but, unlike poets, the Phrygian [Aesop] has no desire to speak arrogantly against the gods. Although he fashions tales, all his remarks and utterances about the gods are such that they have some bit of wisdom cloaked in them. [5] So what does that fashioner of tales do in his story when the chorus gets disorderly? He makes Apollo retune his lyre and change from a gentle to a harsh melody, and he has the god sound the strings with a plectrum rather than with his fingers.75 The mountains, glens, rivers, and birds in Aesop get angry along with Apollo when he is wronged by the nymphs. Helicon itself, as a result of its anguish, is now transformed into a human being, begins to speak, and protests against the nymphs. And let us not consider this feature of the

74. As Himerius does not use physical punishment; see p. 71 above. 75. Using the plectrum instead of the fingers “produces a stronger, sharper sound,” as M. L. West comments in a letter to me of August 19, 1999, a sound that reflects Apollo’s irritation.

96

In and Around Himerius’s School

story to be audacious. For if Helicon knows how to make poets out of shepherds—and we certainly believe Hesiod in this—then it is not right for us to be annoyed at the Phrygian [Aesop] for making a mountain speak.76 [6] What, then, does Helicon say to the nymphs in the story? “Nymphs, where are you going? What is this grievous sting that has driven you mad? Why, having turned your backs on Helicon, the Muses’ workplace, do you hasten to Cithaeron? There are misfortunes and troubles on Cithaeron, and the praises of Cithaeron are a source of tragedy. I make poets out of shepherds, but Cithaeron turns those who are sound of mind into crazed beings. There a mother rages against her child, and family wages war on family; but here one finds offspring of the Muses and gardens of Mnemosyne and nourishment for [Mnemosyne’s] progeny.77 So they dance and sport with Apollo now, and of course they always accompany him as he sings. But as for your ailment, I fear that it may become part of theatrical repertoire and the preface to a sad tragedy for you. “[7] But why all this talk? The nymphs are quickly anticipating the end of my speech. One of them there is right next to the god, another will soon be so, and yet another will become a devotee of this chorus before long. For the spell of Apollo’s lyre is overwhelming, and in its delightfulness it outdoes every charm of Aphrodite.” This is what Helicon says in Aesop. Whether this story has any bearing on the present situation is for all of you to surmise. [cod. R] 76. “if Helicon knows”: i.e., the Muses of Helicon, sacred to them. See Hes. Theog. 1– 35; Him. Orat. 47.9. Helicon and Cithaeron are personified in Corinna no. 654 in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 4: 26–29; and Philostratus major (Imag. 1.14) describes a painting in which Cithaeron was personified. 77. “crazed beings . . . against her child”: surely a reference to Pentheus’s mother Agave and other Theban women, who, overcome by a Bacchic frenzy, tore Pentheus apart on Cithaeron (Eur. Bacch. 660ff., 1030ff.). “family wages war on family [i.e., kin on kin]” (polemei¸ to; gevnoˇ tw/¸ gevnei) : Himerius could still be referring to Agave’s attack on Pentheus. But Wernsdorff saw a reference here to the conflict between the brothers Eteocles and Polynices. (According to Apollod. Bibl. 3.6.5, Polynices and his companions were at Cithaeron when, through the ambassador Tydeus, they demanded that Eteocles yield Thebes to his brother. When Eteocles refused, war ensued.) The baby Oedipus was exposed on Cithaeron (Soph. Oed. Tyr. 1391–93; Eur. Phoen. 801–5; Apollod. Bibl. 3.5.7). Yet another tragedy that occurred there, according to a number of sources, was Acteon’s being devoured by his dogs: Eur. Bacch. 1290–91; Apollod. Bibl. 3.4.4; Philostr. maj. Imag. 1.14. For Cithaeron as a site of tragedy, cf. Him. Orat. 8.8, 17. “offspring (gonaiv ) of the Muses”: i.e., in a metaphorical sense (song, dance, etc.). Earlier translators understood “homeland” (thus Völker). “Mnemosyne”: the mother of the Muses; see Hes. Theog. 52ff., 915ff., with West’s comment on Theog. 54.

In and Around Himerius’s School

97

68. A Protreptic [Talk] on the Need to Be Favorably Disposed to Variety in One’s Orations [Himerius] delivered this [talk] before the oration that has the title “On the Derisive Remark”78 [1] When I saw the theaters of Attic eloquence so parched, I hastened to relieve the drought with my eloquence, as if with a sudden burst of rain. Each land, you know, produces its distinctive fruits and offspring. Horses point to the Thessalian, long hair to the Celt, a lavish table to the Mede, the laurel to the Delphian, and war to the Spartiate. But the word and man are the fruits of this city [Athens]. [2] When any of those fruits is in decline, we say that the land that produces it is in bad condition. So when eloquence is thriving, it lifts Athens up to the heavens; but when it ceases to be heard, it casts the city back down.79 One can see that this is true from past times. The stage once flourished, and so did the city along with [dramatic] eloquence. The speaker’s platform blossomed with its rhetors, and so did the people’s thinking along with them. The Lyceum abounded in wise men at that time, and all majestic houses everywhere were filled with wisdom. But once the public voice became silent, speaking was almost [entirely] removed to [the private world of ] sailors and slaves.80 [3] Come, then, boys, let us kindle the whole of eloquence, like an in-

78. “this [talk]”: tauvthn implies laliavn or diavlexin. Mras (WS 64 [1949]: 77–78) understood “before the oration . . . ‘On the Derisive Remark’” to mean “immediately before the oration,” and therefore regarded Orat. 68 as that lost oration’s prolalia. This is probably correct, but “before the oration” could mean simply “chronologically prior,” not “immediately prior.” 79. “I hastened” etc.: i.e., by coming to Athens to teach and speak. For Thessalian horses, see Anth. gr. 14.73.2; Them. Orat. 27.335b; schol. to Hom. Il. 2.761–65 Erbse; schol. to Ael. Aristid. Orat. 13.102 Dindorf = 1.25 Lenz-Behr: a[llaˇ me;n ga;r cwvraˇ ejlevfanteˇ; CPG 2: 199 n. 87; Keller, Die antike Tierwelt, 1: 227–28. For the Celts’ long hair, see Strabo 4.4.3 [196]; App. Celt. frag. 8. Hence, “Gallia Comata,” i.e., “long-haired Gaul” (Dio Cass. 46.55.5). A “Median table” is proverbial for luxury: Thuc. 1.130 (“Persian”); Plut. De Alex. fortuna 342a; Synes. De insomn. 13.146c Terzaghi; CPG 1: 275, 2: 38, 527. The laurel (bay) is associated with Delphic Apollo: see Steier, “Lorbeer,” RE 13, 2 (1927): 1439–40; Parke and Wormell, Delphic Oracle, 1: 26; Fontenrose, Delphic Oracle, 215, 224–25, 353. The martial orientation of the classical Spartan state is well-known; Hooker, for example, writes of their “mak[ing] military proficiency the be-all and end-all of their life” (Ancient Spartans, 139). For the appearance of eloquence (“the word”) and of human beings first in Athens/Attica, see Pl. Menex. 237d–e; Isoc. 4.48 (lovgoi), 49 (lovgoˇ); Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.2, 6, 25, 33, 43 Lenz-Behr; Them. Orat. 27.336c– d, 337a. 80. It is not clear to me precisely what Himerius has in mind historically in this paragraph; Völker (Himerios, 347 n. 11) thinks of the post-Demosthenic world of Macedonian domination over Athens. With Colonna and against the earlier editors, I retain the

98

In and Around Himerius’s School

extinguishable fire, and in this fire let us ensure the city’s preservation. This fire would shoot up and illuminate everything, if those who give shape to words would refuse always to be satisfied with the ancient models and instead would keep coming up with new works of art to fashion. [4] For the conception of new works in a sense strengthened the talent of Phidias and the artistry of the other craftsmen whose hands we admire for their skill. Phidias did not always sculpture Zeus. He did not always make bronze statues of Athena armed. He applied his craft to other gods too; and he adorned the maiden [Athena] by letting a blush cover her cheeks, so that he might hide the goddess’s beauty under that blush rather than under a helmet.81 [5] Isn’t art’s purpose the same in the case of Dionysus, whose form the theologians’ sons change into that of a young man?82 The god lets hair grow on his cheeks, and the golden down of a beard spreads over them. For this, I think, is the way in which the beautiful Dionysus had to be adorned; he had to have a beauty whose flowers would blossom together with the beauty of spring. [6] And, with regard to other things, what has the plan of the great craftsman in heaven been? At one time he conceals the sun with clouds and whitens the whole earth and sea with snow. [By this wintry weather] he frightens the sailor and ships on the sea, he drives the cattleman and his animals from the meadows, he makes peace for the hoplite and hides his sword, and he makes the soldier unwarlike. At another time he gives humans spring, the clouds and sent the golden sun. He crowns the earth with flowers, the sky with choruses of stars, and the sea with calm and stillness. After this come ears and sheaves of grain, after ears of grain come fruits and grapes, the bounding winepresser, and the gleaming kindness of autumn.83

transmitted readings basivleia (“majestic houses,” after Colonna’s suggestion “domus illustres”) and to; levgein (“speaking”). There is no eloquence in the speech of sailors and slaves; cf. Him. Orat. 69.6, on sailors. 81. “and he adorned the maiden” etc.: For comment on this passage and debate about the identity of the statue, see Plommer, CR 9 (1959): 206–7; Magi, PP 169 (1976): 324–35; Völker, ad loc. 82. “Isn’t art’s purpose the same”: i.e., in this case, to vary the representation of a god. “theologians’ sons”: The term occurs in Proclus Theol. Plat. 4.12 ad fin. Saffrey-Westerink; In Plat. Parm. 844–45. It means “theologians’ disciples” or simply “theologians”; see LSJ, s.v. pai¸ ˇ I 3; cf. Him. Orat. 37.1, 45.1. Dionysus could be represented as young or old, bearded or unbearded (C. Gasparri and A. Veneri, “Dionysos,” LIMC 3, 1 [1986]: 414, 420–22). 83. “craftsman”: The Greek is sofisthvˇ, which also designates the earthly master of rhetoric. The winepresser “bounds” as he treads the grapes; for the practice, see, e.g., Anacre-

In and Around Himerius’s School

99

[7] Look, if you wish, at that beautiful Homeric meadow that has everything in it, the meadow that the poets call “the shield of Achilles.” Examine the endless banquet on that shield, how many things it offers. One person does battle on it, another sails, one person’s thoughts are fixed on marriage, another’s on the tending of his cattle, someone is busy playing the lyre, someone else makes music flow from his pipe, here a person cuts grain with his sickle, and there someone else works the earth with a golden plough, behind which the soil seems to split open and blackens.84 [8] Let us also, my boys, imitate Apollo’s most clever lyre. How did he tune it? Well, Colophon has his lyre, but his tripods [at Delphi] resound [with his oracular utterances] as well. Furthermore, you will see the waters of the Branchidae helping him issue his oracle; and you will also see the god prophesying in the midst of the Delians’ trees. At one time we honor Apollo as the sun, when, after bathing himself, he drives his horses up out of the ocean and above the earth with his falling hair and blazing fire; at another time we honor him as Dionysus with beautiful hair, when, having put the [sun’s] flame out, he delights in song and dance.85 [9] It seems to me that Proteus was also a sophist, one skilled at elo-

ontea 4.iii.15–16 West; Athen. 5.199a; Anth. gr. 9.403; Greg. Naz. Orat. 45.25 (PG 36.657); Verg. Georg. 2.7–8. 84. For Achilles’ shield and Himerius’s comments on it here, see Hom. Il. 18.478–608. 85. “Apollo’s . . . lyre”: i.e., his oracular voice. The shrine of Claros was near Colophon, that of Didyma (Branchidae) near Miletus. “his tripods resound as well” (trivpodeˇ de; a[llwˇ hjcou¸ sin) : For a[llwˇ, perhaps read a[llwˇ; see LSJ, s.v. a[llwˇ 2. Dübner wanted to emend a[llwˇ to Delfoi¸ ˇ, but a reference to Delphi would have been understood without the specification; according to Apollonius Lex. Homer., s.v. trivpodaˇ, there were so many votive tripods at Delphi that “Delphic tripod” came to mean “votive tripod” in general. “the waters (phgavˇ) of the Branchidae”: apparently the sacred spring. See Fontenrose, Didyma, index s.v. “springs.” In an account of the origins of the prophetic shrine, Callimachus writes of “twin springs”; see Callim. frag. 229.11 Pfeiffer, with the editor’s note. “the Delians’ trees”: Aelian (Var. hist. 5.4) notes “the Delian tradition that the trees which flourish on Delos are the olive and the palm. When Leto took hold of them she immediately gave birth [to Apollo]” (trans. N. G. Wilson). Only a palm tree is mentioned in connection with Apollo’s birth, e.g., by Hymn. Hom. 3.18, 117; Theogn. 5–10; Callim. Hymn. 4.210. Delos and the birth of Apollo (and of Artemis) are associated with the palm and laurel or the palm, laurel, and olive by Euripides (Iph. Taur. 1097–1102, Ion 919–22, Hec. 458–61) and with the palm and olive in Ov. Met. 6.335. “At one time” etc.: For the sun god Apollo as Dionysus, see Macrob. Sat. 1.18, esp. 1.18.8: “a mysterious rule of religion ordains that the sun shall be called Apollo when it is in the upper hemisphere, that is to say, by day, and be held to be Dionysus, or Liber Pater, when it is in the lower hemisphere” (trans. P. V. Davies); Liebeschuetz in Athanassiadi and Frede, Pagan Monotheism, 193. “after bathing . . . the flame out”: Rizzo (RFIC 26 [1898]: 527) saw some hexametrical citations in the Greek text here. “[H]e drives his horses . . . with his falling hair and blazing fire” is Pindar, frag. dub. 356 Snell.

100

In and Around Himerius’s School

quence. When a Momus with his censure-loving tongue verbally harassed him, he used many qualities of style in his response, so that he could thus prove that that Momus’s derisive remarks about him were false. But when Proteus encountered a more skillful sophist [i.e., Homer], he found himself being represented in that sophist’s tale as having the same multiformity that he had managed to achieve stylistically in his response to that Momus. Hence the Homeric Proteus [Od. 4.417–18, 456–58] kindles like a fire, flows like water, roars like a lion, grows tall and flourishes like a tree.86 [10] I want to tell you one of Protagoras’s stories. When nature made human beings and the other animals, almost predisposed as it was to one pattern, it imposed a single shape on the appearance of all creatures. Upon becoming aware of this absence of embellishment, Zeus agreed to send the two heavenly beings—I mean Prometheus and Epimetheus—to help nature. They brought with them, from [the god] who had sent them, mind and perception, also strength and speed. Thus they introduced variety into nature’s pattern, altering it by this diversification of the appearance of what nature had fashioned. Reason received humankind; and the remaining faculties, in a fitting manner, received each of the other kinds of animal, making nature’s beauty motley now by the multiformity of its creatures.87 [11] So, my boys, you, no less than I, have Protagoras’s story to prepare you through its myth to introduce variety into your orations. Actually, you opt for variety even before Protagoras and I do, for yesterday I saw you acting as workmen for your orator [i.e., Himerius], when you tossed your books aside and built this makeshift auditorium for the Muses, an auditorium that is much better than the wall erected against the Lacedaemonians by Demosthenes and the Athenians in Pylos. That wall was built because of the winter, but this auditorium was built because of the desire and yearning of your ears, which longed for a new 86. Proteus a “sophist”: Pl. Euthyd. 288b. “a Momus” (tiˇ . . . mw¸moˇ): On Momus (Blame), who appears as the offspring of Night in Hes. Theog. 214, see W. Kroll, RE 16, 1 (1933): 42; he appears repeatedly in Lucian. “[Proteus] used many qualities of style”: “Qualities of style” is ijdevaˇ, and Himerius is apparently alluding to idea theory, on which see Rutherford, Canons of Style, esp. 6–21. Note Hermog. Id. 1.11 [279] Rabe: “A speech is especially admirable when it is constructed out of opposing types [of style] ( ijdew¸ n) that are well blended together. But such mixing and blending of styles is difficult” (trans. C. W. Wooten). Dionysius of Halicarnassus compares Demosthenes’ stylistic versatility to the metamorphosing Proteus (Dem. 8). 87. Cf. Pl. Protag. 320c–22d, and Them. Orat. 27.338a– d, but all that the three versions have in common is that they deal with Prometheus, Epimetheus, and the creation of living beings.

In and Around Himerius’s School

101

declamation. [12] But turn your gaze away from the walls [of the auditorium] to the tongue, and imitate Amphion, if you will. He applied his hands partly to the wall [of Thebes] and partly to his lyre and spread his country’s fame abroad because he walled Thebes so harmoniously.88 [cod. R] 69. The Discourse (Diavlexiˇ) Delivered after His Wound Healed [Himerius] delivered these remarks after his wound healed, when studies were [re]commencing and he was about to speak for the first time in the very same auditorium. [1] It is time to open the lecture hall, my boys, since the Muses are giving eloquence its season. We must do what they say Hesiod did when he threw away his little pipe in his desire to attend on the Muses with his lyre. And let me first offer hospitality here to those who have come to my school from other lands, so that I may finally pay an old debt. I have not willingly let my tardiness in paying this debt reach this point in time. It is not a pleasant thing when eloquence takes time off, like those collectors of money who customarily seek to retreat from the crowd so that, when they encounter them [later], they will seem more impressive to those who behold them.89 [2] But envy is good at abusing lofty tongues as well as lofty fortunes, and envy’s fight against eloquence is much more intense than its fight against material prosperity. For the lesser boon of material prosperity, although it has often incurred envy, does not provoke it very much; but a lofty and great tongue, I think, shoots at the very center of envy’s heart. [3] So no human being in the whole world envied Sardanapalus, even though he ruled over countless people and, because of the way in which 88. “the wall erected . . . by . . . the Athenians”: See Thuc. 4.4. The Athenians built the wall despite the fact that they did not have the proper tools. Amphion was a lyre-player who walled Thebes. His enchanting music caused the stones to move into place on their own. This preternatural event is what Himerius is alluding to in saying that Amphion walled Thebes “harmoniously” (ejmmelw¸ ˇ). See the frag. of Eur. Antiope 84–89, in Page, Select Papyri, 3: 68–71; Palaephatus Peri; ajpivstwn 41 Festa; Apoll. Rhod. 1.735–41; Paus. 9.5.6–8; Apollod. Bibl. 3.5.5. 89. Hesiod: A reference to Hesiod’s transformation from mere shepherd to poet (Hes. Theog. 22–23). Himerius means that it is now time for serious rhetorical endeavor. “like those collectors of money” etc.: Wernsdorff suggests that Himerius is referring to speakers who charge fees; by occasionally absenting themselves from the public arena they enhance their perceived worth.

102

In and Around Himerius’s School

he decked himself out, was almost thought to be made of pure gold. But insolent envy did not let Palamedes and Orpheus go until it made them victims of an accuser and of madness respectively. [4] And I know that on Homer’s plains many demigods became the playthings and sport of envy: “the son of Tydeus, strong Diomedes, has been hit; Odysseus, famous for his spear, has been hit, and also Agamemnon” [cf. Hom. Il. 11.660–61]. Envy chases the whole phalanx of heroes away from battle through the wounds they suffer. Poetry struck down even the gods themselves, as if it sought to console mortal heroes by pointing out that envy shoots its arrows as far as heaven. Thersites is the only one in Homer who is not injured, for he had nothing by which to annoy envy.90 “But endure, my heart,” said the wise man [Odysseus] after the Cyclopes, the Laestrygonians, and the ocean [Hom. Od. 20.18]. [5] Yet why do I need Odysseus? Why do I need Homer and the Cyclops? Come, in our fight against reproach let us rather seek consolation from the Muses and lyric poetry. Anacreon tuned his lyre after an illness and once again greeted his dear loves in song. Stesichorus also tuned his lyre after his suffering. There is a widespread story that Ibycus fell off his chariot as he was riding from Catana to Himera. Having broken his hand, he did not sing for quite some time but made his lyre a votive gift to Apollo.91 [6] But enough of woes! Enough of pain and disease! Perhaps we cannot say “enough of envy,” though, so long as eloquence soars with its golden wings. Let us speak again, let us lead our chorus again in the midst of envy. Surely the Muses will do what they can to blunt envy’s arrows, for it is they who, like shepherds, tend to eloquence. Now the Muses’ 90. “the lesser boon of material prosperity”: i.e., a lesser thing than eloquence. Sardanapalus: the Assyrian king, remembered for his luxury (Diod. Sic. 2.23). Palamedes and Orpheus: False charges of treason brought by Odysseus against Palamedes led to the latter’s being put to death (Apollod. Epit. 3.8; Hygin. Fab. 105; Serv. on Aen. 2.81; schol. to Eur. Or. 432). Palamedes was credited with (among other things) the introduction of the alphabet (E. Wüst, “Palamedes 1,” RE 18, 2 [1942]: 2505–9) and is associated with logoi and the Muses by Philostratus (Vita Apoll. 4.13). Orpheus was torn apart by mad Maenads or Thracian women or Thracian and Macedonian women (see esp. Ov. Met. 11.1–60; also Conon, FGrH 26 F 1.45; Verg. Georg. 4.520–22; Apollod. Bibl. 1.3.2; Paus. 9.30.5). Persuasive speech was compared to Orpheus’s charming music (Ael. Aristid. Orat. 34.45 Keil; Philostr. Vitae soph. 520; Eunap. Vitae phil. et soph. 23.3.3 [502]). Himerius’s thought now moves from how envy is stirred up by cultural rather than material success to how at Troy it was stirred up by heroes and not by a base fool like Thersites (Hom. Il. 2.248, 258). 91. “Anacreon . . . in song”: Anacreon no. 494 in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 2: 135. Stesichorus’s suffering: probably a reference to his temporary blinding, connected to his slander of Helen (Pl. Phaedr. 243a–b; Isoc. 10.64; Dio Chrys. Orat. 11.40; Lazzeri, SRCG 5 [2002]: 169–74). “There is a widespread story” etc.: Ibycus no. 343 in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 3: 291.

In and Around Himerius’s School

103

trumpets are sounding, the calls of sailors have come to an end, cicadas are breaking off their songs and giving way to the eloquence [of sophists], and nightingales are refraining from their melodious sounds and yielding to sophists. The Nile’s flow is abating, and what for a time was a sea is becoming a river [again]; it is the Muses’ rivers and streams whose waters are rising.92 [7] Come, then, before proceeding to the rites and the shrine, let me tell you what it is right to do and to refrain from doing. Let all initiates and those entering the higher degree of initiation listen. Throw the balls out of your hands. Put all your energy into using your styluses. Put the palaestra’s games behind locked doors, and let the Muses’ workshops be opened. Say good-bye to the streets, and stay at home more and write. Hate the vulgar theater, and give your attention to the better theater [of the school of rhetoric]. Let luxury and the pursuit of pleasure be removed from your labors; show me that you can be austere and can overcome luxury. This is my pronouncement and law—a great deal contained in a few words. Whoever of you listens and obeys will let Iacchus’s song sound to the full; if any of you disobeys and has taken no heed of what I say, I shall conceal from him the [sacred] fire and lock him out of the shrines of eloquence.93 [8] This pronouncement is for everybody, but it is especially directed, my young men, at those of you who are newly initiated and have recently come to me. Of these new students, [Mt.] Argaeus sent one—a mountain at whose foot sprout golden saplings of my family. The peoples and cities of the Galatians sent another, and this is the first “colony” they have dispatched to learn rhetoric [under me]. Some come to the mysteries who live close to the river Caicus; and when this pair leaves us and returns to that river, I think that it will swell with golden waters. [9] Of course, among the initiates there is also a chorus from the Nile. When I

92. “golden wings . . . speak again . . . lead our chorus again”: For the apparent Stesichoran echoes, see Lazzeri, SRCG 5 (2002): 175. “let us lead . . . envy”: Wernsdorff reports that the manuscript reads corhgw¸men ejn tw¸/ fqovnw/ and notes that Reiske would delete ejn. Dübner claims that Wernsdorff added an ejn that does not appear in the manuscript. Colonna has no ejn and no comment in his apparatus. If the manuscript does not have ejn, I would supply it. “the calls of sailors”: i.e., rough speech, as opposed to the sophist’s eloquence (thus Wernsdorff ); cf. Him. Orat. 68.2. “The Nile’s flow” etc.: The abundance of eloquence is replacing the abundance of the Nile’s waters (thus Wernsdorff ). 93. “all initiates . . . higher degree of initiation”: i.e., muvsthˇ (junior initiate) kai; ejpovpthˇ (senior initiate). See Mylonas, Eleusis, 274. “Iacchus’s song”: Himerius is alluding to the procession with the statue of Iacchus from Athens to Eleusis during the celebration of the Eleusinian mysteries (Mylonas, Eleusis, 252–57). “[sacred] fire”: the great fire of the Eleusinian mysteries; see Him. Orat. 35 [6], and 60.4, with my note.

104

In and Around Himerius’s School

have bedecked them with the Muses’ garlands, I shall send them from the Ilissus [River] to Egypt with a lyre, so that, with Attic frenzy, they may hymn the Nile’s sea.94 This is my proclamation, and it has been given by way of a preface. Let me now reveal the sacred [rites] to the initiates both in my actions and in my speech. [cod. R] 74. The Theme [of This Talk] Is That One Must Always Be in Training [Himerius] delivered this [talk] extempore in the summer.95 [1] “Practice makes an endeavor succeed” [Hes. Op. 412]. These are the words of an emulous poet. But suppose that something other than this poet can urge us on, and that I call your attention to it and divulge it.96 Well, so that in this matter we do not put our trust just in the poets, I shall tell you a story about the topic under consideration. [2] Once, during the Pythian Games, Timagenidas announced that he would play the pipe. But before he entered into competition with his

94. “[Mt.] Argaeus . . . [with] saplings of my family”: The manuscript has “[the] Aegaean” (Aijgai¸oˇ), which cannot stand. Wernsdorff conjectured Argai¸ j oˇ. Argaeus is a mountain in Cappadocia, near Caesarea. (I note that Talbert, Barrington Atlas, map 63 E4, also shows an “Arg(ai)os Mons” southwest of the Mt. Argaeus near Caesarea.) But Wernsdorff, wanting to keep Himerius’s family in his native Bithynia, suggested that Argaeus was another name for Bithynian Mt. Arganthoneium (Arganthus, Arganthon[e]), near PrusiasCius, which he believed was Himerius’s native city (Himerii sophistae quae reperiri potuerunt, xl). Nothing, however, prevents us from assuming that Himerius had relatives in Cappadocia. Caicus: The Caicus River, in Asia Minor, flows into the Aegean. Pergamum and Elaea, among other cities, are not far from it. “this pair”: Himerius probably pointed here to two students from the Caicus area in the audience. “I shall send them . . . with a lyre”: after Himerius “plays the lyre,” i.e., gives them a propemptic oration (thus Wernsdorff )? Or “equipped with their own lyre,” i.e., with the ability to be orators themselves? j ˇ oi[stroiˇ. I retain the manThe Ilissus is a river of Athens. “with Attic frenzy”: Attikoi¸ uscript’s reading (literally, “goads”). Cf. Stat. Theb. 1.32–33: “tempus erit, cum Pierio tua fortior oestro / facta canam,” a text that Wernsdorff knew, and see LSJ, s.v. oi\stroˇ II, 3. Wernsdorff’s conjectural emendation seivstroiˇ was accepted by Dübner and Colonna and is retained by Völker. The sistrum was a religious rattle typical of Egypt (Philostr. maj. Imag. 1.5). 95. The opening scholion in codex R refers to this piece in the feminine gender (aujthvn). The version of the title that appears in Photius’s Himerian bibliography explicitly labels it a lalia. 96. “an emulous poet” (filotivmou): The adjective reflects Himerius’s understanding of the quoted Hesiod, Op. 412: the poet “urge[s] us on” to practice, excel, and win glory. “Emulous” also calls to mind the contest of Hesiod and Homer and that Hesiod was the advocate of “good strife” or “rivalry” (Op. 11–26).

In and Around Himerius’s School

105

fellow pipers, he quietly took leave of the crowd to practice solely in the company of his friends. First he practiced a melody on a single pipe, then, blowing more forcefully, on two instruments together. For a while he played a melody, restricting his practice to a prenomic tune; then he played what they call the nome of Athena’s contest [the Panathenaea].97 For practice, you see, cannot fail to spur on and keep improving people’s skills. [3] Thus, a horse is swift at racing, not when he goes from the manger directly to the racecourse, but when he beholds the racecourse after a period of training. An athlete is quickly proclaimed the victor when he willingly subjects himself to training before going to the table. If a person is a soldier, I urge him not to wait for battles to occur, but to practice using his weapons in peacetime, before war breaks out. We see those devoted to agriculture attending to the plow before the setting of the Pleiades and sharpening the sickle before the rising of those goddesses so that, when summer comes, they will be ready to harvest the crops.98 [4] As for those who are devoted to the spoken word, is there anything they should do except constantly to practice composing orations? I once heard a wise man—he was wise, that is, in the art that we pursue— expressing the opinion about the matter under discussion that “speech always comes from speech.”99 [5] The reason why the Attic myth deprives the nightingale of its tongue is that it does not speak incessantly but spends some of its time in silence and some in song. Myth thus calls its melody a lament, berating it, I think, because, although it is of Attic origin, it does not devote itself to singing incessantly. On the other hand, myth says that swans are sacred to Apollo 97. Colonna, after Wernsdorff, emends the manuscript’s “Timagenidas” to “Antigenidas,” the famous Theban piper apparently of the early fourth century b.c. Perhaps that emendation should be adopted; but “Timagenidas” may be Himerius’s own mistake. Pipes (auloi) were normally played two at a time. See West, Ancient Greek Music, 81–82, 103–5, 367; Mathiesen, Apollo’s Lyre, 218–22. (I regret using LSJ’s gloss “flute” for aulos in my Private Orations of Themistius; for the incorrectness of that translation, see West, 1–2, 82–85.) For the nome (nomos), “a specific, nameable melody, or a composition in its melodic aspect, sung or played in a formal setting in which it was conventionally appropriate,” see West, 215–17; Mathiesen, 58–71. 98. For the setting and the rising of the Pleiades as signs indicating that it is a time to plow and sow and to harvest respectively, see Hes. Op. 383–84; Philostr. min. Imag. 10, p. 406 Kayser. 99. The quoted line, an iambic trimeter whose author is unknown, is frag. 514 incertorum poetarum Kock; it apparently became proverbial. Himerius is referring to the teaching of an Athenian sophist named Phrynichus. But if this Phrynichus belongs to the third century, Himerius heard some other “wise man” teaching the Phrynichan doctrine. See Keil, Hermes 42 (1907): 548–51; Greco, Orpheus 15 (1994): 307–9; Heath, Menander, 23.

106

In and Around Himerius’s School

and marvels at their song because they never stop fashioning a hymn of praise to their god through their singing.100 [cod. R] 100. “nightingale”: Himerius seems to be thinking of the myth of Procne and Philomela. There is a version of the myth in which it is Philomela, whose tongue is cut out, who is transformed into a nightingale rather than her sister Procne: see, e.g., Agatharchides in Phot. Bibl. 250.443a; Hygin. Fab. 45; Serv. on Verg. Ecl. 6.78. But Philomela’s tongue is cut out to silence her (e.g., Ov. Met. 6.549–62; Ach. Tat. 5.5; CPG 1: 61; Serv. on Verg. Ecl. 6.78), not because “she does not speak incessantly.” The Procne-Philomela story is one of several versions of an old nightingale story, which are associated with various localities: see Thrämer, “Aëdon 1,” RE 1 (1894): 467–74. In the standard version of the Procne-Philomela story, Procne kills her son, and she and her sister Philomela are turned into a nightingale and a swallow respectively (Apollod. Bibl. 3.14.8) because “the note of these birds is plaintive and like a lamentation” (Paus. 1.41.9, trans. W. H. S. Jones). In a cognate version of the story, a woman named Aëdon (Nightingale) kills her son, is changed into a nightingale, and mourns her dead son (Hom. Od. 19.518–23; Pherecydes Athen., FGrH 3 F 124; Helladius in Phot. Bibl. 279.531a). For the lament of the nightingale, see also Steier, “Luscinia,” RE 13, 2 (1927): 1859–64 passim; Thompson, Glossary of Greek Birds, 20. “she does not devote herself to singing incessantly”: Yet an ancient etymology derives “nightingale” (ajhdwvn) from aje i; a/[dein, “to sing incessantly,” i.e., “both in summer and in winter” ([Athanas.] Lib. de definit. 4 [PG 28.544]). A much more modest ancient assertion is that the nightingale sings incessantly, at a certain season of the year, for fifteen days and nights: Arist. Hist. animal. 8(9).49b [632b20]; Plin. HN 10.43 [81]. For the swan as Apollo’s bird, see Gossen, “Schwan,” RE 2A, 1 (1921): 788; Thompson, Glossary of Greek Birds, 184; and add to the references Pl. Phaedo 85b.

chapter 4

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

Arrivals at and departures from Himerius’s school in Athens were often occasions for oratory. There are enough examples of Himerian oratory associated with such occasions to warrant examining them here as a group. Four of the pieces (11, 30, 63, and 64) concern Himerius’s own comings and goings. The meager remains of Oration 11 are from a “syntactic” or farewell talk that he delivered to his pupils at Athens when he was about to depart for a visit to Corinth. We have a description of a syntactic oration in Menander Rhetor 2.15. One might imagine on the basis of Menander’s comments that in the essentially lost Oration 11 Himerius expressed distress at the thought of being separated from his pupils. He may have explained why he had to go to Corinth, at the same time wondering how he would be received there. He may have praised both Athens and Corinth. He probably prayed both for his pupils in Athens and for a safe voyage for himself. Himerius delivered Orations 30, 63, and 64 upon returning to Athens, 30 upon returning from Corinth—whether this was the same visit that Oration 11 refers to is not clear—and 63 upon returning from a visit to his original homeland, Bithynian Prusias. Oration 64 gives no indication of where he had returned from when he delivered it. In Oration 30 he appropriately stresses the sadness he felt abroad, as he yearned for those

107

108

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

he had left behind in Athens.1 His desire for Athens was like Odysseus’s yearning for Ithaca. But this routine motif is qualified by another thought: his students will appreciate him more now that they have been deprived of him for a while. In Oration 63, on his return from Prusias, Himerius makes the point that, since he has been away from Athens and oratory for “a considerable . . . time,” he needs to practice before speaking publicly. This oration to his students is, then, appropriately a dialexis, a work of limited ambition.2 Himerius wants to deliver a declamation (63.7), but because of his vacation from oratory he is now capable only of a dialexis. He will soon speak before the general public, but now he restricts himself to his home and to an audience of students. This dialexis insists, through a series of comparisons, on the importance of practice before giving a public display of oratory: the oratorical mode that Himerius adopts reflects his own unpracticed state while teaching the importance of practice. In Oration 64.3 Himerius tells his students that “I have met with you here [i.e., in his Athenian school] again for rhetorical purposes after having contended in many great auditoria.” Himerius had been away and, during his absence, had spoken before many large audiences. His return to Athens leads him to comment on the “small auditorium” of his school there, contrasting it with the “great auditoria” in which he had spoken while away. Two points are made: that his students will always highly regard the place where they took their first serious steps, however small it was, and that truly great accomplishments can be carried out in a modest physical setting. Himerius’s absence from Athens has caused him to appreciate the city and his academic quarters there more. Many pieces presented here mark a student’s or student group’s arrival at or departure from Himerius’s school. The arriving students are sometimes referred to as nehvludeˇ, “newly arrived,” which should be the equivalent of “newly enrolled” or “freshmen” (see titles of Orat. 13.6–8, 14, 21, 26, 54, the lost 57 Colonna, and text of 54.3).3 Himerius saw his speeches of welcome as a continuation of the practice of Isocrates, 1. See Men. Rhet. 2.3 [382.31–383.9, 384.28–32]. 2. See p. 9 above. 3. Cf. Lampe, Patristic Greek Lex., s.v. nevhluˇ 1. Olympiodorus of Thebes refers to nehvludeˇ being led to the baths and pushed around in a hazing ritual (frag. 28 Blockley). They are described as a[n te mikroi; a[n te megavloi. I suspect that this means “whether puny or well built”—i.e., the physically impressive students were subjected to the same pushing around as the puny ones. Walden (Universities, 302) translates “large and small” but seems to understand this to mean “young and old” (303n). Blockley (ad loc.) translates “junior and senior” but does not explain what he means by junior and senior newcomers.

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

109

who “always opened up the doors of his royal school to lovers of eloquence by means of an oration” (Orat. 33 [7–9]). He welcomed, on various occasions, the enigmatic “followers of Piso,” presumably a group of students (13.6–8); an Egyptian (14); a group of Cyprians (17); a Cappadocian (18); Severus (21); a group of Ephesians, Mysians, and citizens of his own Prusias (26); Phoebus, son of the proconsul Alexander (33); and a group of students apparently of mixed provenance (54). The young men from Prusias whom he addressed in Oration 27 have probably just arrived, either as newly enrolled or continuing students.4 In a lost oration (57), whose title is known from Photius’s Himerian bibliography (cod. 108b), Himerius welcomed “the newly arrived Aphobius” (or, in a variant reading, “Aphobinus”). Another lost oration (58), whose title is known from the same passage of the same source, addressed “the [student] who came [to Himerius’s school] because of the oracle he received from Poseidon”; this was probably also a speech of welcome on the student’s first arrival. What is left of Oration 18 is not explicitly identified as a welcoming address, but excerpt 4 of it—“Rumor leads the young man [to me?] from there [i.e., Cappadocia?]”—certainly suggests that that is what it is. Jean Bernardi, however, views it as an oration at the addressee’s departure. He suggests that the addressee was none other than Basil of Caesarea, leaving Athens probably in 358.5 The successful Severus of Oration 21 is known from other Himerian orations.6 As for the Phoebus of Oration 33, he has been thought to be the son of the Alexander who was proconsul of Constantinople in 342.7 But Barnes, reviving a suggestion of Wernsdorff, suggests that the father may, instead, have been a proconsul of Achaia. The opening scholion to Oration 33 refers to “Phoebus,

4. The information on the provenance of Himerius’s students provided by these orations may be supplemented by a few more notices. The addressee of Orat. 44, whom I take to be a student, was from Egypt (44.5). Orat. 61.4–5 mentions a student from Pamphylia. Orat. 62 was published for a Constantinopolitan student, if eJtaivrw/ in the title means “student.” Orat. 69.8–9 mentions a group of students from Egypt, one from Galatia (Himerius’s first from there), one perhaps from Cappadocia (see my note on 69.9), and some “who live close to the river Caicus” in Asia Minor (probably from Pergamum). Himerius’s former student Flavianus was a native of Corinth (12.17, 36). His students Gregory of Nazianzus and Basil of Caesarea were Cappadocians (Socr. 4.26.6). Cf. Eunapius’s remarks on the provenance of the overseas pupils of Himerius’s Athenian rival Prohaeresius—mainly Asia Minor and Egypt (Vitae phil. et soph. 10.3.12–13 [487–88]). 5. Bernardi, REG 103 (1990): 90–92; cf. id., Grégoire de Nazianze, Discours 42–43: 38–40. For Basil as a student of Himerius, see Socr. 4.26.6; Sozom. 6.17.1. 6. See p. 141 below. 7. PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Alexander 3”; Dagron, Naissance, 220–21; Schamp, DPA 3 (2000): 724–25.

110

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

son of the proconsul Alexander . . . {entrusted} to [Himerius] by his father after his schooling in Corinth.” If Alexander were something other than the proconsul of Achaia, whose gubernatorial seat was at Corinth, we might have expected the scholion to tell us that.8 Oration 54 is a special case. Although the title we have is “To Newly Arrived Students,” Himerius is actually addressing a mixed audience of new students and upperclassmen. He urges the upperclassmen to take the new students in hand and act as their mentors. Some recurring motifs can be seen in the remains of Himerius’s welcoming orations. First, Himerius shows an interest in the fatherland of new students, praising or at least referring to it in his welcome. “Every person, I think,” says Himerius in Oration 23.2 (see chapter 7), “is fond of what belongs to his own country. If an Egyptian should come here, he will find the Nile—that is, our conception of it—swelling in orations we deliver on Egypt” (cf. Him. frag. 5). To a new Egyptian student he makes a point precisely by appealing to the Nile (Orat. 14). New Cyprian students hear him praise Cyprus and its association with Aphrodite and are assured that “its inhabitants [are] genuinely Greek in language” (17). A welcoming address to a young Cappadocian includes a story about the Cappadocian Melas River (18). Next, Himerius praises the students themselves. He appears implicitly if not explicitly to have told the newly enrolled Cyprians that they were in the camp of the heavenly, not the vulgar, Aphrodite (17.7–8) and to have made the Cappadocian feel that he was one of those youths who “look proud and carry their heads high because they were born right from Zeus’s chest” (18.5). In Oration 33 Himerius remarks that Isocrates used welcoming speeches in his school to provide an introduction to his teachings. Himerius probably did this too. We certainly find general remarks about eloquence in what survives of the welcoming orations. Oration 13.6–8 notes that eloquence allows the rhetor to get control over the masses; 18 glorifies Apollo’s arrow, which transported the Scythian Abaris all around the world, the arrow being understood to be eloquence; and 33 celebrates the traditions of Attic eloquence. Himerius assures his new students that he will love them as well as teach them, that he will have a “cheerful bearing” and not use physical punishment (33 [27–28], 54.1–2). New students might be given general advice: the young Egyptian is told

8. Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 216. But if Alexander was proconsul of Constantinople, I see nothing, pace Barnes, in Orat. 33 that requires us to believe that Himerius left Athens and went to Constantinople to get Phoebus.

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

111

that “Rome wasn’t built in a day,” that steady hard work leads incrementally to one’s goal. Sometimes the advice needed to be tailored to special circumstances: the newly enrolled Severus was or just had been involved in a conflict, and in Oration 21 Himerius seems to have urged him not to be obsessed by strife nor to resort to violence. Orations 59 and 60 welcome a group of Ionians. They are identified as “guests” (xevnoi), not students. Yet at one point Himerius addresses them as “boys” (59.6). I suspect that they were youths whom Himerius was trying to attract to his school. Himerius affirms the Attic ancestry of the Ionians, as he also does in Oration 26; he can therefore welcome them to their motherland and speak of the shared ancestors of the Athenians and the Ionians. He praises Ionian accomplishments in Asia Minor and in Magna Graecia, including contributions to the development of the art of rhetoric. In the ecphrastic Oration 59, he takes the Ionian visitors on a verbal tour of Athens.9 The opening scholion of Oration 60 explains that Oration 59 was an informal dialexis, but that “on this day [i.e., on the day on which he delivered Oration 60] Himerius spoke on a topic (zhvthma) extempore.” This probably means that he treated the Ionians to an oration on an imaginary topic proposed to him by someone in the audience or on some other theme at length.10 Oration 60, then, only a few lines longer than Oration 59, can hardly be that oration but is another dialexis, a preliminary dialexis or prolalia, that immediately preceded it.11 In this second dialexis, Himerius tells an apt anecdote. Once, a group of Ionians visited Athens during a festival, at a time when Pindar was playing his lyre. Pindar was not feeling well, so he played only a “short melody” for the Ionians; but he promised that, on the next day, he would perform the extended and complex orthios nomos. Lyric poetry here stands (typically) for oratory, the “short melody” for a dialexis, and the orthios nomos for a declamation. If Himerius thinks of himself as a Pindar, he can also flatter the young Ionians’ self-image by noting that Pindar’s visitors were “very prominent Ionians from the families that trace their ancestry back to Codrus and Neleus.” Two pieces, Orations 10 and 15, mark the departure of a student from Himerius’s school and are titled “propemptic” orations.12 Menander 9. Cf. the verbal tour of Smyrna given in Ael. Aristid. Orat. 17 Keil. Aelius’s oration is a periodos (17.21). 10. See Korenjak, Publikum und Redner, 116–20. 11. See p. 9 above. 12. That the addressee of 15 was a young man, presumably Himerius’s student, is suggested by 15.1 (cf. 15.4).

112

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

Rhetor notes, as features of the propemptic talk, expression of the pain of separation and “encomiastic and amatory (ejrwtikouvˇ) passages” (2.5 [395.6–7, 396.3ff., 398.28–29]). We do find in Oration 10 that Himerius expresses sadness at the departure of the addressee (10.2, 16), praises him (10.15, 17, 19), and speaks of the love (e[rwˇ)—the spiritual love— that characterizes the teacher-pupil relationship (10.9, 10, 15). A specific compliment recommended by Menander for an educated person who is departing is to suggest that he will one day have his own school (2.5 [397.28–33])—which seems to be precisely what Himerius is suggesting of his addressee at the end of 10.17. Menander also remarks that the propemptic talk “can admit advice when a superior is sending off an inferior, e.g. a teacher his pupil, because his own position gives him a character which makes advice appropriate” (2.5 [395.8–12], trans. Russell and Wilson). We can clearly see Himerius giving advice—about the need for a young man to establish his own reputation, about the relation of eloquence to virtue, about the cardinal virtues and the virtues that depend on them—in the few remains of Oration 15. In 15.1 Himerius warns that a young man cannot lean on his father’s reputation and that a father’s renown can actually highlight the deficiencies of his children; as Wernsdorff already suggested (ad loc.), this hints that the young man in question was the son of a prominent father. Oration 10 has the distinction of being largely in dialogue form. This is noted both in its opening scholion and in its surviving protheOria, or preliminary explanatory comment. In the protheOria Himerius takes none other than Plato as his dialogic point of reference, contending that by employing the dialogue form he is making the relatively new genre of the propemptic oration seem older. Oration 10 did not consist entirely of an imaginary dialogue; in some sections, as I have already indicated—surely in 10.2, 13, 15–17, 19, 20—Himerius is speaking about (or to) the departing young man (or about his father).13 It should be noted that excerpts 5, 7, 8, and 16 of this oration survive exclusively in the Excerpta Neapolitana and that their placement relative to the remaining Photian excerpts is merely the conjectural act of Aristide Colonna, the editor of our modern edition. One of the interlocutors in the dialogue of Oration 10 is Socrates himself (10.10). Another, presumably, is the Diogenes who appears in the title, “Diogenes; or, A Propemptic Oration.” On the assumption that 13. In his tentative assignment of parts in this dialogue, Völker gives only sections 20–22 to Himerius himself.

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

113

Himerius chose interlocutors who were actual historical figures and coevals, Wernsdorff’s suggestion that this Diogenes is the pre-Socratic from Apollonia is plausible. Diogenes Laertius (9.57) calls him a physikos. His presence in the dialogue is consonant with Himerius’s inclusion of physical (and theological) as well as ethical material (see the protheOria of Oration 10). Were there other interlocutors? A Cleinias is mentioned in section 10, but we have no clear indication that he was a speaker. Wernsdorff is inclined to identify this Cleinias with Alcibiades’ brother. He might have noted, in support of this suggestion, the mention of Pericles in section 11. The relevance of Pericles to Alcibiades’ brother is that the former was the latter’s guardian—and the guardian of Alcibiades as well (Pl. Protag. 320a, Alcib. I 104b). As for the content of Oration 10’s dialogue: although we can see that it included discussion of Eros—if 10.9 is, in fact, from the dialogue portion of the oration—and of virtue (10.10, 11), unfortunately so little of it survives that we cannot even come near to saying what its argument was.

translations 10. From the Speech Entitled “Diogenes; or, A Propemptic Oration” This oration is also dignified by a preliminary explanatory comment (proqewriva/) , and the dialogue form has left its mark on it as it was being fashioned.14 from the preliminary explanatory comment [1] The treatment we give to common themes is what makes them our own. Thus it is possible through the art of rhetoric to make propemptic orations seem older, even if they are a recent custom. And that is just what I have done. For I have put the present theme into the form of a dialogue without compromising the business at hand or destroying the dignity that is owed to the dialogue form.15 Although my discourse happens to be ethical, nonetheless in the manner of Plato I latch onto physical and theological considerations, mixing these with the ethical material. And since Plato hides his more divine discussions in myth, one should 14. This note appears in Photius’s Himerian bibliography. 15. “even if they are a recent custom”: Note the comments of Russell and Wilson, Menander Rhetor, 304–5, concluding that “we should take seriously the statement of Himerius . . . that [prose propemptica were] a new form.” For the “dignity” (semnovn) of dialogue, cf. Lucian Bis accus. 33, Prometh. es in verb. 6. Lucian combines dialogue and comedy.

114

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

observe whether I emulated him in this. As for the other qualities of dialogues—I mean relief from monotony, arrangement of the material and interludes, also elegance and a dramatic flavor throughout—the written version of the oration will show better [than anything I might say here] whether or not I succeeded in achieving those qualities.16 Dialogues begin with a rather plain style so that the nature of the diction may produce a sense of simplicity; then in what follows they become elevated [in style] as the action progresses. Those whose ears have been prepared by rhetorical training to listen to orations may judge whether or not I have followed this pattern. from the dialogue itself [2] It is a time for silence, not for words, whenever eloquence is saddened at having to send forth pupils from its drove. Nevertheless, eloquence must give expression to itself, regardless of what befalls it. So if it pleases all of you, I shall declaim to you the oration that the feelings of concern that have taken hold of me have engendered. [3] Although the two men were as distant from one another in their rule as the middle part of Europe is separated from the inland recesses of Asia, where they met was in their longing for this person, each desiring to anticipate the other in carrying off the first fruits of his tongue.17

[4] You did not follow the initiatory custom that specifies one time for junior initiation and a later time for senior initiation.18 Rather you accepted one and the same person at one and the same time as both junior initiate in, and priest (profhvthn) of, the holy rite of your teachings, and you allowed him to be filled insatiably with the waters that flow from those teachings. [5] . . . as you refresh yourself under the trees. . . . [6] Haven’t you heard that long ago these cicadas were human beings; then, when in their love of the Muses they were dissolved into song as a

16. “the written version”: cf. Him. Orat. 9.1. 17. I repeat a suggestion of Wernsdorff, that the “two men” are the emperors Constans and Constantius, co-ruling from 340 to 350, and that the person they long for is the addressee’s father, who is the subject of section 13 below. “As distant from one another in their rule” is tosouvtoiˇdiasthvmasi th¸ ˇ ajrch¸ ˇ ajfesthkovteˇ ajllhvlwn. If ajrch¸ ˇ means “beginning” or “origins” (“as far apart from one another in their origins”), the excerpt might refer to characters in the dialogue section of the oration. For a different understanding of this excerpt, see Völker’s translation. 18. “junior . . . senior”: The text has ejpovpth/ te kai; muvsth/, for which see Him. Orat. 69.7, with my note.

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

115

result of their endless singing, they changed from human beings into birds and went from one melody to another?19 [7] Then having rallied myself. . . . [8] I know how to pull back eloquence’s bowstring.20 [9] Listen to the story. When Zeus brought human beings into existence, they had everything, just as currently arranged, except that Eros was not yet dwelling in their souls; this god, with his wings still high above this world, frequented heaven and shot his arrows only at the gods. But Zeus feared that the most beautiful of his works [i.e., humankind] might perish, so he sent Eros to be a guardian of the human race. Eros accepted this role from Zeus, but he did not think that he should dwell in all souls or consider every personality, both newly initiated and unhallowed, to be part of his domain. Rather he assigned the shepherding of the many ordinary souls to the vulgar Erotes, the offspring of the Nymphs; and he himself dwelt in the divine and heavenly souls, and by rousing them to a loving frenzy he benefited the human race in countless ways. So whenever you see someone who is of a sluggish nature and cannot easily enter into a friendship, realize that this person is not deemed worthy of the gifts of that Eros. And when you see someone of sharp and heated disposition who, like fire, turns eagerly to a loving friendship, realize that he enjoys the hospitality of that Eros.21 [10] For you tell me, dear Socrates, best of lovers, about one part of

19. Section 5 is perhaps based on Pl. Phaedr. 229a–b, as section 6 is based on Phaedr. 259b. For the association of cicadas with birds—they both “sing” and have wings—see Steier, “Tettix 3,” RE 5A, 1 (1934): 1114; Davies and Kathirithamby, Greek Insects, 117–18. In Musc. laud. 1, Lucian includes a fly in the race of birds. We need not question the text at Aelian De nat. animal. 1.20 —pace A. F. Scholfield in his Loeb text, following Warmington—where cicadas are called birds, as in this Himerian passage. 20. I.e., how to aim my words well or forcefully. 21. Contrast Him. Orat. 17.7, where there is a vulgar and a heavenly Aphrodite, each of whom gives birth to multiple Erotes who pursue unhallowed and newly initiated souls respectively. In Orat. 10 Himerius makes the vulgar Erotes children of the Nymphs but does not say who the mother of the sole heavenly Eros was—presumably Aphrodite. Cf. Claud. Epithal. Hon. et Mariae 71–75, where Cupid’s mother is Venus but his many brother Amores have the Nymphs for mothers. In Philostr. maj. Imag. 1.6, the Erotes are children of the Nymphs. “Zeus feared . . . might perish”: This seems to imply that Zeus was concerned with human procreation and hence with carnal love. But the heavenly Eros of this passage is concerned with spiritual love. “newly initiated”: i.e., having freshly experienced a vision of heavenly verities before being incarnated. According to Platonic doctrine, all humans were thus initiated, but some forget the vision by committing vice on earth (Phaedr. 249e–50a); these are presumably Himerius’s “unhallowed.” If Himerius is following and correctly understanding Plato, then “both newly initiated and unhallowed (uninitiated, bevbhlon)” should mean “both the newly initiated who have retained the initiatory vision and the newly initiated who have lost it and become, effectively, uninitiated.” Cf. Him. Orat. 48.12–13, with my note.

116

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

Cleinias’s virtue, his courage in the face of fears, and this is a quality that practice often bestows without having awaited the guidance of reasoned discourse.22 [11] That which once gave Pericles the capacity to speak freely when he was general in the city [of Athens] also gives it to him—namely, an honest character.23 [12] If you see this man barred from tribunals of justice, bewail the law because it has been overcome by money.24 [13] He reached his prime along with the emperor’s city [Constantinople], which marks the separation of great seas,25 and he laid the very same foundation for his own reputation as for the city’s. While that city, in swaddling clothes, was still being physically fashioned, he guided the rudder of other offices that were entrusted to him by the emperor. But when [Constantinople] needed a precise hand, such as is required to give shape to a statue, he returned to it so that he might be both beginning and end to the whole adornment of the city.26 [14] . . . cities raised up, peoples flourishing, the life of Tartessus, the horn of Amaltheia, the whole sum of happiness. . . . 27 [15] But why [am I] so enthusiastic about this young man? Every soul that has recently been separated from the upper sphere still carries with it the fresh vision of the delights that it beheld when it danced that happy dance with chariots of the gods. So whenever such a soul sees here on earth a beauty hidden inside [another] divine soul, a beauty that it observed with no encasement around it when it was in the upper sphere, it bursts with joy at the sight and rushes to the site of that beauty to join itself with [that other soul], having been lightened by both [correct] opinion and [true] knowledge. This is what I experienced in the case of this

22. For Cleinias, see p. 113 above. 23. Pericles refused to flatter the Athenians: Thuc. 2.65.8; Plut. Per. 15.1; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 3.17, 21, 31, 39, 118, 490, 507 Lenz-Behr. “also gives it to him”: to Cleinias? 24. “this man”: Cleinias? Or, if taken with section 13, the father of the young man whom this oration honors? 25. I.e., the Aegean and the Black seas (cf. Him. Orat. 41.4). 26. As Wernsdorff saw, Himerius must be referring here to the father of the young man whom this oration honors. After holding “other offices,” the father became either proconsul or (after late 359) urban prefect of Constantinople. 27. Tartessus was known for its prosperity and for its inhabitants’ (especially its rulers’) longevity (Strabo 3.2.12–14 [149–51]). “the horn of Amaltheia”: the horn of plenty. Note Anacreon no. 361, preserved in Strabo, in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 2: 59: “I would not wish for Amaltheia’s horn nor to be king of Tartessus for a hundred and fifty years.”

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

117

young man. I saw in his soul, as if in a mirror, an image of my own mind appearing, and I delighted in it. Consequently I yearned for and sought out his soul as if it were my alter ego.28 [16] It is burdensome, dear [soul], and extremely difficult to be deprived in the course of time of a close relationship that one had been granted. But we yield, as they say, to the decrees of necessity and of the gods’ will, even if we do so reluctantly. [17] So he is quite capable of preserving in memory anything that he might have worked on under a mentor . . . as a philosopher [he will preserve] his judgment, as [he will preserve] not only this eloquence [that he learned from me], but also anything else he wishes from the abundance of the Muses’ and Apollo’s meadows. Having culled the foliage of all learning from those meadows, he has made his soul a vernal crown. If there should be a need for someone to speak, you would no longer ask whose boy he is29 and to whom he belonged; so thoroughly has he become an image of his mentor, more exactly so than any picture could be. He would be a good helper, if it should be necessary for him to assist his mentor, but he would also be good acting in his own right.

[18] Poets and, along with them, painters and sculptors rightly divest Eros of old age and make this god young and adolescent, indicating his faithlessness by his youthfulness.30 [19] O you who were so strong in eloquence, as I hear that the Thessalian Cineas was. That man, who traversed every land and sea with King Pyrrhus, caused cities to yield through his eloquence before any engines of war did.31 [20] For I am not this fellow’s teacher, I swear by my love of you, O eloquence, because of whom I cast aside the blessed happiness of my na-

28. For the thought and Platonic influence, cf. Him. Orat. 48.12, with my note 205. “no encasement”: i.e., no body. “[correct] opinion and [true] knowledge”: The terminology, of course, is Platonic. “as if in a mirror”: cf. Pl. Phaedr. 255d. Himerius’s young man is one of the “divine and heavenly souls” of section 9. 29. “Boy” here in the sense of “pupil.” 30. In light of the positive remarks about Eros in section 9 and the relevance of Eros to Himerius’s relationship to the student to whom this oration is addressed, it does not seem likely that Himerius described Eros tout court as faithless. Of course, we do not know what he went on to say about Eros in this passage. But Dübner (ad loc.) was so unhappy with “faithlessness” (ajpistivaˇ) here that he tentatively accepted Reiske’s emendation ajplhstivaˇ (insatiability). 31. Himerius is presumably speaking to his departing student here. On Cineas, see Plut. Pyrrh. 14.1–3; Dio Cass. 9.40.5.

118

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

tive land [Bithynian Prusias] and have taken up residence by the mystic banks of the Ilissus.32 [21] Alexander, who used his military trophies as boundary stones for the whole world. . . . [22] For the heat of midday slips away, and the breeze tempers the sun . . . and to part the waves surging around the prow by means of the Zephyr. . . .33 [Exc. Phot.; two very short passages also in Exc. Neapol.; but sections 5, 7, 8, and 16 exclusively in Exc. Neapol.] 11. From the Farewell [Talk] (Suntaktikh¸ ˇ) to His Students, When He Departed for Corinth34 [1] Whenever serious lyre-players of the past hastened to another land, they did not depart in silence but took leave of their followers with song and melody. 35 [2] . . . not a melody that is out of tune and a trifling song . . . [Exc. Phot. (1), Exc. Neapol. (2)] 13.6–8. To the Newly Arrived Followers of Piso36 [6] The physician gets control over disease through his knowledge of medicine, and the rhetor gets control over the masses through his eloquence. 32. Himerius probably means that eloquence, not he personally, is his pupil’s teacher. The Ilissus River is in Attica. Its banks are “mystic” because Attica (Athens) is where one is initiated in the “mysteries” of learning. 33. “and to part” etc.: cf. Him. Orat. 12.33. 34. I give the form of the title in the Photian excerpts, understanding suntaktikh¸ ˇ [lalia¸ ˇ]. For a syntactic oration in the form of a laliav (talk), see Men. Rhet. 2.4 [393.31ff.], 2.15 [434.1ff.]. Codex Nb has suntaktikovˇ, Photius’s Himerian bibliography has suntakthvrioˇ—i.e., lovgoˇ. (sunakthvrioˇ here in Henry’s edition of Photius is probably a typographical error.) For suntakthvrioˇ, see Lampe, Patristic Greek Lex., s.v. “students”: eJtaivrouˇ, which could mean “companions” or “associates,” but surely “students” here. 35. Himerius is, of course, typically comparing oratory to music. “their followers”: to;n corovn, the word commonly used of the sophist’s students (Petit, Les étudiants, 21–22; Him. Orat. 54.1). 36. For my separation of Orat. 13.6–8 from 13.1–5, see my note on the title of 13.1–5 in chapter 3. The title of 13.6–8 in Excerpta Neapolitana has peri; Poseidw¸ noˇ, which has been corrected to peri; Peivswna from the uncorrupted version of the title in Photius’s Himerian bibliography. Piso might have been a teacher whom the newly arrived students were abandoning for Himerius. Or was he a student, the de facto head of a group?

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

119

[7] Whenever the sun makes you hot, and you want to seek shelter in the shade of a glen [8] . . . not when the Nile swells and has covered Egypt with its waters . . . [Exc. Neapol.] 14. From the Oration to the Newly Arrived Egyptian [1] The Egyptians call the [progressive] augmentation of the Nile “cubits,” and they measure the [rise of its] waters [in cubits], and the cubit is a cause of celebration for them.37 [2] A clever businessman amasses a large sum of money by increasing his wealth little by little. [3] And you will see that excellent generals are at first credited with only a few triumphs; then, as time goes on, they can proclaim innumerable victories. Themistocles was of rather small stature at Artemisium, for he excelled there against what were still [only] the [Persian] king’s servants. He was greater at Psyttaleia and really great at Salamis, for in the fight at Salamis he drowned the whole of Asia. 38 [4] It seems to me that Homer himself wrote about the ten-year war

37. The cubits were personified as infants. See, e.g., Strabo 17.1.3 [788]; Plin. HN 5.10 [58]; Lucian Rhet. praec. 6; Philostr. maj. Imag. 1.5. “If the rise [of the Nile] is too small, it threatens a bad harvest” (Amm. Marc. 22.15.13, trans. J. C. Rolfe). “the cubit is a cause of celebration”: i.e., in line with what follows, each increment is worth celebrating because eventually increment upon increment leads to a significant result. 38. “And you will see . . . victories”: The example that follows, however, involves, not merely an accumulation of victories, but a progressive rise in their significance. For the military actions alluded to here, see Hdt. 8.1–96. “against what were . . . servants”: The transmitted kata; ga;r tw¸ n propatovrwn e[ti tw¸ n basilevwˇ is clearly corrupt. I tentatively accept Colonna’s emendation of tw¸ n propatovrwn to tw¸ n propovlwn. Colonna does not comment on his proposal in his edition, but by “servants” I suppose that he means “officers” or “troops” in general, Xerxes himself not being present till Salamis (Hdt. 8.25–90 passim). The greater challenge that would be posed to the Greeks by Xerxes’ presence at Salamis is hinted at by Herodotus’s remark that “[Xerxes] believed that in the battles off Euboea his men had shirked their duty because he was not himself present” (8.69, trans. A. de Sélincourt and J. Marincola). Propovlwn could have been corrupted to propovrwn and then povr wrongly understood as an abbreviation of patovr. Dübner adopted a suggestion of Wernsdorff’s, tw¸ n provplwn (“against what were still the king’s advance sailors”), but one can hardly describe the Persian fleet at Artemisium as a mere advance contingent. Another suggestion of Wernsdorff’s, th;n provpeiran, is inviting (“in what was still a preliminary trial”) but is a bolder emendatory move than Colonna’s. Psyttaleia: It was actually Aristides who led the troops who killed the Persians on Psyttaleia (Hdt. 8.95). Salamis: Cf. Liban. Decl. 9.38: “the culmination of all actions, Salamis, where you [Themistocles] drowned Asia.”

120

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

and destroyed Troy by fire only after that interval in order to show all humankind through his poetry that fortune gives good things to people only after hard work and the passage of time.39 [Exc. Phot. (1, 3), Exc. Neapol. (2, part of 3, 4)] 15. From a Propemptic Oration [1] And perhaps it is well that you do this [i.e., end your studies?]. For a person who wishes to be praised must strive to do the kind of deeds that will earn him admiration. The actions that were a source of pride to Pericles were not sufficient for his children; in fact, since the children were unworthy of their father’s virtue, his reputation caused them to be subject to more censure than they might otherwise have been.40 Many other outstanding men have had children, for all of whom their fathers’ fame was more a proof of their own deficiencies than a source of praise for them. [2] How, then, you may ask, is the mind cared for? By virtue and eloquence (lovgoˇ). Virtue rules and presides over eloquence. Eloquence, like an adept servant of a good queen, executes and carries out virtue’s commands with all haste.41 [3] There is another uncountable group of virtues, all of which you will find when you have entered the shrines of learning. But I shall recommend these virtues to you [instead], as the nurses and mothers of those others, and I say that, through them, you will also get to the prey of the virtues that depend on them.42

39. “destroyed Troy by fire”: i.e., narrated its destruction. For the ascription of the actions of characters in a poem to the poet himself, see my note on Him. Orat. 9.4. The firing of Troy was described in the Epic Cycle’s Iliou Persis, which we might have expected to see ascribed to Arctinus (Rzach, “Kyklos,” RE 11, 2 [1922]: 2409–10). 40. “end your studies”: I adopt Völker’s suggestion for what “this” refers to. According to Pl. Meno 94b, Pericles’ sons Xanthippus and Paralus fell short of their father in virtue. Antisthenes accused both sons of misbehavior (Athen. 5.220d). Xanthippus was prodigal and abused Pericles when the latter refused to support his extravagance (Plut. Per. 36.2–6). 41. Wernsdorff and Dübner translate logos as “eloquentia” (cf. Völker), Henry as “la raison.” For the singular logos (as well as its plural) as “eloquence” (or “the word”), cf. Him. Orat. 18.1, 68.1. Does one care for one’s own mind by eloquence (as well as by virtue)? Perhaps Himerius means that the minds of others are cared for by the sophist’s eloquence, which has been developed under the guidance of virtue. 42. “these virtues”: Wernsdorff suggested that Himerius means the cardinal virtues. Cf. Him. Orat. 32.14. “through them”: i.e., the cardinal virtues. “the prey”: For the “prey” of virtue, cf. Him. Orat. 3.17; note also 23 [12].

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

121

[4] The boys, released from their teachers, were taking part in that procession.43 [5] The Phrygian Midas, when he wanted to capture Satyrus, put wine in the waters. He bound him with sleep and lethargy and thus made him his prey.44 [Exc. Phot.] 17. From the Oration Given at the Arrival of the Cyprians [1] The poets give Cyprus to the goddess Aphrodite, just as they give Delos to the god Apollo. For Cyprus is a great country.45 [2] Sappho and Anacreon of Teos do not cease invoking Cypris as a prelude to their songs.46 [3] They say that the well-being of this island has nothing to do with land and sea, but actually with heaven.47 [4] Its inhabitants [are] genuinely Greek in language. [5] The sea brought forth Aphrodite from Heaven, but the mystical teachings command that the precise nature of this birth be hidden. This heavenly being had to be born, then. The sea was immediately stilled and became calm, swelling in gentle waves around the newborn goddess.48

[6] One could say that the island [of Cyprus] is Aphrodite’s own meadow; and this island, I think, is teeming with Erotes. 43. Whatever this particular sentence was about, this passage probably alluded to the fellow students who gathered around the addressee of this oration as he departed. Völker notes the relevance of Greg. Naz. Orat. 43.24. 44. For Midas’s capture of Satyrus (or Silenus), see, e.g., Xen. Anab. 1.2.13; Max. Tyr. 5.1 Koniaris; Paus. 1.4.5; Athen. 2.45c; Philostr. Vita Apoll. 6.27. What the point of the story was in this Himerian oration is not apparent from the extant fragment. 45. “country”: The word is povliˇ. See LSJ, s.v. II (and add Eur. frag. 730 Nauck); Lampe, Patristic Greek Lex., s.v. 3. 46. Cypris: i.e., Aphrodite. She was also called Cyprogenes (Hes. Theog. 199) and the Paphian. She is “queen of well-builded Cyprus” (Hymn. Hom. 5.292); “[her] dominion is the walled cities of all sea-set Cyprus” (Hymn. Hom. 6.2, trans. H. Evelyn-White). “[Sappho?] summons Aphrodite from Cyprus, Cnidus, Syria, and many other places” (Men. Rhet. 1.1 [334.31], trans. Russell and Wilson). See the references to Aphrodite in Sappho and Anacreon, listed in the index to Campbell’s edition (Greek Lyric, 1 and 2). Note Anacreonta 5: “To initiate us in the drinking let there be the Cyprian [Aphrodite]”; 50: “When I drink wine, . . . I sing of the Cyprian” (trans. Campbell, Greek Lyric, 2: 169, 225). 47. Völker understands the Greek differently: “Sie sagen, diese Insel verfüge nicht nur über fruchtbares Land und reichlich Wasser, sondern auch über ein gutes Klima.” 48. Cronus cut off his father Heaven’s genitals. After they were cast into the sea, a foam gathered around them, and out of it Aphrodite was produced, off of Cyprus (Hes. Theog. 176–200; Hymn. Hom. 6.1–5).

122

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

[7] The vulgar Aphrodite has nothing in common with the heavenly one. The former gives birth to Erotes who have an unhallowed and impure nature. But the latter’s children are golden, and so are their arrows; they take aim at newly initiated and undefiled souls.49 [8] May you yourselves take notice if I open my doors to welcome a false lover.50 [Exc. Phot. (1, 4, 5, 7), Exc. Neapol. (2–4, 6, 8)] 18. From an Oration Addressed to the Cappadocian51 [1] Because of [Apollo’s] arrow, the Scythian [Abaris] was transported about, not only across the Danube itself and the Tanaïs, but also to every land and sea; and, of course, Apollo’s arrow is eloquence.52 [2] And a river there [i.e., in Cappadocia] that has a story connected with it is something Greeks can consider worth hearing about. Dionysus had gone to the Indians, a people who rejected his kindness. His army consisted of Bacchae and satyrs; his arms were fawnskins and thyrsi. As soon as the Indians saw the god, they were overcome. They threw away their weapons, and they who had been fighting against Dionysus up to that point became his chorus. [3] Well, when they had been led into the territory of the Cappadocians, they encamped alongside the river for which they were about to provide a name. When they had to wash in its waters, the river was transformed, its silvery water darkening (melaivnetai) after coming into contact with the Indians. Thus

49. For the two Aphrodites, see Pl. Symp. 180d–81d, 185b– c; Xen. Symp. 8.9–10. The heavenly Aphrodite was the daughter of Heaven and motherless; the vulgar Aphrodite was born of Zeus and Dione. Cf. Him. Orat. 10.9. A “newly initiated and undefiled” soul has had a vision of heavenly verities before being incarnated and preserves it by virtuous living on earth; see Him. Orat. 10.9 and 48.12–13, with my notes. 50. I.e., to welcome a student who is in the camp of the vulgar Aphrodite. 51. Wernsdorff, Dübner, Colonna, and Völker all assume that the title “To the First Person from Cappadocia Who Heard Him [i.e., Himerius] Lecture,” found in Photius’s Himerian bibliography, is simply a variant of the title “From an Oration Addressed to the Cappadocian,” which occurs at the head of the following Photian excerpts. 52. Abaris was a wise barbarian associated with Pythagoras (see Burkert, Lore and Science, esp. 147, 149–50). Himerius (Orat. 23.4) praises his command of Greek. “Because of . . . transported about”: uJpe;r tou¸ bevlouˇ ojcouvmenoˇ. Abaris rode the arrow, given to him by Apollo, like a witch on a broomstick! See Origen Contra Cels. 3.31; Iambl. Vita Pyth. 19[91], 28 [135–36]; Greg. Naz. Orat. 43.21 [524b] Bernardi; Nonnus Dionys. 11.132–33; Suda A 18. The word uJpevr here may be an erroneous iteration of the uJpevr in the previous line (uJpe;r [Istron), to be emended to uJpov (“by”).

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

123

they caused the river to be and be called what they themselves were.53

[4] Rumor leads the young man [to me?] from there [i.e., Cappadocia?]. [5] But my wealth is not the gold of Gyges or Lydian [gold], but boys in the bloom of youth, of a vigorous age, who, first of all, look proud and carry their heads high because they were born right from Zeus’s chest.54 [Exc. Phot.] 21. From the Oration to the Newly Arrived Severus55 [1] Achilles, of course, did not forget his lyre (lyra) even while battles were going on. The plains were gleaming with weapons, but he was in his tent tuning his kithara. As for the theme of his song: well, Achilles loved valor. Whether he was fighting or singing songs, he tried to make the glorious deeds of men come alive again.56 [2] There was strife among the gods over what they were enamoured of. But although Athena had weapons, she did not use them in contending [with Poseidon]. Nor did Poseidon aim his trident at [her], even though he was carrying it. Instead, she brandished the olive branch, and he in

53. For Dionysus in India in general, see Dihle in Pollet, India, 47–57; Lévêque in Carrière et al., Inde, Grèce ancienne, 125–37. Himerius is referring to the Melas (“Dark” or “Black”) River in Cappadocia; see Talbert, Barrington Atlas, maps 1 K3, 3 C2, 64 E3. 54. For the Lydian king Gyges’ gold, see, e.g., Archilochus frag. 19 in Gerber, Greek Iambic Poetry, 92; Anth. Pal. 9.110. Reiske suggested that “or Lydian” is an intrusive gloss. But, as Wernsdorff noted, with this phrase, to be understood as “or [other] Lydian gold,” Himerius may be thinking of the wealthy Lydian king Croesus (Hdt. 1.30.1, 32.5) or of the gold-bearing Pactolus River of Lydia (J. Keil, “Paktolos,” RE 18, 2 [1942]: 2439). Note that, at Ep. 1221.5 Foerster, Libanius associates Croesus, Gyges, and Cinyras with wealth; at Ep. 1400.3 the Pactolus and the wealth of Cinyras and of Gyges are mentioned together. “born . . . from Zeus’s chest”: cf. the Isocratean chreia “gifted (eujfuei¸ ˇ) students are children of gods” (Hock and O’Neill, Chreia, 324 [no. 40]). 55. The title “To the Newly Enrolled Severus Who Had Turned His Attention to a Conflict,” preserved in Photius’s Himerian bibliography (Bibl. cod. 165.108a), is presumably a variant of the title I give from the Photian excerpts. “Who had turned his attention to a conflict,” or perhaps “who had suddenly come upon a conflict,” is ejpistavnta sumplhgavdi. For the conflict motif, see pp. 71–73 above. For Severus, see p. 141 below. 56. For Achilles singing “the glorious deeds of men,” see Hom. Il. 9.186–94. Homer calls Achilles’ instrument a phorminx. Himerius uses lyra generically here, then he switches to the narrower kithara; see Maas and Snyder, Stringed Instruments, 79–80.

124

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

turn shouted at her with the sound of his waves. A vote settled their dispute, and Athena carried off the prize of victory.57 [3] But choruses of Muses and Apollo play in soft meadows. [4] And one played the aulos, another held a kithara, and yet another played the syrinx.58 [Exc. Phot. (1, 2, 4), Exc. Neapol. (part of 1, 3)] 26. To the Newly Arrived Ephesians, Mysians, and Fellow Citizens of the Speaker59 Largely {aimed} at . . . who had become [Himerius’s] pupil and was attending his school against the wishes of his parents. When Apollo had set up his prophetic tripod and was foretelling the future to people who came from everywhere, all peoples and all cities visited the god, persuaded to go by his reputation . . . {Apollo}, rejoicing, I think, in their embassies, {established} prophetic days for those who came {to his oracle. Let me also speak my “prophetic” words} again. For the people must, I think, taste of the sacred laurel and of the god and his spokesmen. . . . {Mys}ians and Ionians. For the one group, descended from Heracles,60 and the other group from Ion, from long ago . . . the settlement [10] of Ionia, because of which the Ionians are almost considered to be Athenians, from where does tradition insist that they set out if not from

57. Himerius is referring here to the peacefully resolved contest of Athena and Poseidon on the Athenian acropolis for the possession of Athens. See, e.g., Hdt. 8.55; Ov. Met. 6.70–82; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.40–43 Lenz-Behr; Hygin. Fab. 164; Apollod. Bibl. 3.14.1; August. De civ. Dei 18.9; Hurwit, Athenian Acropolis, 31–32, 174–76; and cf. Him. Orat. 6.7. The contending gods made an olive tree and seawater (Himerius’s “sound of [Poseidon’s] waves”) appear, respectively, as tokens of their claim to the land. The sources disagree on who decided the contest. 58. In the Greek, the subjects are explicitly feminine. Himerius is apparently referring to the three Graces. Ps.-Plut. De mus. 14.1136a describes a statue of Apollo holding the Graces in his left hand, one with the lyra, the second with auloi, and the third with a syrinx. For the aulos and the syrinx, both wind instruments, see West, Ancient Greek Music, 81–112; Mathiesen, Apollo’s Lyre, 177–225. 59. The version of the title in Photius’s Himerian bibliography has the word “and” between “Mysians” and “fellow citizens” that has dropped out in codex R. On the other hand, Photius’s “fellow citizens of Leon (tou¸ Levontoˇ)” should be emended to codex R’s “fellow citizens of the speaker (tou¸ levgontoˇ).” Himerius’s fellow citizens are from Bithynian Prusias. 60. “{Mys}ians”: I tentatively restore “Mysians” with Wernsdorff and Völker (see his note ad loc.) rather than “Athenians” with Colonna. Mysians and Ionians (i.e., Ephesians) are among the students Himerius is addressing here. Telephus, son of Heracles, became king of Mysia (Strabo 13.1.69 [615]; Apollod. Bibl. 3.9.1; id. Epit. 3.17.

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

125

Delphi61 and . . . ? So they sacrificed to the Attic Muses, {honoring their land?} with their eloquence, as was the custom at Olympia whenever they {held} a festal assembly {there} in honor of the {god} . . . {Whoever} boasts of {Hera}clids as ancestors, let him first tend to the sacrifices . . . but, instead of these sacrifices, the Muses . . . [20] I propose at the outset [of a young man’s career] a fervor for accomplishment, inasmuch as it is customary that . . . {Achilles} was . . . in battle as a result of the teachings of Chiron . . . and Socrates equipped Alcibiades for life’s labors more than . . . did. . . . Perhaps most people will not find this [following] story unappealing . . . A young man asked for a first-rate trainer62 so that {he might win a victory at} the Pythian Games. But his city and his father led him off to another competition. Someone else {urged him?} to forget about {the latter competition} and to trust the [first-rate] trainer . . . [30] the god granted [the young man] a victory and sent word to his father63 . . . {There are some descendants} of Neleus {here}—for my lecture hall is open to all . . . It will not be a swarm of bees, all clustered together, that will lead the emigration for me . . . {but, rather, the Muses?} . . . so as to still everything with their song, in order that . . . the whole of Attica, just as Orpheus’s lyre, introduced from across the sea, made the island of Lesbos, around which the billowy Aegean is parted, musical, although it had been unmusical before that—his lyre made it so musical that the wonders of that music were spread abroad to all parts of the earth.64 [cod. R., with a passage also in Exc. Phot. and another passage also in Exc. Neapol.] 27. To the Students from His Fatherland [Prusias] This was delivered in the g{ymnasium?} . . .

61. Because their leader Ion grew up at Delphi (Eur. Ion 1–75)? 62. I emend gumnasthvˇ (trainer) to gumnasthvn (cf. Völker). 63. Clearly this story addresses the issue of the student, mentioned in the opening scholion, who chose to study under Himerius despite the objection of his parents. 64. “{descendants} of Neleus”: i.e., Ionians (Ephesians); see Him. Orat. 60.4, with my note. The “emigration” Himerius refers to seems to mean his Ionian students’ eventual return to their homeland. They will bring Attic eloquence back with them and make Ionia “musical.” “a swarm of bees”: cf. Him. Orat. 59.1: “When [the original ancestors of the Ionians] left Attica, the bee led them to Ionia.” For those bees, see my note on Him. Orat. 59.1. In the reference to Lesbos, Himerius is especially thinking of Alcaeus and Sappho.

126

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

It is time, then, my boys, to tune up my lyre for my fellow citizens . . . The Muses have brought here, to see me speak, {a group of young men} who love eloquence so much that . . . but my words will make you alone, [my fatherland], their subject again; and on this occasion . . . these [young men] are dancing [with me] in honor of the Muses, but they have waited until this point in my . . . [10] of this phalanx of students at the common hearth of guests (?) . . . And I hear this from Hesiod, too, who commands . . . wise and beautiful words. How can the Muses’ poems not . . . but also the gods have the same view about the fatherland. {Apollo} loves {Delos} . . . ; he stabilized the island, which tossed around {in} the sea’s {waves} before he appeared. Dionysus loves Thebes because he brought Semele’s birth pangs to an end there. Pan is proud of the Arcadians, Aphrodite is proud of Paphos, and the Dioscuri are proud of the city on the Eurotas River [i.e., Sparta]. Homer does not bring on most of the gods from heaven, [20] but from mountains and cities, calling Hera “Argive,” Zeus “Dodonaean,” and Apollo “Lycian-born.”65 As for the god of my craft [Hermes], perhaps {eloquence?} . . . because it gratified the god by calling him . . . {I find that Homeric figures} had similar fond feelings toward their fatherland. {Odysseus}, called (?) . . . , loves little I{thaca}, despite the fact that he often hurls his ashen spear against Troy, and that he alone . . . Homer does {not} assign {Nestor} . . . to Mycenae, rich in gold, but to little Pylos . . . Anacreon adorns the city of the Teians with his songs, and he leads off the Erotes from there. Alcaeus adorns Lesbos [with his songs] and mentions Mytilene [30] everywhere in them. Neither Simonides nor Bacchylides has neglected Iulis. Stesichorus not only freed Sicilian Himera from tyrants,66 but also adorned it with his words. My friends, what shall I do for the city that brought me forth? I do not ride on a chariot pulled by free-ranging horses and am not a poet; so, come now, let me fortify the city with human exemplars and with prose oratory. {After all}, Lycurgus {fortified Sparta} when, with the help of the god

65. For the stabilization of Apollo’s native Delos after his birth, see Callim. Hymn. 4.273; Strabo 10.5.2 [485]. “Dionysus . . . brought Semele’s birth pangs to an end”: by emerging prematurely from the womb of his mother, who perished (Ov. Met. 3.287–315; Apollod. Bibl. 3.4.3). Argive Hera: Hom. Il. 4.8. Dodonaean Zeus: Il. 16.233. “Lycianborn” is how Himerius interprets the Homeric epithet Lukhgenhvˇ (Il. 4.101, 119), understanding it as giving a variant to the tradition, which he has just noted, that Apollo’s fatherland was Delos. 66. The places assigned to the respective individuals are their fatherlands. For Stesichorus’s warning to the people of his native Himera about the tyrant Phalaris, see Arist. Rhet. 2.20 [1393b].

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

127

[Apollo], he {gave} the Lacedaemonians their laws; {whereas Babylon and Nineveh?}, which {once} flourished with their lavish {walls}, are now known only by their paltry ruins. Time has {hardly} preserved {the walls of Troy} . . . for human memory. [40] {Cadmus merely} erected . . . , {but the Theb}ans’ walls {were put in place} through Amphion’s lyre. Socrates himself publicly . . . always . . . and restored the city with rhetors, and Aesop made Phrygia known for fable alone. When someone faulted Plato for not serving the state in some military or civilian capacity, he said, “Not me the . . . of Chabrias . . . pupils (?) of Plato.”67 I also want to tell you something about Pythagoras. {Although he was from Samos}, he spent his time not in Samos, but in Italy. It turned out that his fatherland Samos was {not the center} . . . of his philosophical teaching. So, since he thought it dreadful if the city [50] where a person spent his earliest years was not adorned by his achievements . . . , {he made sure} that not only Samos, but the whole of Ionia {was regarded as} blessed because of that [philosophy of his].68 [cod. R, with passages also in Exc. Phot., Exc. Neapol., and Lex. Lopad.] 30. From the Oration He Gave When He Returned from Corinth Poetry [i.e., Homer] admires many aspects of Odysseus’s mentality, sometimes calling him “sprung from Zeus” and sometimes “resourceful” . . . , {but it especially} seems to admire how {. . .} his love of Ithaca and his desire never {to injure?} the memory of his subjects . . . as he thinks {of his fatherland}, the Lotus-eaters’ fields seem barren to him, {their land?} seems parched and unpleasant . . . Of course {he} also {re-

67. “I do not ride”: i.e., I am not a poet. Poetry rides; it is not pedestrian (Cic. Ep. ad Quint. 2.14.2; Ov. Ars amat. 1.264). “let me fortify . . . oratory”: The “human exemplars” he produces through his rhetorical teaching will bring glory to his native Prusias. Himerius’s point here is not only that he works in prose rather than in poetry, but also that, like the individuals he is about to mention, he “fortifies” and “restores” culturally rather than materially. Amphion straddles the literal and metaphorical sense of “fortifying”: he walls Thebes, but does it through the power of his music, which in Himerius can always be metaphorical for eloquence (Apollod. Bibl. 3.5.5; Apollon. Rhod. 1.735–41). For the view that Apollo aided Lycurgus’s law-giving, see Hdt. 1.65; Dionys. Hal. Ant. Rom. 2.61; Plut. Lycurg. 5.4 Cadmus was the legendary founder of Thebes. Chabrias: Perhaps Himerius said something to the effect that all Chabrias got for his military service was to be brought to trial (see Diog. Laert. 3.24). I cannot be sure that “pupils (?) of Plato” is part of the quotation. 68. Like Pythagoras, Himerius practices his craft elsewhere than in his fatherland. “because of that [philosophy of his]”: Völker less likely understands “because of that [youth that he spent in Samos].”

128

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

jects} the Sirens’ song, having applied not wax, but yearning for one’s city to [his comrades’] ears.69 This excellent king . . . for a good ruler [10] certainly must always be with his subjects, I think. If fortune should physically separate him from them, then he should at least keep his mind focused on them and not be separated from them by any infatuation. I know what Odysseus went through; the poem about him explains my own state of mind. When I was separated from you and was among the sons of the Ephyraeans [i.e., the Corinthians], their land . . . seemed depressing and gloomy to me, the waters of Pirene seemed briny, and the Crisaean [i.e., Corinthian] Gulf seemed agitated even in a gently heaving calm.70 I was utterly laid low, overwhelmed by my yearning for you. But why dwell on this? I have eloquence back, I have Athens back and . . . very sweet.71 This is the finest Attic honey. Let me not, though, completely object to being away, beginning [20] . . . The hierophant seems sweeter to initiates after a long absence; so does the helmsman to the ship. To those who {want?} to dance in chorus . . . Sometimes even the sun, whom human beings regard as great, hides itself, so that we may look upon it again with eager eyes as it rises up from the ocean. Also, they say that, when Xenophon, the historian and skilled general, saw that he was prevailing as he moved through the [Persian] king’s territory and was now in possession of Byzantium, he wanted to make trial of the ranks to see how well disposed they were toward him. So he hid himself from them for a while and then suddenly [30] reappeared, as if coming from somewhere else. The men embraced him when he returned, as if he had been away for a whole year, and addressed him with every [imaginable] title.72 Satiety, then, is an evil thing, and it causes injury to many a fine situation. We remedy it by limiting our exposure [to others].73

69. “sprung from Zeus . . . resourceful”: diogenh¸ (Hom. Od. 2.352, 366, etc.), poluvtropon (1.1, 10.330). “his desire . . . subjects”: to; mhvpote ejqevlein th¸/ mnhvmh/ tw¸ n ajrcom[evnwn, followed by a lacuna of 23 spaces. For “{to injure}” I am thinking of lumaivnesqai, but this is just one possible way of complementing ejqevlein. “the Lotus-eaters’ fields”: see Hom. Od. 9.82–104. “not wax”: Odysseus did apply wax (Od. 12.165–200), which Himerius seems to be understanding metaphorically (i.e., “not real wax”), to keep his comrades from hearing the Sirens’ song. 70. “the sons of the Ephyraeans”: paisi;n jEfuraivwn. This could literally mean their young men or could be taken simply as tantamount to “Ephyraeans” (see LSJ, s.v. pai¸ ˇ I, 3). The Corinthian fountain of Pirene provided potable fresh water. 71. The lacuna is 15 spaces long. The first word in the lacuna begins with theta, perhaps qeatr-. Wernsdorff, Dübner, and Völker imagine a reference here to the very sweet sounds of the theater. 72. Himerius is apparently referring to events narrated in Xen. Anab. 7.1–2 (note esp. 7.2.9); see Völker’s comments ad loc. 73. On satiety, cf. Him. Orat. 19.

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

129

[cod. R, with passages also in Exc. Phot. and Exc. Neapol.] 33. From the Oration to Phoebus, Son of the Proconsul To Phoebus, son of the proconsul Alexander, . . . {entrusted} to him [i.e., Himerius] by his father after his schooling in Corinth.74 It is reasonable, I think, that those who have come from a lesser tongue [i.e., teacher] to the door of a sophist should also find stories about sophists. So here is one about the sophist Isocrates. His name and his orations, I think, are well-known to all, for it was because of him that sophists’ tongues scorned those of poets and embraced a law of their own. Now this Isocrates always opened up the doors of his royal school to lovers of eloquence by means of an oration . . . He desired thereby to provide young men with an introduction to his teachings [10], especially anyone who was naturally suited to learning and of royal family . . . and another person was considered to be worthy of this favor. Isocrates’ works quite rightly indicate [who that person was]. [In the past] I have explained that he . . . , but I want to tell all of you, too, about this.75 The Cyprian tyrant Evagoras had a son {named Nicocles, who loved} the Lyceum, breathed forth Mt. Lycabettus itself, and in every other way was purely Attic. When his father saw {that he yearned for Attic eloquence} and, in his desire for it, developed an attachment to all things Attic, he deliberated about his son . . . so that {he might leave} . . . the Cyprians a worthy heir of his own glory. Now Isocrates held the Athenian chair [at that time], and his glory extended [20] as far as the sun could

74. For Alexander, see pp. 109–10 above. 75. “sophists’ tongues . . . a law of their own”: Wernsdorff thought that the innovation Himerius had in mind here was the Isocratean period (“numerosa ac periodica dictio”). But cf. instead Dionys. Halicarn. Lys. 3: “[Lysias could express] ideas in standard, ordinary, everyday language . . . and the man who came nearest to achieving [this style] among the earlier writers was his successor Isocrates in his early career; but . . . one would not be able to find any later writer than these who displayed comparable force and power while using only standard and ordinary words”; id. Isoc. 11: “[Lysias and Isocrates] both use standard, familiar and ordinary language” (trans. S. Usher). And note Isocrates’ advocacy of prose in his Orat. 9.8–11. “and another person”: viz. Nicocles. I assume that at least one other prominent pupil of Isocrates was mentioned by name, exempli gratia, in the 16-space lacuna preceding the words “and another person.” “indicate [who that person was]”: Isocrates wrote an advisory oration to Nicocles (2) and one put in his mouth (3), and he mentions him in 9.1, 73, 78 and in 15.40, 67, 71. Wernsdorff and Dübner thought that Himerius meant “indicate [that Isocrates welcomed newcomers with an oration].”

130

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

see, because he had purified rhetoric, which was inflamed with strange diction as a result of its ancient aberrations. By means of his skill he had brought it onto the right path, a regular and orderly one . . . When Evagoras saw that everyone who desired to acquire the genuine art of rhetoric flocked to Isocrates from everywhere, {he decided} to send his son {to him}. Isocrates welcomed Nicocles. In addition to training him in the rest of learning, through his hortatory {remarks he} . . . , having taken the zealous young man as a partner in his own exertions—for when eloquence lacks love, it is incomplete, in my opinion, and without wings. When Nicocles took his fill from this font and became the kind of person in deed [30] as {he was in word, he showed himself} to have become a true disciple {of his master’s} eloquence.76 [cod. R, with passages also in Exc. Phot. and Exc. Neapol.] 54. To Newly Arrived [Students] [Himerius] delivered this [talk] extempore in his house in the presence of his pupils when welcoming some newly arrived [young men].77 [1] How sweet this lecture hall is to me again! How sweet is my chorus [of pupils]—which is to say the Muses’ chorus [of pupils]—as it rouses itself up to leap around my lyre again! Consider those individuals who have ever endured separation from my friendship and life apart from me even for one day. What an act of daring, what hearts they have! They are insolent and reckless and have little regard for love. If it were at all possible, how gladly would I ask them some questions: What sound is sweeter to them than my tongue? Whose bearing is more cheerful to behold than mine? What naturally musical birds of spring speak as sweetly

76. “Lyceum, Lycabettus”: The Lyceum was associated with learning, and there is a tradition that Isocrates himself taught there; see the anonymous life of Isocrates 116–17 (in vol. 1 of the Budé Isocrates). The Lyceum was in the vicinity of Lycabettus. “held the Athenian chair”: Himerius is referring to academic realities of his own time; he means simply that Isocrates was the greatest Athenian sophist of his day. For Nicocles as a literal pupil of Isocrates, see Isoc. 15.40 (cf. 9.78 and 15.30), although it is troubling that he is not mentioned among Isocrates’ prominent pupils in [Plut.] Vitae decem orat. 837c–e or in the anonymous life of Isocrates (100ff.) and that he is not identified as a pupil of Isocrates in [Plut.] at 838a. 77. “delivered this [talk]”: tauvthn . . . dieivlektai. Apparently understand laliavn or diavlexin. See p. 10 above.

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

131

and pleasantly as I do? What melodious and rhythmical chorus, resounding with the music of the aulos or the donax, ever touched their souls as much as the sound that comes from my lecture halls?78 [2] So I find fault with those herdsmen who have refused to shepherd their flocks with song and the syrinx and, instead, threaten them with blows and whips. As for my flock and my creatures, may I never look angrily upon them. Let it be my words that lead them to the Muses’ meadows and waters, let them be led by song rather than by harsh blows so that, nurturing in this way our mutual love, I may, with music and harmony, keep my governance of them on the right path.79 [3] Share these norms, my boys, with these newly arrived students as part of your hospitality toward them so that, after having tasted of the finest norms and principles at their first arrival, they may move from that point, as they become more fully initiated, toward the contemplation of our mysteries. For those who are experienced in the rite make good mystagogues for initiates. Those who have familiarized themselves with much of the great ocean are good at sailing and directing a sea voyage. Dogs practiced at controlling wild beasts are the ones who teach puppies who are just learning how to hunt. And birdcatchers say that eagles just ready to fly do not let themselves fall behind the older birds in flight but follow them until they have got above the clouds and are flying around the great sun itself.80 [4] I also want to tell you a story about a king. They say that Alexander [the Great], son of Philip—Alexander is known to all Greeks, I think, from books; we hear that he had a noble nature and was reared in a manner that matched his nature, for in the midst of military trophies, victories, and glorious deeds—anyway, we hear that, whenever he learned that his father was marching off to war, his desire was not to lag behind the battle line, but to follow his father, despite the fact that 78. The aulos, the donax, and the syrinx (in section 2) are all pipes. For the aulos and the syrinx, see my note on Him. Orat. 21.4. The syrinx “had a rather lowly status, appearing most often as the characteristic instrument of herdsmen and herdsmen’s gods” (West, Ancient Greek Music, 110). There are some remarks on the donax in Gow’s comment on Theocr. 20.29. 79. “may I never look angrily upon them”: Or, if one adopts Dübner’s emendation of skuqrwpav zwn to skuqrwpav zon, “may I never see them saddened.” For Himerius’s rejection of the use of physical punishment, see also Orat. 66, with my comments on p. 71 above. 80. “Dogs . . . wild beasts”: o{soiˇ tw¸ n kunw¸ n ta; qhriva melevth tugcavnei kratei¸ n. Emend melevth to melevth/. “birdcatchers”: ojrniqeutw¸ n pai¸ deˇ. For this idiom, see LSJ, s.v. pai¸ ˇ I, 3. For the thought of this paragraph, cf. Him. Orat. 61.3.

132

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

he was still young and just at the beginning of his adolescence and not yet mature enough for battle. His father was anxious about his son and bid him stay home, but Alexander would have none of this. Instead, he offered his father the same object lesson that I just offered you about the puppies—namely, that noble bitches are trained right from the time they are puppies and when just on the verge of hunting. He persuaded his father to let him engage in battle; and so, with this military experience acquired in his youth, he went on to put all lands under the sun in the palm of his own hand.81 [5] They say, then, that Alexander offered these remarks [about puppies on that occasion]. Homer too, I think, would give us advice on the same matter. In Homer Antilochus is a young soldier and fond of war, and he imitates Achilles and is immortalized by his Asian victories. In other poets Iolaus imitates Heracles, and Theseus imitates Pirithous. In this way the whole band of noble youths achieves glory.82 [6] Come, then, teach these things yourselves so that these [newly arrived students], reared on these principles, may become prominent in Attic meadows and then, after taking the beautiful wares [of rhetoric] from here, practice it in their own locales.83 [cod. R] 59. To Those Who Came [to Athens] from Ionia [1] These guests are Ionians, of Attic ancestry. Come, let me show them their mother-city, not by putting on a cicada brooch, but by giving them a verbal tour. When they left Attica, the bee led them to Ionia; but now

81. Völker (ad loc.) calls attention to Dio Chrys. 2.1–2: the young Alexander accompanied his father on campaign, despite the latter’s attempts to prevent him. Dio compares Alexander to puppies who cannot be restrained from the hunt. 82. For Antilochus’s youth and military valor, see Hom. Il. 15.569–70; Philostr. Heroic. 26.7 de Lannoy. For his relationship with Achilles, Hom. Il. 23.556, Od. 24.78. Iolaus was Heracles’ nephew (Paus. 7.2.2) and companion. He was only sixteen years old when Heracles completed his famous labors (Plut. Amatorius 754e with Apollod. Bibl. 2.6.1). “I[olaos] is always shown as a youth on Corinthian vases (in contrast to the bearded Heracles). . . . From the Classical period onwards he is a youth . . . unless shown with the Herakleidai, since this episode took place late in his life” (M. Pipili, “Iolaos,” LIMC 5, 1 [1990]: 696). The friendship of Theseus and Pirithous was proverbial (J. E. Fontenrose, “Peirithoos,” RE 19, 1 [1937]: 121). “the whole band (lovcoˇ) of noble youths”: Wernsdorff saw an allusion to the Argonauts here, but Himerius may be referring to all noble youths through the course of time. 83. For intellectual “wares” (tw¸ n ajgwgivmwn), cf. Them. Orat. 23.297b–99c; Synes. Ep. 59.

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

133

that they are returning from there to Athens, it is eloquence that will guide them.84 [2] I shall direct you to the great sights that keep the knowledge of your ancestors alive. I shall show you, in pictorial form, the battle of Marathon and your ancestors checking the onslaught of Persians, as they ran toward and hacked at those barbarians. I shall also show you my soldiers, one of whom, even in the painting, is fighting against nature; for you will think that this Callimachus, even though merely depicted, is fighting rather than dead. The other soldier [Cynegirus] is trying to sink the Persian fleet with his bare hands and meting out his bodily strength to meet the demands of [the] elements.85 [3] After you have seen the Painted Stoa, I shall lead you up to the hill, to Athena’s workshop [i.e., the Acropolis]. There you will be able to fill yourselves with innumerable stories, just like people who search a document for evidence of their ancestors. You will see the olive sprout, the triumphal monument of the armed goddess [Athena]. You will see an ocean wave high up on the hill, still making a crashing sound, as if shaken up along with the god [Poseidon] as he contends for his beloved [city]. I shall also lead you in my oration to the tribunal of the gods and show you the Areopagus. I shall tell you mythic tales as you look around and shall make what you see even sweeter by providing a narrative.86 84. “Ionians, of Attic ancestry”: Himerius is referring to the tradition of the Ionian colonization of Asia Minor from Attica; see Him. Orat. 6.11, with my note. The early Athenians used cicada brooches to fasten up their hair. The cicada was explained as a symbol of Athenian autochthony, since cicada larvae burrow into the earth, whence they emerge as grown insects. See Steier, “Tettix 3,” RE 5A, 1 (1934): 1118–19; Davies and Kathirithamby, Greek Insects, 124–26. “When they left”: He means, of course, their distant ancestors. “the bee”: mevlitta. The noun without the article here is probably not meant as singular; rather, it denotes the class (Smyth, Greek Grammar, no. 1129); cf. Him. Orat 26 [32]. Philostratus maj. explains that the colonists were guided by the Muses in the form of bees (Imag. 2.8, p. 353 Kayser). 85. Himerius is referring to the famous Marathon painting in the Painted Stoa. Cf. Him. Orat. 6.20–21, with my note 129. “my soldiers”: Why “my” soldiers? Colonna, in his critical apparatus, understands “verbally depicted by me.” Other connotations are possible: “mine as an Athenian citizen,” “my favorite.” “[F]ighting against nature” means “fighting against death”; cf. Orat. 6.20–21. “trying to sink”: Other texts, including Him. Orat. 6.21, have Cynegirus attempting to hold back a Persian ship (not the whole fleet) manually, not trying to sink it (Plut. Parall. gr. et rom. 305c; Polemo Orat. 1.9–10, 35–38, 40; Just. Epit. 2.9.16–18; Anth. Plan. 118). 86. The olive sprout and the “ocean wave” (i.e., a cistern of seawater) were shown as memorials of the legendary contest of Athena and Poseidon for Athens, a contest won by Athena. Cf. Him. Orat. 6.7 and 21.2, with my note; and for the olive and the seawater, see Hdt. 8.55; Paus. 1.26.5, 1.27.2. Pausanias (1.26.5) notes the noise made by the seawater when the south wind blows. “the tribunal of the gods”: I read Wernsdorff’s conjecture dikasthvrion for the manuscripts’ ejrgasthvrion (workshop), which is retained by Colonna—probably an erroneous iteration of this word from the first sentence of this

134

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

[4] Perhaps you will accuse me of slowness. Perhaps you will borrow the law that our ancestors passed on idleness and bring against me a charge and accusation that, in my words to you, I have not yet brought you to Ion’s father [Apollo]. Well, then, I shall verbally portray him too for you and shall provide a feast for your ears before your eyes are feasted.87 [5] His golden hair is parted on his forehead. On both sides his locks hang down over his neck and fall like waves onto his divine chest. His robe falls over his feet, he has a lyre but no bow. The god is smiling. It is as though he is prophesying to the Ionians that they will be colonizers. [6] He is a musical god, boys. So let me too pluck the lyre in my soul so that, by sounding forth strongly in speech, I may join colonists to their mother-city.88 [cods. R and B] 60. To the Ionian Guests On the previous day [Himerius] was in their presence just long enough to deliver a discourse [dialevxewˇ], but on this day he spoke on a topic extempore. [1] Yesterday we addressed Ionia in a pleasant little piece [Orat. 59], playfully taking a verbal sightseeing tour of the city with its [mythic] tales. But now let us sing for the Ionians the orthios nomos. For the mark of their land is not only linen tunics, that fancy knot of hair, or a gourmet’s table; it is also a land known for its seriousness, its eloquence, its arms, and its battles.89

paragraph. For the Areopagus as the gods’ tribunal, see Him. Orat. 6.8 and 7.1, with my note. 87. For idleness (i.e., lack of livelihood) as a punishable crime at Athens, see Thalheim, “Argiv j aˇ grafhv,” RE 2 (1896): 717; MacDowell, Law in Classical Athens, 155. It is clear from section 5 that Himerius regards Apollo, not Xuthus (or anyone else), as the father of Ion, the eponym of the Ionians (see Owen, Euripides, Ion, ix–xiv). For the orator’s providing a metaphorical feast (eJstiavw), cf. Philostr. Vitae soph. 573; Them. Orat. 24.301a, 26.313a, 33.367a. 88. For representations of Apollo with the lyre, see W. Lambrinudakis et al., “Apollon,” LIMC 2, 1 (1984): 199ff., nos. 82–189, 630–43. For the long hair and the long robe, note [Tibull.] 3.4.27, 35; Ov. Met. 11.166. Apollo had important connections both with music and with colonization: Callim. Hymn. 2.55–57; Wernicke, “Apollon,” RE 2 (1896) 16–18. Consulting Apollo at Delphi before establishing a colony was de rigueur, and Apollo himself was sometimes regarded as the oikist of a colony (Graham, Colony, 25–27). 89. “playfully . . . tales”: paiv zonteˇ a{ma kai; tw¸/ lovgw/ to; a[stu meta; tw¸ n lovgwn qewvmenoi. Dübner keenly suggested that lovgwn refers to the mythic tales mentioned in

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

135

One could more or less say that the Ionian race prides itself on the very things its ancestors took pride in. Those men of old traversed the Aegean, purging it of Persian arrogance; they sailed the Ionian Sea to colonize Sicily; and they caused the name Greece to be extended to the peoples of Italy through Pythagoras’s tongue. [2] In those days, the art that I practice was modest and unsophisticated; it did not extend beyond the courtroom. But those Ionians lifted it on high and made it resound more loudly than tragic poetry. They made many contributions to stringed music, medicine, and poetry. These [Ionians here before us] are fellow citizens and kin of the wise Heraclitus, because of whom Plato’s genius took wing and contemplated the knowledge that surpasses eloquence. And in Ionia rivers are said to bring forth poets; all the Ionians give credit to [the river] Meles for the genius of Homer. [3] In line with all this, [Apollo], leader of the Muses, in portioning out the whole earth [and giving part of it] to his sister [Artemis], chose to dwell among the Greeks himself but made [Ionian] Ephesus Artemis’s allotment. Actually, Apollo himself puts his arms around Ephesus, to the south and to the north, causing his tripods to resound from Branchidae and from Colophon.90 I make this salute to Ionia through you, dear guests. Tell the Ionians that they have their just verbal deserts from my tongue.

Orat. 59.3. Thus lovgw/ . . . meta; tw¸ n lovgwn is not redundant. Wernsdorff had conjectured lovfwn for lovgwn (“a tour of the city with its crests,” i.e., the Acropolis and the Areopagus). For the orthios nomos, see section 4 below with my note. The wearing of linen garments and the knotting of their hair were marks of luxury that, according to Thuc. 1.6.3, the Ionians got from the Athenians. See Gomme’s comment ad loc. On Ionian luxury, see Diod. Sic. 8.18.1; Athen. 12.524f–26d (citing a play that calls Ionia “richly tabled,” kallitravpezoˇ); Huxley, Early Ionians, 81–82. 90. “the name Greece . . . extended”: i.e., in the designation Great Greece, Magna Graecia (see LSJ, s.v. “ JEllavˇ I, 6”). Iamblichus agrees that southern Italy got this designation because of Pythagoras (Vita Pyth. 29 [166]). Pythagoras was a native of Ionian Samos but settled in southern Italy. “lifted [oratory] on high . . . tragic poetry”: Himerius is alluding to the Asianic style of oratory (Norden, Die antike Kunstprosa, 370). “stringed music . . . poetry”: I translate luvra here as “stringed music” rather than as “lyric poetry” because the latter is included in “poetry” (poivh siˇ). At Orat. 48.15, where luvra does mean “lyric poetry,” Himerius writes pa¸ sa luvra, pa¸ sa de; a[llh poivh siˇ. Heraclitus and Plato: Heraclitus seems to be singled out here as the earliest philosophical influence on Plato (see Arist. Metaph. 1.6 [987a32–33]; Diog. Laert. 3.5). Homer: Himerius is alluding to the tradition that Homer was the son of the Ionian river Meles (Certamen Hom. et Hes. 8–11 Rzach; [Plut.] De Hom. 2.2). “[Apollo] chose to dwell among the Greeks”: presumably at Delphi. Artemis had a major cult at Ephesus. Apollo had oracular shrines at Branchidae (Didyma) near Miletus, south of Ephesus, and at Colophon (Clarus), north of Ephesus. “Causing his tripods to resound” (cf. Him. Orat. 48.10) means “giving prophecies.” With reference to this Himerian passage and to Didyma, Fontenrose writes that “the allusion to tripods is metaphorical: the tripod is a mantic symbol that reflects the fame of the Delphic tripod” (Didyma, 83). For the tripod at Colophon, see Parke, Oracles of Apollo, 123, 130, 132.

136

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

[4] I shall now tell you a story that is both Attic and Ionic. Once, during the festival of Dionysus, Pindar with his lyre had the full attention of his audience, as usual. Now some Ionian visitors, very prominent Ionians from the families that trace their ancestry back to Codrus and Neleus, came to Athens. They desired the mystic fire and initiation at Eleusis. Well, when they arrived, they found Pindar just beginning to win over a pair of young men. He delighted in the Muses, but on that occasion, since he was not feeling well, he acknowledged the arrival of the Ionians as best as he could, with only a short melody. But he told them that he would appear before an audience on the next day, and he retuned his lyre for them in preparation for the orthios nomos.91 [cods. R and B] 63. A Discourse [Diavlexiˇ] in the Presence of His Students after His Return from His Homeland [Himerius] delivered this [discourse] at home in the presence of his students after returning from his homeland [i.e., Bithynian Prusias] and before announcing a public oratorical display (ejpivdeixin). Here he maintained that exercise in all skills is very useful before undertaking a more ambitious [display of them].92 [1] Let us first sacrifice to the Muses at home—the sacrifice we offer them is, of course, a verbal one—and let the domestic hearth be the place where our offerings begin.93 For it is an Attic custom to conciliate the 91. Neleus, a son of the Athenian king Codrus, was said to have founded colonies at Miletus and other Ionian sites (Hellanic., FGrH 4 F 48, 125; Marmor Par. 1.27 Jacoby; Paus. 7.2.1–6). “the mystic fire”: For the great fire of the Eleusinian mysteries, see Burkert, Ancient Mystery Cults, 91, 98; Riedweg, Mysterienterminologie, 48–49. “win over”: i.e., through his music and poetry. For “win over” I read the transmitted eJlei¸ n, not the conjecture telei¸ n (initiate) adopted by Dübner and Colonna from Wernsdorff’s more extensive emendation of the passage. “He delighted . . . Muses”: i.e., he delighted in music and song and would have immediately performed the orthios nomos if he had been feeling well. For the orthios nomos, see West, Ancient Greek Music, and Mathiesen, Apollo’s Lyre, s.vv. “nomos,” “orthios nomos.” “Nomoi were extended compositions, organized in several sections” in “a style of great complexity” (Mathiesen, 58, 63). 92. JEtaivroiˇ in both the title and the opening scholion is “students,” not “friends.” In section 6 Himerius refers to his addressees as “boys.” “exercise in all” etc.: crhsimwvtaton pro; tw¸ n meizovnwn hJ peri; pavntwn gumnasiva . Wernsdorff (and Dübner) emended pavntwn to (tw¸ n) mikrw¸ n (“exercise on a small scale . . . before” etc.), hypercorrecting what the scholiast probably actually wrote to bring it into closer alignment with the text. 93. “let the domestic hearth” etc.: The expression is proverbial: CPG 1: 14, 385; 2: 62.

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

137

gods through domestic sacrifices before moving on to the mysteries outside of the home. Even in other matters it is our habit to go on and attempt something bigger only after beginning with something smaller. No sailor goes out into the vast ocean before he has got his ship going inside of the harbor. When the seaman sees that his ship is watertight in a contained part of the ocean, then he confidently lets it sail out onto the open sea. [2] An athlete may be a first-class Olympic victor and have been grandly proclaimed as such by the Eleans; but if he sees that his bodily strength has not been put to use for some time, he does not enter the stadium until he has stripped for exercise in the palaestra. I know that serious musicians do not rush into public theaters without having first exercised their hands at home. The piper does not dare to go on stage unless he first warms up on his instrument in private. The lyre-player does not come before the public until he plays the lyre at leisure. [3] And of course we see that those musical birds make their music in the air and up on tall trees only after they have practiced their melodies in this manner. So it is with the cicada sounding his melodies. So it is with the swan readying his wings to hymn Apollo. If a charioteer has been training a foal for a long time to run in a race, he does not immediately yoke the horse to the chariot; he first lets the foal exercise itself free of the yoke the wheels and only then mounts the chariot and guides the animal against its rivals.94 [4] I want to tell all of you a story about this very point that I am making. The Ethiopians who live in the east are nomads and archers. The whole race keeps itself alive through archery—for they get their food by hunting—and those very same arrows are their weapons in war. To be precise, they ride around high up on elephants, just as if on horses, and shoot at their enemies from there. Now in the course of traversing much of the earth, Alexander [the Great] came to the land of these Ethiopians. When he made an inquiry and learned which Ethiopian was the best archer, he summoned that individual and asked for a demonstration of his skill. The man paused briefly and became quietly thoughtful. Then

94. “practiced their melodies in this manner”: i.e., in a more modest setting. “the swan readying his wings”: Himerius is alluding to the belief that the swan’s song is not vocal, but made from the wind’s (specifically the Zephyr’s) striking its wings: Philostr. Vita Apoll. 1.5; id. Imag. 1.9, p. 308 Kayser; Greg. Naz. Orat. 28.24; Him. Orat. 13.5, 47.4, 48.7; Nonnus Dionys. 26.202–5 (ed. F. Vian, with his note); George Pisid. Hexaem. 1168a– d Tartaglia. For the swan as Apollo’s bird, see Him. Orat. 74.5, with my note. “free of the . . . wheels”: A kaiv is need here: e[xw th¸ ˇ zeuvglhˇ . . . tw¸ n trovcwn.

138

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

he said that he needed some practice, for he had not used the bow for a whole day. This is what the Ethiopian said.95 [5] It seems to me that Homer also wishes to allude to this same principle in his poetry. He does not arm the man of Ithaca [Odysseus] against Antinoos, the [really] wicked one among the suitors, immediately after the former has ended his sea voyage and disembarked from the Phaeacians’ ship. Instead, Homer first gives Odysseus axes for practice, and only after the poet shows him successfully shooting at these axes does he present him bending his great bow against Antinoos.96 [6] Well, then, boys, since I am returning to oratory after a considerable lapse of time, let me take it inside my own precincts and train it before stripping it [for a contest] on the public stage.97 Perhaps it will be very daring and utterly proud. Perhaps it wishes to be untiring and in full bloom, patterning itself on its divine founder [Apollo], whom poets, painters, and sculptors always depict as vigorous and young.98 For their art does not profess to be a cosmetic one; it always represents that god just as his father [Zeus] engendered him when he lay with the goddess [Leto]. [7] But since the custom is well-established that in declamation (ejn tai¸ ˇ melevtaiˇ) one practices before entering contests, let me sport [with or-

95. The division of the Ethiopians into westerners and easterners is as old as Homer; see Hom. Od. 1.23–24, with Strabo 1.2.24–28 [30–35]. For Ethiopians as nomads, Strabo 17.1.3 [787], 17.1.53 [819], 17.2.1–2 [821]. For Ethiopians as archers, Hdt. 3.21–22, 7.69; Diod. Sic. 3.8.4, 6; Strabo 16.4.17 [776], 17.2.3 [822]; Plin. HN 6.35 [194]. For Ethiopian skill in handling elephants, Snowden, Blacks, 130–31, 166–67. The story that Himerius tells of an Ethiopian is told by Plutarch of an Indian (Reg. et imperat. apophthegm. 181b). When the scrupulous Indian archer refused to perform on the spot, Alexander ordered him executed. But he stayed the order and marveled at the man when he learned that it was his perfectionism that would not allow him to shoot without prior practice. India and Ethiopia could easily be confused; see Pietschmann, “Aithiopia,” RE 1 (1894): 1101; Karttunen, India, 134–38; Snowden, Blacks, 101. For some Indians, or Indians originally, as nomads, Hdt. 3.98–99; Arr. Indic. 7. For Indians as archers, Hdt. 7.65; Strabo 15.1.66 [717]; Arr. Indic. 16; Him. Orat. 61.3. It was “Indians and Ethiopians” who used elephants militarily before Macedonians, Carthaginians, and Romans did (Arr. Tact. 2). It cannot be clear where Himerius thought the eastern Ethiopians lived—perhaps in Asia rather than in Africa (see Aesch. Suppl. 284–85 [reading jIndavˇ or jIndw¸ n]; Strabo 1.2.28 [34–35]; Dilke, Greek and Roman Maps, 63). And (to add further confusion) for “Indians” in Africa, see Expos. totius mundi 35 with Rougé’s comment on Expos. 18.1. 96. “the [really] wicked one”: see Hom. Od. 17.388–89, 500–501. According to a widely accepted theory, Odysseus caused an arrow to pass through the helve-holes of twelve aligned axe-heads: Od. 21.68–79, 120–22, 404–23; Heubeck et al., A Commentary, 3: 144. The shooting of Antinoos: Od. 22.1–30. “his great bow”: Od. 21.74, 405, 409. 97. For the athletic metaphor, cf. Him. Orat. 38.3. 98. On the youthful Apollo, see Callim. Hymn. 2.36, with Williams’s comments, to which add Plut. De E ap. Delph. 389b, where it is noted that painters and sculptors depict Apollo as forever young.

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

139

atory] in the privacy of my own home and reserve the contests themselves for the great theater. [cod. R] 64. An Extempore Talk (Laliav ) Delivered at His Modest School [1] On this island of Delos the inhabitants say that people are shown a temple that is modest in what is said and narrated about it. There a story prevails that, when Leto gave birth to the deities [Artemis and Apollo], her travails were ended, and Apollo, honored by the land, set up the sacred tripods there in the midst of the branches; from there he issued oracles to the Greeks. For the place where a person takes his first steps is sweet and highly prized, even if it seems small.99 [2] The sailor delights in the harbor from which he began his first sea voyage, the soldier delights in the field where he first erected a trophy, and the farmer is fond of the land from which he cut his first stalks of grain. I have noticed that this same inclination obtained among the ancients. Odysseus prefers small Ithaca to Ogygia itself and to Calypso, Nestor prefers Pylos to Troy, and Aeacus prefers Aegina to Corinth. They say that, when Democedes of Croton was spending time with the king of the Persians and had access to all the very beautiful things available to him, he never preferred any of those things to Croton but regarded Susa, Bactra, the waters of the Choaspes, and the king’s golden table itself as inferior to the life he had in Croton.100 [3] Come, then, since I have met with you here again for rhetorical purposes after having contended in many great auditoria, let me address this small one. O precinct of the Muses and of Hermes! O sacred and most

99. “On this island of Delos”: I see no reason to accept A. Castiglioni’s supplement

geivtoni before nhvsw/. Himerius says “this” island perhaps because, our Orat. 64 being only a portion of the original talk, there had been a reference to Delos in what immediately preceded section 1. Of the twin deities, Artemis and Apollo, Apollo was born second. When Leto swore that Apollo would build a temple and establish an oracle on Delos, the island agreed to be Apollo’s birthplace (see Hymn. Hom. 3; cf. Callim. Hymn. 4). For the “branches,” cf. Him. Orat. 68.8, “the Delians’ trees,” with my note. 100. “Odysseus prefers” etc.: All the examples prefer their homeland. (For Aeacus’s birth on Aegina, see Apollod. Bibl. 3.12.6.) The goddess Calypso lived on the island of Ogygia, where she promised Odysseus immortality if he stayed (Hom. Od. 5.203–24, 7.253–58). For the story of the physician Democedes, pressed into service at the court of Darius, see Hdt. 3.129–37. Darius lived at Susa (Hdt. 3.132, 5.49). Cf. Him. Orat. 34 ad fin. Bactra: in Bactria. Persian kings insisted that their drinking water come from the Choaspes River (Hdt. 1.188).

140

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School

lovely place, which first welcomed the fruits of my eloquence. Longing for you and welcoming you, I greeted your gold-roofed halls, I greeted your riches and those distinctions of yours that the masses embrace.101 The reputation I have acquired from you I regard as loftier than everything else. I think that people often experience a greater sense of wonder from smaller things than from things that seem large. What stranger who comes to Athens is more inquisitive about the great house of Hipponicus than about Demosthenes’ dwelling or Socrates’ abode? Who has ever gone to Thebes and desired to see Timagenides’ house and those of other rich men there instead of Pindar’s? Of the sites to see in their land, the Lacedaemonians especially show foreigners who come to Sparta the house of Lycurgus. [4] So let us not be ashamed of this place, my boys, if we study eloquence here. Phidias’s workshop was small, but he sculpted his Zeus and his [Athena] Parthenos there; Praxiteles’ workshop was small, but everyone sailed to Cnidus. The nightingale’s thicket is small, yet everyone hears its melody at a distance; the swan’s meadow is small, yet there is nothing that does not wish to resound with its song.102 [5] But please, O Muses’ Apollo—for you too delight, I think, in being called upon in the hymns of poets—please, you chorus of Muses who dwell on Helicon, do not abandon us as we speak.103 Be our fellow workers in letters (th;n mousikhvn) everywhere, whether we gather in small or large auditoria. [cod. R] 101. Hermes is the god of eloquence. Note that Himerius’s auditorium is not unadorned; the point is that it is small. 102. Hipponicus: probably the very wealthy grandson of Hipponicus “Ammon” (cf. Swoboda, “Hipponikos 3,” RE 8, 2 [1913]: 1908). For the Theban leader Timagenides, see Hdt. 9.38, 86–88. Lycurgus: The point is that his house was modest. Lycurgus opposed luxury and favored austerity (Plut. Lycurg. 10.1, 11.6, 13.4–7). “everyone sailed to Cnidus”: Clearly “to see Praxiteles’ famous Aphrodite there” is implied; there is no need of a conjectural supplement, pace editors. Pliny says that many people sailed to Cnidus to see this Aphrodite (HN 36.4 [20]); see also [Lucian] Amores 11, 13–16. “thicket . . . meadow”: The manuscript has “voice (fwnhv ) . . . meadow (leimwvn).” It fits the thought better to emend “voice” to “thicket” (lovcmh, Dübner) than to emend “meadow” to “throat” (laimovˇ, Wernsdorff ). 103. “for you too delight”: i.e., you, like the other gods, delight in being called upon in the hymns of poets, as I am calling upon you now. “as we speak”: Mras (WS 64 [1949]: 78) took this to refer to a declamation that Himerius was immediately about to embark on and therefore regarded Orat. 64 as the preliminary lalia (i.e., a prolalia). But Himerius more likely means “whenever we speak.”

chapter 5

The Epithalamium for Severus

The epithalamium for Severus, Oration 9, survives in full. It was not the only epithalamium Himerius composed. Photius’s Himerian bibliography mentions another one, for a bridegroom named Panathenaeus. It has not survived, although Colonna has ascribed three consecutive, untitled Himerian fragments in the Excerpta Neapolitana to it.1 They may be found, as the remains of Oration 37, in chapter 8. There is nothing distinctively epithalamic in them. There is also an allusion to a Himerian epithalamium in the opening scholion of Oration 34, but without any hint of who its addressee was. Severus either was a continuing student in Himerius’s school or had just completed his studies there shortly before his marriage.2 Oration 21 had been addressed to him as a newly arrived student, and Oration 24 shows that he went on to have a successful career in Roman government. We know from the opening scholion of Oration 40 that Severus arranged 1. A portion of one of these fragments that also survives in Lopadiotes’ Lexicon is also untitled. 2. Orat. 9.5 says that Severus “very recently . . . was a reveler in the camp of the Muses, then he suddenly leaped away from my precincts and took his merrymaking to Aphrodite.” It is not clear whether Himerius means that Severus had just completed his studies and then married or that he was still a student but had been distracted from his studies by his bride. I note the conjectures of Heil (Klio 79 [1997]: 468–78) that the Panathenaeus of Himerius’s lost epithalamium in honor of that individual (Orat. 37) is identical to the Panathenius of IG II/ III2 5201; and that this individual, who later became proconsul of Greece, was Himerius’s student when he married. If all this is correct, we would have two examples of Himerian epithalamia for student bridegrooms.

141

142

The Epithalamium for Severus

for Himerius to deliver an oration at Philippi in 362, when the sophist was on his way to join Julian in the East. A passage in the epithalamium for Severus (section 13) may be understood to mean that his bride and her family were from Philippi. Himerius organizes his epithalamium for Severus, as he tells us in his protheOria, in four parts: prooemium (9.3–6), the question of marriage (9.7–11), an encomium of the spouses (9.12–17), and a description of the bride (9.19–21). We may profitably compare the arrangement suggested by Menander Rhetor for the epithalamios or gam;lios logos (2.6 Russell and Wilson). Menander would have the epithalamist begin, as does Himerius, with a prooemium. Differentiating between formal and relaxed epithalamia, Menander notes that in the prooemium of the former type the orator may explain why he is doing the speaking. Even though Himerius is speaking in the relaxed mode,3 he gives just such an explanation in his prooemium: he speaks at Severus’s wedding because he is Severus’s teacher (9.5). “Very recently,” we are told, “[Severus] was a reveler in the camp of the Muses, then he suddenly leaped away from my precincts and took his merrymaking to Aphrodite.” There is a hint of tension here between studies and love, a theme that Himerius does not develop. The theme is developed, though, in Choricius of Gaza’s epithalamium for his pupil Zacharias: Eros, Choricius says, spares no one, not even a dedicated scholar. Choricius imagines the Muses complaining to Apollo that Eros has distracted Zacharias from his studies; Apollo promises that the young man will return to his studies after the wedding. Again, in another epithalamium, for three of his pupils, Choricius remarks that “while education attracted the young men, the maidens also attracted them toward themselves. Once again, the son of Aphrodite [Eros] prevailed [over] Hermes, [the god of eloquence].”4 Something that Menander suggests for the relaxed epithalamic prooemium is also found in Himerius’s prooemium: mythological and historical examples of music, song, and word celebrating the union of man and woman. Himerius recalls that such unions were celebrated by Apollo and by Sappho with their lyres, by Pan with his pipe, and by Poseidon 3. I.e., his epithalamium is not suvntonoˇ (Him., Orat. 9.3). 4. Choric. Dialex. 4.5–6, 8, 12; Orat. 5.26–28 Foerster-Richtsteig. I am using F. K. Litsas’s translation in his unpublished dissertation, “Choricius of Gaza, An Approach to His Work: Introduction, Translation, Commentary” (University of Chicago, 1980). For Choricius’s epithalamia and the significance of them and of Himerius’s epithalamium, see my discussion in Saliou, Gaza, 135–48.

The Epithalamium for Severus

143

with song. Chiron would have similarly honored Achilles’ love for Deidamia, had he known of it. And cowherds and horsekeepers, adds Himerius, celebrate the copulation of their animals with pipes and song. Music and song are routine metaphors for oratory in Himerius. The example of Poseidon has a special pertinence for him as Severus’s teacher. Poseidon, who sang of Pelops’s love of Hippodamia, had been Pelops’s teacher in the handling of horses and chariots. And, although Himerius does not say so, all will have known that Chiron had been tutor to the Achilles whose love he would have willingly celebrated. According to Menander, the epithalamic prooemium should be followed by “a sort of thematic passage (lovgoˇ w{sper qetikovˇ) on the god of marriage, including the general consideration of the proposition that marriage is a good thing” (2.6 [400.32–401.1], trans. Russell and Wilson). Although it is not immediately apparent what Menander wants “on the god of marriage,” and Himerius only implies that marriage is a good thing without arguing the point as a proposition, nonetheless it is clear from what Menander goes on to say that his second part of an epithalamium corresponds with Himerius’s second part, “the question of marriage,” th;n ejpi; tw¸/ gavmw/ qevsin (9.7–11). Menander explains that part 2 of the epithalamium should explain the cosmic origins of marriage and its fundamental importance in the scheme of things; from marriage come the universe, the gods and demigods, human beings, and all human works. A comparison of Himerius 9.7–10 shows that he and Menander are on the same track here. Menander recommends the inclusion, in this section of an epithalamium, of specific love stories. One possibility he suggests is stories about the loves of rivers. Himerius is especially fond of these. He devotes 9.11 entirely to them (or, in one case, at least to a river’s harboring of lovers) and already gives examples of them in 9.8 (cf. 9.17). The next two sections prescribed for the epithalamium by Menander, “the encomium on those contracting the marriage” (i.e., the couple’s families) and “the bridal pair,” Himerius collapses into one section (9.12–17), which in his protheOria he titles “an encomium of the spouses.”5 In this

5. I agree with Russell and Wilson that, in light of what follows in Menander, ta; tw¸ n gamouvntwn ejgkwvmia at Menander 2.6 [402.22] can only mean “the persons (families) arranging the marriage” (Men. Rhet. 315 on 402.22). On the other hand, ejgkwvmion tw¸ n gamouvntwn, Himerius’s description of his Orat. 9.12–17, must mean “an encomium of the spouses”—even if the advice given by Himerius for this section of his oration, that it should move along quickly, parallels advice given by Menander (2.6 [403.4–7]) for praising the spouses’ families.

144

The Epithalamium for Severus

single section of his oration, Himerius praises both the spouses and their families. The final section of an epithalamium, according to Menander, should be “derived from the description of the bridal chamber and alcoves, and the gods of marriage” (2.6 [404.15–16]). Himerius describes his epithalamium for Severus as ending “with a description of the bride” (9.19–21). Despite these discordant headings, Menander and Himerius do have something in common here. In this section, Himerius imagines his oration going into the bridal chamber. He does give some description of it, although he is focused more on the bride and her beauty, a theme that we might have expected to be confined to the previous section of the oration. Menander advises mentioning here the presence of the Erotes, Hymenaeus, the Graces, Aphrodite, and Artemis, goddess of childbirth. Himerius does mention the Erotes, the Graces, Aphrodite, and other appropriate mythological figures (including “the marriage goddess Hera”), as well as “the gods of procreation.” Menander says that this is the place to allude to the coming of children,6 and recommends that the epithalamist end with a prayer, both of which Himerius does. If Himerius actually read Menander, he was not much inhibited here by Menander’s advice, at 2.6 [404.11–14], to “be cautious in describing [the girl’s] beauty because of the scandal that may be caused” by the presumption of inappropriate familiarity.7 Himerius’s advice to the bride at 9.20 to “approach the bed, approach the place where marriage is consummated,” where “you do not resist,” coupled with his references to the beauty of the bride and of the bridal chamber and to future children, might make one think of what Menander calls the kateunastikos logos (2.7), the exhortation to sexual intercourse, in contradistinction to his epithalamios or gam;lios logos.8 Menander’s kateunastikos logos, however, is directed at the bridegroom. Section 18 of Himerius’s epithalamium is custom-made for Severus’s marriage. In it Himerius praises an unnamed woman, apparently an Athenian, “who has been the orchestrator of this marriage.” “My art and hers,” he continues, “have the same forefathers . . . in her eloquence she is another Aspasia.” Himerius implies that this woman used her arts 6. Not surprisingly, the hope for children is commonly expressed toward the end of epithalamic compositions (e.g., Theocr. 18.50; Catull. 61.207ff.; ps.-Dionys. Hal. Ars rhet. 4.3 Usener-Radermacher; Stat. Silv. 1.2.266ff.; Claudian 10.340–41). 7. Cf. Russell, PCPS 205 (1979): 109. 8. For the two types of speech, see in addition to Russell and Wilson, Menander Rhetor, Russell, PCPS 205 (1979): 104–17.

The Epithalamium for Severus

145

of persuasion to bring about the match. He would have agreed with Menander Rhetor that Marriage produced “all human things” (2.6 [401.25–26]; cf. Him. Orat. 9.9). That includes rhetoric. Marriage, Himerius notes (9.10), produced the Muses, Apollo, and Hermes. He undoubtedly means Hermes logios, and these divinities are patrons of the schools (cf. Him. Orat. 46.1). But at 9.18 he can also make the point that marriage (at least Severus’s marriage) may actually owe something to rhetoric.9

translation 9. The Epithalamium for Severus preliminary explanatory comment ( Proqewriva ) [1] One might perhaps regard it as useless to theorize about the art of composing nuptial orations. For when you have [the marriage-god] Hymenaeus and choruses and the freedom of poetic license, what chance does art have? But since the knowledgeable person should do nothing, even in cases such as these, without reference to the art [of rhetoric], it is worth saying a few things about this kind of oration. The best rule for nuptial orations should be to look to the poets for diction, to what is needed for the contents, and to the situation for length. If the oration has aimed to do all this, the written version of it will clearly show it.10 [2] A nuptial oration has four parts. The first part functions as a prooemium: it reveals through elegant arguments the frame of mind in which the speaker has undertaken the rhetorical display. The second part addresses the question of marriage. Since this is a common human theme, we made it our own with fresh arguments and by the manner in which we expressed our thoughts. We also sweetly added some erudition to it, which those steeped in learning will not fail to notice. The third part of a nuptial oration has an encomium of the spouses. In reviewing the qualities of the [two] people being praised, it moves along quickly and [thereby] suits the matter at hand.11 The oration ends with a description 9. On ancient epithalamic compositions in general, one might begin with the articles s.v. “epithalamium” in RAC and in OCD3 and the works listed in their bibliographies. 10. “for length”: to; mevtron. See Ernesti, Lexicon, s.v., and cf. the end of the next paragraph. “the written version”: cf. Him. Orat. 10.1 11. “functions as a prooemium”: I adopt Wernsdorff’s suggestion tou¸ prooimivou e[cei lovgon for the manuscript’s to;n prw¸ ton e[cei lovgon. “addresses the question of marriage (th;n ejpi; tw¸/ gavmw/ qevsin)”: I translate qevsin broadly, but there is probably a reference here to the progymnasmatic exercise called the thesis (cf. Men. Rhet. 2.6 [401.1]:

146

The Epithalamium for Severus

of the bride, in which it presents a poetic beauty, the length of treatment being determined by the situation. the oration [3] They say that, after the great victories he won playing the lyre, Apollo also sounded the wedding song over bridal chambers. If what the poets say is not sheer myth, he first struck up this latter kind of music amidst glens and caves when he sang these charming tunes to his beloved.12 So, my boys, since I am summoning my Muses to a wedding chorus and to love, it is time for me, too, to be done with serious music so that I may dance along with young girls in honor of Aphrodite. [4] But one can learn from the poets themselves that it is very dangerous to try to come up with a song tender enough to please that goddess. Most of them, skilled as I believe they were in matters involving love, have shown Hera acting brazenly against deities and young girls. They left it to Lesbian Sappho to sing with her lyre of the rites of Aphrodite and to prepare the bedroom. After the contests, the poetess entered the bedroom; she readies it, makes the bed, gathers young maidens the bridal chamber, and leads Aphrodite to the Graces’ chariot along with her chorus of Erotes, who sport with her. She bound Aphrodite’s hair in blue, except for the parted hair on her forehead, letting what was unbound ripple in any breezes that might blow. Having adorned the Erotes’ wings and locks of hair with gold, she urges them on as they process and wave their torches in the air in front of the chariot.13 lovgoˇ w{sper qetikovˇ). The question “whether one should marry” was commonly set for students as a thesis (ps.-Dionys. Hal. Ars rhet. 2.2 Usener-Radermacher). The sense would be “incorporates [themes from] the thesis on marriage.” “we made it our own”: The manuscript has hJdei¸an ajpeirgasavmeqa. I accept Shorey’s emendation of hJdei¸an to ijdivan (CP 1 [1906]: 415). Cf. Isoc. 4.9; Hor. Ars poet. 128; Him. Orat. 10.1. “suits the matter at hand”: Himerius seems to mean that an epithalamium should focus on the wedding and not dwell too long on laudation of the spouses individually. 12. Apollo defeated Marsyas and Pan in music contests, in both cases the lyre defeating the pipes: Diod. Sic. 3.59.2–5; Ov. Met. 11.146–71; Apollod. Bibl. 1.4.2; Hygin. Fab. 165. He played the lyre at the wedding of Peleus and Thetis (Hom. Il. 24.62–63), at that of Dionysus and Ariadne (Men. Rhet. 2.6 [400.14]), and at that of Cupid and Psyche (Apul. Met. 6.24). “his beloved”: i.e., Admetus. Himerius must mean that Apollo, himself in love with Admetus (schol. to Eur. Alc. 1; Callim. Hymn. 2.49; Plut. Amat. 761e), first sang a wedding song at the marriage of Admetus and Alcestis. 13. “it is very dangerous”: In fear of offending Aphrodite by not writing a tender enough piece about love, most poets have chosen the safer path of writing about Hera’s bold behavior. “Hera . . . young girls”: Hera’s victims included Callisto (Ov. Met. 2.401–95; Apollod. Bibl. 3.8.2), Io (Ov. Met. 1.588–746; Apollod. Bibl. 2.1.3), Leto (Callim. Hymn. 4.55ff., 106ff., 239ff.; Apollod. Bibl. 1.4.1), and Semele (Ov. Met. 3.259–315; Apollod. Bibl. 3.4.3). “They left it . . . in front of the chariot”: Sappho frag. 194 Lobel-Page and Voigt; both

The Epithalamium for Severus

147

[5] The duty done by Sappho must now be done by me. For the young man being initiated in marriage is not alien or a stranger to eloquence. Very recently he was a reveler in the camp of the Muses, then he suddenly leaped away from my precincts and took his merrymaking to Aphrodite. So it would be fitting for me to join the chorus at his wedding. The cowherd in the glens takes up his pipe when he sees a young bull he has raised brought to full maturity under the guidance of Aphrodite. Horsekeepers strike up a song when their colts start acting like adult males in their relations with mares. Chiron would not have remained silent in the case of Achilles, if the latter had not concealed his love for Hippodamia. And I understand that the pastoral god Pan played his pipe more forcefully when Dionysus took Ariadne to wife in Cretan caves.14 [6] I want to tell you a story. Poseidon once loved Pelops. When Pelops was young, Poseidon taught him how to mount horses and to drive a chariot on the waves, keeping it skimming over the ocean’s surface. But when love of Hippodamia persuaded Pelops, too, to serve Eros and Aphrodite, then the god gathered together a chorus of Nereids and raised up a bedroom for him on a headland of the shore. The bedroom, I believe, was a wave, heaving and tall and curved up over the bed so as to resemble a bridal chamber. Poseidon sang a wedding song for Pelops. But I shall leave such things to the gods and to Poseidon. I shall begin my song of marriage from where it is reasonable and necessary, elevateditions have useful critical apparatuses. This is also no. 194 in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 1: 182. The problematic text is discussed by Meerwaldt, Mnemosyne 7 (1954): 19–38. “to prepare the bedroom”: Colonna rejects Wernsdorff’s supplemented text poiei¸ n to;n qavlamon (“to make the bedroom the subject of her song”), for in what follows there is a sustained affectation by which occurrences in or actions of the character(s) of the poem are ascribed to the poet herself; see Lieberg, RhM 133 (1990): 180–85; cf. Him. Orat. 46.6, 65.1. “After the contests”: Campbell (Greek Lyric, 1: 182) tentatively explains as “[m]ock contests of suitors.” Or are contests of poetry and song meant, as in Catull. 62? “gathers young maidens the bridal chamber”: Colonna has gravfei parqevnouˇ, numfei¸on a[gei ktl. Dübner regarded gravfei as a corruption and proposed ajgeivrei, which I adopt. I put the comma after numfei¸on, not after parqevnouˇ. “bound . . . in blue [fabric]”: or “bound . . . in a hyacinth garland.” 14. “in the camp of the Muses”: i.e., in Himerius’s school. Hippodamia: apparently an error for “Deidamia,” with whom the young Achilles fell in love on the island of Scyros. See Bion Smyrn. 2; Stat. Achill. 1.293ff., 560ff.; Apollod. Bibl. 3.13.8; Philostr. min. Imag. 1. Whether the error was Himerius’s or a scribe’s, the occurrence of the word “Hippodamia” a few lines below is probably what occasioned it. Chiron was Achilles’ tutor. The union of Dionysus and the Cretan Ariadne is normally placed on the island of Dia (e.g., Ov. Met. 8.174; Philostr. maj. Imag 1.15) or on Naxos (Sen. Oed. 487; Apollod. Epit. 1.9). Some claimed that Dia was an old name for Naxos (Diod. Sic. 4.61.5; schol. to Theocr. 2.45).

148

The Epithalamium for Severus

ing my oration to the regions where the bedroom and marriage had their beginnings.15 [7] Once there were God and nature. God needed generation, and nature needed someone who would impregnate. Marriage did not exist yet, nor had that which would bring forth been joined yet with that which could beget. So that this process would begin from on high, the All became a bedroom for the All, and from this marriage were born the sky and the sun and also the chorus of stars, the light of the moon, and the two poles, around which the first offspring of God’s first marriage revolve. [8] After this marriage, nature showed forth a second marriage, that of Ocean and Tethys, out of which emerged rivers and marshes, and also springs and streams and deep wells, and the sea, which is the mother of all waters. Plants and animals were produced, the earth was inhabited, the sea received swimming creatures, and the air showed itself traversable by winged creatures. Marriage gave plants over to plants, rivers to streams, hail and rain to the earth, the Nile to Egypt—in a word, the male to the female. Then the Ister [Danube] fell in love with the sea near the Bosporus, the Rhine with the sea near the Celtic cities. Eros divided these two rivers, which arise from the same source, through the agency of desire, giving one as a bridegroom to the Euxine [Black] Sea and the other to the Atlantic Ocean.16 [9] The last thing that marriage produced was the human being, who is a contemplator of the divine, although his work is limited to this earthly realm. (The idea that man is a child of the earth and that the Attic soil broke open at his birth and brought him forth as its offspring is a myth, an entertaining story of Attic charm.) Having produced this human being, marriage helped him discover and procure everything by which he makes land and sea his home. Through the human being marriage made furrows in the ground with the plow, launched ships on the waves, and

15. Poseidon had given Pelops “a winged chariot, such that even when it ran through the sea the axles were not wet” (Apollod. Epit. 2.3, trans. J. G. Frazer). For Poseidon’s love of Pelops and the story of Pelops’s winning of Hippodamia, see, e.g., Pind. Ol. 1.25–26, 67–88; Diod. Sic. 4.73; Apollod. Epit. 2.3–8; Hygin. Fab. 84. “then the god gathered together a chorus”: The Photian excerpt has “Apollo” instead of “the god” [i.e., Poseidon]. “The bedroom . . . was a wave” etc.: cf. Hom. Od. 11.243–44. “elevating my oration”: cf. section 7: “from on high.” 16. For Tethys’s marriage to Ocean and her giving birth to rivers and nymphs of springs, see Hes. Theog. 337ff. “out of which emerged . . . deep wells”: cf. Hom. Il. 21.196–97. For rain as the bridegroom of earth, cf. Nonnus Dionys. 38.281. John Lydus (De mag. 3.32) also asserts that the Ister and the Rhine arise from one source.

The Epithalamium for Severus

149

tamed horses with the curb. It gave him weapons for war, festivities for peace, honor for old age, the bloom of life and the sweet hope of children for his youthful prime. Thus we sacrificed to the generative gods, we recognized Hera the matchmaker, and we erected an altar to Zeus teleios; the latter broke open the waves for the birth of Aphrodite, who was concealed in the ocean, and revealed her sparkling in the sunlight.17 [10] As for the race of heroes, which is midway between divine and human nature, whose work would you say it was except that of marriage? For when marriage saw that it was totally forbidden to mix the upper with the lower sphere, it produced something between those two spheres so that it could bring the divine emanation over into the lesser realm. As a result of this, Heracles labors, Dionysus farms, Asclepius heals, and the Dioscuri guide the fortunes of those who cross the seas.18 Marriage would also have to be celebrated by the Muses because it produced them, by Apollo because it brought him forth, and by Hermes because it caused him to come into existence. [11] Now if I should wish to speak of the loves of rivers, an endless throng of them would flow into my oration. For they all seem to me to love the ocean, and consequently they hasten on to it with great speed, each one wishing to greet its beloved before any other does. If we had to link the doings of rivers to marriage, then marriage would have been celebrated because of them. Marriage introduced Thisbe to a river. Thisbe and the river were mutual neighbors. Marriage changed Thisbe from a girl into water and preserved the couple’s love right through that change, uniting the flowing waters of the beloved and her spouse. Tradition knows of the river Enipeus as one who scorned love; yet, in order to provide an erotic myth even in this case, it came up with the story of Poseidon’s marriage in that river. The Enipeus swelled in joy, surging and bulging up to form a bridal chamber, as if, I think, haughtily disposed toward other rivers because it alone had been entrusted with Poseidon’s love. But why

17. “a myth, an entertaining story”: the story of Cecrops. Cf. Him. Orat. 41.3. “Hera the matchmaker”: zugivan, goddess of marriage (Eitrem, “Hera 1,” RE 8, 1 [1912]: 382, 392). “Zeus teleios”: here also a god of marriage (H. Schwabl, “Zeus,” RE Suppl. 15 [1978]: 1033, 1074). “the birth of Aphrodite”: If Himerius is thinking of the Hesiodic version of Aphrodite’s birth from the sea, it must be noted that Zeus did not yet exist at the time of her birth (Hes. Theog. 188ff., 453ff.). 18. Heracles’ labors and Asclepius as a god of healing are well-known. “Dionysus farms”: probably an allusion to viticulture. Dionysus can be more broadly associated with agriculture and, in his vegetative functions, with fruit trees (Diod. Sic. 3.63.3, 64.1, 70.8, 73.5–6; Arr. Indic. 7.5–7; Otto, Dionysus, 157–58). For the Dioscuri as saviors at sea, see Bethe, “Dioskuren,” RE 5 (1905): 1096.

150

The Epithalamium for Severus

do I need myths from abroad? Marriage makes the Ilissus River mad with passion right down from its Attic source. And lest we find fault with the river because, like some lover, it perhaps gets tripped up in the presence of its beloved, marriage has not only adorned the river’s spring, but also the spring’s very name, having joined beauty of appellation to its flowing waters.19 [12] So these (and all the rest) are the beauties of marriage; the poets sing of them, and it is customary to rehearse them at the bridal chamber. But this couple here especially confirm the charm of marriage. They have not been brought into this harmonious state by chance. Just as when a pair of colts of the same age is put under a single yoke, they quickly find concord as they run together; so too this couple, of the same birth and similar upbringing, have, in their completely identical circumstances, passionately desired union. It is said that, when Olympias, who was [later] blessed with the birth of Alexander [the Great], was once celebrating the mysteries of the Cabiri in Samothrace, she saw Philip, who was still just getting his first beard, during the rites. Upon seeing him, she fell in love with the young man and, having turned the mysteries into a prenuptial sacrifice, she vowed that she would marry him. 20 [13] The bride’s fatherland is a Thracian city named after King Philip.21 In the north, and west of the Bosporus, the Scythians to it, and south of it is the Aegean Sea. Her family was Thracian from the very start; they were indigenous, I believe, and traced their most distant roots back to kingly stock. People called Hermogenes and Medus 19. Thisbe: Asopus’s love of her is mentioned at Ov. Am. 3.6.33, where, however, her name is Thebe, daughter of Mars. Other sources call Thebe the daughter of Asopus (Hdt. 5.80; Paus. 2.5.2); Steph. Byz., s.v. Qivsbh (in Boeotia), and Eustathius on Hom. Il. 2.502, p. 409 van der Valk, refer to Thisbe, daughter of Asopus. Whether Thebe’s father was the Phliasian or the Boeotian Asopus was disputed (Paus. 2.5.2). Diodorus Siculus (4.72) provides a way to have a Thebe, daughter of Asopus, who is enamored of a river Asopus without being incestuous: Diodorus differentiates Thebe’s father Asopus, born of Ocean and Tethys, from the Boeotian river named after Asopus. Enipeus: For the union of Poseidon and Tyro in the Enipeus, see Hom. Od. 11.235–45. Himerius’s “surging . . . bridal chamber” echoes Od. 11.243–44. Tyro loved Enipeus, who scorned her advances; Poseidon then won her by deceptively taking Enipeus’s form (Lucian Dial. marin. 13). The Ilissus River: The river is in love with its spring. The spring’s name is Callirrhoë, “Beautiful Flow” (see [Pl.] Axioch. 364a). 20. For the harmony of bride and groom and the desirability of similarity of circumstances and qualities in them (cf. below, section 15), see Catull. 62.57; Men. Rhet. 2.6 [402.28–29], 2.7 [407.22], 2.7 [411.15]; ps.-Dionys. Hal. Ars rhet. 2.7 Usener-Radermacher; Sidon. Apoll. Carm. 11.91–92; Choric. Dialex. 5.11, Orat. 5.40–43 Foerster-Richtsteig. For Olympias, see Plut. Alex. 2.2, where, however, it is Philip who falls in love with her rather than she with him. I propose a lacuna at the end of the paragraph, in which Himerius would have drawn some explicit comparison with the couple he celebrates. 21. For the Thracian city, see p. 42 above.

The Epithalamium for Severus

151

and those who even now are preeminent among the Thracians share roots with her on both sides of her family. [14] The bridegroom’s family are natives of so-called Diospontus. The head of that family, I believe, was the renowned Androclus. From this one root, as it were, innumerable sprouts broke off and shot forth all over the world, making many cities fortunate because of the family’s association with them. This is just what I hear about the Pelopidae, when the famous [head of that family] crossed over from Ionia to Greece and brought the honor of his name to that people. Others would consider it a great advantage if they could lay claim to the glory of Androclus in just one branch of their family. But this [bridegroom] has experienced what happens when rivers flow out from a single source, then diverge in a number of streams and come together again: the family of Androclus, after wandering around for a long time, has been tied down and amalgamated again in him.22 Those who say that Achilles was born of a divine mother [Thetis] also say that he was the son of mortal Peleus. Our bridegroom enjoys the equal good fortune of having this same mixture in his parents. [15] So much, then, for the question of family. But the couple’s traits and [simultaneous] flourishing confirm their similarity much more. For they flourish equally, like buds from a single meadow in spring, buds that appear and open up at the same time. They have a remarkable similarity of soul. They are both self-controlled, of upright character, different only in the activities that they are inclined to by their natural propensities. She, through her spinning, has reaped the fruit of Athena’s craft; he, through serious application, has reaped the fruit of Hermes’ charm. Her concern is the shuttle; his is the spoken and written word. She holds a lyre; he clings to a book. Aphrodite loves her; Apollo has become very fond of him. He was the first of unmarried young men; she is the cho-

22. “so-called Diospontus”: literally, “the Pontus that is referred to as belonging to Zeus” (oJ Dio;ˇ kalouvmenoˇ Povntoˇ). Wernsdorff proposed the emendation hJ Dio;ˇ kaloumevnh povliˇ (Diospolis Pontica). But Himerius is referring to the Asianic province of Diospontus, “which was certainly renamed Helenopontus before the end of Constantine’s reign” (Jones, Later Roman Empire, 1: 43); cf. Him. Orat. 24 [26–27]. Himerius retains the pagan name here. Androclus: The name is not securely established because of the uncertain terminal abbreviation with which it is written here in codex A. If Himerius did write “Androclus,” he probably means the son of the Athenian king Codrus and founder of Ephesus (Strabo 14.1.3 [632–33]; cf. Wernsdorff ad loc. and Seeck, “Severus 24,” RE 2A, 2 [1923]: 2004, where “Androdoklos” is a typographical error for “Androklos”). Pelops came from Asia Minor and gave his name to the Peloponnesus. “Others would consider it” etc.: Himerius seems to mean that both Severus’s father’s family and his mother’s family claimed descent from Androclus.

152

The Epithalamium for Severus

sen one among girls. He, while still a young adolescent, got a beard sooner than his coevals; and she is quite ready for marriage. ([16] It was Sappho, of course, who compared the girl [in her poem] to an apple. Those who rush to pick her prematurely do even get to taste of her with the tips of their fingers; instead, she saves her grace, in its full bloom, for the man who intends to pluck the apple at the right time.)23 Sappho also likened the bridegroom [she was writing about] to Achilles and equated the young man’s actions with his. Just as poetry puts that famous hero in command of the whole Hellenic force in wartime, so too this young man [Severus], leading his own band, has won many great contests. If judgment is required, he wins through the use of his mind. If courage is needed, he overcomes his contemporaries. If it is a liberal disposition that the situation demands, he outdoes all his peers in philosophy. This renown of his is what won him this fortunate bride. For the Erotes know how to stir up the wedding fire, even when shooting their arrows overseas.24 [17] In joining together Deianira, daughter of Oeneus, and Heracles, legend makes her someone who was fought over by [the river] Acheloüs and others. As if wishing to indicate that it was not ignorant of the [relative] worth of [potential] bridegrooms, legend gave the bride to Heracles and left the river a tragic loser. But I think that every arrangement is a decision of the gods—[in this case] so that, after [the bridegroom] has secured a foreign rather than Attic marriage, he will at least set up his bedchamber in Attic territory in order that this land may welcome and nurture the first offspring of the marriage and through you, [Severus], bring happiness to Thrace by means of Attic progeny.25 [18] It occurs to me that I should not fail to mention and praise the

23. For Athena’s connection with spinning and weaving, see Verg. Aen. 7.805; Ov. Met. 6.19–23; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 37.12 Keil; Roscher, “Athene,” Ausführl. Lex. 1 (1884–1890): 681–82. Hermes is logios, god of eloquence. “She holds a lyre . . . a book”: cf. the conjecturally supplemented text of Menander Rhetor 2.6 [403.29]: ejn paideiva/ sofo;ˇ ou|toˇ,

j ejn luvra/ (Russell and Wilson, Menander Rhetor, ad loc. and p. 316), and note in Sidonius Apollinaris’s epithalamium, Carm. 15, the temples of philosophy and of the textile arts associated respectively with the groom and the bride. For comments on the maturity or right age of one or both spouses, cf. Men. Rhet. 2.6 [404.10]; Choric. Orat. 5.39 Foerster-Richtsteig; Venant. Fortunat. Carm. 6.1.52–53. “It was Sappho” etc.: This and the Sapphic reference at the beginning of the next paragraph are Sappho no. 105b in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 1: 130. For the motif of the plucked apple, see Petropoulos, Eroticism, 69–73. 24. I.e., shooting from Athens to Thrace. 25. For Heracles’ fight with Acheloüs over Deianira, see Soph. Trachin. 1–25; Ov. Met. 9.1–88; Apollod. Bibl. 1.8.1; Philostr. min. Imag. 4. For Deianira’s many suitors, Ov. Met. 9.10, 13. Severus, like Heracles (Ov. Met. 9.19–20), married a foreigner.

The Epithalamium for Severus

153

woman who has been the orchestrator of this marriage. My art and hers have the same forefathers. She does not disgrace our [Athenian] race by her sex, for in her eloquence she is another Aspasia. In her wisdom she outdoes the foreign woman of Mantinea to the same extent that Athenians are superior to Arcadians. She obtains for the city [of Athens] a Thracian in-law who derives his name from that wise [city of ] Chalcis, as if, I think, she is eager to confirm the ancient story that love of Oreithyia brought the wind Boreas from Thrace to Athens and, through the young lady, linked the wind to the city. There are many fine things that one could say about this woman I am praising, but it would be especially fitting to admire her for what she did in the case of this marriage. For the gods saved this girl [i.e., the bride], who was almost on the verge of being caught by evil snares.26 [19] But my oration has lingered outside the bridal chamber and has quite neglected the bride, as if unaware that it troubles the bridegroom by not yet having given a verbal depiction of her. Very well, we shall now conduct my oration into the bedroom and persuade it to encounter the bride’s beauty. “O beautiful woman, O graceful woman”—for Lesbian accolades suit you—rosy-ankled Graces and golden Aphrodite play with you, the Hours supply you with the meadow’s flowers. Leap nimbly to the accompaniment of song. Dance over the flowers. The Erotes have fashioned crowns of roses, which they cut from Aphrodite’s gardens whenever they wish, and are putting them all over your bed. Persuasion, Love, and Desire divided the whole of your beauty among themselves. [Desire] takes up a position in your eyes, sending out from them its irresistible flames. [Love] reddens your cheeks with modesty more than

26. For the mastery of rhetoric achieved by Pericles’ mistress Aspasia, see Pl. Menex. 235e–36b; Alciphr. Ep. 4.7.7 Schepers; Them. Orat. 26.329c. “the foreign woman of Mantinea”: probably Diotima of Plato’s Symposium (201d) rather than Plato’s pupil Lastheneia (Diog. Laert. 3.46, 4.2)? Mantinea is in Arcadia. “who derives his name . . . Chalcis”: Is the name Chalcidius? To which Chalcis is Himerius referring, and why is it “wise”? If it is the philosopher Iamblichus’s birthplace in Syria, wise for that reason, what inspires the reference here is not apparent. For Boreas’s love of Oreithyia, daughter of Erechtheus, see, e.g., Apoll. Rhod. 1.211–18; Ov. Met. 6.682ff.; Paus. 1.19.5. “Thracian in-law” is gambro;n Qrav/kion, gambrovn being Wernsdorff’s conjectural emendation of gamikovn. Boreas was called “Erechtheus’s gambrovˇ,” in this case son-in-law (Hdt. 7.189; Nonnus Dionys. 39.113; Suda G 46 Adler). In our case, perhaps a father-in-law or brother-in-law of some importance. The example of Oreithyia and Boreas does not fit Himerius’s sentence perfectly because it refers to the acquisition of a spouse, whereas what is at issue for Himerius is the acquisition of a relative of a spouse. “by evil snares”: It is worth repeating Wernsdorff’s suggestion that Himerius means that the girl was saved from marrying a Christian. For Christian allusions to the “snares” (qhravtroiˇ) of paganism, see Lampe, Patristic Greek Lex., s.v.

154

The Epithalamium for Severus

nature colors rosebuds, when in springtime they split open in their maturity and show the redness at the tops of their petals. Persuasion settles on your lips and lets its charm trickle out along with your words. Many curls appear on your head, reddish and parted on your brow. And if I want to describe the flower of your appearance, I would have to speak the words of poets: “What fairness of skin, white as milk!” These are the words a shepherd [the Cyclops Polyphemus] addressed somewhere in the works of those poets to the Nereid Galateia whom he loved, having used his skill to compose a song for her. [20] Having brought together a chorus of Graces, he would have given this bride to the goddesses as their playmate.27 But if I had a poetic nature such that I could freely let my tongue loose on the subject of the bride, I would have spoken of her beauty like a Homer. I would have placed her, spotted with gold, in Aphrodite’s groves, not next to an altar of Apollo. I would have led the Muses out of Athens— and I fault the poets when they rob Athens of them and maintain that they belong to the Boeotians—I would have led the Nereids out of the nearby sea; I would have led choruses of Nymphs, resounding Dryads, leaping Satyrs, piping Pan, and Dionysus’s whole company out from wherever they practice their rites. As for Aphrodite herself, coming up from the midst of the sea with foam still dripping from the ends of her strands of hair after she emerged from the ocean, I would have placed her above the marriage bed with her sweet smiles and her commands to her children [the Erotes] to shoot arrows at the couple. If a song had been needed, I would have provided the following one: “O bride, you who are brimming with rosy love, O bride, most beautiful delight of Paphian [Aphrodite], approach the bed, approach the place where marriage is consummated, O gently playful bride, such a delight to your groom. Evening leads you on, and you do not resist; you honor the marriage goddess Hera in her silver throne.”28 27. “O beautiful . . . graceful woman”: Sappho no. 108 in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 1: 134; cf. Theocr. 18.38. “rosy-ankled . . . play with you”: cf. Anacreon no. 357 in Campbell, 2: 54? “Leap nimbly”: Anacreon no. 417.5, in Campbell, 2: 94, a poem addressed to a “Thracian filly.” “[Desire] . . . eyes”: cf. Theocr. 18.37. “What fairness of skin” etc.: cf. Theocr. 11.19–20; Ov. Met. 13.789; Lucian Dial. marin. 1.2–3; Philostr. maj. Imag. 2.18. The Cyclops’s praising of Galateia’s milky-white skin was standard. “he would have given”: Perhaps a specific poet whom Himerius has in mind—despite the previous reference to “poets”—rather than Polyphemus. 28. “not next to an altar of Apollo”: a reference to Hom. Od. 6.162, where the sight of beautiful Nausicaa reminds Odysseus of a beautiful palm shoot he once saw at Delos next to Apollo’s altar? “[the Muses] belong to the Boeotians”: because Mt. Helicon, sacred to them, is in Boeotia. For Aphrodite born from the sea, cf. section 9 above. “O bride . . .

The Epithalamium for Severus

155

[21] But tell me, where are the choruses of maidens, where are the choruses of young bachelors? My eloquence leaves the rest of the festivities to you. Let someone light a large torch. Let someone else sound forth. Let song take hold of everything. Headlands and vales, the pipes of shepherds and of all herdsmen are resounding, just as when Zeus was begetting the daughters of Memory [i.e., the Muses] on Mt. Helicon.29 I leave dancing to the dancers. I myself shall stand next to the bedroom and pray to Fortune, to Eros, and to the gods of procreation: to Eros, that he shoot every one of his arrows; to Fortune, that she give life; and to the gods of procreation, that they grant the birth of lawfully begotten children, so that one day we may join the drink-offering that celebrates birth with the cup that celebrates marriage. [cod. A, with passages also in Exc. Phot. and Exc. Neapol.] silver throne”: It has been thought that Himerius composed these lines in imitation of something Sapphic; see Sappho frag. 133 Bergk4. For the marriage goddess Hera (zugivan), cf. section 9 above. 29. The classic passage, Hes. Theog. 53ff., says that the Muses were born in Pieria, but does not have to be interpreted to mean that they were conceived there.

chapter 6

Imaginary Orations

The height of the ancient rhetorical curriculum was the melet;, what we commonly call the declamation, an imaginary deliberative or judicial oration in which the speaker impersonated a mythical, historical, or generic character.1 Meletai were complete, full-blown orations; the student advanced to them after working on the progymnasmata, preliminary exercises in various modes of discourse, which often can be found incorporated into appropriate sections of a full-blown oration.2 The sophist was expected to be a master of declamation. His meletai were models for his students to emulate, and there were also eager audiences for them outside of the schoolroom. Despite criticisms of these “toy model[s] of oratory,” they remained entrenched in ancient academic culture.3 It is no wonder, then, that we find examples of meletai as well as of “real world” oratory in the surviving works of figures such as Aelius Aristides, Libanius, Choricius of Gaza—and Himerius. For Himerius we have excerpts from five declamations, Orations 1–5. Given that modern readers do not readily warm to the ancient declamation,4 Photius’s judgment 1. For meletai, see esp. Russell, Greek Declamation; also Anderson, Philostratus, 28–30. 2. For progymnasmata, see Kennedy, Greek Rhetoric, 54–73, and his Progymnasmata; Schouler, La tradition hellénique, 51–138; Cribiore, Gymnastics, 221–30. 3. The quotation is from Russell, Greek Declamation, 87. For ancient criticisms of school declamations, see, e.g., Reader, Severed Hand, 29. 4. In the spirit of ancient critics of declamation, we tend to see its themes as escapist, trivial, or bizarre. This is to say nothing of any stylistic criticisms that we might have. More serious study of the corpus of extant ancient declamations may lead to a better apprecia-

156

Imaginary Orations

157

on Orations 1–5 in his Himerian bibliography is especially striking: “These orations (lovgoi) were worked up to display his oratorical competence and the brilliance and power of his thoughts more than his other orations” (cod. 165.107b). For Photius, the declamations are Himerius’s masterpieces. A stylistic analysis follows, which Photius accords separately to no other titles in his Himerian bibliography.5 The meletai are the only works of Himerius explicitly mentioned in the Suda’s article on him. The oration he delivered in the 340s at Nicomedia, in an oratorical contest in which Libanius participated, was apparently a melet;.6 Sopater, in his Division of Questions (p. 318 Walz), quotes him as an authority on meletai. Included here with Orations 1–5 is Oration 6, not a deliberative or judicial melet; but an epideictic piece, an encomium.7 It is, however, like the meletai, an imaginary oration, in which Himerius impersonates a polemarch of classical Athens. It is also, like them, a fullblown exercise and not a short, progymnasmatic example of its genre. An advocate of the “modern” style in his real-life orations, Himerius can also mimic the style of Demosthenes, whom he impersonates in Oration 2, or that of Aelius Aristides in his declamations.8 Oration 1 is a defense of Demosthenes put in the mouth of Hyperides. Hyperides aligns himself with Demosthenes’ strong anti-Macedonianism and berates the Athenians (and other Greeks) for not heeding Demosthenes and for allowing Philip to gain mastery over them. Some Athenians (including Aeschines) have traitorously abetted Philip and have falsely accused Demosthenes of having tyrannous ambitions and of being a coward. In the course of the speech, Hyperides praises the bravery of the Athenians of old, who boldly stood up to Xerxes, contrasting them to their current counterparts. The only further specification of the historical premise in the skimpy tion of qualities that at least the best of them have; these latter can be thought of as constituting a minor literary genre, with links to comedy, the novel, mime, and fable (Russell, Greek Declamation, 38–39). And if one cannot warm to the literary qualities of at least some declamations, they can still be taken seriously as important cultural artifacts, as, for example, by Schmitz in Zimmermann, Geschichtsschreibung, 71–92. 5. There are some stylistic comments at the end of the bibliography, applicable to Himerius’s oeuvre in general. 6. See p. 6 above. 7. See Russell, Greek Declamation, 10. 8. For encomium as progymnasma or only part of a full speech that is not primarily encomiastic vs. encomium as freestanding, full panegyric in its own right, see Nicolaus Progymn. 8, pp. 47–48 Felten; John of Sardis Comment. in Aphthonii Progymn. 8, pp. 116–18 Rabe (Eng. trans. of both texts in Kennedy, Progymnasmata, 154–55, 206–7). For Himerius’s style, see Norden, Die antike Kunstprosa, 428, and note Eunap. Vitae phil.et soph. 14 [494] Giangrande; Völker in Amato et al., Approches, 590–92, 610.

158

Imaginary Orations

remains of this oration is found in section 2. There the speaker refers to a “proclamation” (khruvgmatoˇ) that “would deprive you not only of Demosthenes, but of all your popular [anti-Macedonian] leaders.” “For soon,” the excerpt ends, “we shall seem to fare ill and be subjected to Philip by our own free will and not under constraint [i.e., if we comply with him].” In his opening comment on Oration 1, Wernsdorff assumes that “Hyperides” is urging the Athenians not to yield to a demand from Philip to hand Demosthenes over to him. No such demand is attested of Philip, although Alexander the Great did ask for the surrender of Demosthenes and other Athenian leaders but subsequently retracted the demand (Plut. Dem. 23). Libanius makes precisely such a demand by Philip the premise of a number of his imaginary orations (Decl. 19–23). If my understanding of the excerpt from the theOria, or explanatory comment, of Oration 1 is correct,9 Hyperides’ speech on behalf of Demosthenes was originally paired with that of another speaker who argued against Demosthenes. But no excerpts from this anti-Demosthenic oration survive. Oration 2’s theme is inspired by two historical facts: Alexander the Great’s exiles’ decree, pronounced at the Olympic Games of 324 b.c., shortly before his death, and Aeschines’ exile from Athens after the failure, in 330, of his case against Ctesiphon, whom he had attacked for proposing honors for Demosthenes. With the exception of several categories of individuals, Alexander called for the restoration of all Greek exiles in 324. This was absolutist interference in the affairs of the Greeks. As Quintus Curtius says (10.2.5), they saw Alexander’s move as a challenge to the validity of their own legal enactments. Athens was upset not just at this, but also because enactment of the decree would mean that its cleruchies on Samos would have to be restored to Samians then in exile.10 Our sources offer two explanations of why Aeschines was in exile from Athens at the time of Alexander’s exiles’ decree: either he left on his own after the humiliating failure of his case against Ctesiphon or he was ordered into exile at that time by a public enactment.11 Himerius’s Oration 2, in which Demosthenes is the speaker, assumes the latter. Its imaginary premise is that Demosthenes himself, Aeschines’ political enemy, advised that the Athenians should recall Aeschines by their own action rather than 9. See my note on Orat. 1.1. 10. Bosworth, Conquest and Empire, 220–28. 11. Plut. Vitae decem orat. 840c– d; cf. Philostratus (Vitae soph. 509), who, in specifying that Aeschines left Athens “not because he had been ordered into exile” but to avoid disgrace, also attests to the tradition that he was ordered to leave the city. For Aeschines’ case against Ctesiphon, see Harris, Aeschines, 139–48.

Imaginary Orations

159

passively accept his restoration by Alexander’s fiat. The Athenians have heard “rumors from India” (2.22) about Alexander’s intention to restore exiles (cf. opening scholion), so the date of Demosthenes’ imagined oration must be prior to the proclamation of the restoration at the Olympic Games of 324. Himerius’s Demosthenes is loath to propose the overturning of the Athenian decree that exiled Aeschines, regarding such a proposal as illegal (2.7), and he still maligns Aeschines; but acting to avoid passive acceptance of Alexander’s own action is the only way to save face. Oration 3 is a judicial declamation in a specific historical setting: the declaimer is accusing the philosopher Epicurus in Athens of impiety because he denies divine providence.12 The speaker cites the very fact that Epicurus is finally being tried as a proof that providence exists (3.2, 14–15). The last excerpts from this oration (3.17–22) respond to Epicurus’s claim that the idea of divine providence can be refuted by the fact that evil men fare well and good (i.e., wise) men fare badly. The declamation takes the typical anti-Epicurean view that Epicurean hedonism is sheer abandon and leads to the destruction of the moral order.13 Oration 4 is a judicial declamation with generic characters: a poor man accuses a rich man of having wronged him. The situation is as follows. The poor man exposed his infant son in the wilderness. The rich man took up the exposed infant and raised him, knowing who his father and mother were. The father was ignorant of his son’s fate. When the son reached maturity, his rich guardian urged him to commit adultery with his mother without revealing her identity to him. The poor man apparently caught the youth in bed with his wife, the youth’s mother, and killed both of them. The rich man then revealed to the poor man, through tokens of recognition, that the young adulterer he had just killed was none other than the son he had exposed many years earlier. The rich man claims that he revealed the young man’s identity so that he might be buried with his ancestors. The rich man and the poor man have been active in city politics and were political opponents, and one (if not the only) motive behind the rich man’s actions was to drive the poor man out of politics. In the oration, the poor man is accusing the rich man of having engineered the tragic bedroom scene. The rich man is the real guilty one. Both conflict between the rich and the victimized poor and adultery were 12. Cf., in a scholion of Syrianus to Hermogenes’ Staseis, a declamation theme titled “Epicurus is examined when chosen by lot to serve as dadouchos [at Eleusis]” (C. Walz, Rhetores graeci [1832–36], 4: 719). Presumably found unqualified. 13. For comment on Orat. 3 in a general discussion of late ancient anti-Epicurean polemic, see Criscuolo in Storia, poesia, e pensiero, 149–67.

160

Imaginary Orations

common themes in declamation.14 In Oration 4, the poor speaker regards his rich opponent as the enemy of all poor citizens, not merely of himself (4.23). He thinks of the rich man as a playwright who has orchestrated a tragedy—actually enough woes for a number of tragedies—against him (4.7, 18, 22–23), but who will himself soon “be part of the tragedy” (4.27) when he receives his just deserts. In the last excerpts (4.24–26) there is an interesting ecphrasis of a painting illustrating, in a series of scenes, the poor man’s sufferings—not an actual painting, but one that the poor man urges the rich man to paint or to have painted for the whole world to see. Oration 5 is based on the historical fiction that, after the war launched against Greece by Xerxes in 480 b.c. was over, the Athenians voted to wage a new war against the Persians. Xerxes tried to dissuade them from going to war by offering “to restore what had had damage inflicted on it [in Athens]” (opening scholion) during his invasion of Greece. Some Athenians—and one in particular whom “Themistocles,” Oration 5’s imagined declaimer, addresses individually (5.11, 17, 20, 41)—want to accept the king’s offer. Themistocles urges the Athenians not to do so. Photius (cod. 165.107b) calls this declamation judicial, apparently because Themistocles “indicts” Xerxes. It is better labeled deliberative: Themistocles is trying to persuade the Athenians not to turn away from their decision to wage a new war against Persia. As Wernsdorff noted in his opening comment on this oration, Himerius’s historical fiction here seems to be inspired by an offer Xerxes made to come to terms with Athens before his Persian War was over. Reported in Herodotus 8.139– 44, this rejected offer included the promise to rebuild temples that had been burned in the course of the war. “Themistocles” argues that Xerxes’ promise to restore Athens is not serious. It is not clear what the king will rebuild, and his offer has strings attached. In any case, compromise with Xerxes is unthinkable; he is the city’s enemy, who cannot be trusted, and coming to terms with him would betray the city’s highest standards. Furthermore, the city has already voted to go to war and should not be tempted by material gain to undo its decision. Themistocles’ self-importance is on display in this declamation: Xerxes had invaded Greece “on my account” (5.3); it was “I,” not Greece, who was not defeated in battle (5.6). Themistocles’ thinking was like that of the gods (5.2).15 He “want[s] to name places after [his] ac-

14. Russell, Greek Declamation, 27–30, 33–35, with some comments on Him. Orat. 4; Richlin in Foley, Reflections, 390–91, for adultery in Latin declamations. 15. But see my note on this passage.

Imaginary Orations

161

complishments, [he] want[s] seas and rivers to be referred to by [his] victories rather than by their old names” (5.40). The public burial of those who fell in battle, with a funeral oration honoring them, was a distinctive institution of classical Athens.16 In Oration 6, Himerius impersonates someone delivering such an oration apparently at the end of the fifth century b.c. 17 Aelius Aristides had also written three such orations. They do not survive, but Menander Rhetor (2.11 [418.10–12]) refers to them, assuming that in classical Athens such orations would have been delivered by the polemarch. Himerius must also have imagined a polemarch as the person delivering Oration 6— hence its title. In fact, classical texts inform us that the Athenian funeral oration was delivered by a prominent individual specially chosen by the state.18 The polemarch’s role was normally restricted to arranging the funeral games in honor of the fallen dead.19 It was typical of the Athenian funeral oration to allude to the nomos that required it (and public burial at Athens),20 as does Himerius’s polemarchic oration (6.1, 32). Nomos can be translated either as “custom” or as “law.” I have chosen the latter, since Himerius refers to a specific person “who framed this nomos (oJ nomoqevthˇ).” He may be thinking of Solon.21 If Himerius imagines his polemarch speaking at the burial of recently fallen war heroes, there are no allusions specifically to them, to the circumstances of their death, or to their survivors. The polemarch refers only to “the men buried here,” oiJ th¸/ de keivmenoi (6.2, 8, 15), or to “these men,” tw¸ n a[ndrwn touvtwn (6.2), tw¸ nde (6.8), touvtwn (6.10)—that is, to all the war dead who have been laid to rest in the state burial grounds over the years. They all displayed a valor, whether fighting barbarians or fellow Greeks, that made Athens supreme. Athenian valor during the Persian Wars is the major focus (6.14ff.), and Himerius exploits all the dramatic

16. For the classical Athenian funeral oration, see Kennedy, Art of Persuasion, 154–66, and, e.g., the impressive study by Loraux, Invention of Athens. “distinctive”: see Gomme, Historical Commentary, 2: 94; note Dem. 20.141; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.368 Lenz-Behr; and cf. Him. Orat. 6.1: “It [i.e., the law requiring public funeral orations] is Attic and belongs strictly to this city and this city alone.” 17. For dates of the latest events referred to in this oration, see my note on 6.30–32. 18. Thuc. 2.34.6; Pl. Menex. 234b; [Dem.] 60.1; Cic. Laws 2.26 [65]; Diod. Sic. 11.33.3. 19. Arist. Ath. pol. 58; Philostr. Vitae soph. 623. Of course, on occasion the specially chosen speaker could have been holding the office of polemarch. Hammond (Studies, 356–57) conjectures that before 479/8 b.c. it was the polemarch who routinely delivered the public funeral oration. 20. Thuc. 2.35, 46 (cf. 2.34); Pl. Menex. 236d; [Dem.] 60.2. 21. Cf. the scholia to Thuc. 2.35, and Anaximenes of Lampsacus, FGrH 72 F 24.

162

Imaginary Orations

and rhetorical possibilities of that period of Athenian history. The Persian Wars are “the main argument in my oration,” the period “that my audience has long been expecting and seeking to hear praised” (6.13). Although fallen soldiers and martial valor would seem to be the topics strictly proper to the occasion, the Athenian funeral oration typically praises the fallen soldiers’ ancestors, Athenians in general from the beginning of the city’s history, and nonmartial achievements of the city as well. So the Himerian polemarch notes that “in everything . . . our city could rightly be said to have shown the way to others” (6.4). There was “no other city or even human beings before Athens” (6.3). It was “the first city to have consorted with the gods . . . [and] to have revealed divine knowledge to the human race” (6.4). It gave various civilizing benefactions to the human race. Athenian exploits benefited the whole of Greece, not just Athens. The city displayed kindness (6.9ff.) and could be a peacemaker (6.29, 32) as well as wage war successfully. The Athenian funeral oration, as one can see from this Himerian oration as well as from classical examples of the genre, becomes an opportunity to celebrate the city generally.22 All of Himerius’s imaginary declamations that we know of have Athenian themes except the nameless and placeless Oration 4.23 This may be an accident of transmission. Or should we take it to suggest that Himerius, with his various ties to Athens, favored Athenian themes or at least the dissemination and preservation of those declamations of his that were based on such themes? Alternatively, it may have been his posthumous editors, aware of his Athenian ties, who favored the preservation of his Athenian themes.

translations 1. From an Oration of Hyperides on Behalf of Demosthenes from the explanatory comment (Qewriva) [1] Every citizenry views this kind of debate with suspicion and as something that can trip a person up, as something troubling enough to 22. Cf. Loraux, Invention, 2: “The codified praise of the dead spilled over into generalized praise of Athens”; id., 52: “Each epitaphios can easily be reduced to an encomium of Athens, in relation to which the praise of the dead becomes secondary.” For the traditional praises of Athens, see, besides extant classical Athenian funeral orations, Isocrates’ Panegyricus and Panathenaicus and Aelius Aristides’ Panathenaicus. One might still consult Schroeder, De laudibus Athenarum, and there is much in Loraux, Invention. 23. Oration 3 is concerned with Epicurus in Athens: it is Athens that his teaching is outraging (3.11), and it is an Attic court that is trying him (3.2, 15)

Imaginary Orations

163

affect the listener’s willingness to be persuaded. For both orations are aimed at the masses and conceive of themselves as advocating the better argument. . . . not to use plain words, but those that express the speaker’s meaning by hinting at more than what they say. . . .24 from the declamation (Melevthˇ) [2] Athenians, Philip thought that through this one proclamation he would deprive you not only of Demosthenes, but of all your popular leaders, of all of us who, having given ourselves to the state along with him, have kept Philip out of Attica and up to now maintained the city’s freedom unharmed. For soon we shall seem to fare ill and be subjected to Philip by our own free will and not under constraint.25 [3] At first [Philip] turned against barbarians. After he emptied out that area of the mainland, he subsequently moved against important regions belonging to our city and to other Greeks. Everywhere he surrounded us with nets, as clever hunters do, who spare wild animals as long as they are still preparing themselves for the hunt. But nothing stirred us up, nothing pushed us into taking command of the situation—not his undermining of the Peloponnesus, not the fall of Phocis, not his installing of tyrants in Euboea (Euboea with its trophies from the Persian War!), not his enslaving of Arcadia, not the misfortunes suffered by Elis. We even saw an attempt made on the [Thracian] Chersonesus, and we dragged our feet as we watched the Hellespont being taken away from us. [4] For what plague or earthquake emptied out so many cities or obliterated and buried so many peoples as Philip and his gold?26 [5] For [Philip] fully understands that he is deprived of what he does not yet have because of the efforts of this man [i.e., Demosthenes] and that he would not have obtained what he does have if anyone had been heeding Demosthenes’ advice. [6] Philip, egged on by the resolutions of [Greek] traitors, not only 24. I translate sumboulhv in the first sentence as “debate.” The reference to a “debate” and to “both orations” (pace Völker) shows that Himerius composed both this pro-Demosthenic oration in Hyperides’ mouth and a lost anti-Demosthenic oration in someone else’s mouth. Wernsdorff, who did not think that the second sentence of this excerpt followed immediately on the first, conjectured that both orations were in Hyperides’ mouth. “not to use” etc.: see Brinkmann, RhM 62 (1907): 627. “by hinting . . . they say”: The Greek is di j ejmfavsewˇ, for which see Quintil. 8.3.83–86, 9.2.3; Ernesti, Lexicon, s.v. 25. On this excerpt, see p. 158 above. 26. For the emendation “gold” (crusovˇ) instead of the transmitted “times” ( crovnoˇ), see Wilamowitz, Kleine Schriften, 4: 647; Guida in Bianchetti, POIKILMA, 588–90. Philip’s gold is mentioned in section 11 below.

164

Imaginary Orations

uses bribery against our cities, makes prizes out of our homelands, and arms destructive men against our peoples; he has also turned his engine of war upon our orators and our popular leaders.27 [7] On the contrary, everyone ordained that that action was a feast and a holiday. Then that man [Xerxes] did not [merely] make outrageous remarks but began to commit outrageous acts against the natural order of things. He piled earth on the sea and sailed right through mountains, using the sea as land and the land as sea.28 [8] The city made the triremes its home instead of Attica, and it did everything at sea that was previously done in its sacred shrines.29 [9] Aren’t the Macedonians, who previously were content if they could live safely as tributaries, now in control of things? They ousted our city from power and themselves infringed upon the position in which our ancestors left us.30 [10] What legal enactment [of yours] brought Philip down to the sea and compelled him to make contact with an element that was not his?

[11] For when law and opportunity both bid me do the same thing, I expediently obey them both. But when need bids me do one thing and the laws another, I ignore the letter of the law and follow what is expedient. And who does not know that those men [i.e., Macedonian sympathizers at Athens] long ago bid adieu to our lawgivers, long ago said their full good-byes to Solon, Dracon, and all the others, and now regard Macedonian gold and friendship with Philip as their laws, their fatherland, their state, and the most valuable things in the world? [12] . . . [Aeschines?] placarded as infamous next to the goddess

27. “makes prizes”: i.e., for his Greek partisans, e.g., the tyrants of Eretria and of Oreus in Euboea (Dem. 9.57–62). “destructive men”: ajlavstoraˇ, a word Demosthenes (18.296) uses to describe Greek traitors. “he has also turned his engine” etc.: cf. section 2 above. 28. The speaker must here be contrasting the Athenian/Greek response to Xerxes with the current response to Philip. “On the contrary . . . holiday”: Everyone in Athens was so confident that they responded to Xerxes’ invasion as though it were a party rather than a military assault. For the comparison, cf. Eunap. Hist. frag. 39.8 Blockley. “He piled” etc.: a reference to Xerxes’ bridging of the Hellespont and his cutting a canal through the Athos promontory (cf. Him. Orat. 2.7; 5.3, 4, 6; 6.24, 25, 27). This motif was a sophistic commonplace (Lucian Rhet. praec. 18). 29. The reference is to the Athenians’ decision to evacuate their city and stake all on a sea battle during the Second Persian War (Hdt. 7.140–43, 8.41). Cf. Him. Orat. 6.27: “They made the sea their city.” For their celebration of the Eleusinian mysteries on board their ships, see Them. Orat. 4.53c, 5.71a. 30. For the Macedonians as once tributaries of the Athenians, see [Dem.] 7.12, 11.16; Arr. Anab. 7.9.4; Liban. Decl. 19.4 Foerster.

Imaginary Orations

165

[Athena]. . . . I am suspicious of Aeschines. For the Phocian tragedy disturbs me, a real-life tragedy, not a staged one, in which this marvelous third-part actor played his role.31 [13] And nevertheless, even though this is the case, they [i.e., Demosthenes’ Athenian enemies] insult the man [Demosthenes] and often mention [the tyrant] Pisistratus in connection with him.32 They feel no shame in now scoffing at him for his cowardice and softness, now expressing fear that he may tyrannize the city. Yet the two charges are utterly at odds with one another. [14] [Demosthenes], sailing from Piraeus against the tyrants with every one of the fleets. . . . [15] They [Demosthenes’ Athenian opponents] ruin the position of the city itself and make it possible for Philip’s interests to move along smoothly. [Exc. Phot.] 2. [Demosthenes on Behalf of Aeschines] From the declamation (melevthˇ) in which [Himerius] introduces Demosthenes advising that [the Athenians] recall Aeschines from exile, after the rumor had spread that Alexander [the Great] would recall the exiles. [1] It is terrible when citizens nullify a decree by their own action and also when they are forced to nullify a decree contrary to their opinion by someone’s order. But I think that it is less objectionable that citizens nullify a decree by their own action than against their will. For the former course can at times look like a humanitarian act; but those who obey the will of others [i.e., Alexander] bring shame upon themselves and glory upon the ones who issued the orders.33 [2] Aeschines takes counsel with kings even after his trial, and he still 31. “placarded as infamous”: sthlivthn. Malefactors in classical Athens had their names engraved on a stele on the Acropolis, to which Wernsdorff’s emendation of tw¸/ qew¸/ to th¸/ qew¸/ gives a reference; see Arist. Rhet. 2.23 [1400a33]. For Aeschines as responsible for Philip’s destruction of the Phocians, cf. Him. Orat. 2.6, 13. “a real-life tragedy”: cf. Dem. 19.337: “[Aeschines] has wrought immeasurable mischief, not on the stage, but in his dealings with the most momentous affairs of state” (trans. C. A. and J. H. Vince). “third-part actor”: Aeschines spent a period of his life as an actor, and Demosthenes derided him with the term tritagwnivsthˇ—“third-part actor,” but with the implication “third-rate.” See Pickard-Cambridge, Dramatic Festivals, 133–35; Harris, Aeschines, 30–31. 32. I.e., they say that he aspires to become a Pisistratus. 33. “a humanitarian act”: i.e., if, as in this case, the nullification entails some act of clemency.

166

Imaginary Orations

concerns himself with tyrants after [his accusation of ] Ctesiphon and his exile.34 [3] A man [Alexander] who leaped across the whole of Asia with his weaponry and subsequently has been contending with nature because he has no [human] enemies left. . . . [4] Because of them [i.e., the Thebans] Philip was elevated to such a height, because of them Greek spirits sunk, from them came allies, [useful] sites, opportunities, the whole basis for Philip’s great successes. The Theban disaster drowned out the cries of the other Greeks, yet Alexander did experience a sense of shame in his dealings with our city even after destroying Thebes, despite the fact that he could have found some fault with our city at that time; for when Thebes fell, we stopped celebrating the [Eleusinian] rites so that we would not be answering to the laments of the Thebans with our song to Iacchus.35 [5] If the person who was thanked seemed to be a good man, the city would have shared in his glory. Likewise, it would have shared in his shame, if he proved to be an evil man. [6] If someone else [i.e., other than Alexander] were proposing something illegal, I would not have been silent. I would have run up to the speaker’s platform and yelled out Solon’s name; I would be invoking the constitution. “I shall not break the laws” is what I’d be saying. Nor do I welcome exiles because of someone’s order to do so or come to terms with the murderer of the Phocians [i.e., Aeschines] at another’s command.36 As long as I have harbors, as long as I am of a vigorous age, as long as I count my victories, as long as at least one trireme still sails out of the Piraeus, I shall not abandon our laws or break with our constitu-

34. “his trial”: Wernsdorff saw a reference here to Aeschines’ embassy trial of 343 b.c. “his exile”: Aeschines went into exile after the failure of his case against Ctesiphon in 330. “Kings” and “tyrants” are Philip and Alexander. Aeschines set his sights on Alexander after going into exile (Plut. Vitae decem orat. 840d; Philostr. Vitae soph. 509; Phot. Bibl. cod. 61.20a; cf. Ep. Aeschinis 12.7). 35. The first sentence must refer to the Theban alliance with Philip in the Third Sacred War. In the second part of this excerpt, the speaker is referring to Alexander’s destruction of a rebellious Thebes in 335 b.c. For Alexander’s possible sense of shame or reverence (aijdoi )¸ toward Athens on this occasion, see Arr. Anab. 1.10.6. For the Athenians’ abandonment of the celebration of the mysteries after Thebes’ fall, Arr. Anab. 1.10.2; Plut. Alex. 13.1. For the song to Iacchus, Mylonas, Eleusis, 254–55. 36. “Demosthenes” says that he would oppose anyone’s attempt to overturn a legal enactment of Athens, so why shouldn’t he do so in the case of Alexander? Of course his own call for Athens to restore Aeschines from exile would itself overturn a prior legal enactment (see section 7 below), but this action is necessary to avoid passive acceptance of Alexander’s fiat. “come to terms with”: i.e., welcome back from exile. For Aeschines as “murderer of the Phocians,” cf. section 13 below.

Imaginary Orations

167

tion or let rumor [about Alexander’s intention to recall exiles] be the ruination of our city. And if I regard what fortune will bring us as uncertain, still I shall not willingly choose slavery before fortune itself imposes it on us. [7] So let Aeschines return by command of Demosthenes, not of Alexander, by the illegal act of a public speaker [of yours], not by order of a king, as an exile to whom mercy is being shown, not as one whom we regard with fear because of someone’s order. Eloquence belongs to the Athenians, and I know the city’s identity by its pronouncements. You are the ones who filled the whole land and sea with your victories on behalf of your laws and freedom. Confounding land and sea, Xerxes waged war on us, because, when [his ambassadors] demanded land and water from us, they got the pit instead of access to the assembly. But the city remained less disturbed than the elements.37 [8] For, even in other situations, although almost every instance of a type of action may seem to be essentially identical, various instances are differentiated by what motivated them. For example, suppose that someone strikes his neighbor. If he does this in an athletic contest and wins it, he gets the crown. But if he strikes someone outside of a competition, he suffers the legal penalty. We lamented once, when the city was devastated by the [Persian] tyrants; but out of bravery we willingly gave the city over to Persian flames.38 [9] . . . who [i.e., Demosthenes] did not come to terms with Philip, not even after that most unfortunate battle of Chaeronea. . . . 39 [10] Once it was our ancestral practice to lead Greece and fight against tyrants on behalf of freedom. This custom first began with Miltiades, it flourished at the time of Themistocles, it came down to Cimon, it was safeguarded by Pericles, and it was revered by Alcibiades. In my day it was preserved in our thinking but corrupted by fortune and the flattery displayed by our betrayers.40 37. “Confounding . . . sea”: cf. Him. Orat. 1.7, with my note. Xerxes’ ambassadors: Himerius seems to be thinking of Darius’s ambassadors; cf. Him. Orat. 6.27, with my note. “the elements”: i.e., the earth and water that Xerxes had tampered with. 38. The point is that an Athenian revocation of their decree of exile will have to be judged by what is motivating it. “but out of bravery” etc.: The speaker is referring to the evacuation of Athens and the decision to make a stand against the Persians at sea and to the Persian burning of the Acropolis during the Second Persian War (Hdt. 8.41, 49–54). 39. The battle of Chaeronea in 338 b.c. made Philip the master of the Greeks. “Demosthenes” seems to be referring to himself here in the third person, if not in the first; we have only the definite article and the participle. 40. Demosthenes regarded Aeschines as one of the betrayers (Dem. 18.49, 134, 284). Cf. section 13 below.

168

Imaginary Orations

[11] We yielded our leadership to others,41 and you did not object, [sir]. We retreated from our ancestral stance, and you showed no signs of displeasure. [12] Our city did not yield to the Lacedaemonians after the Sicilian disaster. The island of Sicily contained all our young men, yet our city remained unassailable in spirit even after the western disaster.42 [13] But Aeschines, [you say], is a bad citizen. Add to that, if you wish, the ruination of the Phocians, the betrayal of Thrace, the destruction of Cersobleptes—everything that Aeschines in his wronging of the [Athenian] people has often been charged with. For a disease that attacked the Greeks [i.e., betrayal], O Athenians, peaked at the same time that Athens was in full bloom.43 For the city often spared bad citizens in the past, not praising their way of thinking, but pitying their fortune; but as long as it was keeping its pride intact, it would never take orders from someone to violate its own laws. [14] Why, then, don’t I now I forewarn of?44 Why don’t I depart from life before seeing the city enslaved? [15] I myself certainly acknowledge the prevalence of the rumor, but I don’t think that what some people fantastically maintain is true. I look first, O Athenians, at how Alexander typically acts. And how is that? As soon as he undertakes something, it is done. Rather, his actions anticipate his deliberations on them, his undertakings anticipate those who bring him word [of what needs to be done]. For he achieved many of these great successes of his, which his flatterers elaborate on, by overcoming those whom he attacked more through speed than through strength. He was on the scene before his arrival was announced, and he appeared before being heard, just like lightning and thunder, which are

41. I.e., to Philip after Chaeronea (Diod. Sic. 16.89; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.315–16 LenzBehr). “Demosthenes” is presumably addressing Aeschines here. 42. The speaker is referring to the disastrous Athenian expedition to Sicily of 415–413 b.c. during the Peloponnesian War. Cf. Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.233–34: “as if now all of Sicily were being settled [by the huge Athenian expedition]”; “[after the Athenian defeat] Athens behaved in its future conduct as if it had taken all of Sicily” (trans. C. Behr). 43. I.e., the destruction of the Phocians by Philip, the betrayal of Thrace to him. Cf. Dem. 18.41; “[Aeschines is] guilty of the distresses of the Phocians, guilty of all the sufferings of every nation in Greece” (trans. C. A. and J. H. Vince); cf. Dem. 18.36, 142. The Thracian king Cersobleptes was a victim of Philip’s push into that region. For the disease of Greek betrayal of Greece, see Dem. 19.259. 44. I adopt Castiglioni’s supplement as reported in Colonna’s critical apparatus. For another suggestion, see Loenertz, Byzantion 29–30 (1959–60): 1–6, accepted by Colonna, BollClass 9 (1961): 37–39, with modification.

Imaginary Orations

169

often in the immediate vicinity before people expect them to be. This is how he took Sardis, destroyed Caria, swept away Lycia, overran Pamphylia; this is how he was seen by the Cilicians, came upon the Persians, astounded Darius, and (alas for woes closer to home!) took Thebes. A city fell that was in the middle of Greece. It fell before word of what was happening spread. I was unaware of the disaster, yet the city was now a mass grave. This [manner in which Alexander acts], then, is the first factor that does not permit me to pay heed to that rumor. The second factor is the fact that, even if someone assumes that Alexander is very intoxicated with his good fortune, the Macedonian king still knows that. . . .45 [16] Why, then, don’t I demolish trophies? Why don’t I knock down monuments? Why don’t I efface inscriptions? Because, in my view, all memorials of virtue are as much an indictment of those who dishonor [them] as they are an honor to the good. [17] Those who risked their lives at Salamis did well to marvel at the Painted Stoa, for they were destroying at sea what was left [of the Persians’ strength] from land.46 [18] Parnassus slung its peaks at the sea and armed itself on behalf of its race with its own parts rather than with weapons. The Greeks divided up the battles and apportioned among themselves the victories as well as the elements, the Lacedaemonians taking the land, and we taking the sea. They closed off [Thermo]pylae with 300 bodies, and we blocked off access to Greece with the same number of triremes.47 While a young Macedonian [Alexander] revels through every land un-

45. “the prevalence of the rumor”: th;n fhvmhn e[cein. Perhaps read Dübner’s evcein. Loenertz (Byzantion 29–30 [1959–60]: 4n) proposed hjcei¸ n (“that the rumor sounds forth”). The rumor that “Demosthenes” rejects here is not, I think, that Alexander would recall exiles—he has been taking that rumor seriously—but that he had already issued an order to that effect. The argument seems to be that, when Alexander does something, he normally acts so quickly that he anticipates rumor. So the fact that there is a rumor that he already issued an order is proof, in effect, that he did not. Athens still has time to recall Aeschines on its own initiative. “[Thebes] fell before word . . . spread”: cf. Arr. Anab. 1.7.5: “The Thebans did not learn that Alexander was within the Gates until he arrived . . . at Onchestus” (trans. P. Brunt). At the end of this excerpt Photius unusually writes kai; eJxh¸ ˇ (i.e., “etc.”). 46. The speaker is referring to the picture of the battle of Marathon in the Painted Stoa (Paus. 1.15.3; Him. Orat. 59.2). The depiction of the Greek victory at Marathon encouraged those fighting at Salamis. 47. Parnassus: see Hdt. 8.37, 39; cf. Him. Orat. 3.15. For the 300 Lacedaemonians at the battle of Thermopylae, see Him. Orat. 5.5, 33, 35. For the 300 triremes at Salamis, cf. Him. Orat. 6.27.

170

Imaginary Orations

der the sun and almost angers fortune itself by the insulting manner in which he handles his successes, is there no one who rises up against him?

[19] Acting as an intermediary for the king [Xerxes] in [the conveyance of ] the latter’s promises [to the Athenians], he left without having persuaded them. But he did reckon it a gain that he remained safe and sound, even though he did not persuade them.48 [20] They [i.e., your pro-Macedonian betrayers] always make you submissive to tyrants, so that they will end up wealthy, while the city is robbed of what belongs to it. [21] Your fear is necessary, but you are late and very slow in just now beginning to guard against Aeschines’ character. He will no longer set the city’s triremes on fire through Antiphon or secretly, as before, but will play the role of Aethia in his own person.49 [22] The people of Athens propose the return of Aeschines from exile, fearing rumors from India,50 as it does weapons and battles. [23] [The Athenians] were hesitant to restore Aristides from exile, even though the reason for his exile was not any vice on his part, but his virtue. For, to obey Solon, they did not escape from appearing to treat that just man himself unjustly.51 [24] Babylon lies in ruin, Darius is dead, [Alexander] has done away with the Indians, the Persians are enslaved. Only Athens has been left because of its glorious deeds; and as often as the Persians had to fight against Athens, they were made aware of its virtue. [Exc. Phot.] 48. “Acting as an intermediary”: I adopt the variant diakonouvmenoˇ (cf. F. Danker, ed., A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature3 [Chicago and London, 2000], s.v. diakonevw 1). Apparently a reference to Alexander, son of Amyntas, who told the Athenians what Xerxes would do for them if they came to terms with him. Actually, Alexander was representing Mardonius, who was Xerxes’ intermediary. See Hdt. 8.140–9.1, 9.4–5. 49. According to Demosthenes (18.132–34), Antiphon promised Philip that he would set the Athenian dockyards on fire, and Aeschines was involved in this effort (cf. Plut. Dem. 14.5; Liban. Comparat. 3.12 Foerster). “Aethia” (per conj.): Also called Aethilla, this sister of Priam, along with other Trojans, was taken away on ship by the Greeks after the fall of Troy. She persuaded her fellow captives to burn the ships on their homeward-bound journey. See Knaack, “Aithilla,” RE 1 (1894): 1094–95. “Demosthenes” warns that the Athenians will have to keep a very close eye on a restored Aeschines. 50. See p. 159 above. 51. Aristides “the Just” was ostracized in 483/82 b.c. but subsequently restored. “To obey Solon” must be a figurative way to say “to be true to a legal enactment” (cf. section 6 above), in this case the practice of ostracism, unless Himerius wrongly thinks that Solon actually introduced ostracism.

Imaginary Orations

171

3. [Against Epicurus] From the declamation (melevthˇ) titled “Epicurus, Denying the Existence of Providence, Is Prosecuted on a Charge of Impiety.”52 from the explanatory comment (Qewriva) [1] Rhetoric can even take its subject matter from philosophy; for the power of speaking from on high is absolute.53 from the declamation ( Melevthˇ) itself [2] Epicurus will now know clearly, even if he did not know this previously, that a providence governs the nature of all things. He will learn this, not in a classroom, but in a courtroom. For the fact that the wicked are brought to trial, reproved, and punished is clear evidence, not that nature acts randomly and without purpose, but that there is an order, a law, a governance of things, and, greatest of all, that Providence itself does exist. Men of Athens, already something useful has surely come out of this prosecution: Epicurus has come to court with a sad look on his face and by his dejection has utterly discredited his teaching on pleasure. He deserves to be hated both for what he teaches privately and for the deceit he practices in public. In private he does not stop talking about pleasure so that he may enjoy the physical beauty of his friends. But here he puts on a solemn look in order to mislead the court.54 [3] This is a very strange trial: a man is pitted against the nature of all things, and a wicked sophist pleads his case against Providence. [4] Epicurus’s views and teachings cause all virtue to disappear; they cause the disappearance of courts and judgments, of rewards for good deeds and punishment of evil ones.55 [5] In his wrongdoing he reaches up to heaven itself; there is no place that is exempt from Epicurus’s effrontery and shameless acts. The reason 52. For Epicurus’s rejection of providence, see Usener, Epicurea, 245–57. According to Plut. Adv. Colot. 1111b, “although Epicurus does away with providence, he says that he has left us piety.” 53. “from on high” (a[nwqen): Earlier translators have understood this to mean “with divine inspiration”; perhaps it means merely “from the sophist’s platform.” 54. “a sad look”: The argument assumes that Epicurus, since he teaches a doctrine of pleasure, should always be happy. “Enjoy[ing] the physical beauty of his friends” probably has a sexual connotation; cf. sections 6 and 7 below, and there may have been something sexual in what is lost in section 10. For the misrepresentation of Epicurean pleasure as sheer hedonism, see esp. section 6 below and Bailey, Greek Atomists, 482–83, 488–90, 524–25, 532. 55. Cf. Lactant. Instit. div. 3.17: Epicurus’s teachings encourage vice; they deny the soul’s survival after death and, therefore, the need to fear punishment in a hell.

172

Imaginary Orations

for this is that he was ashamed to remain within the ancient boundaries of philosophy and hesitated to take the same road that philosophers before him had taken. Rather, he condemned the faintheartedness of those [philosophers] in our midst who gave offense and were chastised for wicked teachings. He decided to outdo the whole lot of them in wrongdoing. [6] Or how could he not deserve blame for attempting to misrepresent such a great and venerable title [i.e., “philosopher”]? Where are these things [i.e., pleasure and hard work] in unison? Where does pleasure go together and mix with hard work, or endurance with easy living? Where do the Academy and prostitutes go hand in hand, or philosophy and drinking-bouts, or a life of self-control and unbridled youths? [7] What has he chosen and dared to do? He threatens war and battle against the laws of the whole of nature. Epicurus has let loose his madness on people of every age and has loved with an unholy love all who are admired as exceptional for their beauty. [8] But first let us consider his defense. “Do you demand punishment for what I teach?” No, but for your impiety. It is permissible to teach one’s views, but one may not be impious. If you can say that there is no impiety in what you have said, then I do not judge your teachings. But if there is any impiety in your teachings, you will not escape punishment by appealing to your right to teach; instead, you will be punished more for having used your teachings to do wrong [i.e., to be impious]. For if it is possible for a person to use something for what it should be used for, but he prefers to use it for what it should not be used for, he will not fail to be judged and pay the penalty. On the contrary, he will account for the fact that he ruined something good [i.e., the right to teach] by his bad judgment. [9] We call speakers up to the speakers’ platform. And if one of them should hesitate, the common voice of the city often urges him to speak, even if he does not want to do so. [10] A young man or woman comes to Epicurus’s revered school. His distinguished community attracts people of this age.56 [11] A man [Epicurus] outdoes Ixion in insolence, Salmoneus in arrogance, Tantalus in recklessness.57 But their stories are myths, and we 56. For the young and attractive women in Epicurus’s Garden, see Plut. Non posse suaviter 1097d–e. 57. Ixion was the first mortal to murder a kinsman, and he tried to rape Hera (Pind. Pyth. 2.21ff.). Salmoneus arrogantly impersonated Zeus (Apollod. Bibl. 1.9.7). Tantalus was “reckless” in a number of ways (see Apollod. Epit. 2.1, with Pind. Ol. 1.59–64; Serv. on Verg. Aen. 6.603).

Imaginary Orations

173

do not readily accept such stories as true when they are enacted on the stage. Epicurus, though, is found to surpass those individuals, not in the realm of myth, but in his actual teachings and actions. Furthermore, those mythological characters are said to have done their daring deeds somewhere else—some in the mountains, some in glens, some in barbaric and forlorn places—and in some sense the nature of any such place absolves the individuals concerned from charges brought against them. But Epicurus teaches this philosophy of his in Athens. And when I say “Athens,” I have alluded to the sum total of piety. [12] Does Socrates not seem to you at all worth imitating? [13] “And what act of impiety,” he asks, “have I committed for which I must answer?” It is you, Epicurus, who tell me what the great charge against you is, that you are not only impious, but impious in a novel way. Hence you are doubly answerable. Do you say that you have not overturned altars? You haven’t; but by having done away with Providence, because of whom we erected altars, you have argued that they were erected without purpose. Do you say that you have not introduced a novel form of sacrifice? You haven’t; but you have done away with sacrifice as a whole.58 Let Epicurus not escape punishment just because he did not express his disrespect for the gods in the same way in which those who came before him did. For it is impossible for one person in a city to commit every kind of impiety. If a person can escape punishment by appealing to what he did not do instead of to what he did do, what individual guilty of impiety will suffer a penalty? Who will be punished if it is impossible for a person to commit every kind of impiety and permissible for those brought to trial to bring up what they did not do instead of what they did? It is not a mark of men of intelligence to allow evasions of justice. A person should not defend himself against what he is not called to account for, but against the charges his accusers bring against him and with reference to which the judges take the bench. Those who turn their backs on what is most just resort to what is easiest: what is most just is for a person to refute the charge on which he is brought to court; what is easiest is for a person to defend himself against charges that have not been leveled at him. [14] So if you think that there is no providence because you have not yet been punished, you have deliberated correctly. And if your re-

58. For Epicurus’s doing away with sacrifice, cf. Plut. Adv. Colot. 1119e. But if Epicurus held that we cannot benefit the gods by our offerings, he did not disallow participation in such religious practices (Rist, Epicurus, 156ff.).

174

Imaginary Orations

jection of providence is based on [your view of ] the nature of all things, then your argument is groundless. But from where, by the atoms and the much discussed void, have you come up with the opinion [that there is no providence]? “A disorderly impulse and movement is troubling the nature of all things.” But chaos is ancient and older than your teachings. “But it does not obey the established laws of nature.” Yet everything moves in order, and I regard the fact that everything is preserved to be the greatest evidence of this providence. For disorder brings about destruction, but order ensures preservation.59 [15] Why do you carry off Providence from Delphi, as if from heaven? And yet, [despite your view of Providence], Parnassus was stirred up and shook at the Persians. Mountaintops were shot instead of arrows. The Persians fell and had the rocks for their tombs. But although Epicurus has dared to say these things against the goddess [Providence], the mountains do not tremble [at him], Hymettus does not shake with [Parnassus against him], thunder and lightning do not wipe him out along with his school. I understand the gods’ strategy: they have saved him for your votes so that an Attic court may make the same decision that the Pythian god would make.60 [16] So if he had dared to write only enough to get statues of Providence removed, he would have to be punished for impiety. But if his impiety is directed against Providence itself, whose “statues” are heaven, earth, and the elements, shall we be merciful to him as though he were someone who did not intend to commit a serious crime? [17] “The evil fare well,” he says. And what greater misfortune is there than [being] evil? “The wise fare badly.” Then do you think that there is some other kind of faring well that is better than being virtuous?61 Human beings do not all share the same inclination and nature; the aims of

59. “ . . . correctly”: Reiske’s supplement is necessary. Section 15 explains that Epicurus’s punishment has merely been postponed. “the atoms . . . the . . . void”: The speaker swears by central concepts of Epicurean physics. The two sentences I put in quotation marks seem to be Epicurean arguments that the speaker is answering. “But chaos is ancient . . .”: i.e., “you aren’t the first to observe disorder.” The speaker is probably alluding to Hes. Theog. 116, a line that had led Epicurus to philosophy (Sext. Emp. Adv. math. 10.18–19). The speaker would doubtless have said, with Plotinus Enn. 3.2.4.29, that “it is because there is order that disorder exists” (trans. A. Armstrong). 60. “Why . . . Delphi?”: Epicurus rejected divination (Usener, Epicurea, 261–62). For Mt. Parnassus’s “assault” on the Persians, cf. Him. Orat. 2.18, with my note. The point is that Parnassus assaulted the Persians when they attacked Delphi, so why doesn’t it assault Epicurus when he attacks Delphic prophecy? “But although . . . his school”: I return to Wernsdorff’s understanding of this sentence as declarative rather than interrogative. 61. “Wise” and “virtuous” are synonymous.

Imaginary Orations

175

living beings are diverse, and those aims parcel out goals appropriate to each individual. A wise man has no desire at all for any of all those things that most people consider individuals fortunate to possess. Therefore he does not regard the failure to acquire such things as a punishment. What, then, is a wise man’s goal? What does he set his sights on when he works hard and stays awake at night and labors during the day? The possession of virtue, sir. And how does he get possession of virtue? In what way does he obtain that divine prey? One cannot attain virtue through wealth and money. Can one attain it through bodily strength? No, because the crown of virtue surpasses every wild olive crown.62 Can one attain it by military force? Well, tell me, what trophies are greater than those won in the fight against evil? [18] So do not reproach a poor wise man for being poor, for money was not his aim. Do not find fault with a sick wise man for being ill if the better part of his being [i.e., his soul] is healthy. Do not find fault with a wise man who is worsted by those lording it over cities if he rules over [his own] better part. A good man would be so far from seeking to acquire such things [i.e., wealth, health, power] or from considering himself unfortunate for not possessing them that some good men, especially among those renowned for wisdom and virtue, have voluntarily divested themselves of these assets so that, having freed themselves from all external hindrances, they might have instead the immortal wealth of virtue. Anaxagoras let sheep graze on all of his farmland, decreeing by action what kind of “farming” is appropriate for the wise. Democritus willingly endured physical disease so that his better part might be healthy.63 [19] So why do you accuse Providence of not dispensing justice in accordance with people’s merits? For if [wise men] scorn all external goods when they have them, how can they either be irritated when they do not have them or expend a great deal of effort to acquire them? What rich man is not very greatly preoccupied about his money? Don’t knowledge of divine and human matters and the greatness of such important and deep wisdom seem to you to be a mere side concern of the moneymaker,

62. The wild-olive crown was the Olympic victor’s prize (J. Wiesner, “Olympia 1,” RE 18, 1 [1939]: 31–32). 63. Anaxagoras: cf. Anaxag. A13 Diels-Kranz; Philostr. Vita Apoll. 1.13; Euseb. Praep. evang. 14.14.8; Liban. Orat. 12.32. The kind of farming appropriate for the wise is to “prepare one’s soul for fruition (karpouvˇ)” (Liban. Orat. 12.32, trans. A. Norman). Democritus: The speaker seems to be referring to the tradition that Democritus blinded himself to free himself from the allurements of sight (Democr. A23, A26, A27 Diels-Kranz).

176

Imaginary Orations

a busybody’s appendage, a secondary consideration of the man who seeks municipal offices? [20] Therefore, do not call those who are happy in the greatest sense of that word unhappy. Do not call those who resemble the higher powers unfortunate. Do not call those who have an immortal treasure poor, or those whom we admire as though they were gods unhonored. [21] For one often encounters many men whose minds are disordered, and they are often praised by some, although it is need [for their services] rather than truth that generates the praise.64 [22] Yet I would gladly pose a question to those who wish to reproach wise men for being unlucky: were they unlucky before becoming wise, or have they been deprived of their so-called windfalls only since becoming wise? If before, then a complaint should not be lodged against virtue; if only since they acquired virtue, then they have lost not what they desired, but what they did not desire. [Exc. Phot.] 4. The Oration against a Rich Man The rich man, by his loathsome actions, emptied out a poor man’s whole house. [Himerius] takes the part of the poor man pleading his case.65 [1] He makes light of my misfortunes and takes exception now to the nature of the suit. He has undertaken to show, I think, that, because he has not committed an ordinary injustice, he has committed no injustice at all—as if he does not deserve even more anger and accusation for acts so bad and serious that it is impossible to find precedents for them. But if those who have dared to commit greater crimes are not punished because their crimes were greater, what sense would be left in wishing to punish those who have committed lesser crimes? If we acquit people who are guilty of unusual offenses, won’t this be giving carte blanche to those who wish to commit uncommon wrongs, when the first to dare to com-

64. Himerius seems to be referring here to men who only apparently fare well: they are praised but have disordered minds. 65. Orat. 4 is erroneously joined to Orat. 3 in the manuscripts. The title and opening scholion are retrieved from Photius’s Himerian bibliography (cod. 165.107b). The rich man “emptied out” the poor man’s house by causing him to kill his wife and son; cf. section 19 below.

Imaginary Orations

177

mit such wrongs would escape punishment as if guilty of no injustice? And to the extent that it is a person’s intent as well as his actions that we hate, acts of extreme injustice should not be grounds for acquittal but for accusation. For if one desires by his unjust acts to introduce a new type of injustice, he would prove his wickedness in two ways, both by committing wrongs he should not commit and by desiring to do what no one has previously done. [2] You have dared to commit no ordinary act, you say. In saying this to me, you articulate precisely what it is that makes my misfortune extreme. For people who have suffered an injustice that they know others have suffered endure their bad luck more easily, since they regard the bad luck of their fellow creatures as a consolation in their own suffering. But those who are victims of new and unprecedented injustices consider their misfortune unbearable because they can have no fellow sufferers [3] Suppose someone’s child has been the victim of injustice; well, at least his wife has not also suffered an injustice. Suppose injury has come to both of them; at least the acts of injustice were not followed by murder. A person slays someone; yet if he does not know what he has done, that alleviates the misfortune. Let’s say that someone ventures [to engineer] an act of adultery and by his secret schemes destroys a respectable household; at least he does not make such a wicked act more terrible by an even worse act—I mean by mating a child with his mother and by causing the adulterers to regard what is thought of as the injustice of adultery to be a matter of no significance 66 [4] “Has he kept his soul free of corruption? Well, thanks to me, he will not also have a household free of corruption.”67 [5] Rich man, your actions have not belied your threats. I have been snared, I have been conquered, I am silent, I have forgotten about politics. By your acts of murder you have cut out my tongue. Through these tragic tokens [of recognition] you have stopped up my mouth and the words that issue from it; I can barely speak and utter what I absolutely have to say. I am no longer a rhetor of the city, but only of my misfortune.68 66. The point is, of course, that none of the supposed mitigations applies to the poor man’s situation. “he does not know what he has done”: i.e., killed his own son. “what is thought of as . . . adultery”: when it is actually incest, too. 67. The speaker must be quoting the rich man here. The latter will cause incest to be committed in the poor man’s household. 68. “your acts of murder”: The poor man holds the rich man responsible for what he himself did by his own hand; cf. section 6. “tragic tokens”: i.e., tokens of recognition, by which the rich man proved that the youth murdered by the poor man was the poor man’s son. “Tragic” because the events are tragic; but there may also be a reference here to tokens

178

Imaginary Orations

[6] Who is responsible for such great defilements? Aren’t they all your doing? Isn’t it true that, although they are all dead by my hand,69 they perished by your intent? [7] I have not yet spoken of the chief of your acts of injustice, I mean how the tokens [of recognition] were brought out just at the right moment in your magnificent drama. You introduced into tragic misfortunes the kind of ending that one finds in comedy! Through these tokens, which would put an end to calamity in a comedy, you worsened my misfortune!70 [8] So after taking all these actions against me in this way, he goes around and says, “What would you say about the poor man? He wants to charge and accuse me of things that no law forbids.” Then he asks me, “So isn’t it permitted to take up an [exposed] child?” Yes, but one may not take the child up and treat him unjustly. The law permits only one of these two actions. If you chose what is allowed and then added to that what is not allowed, you will not be acquitted on account of the former action; rather you will pay the penalty for adding what is not allowed to what is allowed. “What I did is allowed,” he says. These are the words of a rich man; this is the reply of tyrannical arrogance. Well, I reply to you mildly and kindly, for you will be brought to justice as long as these men are doing the judging. You decided to do something blameless.71 You are permitted to act in this way. But if you transformed what you are permitted to do into what is against the law, then I actually rebuke what you are permitted to do, because, by false reasoning, it has turned itself into what you are no longer permitted to do. [9] Human connections are a beautiful thing, but only when the goodwill [implied by such connections] is beyond suspicion. But if a person ruins households, plots against marriages, injures families, breaks up homes, or pretends to have a kind heart when in fact that “kindness” is brimming over with unmitigated misanthropy, then actions that, with no admixture of injustice for a time, were legitimate [e.g., the raising of

of recognition found in tragedy (e.g., in Euripides’ Ion), although in section 7 the speaker associates such tokens with comedy. 69. “all dead”: i.e., his wife and son. 70. The poor man is thinking of comic tokens of recognition that lead to a happy ending; in the poor man’s case, tokens of recognition proved that he had killed a son, and one who had approached his mother sexually. 71. “things that no law forbids”: The rich man claims that he has committed no crime, but the poor man insists that the rich man has criminally corrupted the youth he has raised. “only one of these two actions”: I emend eJkavteron to e{teron. “to do something blameless”: i.e., to take up the exposed child.

Imaginary Orations

179

an exposed child] become because they have added injustice to the semblance of blamelessness—they become by that very admixture of unjust acts.72 [10] But perhaps you were looking for a child to adopt. Why didn’t you make your intention known before my son was born? Or why didn’t you ask for the child after his birth? Or if perhaps you did not want to take either course of action, why didn’t you communicate with me about the matter immediately after you took up the child from the wilderness? You did not carry out the adoption in accordance with the laws.73 [11] Will anyone refuse to concede that I have not acted contrary to the laws? [12] A foul adultery was ventured upon through [your] tricks, an unfortunate young man was made drunk from a foul mixing-bowl for evil reasons and turned against his pitiful mother, and a father’s hand was armed for the murder of those dearest to him by [your] malicious cunning. [13] I now lament those whom I killed as my enemies, and I sit weeping over acts of slaughter I thought that I had lawfully committed. The person I thought was an adulterer before the killings I recognized as my child after the slaughter was over. Now you are really wounded, now you receive a mortal wound, my child. (For henceforth I shall refer to you not by names that betoken acts of injustice, but by names that affirm that you are my kin.) It was not you, but someone else, who was responsible for my misfortunes.74 [14] I would gladly ask the rich man this question first: Did the young man seem to be of good character, or was he lawless? If of good char-

72. “then actions that, with no admixture” etc.: Colonna has a} prosqhvkhn oujk e[conta tevwˇ th;n ajdikiva n met j ejxousivaˇ ejpravtteto, tau¸ta o{ti tauvthn proseivlhfe, tw¸/ dokei¸ n ajneuv quna faivnesqai prosqhvkh tw¸ n ajdikhmavtwn givnetai. A difficult sentence, and difficult to translate. I delete the comma after proseivlhfe, taking tw¸/ dokei¸ n . . . faivnesqai with tauvthn proseivlhfe. I venture the following emendation for the end of the sentence: prosqhvkh/ tw¸ n ajdikhmavtwn givnetai. Cf. Reiske’s emendation, reported in Wernsdorff. 73. A distinction is being drawn here between the saving and rearing of an exposed child, on the one hand, and the legal adoption of such a child, on the other hand. 74. The poor man believes that he lawfully killed his wife and son; cf. section 11 above. Classical Athenian law did allow the husband to put the adulterer caught in the act to death immediately (Harrison, Law of Athens: Family, 32–33). For the Roman situation, see Treggiari, Roman Marriage, 264–85, 293; Cantarella in Kertzer and Saller, Family in Italy, 234–35; Evans Grubbs, Law and Family, 214–15; Arjava, Women and Law, 194, 199–200. We should avoid trying to force claims made in fictitious declamations into strict conformity to any legal realities (cf. Russell, Greek Declamation, 34–35). “not by names . . . injustice”: e.g., “adulterer,” “lawless.”

180

Imaginary Orations

acter, then it is perfectly clear who was responsible for the acts committed. If the boy was morally worthless, then the rich man should have handed him over to his father. Furthermore, were you unaware that the boy was committing these acts, or did you know what he was up to beforehand and fail to stop him? If you did not know what was going on, can you really talk about your “paternal guardianship”?75 But if, as seems likely, you knew what was going on, you should have stopped the boy when he was on the verge of acting, not after he had acted. For to stop someone before he misbehaves is a mark of foresight, but to intervene only after he has acted is a mark of injustice. The former action shows that a person has goodwill, the latter reveals his pretense. [15] So the young man is guilty of everything. Suppose that he could speak to us. Suppose that some god had brought him back for a while— something we hear of from the poets as a frequent happening—so that he could be present at this trial.76 Wouldn’t he have shouted out, with his blows and wounds, “Me an adulterer? Me lawless? You hateful rich man (for, after all this time, you have shown me the epithets that suit you) .” [16] “Pitying your suffering,” he says, “I showed you these tokens [of recognition], for I wanted you to deem the young man worthy to be buried with his ancestors.” How opportunely, isn’t it true, you showed concern for reconciliation! You thought of bringing kin together precisely when you had arranged a truceless war, to be played out with the sword and adultery! [17] If he speaks and proposes laws and finds for himself in life a position like that of his father, I shall not need any more tokens [of recognition]; I shall know who he is from his behavior on the speaker’s platform.77 [18] Give me [a son] consumed by disease and plague to bury. Even then I shall lament the misfortune of learning my son’s identity, because

75. I have converted this sentence into an interrogation. 76. “guilty of everything”: This is the contention of the rich man. “a frequent happening”: E.g., Heracles brought Alcestis back from death (Eur. Alc.). The dead Protesilaus was restored to his wife for a while by Hermes (Apollod. Epit. 3.30; Hygin. Fab. 103; Lucian Dial. mort. 28 [23]), as told in Euripides’ lost Protesilaus (see the scholion in W. Dindorf’s edition of Aelius Aristides [Leipzig, 1829], 3: 671–72). Dionysus brought his mother up from Hades (Apollod. Bibl. 3.5.3; Paus. 2.37.5). Asclepius was said to have raised various individuals from the dead (Edelstein and Edelstein, Asclepius, testimonia 66ff.). 77. “proposes laws”: gravfei. See LSJ, s.v. gravfw II A, 6. Cf. section 23 below and Orat. 7.6. The poor man imagines his son still alive and revealing himself to be a “chip off the old block.”

Imaginary Orations

181

you have preserved my namesake—the namesake of his father—only for burial. But I shall take consolation in the fact that I send to the gods below a son who perished by disease, not in the course of tragic events. As things are, how tragic has the revealing of these tokens [of recognition] been! How untimely and cruel! I am forced to discover my son now, when it would suit me to be ignorant of him. I am called a father, when I am found to be a killer of my child. Let me lament just the adultery. Assign my misfortunes to just one tragedy.78 Why do you divide me up among [a number of ] poets? Why do you create a [separate] drama and production for each one of my misfortunes? [19] First you have given close attention to the enumeration of my misfortunes. Then you want to fill my tomb, after you have emptied out my house. Do you want to bury my son? You have surrendered the beautiful loving-cup to me! (And how could it be anything but beautiful?) But do let me grieve over my misfortunes. Go ahead, if you wish, and bury this person you took up after he was exposed, and wrap him in swaddling clothes instead of a burial shroud. Your hands are worthy to perform [only] this kind of burial.79 [20] From where shall I carry out the corpse? From my home? What hole in the ground is more gloomy than that ill-fated home? Its inhabitants are ill-fated, and terrible blood has been spilled in every part of it. Much slaughter is on display in the heart of that home, a depressing sight. An army of Poenae and spirits and avenging deities invest it.80 [21] But as things are, what a surfeit, what a profusion of woes! A father has been armed against a son, a mother has been forced to have illicit intercourse with a son. [22] Oh you enemy more oppressive than war, pestilence, and tyranny! You foe of our fatherland more than of our form of government!81 The

78. If you had constructed a plot, the speaker says, in which I had had to bury a son who died of disease, that would have been bad enough. But the plot you have constructed has enough in it for several tragedies (adultery, incest, murder of one’s son). Dübner, Colonna, and Völker suppose that text is missing between “killer of my child” and “Let me lament.” “just one tragedy”: i.e., that will have just the adultery as its theme. 79. “You have surrendered . . . to me!”: He says, ironically, “Aren’t you being friendly!” “Go ahead” etc.: The point seems to be that the only way in which the rich man could worthily bury the poor man’s son is as his rescuer in infancy. There is a play, however, in to;n ajnh/rhmevnon, which can mean “the person you did away with” as well as “the person you took up after he was exposed.” 80. “Poenae . . . deities”: Poinw¸ n kai; daimovnwn kai; ajlastovrwn. Wernsdorff may have been right in suggesting the deletion of the second kaiv. The Poenae are themselves avengers. 81. As a “tyrant” (see section 27) the rich man is a foe of the existing urban government.

182

Imaginary Orations

city has given you so much, and what kind of thanks is this that you give it in turn? In return for the authority you have exercised, for offices held, for the many great honors it has often judged you worthy of, even though you are not, you have given it over to the realm of drama and, like a playwright, have turned our city into an entry in a tragic contest. My misfortune will be contained within the bounds of my own life, but the pollution you have caused and [the effects of ] your character will last as long as the city lives. [23] But you should speak, propose and frame laws, legislate, and be an ambassador. First propose a law, if you wish, that prohibits a poor man from speaking any more in the future and imposes as a penalty on any poor man who has dared to speak that he must be the executioner of his own family. But such a law has already been written by you—you do not need any more words or syllables! It has been written more clearly than in words, through my own misfortune. You have quite obviously walled off the speaker’s platform, and every poor man’s tongue has been cut out by my example. So speak by yourself, engage in politics alone. No one will speak against you. Perhaps in the future you will not deal with petty details or limit your power to the speaker’s platform. Perhaps you will need a stage bigger than what you have here and dramas in which the tragic act is not kept secret.82 [24] In order to frighten everyone more, portray this calamity, paint it, give us this misfortune in a picture. It will be difficult to find a talent capable of representing the monstrous nature of this affair—monstrous, yes, although there is nothing in the world the rich man would not venture to do. Let the paints be got from the meadows of a Poene and of the Erinyes. Let the painting be done on a surface made of some accursed and polluted wood. Let the fire applied to the painting be of the sort that avenging spirits of deaths like the ones in this case ignite.83 [25] Look for a painter who has a tragic hand and an even more tragic soul. Command him to let the painting reflect the order of my misfor82. “the tragic act . . . secret”: The speaker is alluding to tragedies in which horrible acts occur behind the scenes (Hor. Ars poet. 179–88). 83. “a Poene and . . . the Erinyes”: avengers. For the juxtaposition of Poenae and the Erinyes, cf. Him. Orat. 8.8, with my note 34. “fire . . . that avenging spirits . . . light”: cf. the torches of the Erinyes (E. Wüst, “Erinys,” RE Suppl. 8 [1956]: 126; H. Sarian, “Erinys,” LIMC 3, 1 [1986]: 841–42 and, e.g., nos. 45, 55, 99, 102). The speaker is alluding here to the use of plants in making paints (Vitruv. De arch. 7.14) and of heat in encaustic painting (Laurie, Greek and Roman Methods of Painting, 54–68).

Imaginary Orations

183

tunes. He should not paint anything before the exposure [of my son]; he should not show me speaking, giving a public oration, being crowned, or in any other fortunate situation. Let the whole painting be filled with my sad fortune. First, let the unfortunate father appear as he carries his infant into the wilderness in his own hands, bewailing his bad luck, lamenting his lot, going off, coming back, putting the infant down, picking him up, yielding to his natural [paternal] feelings, and once again succumbing to the necessity [of exposing his child].84 If possible, let the painting hint at what he said by showing a gloomy face, and let everyone hear the father’s words through his bearing. [26] Then paint the beauties of love, but do not misrepresent the situation in painting my son. Show him hesitating, delaying, moving toward the deed and then retreating from it, dizzy, pushed on by fear, afraid of committing adultery, and not knowing that he is forcing himself onto his own mother. Let her appear as an unfortunate old woman, if you wish. Show her in love, but with wrinkles and grey hair, in order to impress viewers with the strangeness of the tragic scene. Then go to the heart of the painting: arm the unfortunate poor man against those most dear to him. Represent the awful acts that will satisfy your misanthropy as you imagine them. Then add the finishing touch of the tragedy: you appearing at the scene of the murders with the tokens [of recognition], smiling, beaming with joy, delighted by your success. Save a portion of the surface of the painting for me,85 by the gods, so that no one will be looking for me and wondering where the unfortunate poor man is, how he lived, how he could go on after such misfortunes. [27] But your joy will not be unalloyed, rich man. You too must be part of the tragedy. No one knows a lofty tragedy in which tyrants do not fall. [Exc. Phot.] 5. [Themistocles against the Persian King] From the declamation (melevthˇ) with the following heading: After the Persian War the Athenians voted to wage war against the barbarians. When the [Persian] king found out, he promised to restore what had had 84. Because of his poverty. 85. I.e., in the last of a series of scenes.

184

Imaginary Orations

damage inflicted on it if the Athenians would desist from war. The Athenians were inclined to accept the king’s terms, but Themistocles spoke out against [him].86 [1] My fellow Athenians, it seems that the [Persian] king has not yet stopped testing us, even he always finds that our city’s mettle is superior to his craftiness.87 I do not think it remarkable that the king is again trying the same old things; for it is not remarkable that men who are desperate and afraid cannot find a course of action that will allow them to rectify their situation. There is nothing at all strange in the king’s behavior. But one would rightly be amazed at the speakers in our midst if they still think that they have an opportunity to betray us, when not even the Persian king has decided to deny that we are too strong to be overwhelmed by his power. It is proper that you as a group not be found to be inferior to one man’s resolve.88 How odd it is to glory in conquering the barbarians by force of arms while falling into their hands because of inferior judgment! [2] He was already saying what the gods were saying about the general state of affairs. He had the same opinion about the triremes as the Pythian [god Apollo].89 [3] Why do you [i.e., Xerxes] trouble the straits on my account? Why do you cut through the mountains to the sea? Why do you hide the sea with dry land? Let Mt. Athos stand; please send the fleet through the waves, not through the mountains. But if you scorned these [earthly] elements, please abstain from the heavens and spare that upper sphere. Please do not turn day into night with your arrows; do not let the cloud formed from your army’s arrows block the sun. You certainly leave no stone unturned to make the city of the Athenians just another page of Persian history!90 86. “against [him]”: cf. the version of the title in Photius’s Himerian bibliography,

Qemistokleva . . . basilei¸ Persw¸ n ajntilevgonta. 87. “even ”: I emend kaiv to kaiv. 88. The “one man” is the chief Athenian proponent of accepting Xerxes’ terms, whom “Themistocles” addresses below (sections 11, 17, 20, 41). 89. A reference to Themistocles’ advice to the Athenians in 480 b.c. to fight the Persians at sea (Hdt. 7.143). Cf. Ael. Aristid. Orat. 3.244 Lenz-Behr: “The joint oracle of Pythian Apollo and Themistocles had now for a second time made clear that all depended on the ships” (trans. C. Behr). Wernsdorff wanted to emend “he was . . . saying” to “I was . . . saying” and to adopt the variant “I had the . . . opinion” for “he had the . . . opinion.” Völker retains the third person, understanding the subject to be Athens. But might “Themistocles” be referring to himself in the third person here? 90. “on my account”: as though Xerxes launched the expedition against Themistocles alone. Cf. section 6 below: “I was not subdued.” For Xerxes’ bridging of the Hellespont,

Imaginary Orations

185

[4] In [your] actual undertaking, [Xerxes, you] appeared more frightful than [you were] rumored to be. Now [you] displayed [your] wonders on dry land, now [you] transferred [your] marvelous activity to the sea. Now [you] set [your] army against rivers, now you directed your arrows against the sun and your whips against the waves.91 A tempest-struck mountain was sailed through, a whole watery strait was bridged and trampled upon. Mt. Athos sent triremes right through its middle, and the Hellespont conducted the Persian cavalry along as the horsemen ran over its waters. [5] The Lacedaemonian help amounted to 300 hoplites. The rest [of the Greeks] contributed [forces from] their people as fortune allowed.92 [6] We are not ignorant of the fact that you, [Xerxes], are visiting another war upon us, more terrible than the first [i.e., the assault of 480 b.c.]. You are no longer manning 1,200 triremes against the city, you are not concealing the sea with dry land, you are not crowding the land with your soldiers, you are not forcing the earth’s elements to be transformed to meet your own needs. For you know that in battle I was not subdued by all those tactics.93 You are assaulting the city from Babylon; through heralds you try your wiles on us, and through embassies you undermine the city’s commitment to the highest standards. And you call these ploys of yours gifts and favors! [7] Not by the trophies erected for our victories on land and at sea . . . [8] So if you all think that you should propose what you must do [i.e., wage war against the Persians] but not do what you propose, appearing illustrious in your decrees but not for your actions, that’s fine. But he who is illustrious [only] in deliberation, because it is not yet clear to him that he might act, does not yet win unalloyed fame. It is questionable whether he deserves praise, for everyone is waiting for him to implement his cutting a canal through the Athos promontory, his laying soil on the Hellespont bridge, and his army’s obscuring the sun with their arrows, cf. Him. Orat. 1.7, 6.24–25, with my notes. “Themistocles” is reenacting events that have already occurred. 91. “[you] set [your] army against rivers”: Perhaps cf. Him. Orat. 6.24, “no river could satisfy the soldiers’ need of drinking-water,” with my note. For Xerxes’ whipping of the waves, cf. Orat. 6.27, with my note. 92. The reference is to the battle of Thermopylae, where the Spartans were wiped out. See Hdt. 7.202–3. “The rest . . . as fortune allowed”: I disagree with my predecessors’ understanding of the Greek here: to quote just Wernsdorff, “reliqui patriam fortunae arbitrio relinquebant.” 93. For the figure 1,200, cf. Aesch. Pers. 341–43 (1,207); Hdt. 7.89 (1,207); Lysias 2.27 (1,200); Diod. Sic. 11.2.1 (more than 1,200); Jul. Orat. 1.42c (1,200). Contrast Him. Orat. 6.27 (1,000). “the earth’s elements . . . transformed”: i.e., water becomes land (the bridging of the Hellespont), and land becomes water (the Athos canal). I see no reason to assume, with Dübner, Colonna, and Völker, a gap in the text after “all those tactics.”

186

Imaginary Orations

his proposal so that they may marvel at his intelligence. On the other hand, he who has chosen to try to carry out a good decision is admired on two counts, both for the intelligence of his judgment and for implementing his decisions, thereby not allowing what was decreed to be proved misguided when enacted. [9] I would gladly ask those [Athenians] who speak against us whether they expressed opposition when we were getting approval for war or kept quiet and thought that they should yield to those who were advising it. For if they did not express opposition at that time, then they appear to be contradicting themselves as well as us in their urge to find fault with proposals they responded to with silence, implying thereby that those proposals were excellent. For they will certainly not claim that they deliberately kept hidden from us, out of malevolence, what [they thought] was good [for the city]. But if they did express opposition and were outvoted, aren’t they liable to the charge of shamelessness, since they are trying to put forth for a second time the same opinion that proved unable to withstand the objections of their opponents when they dared to present it previously? And if we rescind what we have got approval for, quite clearly we shall bear the disgrace of being thought indifferent and ill-advised: ill-advised because, when initially it was necessary to determine what was good for the city, we were unable to do so; indifferent because we quickly change our minds after having made a decision. [10] And I have not yet mentioned the greater charge [that we would be subject to if we change our minds]: we shall seem to want to vote against ourselves because we are yielding to advantage. This, I think, would make the charge inexcusable. For if it is intolerable, even apart from such an accusation [i.e., of acting for one’s advantage], to be found to have made the mistake [of voting against ourselves], how could it be anything but unforgivable if we seem to be incurring ill repute for gain? If any of the city’s allies, after accepting a gift from the [Persian] king, tried to nullify a decree of the city or dared to dissolve its alliance with us, wouldn’t you all have become angry and demanded justice from those who were trying to undo what you got approved? I certainly think so. Then if you have not allowed others to undo any of your decisions, will you be seen to be doing precisely this yourselves? And if you would not have allowed yourselves to fail to demand that someone else who had done wrong pay the penalty, will you now appear willingly to be doing the same wrong yourselves? Surely one must avoid doing everything that is or is considered morally objectionable, especially eschewing those actions that one has previously condemned. For if a person should be caught

Imaginary Orations

187

in the act of doing the very things he let everyone know troubled him as base actions, then he will be judged both provocative and immoral: immoral because he is found doing what he should not do, and provocative because he tries to prevent his neighbors from doing things that he claims theoretically he despises but in fact is caught engaging in himself. [11] Tell me, if you will, [sir], about the pronouncements of lawgivers. If you wish, include in your recital the city’s victories; for I call the city’s successes [in battle] martial laws. In all these laws and victories, what have we zealously sought? To make no agreement with the barbarians, to hate their race as something abominable, and to consider war between us impossible to change into friendship through negotiation. And this is a very reasonable position. For [the Athenians] protected themselves by law from suffering harm from those they considered natural enemies, always expecting to be victimized by them. They thought that the greatest protection for their state was not to trust their enemies.94 For the wicked and those who measure everything in terms of their own advantage have customarily gained more from simulated friendship than have those who openly decided on war.95 [12] For I call the oracles of the Pythian god [Apollo] decrees of the Athenians.96 [13] The Persian has been hostile, not on a single occasion or at one time, not only during an actual outbreak of war, but throughout the whole lifetime of [our] city. [14] For if [the Persian] had destroyed Plataea alone and had deprived its people, who went to war in defense of freedom on their own initiative, of their city . . .97 [15] We should not free the [Persian] king from blame in consideration of what he has suffered; we should have in mind what he would have done had he been victorious and realize that every punishment he gets is less than what he deserves. For it is unfair that we as victors should refrain from doing the very things that, if defeated, we would have suffered from them as victors.98 94. “[sir]”: I add “sir” here and below to mark the speaker’s use of the second person singular. In these cases “Themistocles” is addressing a single Athenian opponent. “not to trust their enemies”: cf. Dem. 6.24. I assume a gap in the text after these words. 95. I.e., the Athenians who recommend accepting Xerxes’ terms are simulating friendship with him for personal gain. 96. Said with reference to the oracle Themistocles understood to mean that the Athenians should take to the sea; see section 2 above, with my note, and Plut. Them. 10.2–5. 97. For the destruction of Plataea, see Hdt. 8.50. “who went to war”: see Paus. 9.1.3. 98. Perhaps cf. Thuc. 3.40.5.

188

Imaginary Orations

[16] He who proceeds against and exacts vengeance from the enemy before they have recovered in the wake of a failure does not allow them any time for vengeance and procures for himself complete safety from injury. He deprives the defeated against whom he promptly proceeds of any hope of recuperation in the future. [17] And, they say, the [Persian] king has sent the [Athenian] people gifts. Well, you’re speaking the words of a Cyrsilus to me, [sir]! You are the inheritor of a vicious kind of haranguing! And you have dared to make this assertion in Athens, here where we responded to the person who made the same assertion before you by turning the spot where he stood speaking into his tomb!99 [18] Since it is unclear how a sea battle [against the Persians] will come out, it is not a good idea to recommend at the present moment that we do away with the qualities because of which we enjoy a great reputation or the habits by which we have survived. For those who from the beginning have not valued virtue highly incur little risk, even if they fail. But as for those who have so many and such great examples set before them, what forgiveness will they get from outsiders if they are found to wipe away their previous glory by their most recent actions? [19] When it comes to a gift or a favor, I am more likely to accept one from anybody other than Xerxes. Still, if he were offering a gift with no strings attached, the king’s advocates would perhaps have some justification—although, even under these circumstances, accepting the gift would be unworthy of the Athenians. But if the king asks for a favor from our city in return, surely it is crystal clear that, in his eagerness to receive something from us in return for his favors, he is revealing that he is doing no favor at all. If it is not sound to accept from him a gift that he gives outright, how much less sound is it to accept when not the gift with no strings attached, but in anticipation of a substantial repayment. By this anticipation he shows that he is agreeing to give what he gives in exchange for something. [20] Come now, let us look at the [Persian king’s] promises themselves. “I shall restore,” he says, “whatever I inflicted damage on during the war.” [All] you [have to do is to] tell me the actual cause of the [last] war, [sir], and, [in so doing], you are reading out to me cues to go into

99. Cyrsilus had advised the Athenians to submit to the Persians and was stoned to death. See Hdt. 9.5; Dem. 18.204; Lycurg. Contra Leocr. 122; Cic. De off. 3.11 [48]; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.158 Lenz-Behr. These sources are not fully in agreement on details (Flower and Marincola on Hdt. 9.5.1; Habicht, Hermes 89 [1961]: 21–22).

Imaginary Orations

189

battle rather than to become reconciled. And you fail to see that you are stirring us up to war even more by the very considerations you have eagerly tried to employ to reconcile the city with the king. How contradictory your words are! When you speak to me, you refer to the same person [i.e., the king] as an inflicter of damage and a friend, a murderer and an ally. You read out a single letter [from the king] that is filled with both injustices and gifts, mixing together unmixable emotions, favors and misfortunes, barbarians and Greeks. You appear to be zealous on behalf of the city, but you are actually making the [future] fall of the city the basis for the king’s honor. [21] Then why don’t we get on the triremes rather than respond passively as the [Persian] king brings us destruction? [22] Xerxes inquired into stories about me, as if wishing to wage war [on us] by praising the city.100 [23] So if injustice came from one person and a favor from another, one would have to treat the former as an enemy and repay the latter as a benefactor. But if the same person commits an injustice and does a favor, why would it be more appropriate to be thankful for what he promises than to demand punishment for the injustice he is found to be committing? [24] What are the things he refers to as “having suffered damage”? For even in his letter [Xerxes] is not serious about the favor [he will supposedly do us]. He proclaims that he will assuredly rebuild Athens. That is, he certainly hints at that, even if he doesn’t dare clearly to specify what he means. “I shall rebuild Athens,” he says. You rebuild the city of Athena? You rebuild the city of Theseus and Cecrops? Will the Erichthoniuses and Cecropses, the Theseuses and Codruses then be silenced?101 Will Xerxes be everything to the city, its founder and originator, the subject of praise and encomium? Good grief, what horror! Xerxes is defeated by me and then takes possession of the city! [25] What if he should order us, too, to fight along with him against the Greeks? It would not be just to refuse to help in every way someone who displays such generosity toward the city. So if we begin wars against our kinsmen under Xerxes’ command, we shall be drawing up commendable battle lines—isn’t that so?—battle lines worthy of the trophies that we have erected in the past!

100. “praising the city”: i.e., praising the city and Themistocles? The king’s friendly overtures conceal hostile intentions. 101. I.e., the legendary early heroes and builders of Athens.

190

Imaginary Orations

[26] So [Xerxes] is going to permit himself to build a city for and benefit the very people who caused him to be seen by the Persians looking like a runaway and a fugitive rather than a victor?102 [27] If [Xerxes] believed that he could speedily undo his defeat by force of arms, he would have waged war on us [again] and would not be sending an embassy to us. But since he despairs of his forces, he has hitherto used deceit instead of arms to defend himself. [28] [Xerxes] still was eager to spread slander about the city [of Athens] among the Greeks so that he might deprive us of an alliance with them and then direct the war exclusively against us. [29] It is clear from his very words that [Xerxes] is not serious about the gift [he is offering us]. For someone who wants to rebuild our city would clearly state that in his letter. But Xerxes doesn’t say that; he simply says that he will replace the things he inflicted damage on in the war. So by the ambiguity of phrasing in his letter he has nicely made his trickery clear. [30] But what was the mark of our city? Its mark was the dignity of its buildings, the memorials to its ancient virtue that were found everywhere, and its natural adornment, which added more beauty to the city than the adornment wrought by human craft. What a beautiful sight its acropolis was! What a dwelling place of the gods it was, second only to heaven! How beautiful the shrine of [Athena] Polias and the nearby precinct of Poseidon were! (For we brought the two deities together after their contest by means of their [neighboring] shrines.)103 [31] I do not accept a [rebuilt] site for the [Eleusinian] mysteries from a man whom the herald’s proclamation bars from our mysteries.104 [32] Who will raise up the men whom [Xerxes] killed? Who will revive the bodies of the fallen, upon whom this [king] has “inflicted damage” in war? For cities, [the poet?] says, consist of men, not of buildings.105 He promises to restore for us whatever has had damage inflicted 102. Cf. Him. Orat. 6.28, with my note, and Flower and Marincola on Hdt. 9.1: feuvgonta. Aeschylus speaks of the defeated Xerxes’ rent garb (Pers. 834–36, 847–48, 1017, 1030). 103. “was”: past tense because “Themistocles” is referring to the time before the Persians destroyed Athens (Hdt. 8.53.2, 9.13.2). “the shrine . . . the nearby precinct”: apparently both in the Erechtheum (Plut. Quaest. conviv. 9.6.1 [741a–b]; Frazer, Pausanias’s Description, 2: 334–35). For the contest of Athena and Poseidon, see Him. Orat. 6.7, 21.2. 104. For the Persian burning of Demeter’s sanctuary at Eleusis, see Hdt. 9.65. For the banning of Persians and other barbarians from the Eleusinian mysteries, Isoc. 4.157. 105. Cf. Ael. Aristid. Orat. 3.298 Lenz-Behr, which reveals that the poet is Alcaeus. Understand “[the poet] says” or emend fhsivn to fasivn (“they say”). For the thought, see Smith, CJ 2 (1906–1907): 299–302.

Imaginary Orations

191

on it. But some of what was “damaged” it is impossible to get back; some of it we can get back, but it will not be an exact replica of the original. So how can anyone not be convinced that what [Xerxes] promises about these matters cannot be fulfilled? [33] Those [Persians] could not even withstand 300 Lacedaemonians at [Thermo]pylae. So many tens of thousands fell right before the king’s eyes, and they were facing only one company, and it was the lash that had kept them in place.106 [34] The king himself summons us to Asia [i.e., by his conciliatory gestures]! He shows those against whom he declines to engage in battle that it is safe for them to wage war against him. [35] You all were one company drawn up against the whole of Asia, you were 300 Spartiates. You blocked off [Thermo]pylae first with your weapons, then by dying. You erected a communal tomb more dignified than any trophy.107 [36] I have hastened to demand that the Thebans be punished. A Greek people has been charged with committing treason against their own kin because of the Persians. A Greek city welcomed a Persian army that was attacking Greeks.108 [37] If the Persians are defeated, it is a gain not only for the Athenians, but also for the Greeks in general. [38] Would that we [Athenians] had met the enemy in battle at [Thermo]pylae! The Lacedaemonians would now be displaying a trophy instead of a tomb. [39] I invoke you, Apollo, against Xerxes, against Xerxes, who waged war all the way to your innermost shrine, who endeavored to set fire to your sacred tripods, and because of whom you caused portents to appear.109 [40] I want to name places after my accomplishments, I want seas and rivers to be referred to by my victories rather than by their old names.

[41] “When, then, or with what resources,” someone interjected, “shall we restore the city?” Well, what kind of city are you still looking for, [sir], you who have the triremes of the new city, with Pythian [Apollo] as its founder? This city uses the ocean instead of walls as its defense, is-

106. 107. 108. 109.

See Hdt. 7.223–24. See Hdt. 7.228. For Theban support of the Persians, see Hdt. 7.131–32, 233; 8.34; 9.2. See Hdt. 8.34–39.

192

Imaginary Orations

lands instead of towers, trophies instead of material splendor. And if you seek to know its limits, go all around the whole world in your mind, go around every part of the earth that we tread upon and around as much of the sea as is navigable. These are the limits of Athens under Themistocles!110 [42] I shall demand from Xerxes the plane tree in compensation for Athena’s [olive] branch, so that two trophies belonging to the goddess may be seen on the acropolis, an [olive] branch for her victory over Poseidon and the plane tree for her victory over the barbarians.111 [Exc. Phot.] 6. The Polemarchic Oration [1] I shall not side with those who decide to speak at this tomb and then find fault with the law [that requires an oration in honor of our fallen soldiers]; instead, I shall side with those who praise that law. After all, it is strange that people who have been authorized to speak by that law would use their authority as speakers against it. It is a law that deserves praise for many reasons, firstly because it is Attic and belongs strictly to this city and this city alone. Drink-offerings and other such honors paid to the deceased highlight neither the people who make such an offering nor those to whom such offerings are made, since they are the common practices of everyone; whereas the honor that comes from a funeral oration brings a special distinction with it and commends both the decision of those who have bestowed the honor and the valor of those who are its recipients. Another reason why this law deserves praise is that the rites it prescribes are of more benefit to the living than to the dead. For by lessening the fear of death through the honor that comes from a funeral oration, he who framed this law makes everyone unhesitatingly brave in the face of dangers and urges them to prefer death in battle to an ordinary exit from life.112 For one who has died of nat110. “the triremes of the new city”: see Hdt. 8.61. For the Delphic oracle used by Themistocles and others to support the preparation of an Athenian fleet, see Hdt. 7.141–43. For the general thought, cf. Thuc. 2.62.1–3. 111. For Xerxes’ plane tree, see Him. Orat. 39.4, with my note. For the olive branch (actually, tree), Hdt. 8.55. According to Herodotus, the olive tree was burned by Xerxes but sprang right back up again. 112. “who decide to speak”: “Decide” is ejgnwkovtwn, the reading of codex A adopted by Wernsdorff and Colonna. Dübner read Photius’s eijwqovtwn (“who are accustomed”), comparing Ael. Aristid. Orat 1.86 Lenz-Behr: o} toi¸ ˇ polloi¸ ˇ tw¸ n eijwqovtwn levgein ejpi;

Imaginary Orations

193

ural causes, death is the end both of life and of being remembered; whereas, if a person perishes in the course of an act of bravery, what he gets from that is to depart from life bodily but to remain here on earth in reputation. I cannot imagine anyone who, with all this in mind, would not be ready to take death in exchange for an inglorious life. So these are the things you could say if you desire to praise the law we have been referring to—in fact, there are even weightier things to be said about it. [2] Now I must proceed to the actual praise of the men buried here. The beginning of an encomium might seem to be something that is standard for everyone; but, in fact, for these men it is special. Those who are eager to praise others and intend to celebrate their families raise their orations up to a level of discourse in which we hear good things said about the ancestors of the lauded individuals or learn where those ancestors came from; for virtually all ancestors of people being extolled anywhere came to their country from some other place. But this rule of thumb does not apply to the men I am praising. For as soon as you say “Athenians,” you make clear by that appellation that the people in question are autochthonous. So there is not, in the present case, one kind of praise for [immigrant] ancestors and another for their children or descendants. Instead, the same sign of nobility, like some token of identity, obtains for everyone; and this causes the joy that comes from the good things said about our ancestors to be felt in common by everyone.113 [3] If you praise Lacedaemon, the Thebans call the laudatory things you say into question, since they claim that Heracles was a native of Thebes. If you extol Thebes by what you say, then Cadmus crops up and the wanderings of Phoenicians and things that are alien to the praise [of Thebes]. If you sketch out the lineage of the Argives’ city, you will honor the Egyptians more than the Argives, for the Argives get their founders from Egypt. But, in the case of Athens, praise of its noble line is unblemished in every respect, because there was no other city or even human beings before Athens. Nature simultaneously showed forth both the city of Athena on earth and human beings in the midst of the other liv-

tw¸/ tavfw/ tw¸/ dhmosivw/ parei¸tai. In defense of codex A’s reading, note th;n gnwvmhn a few lines below in section 1 (“the decision of those who” etc.). For the “law” referred to in this paragraph, see p. 161 above. “he who framed . . . in the face of dangers”: perhaps influenced by Hyperid. Orat. 6, as suggested by Feraboli, Maia 25 (1973): 117. 113. The speaker begins with the traditional praise of Athenian autochthony (cf., e.g., Eur. Ion 29; Pl. Menex. 237b–c; Lysias 2.17; Isoc. 4.24, 12.124; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.25–30) and Athenian priority (sections 3–6).

194

Imaginary Orations

ing creatures.114 [4] Consequently, in everything that is found to be good among human beings, whether by nature or by established principle, our city could rightly be said to have shown the way to others. Since Athens was the first city to have consorted with the gods, it was appropriately also the first to have revealed divine knowledge to the human race. Its gift-giving began with the first necessaries of life, which it introduced. It would have been utterly strange to have taught the arts, customs, rites, and other things by which human life has been adorned before civilizing the human race, which was previously reduced to an uncouth life by its savage diet, by [providing it with] sustenance. So the benefactors of humankind began precisely where they should have begun. [5] Demeter had been wandering over every part of the earth under the sun, as they tell it, in pursuit of the abducted Kore. Having traversed the whole earth and the sea, she put an end to her wandering when she reached Eleusis and got back the girl she had been searching for. As a reward for this doubly happy outcome, the goddess gave the fruits of the earth and the [Eleusinian] mysteries to those countrymen of ours who had brought an end to her wandering. She tamed our diet with the first gift and our minds with the second. This was the origin of the first and greatest benefaction of our city to the whole human race.115 [6] And what came next? Humans knew nothing about houses. Athens taught them how to build them. No one had the arts or laws. Both came to the human race from the Athenians. People did not yet gather for festivals. Our city first brought them together for this purpose and bade all cities do the same. Life was lived without weapons. Our city provided arms for the protection of those facing the dangers of battle.

114. One could praise Lacedaemon by noting that its kings traced their descent from Heracles or that Tyndareus awarded it to Heracles (Tigerstedt, Legend of Sparta, 1: 28–34), but Thebes could claim Heracles as a native son (Hom. Il. 19.98–99; Hes. Scut. 27–56; Pind. Isthm. 7.5–7). “Cadmus . . . alien to the praise”: Cadmus is “alien to the praise [of Thebes]” because he was not a native of Thebes. He and his brothers were sent from Phoenicia in search of their sister Europa. He eventually came to Delphi, where he got oracular instructions that led to his founding of Thebes (Ov. Met. 3.1–131; Paus. 9.12.2; Apollod. Bibl. 3.1.1, 4.1–2; Vian, Les origines de Thèbes). The Argives’ founders: Danaus (and his daughters). Danaus unseated the reigning king of Argos (Paus. 2.16.1, 19.3–4; Apollod. Bibl. 2.1.4). Athens the first city: cf. Isoc. 4.23, 12.124; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.7; Steph. Byz., j nai. Human beings first at Athens: Pl. Menex. 237d; Isoc. 4.33; Ael. Aristid. Orat. s.v. Aqh¸ 1.25, 33; Them. Orat. 27.337a. 115. “this doubly happy outcome”: i.e., the end of her wandering and the retrieval of Kore. “the fruits of the earth and the mysteries”: For this twofold gift of Demeter, cf. esp. Isoc. 4.28–29. For Athens’ sharing the fruits of the earth, which it had received first, with all men, cf. also Pl. Menex. 237e–38a; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.33–34, 36–37.

Imaginary Orations

195

People did not know how to use horses. Athens was the first city to designate that species for contests and military use.116 [7] Having adorned their city and country with all these innovations, the Athenians became dear to the gods. All the gods loved their country, but they let Athena and Poseidon contend for it. These two deities did not take up arms against each other, for it was not right to brandish the aegis or the trident in defense of such a favorite as Athens. Instead, they entrusted the decision to the very same people [they were contending for], taking them both as the objects of their love and as the judges of their dispute. When the case was heard by [the mere display of ] an olive branch and of a sea wave, [the Athenians] decided in favor of the olive branch. (By “olive branch” I mean the goddess; for the olive branch is, I believe, a symbol of Athena.) When the dispute was resolved in this manner, the goddess found herself vindicated by the city, and the city took its name from that of the goddess.117 [8] Now once the gods felt respect for the justice administered in Athens, they subsequently used our courts instead of hearing cases in heaven. They tried Ares on a charge of murder that was brought against him by Poseidon, the victim of the crime having been Halirrhothius. Then they freed Orestes from his legal plight. In deciding both of these cases, they employed the ancestors of these [fallen soldiers] as colleagues.118 But it is not difficult for anyone to come up with stories of this kind [about the gods]. What a speaker should not do in tracking down stories like these is to distance himself from the great exploits undertaken on behalf of the city or of Greece as a whole by the [human] ancestors of the men who lie buried here. In that line of ancestors, sons imitated fathers and passed their courage down in every age and from one human generation to the next. So I shall turn now to these great exploits. [9] But perhaps it is worthwhile, before mentioning the city’s victories, to admire its kindness119 and to note how it outdid its whole race

116. Houses: cf. Plin. HN 7.56 [194]. Arts and laws: Pl. Menex. 238b; Isoc. 4.39–40, 12.124; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.32, 43. Festivals: Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.44. Weapons: Pl. Menex. 238b; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.43. Use of horses: Soph. Oed. Col. 714–15; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.43; Ael. Var. hist. 3.38; Them. Orat. 27.337a. 117. For the dispute of Athena and Poseidon, see Him. Orat. 21.2, with my note. Athena brandishes the aegis, Poseidon the trident. Augustine(De civ. Dei 18.9) agrees with Himerius that the Athenians (women as well as men) decided the case. 118. For the gods’ hearing of cases at Athens (on the Areopagus), see my note to Him. Orat. 7.1. Halirrhothius was Poseidon’s son. Orestes was absolved of guilt in his matricide. 119. “Kindness” is philanthropia, the same word Aelius Aristides uses of Athens in an identical context (Orat. 1.49–74 at 49 and 72, 75, 81).

196

Imaginary Orations

in this quality both by receiving those who had the misfortune of being driven away by others and by sending abroad those who wished for a better fortune. Even here it is difficult to know what one should mention first, or what kind of deeds a narrator should give priority to, whether to achievements on land or to those at sea, or where one should begin. [10] Long ago, the Greek race was marked off by short boundaries. Pirates had possession of the Cyclades, one could not sail the sea off the west coast of the Peloponnesus, Thracians were lying in wait near our city, and Amazons were threatening from elsewhere. Before these events, Ionians were fleeing [to Athens]. Before the Ionians, Heraclids were fleeing from the violence of Eurystheus [and coming to Athens]. Thebans, casting the whole human race aside, were committing outrages against their own kind. Soon afterwards Dorians along with Euboeans and Boeotians acted insolently against Athens.120 With such a great cloud of troubles befalling this land at various times, almost daily, it is worth noting what kind of men the ancestors of these [fallen soldiers] were in the face of all those difficulties. [11] Well, they pacified and colonized the islands and cleared away piracy. Having sent the Ionians to the continent opposite them, they filled all the land washed by the Aegean Sea with the Attic race. After welcoming the Heraclids, they put an end to the lawlessness of the individual who was committing outrages against those individuals [i. e., Eurystheus]; and, having transformed their fortune, they made them kings of the whole Peloponnesus instead 120. Details on the incidents mentioned in this paragraph are given in sections 11 and 12. “short boundaries”: cf., in a similar context, Isoc. 4.68: “when Greece was still small.” “one could not sail . . . Peloponnesus”: again, I presume, because of piracy. For the prevalence of piracy in earliest Greece, see Thuc. 1.4–5, 7–8. “one could not sail . . . our city”:

a[batoˇ h\n hJ pro;ˇ eJspevran th¸ ˇ Peloponnhvsou qavlatta, Qra/¸keˇ kat j aujth;n ejfhvdreuon. I suspect that Colonna is wrong in taking aujthvn as a reference to the Peloponnesus. (If there were a reference here to a Thracian threat to the Peloponnesus, we would expect to hear more about it in the follow-up comments in section 11 or 12 below.) Wernsdorff corj rectly understood kat j aujthvn as “juxta urbem ipsam.” Perhaps read kat j aujth;n (Dübner, after a suggestion of Wernsdorff’s) or . Himerius, like Isocrates, seems to imagine Thracians settled near Athens on the eve of the Thracian invasion of Athens that was led by Eumolpus, which is mentioned below in section 11; cf. Isoc. 4.70: “Whereas at one time [the Thracians] dwelt beside us [Athenians] on our very borders, they withdrew so far from us in consequence of that [unsuccessful] expedition [led by Eumolpus] that in the spaces left between their land and ours many nations, races of every kind, and great cities have been established” (trans. G. Norlin). “Before these events . . . [to Athens]”: According to tradition, the Ionians fled to Athens after having been driven out of Aegialus/Achaea (Strabo 8.1.2 [333], 8.7.1 [383–84]; Paus. 7.1–5). Wernsdorff, offering a chronological correction, proposed to emend pro; touvtwn (“before these events”) to pro;ˇ touvtouˇ or ejpi; patevraˇ touvtwn (i.e., “[were fleeing] to the Athenians” or “to the ancestors of these Athenians”). Colonna (also Völker) supposes a lacuna after pro; touvtwn, erroneously claiming that he is following Wernsdorff in this.

Imaginary Orations

197

of fugitives. The Thracians and the Amazons, who were acting insolently, the former against our city, the latter against the whole human race as well, got so increasingly stirred up by the acts of violence they were committing that everyone they fell upon yielded to them. But when those two groups attacked Athens, the Athenians joined battle with them, delivering their country from the Thracians and the human race from the Amazons. (Consequently, after this the race of Amazons was known only by the tomb, not by any progeny.) It was because of this [same kindness of theirs] that the Athenians buried those Argives who had fallen by the city wall [of Thebes], when the Thebans were pressured—by fear of the city [of Athens] and not out of respect for humanity—to hand over the corpses in accordance with the commonly expected standard of propriety.121 [12] All these Athenians were admirable. But perhaps their antiquity causes the stories about them to be consigned to the realm of the fabulous and casts doubt on their very wondrous deeds. On the other hand, who would not celebrate them in word for having simultaneously resisted three assaults, all of them from fellow Greeks [i.e., at a much later date]? Who would not feel shame if he failed to mention these assaults? Just what am I referring to? Well, envy once stirred up against this city a war waged simultaneously by Dorians, by Boeotians, and, in the third

121. “the Ionians”: According to tradition, the Ionians colonized Asia Minor. See the previous note under the lemma “Before these events . . . [to Athens]”; Hdt. 1.146; Thuc. 1.2.6, 1.12.4; Huxley, Early Ionians, 25–26. Athenian tradition prided itself on the claim that the city, under King Theseus or his son Demophon, had helped the Heraclids (Heracles’ sons) against the Argive king Eurystheus: Hdt. 9.27.2; Eur. Heraclid.; Lysias 2.11–16; Isoc. 4.54–56, 58–60; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.52–54, 78–79; see also Diod. Sic. 4.57–58; Apollod. Bibl. 2.8; Wilkins, Euripides, ‘Heraclidae’, esp. xi–xx. “[the Athenians] made them kings of the whole Peloponnesus”: an exaggerated statement of Athens’ role. And if the Heraclids were installed in the Peloponnesus immediately after Eurystheus’s death, this installment would be only temporary (Diod. Sic. 4.57–58; Apollod. Bibl. 2.8; Hdt. 9.26.1–5). Thracians: In the war between Athens and Eleusis under the Athenian king Erechtheus, Eumolpus led a Thracian force against Athens in support of Eleusis. Eumolpus was killed and the force defeated. See Pl. Menex. 239b; Isoc. 4.68, 4.70, 12.193; [Dem.] 60.8; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.85; Apollod. Bibl. 3.15.4–5. For the Amazonian attack on Athens under King Theseus, see, e.g., Hdt. 9.27.4; Lysias 2.4–6; Isoc. 4.68, 70; Diod. Sic. 4.28; Plut. Thes. 27; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.83–84. “the Amazons [acted] against the whole human race”: a reference to their peculiar lifestyle? For Amazonian tombs, see Plut. Thes. 27; Dowden, RhM 140 (1997): 117–19. “the Athenians buried those Argives”: during the reign of the Athenian king Theseus and after the famous and unsuccessful assault of the Seven against Thebes, in which Polynices, with the aid of the Argives, marched against his brother Eteocles, who was holding the Theban throne. The burials were at Eleusis and Eleutherae. “by fear of the city”: Some believed that mere intimidation (or persuasion) had caused the Thebans to hand over the corpses, others that a battle had been fought over the issue. On the whole episode, see Hdt. 9.27.3; Eur. Supplic.; Lysias 2.7–10; Isoc. 4.54–58, 12.168–74; [Dem.] 60.8; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.80; also Diod. Sic. 4.65; Plut. Thes. 29; Paus. 1.39.2; Apollod. Bibl. 3.6–7.

198

Imaginary Orations

place, by Chalcideans from Euboea. How did the city stand up to all these opponents? The Boeotians fell in battle, the Dorians were content to get away alive, and all the Chalcideans were carried off as captives. Three trophies were erected. The rapidity of the victories is even more splendid [than the victories themselves]: that over both Euboeans and Boeotians required only one day.122 [13] Although I want to give due praise to those who in the past distinguished themselves in fighting for their homeland and their whole race, I suspect that I may not be doing justice to them, because the greatness of their deeds gets obscured by the brevity of my remarks. I also suspect that I have not yet touched upon the deeds that my audience has long been expecting and seeking to hear praised; in fact, they seem to be annoyed because their desire has not yet been satisfied. Therefore I must now move on to the main argument in my oration.123 That I shall necessarily fall short of giving those deeds adequate praise is not a charge that anyone could justly bring against me, for this is a failing common to all orators. [14] Well then, the Persians wanted to turn all lands under the sun into one domain by force of arms, but they were prevented from fulfilling their wish by a small region to their west [i.e., Athens]. King Darius desired to gratify the Persians through this conquest, so that their king would possess all lands touched by the sun’s rays.124 Desiring a plausible pretext for fulfilling his wish, Darius could not come up with a reason to go to war against any Greek state but Athens, for no Greeks had acted boldly against the Medes before our city did. There were no Lacedaemonian fleets that had sailed about in Ionia, nor did it trouble the Corinthians that the Attic race in Asia [i.e., the Ionians] was forced into slavery to the Persians. It was to no one’s advantage to rescue those who were enslaved, but only to avoid a similar fate themselves. It was our city alone, it seems, that fought the first battles with Persia. [15] When the Ionians were in danger of being taken by storm, their mother-city [Athens] gave heed to the question of their freedom, since they had a disposition that was worthy of that city. The Ionians who were in charge got no assistance from Sparta, even though they petitioned the Spartans first. The men who lie buried here were the only Greeks who 122. For these events of 506 b.c., see Hdt. 5.74–77; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.91; CAH 2 4: 308, 361–62. The “Dorians” means Sparta with a Peloponnesian army. 123. “the main argument”: I retain codex A’s to;n ajgw¸ na (see LSJ, s.v. III 4b) with Wernsdorff against Photius’s bland tau¸ta (thus Colonna). 124. “all lands under the sun . . . all lands touched by the sun’s rays”: cf. Hdt. 7.8g.

Imaginary Orations

199

acknowledged their fellows and responded to their petition. They burned Sardis and showed the Persians at that time that there were still people who fought for freedom.125 [16] This, then, was the pretext for the Persian expedition. Their forces seemed to be aimed exclusively at our city, which alone had dared to act boldly against the Persian Empire. But it actually was an expedition against the whole of Greece.126 For it was quite clear that it was enough at that time to get possession of Athens; with Athens would come all the rest of Greece. [17] Once [the Persians] decided to go to war, everything seemed inadequate for the undertaking. Darius himself almost went off to battle, and he probably would have joined the expedition, if the Eretrians were not victims of wrongdoing. As it was, wary of the daring of the [Athenians] and ashamed of the war waged against the [Eretrians], he decided to stay at home. He entrusted the war to his satraps, having given them command of as large a force against the Greeks as he himself as king would have led into battle. [18] A notable indication of the size of the force sent against the Greeks is the fact that even now writers are left uncertain about the number of men who took part in the expedition. But it is not so strange that the strange and uncertain doings of tradition deprive us of precise knowledge of the number of those who attacked us, given that the number of [Persian] combatants who fell has also escaped precise count. From that time on, the [Athenian] people have been trying to sacrifice to the goddess [Artemis Agrotera] the same number of victims as of the [Persian] dead, but they have not paid her what they owe; they are still in debt to her, with more than half of the debt outstanding even after the sacrifice of so many goats.127

125. The speaker is referring to the Ionian Revolt of 499 b.c. He does not mention that Eretria also aided the revolting Ionians, although the Eretrian role in 499 is hinted at by what is said below in section 17. For the unsuccessful plea to Sparta, Athenian aid, and the burning of Persian Sardis, see Hdt. 5.49–54, 97–102. 126. The speaker is referring to the Persian expedition of 490 b.c. Eretria and Athens—for Eretria, see my previous note—“were the professed object of the expedition, though in fact the Persians intended to subjugate as many Greek towns as they could” (Hdt. 6.44.1, trans. A. de Sélincourt and J. Marincola). 127. Eretrians: The speaker is saying that Darius was put to shame by the fact that the Persians took Eretria as a result of an act of betrayal by two of its citizens (Hdt. 6.101). “his satraps”: first Mardonius, then Datis and Artaphernes (Hdt. 6.43, 94). “the size of the force”: cf. Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.101. For the annual sacrifice of 500 goats to Artemis after the Athenian victory at Marathon, to which the speaker is referring here, see schol. on Ar. Eq. 660; Xen. Anab. 3.2.11–12; Plut. De Her. malign. 862b– c; Agath. Hist. 2.10.3 Keydell. Xenophon (Anab. 3.2.11–12) says that the Athenians “are still now paying off this [vowed] sacrifice.” According to Herodotus (6.117), 6,400 Persians perished at Marathon;

200

Imaginary Orations

[19] Embarking on their expedition with such a large host, the Persians had no doubts about victory. They brought a trophy and fetters with them along with the rest of the equipment they were carrying, assuming that they would set up the trophy without resistance and put the fetters on their captives with no hindrance. Before any clash of arms, King Darius was making sport of our city—actually, it was Datis who was doing this in his stead. the same as it had been in confronting Eretria and Naxos. For after the Persian fleet set sail from Ionia, it once again covered the whole visible sea with its numerous ships, split up in the midst of the Aegean islands, and straightway got possession of the Naxians’ city on the sea. The Persians left nothing but the soil itself and the city’s name, and they put the inhabitants on triremes. They did not think that the Eretrians were worthy of a military engagement, having judged their situation to be unequal to a war with Persians. Instead, they all joined hands and made the sack of the Eretrians’ city seem like a hunt with the dragnet. [20] But when they reached Marathon, their hopes disappeared; their experience there taught them a good lesson, and they came to see what a difference there is between Eretrians and our city. For as soon as the Athenians found out about the landing of the barbarians, they ran toward the enemy to the accompaniment of a martial rhythm. Those who had landed there immediately turned in flight, before the Athenians even engaged with them. Our men cut the enemy down in various ways. Some they speedily overtook, some they subdued by terrifying them; they cut down some on the shore, others who were still on horseback on the mainland, and yet others as they fell back on their ships.128 And it was not only the living [Athenians] who fought; so did those whose lives the fight had ended at the outset. A double battle encircled those men, one against the Persians and another against nature itself to prove their bravery. They held out on one side so that they would not be

later sources inflate that figure to 90,000 (Zos. 1.2.1) or even 200,000 (Just. Epit. 2.9.20). “with more than half of the debt outstanding”: tou¸ pleivonoˇ aujto;n leivpontoˇ. I would emend aujtovn to aujtou¸ [sc. tou¸ crevwˇ]. 128. For the events of this paragraph, see Hdt. 6.94–117. The speaker does not mention that the Athenians were aided by Plataeans. For the trophy the Persians were confident that they would erect, cf. Paus. 1.33.2–3; Anth. Plan. 221, 222, 263. “”: Dübner suggested a lacuna here. I suppose something like kat j Eretriv j aˇ kai; Navxou ta; paraplhsiva . “it once again covered the . . . sea”: “again,” i.e., after the failed expedition of Mardonius (Hdt. 6.43–45). For the human dragnet used to gather the conquered Eretrians, see Pl. Menex. 240b– c, Laws 3.698d; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.102; Philostr. Vita Apoll. 1.23 (cf. Hdt. 3.149, 6.31).

Imaginary Orations

201

seen falling to the Persians; and, on the other side, they fought even though they were dead, so as to allow nature to have its way only after the Persians had fled. [21] One Athenian [Callimachus], taking upon himself the whole of Asia as it bore down upon him, fought while alive and did not fall after he died; he stood there even after death, as if pursuing the Persians with his [lifeless] figure alone, I suppose. Then another Athenian soldier [Cynegirus], with experience of ships, took bold action against a whole trireme. He ran after the Persians as they fled toward the sea and then took hold of a Phoenician ship, thinking that his right hand was stronger than the whole trireme. The barbarians feared for the trireme, imagining that it might become the spoils of an Athenian’s hand, so they cut the hand off with an axe. The smitten Athenian lay there with his hand cut off but still clinging to the trireme.129 [22] O you who first reversed the Persians’ fortune! You whose victories were more than human! You whose fall in battle was reported in a way in which nothing else was, either before or after your time! You who have a tomb more revered than a trophy! O you who have caused the name Marathon to be heard wherever the sun shines! You who were first blessed with alliances of the gods that came to you unbidden!130 If Marathon has your bodies, the gods who fought with you have your souls, and the earth and the sea have your repute. [23] Marathon, then, was the end of Darius’s good fortune and ambition. Xerxes inherited from Darius both rule over the Medes and the war, which the latter waged with great effort against this city of ours in pursuit of glory. But at this juncture Xerxes had much more hatred in 129. Callimachus and Cynegirus were the subjects of two declamations by the sophist Polemo, which are edited and translated into English by Reader and Chvala-Smith, Severed Hand. They provide an excellent discussion of ancient sources on the two heroes on pp. 33–40. For the two heroes in the famous Marathon painting in the Painted Stoa at Athens, see also Harrison, AJA 76 (1972): 358–65. “A double battle”: cf. Polemo Orat. 2.52: “O [one, i.e., Callimachus] having fought two great battles—with Darius and with death!” Some texts specify that the many missiles lodged in his body were what kept Callimachus standing after he expired. “another Athenian . . . trireme”: I translate Colonna’s kata; trihvrouˇ o{lhˇ nautiko;ˇ stratiwvthˇ. Wernsdorff, objecting that Cynegirus was not a nautikovˇ, preferred codex A’s nautikh¸ ˇ to Photius’s nautikovˇ, translating “triremis ad classem Persicam pertinentis.” But, if nautikovˇ is right, Himerius may just be inferring that Cynegirus had enough knowledge of ships to be able to make a move against one. Wernsdorff also cites a variant nauvthˇ kai; stratiwvthˇ, for which cf. Polemo Orat. 1.33: [Kunaivgeiron] to;n pezomavcon, to;n naumavcon. Cynegirus took hold of a ship to try to stop it from sailing. 130. “alliances . . . unbidden”: ta;ˇ ajklhvtouˇ summacivaˇ. Aklhtoˇ [ is precisely the word Lucian uses in describing Pan’s presence at Marathon to aid the Athenians (Bis accus. 9; cf. Hdt. 6.105). For Greek gods and heroes at Marathon, see Polemo Orat. 1.35, 2.41, 2.62, with Reader’s comments; Harrison, AJA 76 (1972): 366–67.

202

Imaginary Orations

his heart than Darius had had. For it was Sardis alone that troubled Darius, but Xerxes was troubled by Marathon as well as by Sardis.131 When Xerxes got angry at our city, nothing at all was quiet; everything was stirred up and shaken along with him, just as if Poseidon himself were making the whole earth and sea quake. [24] Xerxes rose up against the Greeks more to make sport of our city than to fight the Greeks. Nothing at all was quiet while he was conducting this expedition—not a city or a nation, not a plain, a mountain, a river, or a gulf, not the dry land or the sea. Cities were shaken, every nation was put to the test, there was no plain that was not covered over with soldiers as a result of the expedition, , no river could satisfy the soldiers’ need of drinkingwater, every gulf conducted the [Persian] fleet along, and land and sea exchanged their roles: for [Xerxes] laid dry land on straits and conducted Phoenician ships right through isthmuses.132 [25] Then there were seen astonishing sights, greater than anyone could have expected: Median horses on the Hellespont and a fleet of triremes sent right through the middle of Athos. Xerxes did not even abstain, in his shamelessness, from the heavens, but in his astonishing actions he went leaping from the sea to dry land, from the earth to the sky, and from there even to the sun. For by shooting arrows he obscured the light of the sun, by sailing [through dry land] he changed its nature, and by marching [over the Hellespont] he repudiated its normal function. I say nothing about seas covered over by triremes, forces too large to be counted, peoples incapable of supplying the Persians with enough food, and a king who was present everywhere in the fear he instilled, but whose precise location could never be determined because of the massiveness of the Persian expedition.133 [26] When such a great clamor had sounded through every land and

131. The speaker now moves on to Xerxes’ expedition of 480–479 b.c. “which the latter waged”: Colonna has meta; to; klevoˇ w[dinen ejkei¸ no. I adopt Wernsdorff’s suggestion, ejkei¸ noˇ, and refer it to Darius. For the Greek burning of Sardis, see section 15 above. 132. “just as if Poseidon”: cf. Ael. Aristid. Orat. 3.218 Lenz-Behr. “every nation was put to the test”: e[qnoˇ de; a{pan hjlevgceto. Wernsdorff translates “natio hominum omnis in medium protrahebatur,” seeing a reference especially to the eastern peoples, “antehac plane ignoti,” who took part in Xerxes’ expedition (Hdt. 7.61ff.). “”: Wernsdorff conjectured a lacuna here, in which reference would have been made to mountains. Unlike his editorial predecessors, and with no comment, Colonna implies that the words o[roˇ de; are actually transmitted here. “no river”: cf. Hdt. 7.21, 58, 196; Lycophr. Alex. 1424–25; Diod. Sic. 11.5.3. “[Xerxes] laid dry land” etc.: The speaker is referring here, as in the next paragraph, to the bridging of the Hellespont and the cutting of a canal through the Athos promontory (see Him. Orat. 1.7, with my note). A layer of soil was laid on the Hellespont bridge (Hdt. 7.36.5). Cf. Lycophr. Alex. 1414–16. 133. “he obscured . . . the sun”: cf. Hdt. 7.226; Lycophr. Alex. 1426–28; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.122; Him. Orat. 5.3–4. Lucian pokes fun at this commonplace in the declamations

Imaginary Orations

203

the whole world came to trial in Greece, everyone but the Athenians thought that they could still avoid disaster if only the Persians kept away from their cities. And this was not an unreasonable attitude. For in a place where Thebans were enslaved [to the Persians], where Thessalians were siding with the Medes, where Corcyreans were watching to see how things would develop, where Argives were sending out ambassadors, where Delphians were perplexed, and where Gelon was making threats, as the Pythian [Apollo] had done, right from his tripod, before Gelon—in a place where all of this was happening, did any solid hope or any expectation of deliverance present itself to those who were determined to withstand the Persians?134 [27] Nonetheless, our city did not yield to a king who was causing everything to quake. Athens did not, in fear of [the god’s] message and before attempting something, decide on a shameful course of action. Rather, from the time of that first embassy the city proved itself superior to the king. He demanded tokens of slavery, but the Athenians sent him back tokens of freedom; for death is what he got in return for his embassy. He transformed the land, but they left their land. He yoked the Hellespont, but they made the sea their city. He sent a thousand triremes, but they went against the whole of Asia with a mere three hundred triremes. None of all the things that happened frightened them or made them forgetful of valor—not the fall of the Lacedaemonians, whose service to the Greeks was so great that they were bravely determined to go to their deaths; not all the men who were fighting in support of the barbarians; not the flogging of the waves, and the punishment of the winds, and the barbarians’ reckless treatment of nature. Rather, after Artemisium the Athenians sailed , and they sang a twofold victory song, outdoing the barbarians in fighting and their fellow Greeks everywhere in valor.135 of sophists (Rhet. praec. 18). “seas . . . triremes”: cf. Diod. Sic. 11.5.3. “forces . . . counted”: cf. Hdt. 7.60. “supplying . . . food”: cf. Hdt. 7.118–20, 8.115. 134. “When such . . . from their cities”: cf. Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.123–24. For the submission of the Thebans and the Thessalians to the Persians, see Hdt. 7.132; cf. 7.172–74, 205, 233. For the Corcyreans’ wait-and-see attitude, Hdt. 7.168. For the behavior of the Argives, Hdt. 7.148–52. Himerius probably means that the Argives sent ambassadors to the Greek allies at the Isthmus of Corinth (thus Diod. Sic. 11.3.4). For the Delphians, see Hdt. 7.178.1 and esp. 8.36–38. As the Persians approached, the Delphians were unsure what to do with the sacred treasures. This was resolved by consulting the oracle. Most Delphians abandoned the city to the Persians; some, however, did engage with the enemy. Gelon of Syracuse refused to send help to Greece and spoke ominously to its ambassadors (Hdt. 7.157–62). For Apollo’s dark prophecy to the Athenians, see Hdt. 7.140. A second prophecy offered some rays of hope (Hdt. 7.141–43). 135. “that first embassy . . . his embassy”: This passage probably ascribes to Xerxes the embassy that was sent, according to Herodotus, by Darius (Hdt. 7.32, 133–36). Darius

204

Imaginary Orations

[28] What titles or appellations could one come up with that would be worthy of your deeds? O you who braved dangers for the whole human race! You who dared greater things than Xerxes! You who showed that your souls were more steadfast than the elements! O you whose resolve was not clouded by the Persians’ arrows! You who by two victories demonstrated the inferiority of a [Greek] expedition that had lasted ten years! You forced the man who assaulted the whole of the earth and the sea [i.e., Xerxes] to steal his own safety and to do so gladly. O you who won battles whose outcome was foretold by the Pythian oracle! You who through your valorous actions proclaimed Salamis divine! You who alone proved to all mortals that all brute force is overcome by valor!136 [29] But I don’t know what to do next. How shall I praise Plataea? sent ambassadors to Athens and Sparta to demand submission. They were put to death in both cities. When Xerxes later sent his own ambassadors to Greece to demand submission, he deliberately refrained from sending any to Athens or Sparta because of what had happened to those of Darius. After killing Darius’s ambassadors, the Spartans felt polluted. Two Spartans volunteered to surrender their lives, in atonement, to Xerxes, who was now on the Persian throne. The fact that these Spartans went to Xerxes could have easily given rise to the error that it was Xerxes himself who had sent to Sparta (and to Athens) the ambassadors for whose death they desired to make amends. This error occurs in the version of the story found in Suda X 54 Adler. “for death is what he got”: i.e., the death of the ambassadors. “He transformed the land”: a reference to Xerxes’ digging a canal through the Athos promontory. “they left their land . . . made the sea their city”: a reference to their decision, after the battles at Thermopylae and Artemisium, to evacuate Athens and rely exclusively on their navy. “a thousand . . . three hundred”: For the figure 1,000, cf. Ctesias, FGrH 688 F 13 (23) [cf. 13 (26), “over 1,000”]; Pl. Laws 3.699b (“more than 1,000”); Lysias 2.32 (after the figure 1,200 at 2.27). Aeschylus splits the total: Xevrxh/ . . . cilia;ˇ me;n h\n . . . aiJ d j uJpevrkopoi tavcei eJkato;n di;ˇ h\san eJptav q j (Pers. 341–43; cf. Hdt. 7.89). Note also his split total for the Greeks—“ten times thirty and, apart from these, ten more select vessels” (Pers. 339–41)—although the lines can also be read to mean 300 rather than 310 (see Groeneboom’s comment). See also CAH2 4: 532, 570. “the fall of the Lacedaemonians”: i.e., the Greek defeat at the battle of Thermopylae. “the flogging of the waves”: When a storm disrupted Xerxes’ attempt to bridge the Hellespont, he punished its waters by flogging, fettering, and apparently tattooing them (Hdt. 7.35; Jones, JRS 77 [1987]: 146). “”: Colonna is wrong, I think, in rejecting Wernsdorff’s supplement here. Himerius is referring to the two naval battles, the one at Artemisium and the one in which the Persian fleet was defeated, at Salamis. At Salamis, most of the Greek ships and the best sailing ones were those of Athens (Hdt. 8.42.2). “a twofold victory song”: “Twofold” is explained in the following clause. 136. “whose resolve was not clouded by the Persians’ arrows”: unlike the sun, which was obscured by them (section 25 above). “two victories”: i.e., those at Artemisium and at Salamis. For the battle of Artemisium as a Greek victory, see Pl. Menex. 241a; Lysias 2.31; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.167. “a [Greek] expedition . . . ten years”: i.e., the expedition against Troy. For the superiority of the Greeks who saved Greece from the Persians to those who had fought in the Trojan War, cf. Isoc. 4.83, [Dem.] 60.10–11, and see Loraux’s comments on the denigration of the Trojan War in the Athenian epitaphios (Invention, 69–72). For Xerxes’ escape from Greece after the battle of Salamis, see Hdt. 8.97–120; Diod. Sic. 11.19.6; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.168, 1.249, 3.210; Philostr. Vita Apoll. 3.31. For the Pythian oracle foretelling the Greek victory at Salamis, see Hdt. 7.141–43. The oracle proclaimed Salamis “divine,” qeivh, the same word Himerius uses here.

Imaginary Orations

205

How shall I recount the victories at Mycale? What about Sestus, Eion, Byzantium, and the whole seacoast? These [Greeks] assailed that coast with their weapons as if they were cleansing away a curse, as they everywhere excised the remains of the barbarian forces. But even if I pass over these topics in silence, I shall mention the peace made with the king, which makes our city more worthy of reverence than any military victory does. This is as it should be: for peace agreements are often the work of fortune, but in this case the king readily conceded to Athens that he would remain inland to the distance of one day’s horse ride from the sea and would not send a trading ship between the Chelidonian and the Cyanean islands. How can this fail to procure unblemished glory for our city from every quarter?137 [30] And if one were to neglect praising the city for actions it took against the Lacedaemonians and the Boeotians at the very time it was acting against the barbarians, wouldn’t he seem to be depriving it of great glory and doing it an injustice? Aren’t these Athenians the men who were fighting the barbarians and sailing around the Peloponnesus at the same time that they were laying siege to Aegina? Aren’t these the men who overcame Lacedaemonians at Tanagra, Boeotians in Boeotia, and Corinthians at the very borders of their territory, fighting both for the glory of victory and on behalf of the Megarians? [31] And what about the battles fought after these, when the Lacedaemonians treated our city unfairly and then promised to pay a penalty for that unfair treatment, so that they would be looked upon as completely subdued by us? Attica has a trophy celebrating a victory over the Lacedaemonians, and Sphacteria has evidence of our defeat of Sparta [there]. Consider what happened in the Crisaean [i.e., Corinthian] Gulf, our chastisement of the Corinthians, our long-suffering in the West and in the Hellespont, our countless trophies for victories in naval and land battles, and how the Athenians stood up to every tyranny, to every oppressive regime, having taken on at various times countless struggles on behalf of their race. It is not easy for me to recount such deeds, nor would it have been easy for anyone who tried it before me. [32] Thus, I think that, like those who announce the victors at racecourses, I should compose one and the same token 137. “Mycale . . . seacoast”: For these successful Greek operations, after their victory at Plataea in 479 b.c., see Hdt. 9.90–104, 114–18; Thuc. 1.89, 94, 98; Diod. Sic. 11.34–37, 44, 60. “as if . . . cleansing away a curse”: cf. Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.199. “the peace made with the king”: the much-debated Peace of Callias (CAH2 5: 121–27). For the ancient testimonia on this treaty, see Bengtson, Die Staatsverträge, 64–69. Some texts speak of the banning of ships of war rather than of trading ships.

206

Imaginary Orations

of honor [for all these accomplishments] in the hope of thus satisfying the law:138 O you who have filled every part of the land and the sea to which we have access with victories, and the inaccessible regions with your fame and glory! You alone have overcome nature, time, and envy with your great deeds. O you who have measured off the whole earth with trophies rather than with mere markers! You have fought against all men, you have had opponents who praised and bore witness to your valor. Because of you the Athenian name will always be ageless and . Neither Babylon nor Nineveh nor any other city or land that is fortunate in its glory or in [its claim on] time has ever sounded forth as much as the city whose offspring you are. O fathers of trophies, you who teach us how to achieve every kind of success! You have outdistanced all praise and anything that could be said of you. You did not hesitate to move on to the greater part of glory, which is secure and of which you are now heirs; for you showed yourselves to be glorious in the work of peace as well as in trophies of victory. [33] My remarks are perhaps inferior to what my subject merits, but they are no worse than those of many others. All that is left is for all of us to sound off together at this tomb with a cry of praise, and then we may depart from this ceremony of honor. [cod. A, with passages also in Exc. Phot.] 138. “And if one . . . of the Megarians”: For these events of the 450s b.c., see Thuc. 1.105–8. “fighting the barbarians”: the Persians. The Athenians were supporting an Egyptian revolt against them at the time referred to here (Thuc. 1.104, 105.3, 109.1). “sailing around the Peloponnesus”: Thuc. 1.108.5. “Lacedaemonians . . . promised to pay a penalty”: Is this, as Wernsdorff suggested, a reference to the treaty Sparta was willing to accept from Athens during the Pylos campaign of 425, although in the end it never materialized (Thuc. 4.15–22)? “Attica has a trophy”: Is this the trophy mentioned by Diod. Sic. 13.73 (408 b.c.)? Sphacteria: The defeat occurred in 425. The Athenians erected a trophy there (Thuc. 4.38.4). “in the Crisaean Gulf”: Phormion’s operations of 429 (Thuc. 2.83–92). “our chastisement of the Corinthians”: in 425 (Thuc. 4.42–45). “long-suffering in the West”: the unsuccessful Athenian expedition to Sicily of 415–413. “in the Hellespont”: i.e., during the Peloponnesian War (CAH2 5, index, s.v. “Hellespont”). “to every tyranny, to every oppressive regime”: apparently a reference to the Four Hundred of 411 and to the Thirty Tyrants of 404–403; cf. Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.253. “satisfying the law”: the law referred to in section 1.

chapter 7

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

Almost half of the pieces presented here, including Oration 48, the longest extant Himerian speech, address and honor proconsular governors of Greece (Achaia), the province in which Himerius taught, while they were in office.1 I shall consider those governors first, in their order of appearance. Oration 20 is addressed to Musonius, who is mentioned in the opening scholion of Oration 39 as an ex-proconsul of Greece in 362 and apparently held the office before 356.2 The honorand of Oration 25 is Scylacius. The oration gives us information on his earlier career: he held some position in an “imperial palace,” then a position in which he operated both at the mouth of the Maeander River (at Miletus) and in Pisidia. In a passage whose full sense cannot be recovered because of lacunae (25 [71–94]), Himerius tells how Scylacius altered the flow of water around the Maeander’s mouth. This involved the digging of a canal. Scylacius’s work led to the improvement of a lake and of the harbors of Miletus.3 Scylacius also rid Pisidia of robbers. The position he held when engaged in these activities must be the vicariate of

1. Himerius refers to proconsuls of “Greece” (“Hellas”) rather than of “Achaia” (see titles of Orat. 20, 25, and 48; opening scholion of 39). 2. Groag, Die Reichsbeamten, 39–40; PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Musonius 1”; Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 214. 3. See n. 103 below.

207

208

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

Asia, which he is in fact attested holding in 343. An inscription records his building activity as vicar at Laodicea-Lycus in Asia Minor. Edmund Groag reasons that the proconsulship of Greece that Scylacius was holding when Himerius addressed Oration 25 to him is to be placed after the death of the emperor Constans in 350: Scylacius was vicar in Constantius’s realm (and the “imperial palace” where his career began was presumably Constantius’s); so we would not expect to find him governing Greece, which had been in Constans’s realm from 340, until after the latter’s death and the incorporation of Greece into Constantius’s realm.4 Himerius addresses Oration 31 to Publius Ampelius, who is attested in office in 359–360. He highlights the many physical improvements and building projects, also attested epigraphically, that were undertaken by, or with the encouragement of, Ampelius throughout his province (31.11, 12, 16, 17, A1[?]).5 Ampelius also appears in Oration 29, which is addressed to the teacher of the proconsul’s son. Oration 38 honors Cervonius, whose proconsulship has been conjecturally placed as early as the second half of Constantine’s reign and as late as 353–354. Its opening scholion’s remark that it was “the first talk in Athens that [Himerius] gave in the praetorium” need not mean either that it was delivered at the very beginning of Himerius’s Athenian teaching career or that it was the first talk Himerius addressed to a governor in Athens—except on the arbitrary assumption that a governor could be addressed oratorically in Athens only in the praetorium. Oration 38’s opening scholion refers to physical improvements (ajnoikodomhvsanta) made by Cervonius in Athens (cf. 38.1).6 The identification of “Basilius, the son of Basilius,” the addressee of Orations 46 and 47, is problematic. Timothy Barnes has argued (after Groag) that he was the Basilius who became urban prefect at Rome in 395, and that he was not the son of Valerius Maximus, consul in 327, but rather of Maximus, urban prefect at Rome in 361, who presumably had the signum Basilius.7 Barnes conjectures that the son’s proconsulship of Greece fell in the 370s.8 Jacques Schamp, on the other hand, 4. Groag, Die Reichsbeamten, 34; Stein and Palanque, Histoire du Bas-Empire, 1: 131–32; Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 215. 5. Groag, Die Reichsbeamten, 42–44; PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Publius Ampelius 3”; Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 215–16; Habicht, Hyperboreus 1 (1994–95): 128–31. 6. Groag, Die Reichsbeamten, 27–28; PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Cervonius”; Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 216; Schamp, DPA 3 (2000): 724. 7. CP 82 (1987): 217–18. For the textual complication that Barnes’s identification of Basilius’s father creates, see Him. Orat. 46.8, with my note. 8. For Greece as Basilius’s province, see Him. Orat. 46.10; 47.1, 5, 9, 17.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

209

identifies the addressee of Orations 46 and 47 with Maximus, consul in 327, which would give a considerably earlier date for his Greek proconsulship than that supposed by Barnes.9 In response to Schamp, I would remark that the fact that, according to the opening scholion of Oration 46, Himerius “[came] forward to speak after the other sophists” is not necessarily an argument for his youthfulness at the time. In both orations, Himerius has some appreciative words for Basilius’s father, who was in the West while the son was governing Greece, and he acknowledges the father’s influence on the son.10 We come finally to Oration 48 and the proconsul Hermogenes. In this oration, as in Oration 25 to Scylacius, we are given some information about the governor’s earlier career. “At an early age” (kata; th;n prwvthn hJlikiva n) he was a member of the imperial court, where he was entrusted with what we would call classified information. He gave advice there, having a mollifying effect on the emperor and his regime (48.18–19). Then he left the world of government for a period of time, devoting himself to study—mainly of philosophy, but also of rhetoric, astronomy, and geography—and to travel (48.20–27). After this period he returned to government, equipped with Latin as well as with Greek. He went to work at Constantinople for “a most lawful emperor with a noble nature,” playing (if we believe the panegyrist) a key role at court (48.28–30). Then, just after spending some time along the Danube (48.36), he took up the proconsulship of Greece—what the Bithynianturned-Athenian Himerius calls “the greatest office on earth” (48.31). Here, as often elsewhere, we encounter the annoying sophistic habit of referring to specific individuals without naming them. It has been suggested that the ruler in need of mollification was Licinius (deposed 324), and the “most lawful” emperor at Constantinople was Constantine (died 337). Another conjecture moves us forward in time, making the first ruler Constans (died 350) or Magnentius (r. 350–353) and the second ruler Constantius (died 361). More recently, Barnes has suggested that Caesar Gallus (r. 351–354) was the mollified ruler, and Julian (r. 361–363) was the “most lawful” emperor at Constantinople. Julian ruled from Constantinople from December of 361 to June of 362. Barnes understands the time Hermogenes spent along the Danube to have been a visit to emperor Valens sometime between the spring of 367 and early 370, shortly before the beginning of his Greek procon9. DPA 3 (2000): 723–24. 10. Him. Orat. 46.8–10, 47.16, with my note 190.

210

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

sulship.11 Schamp has rejected Barnes’s reconstruction, arguing for a return to the view that the mollified emperor of sections 18–19 was Licinius and conjecturally placing Hermogenes’ Greek proconsulship between 353 and 358.12 We may note here two lost orations (49 and 51 Colonna), one that was certainly and the other probably addressed to proconsuls of Greece. Their titles are preserved in Photius’s Himerian bibliography. Oration 51 was “To Praetextatus, the Proconsul of Greece, and His Associates.” This is Vettius Agorius Praetextatus. He was with Julian, at the beginning of the latter’s reign, in Constantinople, where the emperor appointed him proconsul (Amm. Marc. 22.7.6). Himerius apparently delivered the lost oration before Praetextatus in that city, where the sophist had gone to join Julian upon leaving Athens. Oration 49 was “To Plocianus the Proconsul.” In a Himerian setting, an unspecified proconsul is likely to be one who is governing Greece.13 Oration 28 is addressed not to a governor of Greece, but to someone Himerius hoped (and had some reason to believe?) would soon become its governor (28.9). The addressee is the comes Athenaeus—although it should be said at the outset that the title of Oration 28, “To the Comes Athenaeus,” which survives in Photius’s Himerian bibliography, has been conjecturally attached to the group of untitled excerpts placed under it in Colonna’s edition. We know nothing further of Athenaeus.14 What occasioned these orations to governors of Greece? Two of them welcomed governors upon their arrival at Athens. Oration 47 was delivered when Basilius visited Athens specifically for the Panathenaea. He is described as a light; his arrival is like the coming of a fair wind, of the evening star, of spring. He is like Dionysus bringing spring. Oration 48 also welcomes the visit of a governor of Greece to Athens, that of Hermogenes. In a complaint that is not to be taken with full seriousness, Himerius brings a charge against Hermogenes for making him and the Athenians have to wait all winter long for a visit (48.2–11, 35–36). According to Himerius, Hermogenes has spent too much time in Corinth, 11. Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 219–20. For the conjectures Constans/Magnentius and Constantius, see Sievers, Das Leben des Libanius, 225. For conjecture as to the positions Hermogenes held under the two rulers, see Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 219–20. 12. DPA 3 (2000): 718–19. In part, Schamp’s position rests on the identification of “Hermogenes 3” and “Hermogenes 9” of PLRE, vol. 1. 13. See PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Plocianus”; Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 220. 14. Barnes, questioning the title comes, suggests that he was vicar of Macedonia, because of references in the oration to “clearly defined territorial responsibilities” and to Greece (CP 82 [1987]: 215).

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

211

the seat of provincial government, tending to official business and neglecting the cultural arena of Athens. Himerius employs the language of erotics with reference to the cities—an old metaphor (Thuc. 2.43.1; Eur. Phoen. 359; cf. Ar. Eq. 732, 1341). He criticizes the Attic Erotes for having allowed Hermogenes “to be cherished [exclusively] by his Ephyrean [Corinthian] lovers” (48.2). The Erotes should have shot Hermogenes with their arrows and caused him to turn his affections toward his lovers the Athenians and Himerius. But, on second thought, Himerius is prepared to dismiss his charges. After all, the Nile and the land of Egypt long for one another all year long, but the Nile visits Egypt in its inundation only once a year, at the beginning of summer. Apollo once kept Delphi waiting, spending a whole year among the Hyperboreans. But he finally came to Delphi, in the summer, when “the poet’s [Alcaeus’s] lyrics about the god [could take] on something of the lushness of summer” (48.11). Hermogenes had kept Athens waiting through the winter because he regarded spring (or summer)15 as a more fitting time for a visit. In addition to these two orations that welcome an arriving governor, we have one that bids farewell to a departing one. The title of Oration 31 calls it a propemptic. The delivery of Himerius’s oration has held back Ampelius just a bit longer from leaving. He is departing at the end of his term as governor. He will be missed, and the Greeks will be in tears (31.2, 18). The orations welcoming and bidding farewell to governors of Greece (and the two, noted below, bidding farewell to Flavianus) belong to the same genre as the orations in chapter 4 that mark the arrival or departure of Himerius’s students. The difference is in the status of the honorands. When Himerius greeted or bid farewell to an official, he was himself honored by having been selected to honor the official, especially at Athens, where there was no dearth of rhetors. The lacunose opening scholion of Oration 25 tells us that Himerius has been made a member of the Areopagus. Perhaps what occasioned this oration to Scylacius was the governor’s recommendation or support of the appointment.16 Both Oration 38 to Cervonius and Oration 46 to Basilius seem to take advantage of a proconsul’s presence in Athens to express Himerius’s thanks for support in a professional conflict. The opening scholion of 38 refers to Himerius’s rival sophists “who had recently derided him.” He compares his situation to that of Socrates, who was slandered by the 15. See n. 201 below. 16. Thus Wernsdorff in his opening remark on Orat. 25; cf. Völker’s note 1 on the title.

212

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

sophists of old after young men started to prefer him to them. Socrates received encouragement from the Delphic oracle, who called him the wisest of men. So too, Himerius implies, he himself has received encouragement from Cervonius. When Himerius refers to “the silence [and] the confinement of eloquence in darkness, conditions that obtained before [Cervonius’s] arrival,” and says that Cervonius “orders me to make eloquence public, to bring it out onto center stage for the Greeks” (38.3), he is probably speaking not of a general decline of eloquence at Athens, but of his own intimidation or marginalization, which he now hopes to overcome with a sympathetic governor’s support. Again, when Himerius says that “the Muses’ arts are reviving themselves” (38.1) and that Cervonius “has brought [eloquence] . . . out into the light” (38.8), he may mean only that the governor is assisting him in overcoming his opponents. Oration 46 is actually addressed to “those individuals laying snares for him” as well as to Basilius. Himerius is speaking after his sophistopponents have spoken. He says that his Muse has been dishonored, that a “hostile proclamation” has been issued against him,17 that he is “under a long siege,” with “the whole population” at war with him (46.1–2). He is the victim of professional envy, but envy will eventually get its due punishment (46.3–5). In the midst of his troubles Basilius is his friend (46.2) and encourages him. We know nothing about the precise occasion of Oration 20 to Musonius; but, in light of Orations 38 and 46, Himerius’s remark there (20.1) that “when I was very reluctant to go before audiences and eager to remove my eloquence from mass gatherings, you forced me to break this habit” may refer to withdrawal due to professional rivalry and the tension resulting from it. Of the remaining seven orations presented here, three (12, 36, and 43) are addressed to a Flavianus, who has been identified with Nicomachus Flavianus, proconsul of Asia in 382–383 and son of Virius Nicomachus Flavianus.18 Oration 12 is titled “A Propemptic Oration.” It was delivered in Athens (12.12). Flavianus is on his way to Asia Minor to take up the proconsulship of Asia, to which he has just been appointed (12, title). Himerius compares the occasion to Alexander’s crossing from Europe to Asia. He refers to a painting of that crossing and sees his own orating on this occasion as comparable to Timotheus’s playing the pipe at Alexan17. Völker (on 46.1) suggests that this was a proclamation of an earlier Christian governor against the pagan Himerius. 18. By O. Seeck, s.v. “Flavianus 15,” RE 6, 2 (1909): 2512; Chastagnol, Les fastes de la préfecture de Rome, 241; PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Flavianus 14”; Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 214; Völker, Himerios, 179 n. 2; Schamp, DPA 3 (2000): 729.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

213

der’s crossing (12.1–5). There are the usual regrets at Flavianus’s imminent departure and allusion to the longing that will follow it (12.7, 8, 13, 14). Flavianus is “a faithless lover” in leaving his Greek admirers (12.15). In Oration 12 Himerius tells us that at a very early age Flavianus came to the attention of an emperor, apparently at Constantinople (12.24–25). He also alludes, in another fragment of the oration (12.26), to time spent by Flavianus along the Danube. The proconsulship of Asia was the man’s second governorship (12.16). His first governorship was that of Campania.19 Barnes believes that the office Oration 36 alludes to, recently held in Africa, was not the governorship, but a legateship “to a recent proconsul who was a relative or a friend of his family.”20 Like Oration 12, Oration 36 is a “propemptic” (see title). Himerius is here saying goodbye to Flavianus after another visit to Greece,21 earlier than that of Oration 12, one that immediately followed his office in Africa. This was a brief visit; Himerius complains that he is virtually forced to welcome Flavianus and bid him adieu at one and the same time (36.1, A3). Finally, Oration 43, “To Flavianus the Proconsul,” a third oration to him, the title of which survives in Photius’s Himerian bibliography and to which title Colonna conjecturally assigns seven fragments preserved without title in the Excerpta Neapolitana, may have been delivered during yet a third visit to Greece after his Asian proconsulship.22 Oration 43.3 says that Flavianus was “seen to be father and teacher of the Attic race,” and the “Attic race” here may mean the Ionians whom he governed as Asian proconsul.23 Why so many visits to Greece? We cannot know the precise answer, of course. But it helps to know that Flavianus was a native of Greece (12.17), that “at the very beginning of his adolescence . . . he was already brimming over with fame and causing the whole of Greece to take note of him” (12.24), and that he had studied rhetoric under Himerius in Athens (12.36). Barnes suggests that the comes Ursacius, to whom Oration 23 is addressed, is the man who was magister officiorum in 364–365.24 Ammi-

19. PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Flavianus 14.” 20. CP 82 (1987): 214. 21. I have no idea why Barnes (CP 82 [1987]: 214n) thinks that Orat. 36.A3 “seems to imply delivery at Corinth.” 22. In contrast, Barnes (CP 82 [1987]: 214) assigns Orat. 12, 36, and 43 all to the same visit. 23. Cf. Him. Orat. 59 and 60. 24. Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 214. Barnes worries, though, that “to judge from the scanty surviving fragments of the speech, Himerius praised his Ursacius as a soldier by profession.” I see no reference to anything military in the speech.

214

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

anus Marcellinus calls him a Dalmatian (26.4.4); Himerius calls him an Illyrian (23.5) and compares him to the northerner Abaris. Oration 23 was surely delivered in Athens—Himerius compares Abaris’s visit to Athens to that of Ursacius—but we have no further information about the circumstances of the speech. The Severus of Oration 24 had been a pupil of Himerius. We have the oration that welcomed him to Himerius’s school (21) and also Himerius’s epithalamium for him (9). Unfortunately Oration 24 is lacunose and therefore what survives is not fully intelligible; it is possible, but not certain, that it was delivered when Severus enrolled his own son in Himerius’s school.25 Whether or not Severus was actually holding office when this speech was delivered, the text comments on and praises his public career. Most of the key informative remarks, in a lacunose passage, occur in lines 32–45: They opened the imperial [doors] to that man . . . and immediately enrolled him among the emperor’s friends . . . he began with an office {greater?} than the others [of his cohort] began with . . . The Galatians were the preface to his honors, the Bithynians came next . . . so the job he got from the emperor was to guide peoples and cities.

Two of the offices referred to here are clearly the governorship of Galatia followed by that of Bithynia. Himerius seems to say, in a section of the above passage that I do not quote, that Severus, like an Orpheus, sedated a troubled Bithynia (24 [39–44]). Barnes believes that the position at court (“comes of the emperor”) came after the two governorships.26 Could it not have come before,27 on the model of Scylacius’s (25 [32–33]) and Hermogenes’ (48.18) careers? Himerius’s description of the Galatian governorship as “the preface to [Severus’s] honors” will mean honors beyond the court. Just before the text quoted above, again in a lacunose passage, there is a reference to an office, th;n u{parcon ejxousivan, apparently held by Severus.28 Was this his most recent office? Barnes argues that it was the urban prefecture of Constantinople, held sometime between 366 and 372. More recently Thomas Brauch contends that it was the vicariate of Pontus, held in the late 360s.29 Both Barnes and

25. 26. 27. 28.

See my note on the first paragraph of Orat. 24. CP 82 (1987): 212–13. Thus Brauch, Byzantion 72 (2002): 76n. I do not know what to make of a second reference to this office at 24 [38–39], Biquno;n th;n cavrin su;n toi¸ ˇ a[lloiˇ perioivkoiˇ u{parcon, with text lost on both ends. 29. Brauch, Byzantion 72 (2002): 75–78.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

215

Brauch assume that Severus was in this office at the time of the delivery of Oration 24 and that it was delivered at Constantinople (according to Barnes) or at Nicomedia or Nicaea (according to Brauch). But these are not necessary assumptions. The “prefect Anatolius” to whom Oration 32 is addressed is either the prefect of Illyricum of the middle 340s or—more likely—the homonymous prefect of Illyricum of 357–360.30 The remains of this speech do not inform us about its occasion, but section 2 suggests that Himerius was greeting Anatolius upon the latter’s arrival at Athens. It is sheer speculation to attempt to explain Himerius’s reference, at the beginning of Oration 32, to a “misfortune” that he hopes to turn into a festival.31 Oration 42 honors Julian’s pagan and learned praetorian prefect Saturninus Secundus Salutius. Barnes has suggested that Himerius delivered it at Constantinople at the beginning of Julian’s reign.32 Perhaps it is better placed in the years immediately following Julian’s death, before Himerius returned to Athens, when Salutius is still found in office as prefect and was twice offered the throne.33 Oration 42.4 and its lost context appears to have asserted that Salutius “was the real power in the state” under Julian; this could have been more comfortably said after than before Julian’s death.34 All of the orations addressed to Roman officials are, of course, panegyrical. Praise is de rigueur—and routine. I shall not rehearse all of its various categories here, but I do want to note several recurringly ascribed qualities that belong distinctively to ideal holders of office.35 First, Himerius’s officeholders revere justice.36 Justice is mentioned together with Right (Themis) four times. Cervonius is the “eye of Justice and of Right” (38.9). Basilius comes to Greece, “not with golden weapons, but with a golden Justice and a golden Right” (46.10).37 A particular aspect 30. Barnes, CP 82 (1987): 216; Schamp, DPA 3 (2000): 725–26. Barnes identifies the addressee (“presumably”) with the later, Schamp with the earlier Anatolius. 31. “Himerius is referring to the death of the emperor Constans”: thus Wernsdorff on Orat. 32.1. Constans died in 350, in which year Wernsdorff assumed that the addressee of Orat. 32 was in office as Illyrian prefect. “Himerius is referring to the victory of his rival Prohaeresius in an oratorical contest staged by the Illyrian prefect Anatolius in the mid 340s”: thus Greco, Prometheus 24 (1998): 264n. 32. CP 82 (1987): 216–17. 33. PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Secundus 3”; Paschoud on Zos. 3.36. Paschoud on Zos. 4.2.4 for the one (not two) brief period of dismissal from office after Julian’s death. 34. The quotation is from PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Secundus 3.” 35. Cf. the qualities of the ideal prefect of Constantinople in Orat. 41.14–15. 36. 24 [48–50]; 25 [66; cf. 53]; 31.8, 10; 32.14; 36.13; 48.31, 33. 37. See also 25 [99–105] and 48.6. For the juxtaposition of Justice and Right (Themis), cf. Men. Rhet. 2.10 [417.26]; Hirzel, Themis, 157, 413; Robert, Hellenica, 4: 26.

216

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

of justice that Himerius ascribes to his officials is incorruptibility. They will not be bribed (12.23, 28.6, 31.8, 32.14, 42.1). Scylacius’s clean hands also discourage others in his jurisdiction from accepting bribes (25 [98–100]).38 Next, Himerius’s ideal officeholders are mild and benevolent. They refrain from violence and arrogance, from harm and the blunt application of power. Severus was slow to punish, Musonius saved a wretch from the public executioner (24 [50–51], 20.3). Ampelius chastened the powerful while caring for the poor (31.10). As a subordinate, Hermogenes made the regime he served milder; he was the midwife of humane laws and helpful to those in need (48.18, 30).39 Finally, Himerius’s officials are men of paideia, and they support paideia. At least two of them, Flavianus and Severus, had been pupils of Himerius himself. Flavianus has “a soul that learns easily, one quick of intellect, with an innate memory, ready for eloquence.” He is “outstanding in wisdom, a skilled speaker” (12.23). He is praised for having “every kind of learning” and is said to excel (among others) Pericles in persuasiveness and Plato in his nature (36.9; cf. 42.1). Musonius is a “sprout of the Muses” (20.8), Hermogenes “sprout and offspring of the Muses” (48.6). Severus is “so powerfully eloquent, but even more powerful in deed and action” (24 [53–54])—Himerius naturally wants to make clear that Severus is a man of action as well as of words. A story in Oration 25 [25–31] implies that Scylacius is an initiate in oratory. Athenaeus’s eloquence gives him control over his audience and wins him admiration (28.5; cf. 6). Cervonius is a “priest of the Muses and of Hermes” as well as an “eye of Justice and of Right” (38.9).40 In Oration 23 the Illyrian Ursacius was apparently compared to the Hyperborean Abaris. Abaris was a lover of Greek culture; and “whenever he opened his mouth to speak, one thought that his words were coming right from the Academy and from the Lyceum itself” (23.4). Ursacius as a second Abaris may be a bit of a stretch, for Ammianus called him a “Delmata crudus” (26.4.4). Panegyric’s purpose, though, is to set forth an idealized version of its subject and, possibly, even to encourage its subject to move more closely to his idealized portrait. 38. For justice (and incorruptibility) in officials, see Robert, Hellenica, 4: 18–27, 37–107, 138–46 passim. Justice is “le thème courant” (p. 60) of the epigrams Robert is studying. See also èevienko in Synthronon, 30–31; Slootjes, “Late Roman Rule,” 68–71. 39. See also 20.3, 5; 24 [52–53]; 25 [54–55]; 28.6; 31.8, 13; 48.13, 32. 40. For the association of officials with the Muses, cf. Robert, Hellenica, 4: 24–25, 29–34; èevienko in Synthronon, 31–32.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

217

Hermogenes’ paideia certainly includes adeptness in rhetoric; indeed, Himerius is prepared to call him “king of eloquence,” a title by which professional rhetors were honored (48.6; cf. 48.22, 27). But Hermogenes took a sabbatical from public life to study philosophy, so his philosophical side gets special attention in Oration 48. He had a “philosophical nature,” rooted, as Himerius explains with Platonic echoes, in the experiences of his soul before it was incarnated.41 He had a divine nature and desired to be likened to God. Himerius details how Hermogenes studied the various parts of philosophy and its various schools. The comparisons of him to Pythagoras and to Plato in Oration 48 have a special aptness.42 Himerius’s officials support as well as embody paideia. Basilius has “made Attica a workshop of the Muses’ activity” (47.9); Hermogenes has caused eloquence to flourish (48.6, 33). What support of paideia mainly and concretely means in the Himerian corpus, though, is support of Himerius himself. Hermogenes had encouraged Himerius at the beginning of the latter’s career—when his talent was “in swaddling clothes”— and had predicted that Himerius would one day be a great rhetor (48.34). Other officials, as I have already noted—Cervonius, Basilius, and perhaps Musonius—supported Himerius when he was enmeshed in professional conflicts. Educated officials could give another kind of support merely by being present: they urged the orator at hand to speak (46.7, 47.9, 48.2); their worthiness and their own command and appreciation of oratory egged him on to speak (25 [2–24], 47.6). Officials who support eloquence—Musonius, Basilius, Hermogenes—are appropriately compared to Apollo (20.1; 46.6; 48.3, 8, 12). When a sophist addressed an official in the kinds of oration gathered in this chapter, the official, of course, was thereby honored. So was the sophist who was chosen to speak. The institutions of rhetoric, as well as the rhetor himself, might benefit, especially if the official was a fervent devotee of the Muses. In Epistula 1230 Foerster (a.d. 364), Libanius introduced the Egyptian sophist Castricius to Maximus, the new prefect of Egypt. He alerted Castricius to his opportunity to “demonstrate [his rhetorical skill] and obtain [honor]”: For the noble Maximus is the sort of man who races to an oratorical performance and honors good speakers. He demonstrated both these qualities [in the capital of his former province, Galatia]. . . . For in addition to build-

41. Himerius also appeals to preincarnational experience in his description of Anatolius (32.14). 42. Orat. 48.12–13, 18, 20–23, 25, 28.

218

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

ings, springs and fountains, he also enhanced it in the area of wisdom by an addition of teachers, rhetorical competitions, and by honoring the victors as well as encouraging the defeated. So employ your tongue for ears that know how to pass judgment.43

But there is more to it than possible benefit to self and profession.44 Many Roman officials were graduates of schools of rhetoric. Other graduates became lawyers (some of whom would eventually move on to imperial office) or served locally as decurions. The sophist Libanius’s advocacy of the traditional rhetorical education as the best preparation for such positions might seem to be self-serving, but it is nonetheless true that the paideia acquired in the sophists’ schools “united potentially conflicting segments of the governing class. It joined imperial administrators and provincial notables in a shared sense of common excellence.”45 When sophists orated before Roman officials in various provincial cities, displaying the highest eloquence and alluding endlessly to classical civilization, they affirmed and put on public display that common culture that lubricated the governing class.

translations 12. A Propemptic Oration to Flavianus, Who Had Been Promoted to the consulship of Asia46 [1] When Alexander, the son of Zeus—his great glory among the Greeks links him to heaven and to Zeus—when this Alexander, I say, filled the whole of Europe with his fame, he set out for Asia, wanting to link the continents with his wondrousness. He called for Timotheus’s pipe—it made a great sound, one worthy of such a great king—and, to the sound of its songs, he loosened the cables of his ships.47

43. Bradbury, Selected Letters, 152, whose translation I use with Americanized spelling. 44. For what follows, see Wolf, Vom Schulwesen, 75–88. 45. Brown, Power and Persuasion, 39. 46. Photius, who preserves these excerpts in cod. 243, merely has the title “From a Propemptic Oration.” The title I use is from Photius’s Himerian bibliography (cod. 165) and was already assigned to these excerpts by Wernsdorff. The excerpts make clear that the honorand has a public career, and have a number of references to Asia in them. In the title, the manuscripts’ u{paton (consul) needs to be emended to uvpaton (proconsul). For all the officials to whom this and the following orations are addressed, see this chapter’s introduction. 47. For Alexander as son of Zeus, see Roisman, Brill’s Companion, 271–78. On Timotheus, cf. Him. Orat. 16.3–4. Like Alexander, Flavianus is crossing from Europe to Asia. Timotheus’s pipe is like Himerius’s eloquence.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

219

[2] Come, now, I shall paint [a copy of ] the picture with my words; for words, I think, have their own paints for making representations of things.48 There was a ship and a sea in the picture. The sea, I think, was the Aegean; for there were many islands separated from each other in various parts of it, and because of them it was clear that the sea was the Aegean. It had not been depicted as rough and wild nor as casting its waves up to the very clouds themselves, which is how the Aegean often behaves in insolent assault on those who sail on it. Instead, the waves had been stilled into a calm, and all the water around the shores got purplish, as each wave itself was gently transformed into a blue-green froth.

[3] For the Phrygians are reputed to be the first ones to play the pipes and to give cymbals a role in religious rites.49 [4] The other side of the ship, which was narrowing into the prow, had been formed out of actual gold. The painter’s skill deserves admiration for how this was done. For where the prow cut into the sea, the water shone because of the radiance of the gold and seemed to make the sea the same color as the gold. [5] Therefore, give me the skill of Zeuxis, the techniques of Parrhasius.50 [6] Of course, Delphi, the sacred city of Apollo, always serves its god and dances around the tripod while singing paeans.51 [7] As the Eleans conduct the river of Pisa [i.e., the Alpheus] forth to the Sicilian spring, they weep over it, as if, I suppose, they fear that it will attend to its departure and give its waters to others.52 [8] Perhaps nightingales and swans and all songs will fly off with you, [sir]. For our Muses are already daring to build boats; they threaten that they will flee and take to the sea, even if it is raging with waves.

48. Sections 2–5 come from an ecphrasis of a painting—a painting, Wernsdorff suggested, of Alexander crossing the Aegean in a boat on which Timotheus was piping (hence the relevance of section 3). 49. Phrygian pioneers of pipes: especially Hyagnis and Marsyas (Marmor Par. 1.10 Jacoby; Anth. Pal. 9.340; Plin. HN 7.56 [204]; Plut. De music. 1132e–f; Athen. 4.184a; Nonnus Dionys. 41.374; Suda M 230 Adler). Pipes and cymbals were used in the worship of Phrygian Cybele (Roller, In Search of God the Mother, 151, 154–55, 297–98). 50. Zeuxis and Parrhasius were painters of classical Greece. 51. Wernsdorff suggested that there was a reference here to how the Delphians yearned for Apollo when he was among the Hyperboreans (see Him. Orat. 48.10), just as Himerius and his audience will yearn for Flavianus in Asia. 52. The Syracusan spring Arethusa was supposed to be derived from the Alpheus (Strabo 6.2.4 [270–71]; Paus. 8.54). Himerius and his audience weep over Flavianus as they send him forth, as the Eleans wept over the Alpheus.

220

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

[9] Hurling the lyre from his hands, he enjoins silence on song.53 [10] The flagship [is] at anchorage, the sail [is] lofty, high in the air, ready to be spread open by keen sea breezes.54 [11] The meadows of the Hesperides are insignificant in charm,55 the Egyptian pyramids are insignificant in size; insignificant too is anything else that Persian or Assyrian hands fashioned and left as a wonder to posterity. [12] Rather, the journey [was] to dear Athens, which set you so on fire with its yearning [for you] that you carried its love [for you] around on your very tongue. [13] Why do you hesitate to reply, [sir], when the common glory of [us] all is about to relocate among others?56 [14] Legend deprived the Cimmerians, a western people, of the sun. Then, fearing that that story would be challenged, legend hastened to cloak it by talking about it ambiguously. But no poet would seem to be telling lies to us, if, after your departure, he expressed the wish to be deprived of the sun.57 [15] O dear fatherland, now I see that I have truly done you an injustice, scorning your love in my desire to gratify in every way a faithless lover.58 [16] But while following the rule about these matters, I have almost brought my oration into a state of disarray, even though the gods are fulfilling my desire. For again [he has] the scepter, again [he has] the seat of justice.59 [17] Ephyra [i.e., Corinth] produced this man,60 a city that not only 53. An allusion to the silence that will follow Flavianus’s departure? 54. Presumably a reference to the ship that will take Flavianus to Asia. 55. For the paradisiacal garden of the Hesperides, see I. McPhee, “Hesperides,” LIMC 5, 1 (1990): 394–96. 56. “[sir]”: i.e., Flavianus. Völker, though, conjectures that Himerius is here addressing Athens. “the common glory”: i.e., Flavianus himself. 57. For the sunless land of the Cimmerians, see Hom. Od. 11.14–19. For the Cimmerians as a western people, see Heubeck et al., Commentary on Homer’s Odyssey on Od. 11.14–19. 58. Himerius has been unjust to his fatherland Prusias by postponing a visit to it because of the presence of Flavianus in Greece, who is now seen to be “faithless” because he is leaving Greece. Misunderstood by Schamp, DPA 3 (2000): 715. 59. The sense seems to be as follows: Although I am following the rule of expressing regret in a protremptic oration, I run the risk of spoiling the oration if I do not celebrate the fact that Flavianus has been awarded a second governorship, a sign of the success that I have wished for him from the gods. The first governorship was that of Campania (see p. 213 above). 60. “This man” is surely Flavianus himself. His family is only subsequently discussed (sections 18, 19).

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

221

is graced by the stories told about it, so that it is admired—as is the case with the majority of Grecian cities—but also displays its good fortune to a discerning eye. [18] Thus this man’s family glories in countless words [spoken about it] and in countless deeds of a similar kind. [19] Mention must now be made of the family itself, but not of every member of it; for an account that gave consideration to such a great number of , I think. [20] Those who were the fruit of that marriage carried an image of that man’s wisdom in their glorious souls.61 [21] The Ionian Gulf62 smooths the shore as it washes against it with its waves. Along this coast a chorus of Nereids danced, all white, the very color of the milk that would be set out thanks to the skillfulness of shepherds. The Nereids’ eyes were bluish, they had oyster-green hair, and white sea-foam was still dripping from the ends of their locks of hair. [22] She loves her bridegroom in turn and confirms their marriage with a gift, for she sends up a spring from the middle of the sea. The spring, as if knowing why the bride did this, deprives other sailors of its fresh waters, saving them as a drink of friendship to be drawn [only] by children of the bride. Song commemorates the same arrangement in the case of [the spring] Arethusa.63 [23] Let there be [ascribed to him] a soul that learns easily, one quick of intellect, with an innate memory, ready for eloquence, a soul clever at concealing [things] but even better at self-concealment—for this is wiser and, at the same time, more agreeable to the gods—a soul even more clever at evaluating any person it meets, one that resists pleasure but succumbs to friendship. . . . He is outstanding in wisdom, a skilled speaker, uncorruptible by friends, noble in fear, stately as a private citizen, fair in office. He exalts the private citizen with his high-mindedness and softens the bluntness of his power through reasonableness. You can see fortune escorting this man’s life along as if with a fair wind blowing at his back. [24] He was something of an old man,64 majestic in appearance, oldfashioned in how he lived and spoke. He was wise when he spoke and

61. “That man” is perhaps an ancestor of Flavianus rather than Flavianus himself. 62. I.e., the Ionian Sea (Bürchner, “Ionisches Meer 1,” RE 9, 2 [1916]: 1896). 63. Wernsdorff (also Völker) conjectured that the first spring is Corinthian Pirene, but I am unsure. Arethusa: i.e., as the Greek river Alpheus, flowing across the sea, “saves” its waters for the Syracusan spring Arethusa (see my note 52 to section 7 above). “Arethusa,” Areqouv j shˇ, is Wernsdorff’s emendation of ajreth¸ ˇ. 64. I.e., Flavianus had the wisdom of old age in his youth.

222

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

even better at listening, noble in every respect. At the very beginning of his adolescence, before his first beard got very long, he came to the attention of the emperor because of his remarkable qualities; at that time he was already brimming over with fame and causing the whole of Greece to take note of him. [25] At this point in the oration a poet would entwine the crown with roses and lead the Muses from Helicon . . . round about the city [i.e., Constantinople] where Europe, extending from Gades, ends and is cut off in the face of Asia by a strait of the sea. . . . 65 [26] He even proceeded down the Ister [i.e., the Danube] and did not fear a barbarian river that, when iced up, is like a plain. [27] When God, wanting to make him perfect in every virtue, once turned the wind of fortune against him so that it might be revealed to everyone what kind of mind he had when things got rough and life got stormy, and also so that he might win renown for his behavior in that kind of situation—in these circumstances, what poet or prose-writer could lend a voice worthy of that man’s accomplishments? [28] He faced not a Sicilian Scylla and Charybdis, but innumerable phalanxes of wicked men stirred up against him, worse than that savage Sicilian shepherd, the Cyclops; and he laid them low all over the earth, not with weapons intended for close fighting, nor with spears and lances, but by his sagacity and reason. [29] The so-called leader and head of the Telchines, having received a mortal wound, weeps and laments the war.66 [30] All of Asia—I don’t mean what we now call Asia, using the name of the whole continent for a mere part [i.e., Asia Minor]—begins way up in India and is separated and set off from the other continents in the east and the north by the Red Gulf and [the] Phasis [River], in the south and where the sun sets by Egypt and the Ionian Sea. From the Propontis to Pamphylia a side of it stretches along and gives shape to the continent. This whole side is washed by the Aegean, which has one and the same beginning with it. . . . The people who inhabit these cities clearly reveal who the ancestors were from whom, I think, they originally descended not by the cicada-pin and the chiton, but by their virtue and wisdom.67 65. “where”: h}n. Something is wrong here. Dübner suggested that the relative pronoun simply be deleted. 66. The “Telchines” must be Flavianus’s enemies, who lament having contended with him. They were malicious and envious (see Him. Orat. 45.4, with my note). 67. Red Gulf: the Persian Gulf? “Ionian Sea” (tw¸/ jIonivw/ pelavgei): hardly the Ionian Sea in its normal sense (i.e., the sea between the sole of Italy and the western coast of Greece),

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

223

[31] This Meles [River]—it is not right to pass over in silence a river that produced such a great tongue [i.e., Homer]—arises in the suburbs of Smyrna, where countless springs that flow forth near one another give birth to it. Because of them the river swells up and quickly forms a sea below them; it becomes navigable by merchantmen and the oar. After passing by banks on both sides that are lush with cypress trees and reeds, it shares its stream with the nearby sea, if “stream” is the right word; for you will hear no sound, nor would it seem to you that any water is moving along. The river is like a lover who wants to conceal a rendezvous with his beloved; it secretly mixes with the sea, calming the sea’s waves with its flow.68 [32] Since I wish to summon the wind in a poetic manner but am unable to express myself poetically, I wish to address the wind in accordance with the Muse of Ceos [i.e., Simonides].69 [33] Diffusing itself gently over the waves, [the wind] parts them as they surge around the prow. . . . For he [i.e., Flavianus] is eager to sail your sea, not in search of reckless love, but in his desire to initiate all the Ionians in the solemn mysteries of self-control.70 [34] Legend says that the Rhodians were rained upon with gold when Zeus broke open a golden cloud upon them. But no dubious tale will tell of the good fortune that all of you [Asian provincials] will enjoy because of this man; no, the wonders [he brings to you] will be right before your eyes.71 [35] The beautiful spring, of course, was destined to bring to all of

but the Aegean Sea, which touches on Ionia, though one might have expected jIwnivw./ At Ov. Fasti 4.566, Ionian Sea (with a short o) means a portion of what we would call the Aegean. For the cicada-pin and the chiton, see Thuc. 1.6.3. 68. For the Meles River as Homer’s father, see Graziosi, Inventing Homer, 72–75. “quickly . . . below them”: Its “springs are not far from its mouth” (Philostr. maj. Imag. 2.8). Homeric Hymn 9.3 calls the river “deep in reeds.” Aelius Aristides notes that it “silently joins the sea, smoothing its waves” (Orat. 17.14 Keil, trans. C. Behr). Smyrna was in Flavianus’s province of Asia. 69. I.e., since he is not a poet himself, he will at least allude to a poetic text. Himerius refers to the same Simonidean poem in Orat. 47.14. He is apparently wishing Flavianus well in his sail to Asia. 70. “Diffusing . . . the prow”: This line has been assigned to the Simonidean poem referred to in section 32. See Simonides no. 535 in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 3: 428; and cf. Him. Orat. 10.22. “your sea” etc.: Himerius is addressing Boreas, the north wind, here. The Thracian Boreas abducted his beloved, the Athenian Oreithyia (Apollon. Rhod. 1.211–18; Ov. Met. 6.681–713. Flavianus, unlike Boreas, will not cross the Aegean “in search of reckless love.” 71. For Zeus raining gold on the Rhodians, see Pind. Ol. 7.49–50; Philostr. maj. Imag. 2.27. “you will enjoy”: The variants are karpwvsesqe and karpwvsasqai. Colonna emended to karpwvsasqe. I return to the variant karpwvsesqe.

224

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

you, not nightingales, swans, or cicadas, but the sun itself, which would illuminate Ionia with its golden rays.72 [36] Above all others, the colt who led my colts [was] holy and lordly, like the colts the Nisaeans train for the god Helios.73 Having equipped this colt with the Muses’ curb-chain and completely bound his hair with the Graces’ headband, I offered him as the first-fruits of my drove [of students] and dedicated him, as it were, to a god. [37] May gleaming stars appear, illuminating the sea voyage with their bright light. [38] My eloquence longs almost to anticipate the future. In the midst of its farewell songs it seeks to strike up a song welcoming [him] back. What it has in mind is what heights it will reach, I think, when it catches sight of him returning and is about to dance the Muses’ dance again in his honor. [Exc. Phot.] 20. From the Oration to Musonius, Proconsul of Greece [1] When I was very reluctant to go before audiences and eager to remove my eloquence from mass gatherings, you forced me to break this habit. The swan breaks its silence whenever it hears Apollo striking his lyre, and the shrill sound of the Zephyr leads the nightingale from the cave out into the light of the sun. [2] The sailor dares to sail over the waves, and the man who belongs to Bacchus leaps up boldly—the former, when he sees springtime calming the sea, and the latter, when he senses that Dionysus is shaking the thyrsus.74 [3] I do not think that a courageous poet would hesitate to compare you to Apollo himself. But your fondness for the bow and arrows goes only far enough to show that you have Apollo’s nature; those weapons of yours always remain unstained with blood. It is unlawful that the barbs of your arrows be touched by human gore. On the contrary, through your 72. “you”: I adopt the conjectural emendation uJmi¸ n here for the transmitted hJmi¸ n. Spring brings the Ionians the sun itself [i.e., Flavianus], not merely creatures who would sing about the sun. Menander Rhetor recommends the comparison of governors (a[rconteˇ) to the sun (2.3 [378, 380, 381]). Cf. Him. Orat. 36.1, 47.2, 48.36. 73. Nisaean horses were highly valued: Them. Orat. 22.266a; Amm. Marc. 23.6.30; R. Hanslik, “Nisai¸on pedivon,” RE 17, 1 (1936): 712. “The colt who led my colts” is Flavianus, Himerius’s former student. 74. Musonius is Himerius’s springtime and Dionysus.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

225

decision a person escaped the public executioner even as the latter was raising his sword up over the victim’s neck.75 [4] So too a colt is broken in well, and a puppy is skillfully trained, when the horse-breaker wants to raise his horse without using a goad or a whip, and the dog-trainer wants to raise his dog using only his hand to tame it. [5] What made Cyrus great among the Persians? His gentle and mild character.76 [6] For the city always fared well against the barbarians. [7] Once one of the valiant soldiers announced victory to the people. They marveled so much at his enthusiasm that, as a result of those words that he spoke to them, a bronze statue of him was set up among the Athenians.77 [8] O sprout of the Muses, O sweetest creature of the Graces! [Exc. Phot. (1–7), Exc. Neapol. (first sentence of 1 and 8)] 23. To the Comes Ursacius78 [1] The hierophant rejoices when he senses that all those religious beginners desire initiation; the poet is delighted when he sees his audience eagerly gathering to hear his poetry; and the general gladly gives the signal for war when he sees his soldiers thirsting for battle.79 [2] Every person, I think, is fond of what belongs to his own country. If an Egyptian should come here, he will find the Nile—that is, our conception of it—swelling in orations we deliver on Egypt.80 [3] Oratory can have the same effect that painting has; rather, any attempt to represent something falls short of oratory. That is how effective some [orations] are in tracking down the truth.81

75. For Apollo’s bow and arrow, see Wernicke, “Apollon,” RE 2 (1896): 17; W. Lambrinudakis et al., “Apollon,” LIMC 2, 1 (1984): 184, 192–95, 197–99. 76. Musonius is presumably being compared to Cyrus. His mildness is the common subject of sections 3–5. 77. Völker repeats the suggestion of Wernsdorff that Himerius is referring to Eucles reporting on the battle of Marathon (Plut. Bellone an pace 347c). 78. With Colonna, I read “Ursacius,” as given in Photius’s Himerian bibliography, against the “Ursicius” of the Photian and Neapolitan excerpts. Photius’s Himerian bibliography calls this oration a lalia. 79. So too, Himerius probably means, the orator is happy when he senses that his audience is receptive to him. 80. Cf. p. 110 above. 81. Cf. Him. Orat. 31.5.

226

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

[4] They say that the wise Abaris was ethnically a Hyperborean, but a Greek in language, and a Scythian as far as his clothes and outer appearance were concerned. Whenever he opened his mouth to speak, one thought that his words were coming right from the Academy and from the Lyceum itself.82 [5] Since a man from Illyria dwells among us, a poet would speak of his “golden countenance.”83 [6] They say that the Eleusinian youth [Triptolemus] was raised on high by Demeter so that he could replace the food of nomads with cultivated grain. But an arrow84 . . . he came to {Athe}ns and to the other Greeks . . . {and, although raised on Scy}thian plains, he understood the Greek language and . . . passionately desiring to visit {Greece?}. [7] Abaris came to Athens carrying a bow, with a quiver on his shoulder, and wearing a tightly fastened cloak. He had a golden belt around his waist and was wearing pants that stretched from his buttocks right to the bottom of his feet. He had pleasing eyes and a charming face, which revealed to those who met him that he had a Hellenic disposition. But when he entered the city, the council welcomed this speaker {of Greek, and} they examined his thinking {as well as} his speech, to see if it too was thoroughly Hellenic (?)85 . . . [8] We find that, as with a lyre’s harmony, everything one heard him say was completely in concord with what he thought. He was pleasant to meet; he could carry out a great deed quietly; he was sharp in seeing what lay before him, but also providently kept the future in mind. He always yielded to wisdom and was a lover of friendship. He entrusted few things to fortune, guaranteeing everything by his judgment.86 [9] When the Centaur [Chiron], having built the cave, was tuning his

82. Ursacius is being compared to Abaris (see p. 214 above). Academy and Lyceum: cf. Him. Orat. 16.8. 83. The “man from Illyria” is presumably Ursacius. Cf. Eur. frag. 486 Nauck: “the golden countenance of justice.” 84. A contrast is being drawn here between Abaris, flying around on his arrow (see Him. Orat. 18.1), and Triptolemus, in his airborne chariot, from which he scattered seed (Penella, Private Orations, 170). 85. “But when . . . thoroughly Hellenic (?)”: For the text here, I follow Guida (in Bianchetti, POIKILMA, 583–88). His reading of codex R differs from Colonna’s, and he also integrates into the text a short fragment from Lopadiotes’ Lexicon ( = Lexicon Vindobonense), which he had published in Prometheus 5 (1979): 212–13. 86. Little consecutive sense can be made of the next ten lacunose lines (37–47) which I do not translate. The references in them to Scythians, to Apollo (who gave Abaris his arrow), and to someone “coming from [his] native land” show that Himerius is still talking about Abaris. It is not clear whether the foreigner (oJ xevnoˇ) of line 46 is Abaris or the Illyrian Ursacius.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

227

lyre in it, Aeacus, the son of Zeus, came to him to see the cave and the lyre. The Centaur put the swans from Mt. Pelion in a circle in the middle of the cave and played the lyre. Then the whole of Mt. Pelion was overcome by amazement, as the swans echoed forth in reply to the lyre. Aeacus marveled at the Centaur for his skill and at how the chorus of swans immediately started dancing around the lyre, and he brought [his sons] Telamon and Peleus to Chiron and gave them to him, to be watched over along with the swans. . . . to be satisfied with the meal I [provide], but if my eloquence skillfully provides food . . . 87 [cod. R, beginning at section 6, “he could replace with cultivated grain,” with some passages also in Exc. Phot. and/or Exc. Neapol.; sections 1–5 and most of the opening sentence of section 6 exclusively in Exc. Phot. and/or Exc. Neapol.; one line from Lex. Lopad.]88 24. To His [Former] Pupil Severus89 But the grace of excellence attends not only the beginnings [of an art], but also anyone who has marveled at it and striven to achieve distinction in it himself. The fact that the seed of Phidias’s craft came from Daedalus did not make Phidias less famous than Daedalus; indeed, Phidias practiced his sculpting craft in full for the human race. Nor was Cratinus less famous than Epicharmus, nor were those who flourished at the time of Gorgias and Protagoras less famous than the followers of Tisias and Corax . . . to sharpen with their eloquence. [20] With reference to these matters, my son, you will hear now {of rhetors?} . . . some of whom, so winged . . . extended their reputation along with . . . while others bloom in a Laconian manner90 . . .

87. Is the Centaur’s lyre metaphorical for oratory? For oratory as the provision of a feast, cf. Him. Orat. 59.4, with my note. 88. See n. 85 above. 89. I do not attempt to translate the opening scholion from codex R or the first twelve lines of the oration. They are lacunose, and one cannot get any reliable consecutive sense from them. The opening scholion has “Severinus,” but the correct “Severus” is preserved in the Photian and Neapolitan excerpts. 90. Daedalus, Epicharmus, and Tisias and Corax are here thought of as founding fathers of sculpture, comedy, and rhetoric respectively. “sculpting craft”: I adopt Elter’s emendation plastikhvn for the transmitted Platwnikhvn, which is hard to defend (see, though, Colonna’s critical apparatus and Völker ad loc.). “my son”: Although Severus had been a pupil of Himerius, it seems unlikely that the sophist would call his distinguished ex-pupil “my son/boy” as an adult. The lacunose opening scholion contains the phrase to;n neanivskon,

228

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

But he himself [Severus] recommended schooling under me (th;n hJmetevran sunousivan) [for his son?], expecting it to be an Olympic racecourse. Meanwhile, this was not announced in an ordinary way, as if [the young man] were “so-and-so, son of so-and-so.” He was the son of a good father. . . . His people and his family {were set forth?} in the announcement. As for his people: he hailed from [Dios]pontus91 . . . all the way to the other side through the Bosporus and the land of the Cimmerians. . . . Now some people . . . the hyparchic office (th;n u{parcon ejxousivan)92 . . . [30] and, not least of all, [it] turns my attention toward you, and . . . Yet it is both unworthy to speak . . . what I myself have heard, they opened the imperial [doors] to that man . . . and immediately enrolled him among the emperor’s friends . . . in the manner of athletes, he gathered together those who . . . he began with an office {greater?} than the others [of his cohort] began with, as if . . . The Galatians were the preface to his honors, the Bithynians came next . . . as if hearing some Orpheus’s lyre. . . . [40] The Muses let Orpheus strike up Calliope’s song so that, by playing his lyre in the midst of wild beasts, he might calm them, as he says, with his music. A myth that took up this story about Orpheus will be fresh in its application to that man [Severus], when, having given {himself?} over to wild beasts . . . so the job he got from the emperor was to guide peoples and cities. And . . . For who hunted down the essence of justice more than he did and with his speed? Who, after rightly hunting it down, made it public [as speedily as he did]? [50] Who was as quick to act, yet as slow to punish a person in legal trouble? Who was so above bribery, so unable to withhold benevolence and pity from a person experiencing misfortune; so powerfully eloquent, but even more powerful in deed and action? They know . . . . . . in Homer’s words, “so that someone in a future generation may speak well of you” [Od. 3.200]—he [Hector?] led off [the Trojans] . . . he ordered battles (?) and armed them against the Greeks . . . having put to flight. What made Plato wise? Solon . . . of Heracles among the Greeks, Socrates . . . to virtue . . . [60] a leader and chief of my own craft . . . to

“the youth”; Wernsdorff, in his opening comment on this oration, suggested that Severus was enrolling his son, whom Himerius would here be addressing, in the latter’s school. If my understanding of the first sentence of the next paragraph is correct, it fits well with Wernsdorff’s suggestion. “some of whom . . . Laconian manner”: There seems to be a reference here to rhetors of a florid and of a plain style. 91. For Diospontus as the homeland of Severus’s family, cf. Him. Orat. 9.14. 92. See p. 214 above.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

229

spur on . . . he set forth great deeds for us, and he {made?} some of them [i.e., ancestral heroes?] objects to swear by . . . to encourage the city to do [great] deeds.93 I shall also tell you a Laconian story. A young Laconian’s luck in warfare was often not going well. His mother was grieved by his setbacks, for Laconian women are remarkable lovers of [eloquent] words or [daring] deeds. She came up with the following device. There was a bronze shield in the precinct of Athena, the dedication of a war hero from the very house from which the young man hailed. [70] The mother secretly took the shield—for even the Laconian mother of Lycurgus had acted presumptuously to palliate the ill luck of her son—and offered it to her son, who was shying away from battle, but before doing so said, “Victory or death.” The son accepted his mother’s watchword along with the shield. From that day on, as they say, he was recognized as the most renowned of all the Spartans and was proclaimed a victor throughout the city.94 [cod. R, with passages also in Exc. Phot., Exc. Neapol., and Lex. Lopad.] 25. To Scylacius, The Proconsul Of Greece95 To Scyl{acius} . . . after he [Himerius] became an Areopagite . . . the oratorical display (th¸ ˇ ejpideivxewˇ). Come now, after [receiving] the Athenians’ myrtle crown, . . . {attend to} the business of the Muses, dance with the Muses, even if I have faced the contest late and with great effort. Consider Achilles, son of Thetis, who stirred up war against the demigods: poetry armed him for battle very late, for he would not tolerate appearing on the plain to fight before he got arms from Hephaestus. But once a shield glittering with gold came down from heaven—a shield that, by its wondrousness, betrayed the hand of Hephaestus [10] because it alone, by virtue of the skill [of its maker], could imitate nature in the craftsmanship it displayed— Achilles no longer would let himself remain in his tent and [only] hear 93. Wernsdorff suggested that there was a reference to Demosthenes here, who swore by ancestral heroes (Dem. 18.208; [Lucian] Dem. encom. 49). 94. For this story, cf. schol. to Thuc. 2.39; Val. Max. 2.8.ext. 2; Plut. Lacaen. Apophthegm. 241f. 95. This title is from the Photian excerpts. The title (or opening scholion) that follows is what survives in codex R.

230

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

the sounds of battle. He took the suit of armor, which the god had fashioned from bronze, and entered into war on the plain.96 . . . tokens of the finest men. An athlete rushes into every contest when he sees an excellent judge present. A soldier into war when, fighting under a noble general, he goes . . . A sailor has no fear of the sea when a {qualified} steersman is guiding the boat . . . [20] I {would} gladly dance to Pan’s pipe because he knows . . . Apelles did not think that he should display one of his paintings unless someone knowledgeable about painting was about to see his work. {I know that horsemen} gladly had Alexander [as a leader] because he knew the art of horsemanship best of the Macedonians.97 I hear a story about the Ethiopic Muse as follows. A spring gushes out from the spurs of her mountains. It is said that it broadens out from a small flow into a river. The Ethiopians call it the fount of Dionysus, and the nature of this stream of water is such that it fades away if someone who is uninitiated wants to drink from it [30], then it swells up again if a Bacchic worshiper approaches to touch its waters.98 Whence for us, O . . . the sign a trumpet (?), which first was so prominent in the imperial palace that . . . later having let loose its bolts upon Ionia. When he set that region, too, in order . . . What, then, O eloquence, what, by the Muses, O friends, shall I do? What Mu{se?} . . . do you wish? He [Scylacius] desires, he desires to know and learn [that?] that trumpet . . . Zeus . . . Chiron’s lyre, because it alone of [the instruments belonging to] the Centaurs99 . . . to praise the race of Zeus . . . a helpmate to our words. The wings of poets [40] are light, and therefore . . . neighboring on my words. Come, let us entrust the hymn to this [lyre of mine?], having tuned [it] . . . The ancients, having allotted nobility to the mind and to the family, some of them . . . that the conjunction of each occurs rarely in human

96. In the first sentence Himerius is giving commands to himself. “even if I have faced the contest”: For the text here (ejqavrrhsa), see Guida in Benedetti and Grandolini, Studi, 392–93. Himerius’s own “arms from Hephaestus” are Scylacius’s moral support (see next paragraph); the “contest,” of course, is his oration. The reception of the myrtle crown: upon Himerius’s appointment as Areopagite? Himerius is referring here to the events of Iliad 18–20. “against the demigods”: toi¸ ˇ hJmiqevoiˇ. I take the dative as “against,” not “for” (thus Völker). Himerius is thinking of Achilles’ encounter with Aeneas, son of Aphrodite, in Iliad 20. 97. The “excellent judge,” “noble general,” etc. is Scylacius; the “athlete,” “soldier,” etc. is the orator Himerius. 98. Himerius is “swelling up” oratorically for the initiated Scylacius. 99. Chiron was a Centaur. Is Himerius comparing his own “lyre” (i.e., oratory) with that of Chiron?

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

231

beings . . . was lucky to have a portion of this good fortune . . . no time to seek on high, for there is one at hand who will give verbal testimony . . . It is said that two races flourished among the Greeks, one descended from Zeus through Aeacus, the other from Poseidon through Theseus; one Attic [50], the other, the earlier one, of Aegina. Let anyone from these two races prevail in whatever field he wishes; he will win the victory, of course, because of this [race of his]. The distinguishing mark of [each] race is not some shoulder, as the Pelopidae say; rather, justice is the excellence of the Aeacidae, and benevolence shows who the elite Athenians are.100 . . . The occasion does his virtues’ actions an injustice if it does not allow the oration to list all of them, so one must mention as many of them as possible. You marvel at [his?] courage and justice and self-control (?) . . . What are his virtues’ deeds? Proof of his courage can be found in {the freeing of} the Pisidians who were formerly slaves, . . . the ingenious measures taken with regard to the Maeander River. Judgments of the justice of leaders . . . [70] first to rule one’s own soul and to keep one’s hands off of all {money}101 . . . Let us speak, beginning with the Maeander . . . That river surpasses the Nile in nature as much as it falls short of it in magnitude. The soil that the Nile bestows upon the Egyptians is wondrous to tell of. But [the Maeander] has deprived sailors of the sea and given farmers furrows, in place of waves, to break through with their plows. You could see a plain where there previously was a sea, a fawn leaping about instead of dolphins; you will hear the sound of a herdsman’s pipe instead of a sailor shouting a command. [80] For the nature of the place is as follows: The gulf, coming forth . . . separates the island [of Lade] from the city [of Miletus].102 This Maeander . . . had turned dry land into a gulf. When

100. Aeacus, son of Zeus, ruled Aegina and was known for his justice (J. Boardman, “Aiakos,” LIMC 1, 1 [1981]: 311). Himerius follows the tradition that the Attic king Theseus was the son of Poseidon (H. Herter, “Theseus,” RE Suppl 13 [1973]: 1053–57). For the golden shoulder of the Pelopidae, see Him. Orat. 44.4, with my note. For Athenian “benevolence” or “kindness” (filanqrwpiva), cf. Him. Orat. 6.9, with my note. In an inscription in his honor from Laodicea-Lycus, which is discussed by L. Robert, Scylacius is identified as an Aeacid. Robert suggests that Scylacius’s family also claimed Athenian ancestry (des Gagniers et al., Laodicée du Lycos, 339, 350–51). I have omitted the lacunose lines 55–63, which immediately follow this paragraph; I cannot get enough consecutive sense out of them to make a translation worthwhile. Himerius is probably ascribing both Aeacid justice and Attic benevolence to Scylacius. 101. kai; panto;ˇ uJperavnw th;n cei¸ra ajnaqei¸ nai {crusivou}. I am uncertain about this. The supplement is Wernsdorff’s. 102. I follow L. Robert in des Gagniers et al., Laodicée du Lycos, 347–48, in my identification of the city and the island. Völker, apparently unaware of Robert, follows Wernsdorff’s suggestion of Priene and Samos.

232

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

this man [Scylacius] saw nature being wronged . . . comparable in extent to the sea (?)—for inlets appeared everywhere, and the place made it possible to sail . . . this lake, which became spoiled over time by [an excess of ] water, {he} . . . by means of a canal dug on the plain . . . he gave a lake to the inhabitants . . . 103 They say that Cyrus the Persian got angry at the Gyndes River because it overwhelmed his Nisaean foal and covered over the animal with its waters [90]; he broke down the waters of this river, which was previously navigable, into a series of canals in order to make the Gyndes crossable by Assyrian women.104 You, however, were not in search of a lordly foal but had seen {the area} being wronged when you {diverted the river’s waters to} where it is natural for them to flow, and you gave back to the city its harbors and . . . it was done like this. And what great deed did you do in the case of the Pisidians? Well, robbers were devastating the Pisidians. {The area’s workers} could not safely traverse it . . . Plundering drove [them] away. But when this man appeared, with the law supporting him, the whole lot of robbers . . . he put out of business. Under your jurisdiction people stopped daring to disgrace justice through bribery . . . [100] they went off, having learned not to inflict outrages on such a goddess [i.e., Justice]. O . . . of all, O dwelling place of all wisdom! These words for the time being . . . we . . . for you, like a . . . of eloquence . . . May {I} set up the same {krater of friendship?} for you a third time and often.105 But you . . . of [your] tenure of office . . . eloquence, in order that {I?}, having learned the solemn my{steries} of Right (Themis) under your [administration of ] justice . . .

103. On this passage see L. Robert in des Gagniers et al., Laodicée du Lycos, 347–49. “which became spoiled over time by [an excess of ] water”: aujcmw¸ san u{dati crovnw/. I would like, with Robert, to understand aujcmw¸ san to mean that the lake dried out. But then what to do with u{dati? Hence my tentative translation, which treats aujcmw¸ san figuratively (see Adrados et al., Diccionario griego-español, s.v.). “he gave a lake to the inhabitants . . .”: ejpicwrivoiˇ e[dwke livmnhn, potamo;n th;n qavlassan, but I do not know what to do with the last three words. Perhaps emend to potamo;n th¸/ qalavssh/, i.e., he gave the river to the sea by diverting thereto its waters that had been filling the lake to excess. 104. For the story, see Hdt. 1.189; Sen. De ira 3.21; Oros. 2.6. According to Herodotus, Cyrus reduced the river by the digging of 360 channels, 180 emanating from each bank. “previously navigable”: apparently no longer navigable because too shallow; Cyrus wanted to reduce its depth to the extent that a woman would be able to cross the river without getting her knees wet. 105. Himerius seems to be offering this oration “for the time being,” promising something fuller in the future, and hoping to address Scylacius for a third and even more times after that. For the “krater of friendship,” cf. Him. Orat. 40.8.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

233

[cod. R., with some passages also in Exc. Phot., Exc. Neapol., and Lex. Lopad.] 28. To the Comes Athenaeus106 [1] What in the world inspired that great ringing sound of Homer? Wasn’t it the glory of men?107 . . . [2] Pindar [Ol. 1] sang at Olympia of Hieron’s glory to the accompaniment of the lyre. Anacreon sang of Polycrates’ fortune, from which offerings were sent to the Samians’ goddess. And Alcaeus referred to Thales in his songs, when Lesbos an assembly. Now Sappho with her lyre, alone of women, loved and therefore dedicated all her poetry to Aphrodite and the Erotes. She would make and charms of a girl the reason for her songs108 . . . [3] For even if these are blissful encomia, they would seem to be encomia of fortune. But I seek after virtue, and I want my praises of men to be based on virtue . . . [4] There are two signs that a person has the virtue proper to ruling, the emperor’s judgments of him and his subjects’ love of him . . . [5] When time enrolled this man [Athenaeus] in the ranks of [adult] men, he became an emulator, in every respect, of the man of Paeania [i.e., Demosthenes]. For just as the speaker’s platform and the courts claimed Demosthenes after [he was readied by] Isaeus,109 so too assemblies and eloquence made [Athenaeus] their own; he had control over everyone and was admired by everyone . . . [6] It is appropriate to examine his nature as well as his actions. And one will find that both his deeds and the nature that has allowed those deeds to be successfully accomplished are equally celebrated. What are the marks of this nature? He has a sharp mind, lofty sentiments, he does the right thing without hesitation, and he has an affable disposition. If he needs to speak, he outdoes Pericles; if he needs to act, he imitates Al-

106. No title survives in this string of excerpts. This title, preserved in Photius’s Himerian bibliography, is conjecturally attached to them. 107. So too the glory of Athenaeus inspires Himerius’s oration. 108. Anacreon: Campbell, Greek Lyric, 2: 130, no. 483. I accept the transmitted tuvchn . . . pevmpousan with Völker’s understanding of it. The goddess should be Hera (Strabo 14.1.14 [637]). Alcaeus: Campbell, Greek Lyric, 1: 436, no. 448. Thales: For whether Himerius is referring to the sage of Miletus here, see, in addition to Colonna ad loc., Liberman’s note to frag. 448 in his recent edition of Alcaeus. Sappho: Campbell, Greek Lyric, 1: 42, test. 50. The various singers mentioned here are presumably analogues of the orator. 109. For Isaeus as Demosthenes’ teacher, see Plut. Dem. 5, Vitae decem orat. 844c.

234

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

cibiades. Or we could say that he is “patriotic and too strong to yield to bribery,” which is how history has characterized Pericles.110 In acting he is much more fervent than the son of Cleinias [i.e., Alcibiades], and in every action of his he is no less harmonious than any lyre at all . . . [7] Egyptian myths make clear that this is the kind of person Proteus was, as they turn him now into water, now into a tree or fire. Wanting thus to indicate that he had an adaptable nature, they turn this Proteus into diverse shapes. So [too] the Athenians have portioned out this Hermes logios through the whole city and greet him under various appellations in various sections [of Athens]111 . . . [8] Before he produced his large [Athena] Parthenos, Phidias sculpted a small one on the Acropolis. Since this [small] work of art did not give scope to Phidias’s skill, Pericles urged him to put the effort into it that its size allowed and to save the full power of his skill for the large 112 . . . [9] These are the first-fruits of friendship and eloquence for you. My words are prophetic, and they can even foresee [more] things of the kind [you have already enjoyed] and better things as well; they predict good fortune, rule over the Greeks, honors from the emperor, and words of praise. [sections 1, 4, 6 from Exc. Phot.; sections 2, 3, 5, 7–9 from Exc. Neapol.; most of section 6 also in Exc. Neapol., sections 3 and 7 partially also in Exc. Phot.; one line quoted in Lex. Lopad. (Guida in Benedetti and Grandolini, “Studi,” 393)] 31. From the Propemptic Discourse to Ampelius113 [1] My boys, I was to be, I alone of the Greeks was to be the one who would find the trap that would prevent this man [Ampelius] from escaping. Yesterday he was threatening to flee in his carriage, but today we have seen him easily captured in my nets.114 110. Himerius is quoting Thuc. 2.60.5, where Pericles is speaking of himself. 111. For Proteus’s adaptability, cf. Him. Orat. 68.9. For Hermes’ various Athenian appellations, see Völker’s note ad loc. Does “this Hermes logios” refer to Athenaeus? 112. Remove the comma that Colonna puts after ejdivdou. Otherwise I follow Lapatin, Chryselephantine Statuary, 166. For the “small Parthenos,” see Lapatin, 199. I suspect that Himerius is comparing this oration to the small Parthenos and promising a large Parthenos, i.e., a more ambitious oration for Athenaeus, in the future. 113. While proconsul of Greece, as is obvious from the contents. 114. “the trap . . . my nets”: i.e., Himerius’s oration.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

235

[2] Since Simonides of Ceos, when sending Hieron off from Sicily to another land, took hold of the lyre, took hold of it and mixed tears with the sounds he made; and since Philammon, son of Apollo, a victory song and sang it to Jason of Thessaly in the midst of the heroes (this was after Jason obtained the golden , which he brought as a prize to the Greeks upon lulling to sleep the sleepless serpent, and while he was fulfilling the mission of the sacred trireme [i.e., the Argo]) . . .115 [3] Won’t the pipe sound for those who have put the crown on their heads at Olympia and exalt their garlands with song? Then won’t Athenian eloquence also send off those who have run the race of glory with unfaltering resolve? [4] People have a variety of honors for those who excel. There is fat in Sparta, a cup in Thebes, land among the Argives, a painting in Sicyon, among the Medes, and a table among the Sybarites.116 But for the people of Attica, the crown of honor is an elegy, an oration, or a poem. These are ancient gifts. Nothing at all can overcome them, and they do not allow the passage of time to triumph over them. [5] It is said that even Alexander [the Great] gave the arts of old something to contend about. So when Lysippus and Apelles assigned themselves the task of representing his form, the latter gave expression to the king’s nature in paint, and the former in bronze. But since speech goes beyond the body and busies itself with the beauty and charms of the soul, let it be [regarded as] a painter who does not deceive.117 [6] . . . unless he has an officer in command at the bow who is skilled in the whole of seamanship.118 For when it comes to action, the inexpe-

115. Himerius is comparing himself to Simonides and Philammon. “Since Simonides . . . he made”: Simonides no. 580 in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 3: 464. For Simonides in Sicily, see Podlecki, PP 34 (1979): 5–16; in his judgment, the evidence for an extended stay in Sicily (“anything but straightforward” [p. 5]) “is . . . extremely weak” (p. 15). Pherecydes of Athens gave Philammon the place normally accorded to Orpheus as an Argonaut (see K. Ziegler, “Orpheus,” RE 18, 1 [1939]: 1254ff.). The serpent who never slept guarded the golden fleece. Ov. Met. 7.149–56 also has Jason himself lull the serpent to sleep, but in other texts Medea does it (Apoll. Rhod. 4.145–61; Ov. Her. 12.101–8; Apollod. Bibl. 1.9.23). There is a version in which the serpent is killed rather than merely lulled to sleep (Eur. Med. 480–82; Diod. Sic. 4.48.3; Serv. on Verg. Georg. 2.140). 116. For the traditional flourishing of painting at Sicyon, see Strabo 8.6.23 [382]. For Sybarite love of fine food, see Aelian Var. hist. 1.19; Athen. 12.519d–e, 521c– d, 527c, 541c. 117. For Lysippus’s and Apelles’ skill and Alexander’s pleasure with them, see Hor. Ep. 2.1.239–40; Val. Max. 8.11.ext.2; Plin. HN 7.37 [125]; Plut. De Alex. fort. 335a–b. Cf. Him. Orat. 23.3. 118. Himerius is presumably making the point here that Ampelius is, metaphorically, “skilled in the whole of seamanship.”

236

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

rienced become disconcerted, whereas the well-trained confidently display the skill they have learned. [7] Keep a straight and even course from the gates to the turningpost. [8] Are you mild? You have this virtue in common [with Ampelius]. Do you hate evil? He has fought against evil with you. Did you avoid any contact with unjust gifts? This man also barred the gates of his soul against outrageous gold that is contemptuous of justice. For he understands that justice with meager resources is no reproach, whereas wealth with injustice is an enemy of virtue and of honor. [9] Praise begins where [praiseworthy] actions begin. But, after making that point, what should one say? What should one refrain from saying? For it is difficult to speak and ungrateful not to speak. Consider how, when people behold the beautiful features of statues, their eyes are held fast by the first thing that strikes them; then, as they subsequently focus on other features of the statue, they don’t know what to look at first. But wait a minute! Why do I need an ancient statue? Consider instead how, when people behold some new piece of workmanship, they are compelled by the beauty that embraces the whole thing to look at all the features of it together; then, as feature after feature wins over their desire, their viewing becomes fragmented by the wondrousness [of the individual parts]. So, too, all your achievements, which strike us everywhere, require some kind of narrative other than what we can provide for you; they are not content with the current conventions of eloquence. [10] Should one tell of your deeds or of your judicial decisions? Of your attention to detail or of your concern for the whole? Of your care for the poor or of your gentle chastening of the powerful? [11] But because of you even Sparta is luxuriating, having exchanged its dirty locks for a fine head of hair. Who could worthily tell of the endless number of buildings [you erected]? The Propylaea and the Parthenon were enough to satisfy Pericles’ ambition, a royal residence was enough for Darius, a golden vine was enough for Artaxerxes—a work of Theodorus of Samos, the useless object of a Mede luxuriating unnaturally.119 But you have urbanized everything between [Thermo]pylae and the farthest recess of the Peloponnesus.

119. For the Persian court’s golden vine, see Hdt. 7.27; Diod. Sic. 19.48.7; Plin. HN 33.15 [51]; Athen. 12.514f. Doubts that Theodorus was the artist: G. Lippold, “Theodoros 195,” RE 5A, 2 (1934): 1919; D. Graham and J. Shipley in The Dictionary of Art, ed. J. Turner (New York, 1996), vol. 26, s.v. “Rhoikos and Theodoros.”

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

237

[12] There was a street in the very middle of the city [of Athens] called Collytus after its deme. It was honored by its use as a marketplace. Because of the street’s ancient glory, this man [i.e., Ampelius] went to the place, attracted there by what he had heard about it. When he saw it, he was amazed by the nature of the place, but what he felt more was shame on behalf of the city because of the poor condition the street was in. He would not allow the city to suffer embarrassment any longer over the matter. 120 [13] [Ampelius is] valued by emperors, cautious with tyrants, kind to the peoples [he comes in contact with].121 He excites respect from the wise, is most pleasant to the elderly, is loved by people of all conditions and ages. [14] Literature [Hom. Od. 4.382ff.] causes the Egyptian sophist Proteus to change into many forms; then it represents him, thus transforming himself, as overcome by those lying in wait for him. [15] Just as poetry [Hom. Il. 18.187–238] says that Achilles, having no arms, achieved victory as the result of a shout alone. . . . [16] For often what is right in our midst escapes notice, while what is rarely seen always wins a spectator. But intricate craftsmanship decks out a work of art, welcoming the spectator who is passing by and the person shopping in the agora.122 [17] One [city] erects a colonnade, another delights in [constructing] pools. A bath makes one [city] feel pride, a domicile for the [archon] basileus that is named after that official does the same for another.123 Each [city] produces something, and they all positively pride themselves on your most excellent achievements. [18] You made believable the stories about how stone can be in love and lament and can pour forth tears, like a lover robbed of his beloved. So I fear that longing for you will cause suffering and that some people

120. On Collytus and this passage, see Frantz, Late Antiquity, 35–36. 121. “cautious with tyrants”: turavnnoiˇ eujlabhvˇ. Eujlabhvˇ is H. Schenkl’s emendation of the manuscript’s eujblabhvˇ. Barnes (CP 82 [1987]: 215–16) suggests that “tyrants” means “usurpers” and may allude to Magnentius. I am not comfortable, however, with his translation of eujlabhvˇ, which gives a passive sense to the word (“an object of fear to tyrants”). Perhaps we need some other emendation. “kind” etc.: cf. Amm. Marc. 28.4.3: “Ampelius . . . ad populi favorem adipiscendum aptissimus.” 122. Himerius seems to be saying that the works of art commissioned by Ampelius were so good that they caught the attention of the locals, who normally take for granted what is in their midst. 123. “a domicile” etc.: a reference to the Stoa Basileios at Athens (Frantz, Late Antiquity, 4–5, 49, 54–55); cf. Habicht, Hyperboreus 1 (1994–1995): 129. Ampelius will have improved it, of course, not built it from scratch.

238

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

will themselves give rise to strange tales by taking on a different nature and becoming flowers or trees.124 [A1] Thinking it outrageous that sculpture and the arts associated with it were being so presumptuous toward the gods . . . 125 [Exc. Phot., with several passages also in Exc. Neapol. and Lex. Lopad.; sections 2–4, 13–17, exclusively in Exc. Neapol., assigned to this oration and placed by Colonna; section A1, exclusively from Lex. Lopad., assigned to this oration by Colonna, “quamvis incerto in loco reponendum”] 32. From the Oration to the Prefect Anatolius [1] When Achilles in Homer was weeping over the slaughter of his friend [Patroclus], Zeus, having sent him a sign from heaven through Hermes, ordered him to take up his weapons.126 Come, then, let us too, as if with approval from on high, turn misfortune into a festival, and let us dance in honor of [Apollo], the leader of the Muses. [2] After [the battle at] Cyzicus, Alcibiades returned to Athens with the victorious fleet. The whole city turned out to meet him, some applauding him, some crowning him, others weeping, and all of them escorted Alcibiades with words of praise.127 [3] The great prefect has become the prey of my rhetorical skill. [4] Gently singing in the Hypodorian mode . . .128 [5] We are not dealing with fables, with Attic fictions, as the Laconians jestingly call them at the city’s expense—Dionysus, the foreigner from Thebes, or Poseidon, who expressed his love for Athens with his wave—

124. Niobe yearned for her dead children and was turned into stone. The stone still wept (Apollod. Bibl. 3.5.6; Nonnus Dionys. 48.427–29). Narcissus, yearning for his own unattainable image, was, according to one version of his story, turned into the flower (Brown, “Narratives” of Konon, 177–78). Phaethon’s sisters yearned for their dead brother and were turned into trees (Lucian Dial. deorum 24 [25]; Hygin. Fab. 154). 125. If this fragment is rightly assigned to this oration, and the thinking is being done by someone other than Ampelius, Himerius could be referring to an enemy of Ampelius, who, envious and critical of his building and beautification projects, accused the governor of somehow offending the gods in his ambitious efforts to beautify Greece. 126. “a sign . . . through Hermes”: This is not found in the Iliad. Greco suggests a tragic, specifically Aeschylean, origin of the notion (Prometheus 24 [1998]: 264–67). 127. Anatolius is being compared to Alcibiades here. The battle of Cyzicus was in 410 b.c. Alcibiades returned (after exile) to Athens in 407. For his reception, see Xen. Hellen. 1.4.12–20; Diod. Sic. 13.68–69.3; Plut. Alcib. 32. 128. jHrevma uJpodwriv zwn tw¸/ fqevgmati. I understand “using the Hypodorian mode” rather than “speaking Doric.”

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

239

but with a real encounter [with Anatolius?]. But [the] education [Athens offers] and [its] laws, the root and metropolis of [its] blessings . . .129 [6] . . . that Heracles, son of Zeus, struggled through his labors and cleansed the human race of evil solely by means of his club, and that through myth this club is established as a subject of story . . .130 [7] He plants his soul with this plant himself, irrigating it with Attic waters. [8] Fine things are always rare,131 and they win immortal glory for those who contrive them. [9] The wise Anacharsis was the first to come to the Greeks from Scythia, and Pelops was the first to come from Lydia. Pelops, borne over the calm sea on immortal horses, received as a reward for his unprecedented feat [the right] to give his name to the land [i.e., the Peloponnesus]. Alexander was the first king to bathe his fame in the [Indian] Ocean, and Cyrus was the first . . . to ride his horse out of Babylon.132 [10] [My] praise [of you] is still off shore; [my] oration is at sea and spies no anchorage.133 [11] Music won fame for Timotheus, and wisdom brought repute to Pythagoras, but it was rhetoric that caused golden likenesses of Gorgias to be erected.134 [12] So it is perhaps best for me, after capturing the nature of this man [Anatolius] in a portrait of him, to imitate the example of Phidias. Phidias was not ignorant of how great Zeus was nor of the many ways in which 129. For Poseidon’s use of a wave (seawater) to lay claim to Athens, see Him. Orat. 21.2, with my note. “But [the] education” etc.: Wernsdorff may have been right in regarding this sentence as a separate excerpt, not immediately connected to what precedes it. The Greek could also be understood to mean “But [a literary] education and the law, the root and metropolis of [Anatolius’s] excellent qualities.” “metropolis”: For metaphorical uses of this word, see LSJ, s.v. I, 2. 130. For Heracles’ club, with which he was frequently depicted, see J. Boardman et al., “Herakles,” LIMC 4, 1 (1988): 729, 731–32. Is Anatolius being compared to Heracles here? 131. The theme of Him. Orat. 19. 132. “Anacharsis . . . the first to come to the Greeks from Scythia”: not according to Lucian Scyth. 1. On Pelops, cf. Pind. Ol. 1.24; Thuc. 1.9.2; Tac. Ann. 4.55. Pindar (Ol. 1.87; cf. Lacroix, BCH 100 [1976]: 334–37) calls Pelops’s horses winged; [Lucian] (Charid. 19) calls them immortal. Neither Pindar nor ps.-Lucian is precise about when and where Pelops obtained his horses. Alexander: see Arr. Anab. 6.19–20, 7.10.7. Cyrus the Great would have been the first Achaemenid to be able to “ride his horse out of Babylon,” because he conquered Babylon in 539 b.c. 133. I.e., Himerius has not yet completed his laudation of Anatolius, and there is still much to say before he “reaches port.” 134. For Timotheus, see West, Ancient Greek Music, 361–64; Mathiesen, Apollo’s Lyre, 65–71.

240

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

he was great, for his soul was wiser than his hand was skillful. So since he wanted to capture the nature of Zeus in one statue, he mixed ivory with gold and, in one statue, formed an image of the Olympian god, huge as it was, for the Eleans, but also intended this Zeus for the rest of humanity as well.135 [13] I want to paint a picture for you with divine colors, for earthly colors quickly get washed away with the passage of time. If it pleases anyone to call the picture a glorious decree, I shall not disagree.136 [14] In my view, whenever this great body that we think of as the earth and as the center of that divine universe is corrupted by the disease of evil, then the spindle of Lachesis, having split heaven with its threads, leads forth from Zeus’s hearth a pure soul, who delivers to us the essence of divine apparitions. This soul brings justice, it brings courage from that hearth. Such a soul is simply absolute prudence. A countless band of cognate virtues follows a soul of this kind: sublimity, magnificence of judgment, independence of tongue, hands that cannot be bribed, a yearning for friendship, love of the truth, a steadfast mind.137 [15] For nature takes precedence over art. [16] Not using friendship as a basis for judging virtue, but assessing friendship on the basis of virtue. . . . [some sections preserved in Exc. Phot., some in Exc. Neapol., two passages in both; three short excerpts also in Lex. Lopad.] 36. From the Propemptic Oration to Flavianus [1] You flee from me, my friend, as I labor on a better lyre tune to greet you after your stay in Libya [i.e., Africa]; you have suddenly pushed me aside and compelled me to sing a gloomy song. We did not yet see the spring, and now a Hellespontic storm strikes us and freezes our soul. We did not 135. If we take seriously the aorist “after capturing the nature of this man,” it would seem that what Himerius wants to imitate is not Phidias’s craftsmanship, but his intending the Olympian Zeus to be for all men and women to see. Himerius could do this by circulating copies of the oration given in praise of Anatolius. For the comparison of a panegyric to a Phidian statue, with specific mention of the chryselephantine Olympian Zeus, and to a painted portrait (see section 13), cf. Them. Orat. 25. For the size of Phidias’s Olympian Zeus, see Strabo 8.3.30 [353]. For the Greek text of the last sentence, see Guida in Benedetti and Grandolini, Studi, 398–99. 136. “A glorious decree” is my attempt for dovgma de; kai; dovxan (i.e., as a hendiadys); cf. Völker. Dübner has “decretum et dogma philosophicum.” Wernsdorff raised the possibility of textual corruption here. 137. Cf. Pl. Rep. 10.617d–e; id. Phaedr. 250c; Him. Orat. 48.12–13.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

241

yet see the sun, and now it directs its rays elsewhere and threatens to bring night to the Greeks. We are gloomy before we smile, we pray to the gods of the wayside before offering sacrifice in honor of your arrival.138 [2] [I think?] that [my] eloquence is being tested, an eloquence less daring than the hand, hesitating to do what wax and iron desire to do.139

[3] For [your] fame was always crossing over the sea from Libya to the Greeks. [4] He depicted the breeze in a wanton and playful state,140 like the Lydian women whom painters depict, artfully making them appear intoxicated on their canvases. [5] So having briefly drawn our oration up on land from midcourse, we shall now allow it to flow down through Libya.141 [6] No one prevails [over Flavianus], because everything [in him] evokes admiration. [7] For my oration, having followed [its] desire, was almost diverted to another path as it moved along, as if by a forceful stream. So it must be brought back to Libya. [8] For they say that they were mad with a heaven-sent love for one another. [9] [Flavianus] has a nature that, from the very start [of any undertaking], points to his divine pedigree. What he says, both at home and in public, is filled with every kind of learning. By these traits of his Pericles was shown to be second in persuasiveness, Themistocles was shown to be rather dull in quickness of judgment, Plato in his nature, Solon in his law-giving. . . . And everyone knows that, whereas other individuals glory in a single quality each, this man glories in all of them. [10] “What shall I do? What decision shall I make? Shall I send [Flavianus] as an [urban] prefect to the Romans? But a people used to luxurious living are unacquainted with a serious governor.”142

138. Flavianus has no sooner arrived than he departs. Hence Himerius must sing a gloomy propemptic song, saying good-bye to the “spring” and the “sun.” Cf. section A3 below. 139. Himerius is hesitant to paint a verbal portrait of Flavianus. “Wax” and “iron” refer to the “hand” of the painter and of the sculptor respectively, “wax” alluding to encaustic painting and “iron” to the sculptor’s tools. 140. Himerius is describing a painting here. 141. I.e., Himerius must return, after a digression, to the subject of Africa and Flavianus’s stay there. Cf. section 7. 142. The words of an emperor deliberating about how to deploy Flavianus. Cf. section 13.

242

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

[11] “Perhaps Carthage is annoyed with me, a city of Africa that once in its bravery was opposed to Rome, a city that feeds the whole of Italy with all the beautiful things it produces, a city that fails to be first only to the degree that it feels humbled by [the city of ] Rome. A great city, I know, is in peril, and the whole land [of Africa] is presided over by a bad government.”143 [12] Absolutely all Greeks between [Thermo]pylae and the Ionian Gulf in the west, from one side [of Greece] to the other, bear witness in public theaters to the goodwill they feel toward me.144 [13] “Let us send him [Flavianus] as the great holder of the reins of justice.” This was the emperor’s judgment, and the golden tablets of office immediately overtook his decision.145 [14] Having reached this point in my oration, “what shall I say first, what next, what last” [Hom. Od. 9.14]?146 For [Flavianus’s] actions are everywhere set in motion, they are all equal, and it is just as hard not to speak as to speak; the former is hindered by the number [of his deeds], the latter by their magnitude. So I must say not everything that it is possible to say, but everything that I am able to say. [15] Seeing him [i.e., Flavianus] conducting his convoy in a storm as though the sea were calm, and sporting on the waves as though in a harbor, some yearned for him as for a passionate lover, and others shuddered at him as at one who was unconquerable by any fear at all.147 [16] They provided a greater procession [for Flavianus] than the one for Hephaestus.148 The people sang out in reply to the waves, the applause from the city answered the surf, the shouting from Carthage overpowered the sound of the sea. [17] Let everyone, old and young, pardon me if I speak like an epic poet; for love knows how, yes it knows how to compose an oration subject only to its own laws.149 143. I assign these words to the emperor of section 10. Carthage is annoyed with him because he had not yet sent them a man of Flavianus’s caliber. 144. This fragment is preserved exclusively in the Excerpta Neapolitana and was conjecturally placed here by Colonna. Is this the best place for it? Its placement here seems to intrude on the thoughts ascribed to the emperor—unless “me” is the emperor rather than Himerius—or even Flavianus. 145. I.e., the “tablets,” the document appointing Flavianus to office, were issued practically before the emperor’s decision-making process was over. 146. For this version of the Homeric quote, cf. Jul. Orat. 4.244c Bidez. 147. This section and the next describe Flavianus’s arrival in Africa. 148. Is Himerius thinking of the Athenian Hephaestia? 149. Himerius’s love for Flavianus causes him to wax poetic in prose.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

243

[18] He suffered from a disease that was greater than his fortune but not lesser than his wickedness. Let no one be amazed if, in his sickness, he acted thus against this man. From time immemorial, lesser men have been finding fault with excellent public officials. Cleon falsely accused Pericles, Nicias had to defend himself against Hyperbolus, Demades brought Demosthenes to trial, Cleophon indicted Alcibiades, a man of Seriphus reproached Themistocles. For those who envy the outstanding good fortune of others are forced to make up by their boldness for what they lack in merit.150 [19] Then he really showed what the difference is between virtue and a knavish character.151 [20] For favors that are done with ease, even if they are great ones, are naturally regarded as small ones because they require no inconvenience at all.152 [21] Alexander, desiring to raise up a city in Egypt [i.e., Alexandria] after experiencing great ordeals, fulfilled his wish merely by laying the groundwork for it.153 [A1] What cities have not experienced the virtuous actions of Flavianus? [A2] [He?] conducted a day-long procession through Carthage illuminated by fire and torches. [A3] What unusual lyre tune can we ever come up with that, at one and the same time, bids a person adieu and welcomes his arrival?154 [mostly preserved in Exc. Phot., with some passages also in Exc. Neapol. and/or Lex. Lopad.; some passages exclusively in Exc. Neapol. or Lex. Lopad.]

150. Himerius is referring here to an envious opponent of Flavianus. “a disease . . . greater than his fortune”: i.e., envy. His envy of Flavianus was greater than his ability to equal him. Cleon: Plut. Per. 35.3–5; Podlecki, Perikles, 151. For Nicias and Hyperbolus as opponents, see Kagan, Peace of Nicias, 60–62, 146. Demades: Plut. Dem. 28.2. On Cleophon and Alcibiades, see Kirchner, Prosopographia Attica, no. 8638. A man of Seriphus: Pl. Rep. 1.329e–30a; Plut. Them. 18.5. 151. Himerius could be referring either to Flavianus or to the envious individual of section 18. 152. Probably in a discussion of how Flavianus spared himself no inconvenience in doing favors for others. 153. Perhaps in a discussion of how Flavianus successfully laid the groundwork for various projects, without letting prior problems discourage him. 154. Cf. section 1 above.

244

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

38. [To the Proconsul Cervonius] This is the first talk (laliavn) in Athens that he [Himerius] gave in the praetorium. It was addressed to the proconsul [of Greece], Cervonius, who set the theme for him and restored the city. [Himerius] upbraids, in a controlled manner, [his rival] sophists and those who had recently derided him.155 [1] Behold now, O noble one [i.e., Cervonius], the Muses’ arts are reviving themselves together with this new city of yours. They were laboring to appear to the Greeks earlier—for nothing beautiful, I think, wishes to be hidden—but “‘twas on thine account,” as one of the lyric poets has already sung, that they saved the fruit of their labor for you, so that they could display it in its maturity and in due season.156 [2] They say that, before the god Apollo appeared to humankind, this neighboring island of Delos was hidden in the deep, moving and tossing about under the sea. But after the god appeared and brought [the island] to light, it immediately came up from the depths to the surface, stood firm in the midst of the waves, and no longer swam about. [3] Come, then, my boys, for this man also brings me to light. He is like the gods whom poets often transform into various human forms and shapes and bring into the midst of cities and peoples, gods “who come upon both the insolence and the good order of humankind” [Hom. Od. 17.487]. (For example, Homer thus put Athena on display, as Anacreon and Euripides did Dionysus.) In like manner, this man appears and commands me to pay

155. “praetorium” (praitwrivw)/ : a conjectural emendation of the manuscripts’ prwvtw/ o{rw/. “The Praetorium [at Athens] in the 4th century, as only a branch office, as it were [the proconsul’s seat being at Corinth], might have been any building of suitable size and adequate state of preservation” (Frantz, Late Antiquity, 24). The Athenian Palace of Giants, built in the early fifth century, might have been a praetorium (Lavan in Lavan, Recent Research, 45; Frantz, 65). The reading Kerbwvnioˇ, against codex R’s Kirwvnioˇ, is confirmed in SEG 15.323 ( = IG 7.1855), from Thespiae, where, however, letters 2–4 are uncertainly read. Colonna prefers the transliteration “Cerbonius,” a name that appears in some Latin inscriptions. SEG 15.323 has the full title “proconsul of Greece.” “who set the theme (provblhma) for him”: not of this lalia, but of the declamation that would have followed it. For a proconsul of Greece and a praetorian prefect proposing themes for Athenian sophists, cf. Eunap. Vitae phil. et soph. 10.4.6 [488], 10.6.4 [491] Giangrande. This oration, then, is more precisely a prolalia. “in a controlled manner”: by only implicitly comparing them to the sophists who were jealous of and slandered Socrates (sections 4–7). For the Greek, dia; baquvthtoˇ, cf. Wernsdorff ad loc.: “artem occultandi animi molestiam”; D. R. Shackleton Bailey’s translation of baquvthˇ as “self-control” at Cic. Ad Attic. 83 (4.6).3 (Cicero’s Letters to Atticus [Cambridge, 1965–1970]). 156. “new city”: i.e., newly restored by you. “‘twas on thine account”: e{kati here, instead of e{khti, could remind one of Pindar (Ol. 14.20, Isthm. 5.2).

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

245

no regard to the silence or to the confinement of eloquence in darkness, conditions that obtained before his arrival. He orders me to make eloquence public, to bring it out onto center stage for the Greeks; and eloquence is indeed about to strip for the Muses’ racecourse, as though obeying a divine command. Now I do not believe that I am a poet. But I am a friend of the divine chorus of poets. So let me tell you an Attic tale, like a prenomic song sung before the contest itself begins.157 [4] There was a time when the Athenians more than anyone else welcomed the sophists, when the sophists and their activities were everything to them. Thus those who practiced this art came to Athens from everywhere and hastened to associate and spend their time there with the young. Various auditors were enthralled by various sophists, some by Gorgias of Leontini, others by Prodicus of Ceos. Some thought that they should study under Hippias of Elis, since he advertised a resourceful and multiform kind of wisdom.158 [5] I hear that Socrates was also alive at that time, a man of true wisdom and an extraordinary lover of eloquence—not the eloquence made for the general populace and the masses, but the kind that, when it enters into the delicate souls of the young, causes them to bear fully formed fruit in season. When a few young men happened upon Socrates as he was conversing and marveled at how accomplished he was in eloquence and learning, they would decide that they should no longer go to the sophists but should stay with Socrates himself and philosophize and converse with him. [6] When this was revealed to the sophists, well, I cannot say whether or not they got angry at him, for I do not like bringing accusations against these very wise men now. But certainly people like Callicles and Thrasymachus, men connected with Gorgias, often set to work at slandering and making fun of Socrates. Some of them joked about his face, saying that he was snub-nosed and had an unpleasant appearance. These sorry individuals did not know that Socrates used to pray to

157. “before the god Apollo appeared”: i.e., was born. For Delos moving about under the sea before Apollo’s birth, see Lucian Dial. deorum mar. 9 (10). It became dh¸loˇ after being a[dhloˇ. Aristotle also had put it under water initially (in Plin. HN 4.12 [66]). Himerius cites the Homeric line with the variant ejfevpontaˇ, which also occurs in the nominative case in Synesius’s citation at De regn. 25a Terzaghi, against the vulgate’s ejforw¸ nteˇ. “For example . . . Dionysus”: E.g., in Hom. Od. 1.105, Athena comes to Telemachus in the form of the mortal Mentes. In Euripides’ Bacchae, Dionysus comes to Thebes in human guise. This Himerian passage is Anacreon no. 492 in Campbell, Greek Lyric 2: 134. “about to strip”: For the athletic metaphor, cf. Philostr. Vitae soph. 601; Him. Orat. 63.6. “like a prenomic song”: cf. Him. Orat. 74.2. 158. On Hippias’s range, see Pl. Hipp. maj. 285b–86b; Hipp. min. 368b–e.

246

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

the gods that he would have an internal beauty! Other sophists latched onto some other outrageous slander against him, trying in this way to turn him away from associating with the young.159 [7] Their device almost worked. What prevented it from doing so was that one of Socrates’ friends happened to go to Delphi to the god [Apollo], and he asked him who was wise among those currently alive. The god, from his very tripod, gave Socrates [himself ] this designation in a truthful and loud voice. Being a prophet and brother of the Muses, the god knew precisely, I think, who had true wisdom and who had a spurious and fraudulent wisdom.160 His pronouncement reached the ears of all Greeks, and Socrates was encouraged and began to make his eloquence public. It was all over for Callicles. This, then, is the Attic tale I have for you, my boys. [8] And what, eloquence, will you do for this noble man [Cervonius]? He has brought you, hidden and invisible to the Greeks, out into the light and into their midst. It is not right for you to be silent; but if you speak, you will inevitably be put to shame if you do not maintain his reputation. So I shall now want to sing him a paean or short song that I have composed, as if to some god. Then on some other occasion, if God grants it, I shall pay the debt of gratitude owed to him with full rites.161 [9] O eye of Justice and of Right (Themis)! O priest of the Muses and of Hermes! O most beautiful creature of Athena herself, to whom you beautifully make a return for your trophies! Neither Pindar himself nor that Siciliote [Theron] to whom the Boeotian lyric poet gave the title “upholder of the city” [Ol. 2.7] would resent the fact that we call you by that same title. Because of you, this city is young again and awakened after being much in decline. After shedding tears and lamenting, it begins to feast and dance, as if the earth had just freed it to do so. The Naiad nymphs, as a daring poet would say, have left their groves and play on Attic streets. Everything shines and has bloomed as in a vernal meadow. Flocks of youths who before were recklessly leaping about are now quietly grazing, are now quietly housed in their pens, as if Orpheus’s or Amphion’s lyre had been plucked. [10] Now every Siren is moved on your account, every barbitos and lyra sounds , peoples and cities

159. For Socrates’ snub nose (and bulging eyes, large mouth, and thick lips), see Pl. Theaet. 143e; Xen. Symp. 5.5–7. For his prayer for internal beauty, Pl. Phaedr. 279b. Like Socrates, Himerius has been slandered. 160. “one of Socrates’ friends”: Chaerephon. See Pl. Apol. 21a. “brother of the Muses”: Their common father was Zeus. 161. A “short song” because only a lalia. In the future Himerius will deliver a fullscale oration for Cervonius; cf. section 10 below.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

247

sing of your deeds. Now the sacred vessel departs for Delos, carrying an Attic chorus to the god [Apollo], the kind they say Theseus established for him after leaving Crete. Let that chorus sing a hymn asking that this man govern Greeks for a very long time.162 This is what I sing to you for now, you person dear to the gods. And if the Delian god [Apollo] grants me the favor, I shall pay my debt to you in full in the future. [cods. R and B, with short passages also in Exc. Neapol. and in Lex. Lopad.] 42. A Discourse (Diavlexiˇ) Addressed to the Prefect Salutius163 [1] Who after Themistocles is wise, and who after Miltiades is earnest, and who after Aristides can resist a temptation of gain? Who outdoes Pericles in eloquence, who is more fervent in action than Alcibiades? Who is as fortunate in generalship as Nicias? Who has the mark of Phocion, an excellent judgment? Who is as untouched by accusers as was Cephalus— something he always boasted about? Who, with the same disposition as the Laconian, is so good to his friends?164 . . . [2] If I had the excess of gold that everyone says Croesus the Lydian, Midas the Phrygian, and Cinyras the Cyprian had . . . [3] They say that such was the friendship of Heracles and Theseus,165

162. Hermes: god of eloquence. Note that SEG 15.323 calls Cervonius “a friend of the Muses.” Naiads are water-nymphs and so may refer, as Wernsdorff suggested, to some kind of waterworks constructed by Cervonius. “every Siren”: i.e., every orator or writer (see Paus. 1.21.1). “barbitos and lyra”: cf. Him. Orat. 48.5, with my note. “the sacred vessel”: see Pl. Phaedo 58a–b; Callim. Hymn. 4.310–15. The Athenians are thanking Cervonius, just as the annual vessel going to Delos thanked Apollo. For Theseus’s chorus, see H. Herter, “Theseus,” RE Suppl. 13 (1973): 1142–44. 163. The title survives in Photius’s Himerian bibliography. Colonna conjecturally attaches it to the following untitled excerpts from the Excerpta Neapolitana. Photius gives the name as Salouvstion; for its various forms see Seeck, Die Briefe, 265–66. 164. Alcibiades: an emendation of the manuscript’s iterated “Miltiades.” For Alcibiades’ fervor and his juxtaposition to Pericles, see Him. Orat. 28.6. Cephalus: For his never having been indicted, see Dem. 18.251; Aeschin. 3.194. Himerius apparently said in this section of the oration that his lauded subject did equal or surpass these individuals from classical Greece. “the Laconian”: Who is he? I see no compelling reason to identify him with Agesilaus (pace Colonna), who appears below in section 4. For Salutius’s own career before becoming a praetorian prefect, see PLRE, vol. 1, s.v. “Secundus 3.” For his incorruptibility, see Liban. Orat. 18.182. The emperor Constantius assumed that Salutius was giving military as well as administrative advice to Caesar Julian in Gaul (Zos. 3.5.3). As praetorian prefect praesens with the emperor Julian during his Persian campaign, he must have continued to give him military advice. 165. For their friendship, see H. Herter, “Theseus,” RE Suppl. 13 (1973): 1202–3. Himerius is probably comparing their friendship to that of Salutius and Julian, who wrote

248

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

who breathed one breath on behalf of the whole of humanity and, by their virtue, cleansed the whole earth and sea . . . [4] King Agesilaus, too, who was lucky to have Antandrus as a secretary and adviser, was once so exalted among the Ionians that Agesilaus himself seemed to be [their] king, while all of the Ionians loved him, for they knew that in times of need he would speak out against [their enemies]. Likewise, we see the great sun move in conjunction with the change of seasons so that, by its light, it may sustain each season as the latter peaks in line with time’s movements; yet the sun still remains unmoved in its nature. Likewise again, I think, they say that Themistocles yielded command of the fleet to Eurybiades yet seemed actually to remain its commander throughout.166 [Exc. Neapol.] 43. To Flavianus the Proconsul167 [1] Homer, wanting to honor virtue through the person of Odysseus, composed a whole poem [about him]. [2] Peleus, already old and no longer able to wield the ashen spear, sent Achilles to Troy to fight in the army.168 [3] But you, while wielding the inspired ashen spear in your vigorous right hand, were yourself seen to be father and teacher of the Attic race.169 a consolation to himself when Salutius was removed from his company in Gaul (Jul. Orat. 4 [8] Bidez). With reference to his friendship with Salutius, Julian himself thinks of the classic friendships of Theseus and Pirithous and of Scipio and Laelius (Jul. Orat. 4 [8] 242d, 244c–45c). 166. King Agesilaus of Sparta assisted the Ionians against the Persians. The otherwise unattested Antandrus is a problem; see Völker ad loc. Problematic, too, is the word ejpistoleva, which I translate “secretary” but can also mean “vice-admiral.” Völker understands “[Agesilaus] seemed to be king [of the Lacedaemonians].” My understanding of the whole passage is that Agesilaus seemed to be king of the Ionians but was not; the sun seems to move but is unmoved in its nature or essence; Themistocles seemed to be commander but was not. For Themistocles and Eurybiades, see Hdt. 8.57–64. As Antandrus advised Agesilaus, as the sun enables the seasons, and as Themistocles influenced Eurybiades, so too Salutius supported Julian. 167. The following fragments survive in the Excerpta Neapolitana, which give no heading for them. Colonna assigns them to the lost third oration to Flavianus noted in Photius’s Himerian bibliography; nothing in the fragments makes that assignment certain. 168. Cf. Him. Orat. 46.9. 169. Himerius might have mentioned Achilles’ teacher Chiron as well as his father Peleus, as in Orat. 46.9. Flavianus would then be both father and teacher (Peleus and Chiron) to the Athenians, but, unlike the elderly Peleus, he still metaphorically “wields his spear.” For the “Attic race,” see p. 213 above.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

249

[4] Now Pindar’s lyre, which sang its strains to Hieron, the tyrant of Sicily, ensures that that tyrant will always be a subject of song among human beings; and the tongue, which outdoes all the Muses and all trumpets170 and has hymned you with words, will never allow forgetfulness to challenge your deeds over the course of time. [5] See how Attic eloquence distinguishes you with a golden wild-olive branch, like some Olympic victor such as Glaucus or Timasarchus or [like] the gloriously triumphant one himself;171 see how it binds your brows with chaplets and wreaths from the Lyceum and the Academy. [6] So when the Egyptians see that Apis is born, they form a judgment about their future prosperity from the signs on the bull.172 [7] Iolaus, helping Heracles with his tasks as the latter struggled through his labors, was fitting for him, and so was Patroclus for [Achilles], son of Peleus.173 [Exc. Neapol.] 46. To Those Individuals Laying Snares for Him and to the Proconsul Basilius [Himerius] gave this talk (ejlavlhse), coming forward to speak after the other sophists. The first part is directed, in an ironic and, at the same time, striking manner, at those who were laying snares for him; the last part, at the proconsul [of Greece], Basilius, the son of Basilius, who set the theme. [Himerius] hints that he developed the topic extempore.174 [1] What love of my eloquence, dear friend, has got hold of you? Who persuaded you to let my Muse, cast out and dishonored as she is, into

170. I.e., outdoes lyric poetry and other modes of expression. Pindar is called a trumpet in Anth. Pal. 7.34. 171. A wild-olive crown was the prize at Olympia (L. Ziehen, “Olympia,” RE 18, 1 [1939]: 31–32). For Glaucus, see Him. Orat. 13.2. Timasarchus, the athlete honored in Pind. Nem. 4, is Colonna’s conjecture for the manuscript’s Timavrran. “The gloriously triumphant one” (kallivnikon) is probably Heracles (Gruppe, “Herakles,” RE Suppl. 3 [1918]: 1002). 172. For Apis’s marks, see Ael. De nat. animal. 11.10. 173. The two exempla suggest that Himerius mentioned someone who befriended and helped Flavianus. “was fitting for”: The verb (e[prepen) could also mean “resembled.” 174. “Basilius . . . set the theme”: not of this lalia, but of the declamation that would have followed it; cf. the opening scholion of Orat. 38, with my note. “extempore”: Perhaps whoever wrote this opening scholion thought that there was a hint in section 7 that the declamation that would have followed this lalia was given extempore.

250

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

your ears like something great and splendid? By the very Muses, haven’t you taken notice of my situation? (Perhaps I still have left to me the option of invoking these free and happy goddesses. For the hostile proclamation issued against me has not reached them. They do love the champions of Apollo and Hermes and sport with them. And a malicious and harsh command may have force over human beings—although not over those who are highly noble—but surely such a command is shooed away from any chorus of gods.) [2] In any case, do you understand, my friend— and I call you, as well as the Muses, my friend—that it is just as if I am under a long siege? For the whole population is at war with me, some of their own accord, some by agreement with others. I have no idea of what complaint against me has caused this war. They say that they hear it said that I want to dance in honor of the Muses.175 [3] Now the Libethrii, who lived near Mt. Pangaeum, admired and took delight in the Thracian Orpheus, the son of Calliope, before he revealed to them the songs he had learned from his mother the Muse. But once he took up his lyre and sang a divinely inspired melody to them, the wretches were overcome by envy. Having dared to commit an act of womanly insolence against him and his melodious songs, they were subsequently turned into women in story. [4] They also say that the Phrygian storyteller Aesop, who was laughed at and made fun of not because of some of his tales, but on account of his looks and the sound of his voice, was very wise and therefore a priest of Apollo, and that the people of Delphi, even though they lived next to the prophetic god [Apollo], were so ignorant of the man that, by an unjust decree they got passed against him, they hurled him down from a rocky precipice and did away with him. [5] But neither did Orpheus’s mother neglect him after [having taught him how to play] the lyre, nor did Apollo neglect the Phrygian [Aesop]. Instead of Orpheus’s lyre, which they chose to dishonor, the Libethrii got madness, a lack of music, and silence. Song fled from them, it went into the wilderness and won over oak trees, rocks, country birds, and a small band of shepherds. Even though [his country associates] uttered few sounds, Orpheus delighted in them more than he did in the voices of the Libethrii, because, being musical and quietly listening to his song, they sounded forth clearly in response to his lyre. As 175. Apollo and Hermes: i.e., the divine patron of culture and the god of eloquence. “that I want to dance in honor of the Muses”: o{ti a[ra Mouvsaiˇ coreuve in bouvlomai. Pap. Osl. inv. no. 1478 has para; M·ouvsaiˇ (“alongside the Muses”) for a[ra Mouvsaiˇ. But for the expression Mouvsaiˇ coreuve in, cf. Him. Orat. 48.5 (note also 47.2). “Dancing in honor of the Muses” simply means “orating” (cf. Orat. 46.7, 48.5).

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

251

for the people of Delphi, they paid a penalty to their ancestral god [Apollo] for their violent treatment of Aesop.176 [6] These matters were and will be a concern to the gods of eloquence. But now we must compare you to the leader of the Muses himself [i.e., Apollo], taking Sappho and Pindar as our models. In their poems they equip him with golden hair and a lyre and escort him to Mt. Helicon, carried by swans, so that he may dance there with the Muses and the Graces. Or we could imitate poets inspired by the Muses who, once spring has first shone forth, crown Bacchiotes—this is the name lyric poetry calls him by, meaning Dionysus—with vernal flowers and clusters of ivy berries. These poets lead the god, now to the high peaks of the Caucasus and to the vale of Lydia, now to the crags of Mt. Parnassus and the Delphic rock, as he leaps and leads the Bacchae in the cry “euoi.” While this is going on, we are told, the earth, as if aware of the god’s coming, flows with honey and milk and with rivers of nectar itself for Satyrs and Bacchae to draw from. It smiles sweetly and with golden gleam and swells everywhere with flowers, so that the god can leap and play in them. And it seems to me that earth does all this appropriately for the god.177 [7] Do you desire to see my eloquence? Am I getting a sign from you to speak? Yes, I obey you. Because of that sign I have persuaded my eloquence to have no fear of the contest, to produce something, to show

176. For the curious story about Orpheus, cf. CPG 1: 27, where it is said that the Libethrii had no concept of what song or poetry was about. “a lack of music” (ajmousivan): or “a lack of culture.” The proverb ajmousovteroˇ Leibhqrivwn is glossed ejpi; tw¸ n ajmouvswn kai; ajpaideuvtwn (CPG 1: 27). For the story about Aesop, cf. testimonia 20–32 and Vita Aesopi G and W, sections 124ff., in Perry, Aesopica, 1. For his unpleasant looks and voice, Vita Aesopi G and W 1 and Max. Planudes Proem. in vita Aesopi (testimon. 2), in Perry. The implication of this paragraph is that Himerius’s enemies will be punished, as were Orpheus’s and Aesop’s. 177. “the leader of the Muses” (tw¸/ Moushgevth/): Pap. Osl. inv. no. 1478 had instead, if the editors Eitrem and Amundsen are correct in their restoration, tw¸/ pre[sbivstw/], “the most august,” an epithet applied to Apollo at Arist. frag. 671 Rose. Bacchiotes/Baccheiotes: In extant texts, the term is found only at Soph. Oed. Col. 678, where manuscripts usually have ei, although cod. Laurent. 31.10 spells the word with iota alone. For Himerius, Pap. Osl. inv. no. 1478 has Bakciwvtan instead of codex R’s Bakceiwvthn. The papyrus’s reading is to be preferred (see Colonna, BollClass 9 [1961]: 36). “lyric poetry” (hJ luvra): In Pap. Osl. inv. no. 1478 luvra is preceded by –ia, and the editors give the restoration hJ Ke]iva luvra, i.e., “Simonidean lyric.” Cf. Him. Orat. 12.32, 47.14. Long before the papyrus was known, T. Bergk had suggested a Simonidean derivation (Simonid. frag. 210A Bergk). “the Caucasus”: Himerius may mean the Hindu Kush; see Strabo 11.5.5 [505], 11.8.1 [510–11]; Arr. Anab. 5.5, 5.6.3; Diod. Sic. 2.37.3–6, 4.3.1–2. “to the vale of Lydia”: For Dionysus’s arrival, with that of spring, in Lydia, see Him. Orat. 47.6. “Mt. Parnassus and the Delphic rock”: Delphi was on the slopes of Mt. Parnassus. It was sacred to Dionysus as well as to Apollo (Parke and Wormell, Delphic Oracle, 1: 11–13, 330–31). For the Bacchic associations of the flow of milk and honey, see Derrett, VChr 38 (1984): 180.

252

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

others what it has conceived, and to allow [what it produces] to reside in your sacred precincts, just like the gods’ sacred birds residing in [hallowed] groves. In fact—and I accuse myself before you [in saying this]— that eloquence of mine has threatened even more, that, once kindled and having dared to strip [for action], it will wound itself and you, its father. Look, it is emboldened, rises up, puts together all its charm for you, and sets its spells in motion.178 It is already dancing and, through me, is singing a song to you. [8] O son of a divine person! O offspring of a consular father! O you who have received the scepter of your father’s virtue, and no less a scepter than that which Homer [Il. 2.204–5] gives to the king of the Achaeans, bringing that accoutrement to Agamemnon from Zeus on high! You are an evening star, I think, “of all stars the most beautiful.”179 This is Sappho’s song the evening star [frag. 104b Campbell]. [9] They say that Peleus of Thessaly, already old and because of his age not ready for war, bedecked his son Achilles with his own arms when the latter was still young and just getting a beard. He sent Achilles to Troy to be a general to the Greeks, and he sent him, not from the girls’ apartments and the house of Lycomedes—let us not believe the myths on this point—but from Mt. Pelion and from Chiron. Hence right in the midst of battle Achilles played his lyre [10] and sang what the Centaur [Chiron] had taught him. He frightened with his golden weapons and saved the Greeks. But you come to the Greeks for our benefit, not with golden weapons for us, but with a golden Justice and a golden Right (Themis), the assessors of your father. Justice and Right received you in their bosoms when you were born; right from the time when you were in swaddling clothes they nursed you, not with bees’ honey, but with respect for law and with learning, by which the soul’s nature is reared and fostered. They first led you to Zeus’s daughter

178. “to strip [for action]”: I introduce this athletic metaphor (cf. Him. Orat. 38.3) into the text by adopting Wernsdorff’s emendation ajpodu¸ nai for the transmitted ajpodou¸ nai. Himerius’s eloquence will “wound”—this is the “vulnus amoris,” as Wernsdorff’s translation makes clear—because of its excess of feeling. Note that the “father” of speech here is not the speaker, but the official who has elicited the speech. “its charm”: i.e., to;n kestovn, a word that points to Aphrodite, goddess of love (see Him. Orat. 41.7). 179. “of a consular father”: If Barnes is right about the identity of Basilius’s father (see p. 208 above), then, with him, we will have to emend uJpavtou (consular) here to uJpavrcou ([ex-]prefect). The problem could be sidestepped if we translate uJpavtou as “lofty” or “noble,” but I agree with Barnes that this “seems unlikely in a context referring to Roman officials” (CP 82 [1987]: 218). “an evening star”: Menander Rhetor recommends that governors (a[rconteˇ) be compared to a bright star (2.3 [381.12]). Cf. Him. Orat. 47.2, 17; 48.36.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

253

[Athena], and they [now] proudly bring you to the goddess [i.e., to Athens] as their offspring.180 [11] It was a poet’s role to give wings to Fame, to send her westwards through the skies and announce to your father your reputation and what the Greeks are saying about you, and to organize a chorus of swans around Fame and make you the subject of the birds’ song. But these things to poets; I sing my own melody now and perhaps shall do so again.181 [cod. R; portions of the text also in Pap. Osl. inv. no. 1478 and in Exc. Neapol.] 47. To the Same Basilius during the Panathenaea at the Beginning of Spring182 [1] “Hail, dear light, who in your smile display such beauty of face!” Having taken a song from lyric, I shall sing it to you at your arrival. I 180. Achilles gets his arms from Peleus: Hom. Il. 17.194–97. Himerius rejects the story that Achilles had to be fetched from the island of Scyros to Troy after Thetis had hidden him there, disguised as a girl among the daughters of King Lycomedes, to prevent him from losing his life in war (Apollod. Bibl. 3.13.8; Hygin. Fab. 96; Philostr. min. Imag. 1). Philostratus (Her. 45.8) also rejects the tradition that Achilles was hidden away on Scyros (cf. Paus. 1.22.6). Eustathius cites Himerius’s version with approval (on Il. 1.1, vol. 1, p. 23 van der Valk). Chiron had educated Achilles in Thessaly. “played his lyre and sang” (luvran ejkivnei kai; h/\de) : In Pap. Osl. inv. no. 1478 there were originally some additional words after luvran. “with a golden Justice . . . and fostered”: cf. Them. Orat. 25.310d, with n. 3 in Penella, Private Orations, 139. “the assessors of your father”: In Pap. Osl. inv. no. 1478 there apparently is a sigma right before the word parevdrouˇ, and the editors Eitrem and Amundsen give the restoration ta;ˇ tou¸ patro;]ˇ par [ev ]dr[ou]ˇ. I adopt this reading over Colonna’s ta;ˇ tou¸ patro;ˇ ew¸ n parevdrouˇ, “the assessors of the father of the gods.” See also the emendation of èevienko (in Synthronon, 41), who, however, is unaware of Eitrem and Amundsen. Basilius’s father “sends” his son to the Greeks, just as Peleus sent Achilles. “to Zeus’s daughter” etc.: In Pap. Osl. inv. no. 1478 the text originally had more in it between Diovˇ and e[rnoˇ than survives in codex R, including the phrase dokei¸ n Eu[ion. The editors suggest a restoration that would give the following: “They first led you to Zeus’s daughter, so handsome that you seemed to be Euios [Dionysus] himself [see section 6 above], and they [now] proudly” etc. 181. “But . . . poets” etc.: Dübner’s assumption of a lacuna here is confirmed in Pap. Osl. inv. no. 1478. The word “poets” (po[ih]tai¸ ˇ) is retrieved from the papyrus. The papyrus has ejmo;n novmon (“my melody”) instead of codex R’s eJo;n novmon, which Dübner had emended to pezovn (“prose”). (Cf. Him. Orat. 48.5.) Pap. Osl. ends after “shall do so again” with the word ejavn and then breaks off, so we have lost some text at the very end. For Colonna’s comments on the editors’ publication of Pap. Osl. inv. no. 1478, see Boll Class 9 (1961): 33–36. 182. The text of this oration agrees with the title in putting this Panathenaic festival in the spring. It will not do to assume that Himerius, who was an eyewitness and composed this oration in conjunction with the festival, has erred about the time. The problem is that, unless one wants to argue for a regular spring date for Panathenaea in late antiquity

254

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

would have gladly persuaded my words to become lyrical and poetic, so that I could say something about you that has a youthful verve to it, as Simonides or Pindar did about Dionysus and Apollo. But my [prosaic] words are proud and hold their heads up high; they frolic without the restraint and beyond the confines of meter. So I made a little request of poetry, to give me a song of Teos (for I love this Muse), something from the stores of Anacreon. I come to you bearing this hymn, and I have added something to the song myself: “O light of the Greeks, of us who dwell on the sacred plain of Pallas [Athena] and in the groves of the Muses!” [2] For you persuade me now to speak and sing.183 You appeared to us, yes, you appeared as Homer [Il. 7.4–6] says a fair wind comes to exhausted sailors, or just as the evening star is likely to appear to those about to dance in honor of Aphrodite. People who are worn out as [those sailors were] yearn for a messenger of peace; people who are fleeing from storms and clouds desire to see the bright sun.184 [3] Now, my boys, spring has really come. Now I feel that season in the air. Now the nightingales’ songs seem to me to be a joyful ode, not a lament; and I agree with those who say that the birds are striking up a song in praise of the gods, not for the boy [Itys]. I leave that Thracian myth to the Attic swallows. I am convinced that they, along with the nightingales, are also striking up a vernal song, not a mournful ode. [4] Now the waters of the Ilissus are ample and clear, and perhaps the river is again portending the mysteries of Deo. If swans ever made song with the Zephyr around the banks of the Ilissus, as they do at the Cayster and the Hebrus, they will fill these banks with their music now more than before. And even if a person never saw these birds at the river [Ilissus]

(note esp. Procl. In Plat. Tim. 21a [vol. 1, pp. 84–85 Diehl], with Festugière, Proclus, Commentaire, 121 n. 2; see also [Verg.] Ciris 21–26, with Lyne’s comment on l. 25), one expects the festival to occur late in the month of Hecatombaion, which is in summer. (For coordination of the Athenian calendar with the seasons, see Samuel, Greek and Roman Chronology, 57, 64.) Leopold suggests that this particular Panathenaea was shifted from summer to spring to accommodate Basilius, who perhaps “wished to combine a celebration of the Panathenaea, under his patronage, with initiation into the Lesser Mysteries, which customarily took place in early spring” (AncW 12 [1985]: 121–24). 183. The “song” with which Himerius begins is a quotation from Anacreon (no. 380 in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 2: 70), which he elaborates on at the end of the paragraph. “Simonides . . . Apollo”: cf. Orat. 46.6, where Himerius thinks of Sappho, Pindar, and “poets inspired by the Muses” celebrating Apollo and Dionysus. “you persuade”: I read Dübner’s conjecture peiv qeiˇ for the manuscripts’ peisqeivˇ. 184. Basilius is explicitly compared to the evening star in section 17. “storms and clouds”: I am not inclined to see a reference to Christian persecution of pagans here (pace Völker ad loc.).

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

255

on a previous occasion, he is predicting that their music will [now] come to Attic meadows.185 [5] Who of you has seen how the very earth is blooming and has sprouted? Crops appear before their season for you, [Basilius], and show their mature spikes, when even their vernal [spikelet] flowers seemed wondrous to those who saw them. The earth is crowned and adorned, not with the anemone, violets, and the rest, but with the gifts of Dionysus and the gleaming wreath of Deo,186 as if, it seems to me, the gods are giving these gifts to the Greeks because of you, [Basilius]. [6] When the Lydians celebrate Dionysus beside the golden river— Lydian tradition refers to the Pactolus as “golden”—they are maddened by the god and break into dance. This celebration occurs when the sun, which is responsible for the changes of season, brings spring to them. This is marked neither by the songs of birds, which are numerous and sing sweetly in groves, nor by meadows turning green with sweet and delicate vegetation. No, it is when Dionysus has left Nysa and the Ethiopians for the Lydians and has come in revelry to Mt. Tmolus and to the Pactolus, it is when the Lydians see that the Bacchae have been incited to begin their leaping that they regard spring as arriving and welcome the season along with the god.187 So Dionysus brings spring and his Bacchic revelries to the Lydians, but you bring them to us and to eloquence. You madden not bacchants and Satyrs, but priests of the Muses and of Hermes. You give yourself to us to address and hail. You are a great signal to us to form a chorus presided over by the Muses. We hail you instead of shouting “euoi.”188 [7] Let no one of you be amazed if eloquence wishes to compare this man to gods. I do not agree that Homer may compare Agamemnon, king of the Achaeans, to three gods [Il. 2.478–79], whereas I am not permit-

185. Procne killed her son Itys and served him up at table to her unfaithful husband, Tereus. She was subsequently transformed into a nightingale, who in her cry laments her son’s death. Tereus was Thracian. See Apollod. Bibl. 3.14.8; Aesch. Agam. 1142–45; Soph. Elec. 147–49; Thuc. 2.29; Strabo 9.3.13 [423]. The Ilissus is in Attica. Deo is Demeter. The name was corrupted in the manuscripts and has had to be conjecturally restored both here and in section 5. For the Zephyr’s (the west wind’s) role in swans’ song, see my note on Him. Orat. 63.3. 186. I.e., grapevines and cereals. 187. For the gold of the Pactolus, see J. Keil, “Paktolos,” RE 18, 2 (1942): 2439. It flows down from Mt. Tmolus. “Nysa and the Ethiopians”: Herodotus (2.146; cf. 3.97) puts Nysa, where Dionysus was reared (Diod. Sic. 3.64.5–6), in Ethiopia; but others put the city elsewhere (O. Stein, “Nysa 12,” RE 17, 2 [1937]: 1640). 188. Hermes: the god of eloquence. “euoi”: a Bacchic cry.

256

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

ted to do the same. On the contrary, who would not rightly find fault with me if I do not wax poetic and stretch the truth, especially since I can say more in the case of this man than Homer has said about Agamemnon? [8] O friend of the gods, fit to be compared to the gods! I think that perhaps it is fitting for you, because of your countenance, to be compared to Zeus with a Homeric quotation, for a Homerid would surely say of you that your eyes make you “like unto Zeus who hurls the thunderbolt” [Hom. Il. 2.478]. But it is even more fitting, I think, to compare you to Zeus because of the beautiful qualities of your soul. For “no [word] of yours goes unfulfilled once you nod assent to it” [cf. Il. 1.527]— and this was said in praise of Zeus. No person will ever boast that he employed deception in describing you, not even if he should say that he possesses Homer’s kestos, to which poetry [the Iliad] says that Zeus himself yielded.189 [9] Apollo too is a friend to you and therefore, I think, like you. He is the leader of the Muses and organizes choruses of the Muses on Mt. Helicon in Boeotia. (There too the Muses make shepherds poets.)190 This is the very thing that links you to the god, for you have made Attica a workshop of the Muses’ activity (mousikh¸ ˇ), just as Apollo has done to Helicon. And you order me to engage in the Muses’ activity, giving me the signal yourself, just as the god gives it to the Muses, the maiden [daughters] of Zeus. [10] Greeks honor Poseidon the horse-god and sacrifice to him at the Isthmus [of Corinth], showing him as a charioteer even in statues. Would someone other than you be rightly compared to this god? Would a person who calls you a student of the art mastered by this god be wrong in so designating you? How could it not be that Poseidon, the teacher of horsemanship, belongs more to you than to the young man of Pylos? The latter, carried along slowly by his horses, shamed the god’s art; but you, it seems to me, would make Bucephalas himself and Pegasus and the immortal team of Achilles submit to the curb-chain and the whip. [11] Now Homer in his verse [Il. 3.237, Od. 11.300] lauds Castor, the son of Zeus, for his excellence in horsemanship; he bestows this skill by itself on him, as though, I think, it alone is enough to honor even Castor, son of Zeus.

189. For the kestos, associated with allurement, see Him. Orat. 41.7, with my note. When Hera wants to lure Zeus to bed and then to sleep—which she does—she equips herself with the kestos (Hom. Il. 14.214–23). 190. Cf. Him. Orat. 66.5.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

257

A horse made Bellerophon the Ephyraean a worthy subject of song and music, a horse made Darius king in Persia, and a horse made Alexander great among the Macedonians. But what caused great kings to be praised are mere playthings, I think, to you.191 [12] I want to tell you a local story about this city and the festival to which you come. It is very sweet and admirable not only to see the Panathenaea, but also to say something about it in the midst of the Greeks, whenever the Athenians in the course of this festival carry the sacred trireme in procession in honor of their goddess. The ship sets out directly from the gates [the Dipylon], as if from a calm harbor. Moving from there as if on a waveless sea, it is carried through the middle of the straight and level course (drovmou) that descends and divides the porticoes stretching out on either side of it. In those porticoes Athenians and others gather to do their buying and selling. [13] The crew of the ship consists of priests and priestesses, all of them eupatrids, crowned with golden or floral wreaths. The ship, upraised and lofty, as if having waves underneath her, moves on wheels, which are fitted with many axles that run straight under the vessel. These wheels bring her, without hindrance, to the hill of Pallas [the Acropolis], from where, I think, the goddess watches the festival and the whole festal period. [14] The ship’s cables will be loosened by a song that the sacred chorus of Athenians sing as they summon the wind to the vessel, asking it to be present and to fly along with the sacred ship. The wind, aware, I suppose, of the song of Ceos that Simonides sang to it after [singing to] the sea, immediately follows upon the Athenians’ songs; it blows strongly and favorably at the stern, driving the bark forward with its blast.192

191. Basilius was skilled in horsemanship. “the young man of Pylos”: Nestor’s son Antilochus, taught horsemanship by Zeus and Poseidon. In the chariot race of Iliad 23, he “shamed the god’s art” by driving recklessly and relying on guile (Il. 23.307–8, 425ff., 576ff.). His horses were “the slowest” (23.310). Bucephalas: Alexander the Great’s horse (Arr. Anab. 5.19.4–6). Pegasus: the winged horse of myth. Achilles’ team: Hom. Il. 16.145–54, 23.276–78. Bellerophon: “Ephyraean” means “Corinthian.” His deeds were accomplished with the help of the horse Pegasus (Pind. Ol. 13.86–90). The neighing of Darius’s horse was a sign that the throne belonged to him (Hdt. 3.85–87). 192. For the course of the Panathenaic procession (the Panathenaic Way), see Travlos, Pictorial Dictionary, 422–23. For the Panathenaic festival and Way in the fourth century, Frantz, Late Antiquity, 23–24, 26–28. “eupatrids”: “the religiously active Athenian upper class” (Figueira, Hesperia 53 [1984]: 457–58). “The ship’s cables” etc.: Simonides no. 535 in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 3: 426; cf. Him. Orat. 12.32. For the wind blowing the Panathenaic ship along, cf. [Verg.] Ciris 25–26. “sang to it after [singing to] the sea”: aujtw/¸ prosh¸/se meta; th;n qavlattan. My suggestion for the problematic brachylogic prepositional phrase. See Molyneux, Simonides, 159 with n. 56. “After his sea voyage” is also possible.

258

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

[15] They say that, when the sun drives its horses to the middle of the sky and causes summer to come, the Egyptian river Nile pours over the land of the Egyptians and conceals their fields with its floodwaters; it turns Egypt into a navigable sea and a land traversed by boats. [16] But the sacred trireme of the maiden [goddess Athena] moves through dry land without need of any incredible Nile flooding. Rather, clearly resounding breezes blowing from Attic pipes send this vessel forth. The greatest marvel, though, is the evening star itself ( E { speroˇ) shining forth along with the sun, the only star appearing along with it in broad daylight and lighting a torch with its father [the sun] over the ship. [17] You too have appeared to us, “of all stars the most beautiful” [Sappho frag. 104b Campbell]. For the Athenians call you Hesperus. You brought a fortunate festal period to the Greeks, and with auspicious signs you promise us a prosperous future. That is what this populace has said, and I am persuaded by their words.193 [cods. R and A; a short passage also in Exc. Neapol.] 48. To Hermogenes, The Proconsul of Greece [1] The Greeks once longed for Philoctetes after he was attacked by disease, and they offered many prayers to the gods [to get him back]. After his illness abated, he took up his arrows, desiring to find out if he could again hit his targets. It was Odysseus who, being with that famous Philoctetes, urged him on into combat and signaled him to start exercising his skill—that Odysseus who was the foundation for almost the whole of Homer’s poem [i.e., the Odyssey] and let himself be hymned in music and song. For Homer does not give much attention to Achilles, son of Thetis, in his poem [the Iliad], describing [only] his battle at the river Scamander and his run [around Troy]. But, as for Odysseus, he appears everywhere in Homer’s epic verse; the poet is overwhelmed as he exerts so much effort on Odysseus. So the Greeks considered Odysseus responsible for Philoctetes’ victory and for what he accomplished at Troy through his skill with the bow.194 193. On the flooding of the Nile, cf. Him. Orat. 48.8–9. “lighting a torch with its father”: as Basilius “lights a torch” with his father (cf. Him. Orat. 46.8). “you brought a fortunate festal period to the Greeks”: i.e., his governorship, appropriately called a festal period during the Panathenaea. 194. Philoctetes had been abandoned on Lemnos because of a snakebite while the Greeks were sailing to Troy. He came back to Troy at the end of the Trojan War and mortally

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

259

[2] But you, my friend, order me to “shoot” for the Greeks by taking up the Muses’ songs rather than Heracles’ bow and arrows. Behold how I obey you in this too. If I also played my lyre in the past, when I yearned to address in the midst of the Greeks, I now wish [first] to bring an accusation against the Attic Erotes with the support of all of you, my boys, because they have stifled [my] song for so long and have allowed this man to be cherished [exclusively] by his Ephyraean lovers. [3] Oh, how could I explain how silently we passed through the winter? The ridges of Mt. Hymettus were getting white, the Pleiades were quickly setting. The sun no longer wished to burn brightly; it was a gentle and soft sunlight that summoned the Muses to come from Mt. Helicon. And they came and organized the usual choruses in Attic meadows. The winter, now in full force, had taken hold of all the land. Bands of young men danced around their leaders, and the shepherds’ pipes were ready for Attic song, eager to sound their song for the leader of the Muses [i.e., Hermogenes].195 But that leader himself, whom the Attic people summoned and the maiden goddess [Athena] yearned for, greeted the Attic Muses from afar. So how shall I not find fault with the Attic Erotes for this? [4] What I would need now are songs of Teos, what I would need now is Anacreon’s lyre. Whenever he was scorned by a boy he loved, he knew how to use that lyre against the Erotes themselves. I would have used his very words against them: “You are insolent and wicked, and you don’t know whom you should shoot your arrows at!” Perhaps I would also have uttered against the Erotes the threat that Anacreon utters against them. He was once in love with a beautiful young man. When he saw that the young man was not paying much attention to him, he tuned his wounded Paris. For details, see Soph. Philoct.; Dio Chrys. 35 (52); Hygin. Fab. 102; Apollod. Epit. 5.8. For discussion of this paragraph, see Greco in Mnemosynon, 305ff. “signaled him . . . skill” (didou;ˇ th¸ ˇ tevcnhˇ to; suvnqhma): Greco (306) translates “[Odisseo] dava prova di destrezza.” “the whole of Homer’s poem”: or “the whole of Homer’s poetry.” “let himself be hymned”: Taking up a suggestion of Dübner’s, I emend the transmitted aujthvn (“Homer’s poetry”) to auJtovn (“himself”). “describing . . . his run”: Himerius is alluding to events of Iliad 21 and 22. Himerius’s statement is unsatisfactory, especially if I rightly understand “only” after “describing.” Of course, the very positive picture of Odysseus in all the details of this paragraph is needed to make him a panegyrically appropriate figure to whom Hermogenes may be compared (next paragraph). 195. “But you, my friend” etc.: Hermogenes urges Himerius to declaim, just as Odysseus had urged Philoctetes to use his bow at Troy. “to ‘shoot’ for the Greeks”: For the arrows of eloquence, cf. Pind. Isth. 2.3; Aesch. Suppl. 446; Lucian Heracl. 8. “Heracles’ bow and arrows”: Philoctetes possessed them (see the ancient sources on Philoctetes cited in the previous note). “Ephyraean”: Corinthian. Corinth was the seat of the proconsul. Pleiades: Their setting announces the coming of winter (Verg. Georg. 4.234–35; Plin. HN 18.10 [49]). “the leader of the Muses” (tw¸/ Moushgevth/): The title normally belongs to Apollo (Pl. Laws 2.653d; Diod. Sic. 1.18.4; Him. Orat. 47.9, 60.3).

260

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

lyre and issued a threat to the Erotes, telling them that, if they did not immediately wound the young man for him, he would no longer strike up a song in praise of them.196 [5] Having been in that situation, I congratulate poetry if it is allowed so much that it can even utter a serious and terrible threat against the Erotes themselves. As for me, the art of rhetoric wrongs me in not having taught me to play the lyra or the barbitos, but only to dance this prose dance for the Muses.197 So I shall let poets be frenzied and shall find fault with the leader of the Muses in my own way. [6] Tell me, then, [Hermogenes], why do you disdain the concerns of the Muses so much? Why have you neglected Attic theaters so much, you sprout and offspring of the Muses? Aren’t we actually obligated under your supervision to engage in the activities the Muses oversee? Didn’t God bring you to the Greeks so that eloquence would once again have its ancient vigor? Or should those who are to celebrate the rites of Justice and of Right (Themis) be initiated by you every day and in every season of the year, as you [readily] address them and make your disclosures to them, while the spokesmen of Hermes and of the Muses have access to you only after a long and difficult wait? When would we have leaped about in the Muses’ precinct during the winter with more pleasure than after having received the nod from you, whom it would not be a mistake to call the king of our art?198 When would we have given a more flowery and noble display of eloquence than with you as a witness to our efforts? [7] Or do you think that Satyrs and Bacchae in Lydia refuse to shout out in honor of Dionysus or to become frenzied until spring comes and the god appears and signals to them that the frenzy may commence, whereas we did not greatly yearn for the one who has made the season more manifest to us?199 How brash are they who have dared to practice the art of eloquence during the winter before your visit! Whom did they put in charge of cultural affairs before engaging in their art? Even the

196. This paragraph is Anacreon no. 445 in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 2: 112. Anacreon was a native of Teos. Those whom the Erotes shot would yield to love. 197. Lyra here is not used generically but refers to a specific type of lyre, the chelyslyra. For it and the stringed barbitos, see Maas and Snyder, Stringed Instruments, 79ff., 113ff. 198. “of Justice and of Right (Themis) . . . of Hermes and of the Muses”: Himerius alludes to the governor’s roles as judge and as patron of culture. Hermes logios is patron of eloquence. “the king of our art”: For the title “king of eloquence,” see Penella, Greek Philosophers, 89; id., Private Orations, 5. 199. Cf. Him. Orat. 47.6. Hermogenes has made spring, or summer (see note 201 below), more manifest by his arrival.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

261

swan by the river Cayster is silent if any wind other than the Zephyr has blown. Even if other birds sing frequently, the swan waits for the Zephyr, wishing to make its music only under that wind.200 [8] But now it is time for me to dismiss my charge. I know what was in the mind of the leader of the Muses [i.e., Hermogenes] and why he preferred this season for his visit. Poetry recently taught me [to withdraw my charge], and so, having taken up the following story, I want to sing a palinode and speak on behalf of the leader of the Muses before all of you. The Egyptians always long for the Egyptian river Nile, and, thanks to those who revealed religious truths to them, they pray that the river’s waters will come to them from Ethiopia. Now the Nile also longs for Egypt in all seasons of the year, because Egypt is a wise and divinely inspired land; and the river is gladly receptive to the Egyptians’ prayers. But when the Egyptians, having made sacrifice in honor of Demeter, work at the threshing-floor, then the Nile comes pouring down from Ethiopia with full waters and suddenly turns the whole of Egypt into a sea.201 [9] When that happens, you can see, yes, you can really see great wonders in that land. On a single plot of land you will see the same man playing the part of sailor and farmer; you will see cattle taken to pasture and, soon after, boats; you will suddenly see an island that was previously a city surrounded by dry land. It is then, they say, then that the whole of Egypt enjoys itself in dance and song. The usual vessels sail the Nile not merely on business, as they were just recently doing, but as if in procession in honor of the river because of the sea of water [they have been given]. The sailors on those vessels are extremely delighted, and they all dance. They carry cymbals instead of naval weapons. Even a very large ship can finally sail, one that was on dry land for a long time because it could not find a waterway big

200. For the swan and the Zephyr, see my note to Him. Orat. 63.3. 201. “this season” (cf. “the season” in section 7): Despite the reference to spring in section 7, Hermogenes may have come to Athens in the summer. His arrival there is about to be compared to the inundation of the Nile, which began at the summer solstice (Diod. Sic. 1.36.2), and to Apollo arriving at Delphi in midsummer. “why he preferred this season”: because the warmth and fecundity of spring-summer better fit his visit. “Poetry recently taught . . . my charge”: ejdivdaxev me tou¸to prwvhn ejf jhJmi¸ n hJ poivh siˇ. There are three difficulties here: What does tou¸to refer to, the withdrawal of Himerius’s charge or what was in Hermogenes’ mind? Does prwvhn mean “recently” or “some time ago” (for the latter, note LSJ, s.v. I, 2 and LSJ Rev. Suppl., s.v.)? And is ejf j hJmi¸ n corrupt? With reference to the last question, I agree with the editors that the phrase is corrupt, and have simply removed it from my translation. Himerius may be referring in this passage to a contemporary palinode in verse. Colonna’s clever emendation ajf j JImevraˇ for ejf j hJmi¸ n would give a reference to Stesichorus of Himera’s famous palinodes. Demeter: Demeter is Isis (Hdt. 2.156; Diod. Sic. 1.13.5). For the rising of the Nile at the time of her feast in Egypt, see Paus. 10.32.18.

262

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

enough for it to loosen its cables. When the Nile’s waters are at their peak, a ship of that size emerges from a marshy inlet and, with sails filled with every kind of wind, is borne on high over the waves.202 [10] How does this sound to you, my boys? Doesn’t it sound good because (among other reasons) it very suitably fits the present situation? Now I also want to tell you a story from Alcaeus, one that he sang in his lyric poetry when he composed a paean in honor of Apollo. I shall not tell you the story in Lesbian verse, since I am not a poet, but by breaking up the meter of the lyric poetry into prose.203 When Apollo was born, Zeus outfitted him with a gold headband and lyre. He also gave him a chariot to drive—it was pulled by swans— and sent him to Delphi to the Castalian waters to expound justice and law to the Greeks from there. But Apollo got on his chariot and ordered the swans to fly to the Hyperboreans. When Delphi heard of this, its people composed a paean and song [in Apollo’s honor] and stationed choruses of unmarried youths around the tripod. Then the city summoned the god to leave the Hyperboreans and come to Delphi. But Apollo delivered oracles among those people for a whole year. When he ordained that it was now time also for the Delphic tripods to resound, he again issued an order to the swans, this time to fly away from the Hyperboreans. [11] It was summer, the very middle of summer, when Alcaeus led Apollo away from the Hyperboreans. So, with summer beaming forth and Apollo arriving in Delphi, the poet’s lyrics about the god took on something of the lushness of summer. Nightingales sing to the god, as birds are likely to sing in Alcaeus. Also swallows and cicadas sing, not reporting the fortune that was theirs among human beings, but making the god the subject of all their songs. The Castalian spring flows, as po202. For the inundated Nile as a “sea,” cf. Ael. Aristid. Orat. 36.122 Keil; Ach. Tatius 4.12; Aelian De animal. 10.43. Note Seneca’s description of the Nile’s inundation (Quaest. nat. 4A.2.11): “The plains lie hidden, the valleys are covered over, towns stand out like islands. In the interior of the country there is no communication except by boat. The less people see of their land the happier they are” (trans. T. Corcoran). Cf. Him. Orat. 47.15. For cities and villages coming to resemble islands, see also Diod. Sic. 1.36.8; Strabo 17.1.4 [789]. For the conflict in Egypt between river life and land life, Ael. Aristid. Orat. 36.123; Ach. Tatius 4.12; Amm. Marc. 22.15.12. For Egyptian recreation and celebration occasioned by the inundation, Diod. Sic. 1.36.10; Heliodor. Ethiop. 9.9. 203. “it . . . fits the present situation”: i.e., Hermogenes always longs for Athens, even though he is not always there, just as the Nile always longs for Egypt, even though it visits the land with its floodwaters only for a portion of the year. Athens always longs for Hermogenes and celebrates his arrival, just as Egypt longs for and celebrates the arrival of the Nile’s floodwaters. “I shall not tell . . . a poet”: Jacob compares Pl. Rep. 3.393d ( JEllhnikav 35 [1984]: 142).

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

263

etry puts it, with silvery waters, and the great Cephisus River surges up, swelling with its waves, in imitation of Homer’s Enipeus River. For, in the manner of Homer, Alcaeus uses every effort to portray even water as capable of sensing the arrival of gods.204 But don’t you think that my charge [against Hermogenes] has been adequately dismissed? I myself am certainly ready to cast my vote and to ask you all to vote as I do on the present matter. [12] I shall now address the leader of the Muses after first saying a few words about his soul, in order that you may see the man contained, as if in a mirror, in what I say about a divine and blessed soul. This is the nature of his divine and newly initiated soul: it always aims for the best and greatest pursuits. Once it attended on God, often beholding the plain of truth in heaven’s revolution and being filled with the spectacle of heaven’s wonders. Then it encountered misfortune: its wings fell off, and, clothed in a body, it had to accept life in this earthly zone. Yet even though it has descended for a while to a fortune quite the opposite of that which it had previously enjoyed, and despite having forgotten the wonders of heaven, it does not remain completely wingless here, nor does it spend its life here in ignorance. When it sees something good and beautiful on earth, it is stirred up and carried in memory to the things it once saw when it was at large in heaven itself with the gods. When moved by something here, it turns its attention to heavenly things, seeks after that region, and focuses on what [truly] exists. [13] To those who make trial of it, it displays the gentleness of a truly divine nature. It wants to exercise legal and political authority and never harms anyone, for it is never right for a divine nature to be the cause of any evil to human beings. This soul overcomes fears, has mastery over pleasures, and appears to be free of passion. It shapes its body, bringing it into conformity with its nature; what it seeks for it are dark eyes, a dignified face, and true symmetry of limbs, which wise men call beauty, so that, having put together a body

204. This paragraph is Alcaeus no. 307c in Campbell, Greek Lyric, 1: 354. Hermogenes eventually went from Corinth to Athens, just as Apollo went from the Hyperboreans to the people of Delphi, who yearned for him. “Alcaeus led Apollo away”: i.e., described him as leaving. “swallows and cicadas . . . human beings”: The swallows did not report, for example, that the swallow Philomela was once a woman (Conon, FGrH 26 F 1.31; Ach. Tatius 5.1–2; Apollod. Bibl. 3.14.8; CPG 1: 61–62), nor did the cicadas report that they were once men (Pl. Phaedr. 259b; Him. Orat. 10.6). Cephisus River: According to Pausanias (10.8.10), Alcaeus derived the water of the Castalian spring at Delphi from the Cephisus. This gives special point to the reference to the Cephisus here. The “swelling” Enipeus: cf. Hom. Od. 11.243.

264

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

that is beautiful and noble on both sides, it may let that body show itself forth to the human race as the image of a god.205 [14] See how my oration depicts the man for all of you; this image that it forms on its own is more accurate than one made from any wax and colors. If all the plastic arts that sought to replicate the human body were still in high repute today, I would have proposed that those artisans use their hands to compete in representing you, [Hermogenes]. Didn’t the Alexander fashioned by Lysippus bring the latter fame and reputation, so much so that even poetry expressed great admiration for his handiwork? Don’t you hear the epigram about the statue of Alexander, “Lysippus, sculptor of Sicyon, skillful hand” [cf. Anth. Plan. 119.1], and all the rest that the poet wrote about that craftsman? [15] Wouldn’t someone who had depicted you [in stone] for the Greeks have understandably felt superior to other artisans, because he would have portrayed a person who is a philosopher as well as a strategos? But such an artisan would not have had any poetry capable of honoring his work. Not true, for wouldn’t all poetry, both lyric and other poetry, have made your image its subject? I would have erected such a statue in Attic precincts next to the maiden goddess [Athena] if all the Greeks agreed to this, for you have honored wisdom and temperance. But if they disagreed about the erection of the statue, I would have taken you to Delphi and set you up beside the tripod of the Seven Sages, because your mind belongs with theirs and it would have been appropriate for your statue to be seen in the Pythian god’s dwelling place by those who come there during public festivals.206 [16] But now that there is no Lysippus nor any other living person 205. Section 12 is heavily influenced by Pl. Phaedr. 248a–51b. “Newly initiated,” applied to Hermogenes’ soul, derives from that passage; it refers to the heavenly vision freshly experienced by his soul before his incarnation. Himerius would doubtless say that Hermogenes got a good view of the heavenly realities and did not forget them through moral corruption on earth (Pl. Phaedr. 250b–51a). Cf. Him. Orat. 32.14. “It shapes its body”: cf. Panegyr. lat. 2.6.3 Mynors: “whether that divine soul, before entering a body, first marks out a home worthy of it, or whether, when it has entered a body, it molds its habitation according to its image, or whether one develops from the other” (trans. C. Nixon and B. Rodgers). “dark eyes”: Colonna’s text here is o[mma mev, and he compares the dark eyes of the part of the soul that has the form of a good horse in Pl. Phaedr. 253d. Another possible reconstruction of the text, suggested by Wernsdorff, would be o[mma mev, “big eyes.” Himerius may have something from the science of physiognomy in mind rather than from Plato. “symmetry of limbs”: For the importance of symmetry or proportionality in physiognomy, see Evans, Physiognomics, 9, 53, 58, 73. 206. “any wax and colors”: Himerius is alluding to encaustic painting. “strategos”: Meaning “general” with reference to Alexander, it probably stands for strathgo;ˇ ajnquvpatoˇ, i.e., “proconsul,” with reference to Hermogenes. For the tripod of the Seven Sages, see Plut. Solon 4; Diog. Laert. 1.27.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

265

who can display the skill worthy of the model before us, new arts busy themselves with you, and select individuals from all parts of the world minister to those arts. These individuals judge that their offerings are suitable to Attic audiences and therefore decide to dedicate them there. I myself have been eager to portray you verbally, with my own paints, and no passage of time will ever insolently obliterate that portrait. [17] All right, then, I shall speak, going through each one of your qualities separately. I don’t want some quibbler to accuse me, because of my failure to cite a sufficient number of true grounds for praise, of pushing my oration beyond what the facts allow. On the other hand, I shall limit my remarks in accordance with what time and proportionality allow. Of course I wanted free rein in speaking, like a horse that has been let loose and got onto a low-lying plain—the free rein that is reasonably required by one who is eager to sing to the human race the praises of a man such as this one. But guarding against another charge that I would incur if I indulged this urge,207 I shall once again postpone speaking at length; on this occasion I shall allow my oration to address only those matters it initially set out to address. [18] When it was in the hands of others to guide him and to direct his pursuits, [Hermogenes] learned to study and to behave in accordance with his guides’ wishes and with what seemed best [to them], for his philosophical nature was compliant. Finding himself in the imperial court at an early age, he was deemed worthy of so much trust that he alone was regarded as a worthy keeper of secrets. He both consulted the gods about those secret matters and conveyed their utterances to the person who had sent him [to them]. He was an expounder of the best laws and customs, always wishing to mollify the mind of the ruler, as they say that Pythagoras of Samos did when he was with Phalaris in Sicily. [19] For it is said that, as his tyranny got stronger, Phalaris desired to associate with Pythagoras. The latter was summoned and came, thinking that, if he was with Phalaris, he might make him a better ruler of his subjects in the future. But Phalaris’s character was incorrigible and could not be changed. So when none of his proposals was acted on, Pythagoras quickly left Sicily. He gave up before either making the tyrant more benevolent or persuading him to make peace with his subjects. In contrast, this man of ours kept talking and reasoning so much that, as he told the ruler ancient stories and called his attention to passages from poetry and prose, 207. I.e., a charge other than “failure to cite a sufficient number of true grounds for praise,” viz. the charge of speaking too long.

266

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

he made the regime milder. For he was already fond of learning before becoming versed in philosophy.208 [20] When he became a man and reached full adulthood—at a time when wisdom shows us, by the kind of life men choose, who are possessed of it—he said good-bye to and walked away from those offices and positions of power. He became a lover of the virtue and knowledge by which the soul is nurtured and, thus fostered and lifted up, goes lightly on its upward journey. He was so distinguished in virtue and learning that, if anyone who still inhabits a body has ever investigated the upper region and latched on to the wonders there through the helmsman of the soul, I am quite convinced that it is he. [21] I hear that Plato, the follower of Socrates, trained in wrestling and bestowed care upon his body early in life.209 Then, as he got older and heard Socrates conversing with young men, he became so enamored of philosophy that he turned away from his early pursuits and, after associating with Socrates, became a font and source of philosophy for subsequent generations. Precisely such a love of philosophy also has hold of this man [whom we are praising]; for, possessed by some god, and like someone who has touched the flower of the greatest mysteries, no amount of initiation in them has been able to fill him up. [22] The first thing he did was to give his fullest attention to his instruments,210 just like a good craftsman who feels that he is best executing each of his undertakings when none of the instruments required for the completion of a proposed piece of workmanship is missing. Then he learned how to argue, to overpower the sophistical, and to prevail over mere babblers. He combined skillful arrangement with noble words, and it is only the person with an accurate knowledge of how to arrange words who is naturally disposed and said to be a skilled rhetor or an in-

208. For the imperial court mentioned here, see p. 209 above. “He both consulted . . . had sent him”: I understand ejcrhmavtizen . . . toi¸ ˇ qeoi¸ ˇ, “he . . . consulted the gods,” literally. I am not comfortable with Barnes’s assertion that “the generalizing plural . . . ‘the gods’ means . . . ‘a deified emperor’—and has nothing to do with the consultation of oracles” (CP 82 [1987]: 219). Barnes thinks that “the gods” means Constantius, dead at the time this oration was delivered, and that Himerius means that Hermogenes consulted emperor Constantius as an emissary from Caesar Gallus, to whose court he believes Himerius is alluding in section 18 (see p. 209 above). For Pythagoras and Phalaris, see Ep. Phalar. 23 and 74; Iambl. Vita Pyth. 32 [215–21]. Iamblichus highlights Pythagoras’s courage in the face of the threat of being killed by Phalaris and represents the philosopher as cooperating with Apollo’s oracles in bringing about Phalaris’s overthrow. “fond of learning” (filomaqhvˇ): i.e., versed in literature. 209. For Plato’s early interest in wrestling, cf. Him. Orat. 35 [28], with my note 49. 210. I.e., the instruments (o[rgana) of logic.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

267

spired poet. In a word, having acquired all these skills, he entrusted them to his mind. [23] With his instruments gathered together, he now proceeded to consider substantive issues. The whole of philosophy is divided into three parts, one concerned with [human] actions, one with nature, and one that investigates and studies supercelestial reality. Our man did not consider one part, ignore another, and slight another as useless to the individual [who wants to be] happy. Rather he gave himself to and mastered all the parts of philosophy more thoroughly than anyone who had ever put a very high value on mastering only one part. He gave special honor to the views of Plato and Aristotle and worked hard on their philosophies, going directly to their writings. He knows the philosophy of Stoics like Zeno, Cleanthes, Chrysippus, and all those who, having put order into irrational human behavior through reason, passed their philosophy on from one person to another. [24] He also knows the views held in common by Epicurus and Democritus and how those men visualized nature. He understands all the Academies as well as the school of thought that traveled from the Lyceum to Libya and Cyrene. He also investigated the tropes of Pyrrho (and the strife that arose from them among all men), although he regarded them not as an important subject of study, but as a side dish of the rest of philosophy.211 [25] Having become skilled in astronomy and geography, he knows what others have written [on these subjects]. But he wished to learn about these matters through personal experience and precisely; he wanted to understand what is asserted in books by seeing for himself the phenomena they discuss. So this man traveled around most of the earth, imitating Plato. For Plato, after being admonished by Socrates, went to Egypt and to the expounders of the gods’ will there. He wanted to track down

211. “all those who, having put” etc.: i.e., all the Stoics. “from one person to another”: I would emend the manuscript’s ejx eJtevraˇ eijˇ eJtevran to ejx eJtevrou eijˇ e{teron. Cleanthes succeeded Zeno, and Chrysippus succeeded Cleanthes. “the views . . . Democritus”: ta;ˇ koina;ˇ . . . dovxaˇ. For the significant influence of Democritus on Epicurus, see Cic. De nat. deorum 1.26 [73], with Pease’s comments; Plut. Adv. Colot. 3.1108e–f; Diog. Laert. 10.4. “all the Academies”: i.e., Old, Middle, and New. Otherwise understand, from the previous sentence, dovxaˇ after aJpavsaˇ in the phrase ta;ˇ Akadhmiv j aˇ aJpavsaˇ (“all the opinions of the Academy”). “the school of thought . . . Cyrene”: the Cyrenaic school, founded by Aristippus. Libuvhˇ is an emendation of the manuscript’s Likuvhˇ (see Wernsdorff ). “Lyceum” alludes to Aristippus’s teacher, Socrates (Diog. Laert. 2.65; Him. Orat. 35 [9], with my note 48; 39.11, with my note). For Skeptic “tropes,” see Patrick, Greek Sceptics, 220–31, 248–52, 309–13; Stough, Greek Skepticism, 67–97, 99–102. On Hermogenes’ broad study of various philosophical schools, cf. my comments in Private Orations, 11.

268

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

among them more than what he had learned in Attica. He even went to Sicily and to those among whom Pythagoras’s philosophy was still being kept alive after his death.212 [26] And I hear the following story about Dionysus. The myths say that, before becoming a god, when he was offering sacrifices but desired to extend his knowledge beyond the realm of sacrifice, Dionysus rushed off to Egypt and the Nile and then to the Indians, Ethiopians, and all other men in his curiosity about the workings of nature. He then came to the Greeks, all of whom were pleased to see him, and received honors from them. Wanting the Athenians to be the first to receive his gifts and wares, he came to Athens. The Athenians, who happened to be celebrating a festival at that time, held a public festival in Dionysus’s honor and voted henceforth to organize a procession in honor of Dionysus as a god. [27] Such was the intention of [Hermogenes’] travels;213 and if you hear him telling about the peoples and cities he visited, you would marvel at how he remembers those travels and how much pleasure he got from them. The drops of honey, so to speak, that fall from his words truly fill all his hearers with sweet pleasure. I used to get such delight from the stories in Herodotus, but I have now come to regard Herodotus as a mere child when compared to this man’s charm. Writers like Hellanicus and Duris and the work of the man from Halicarnassus [i.e., Herodotus] and of all who exerted themselves to describe in words the inhabited earth are henceforth insignificant compared to those charms by which [Hermogenes] so enchants his listeners. [28] Once he desired to be likened to God, and aware that the divine cares for human nature, he exercised political virtue, taking on the Greek and Latin languages as bodyguards, I think, to assist him in his state of mind. Now there is a city [Constantinople] at the mouth of the Euxine [Black] Sea, on the left as you sail into that sea and at the very end of Europe. It is a great and fortunate city, at which a small, narrow strait of the sea [i.e., the Bosporus] divides the continents by its flow, like a boundary stone set midway between them. Going there, [Hermogenes] gave himself to a most lawful emperor with a noble nature, at whose side he could make use of his arsenal of knowledge. [29] The emperor gladly welcomed him and immediately made him a partner in his work, just as Heracles did to Theseus, Cyrus to Clearchus, Hieron to Simonides, and Alcibiades to Socrates. He trusted him in everything, looked to him, and marveled at him, regarding him as a sort of helmsman of his rule. So the 212. For Plato’s travels, see Strabo 17.1.29; Diog. Laert. 3.6, 18–23. 213. I.e., to broaden his knowledge.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

269

emperor provided the name for the regime, but [Hermogenes] did the work. This is how it was in the case of the all-wise Themistocles. He was appointed co-general with Eurybiades. When the Greek force set out against the Persians, he formally yielded the naval command to the Laconian, but in the engagement he showed that it was he who was actually commanding the fleet for the Greeks.214 [30] What laws that were not humane were ventured through [Hermogenes’] agency? What people in [legal] trouble did not escape from their troubles through his agency? Who, worthy of office, did not obtain an office through his agency? Who in need of something did not flee to him? Standing as he did between the emperor and his subjects, he served the needs of the latter before their emperor and worked to implement the commands of the former among his subjects. So too the myths say that Hermes was a messenger of Zeus and learned and announced what was in Zeus’s mind to gods and men. [31] But now that God and time have established this man as ruler in the greatest office on earth—for the belief is well established that the race of Greeks is the greatest and best under the sun—take part with me here, Greeks, in the panegyric from this point on yourselves. We, an Attic and ancient people, shall be first in putting together a panegyric jointly and in striking up together a harmonious dance, so to speak, around the seat of Justice.215 I shall give the sign to begin the dance. [32] A calm has possession of all the subjects [of this province], as if they have gone from a mighty wave and a storm to a waveless haven. There is no act of arrogance here, no mention of the word. Reason guides everything and has no need of the sword. I know that shepherds who are excellent at tending sheep do not use the crook much, but shepherd their animals with the pipe. Now, though, we have really come to know that Homeric ruler whom Homer, in his desire to liken him to something in light of his love of human beings, has honored with the title “father”: “he was as gentle as a father,” he says [Od. 2.47]. It is good, it is good

214. For the emperor referred to here, see p. 209 above. For the friendship of Heracles and Theseus, see, e.g., Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.35, 52 Lenz-Behr. For Clearchus’s support of the younger Cyrus, see Xen. Anab. 1 passim; Diod. Sic. 14.12–23 passim; Plut. Artaxerx. 6.1–5, 8.1–8. Simonides appears in Xenophon’s Hieron, giving political advice to the Sicilian tyrant, and in Cic. De nat. deorum 1.22 [60], being questioned by the tyrant on the nature of God. For their historical relationship, see Molyneux, Simonides, 224–33. Alcibiades, of course, was mentored by Socrates. For Themistocles and Eurybiades, see Diod. Sic. 11.12.4–6, 17, 59.1; Plut. Themist. 7.3–4, 11.2–6, 17.3; Ael. Aristid. Orat. 1.148, 3.242–43 Lenz-Behr. 215. I.e., around Hermogenes, who as proconsul administers justice.

270

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

to address you this way too, you who alone work on behalf of all, you who alone, for the sake of the Greeks, strain your eyes and mind and give them no rest. You are like an excellent helmsman who allows all the sailors to travel on the ship without having to work, while he alone stands at the helm and guides the vessel so that it is not troubled by waves. [33] The morning star has often led you to the shrine of Justice, and the evening star has often escorted you back from there, shining its pure light on your rites. Peoples and cities summon you, they beg you to come to them, and they congratulate the Athenians on their good fortune, but they are speechless before them in their victory. I myself have even persuaded Delian Apollo to leave his island and be with us, to be our ancestral god and tune his first lyre among all the Athenians. Because of you, eloquence is flourishing and is daring what it did not previously dare. [34] O you who are worthy to be sung of in every hymn and utterance, especially by me and in my orations! For you loved my rhetorical talent even when it was being shaped in swaddling clothes. You often predicted that it was absolutely certain that, when my talent reached maturity, it would shine out widely and greatly through the human race in its wondrousness. See if it is fulfilling your prophecy. I shall command it to be confident and to leap up. [35] Come now, eloquence of mine, take wing henceforth; abandon the lower regions and from now on aim for the skies! For the leader of the Muses [Apollo] gives you wings and shows you to the human race. He does not attach wings onto you as Daedalus did [to Icarus]. The story is that, when Icarus, the young man of Attica, was lifted up by those wings, he became confident that he would be able to fly over the ocean; but when he got near the sun, he was undone along with the wax and became, with his wings, nothing but a story for future generations. But your wings, [O eloquence of mine], were brought forth by the Muses in the gardens of Mnemosyne, and the Hours and Graces nourished them, drawing water for them from the springs of truth. Thus you rise up above the many and become weightless; you cannot be seen by unhallowed and wingless souls any more than they say that the Cimmerians could see the sun. So address your lover himself [i.e., Hermogenes] in accordance with your nature.216

216. For Icarus, see Ov. Met. 8.183–235; Apollod. Epit. 1.12–13. The Muses’ parents were Mnemosyne and Zeus (Hes. Theog. 52ff., 915ff.). The Cimmerians lived in perpetual darkness (Hom. Od. 11.13–19). “in accordance with your nature”: I have returned to Wernsdorff’s and Dübner’s emendation of the manuscript’s hJmetevran to uJmetevran.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials

271

[36] You came to me, [Hermogenes], as a sweet and gentle light, just as the morning star shines its light on the human race as herald of a spring day, just as the noontime sun stands before those who are weary of winter. I yearned to see you while you were still dancing along with swans by the eddies of the Ister [i.e., the Danube] in honor of the leader of the Muses [Apollo].217 I wanted to invent some device by which I could be lifted up on wings into the air and fly away from the Greeks and to the Ister. But you, my friend, anticipated my yearning; for you had to, you had to shine your light on all the Greeks, so great and beautiful a wonder you are. But I want to ask the gods themselves for a small favor on behalf of the Greeks. And first I call my own goddesses, the Muses, to my prayer. [37] O children of Zeus, come, come, you gold-winged Muses—it occurs to me to address you in a poetic manner—whether you are dancing with Apollo on Mt. Helicon or in Pieria and playing a sweet and divine song on the lyre, or playing with Castalian nymphs at Delphi and [the spring of ] Castalia, or flying through Attic meadows and making crowns for your leader [Apollo]. Come and listen to this prayer, which I say on behalf of the Greeks, and grant that this man guide the bands of young men for a very long time, so that [my] eloquence may pour a libation to him from a second and third mixing-bowl.218 [cod. R] 217. The swan is sacred to Apollo (Him. Orat. 74.5, with my note). For Hermogenes on the Danube, see p. 209 above. 218. “gold-winged Muses”: For the epithet (perhaps an allusion to Stesichorus), see Lazzeri, SRCG 5 (2002): 174–76. “from a second and third mixing-bowl”: i.e., on a second and third occasion.

chapter 8

Miscellaneous Remains

Presented here are what Colonna calls the Himerian fragments. One new fragment has surfaced since the publication of Colonna’s edition; it is added to the others here as fragment 17. I have prefaced the fragments with the few remains of Oration 37, which could find no home in any of the previous chapters. Most of the very short fragments are from Lopadiotes’ Lexicon (or the Lexicon Vindobonense), with the exception of fragment 2, which comes from the Homeric commentator Eustathius, the longer fragment 1, which is preserved in Photius, and fragment 3, from the Excerpta Neapolitana. Photius titles fragment 1 “From the Various Remaining Orations on Various Themes.” It consists of eight distinct sections or excerpts, which could be from as many as eight orations, although one cannot fail to suggest that sections 7 and 8 may be from one and the same propemptic oration. Section 6 is the single most interesting item in this chapter, an excerpt from an oration to the emperor Constantius, the Caesar Gallus, and Julian.

translations 37. The Epithalamium for Panathenaeus1 [1] The Thymbris [i.e., Tiber River] moves with full stream from the interior of Italy as far as the city [of Rome], where it floods with its overflow1. See p. 141 above.

272

Miscellaneous Remains

273

ing waters. When it makes contact with the city, it splits its flowing waters into two branches. Then the river comes together again and is reunited, but not without dividing its flow around the [dry land] between the two branches and forming an island of significant size there [i.e., Tiber Island]. The Romans dedicated this place as a precinct sacred to Asclepius.2 [2] After Asclepius gave the art [of medicine] to everyone, and after he gave that art’s wonders to three continents, he came to the city of the Thymbris. [3] That Thracian Bosporus, a narrow body of water with strong currents, a body of water that the Euxine [i.e., Black] Sea gives birth to, divides the continents [of Europe and Asia] by its flow, then is dispersed through the Propontis and turns into the broad Aegean. [Exc. Neapol., with a short quotation from section 1 also in Lex. Lopad.] Fragment 1: From the Various Remaining Orations on Various Themes [1] a king’s court and [his] winged golden fortune3 [2] For your office was not taken away from you; you cast it aside of your own free will, like an arrogant fellow who wants to make sport of his beloved. [3] golden hair by a red crown of roses [4] But what thanks was shown for these things? Flight, disappearance, and rejection of such a great friendship! [5] In your judgment I defeated the cicada in summer, and I warned the Attic nightingales that, if you set up an Attic theater for me, what I say in your honor would really turn their [eloquent] tongues into a myth.4 [6] O most brilliant light of your family, you [Constantius II] who have been for your family what your ancestor the Sun has often been for you! For of this fair pair [Gallus and Julian], the one [Gallus], like a morning star, rose up early with you, as you illuminated your great throne. He imitated your rays with his own beams of light. The other of the two [Julian], letting his light shine out from the herd of young men like a high2. For the flooding of the Tiber, see E. M. Steinby, ed., Lexicon topographicum urbis Romae (Rome, 1993–2000), s.v. “Tiberis.” For the sacredness of Tiber Island to Asclepius, see Edelstein and Edelstein, Asclepius, testimonia 846, 848–52, 855–59; Steinby, s.v. “Insula Tiberina.” Asclepius was brought there in 292 b.c. in the form of a serpent. 3. Only the full context would allow us to decide between “king’s” and “emperor’s” (basilevwˇ) here. 4. “really . . . a myth”: i.e., “nonsense,” because Himerius’s eloquence would so outdo theirs. For the nightingale in mythology, see Him. Orat. 74.5, with my note.

274

Miscellaneous Remains

spirited bull leading the herd, leapt about in the meadows of the Muses like an inspired colt with his head held high. He imitated the Homeric youth, the son of Thetis, by being both a good “speaker of words” and “doer of deeds.”5 [7] If I shared in the power of poets, I would have shown you this river Ilissus crying, I would have painted the beautiful waters of Callirhoe a sad color.6 [8] May Pan of the wayside conduct you as he plays a sweet escorting tune on his pipe.7 May Aphrodite and her children the Erotes mix a bowl of love and go before you on your journey. [Exc. Phot.] Fragment 2: [No Title] He calms down the agitated people. [Eustathius On Homer’s Odyssey 9.415, p. 353 [1637] Stallbaum: “The [Homeric] line Kuvklwy de; stenavcwn te kai; wjdivnwn ojduvnh/si (‘The Cyclops, groaning and suffering from pain’) has a rather peculiar alliterative effect, perhaps not a studied effect, but a random and unintended

5. Wernsdorff already recognized the allusions to Constantius, Gallus, and Julian here; see also Bidez, La vie, 95. Himerius’s language seems to imply that Gallus is Caesar (r. 351–354) and alludes appropriately to Julian’s academic pursuits (“the meadows of the Muses”). Barnes (CP 82 [1987]: 209) suggests that Himerius delivered the oration from which this fragment comes before Constantius in Sirmium on March 15, 351, when he appointed Gallus his Caesar, with Julian as well as Gallus present. Although Himerius’s reference to the Sun here might recall that Constantius’s father Constantine had worshiped the Sun before his conversion to Christianity, the Sun could be understood ecumenically as “an image of the supreme deity, rather than a God of Worship” (Liebeschuetz, Continuity and Change, 284). For the idea of the emperor himself as sun, paralleling the heavenly sun, see Liebeschuetz, 284–85. Note that Himerius calls the Sun not Constantius’s protector or patron, but his ancestor (oJ propavtwr); in its context this suggests a special relationship, even though Julian remarks that the Sun is the common father of us all (Orat. 11.131c Lacombrade). “your great throne”: tou;ˇ megavlouˇ qrovnouˇ. I translate this as a singular, regarding it as a poetic or majestic plural, of which Himerius is fond; see Smyth, Greek Grammar, no. 1006, where the example qrovnoi at Soph. Ant. 1041 is given. (Cf. section 1 above, where “court” is actually plural in form.) “speaker . . . deeds”: Hom. Il 9.443—what Phoenix was enjoined to instruct Achilles, son of Thetis, to be. “Doer of deeds” cannot mean political or military deeds before Julian’s own Caesarship, which began in 355. On the other hand, the comparison of Julian to a bull leading the herd is a comment on his leadership potential; cf. Dio Chrys. Orat. 2.66–74, where the ideal ruler is compared to a bull in command of its herd. 6. The Ilissus is an Athenian river, the Callirhoe an Athenian spring (Kroll, “Kallirhoë 11,” RE 10, 2 [1919]: 1669–72). Himerius must be saying good-bye to someone leaving the city here and in section 8. 7. “of the wayside”: ejnovdioˇ, an epithet applied to a variety of gods in their role as protectors of wayfarers (see Jessen, “Enodios,” RE 5 [1905]: 2635–36; cf. Him. Orat. 36.1).

Miscellaneous Remains

275

one that occurs opportunely because of the similar-sounding words. So too in Himerius the sentence ‘He . . . people’ (Koimiv zei me;n dh¸mon kumaivnonta) has [a similar effect].” Cf. On Homer’s Odyssey 12.169, p. 6 [1710]: “The [Homeric] line koivmhse de; kuvmata daivmwn (‘a god lulled the billows to sleep’) has a certain alliterative effect. The sophist Himerius also makes use of this device.”] Fragment 3: [No Title] A lender who is considerate and just is, I believe, a fine thing everywhere. [Exc. Neapol.] Fragment 4: [No Title] Enslaving the pupil with inexpressible love . . . 8 [Lex. Lopad.] Fragment 5: [No Title] The Muses entertain visiting guests on every occasion with eloquence that refers to their native land.9 [Lex. Lopad.] Fragment 6: [No Title] Surely the ruling city [Constantinople?] would rightly find fault with us on many grounds. [Lex. Lopad.] Fragment 7: [No Title] What good is music to Scythians, [for] they are entirely habituated to the sword?10 8. “the pupil”: to; plhsiav zon [meiravkion?]. 9. This is how, with Colonna, I understand toi¸ ˇ ejpicwrivoiˇ lovgoiˇ. Cf. Him. Orat. 23.2, and see p. 110 above. 10. “music”: or, more generally, “the arts of the Muses.”

276

Miscellaneous Remains

[Lex. Lopad.] Fragment 8: [No Title] Even if they outrun all the others in their speed . . . [Lex. Lopad.] Fragment 9: [No Title] When the Macedonian state came into his hands . . . [Lex. Lopad.] Fragment 10: [No Title] Nor does the driver of the pair of horses have any advantage, even if he outstrips the blasts of the north wind in speed. [Lex. Lopad.] Fragment 11: [No Title] He secretly goes as an ambassador from the king about the matter.11 [Lex. Lopad.] Fragment 12: [No Title] And more fountains in the form of wild animals, pouring out whole rivers of water from every side, create a pool and frolic on the swell of water ejected from them.12 [Lex. Lopad.]

11. “king”: or “emperor.” 12. I am using the expanded text of this fragment discovered and briefly commented on by Guida (Prometheus 5 [1979]: 214). “from every side”: or “from the entire side.”“create a pool,” pelagiv zousi me;n th;n kolumbhv qran: see Lampe, Patristic Greek Lex., s.v. pelagiv zw.

Miscellaneous Remains

277

Fragment 13: [No Title] You are again sailing the waves of the Aegean. [Lex. Lopad.] Fragment 14: [No Title] How many streams of tears have I not offered you? [Lex. Lopad.] Fragment 15: [No Title] Therefore we must put all further remarks aside and say only a few of the many things [that could be said], so that even in this we may be true to the standard that suits this oration. [Lex. Lopad.] Fragment 16: [No Title] Alas for its beauty! Alas for its size! [Lex. Lopad.] Fragment 17: [No Title] They say that, after the Athenians were relieved of the Cretan tribute, the whole population held a festal procession in honor of Theseus, the son of Poseidon.13 [Lex. Lopad.] 13. I follow Völker in presenting this new fragment from Lopadiotes’ Lexicon ( = Lexicon Vindobonense), discovered by Guida (Prometheus 5 [1979]: 210–13), as number 17. Theseus relieved the Athenians of the obligation of providing human tribute to King Minos by slaying the Minotaur (Plut. Thes. 15–17). This fragment is probably referring to the institution of the Theseia (Guida, 211). For Theseus’s father, see H. Herter, “Theseus,” RE Suppl. 13 (1973): 1053–57. A second new fragment from Lopadiotes’ Lexicon, also published by Guida in the above-cited article and presented by Völker as frag. 18, was later recognized by Guida to belong to Orat. 23 (see p. 226 n. 85 above).

This page intentionally left blank

Arrangement of Orations and Concordance

arrangement of orations in this translation 1.

Himerius’s Son, Rufinus: 7, 8

2.

In Praise of Cities and of Men: 62, 39, 40, 41

3.

In and Around Himerius’s School: 13.1–5, 16, 19, 22, 29, 34, 35, 44, 45, 61, 65, 66, 68, 69, 74

4.

Coming and Going in Himerius’s School: 10, 11, 13.6–8, 14, 15, 17, 18, 21, 26, 27, 30, 33, 54, 59, 60, 63, 64

5.

The Epithalamium for Severus: 9

6.

Imaginary Orations: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

7.

Orations Addressed to Roman Officials: 12, 20, 23, 24, 25, 28, 31, 32, 36, 38, 42, 43, 46, 47, 48

8.

Miscellaneous Remains: 37; frags. 1–17

concordance Wernsdorff and Dübner had divided what Colonna universally calls orations into eclogues (i.e., the Photian excerpts) and orations. Orations 49–53, 55–58, 67, 70–73, and 75 Colonna have no text; they are titles of completely lost orations, to which Colonna has given oration numbers, and are not included here. Völker follows Colonna’s numeration. I have added one newly discovered “fragment” to the 16 gathered by

279

280

Arrangement of Orations and Concordance

Colonna. In the “Penella” column, I give the page number of this translation on which the text of the item begins. colonna (number)

wernsdorff/ dübner (number)

( page)

penella

1

Ecl. 1

162

2

Ecl. 2

165

3

Ecl. 3

171

4

Ecl. 4

176

5

Ecl. 5

183

6

Orat. 2

192

7

Ecl. 7

23

8

Orat. 23

24

9

Orat. 1

145

10

Ecl. 10

113

11

Ecl. 11

118

12

Ecl. 13

218

13.1–5

Ecl. 14

76

13.6–8

—

118

14

Ecl. 15

119

15

Ecl. 16

120

16

Ecl. 17

77

17

Ecl. 18

121

18

Ecl. 19

122

19

Ecl. 20

78

20

Ecl. 21

224

21

Ecl. 22

123

22

Ecl. 23

80

23

Orat. 25

225

24

Orat. 26

227

25

Orat. 27

229

26

Orat. 28

124

Arrangement of Orations and Concordance

281

27

Orat. 29

125

28

Ecl. 28b

233

29

Orat. 30

80

30

Orat. 31

127

31

Ecl. 31

234

32

Ecl. 32

238

33

Orat. 32

129

34

Orat. 33

82

35

Orat. 34

84

36

Ecl. 36

240

37

—

272

38

Orat. 4

244

39

Orat. 5

48

40

Orat. 6

55

41

Orat. 7

58

42

—

247

43

—

248

44

Orat. 8

87

45

Orat. 9

90

46

Orat. 13

249

47

Orat. 3

253

48

Orat. 14

258

54

Orat. 15

130

59

Orat. 10

132

60

Orat. 11

134

61

Orat. 12

91

62

Orat. 16

46

63

Orat. 17

136

64

Orat. 18

139

65

Orat. 19

93

66

Orat. 20

94

282

Arrangement of Orations and Concordance

68

Orat. 21

97

69

Orat. 22

101

74

Orat. 24

104

frag. 1

Ecl. 12

273

frags. 2–17

—

274

Bibliography

editions and translations of himerius Colonna, A. Himerii Declamationes et orationes cum deperditarum fragmentis. Rome, 1951. The standard critical edition. Dübner, F. Himerii sophistae Declamationes. Paris, 1849. Greek text with Latin translation. Separately paginated, but bound with A. Westermann, ed., Philostratorum et Callistrati opera, and J. Boissonade, ed., Eunapii Vitae sophistarum. Henry, R. Photius, Bibliothèque, Tome VI (“Codices” 242–245). Paris, 1971. Greek text and French translation of codex 243, excerpts from Himerius. Völker, H. Himerios, Reden und Fragmente: Einführung, Übersetzung und Kommentar. Serta Graeca 17. Wiesbaden, 2003. Wernsdorff, G. Himerii sophistae quae reperiri potuerunt. Göttingen, 1790. Greek text with Latin translation and commentary.

other works consulted Adrados, F. R., et al. Diccionario griego-español. Madrid, 1980–. Alcock, S. E. “The Reconfiguration of Memory in the Eastern Roman Empire.” In Empires: Perspectives from Archaeology and History, edited by S. E. Alcock et al., 323–50. Cambridge, 2001. Alexiou, M., and P. Dronke. “The Lament of Jephtha’s Daughter: Themes, Traditions, Originality.” Studi medievali 12:2 (1971): 819–63. Anderson, G. Philostratus: Biography and Belles Lettres in the Third Century a.d. London, 1986. Anderson, J. K. Xenophon. New York, 1974. Arjava, A. Women and Law in Late Antiquity. Oxford, 1996.

283

284

Bibliography

Athanassiadi, P. Julian: An Intellectual Biography. London and New York, 1992. Bailey, C. The Greek Atomists and Epicurus: A Study. Oxford, 1928. Barnes, T. D. Constantine and Eusebius. Cambridge, Mass., and London, 1981. ———. “Himerius and the Fourth Century.” Classical Philology 82 (1987): 206–25. Barron, J. P. “The Sixth-Century Tyranny at Samos.” Classical Quarterly 14 (1964): 210–29. Bengtson, H., with R. Werner. Die Staatsverträge des Altertums. Zweiter Band, Die Verträge der griechisch-römischen Welt von 700 bis 338 v. Chr. 2nd ed. Munich, 1975. Berger, A. Das Bad in der byzantinischen Zeit. Miscellanea Byzantina Monacensia 27. Munich, 1982. Bernardi, J. “Un regard sur la vie étudiante à Athènes au milieu du IVe s. après J.-C.” Revue des études grecques 103 (1990): 79–94. ———, ed. and trans. Grégoire de Nazianze, Discours 42–43. Sources Chrétiennes 384. Paris, 1992. Bidez, J. La vie de l’empereur Julien. Paris, 1930. ———. “Hermias d’Atarnée.” Académie royale de Belgique, Bulletin de la classe des lettres et des sciences morales et politiques 29 (1943): 133–46. Blockley, R. C., ed. and trans. The Fragmentary Classicising Historians of the Later Roman Empire. ARCA: Classical and Medieval Texts, Papers and Monographs 6 and 10. Liverpool, 1981–83. Booth, A. D. “Punishment, Discipline, and Riot in the Schools of Antiquity.” Échos du monde classique 17 (1973): 107–14. Bosworth, A. B. Conquest and Empire: The Reign of Alexander the Great. Cambridge, 1988. Bowersock, G. W. Julian the Apostate. Cambridge, Mass., 1978. ———. “The Miracle of Memnon.” Bulletin of the American Society of Papyrologists 21 (1984): 21–32. Bowie, E. L. “Greeks and Their Past in the Second Sophistic.” Past & Present 46 (1970): 3–41. Bradbury, S., trans. Selected Letters of Libanius from the Age of Constantius and Julian. Liverpool, 2004. Brauch, T. “The Prefect of Constantinople for 362 a.d.: Themistius.” Byzantion 63 (1993): 37–78. ———. “Notes on the Prefects of Constantinople, a.d. 366–369.” Byzantion 72 (2002): 42–104. Brinkmann, A. “Rhetorica.” Rheinisches Museum 62 (1907): 625–31. Brown, M. K. The “Narratives” of Konon. Beiträge zur Altertumskunde 163. Munich and Leipzig, 2002. Brown, P. Power and Persuasion in Late Antiquity: Towards a Christian Empire. Madison, Wisc., 1992. Bühler, W., ed. Zenobii Athoi proverbia. 6 vols. Göttingen, 1982–. Burkert, W. Lore and Science in Ancient Pythagoreanism. Translated by E. L. Minar, Jr. Cambridge, Mass., 1972. ———. Greek Religion. Translated by J. Raffan. Cambridge, Mass., 1985. ———. Ancient Mystery Cults. Cambridge, Mass., 1987.

Bibliography

285

Calame, C., ed. Alcman. Rome, 1983. Campbell, D. A., ed. and trans. Greek Lyric. 5 vols. Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge, Mass., and London, 1982–93. Cantarella, E. “Homicides of Honor: The Development of Italian Adultery Law over Two Millennia.” In The Family in Italy from Antiquity to the Present, edited by D. I. Kertzer and R. P. Saller, 229–44. New Haven and London, 1991. Carrière, J.-Cl., et al., eds. Inde, Grèce ancienne: Regards croisés en anthropologie de l’espace. Centre de Recherches d’Histoire Ancienne 148, Institut Félix Gaffiot 13. Paris, 1995. Casson, S. Macedonia, Thrace, and Illyria. London, 1926. Chastagnol, A. La préfecture urbaine à Rome sous le Bas-Empire. Publications de la Faculté des Lettres et Sciences Humaines d’Alger 34. Paris, 1960. ———. Les fastes de la préfecture de Rome au Bas-Empire. Études Prosopographiques 2. Paris, 1962. Chroust, A.-H. Aristotle: New Light on His Life and on Some of His Lost Works. 2 vols. Notre Dame, 1973. Clader, L. L. Helen: The Evolution from Divine to Heroic in Greek Epic Tradition. Mnemosyne Supplements 42. Leiden, 1976. Clinton, K. The Sacred Officials of the Eleusinian Mysteries. Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 64:3. Philadelphia, 1974. Collart, P. Philippes, ville de Macédoine, depuis ses origines jusqu’à la fin de l’époque romaine. École Française d’Athènes, Travaux et Mémoires 5. Paris, 1937. Colonna, A. “Himeriana.” Bolletino del Comitato per la preparazione dell’ edizione nazionale dei classici greci e latini 9 (1961): 33–39. Cook, A. B. “The Gong at Dodona.” Journal of Hellenic Studies 22 (1902): 5–28. Cribiore, R. Gymnastics of the Mind: Greek Education in Hellenistic and Roman Egypt. Princeton and Oxford, 2001. Criscuolo, U. “Note filologiche III.” In Filologia e forme letterarie: Studi offerti a Francesco della Corte, 5: 191–205. Urbino, 1987. ———. “Aspetti della polemica antiepicurea nel tardoantico.” In Storia, poesia, e pensiero nel mondo antico: Studi in onore di Marcello Gigante, 149–67. Naples, 1994. Cuffari, G. I riferimenti poetici di Imerio. Università di Palermo, Istituto di Filologia Greca, Quaderni 12. Palermo, 1983. Dagron, G. Naissance d’une capitale: Constantinople et ses institutions de 330 à 451. Bibliothèque Byzantine, Études 7. Paris, 1974. Davies, M., and J. Kathirithamby. Greek Insects. New York and Oxford, 1986. Demandt, A. Die Spätantike: Römische Geschichte von Diocletian bis Justinian, 284–565 n. Chr. Handbuch der Altertumswissenschaft III 6. Munich, 1989. Derrett, J. D. M. “Whatever Happened to the Land Flowing with Milk and Honey?” Vigiliae Christianae 38 (1984): 178–84. Des Gagniers, J., et al. Laodicée du Lycos, Le Nymphée, Campagnes 1961–1963. Université Laval, Recherches Archéologiques, Série 1: Fouilles. Quebec and Paris, 1969. Dietrich, B. C. Death, Fate, and the Gods: The Development of a Religious Idea

286

Bibliography

in Greek Popular Belief and in Homer. University of London Classical Studies 3. London, 1967. Dihle, A. “Dionysos in Indien.” In India and the Ancient World: History, Trade, and Culture before a.d. 650, edited by G. Pollet, 47–57. Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta. Leuven, 1987. Dilke, O. A. W. Greek and Roman Maps. Ithaca, N.Y., 1985. Dowden, K. “The Amazons: Development and Functions.” Rheinisches Museum 140 (1997): 97–128. Düring, I. Aristotle in the Ancient Biographical Tradition. Acta Universitatis Gothoburgensis 63. Göteborg, 1957. Edelstein, E. J., and L. Edelstein. Asclepius: A Collection and Interpretation of the Testimonies. 2 vols. Baltimore, 1945. Eitrem, S., and L. Amundsen. “Fragments from the Speeches of Himerios: P. Osl. inv. no. 1478.” Classica et mediaevalia 17 (1956): 23–30. Ernesti, J. C. T. Lexicon technologiae graecorum rhetoricae. Leipzig, 1795. Evans, E. C. Physiognomics in the Ancient World. Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 59:5. Philadelphia, 1969. Evans Grubbs, J. Law and Family in Late Antiquity: The Emperor Constantine’s Marriage Legislation. Oxford, 1995. Feraboli, S. “Nota a Hyp. VI 17.” Maia 25 (1973): 117. Festugière, A. J. Antioche païenne et chrétienne. Paris, 1959. ———. Proclus, Commentaire sur le Timée, Tome I, Livre I. Paris, 1966. Figueira, T. J. “The Ten Archontes of 579/8 at Athens.” Hesperia 53 (1984): 447–73. Flinterman, J.-J. Power, Paideia, and Pythagoreanism. Dutch Monographs on Ancient History and Archaeology 13. Amsterdam, 1995. Flower, M. A., and J. Marincola, eds. Herodotus, Histories, Book IX. Cambridge, 2002. Fontenrose, J. The Delphic Oracle. Berkeley, 1978. ———. Didyma: Apollo’s Oracle, Cult, and Companions. Berkeley, 1988. Fornara, C. W. The Athenian Board of Generals from 501 to 404. Historia Einzelschriften 16. Wiesbaden, 1971. Fowden, G. “Nicagoras of Athens and the Lateran Obelisk.” Journal of Hellenic Studies 107 (1987): 51–57. Frantz, A., et al. The Athenian Agora. Volume 24, Late Antiquity: a.d. 267–700. Princeton, 1988. Frazer, J. G. Pausanias’s Description of Greece. 6 vols. 2nd ed. London, 1913. Gärtner, H. “Himerios.” RAC 15 (1991): 167–73. Gallay, P. La vie de Saint Grégoire de Nazianze. Paris, 1943. Gerber, D. E., ed. and trans. Greek Iambic Poetry from the Seventh to the Fifth Centuries b.c. Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge, Mass., and London, 1999. Gomme, A. W., and F. H. Sandbach. Menander: A Commentary. London, 1973. Gomme, A. W., et al. A Historical Commentary on Thucydides. 5 vols. Oxford, 1945–81. Goulet, R. “Sur la chronologie de la vie et des oeuvres d’Eunape de Sardes.” Journal of Hellenic Studies 100 (1980): 60–72. ———. “Prohérésius le païen et quelques remarques sur la chronologie d’Eunape de Sardes.” Antiquité tardive 8 (2000): 209–22.

Bibliography

287

Gow, A. S. F. Theocritus, Edited with a Translation and Commentary. 2 vols. 2nd ed. Cambridge, 1952. Graham, A. J. Colony and Mother City in Ancient Greece. 2nd ed. Chicago, 1983. Graziosi, B. Inventing Homer: The Early Reception of Epic. Cambridge, 2002. Greco, G. M. “Note al testo di Imerio, or. 8 Colonna.” Atti della Accademia Pontaniana 42 (1993): 313–19. ———. “Questioni di cronologia Imeriana.” Orpheus 15 (1994): 302–19. ———. “Due note Imeriane.” Prometheus 24 (1998): 264–70. ———. “Filottete e Tifone (Himer., or. 48, 1–2; Them., or. 2, 34ab).” In Mnemosynon: Studi di letteratura e di umanità in memoria di Donato Gagliardi, 305–14. Naples, 2001. ———. “Imerio e l’encomio della città.” In Da Costantino a Teodosio il Grande: Cultura, società, diritto, edited by U. Criscuolo, 153–66. Naples, 2003. Gribble, D. Alcibiades and Athens: A Study in Literary Presentation. Oxford, 1999. Groag, E. Die Reichsbeamten von Achaia in spätrömischer Zeit. Dissertationes Pannonicae 1, 14. Budapest, 1946. Groeneboom, P., ed. Aischylos’ Perser. 2 vols. Göttingen, 1960. Guida, A. “Frammenti inediti di Eupoli, Teleclide, Teognide, Giuliano e Imerio da un nuovo codice del Lexicon Vindobonense.” Prometheus 5 (1979): 193–216. ———. “L’arrivo di Abari ad Athene, l’arma segreta di Filippo e l’arco dei Persiani: Tre note a Imerio.” In POIKILMA: Studi in onore di Michele R. Cataudella, 2 vols., edited by S. Bianchetti et al., 583–90. La Spezia, 2001. ———. “Contributi imeriani (con una nota su Anacreonte e Policrate).” In Studi di filologia e tradizione greca in memoria di Aristide Colonna, 2 vols., edited by F. Benedetti and S. Grandolini, 391–400. Naples, 2003. Guthrie, W. K. C. Orpheus and Greek Religion. 2nd ed. London, 1952. ———. A History of Greek Philosophy. 6 vols. Cambridge, 1962–81. Habicht, C. “Falsche Urkunde zur Geschichte Athens im Zeitalter der Perserkriege.” Hermes 89 (1961): 1–35. ———. “Eine verkannte Bauinschrift aus Megara des Publius Ampelius von 359/60.” Hyperboreus 1, 2 (1994–1995): 128–31. Hammond, N. G. L. Studies in Greek History. Oxford, 1973. Hammond, N. G. L., G. T. Griffith, and F. W. Walbank. A History of Macedonia. 3 vols. Oxford, 1972–88. Harris, E. M. Aeschines and Athenian Politics. New York and Oxford, 1995. Harrison, A. R. W. The Law of Athens: The Family and Property. Oxford, 1968. ———. The Law of Athens: Procedure. Oxford, 1971. Harrison, E. B. “The South Frieze of the Nike Temple and the Marathon Painting in the Painted Stoa.” American Journal of Archaeology 76 (1972): 353–78. Heath, M. “The Family of Minucianus?” Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 113 (1996): 66–70. ———. “Hermogenes’ Biographers.” Eranos 96 (1998): 44–54. ———. Menander: A Rhetor in Context. Oxford, 2004. Heil, M. “Panathenius, Statthalter von Griechenland.” Klio 79 (1997): 468–78.

288

Bibliography

Herter, H. “Beiträge zu Apollonios von Rhodos.” Rheinisches Museum 91 (1942): 226–49. Hertz, W. “Aristoteles in den Alexanderdichtungen des Mittelalters.” In Abhandlungen der philosophisch-philologischen Classe der königlich Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Band 19, Abtheilung 1, 3–103. Munich, 1891. Heubeck, A., et al. A Commentary on Homer’s Odyssey. 3 vols. Oxford, 1988–92. Hirzel, R. Themis, Dike und Verwandtes. Leipzig, 1907. Hock, R. F., and E. N. O’Neill. The Chreia in Ancient Rhetoric. Vol. 1, The “Progymnasmata.” Texts and Translations 27, Graeco-Roman Religion Series 9. Atlanta, 1986. Hooker, J. T. The Ancient Spartans. London, 1980. Huffman, C. A. Philolaus of Croton, Pythagorean and Presocratic. Cambridge, 1993. Hurwit, J. M. The Athenian Acropolis: History, Mythology, and Archaeology from the Neolithic Era to the Present. Cambridge, 1999. Huxley, G. L. The Early Ionians. London, 1966. Jacob, D. J. “Sto; periqwvrio eJllhnikw¸ n keimevnwn b .v ” Ellhnikav J 35 (1984): 133–42. Janin, R. Constantinople byzantine: Développement urbain et répertoire topographique 2nd ed. Archives de l’Orient Chrétien 4A. Paris, 1964. Janko, R. The Iliad: A Commentary. Vol. 4, Books 13–16. Cambridge, 1992. Jones, A. H. M. The Later Roman Empire, 284–602: A Social, Economic, and Administrative Survey. 3 vols. and map suppl. Oxford, 1964. Jones, C. P. “Stigma: Tattooing and Branding in Graeco-Roman Antiquity.” Journal of Roman Studies 77 (1987): 139–55. ———. “Epigrams from Hierapolis and Aphrodisias.” Hermes 125 (1997): 203–14. Kagan, D. The Peace of Nicias and the Sicilian Expedition. Ithaca, N.Y., and London, 1981. Karttunen, K. India in Early Greek Literature. Studia Orientalia 65. Helsinki, 1989. Kaster, R. A. Guardians of Language: The Grammarian and Society in Late Antiquity. The Transformation of the Classical Heritage 11. Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1988. Keil, B. “Zwei Identificationen.” Hermes 42 (1907): 548–63. Keller, O. Die antike Tierwelt. 2 vols. Leipzig, 1909–13. Kennedy, George A. The Art of Persuasion in Greece. Princeton, 1963. ———. Greek Rhetoric under Christian Emperors. Princeton, 1983. ———, trans. Progymnasmata: Greek Textbooks of Prose Composition and Rhetoric. Society of Biblical Literature, Writings from the Greco-Roman World 10. Atlanta, 2003. Kirchner, J. Prosopographia Attica. 2 vols. Berlin, 1901–3. Korenjak, M. Publikum und Redner: Ihre Interaktion in der sophistischen Rhetorik der Kaiserzeit. Zetemata 104. Munich, 2000. Labarbe, J. “Un décalage de 40 ans dans la chronologie de Polycrate.” L’antiquité classique 31 (1962): 153–88.

Bibliography

289

Lacroix, L. “La légende de Pélops et son iconographie.” Bulletin de correspondance hellénique 100 (1976): 327–41. Lai, A. “Un aneddoto narrato da Imerio: Solone e la tragikh; iJstoriva nei drammi di Eschilo.” Annali dell’Istituto Universitario Orientale di Napoli, Dipartimento di studi del mondo classico e del mediterraneo antico, Sezione filologicoletteraria 20 (1998): 179–88. Lampe, G. W. H., ed. A Patristic Greek Lexicon. Oxford, 1961. Lapatin, K. D. S. Chryselephantine Statuary in the Ancient Mediterranean World. Oxford, 2001. Laurie, A. P. Greek and Roman Methods of Painting. Cambridge, 1910. Lavan, L. “The Praetoria of Civil Governors in Late Antiquity.” In Recent Research in Late-Antique Urbanism, edited by L. Lavan, 39–56. Journal of Roman Archaeology Supplementary Series 42. Portsmouth, R.I., 2001. Lazzeri, M. “Imerio e la Palinodia di Stesicoro.” Seminari romani di cultura greca 5 (2002): 169–79. Lefkowitz, M. R. The Lives of the Greek Poets. Baltimore, 1981. Lemerle, P. “Inscriptions latines et grecques de Philippes.” Bulletin de correspondance hellénique 59 (1935): 126–64. Leopold, J. W. “Himerius and the Panathenaea.” The Ancient World 12 (1985): 121–27. Lévêque, P. “Dionysos dans l’Inde.” In Inde, Grèce ancienne, edited by J.-Cl. Carrière et al., 125–38. Paris, 1995. Liberman, G., ed. Alcée, Fragments. 2 vols. Paris, 1999. Lieberg, G. “Zur Figur des handelnden Dichters bei Himerios.” Rheinisches Museum 133 (1990): 180–85. Liebeschuetz, J. H. W. G. Continuity and Change in Roman Religion. Oxford, 1979. ———. “The Significance of the Speech of Praetextatus.” In Pagan Monotheism in Late Antiquity, edited by P. Athanassiadi and M. Frede, 185–205. Oxford, 1999. Lloyd-Jones, H. “The Pride of Halicarnassus.” Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 124 (1999): 1–14. Lobeck, Ch. A. Aglaophamus. Königsberg, 1829. Loenertz, R.-J. “PROSAGGELLEIN JEAUTON.” Byzantion 29–30 (1959–60): 1–6. Loraux, N. The Invention of Athens: The Funeral Oration in the Classical City. Translated by A. Sheridan. Cambridge, Mass., and London, 1986. Lyne, R. O. A. M., ed. Ciris, A Poem Attributed to Vergil. Cambridge, 1978. Maas, M., and J. M. Snyder. Stringed Instruments of Ancient Greece, New Haven and London, 1989. MacDowell, D. M. The Law in Classical Athens. Ithaca, N.Y., 1978. Magdalino, P. “Prosopography and Byzantine Identity.” In Fifty Years of Prosopography: The Later Roman Empire, Byzantium and Beyond, edited by Averil Cameron, 41–56. Proceedings of the British Academy 118. Oxford, 2003. Magi, F. “Un passo di Imerio, la Lemnia e l’Atena pensierosa.” Parola del passato 169 (1976): 324–35. Marrou, H. I. A History of Education in Antiquity. Translated by G. Lamb. Madison, Wisc., 1982 [1948].

290

Bibliography

Mason, H. J. Greek Terms for Roman Institutions. American Studies in Papyrology 13. Toronto, 1974. Mathiesen, T. J. Apollo’s Lyre: Greek Music and Music Theory in Antiquity and the Middle Ages. Publications of the Center for the History of Music Theory and Literature 2. Lincoln, Nebr., and London, 1999. Meerwaldt, J. D. “Epithalamica: I. De Himerio Sapphus imitatore.” Mnemosyne 7 (1954): 19–38. Merkelbach, R. Die Hirten des Dionysos: Die Dionysos-Mysterien der römischen Kaiserzeit und der bukolische Roman des Longus. Stuttgart, 1988. Millar, F. “P. Herennius Dexippus: The Greek World and the Third-Century Invasions.” Journal of Roman Studies 59 (1969): 12–29. Molyneux, J. H. Simonides, A Historical Study. Wauconda, Ill., 1992. Mras, K. “Die prolaliav bei den griechischen Schriftstellern.” Wiener Studien 64 (1949): 71–81. Mylonas, G. E. Eleusis and the Eleusinian Mysteries. Princeton, 1961. Norden, E. Die antike Kunstprosa vom VI. Jahrhundert v. Chr. bis in die Zeit der Renaissance. Reprint, Stuttgart, 1974. Norman, A. F., ed. and trans. Libanius’ Autobiography (Oration I). London, 1965. Oakley, J. H., and R. H. Sinos. The Wedding in Ancient Athens. Madison, Wisc., 1993. Otto, W. F. Dionysus, Myth and Cult. Translated by R. B. Palmer. Dallas, 1981. Owen, A. S., ed. Euripides, Ion. Oxford, 1939. Page, D. L., ed. and trans. Select Papyri. Vol. 3. Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge, Mass., and London, 1941. Parke, H. W. The Oracles of Apollo in Asia Minor. London, 1985. Parke, H. W., and D. E. W. Wormell. The Delphic Oracle. 2 vols. Oxford, 1956. Paschoud, F., ed. Zosime, Histoire nouvelle. 3 vols. in 5. Paris, 1971–89. Patillon, M., with G. Bolognesi, eds. and trans. Aelius Théon, Progymnasmata. Paris, 1997. Patrick, M. M. The Greek Sceptics. New York, 1929. Pease, A. S., ed. M. Tulli Ciceronis, De natura deorum. 2 vols. Cambridge, Mass., 1955–58. Penella, R. J. Greek Philosophers and Sophists in the Fourth Century a.d.: Studies in Eunapius of Sardis. ARCA: Classical and Medieval Texts, Papers and Monographs 28. Leeds, 1990. ———, trans. The Private Orations of Themistius. The Transformation of the Classical Heritage 29. Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1999. ———. “From the Muses to Eros: Choricius’s Epithalamia for Student Bridegrooms.” In Gaza dans l’antiquité tardive: Archéologie, rhétorique, et histoire, edited by C. Saliou, 135–48. Cardo 2. Salerno, 2005. Pernot, L. La rhétorique de l’éloge dans le monde gréco-romain. 2 vols. Collection des Études Augustiniennes, Série Antiquité 137–38. Paris, 1993. Perry, B. E., ed. Aesopica. Vol. 1. Urbana, Ill., 1952. ———, ed. and trans. Babrius and Phaedrus. Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge, Mass., and London, 1965. Petit, P. Les étudiants de Libanius. Paris, 1957.

Bibliography

291

Petropoulos, J. C. B. Eroticism in Ancient and Medieval Greek Poetry. London, 2003. Pfeiffer, R., ed. Callimachus. 2 vols. Oxford, 1949–53. Pickard-Cambridge, A. The Dramatic Festivals of Athens. 2nd ed. Oxford, 1968. Piganiol, A. L’empire chrétien (325–395). 2nd ed. Paris, 1972. Plommer, H. “Himerius and Athena.” Classical Review 9 (1959): 206–7. Podlecki, A. J. “Simonides in Sicily.” La parola del passato 34 (1979): 5–16. ———. Perikles and His Circle. London and New York, 1998. Pollit, J. J. Art in the Hellenistic Age. Cambridge, 1986. Pritchett, W. K. The Greek State at War, Part IV. Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1985. Radermacher, L., ed. Artium scriptores (Reste der voraristotelischen Rhetorik). Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philos.-hist. Kl., Sitzungsberichte, Band 227, Abhandlung 3. Vienna, 1951. Reader, W. W., with A. J. Chvala-Smith, eds. and trans. The Severed Hand and the Upright Corpse: The Declamations of Marcus Antonius Polemo. Society of Biblical Literature Texts and Translations 42, Graeco-Roman Series 12. Atlanta, 1996. Rehm, R. Marriage to Death: The Conflation of Wedding and Funeral Rituals in Greek Tragedy. Princeton, 1994. Richlin, A. “Approaches to the Sources on Adultery at Rome.” In Reflections of Women in Antiquity, edited by H. P. Foley, 379–404. New York, 1981. Riedweg, Ch. Mysterienterminologie bei Platon, Philon und Klemens von Alexandrien. Untersuchungen zur antiken Literatur und Geschichte 26. Berlin and New York, 1987. Riginos, A. S. Platonica: The Anecdotes Concerning the Life and Writings of Plato. Columbia Studies in the Classical Tradition 3. Leiden, 1976. Rist, J. M. Epicurus: An Introduction. Cambridge, 1972. Rizzo, G. E. “Saggio su Imerio il sofista.” Rivista di filologia e di istruzione classica 26 (1898): 513–63. Robert, L. Études anatoliennes. Études Orientales, L’Institut Français d’Archéologie de Stamboul, 5. Paris, 1937. ———. Hellenica. Vol. 4. Paris, 1948. Rohde, E. Der griechische Roman und seine Vorläufer. 2nd ed. Leipzig, 1900. Roisman, J., ed. Brill’s Companion to Alexander the Great. Leiden, 2003. Roller, L. E. In Search of God the Mother: The Cult of Anatolian Cybele. Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1999. Roscher, W. H., et al. Ausführliches Lexikon der griechischen und römischen Mythologie. 6 vols. in 9. Leipzig, 1884–1937. Rougé, J., ed. and trans. Expositio totius mundi et gentium. Sources Chrétiennes 124. Paris, 1966. Rouse, W. H. D. Greek Votive Offerings: An Essay in the History of Greek Religion. Cambridge, 1902. Rousseau, P. Basil of Caesarea. Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1994. Russell, D. A. “Rhetors at the Wedding.” Proceedings of the Cambridge Philological Society 205 (1979): 104–17. ———. Greek Declamation. Cambridge, 1983. Russell, D. A., and N. G. Wilson, eds. and trans. Menander Rhetor. Oxford, 1981.

292

Bibliography

Rutherford, I. Canons of Style in the Antonine Age: Idea-Theory in Its Literary Context. Oxford, 1998. Samuel, A. E. Greek and Roman Chronology: Calendars and Years in Classical Antiquity. Handbuch der Altertumswissenschaft 1:7. Munich, 1972. Schamp, J. “Himérius de Prousias.” DPA 3 (2000): 708–42. Schemmel, F. “Die Hochschule von Athen im IV. und V. Jahrhundert p. Ch. n.” Neue Jahrbücher für das klassische Altertum, Geschichte und deutsche Literatur und für Pädagogik 22 (1908): 494–513. Schenkl, H. “Neue Bruchstücke des Himerios.” Hermes 46 (1911): 414–30. ———. “Himerios 1.” RE 8, 2 (1913): 1622–35; RE Suppl. 3 (1918): 1151–53. ———. “Zur Biographie des Rhetors Himerios.” Rheinisches Museum 72 (1917–1918): 34–40. Schissel, O. “Die Familie des Minukianos: Ein Beitrag zur Personenkunde des neuplatonischen Athen.” Klio 21 (1927): 361–73. Schmitz, T. Bildung und Macht: Zur sozialen und politischen Funktion der zweiten Sophistik in der griechischen Welt der Kaiserzeit. Zetemata 97. Munich, 1997. ———. “Performing History in the Second Sophistic.” In Geschichtsschreibung und politischer Wandel im 3. Jh. n. Chr.,” edited by M. Zimmermann, 71–92. Historia Einzelschriften 127. Stuttgart, 1999. Schouler, B. La tradition hellénique chez Libanios. 2 vols. Lille and Paris, 1984. Schroeder, O. De laudibus Athenarum a poetis tragicis et ab oratoribus epidicticis excultis. Göttingen, 1914. Seaford, R. “The Tragic Wedding.” Journal of Hellenic Studies 107 (1987): 106–30. Seeck, O. Die Briefe des Libanius. Leipzig, 1906. èevienko, I. “A Late Antique Epigram and the So-Called Elder Magistrate from Aphrodisias.” In Synthronon: Art et archéologie de la fin de l’Antiquité et du Moyen Age, 29–41. Bibliothèque des Cahiers Archéologiques 2. Paris, 1968. Shipley, G. A History of Samos, 800–188 b.c. Oxford, 1987. Shorey, P. “Himerius Oration I and Horace Ars Poetica 128.” Classical Philology 1 (1906): 415. Sider, D. The Epigrams of Philodemos: Introduction,Text, and Commentary. New York and Oxford, 1997. Sievers, G. R. Das Leben des Libanius. Berlin, 1868. Sisti, F. “Ibico e Policrate.” Quaderni Urbinati di cultura classica 2 (1966): 91–102. Slootjes, D. “Late Roman Rule and Provincial Expectations: The Governor and His Subjects.” PhD diss., University of North Carolina, 2004. Smith, C. F. “‘What Constitutes a State?’” Classical Journal 2 (1906–1907): 299–302. Smith, R. Julian’s Gods: Religion and Philosophy in the Thought and Action of Julian the Apostate. London and New York, 1995. Smyth, H. W. Greek Grammar. Revised by G. M. Messing. Cambridge, Mass., 1966. Snowden, F. M., Jr. Blacks in Antiquity: Ethiopians in the Greco-Roman Experience. Cambridge, Mass., 1970. Sommer, L. Das Haar in Religion und Aberglauben der Griechen. Münster i. Westf., 1912.

Bibliography

293

Stein, E., and J.-R. Palanque. Histoire du Bas-Empire. 2 vols. in 3. Paris, 1949–59. Stewart, A. Greek Sculpture: An Exploration. 2 vols. New Haven, 1990. Stough, C. L. Greek Skepticism, A Study in Epistemology. Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1969. Swain, S. Hellenism and Empire: Language, Classicism, and Power in the Greek World, a.d. 50–250. Oxford, 1996. Talbert, R. J. A., et al., eds. Barrington Atlas of the Greek and Roman World. Princeton and Oxford, 2000. Thompson, D’Arcy W. A Glossary of Greek Birds. 2nd ed. London, 1936. Tigerstedt, E. N. The Legend of Sparta in Classical Antiquity. 3 vols. Stockholm, 1965–78. Travlos, J. Pictorial Dictionary of Ancient Athens. New York and Washington, 1971. Treggiari, S. Roman Marriage: Iusti Coniuges from the Time of Cicero to the Time of Ulpian. Oxford, 1991. Turcan, R. “Deux notes dionysiaques.” Mélanges d’archéologie et d’histoire, École française de Rome 79 (1967): 134–51. ———. Mithras Platonicus: Recherches sur l’hellénisation philosophique de Mithra. Leiden, 1975. Usener, H., ed. Gesammelte Abhandlungen von Jacob Bernays. Vol. 2. Berlin, 1885. ———, ed. Epicurea. Leipzig, 1887. Veyne, P., ed. A History of Private Life. Vol. 1, From Pagan Rome to Byzantium. Translated by A. Goldhammer. Cambridge, Mass., and London, 1987. Vian, F. Les origines de Thèbes: Cadmos et les Spartes. Paris, 1963. Vickers, M. “Hellenistic Thessaloniki.” Journal of Hellenic Studies 92 (1972): 156–70. Völker, H. “Spätantike Professoren und ihre Schüler: Am Beispiel von Himerios und Libanios.” In Gelehrte in der Antike, edited by A. Goltz et al., 169–85. Cologne, Weimar, and Vienna, 2002. ———. “Poesie in scheinbarer Prosa—ein zutreffende Charakterisierung der Reden des Himerios?” In Approches de la Troisième Sophistique: Hommages à Jacques Schamp, edited by E. Amato et al., 589–612. Brussels, 2006. Walden, J. W. H. The Universities of Ancient Greece. New York, 1909. Wallace, R. W. The Areopagos Council, to 307 b.c. Baltimore, 1989. Watts, E. J. City and School in Late Antique Athens and Alexandria. The Transformation of the Classical Heritage 41. Berkeley and Los Angeles, 2006. West, M. L. Hesiod, Theogony, Edited with Prolegomena and Commentary. Oxford, 1966. ———. “Melica.” Classical Quarterly 20 (1970): 205–15. ———. Ancient Greek Music. Oxford, 1992. Wiedemann, T. Adults and Children in the Roman Empire. New Haven and London, 1989. von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, U. Aristoteles und Athen. 2 vols. Berlin, 1893. ———. Kleine Schriften, IV: Lesefrüchte und Verwandtes. Berlin, 1962. Wilkins, J. Euripides, “Heraclidae,” with Introduction and Commentary. Oxford, 1993.

294

Bibliography

Williams, F. Callimachus, Hymn to Apollo, A Commentary. Oxford, 1978. Wintjes, J. “Libanius and Himerius.” In Mélanges A. F. Norman, Topoi Suppl. 7, edited by Á. González Gálvez and P.-L. Malosse, 231–41. Lyon, 2006. Wolf, P. Vom Schulwesen der Spätantike: Studien zu Libanius. Baden-Baden, 1952. Wormell, D. E. W. “The Literary Tradition Concerning Hermias of Atarneus.” Yale Classical Studies 5 (1935): 55–92.

Index

Abaris (Scythian), 122; and comes Ursacius, 216, 226 Academy, Athenian: in Oration 3, 172; in Oration 41, 64 Achaia: Himerius in, 4; proconsular governors of, 207 Acheloüs, in Oration 9, 152 Acheron (underworld), 32 Achilles: arms of, 229, 252, 253n180; birth of, 151; conflict with Agamemnon, 93; in Homer, 258; at house of Lycomedes, 252, 253n180; love for Deidamia, 143; lyre of, 73, 123, 252; and Patroclus, 238, 249; psychological wound of, 93n70; studies under Chiron, 66, 83, 125, 143, 248n169, 252, 253n180; studies under Phoenix, 68, 82, 274n5 —in Oration 9, 143, 151; in Oration 21, 73, 123; in Oration 25, 229–30; in Oration 26, 125; in Oration 29, 82n40; in Oration 32, 238; in Oration 34, 83; in Oration 39, 52; in Oration 46, 252; in Oration 54, 132; in Oration 65, 72, 93 Adultery: in Attic law, 179n74; entrapment into, 177, 179, 180, 181, 183; in Latin declamations, 160n14; in meletai, 159–60; in Roman law, 179n74 Aeacus, 139; and Chiron, 227; descendants of, 231

Aëdon (nightingale), 106n100 Aegean Sea: painting of, 219; piracy in, 196 Aelius Aristides, 62n68; on Athens, 195n119; funeral orations of, 161; influence on Himerius, 22; on Meles River, 223n68; Panathenaicus, 162n22; praise of Apellas, 23n22; on Smyrna, 111n9 Aeschines: acting career of, 165n31; case against Ctesiphon, 166n34; exile of, 158–59, 165, 167; in Oration 1, 164–65; treachery of, 167n40, 168, 170; trial of, 165, 166n34 Aeschylus: grandiloquence of, 26; and Solon, 66, 67, 83 Aesop, 94n73; and Delphi, 251; fable of Apollo, 94–95 Aethia (sister of Priam), 170 Agamemnon: conflict with Achilles, 93; in Oration 46, 252; in Oration 47, 255–56; in Oration 65, 13, 72, 93 Agave, 96n77 Agesilaus, and Antandrus, 248 Alcaeus, 190n105; in Oration 48, 262– 63; on Thales, 233 Alcestis, 180n76 Alcibiades: beauty of, 26; eloquence of, 78n27; envy of, 243; luxury of, 78; Nicias and, 40, 41, 43n25, 53;

295

296 Alcibiades (continued ) opposition to tyrants, 167; Socrates and, 125, 269n214; triumph of, 238; and Xenophon, 89 —in Oration 16, 72, 78; in Oration 28, 233–34; in Oration 32, 238; in Oration 35, 85; in Oration 39, 13, 40, 41, 43n25, 52, 53; in Oration 44, 89 Alcinous: in Homer, 87n53; in Oration 39, 39, 41, 54; palace of, 86 Alcman, in Oration 39, 49–50 Alexander (proconsul of Achaia), 109, 129 Alexander (son of Amyntas), 170n48 Alexander Romance, 50n44 Alexander the Great: among the Ethiopians, 137–38; and Aristotle, 58; artists’ depictions of, 235; conquests of, 168–69; crossing to Asia, 212–13, 218; and Demosthenes, 158; destruction of Thebes, 166; Dio Chrysostom on, 78n25, 132n81; exile decree of, 158–59, 165, 167, 169n45; influence of music on, 72, 77–78; invasion of East, 58n61; Ismenias and, 50; Lysippus’s depiction of, 235, 264; reverence toward Athens, 166n35; as son of Zeus, 218; training of, 131–32 —in Oration 2, 165, 166–67, 168–70; in Oration 10, 118; in Oration 36, 243; in Oration 54, 131–32 Alpheus River, 221n63; in Oration 12, 219 Amaltheia, horn of: Anacreon on, 116n27; in Oration 10, 116; in Oration 35, 86; in Oration 39, 54 Amazons, in Oration 6, 196, 197 Ameinias (father of Himerius), 1, 20 Ampelius, Publius (proconsul of Achaia), 67–68, 80; art commissions of, 237n122; enemies of, 238n125; improvements to Athens, 237; judicial decisions of, 236 —in Oration 29, 208; in Oration 31, 208, 211, 234–38 Amphion, in Oration 68, 75, 101 Amphipolis, founders of, 44, 63 Anacharsis the Scythian: initiation into mysteries, 81n38; in Oration 29, 68, 80–81; in Oration 32, 239 Anacreon: on horn of Amaltheia, 116n27; illness of, 102; and Polycrates, 81, 233; portrayal of Dionysus, 244 —in Oration 17, 121; in Oration 39, 49; in Oration 47, 254; in Oration 48, 259–60; in Oration 69, 102

Index Anatolius (prefect of Illyricum), 4, 215, 238–40 Anaxagoras: in Oration 3, 175; in Oration 8, 26 Ancestors, Athenian: encomia for, 192– 93, 195, 196, 200–201, 204, 206 Androclus, in Oration 9, 151 Andros, poverty of, 89 Anti-Epicureanism, in Oration 3, 159 Antilochus, 257n191; imitation of Achilles, 132; military valor of, 132n82 Antinoos (Odyssey), 138 Antiphon, firing of dockyards, 170n49 Apellas, Aelius Aristides on, 23n22 Apelles, depiction of Alexander the Great, 235 Aphobius (student), 109 Aphrodite: birth of, 121, 149, 154; dual aspect of, 115n21, 122; in Fragment 1, 274; kestos of, 61, 62n68; worship on Cyprus, 121 —in Oration 9, 154; in Oration 17, 121–22; in Oration 47, 254 Apis: in Oration 42, 249; in Oration 44, 88 Apollo: Aesop on, 94–95; aid to Lycurgus, 127n67; among the Hyperboreans, 262, 263n204; birth of, 60, 61n67, 99n85, 126, 139, 245n157, 262; chariot of, 262; defeat of Marsyas, 146n12; as Dionysus, 99n85; as healer, 86; killing of Python, 50n44; oracles of, 99, 124, 134n88, 139, 203n134, 204; oracles on triremes, 184, 187, 192n110; patronage of culture, 250n175; restraint of, 71, 95; on Socrates, 246; as sun god, 59, 86, 99; swans of, 105–6, 224, 262, 271; tripods of, 99n85, 135, 139; wedding songs of, 146; worship at Athens, 31n44, 270; wrath of, 95; youthfulness of, 138 —in Oration 5, 191; in Oration 9, 146; in Oration 35, 86; in Oration 41, 59, 60; in Oration 47, 256; in Oration 48, 262; in Oration 59, 134; in Oration 60, 135; in Oration 62, 38; in Oration 64, 139; in Oration 66, 71, 94–95; in Oration 68, 99; in Oration 74, 105–6 Apsines (sophist), 71–72 Arcadius (physician), in Oration 34, 66, 67, 82, 83n44 Archery: Ethiopian skill in, 137–38; Persian, 74, 79, 202, 204

Index Areopagites: in Oration 7, 23; qualities of, 30n41; Rufinus before, 21, 22– 23, 30 Areopagus: gods’ judging and pleading at, 23n24, 30, 195; sanctuary of Erinyes near, 28n36; in Oration 8, 28, 30; in Oration 59, 133 Ares, trial of, 195 Arethusa (spring), 219n52, 221 Argo (ship), in Oration 41, 64 Argos: encomia of, 193; founding of, 44; in Persian War, 203 Ariadne, wedding of, 146n12 Aristides the Just: exile of, 170; in Oration 38, 247 Aristotle: and Alexander, 58; and Hermias of Atarneus, 43, 57, 58; Hermogenes’ study of, 267; in Oration 40, 13, 43, 57 Artaphernes (satrap), 199n127 Artaxerxes, golden vine of, 236 Artemesium, battle of, 203, 204nn135–36 Artemis: Agrotera, 199; cult at Ephesus, 135n90; in Oration 60, 135 Asclepius, 149; resurrections by, 180n76; Tiber shrine of, 273 Asia, boundaries of, 222 Asia Minor, students from, 69 Asopus, love for Thisbe, 150n19 Aspasia, eloquence of, 153 Athena: in building of Argo, 64n74; connection with spinning, 152n23; contention with Poseidon, 81, 123– 24, 133n86, 190, 195; in Homer, 244; as Mentes, 245n157; olive branch of, 192, 195; sacrifices to, 31; sculptures of, 234, 264 —in Oration 5, 190; in Oration 6, 195 Athenaeus (comes): and Demosthenes, 233; eloquence of, 216; in Oration 28, 210, 233–34; vicariate of Macedonia, 210n14 Athena-Nike, cult of, 94n72 Athens: academic traditions of, 1, 38; Academy, 64, 172; Acropolis, 133, 190, 257; Aelius Aristides on, 195n119; age of majority at, 21; aid from Plataea, 200n128; aid to Heraclids, 197n121; Alexander the Great and, 166n35; Ampelius’s improvements to, 237; Augustine on, 195n117; autochthony of, 193; calendar of, 254n182; capture of Cythera, 54n51; Chalcidean attack on, 198; civilizing arts of, 162, 194–95; Collytus street, 237; colonizing of Constantinople, 37,

297 45, 60n65; colonizing of Ionia, 124, 132, 133n84; conflict with Boeotia, 197, 205; cult of Dionysus at, 268; Darius’s embassy to, 167n37, 203n135; domestic sacrifices at, 136–37; eloquence of, 97–98, 167, 235, 245, 246, 249; encomia for, 162n22, 193–94; eupatrids of, 257; famous sights of, 140; founding of, 63; funeral orations in, 161–62, 192–93; gift-giving by, 194; gods’ contention over, 81, 123–24, 133n86, 190, 195; Greek language of, 37, 55, 56; Hephaestia, 242n148; Himerius’s absences from, 107–8; Ionians’ exile at, 196; kindness of, 195–96, 231n100; law on adultery, 179n74; law on funeral orations, 192–93; Lyceum, 129, 130n76; Macedonian domination over, 97n80; malefactors in, 165n31; marketplace of, 237; myth-history of, 63n72, 148; nightingale of, 56, 105; opposition to tyrants, 167; ostracism in, 170n51; Painted Stoa, 133, 169, 201n129; Palace of Giants, 244n155; Parthenon, 236; in Persian Wars, 198–99; Pindar on, 37, 46; Praetorium, 244n155; Precinct of Poseidon, 190; Propylaea, 236; Pylos campaign, 206n138; shrine of Athena Polias, 190; Spartan attack on, 197, 198; Stoa Basileios, 237n123; support for Megarians, 205; Theseia festival, 277n13; Thracian threat to, 196, 197; tribute to Crete, 277; wall of, 101n88; war with Eleusis, 197n121; worship of Apollo at, 31n44; Xerxes and, 189–90, 191 —in Oration 1, 157; in Oration 6, 192– 95, 198; in Oration 31, 237; in Oration 59, 133; in Oration 64, 140 Athos canal, 185, 204n135 Auloi (pipes), 105n97, 124; in Oration 54, 131 Bacchae: in Oration 46, 251; in Oration 47, 255; in Oration 48, 260 Basilius (prefect at Rome), 208 Basilius (son of Basilius), 208, 209, 252n179; dispensation of justice, 215; horsemanship of, 257n191; support for Himerius, 211, 217 —in Oration 46, 249–53; in Oration 47, 253–58

298 Basil of Caesarea, 109; in Athens, 4; Sozomen on, 5 Baths, ritual, 25n30 Bellerophon, in Oration 47, 257 Boeotia: conflict with Athens, 197, 205; Himerius in, 21, 22 Boreas, and Oreithyia, 153, 223n70 Bosporus: in Oration 37, 273; in Oration 41, 61 Branchidae (spring), 99; shrine of Apollo at, 135n90 Brasidas, capture of Amphipolis, 44, 63 Bridegrooms: in Oration 9, 151–52; ritual baths of, 25n30. See also Epithalamia Bucephalas, 256, 257n191 Cabiri, mysteries of, 150 Cadmus: in encomia, 193; founding of Thebes, 194n114; in Oration 27, 127 Caicus River, 104n94; students from, 103 Callicles, slander of Socrates, 245, 246 Callimachus (soldier), 201 Calliopius (consularis of Macedonia), 13, 39–41, 43n25; as Nicias, 53n51 Callirrhoe (spring), 150n19; in Fragment 1, 274n5 Callistratus, 37; and Philippi, 55 Cappadocia, students from, 110, 122 Carthage, in Oration 36, 242, 243 Castalian spring, 262–63; in Oration 48, 271 Castor, horsemanship of, 256 Castricius (sophist), 217 Cato, the elder, 2, 3 Cato, the younger, 2, 3 Cayster River, in Oration 48, 261 Cecrops, 60n66; descendants of, 88 Cephalus, in Oration 42, 247 Cephisus River, in Oration 48, 263 Cersobleptes (king of Thrace), 168 Cervonius (proconsul of Achaia): in Oration 38, 208, 244–47; support of Himerius, 211, 217; uprightness of, 216 Chaeronea, battle of, 167, 168 Chaerephon, 246n160 Chalcideans, attack on Athens, 198 Chersonesus, Philip’s assault on, 163 Children: adoption of, 179; exposure of, 178, 179, 181, 183 Chiron: lyre of, 226–27, 230; teaching of Achilles, 66, 83, 125, 143, 248n169, 252, 253n180 —in Oration 9, 147; in Oration 23, 226–27; in Oration 25, 230

Index Choricius of Gaza, epithalamia of, 142 Chrysanthius (philosopher), 34 Cicadas: association with birds, 115n19; in Fragment 1, 273; human origin of, 114–15, 263n204; symbolism of, 133n84 Cimmerians: in Oration 12, 220; in Oration 35, 86; in Oration 45, 90; in Oration 48, 270 Cimon, defeat of Pamphylians, 92–93 Cineas, in Oration 10, 117 Cinyras the Cyprian, gold of, 247 Cities, ancient: founders of, 44, 63 Claros, shrine of, 99n85 Clearchus, and Cyrus, 268, 269n214 Cleinias, in Oration 10, 113 Cleon, envy of Pericles, 243 Cleophon, envy of Alcibiades, 243 Cocytus (underworld), 32 Codex A (Monacensis gr. 564), 7 Codex B (Oxoniensis Baroccianus gr. 131), 7 Codex R (Parisinus bibl. nat. suppl. gr. 352), 7 Colophon, shrine of Apollo at, 135n90 Constans (emperor), 209; death of, 208, 215n31; in Oration 10, 114n17; Prohaeresius and, 60n65 Constantine (emperor), 209; Sun worship of, 274n5 Constantinople: as Argo, 64; Athenian colonization of, 37, 45, 60n65; Christian character of, 62n69; cultural achievements of, 38; in Fragment 6, 275; geographical situation of, 61; Hellenism of, 36; Himerius in, 2, 58, 59; Himerius’s orations at, 3–4, 9, 34–36, 44–48, 58–65; Julian’s benefactions to, 44; as new Rome, 47n37; philosophy at, 46, 64; population of, 63; prefects of, 64–65, 116n26, 215n35; royal portico of, 65; senate-house of, 61; walls of, 47n35 —in Oration 41, 36, 37–38, 44–46, 63– 65; in Oration 62, 46–48 Constantius II (emperor), 2, 94n72, 209, 272; fortification of Constantinople, 47n35; and Hermogenes, 266n208; in Fragment 1, 273; in Oration 10, 114n17; and Salutius, 247n164; Scylacius under, 208; in Sirmium, 274n5 Contests, oratorical, 4, 6, 157, 215n31 Corcyreans, relations with Persians, 203 Corinth: Athenian victories over, 205; cult of Poseidon at Isthmus of, 256;

Index Hermogenes in, 210–11, 259n195; Himerius at, 4, 107, 118, 127; in Oration 12, 220–21 Corinthian Gulf, in Oration 30, 128 Crenides, colony of, 37, 55n57. See also Philippi Crete, Athenian tribute to, 277 Croesus, gold of, 247 Cronus, 121n48 Crown, olive, 52, 175, 249n171 Ctesiphon, Aeschines’ case against, 166n34 Cyanean rocks, in Oration 62, 47 Cyclades, possession by pirates, 196 Cyclops: in Fragment 2, 274; in Oration 12, 222; Polyphemus, 154 Cylon (Olympic victor), 52 Cynegirus (soldier), 201 Cyprus: Erotes on, 121; students from, 110, 121 Cyrsilus, in Oration 5, 188 Cyrus the Great: conquest of Babylon, 239n132; diversion of Gyndes, 232; in Oration 20, 225 Cyrus the Younger: and Clearchus, 268, 269n214; in Oration 44, 69–70, 89; rebellion of, 89n58 Cythera, Athenian capture of, 54n51 Cyzicus, battle of, 238 Daduchs (torchbearers), in Oration 8, 27 Daedalus, in Oration 48, 270 Danaus, 194n114; founding of Argos, 44; in Oration 41, 63 Darius, 200; and Democedes, 139n100; embassy to Athens, 167n37, 203n135; expeditionary force of, 199; in Oration 6, 198; royal residence of, 236; satraps of, 199 Datis (satrap), 199n127, 200 Death, rhetorical responses to, 22n17. See also Funeral orations; Monodies Declamations. See Meletai Deianira, 152 Deidamia, 143 Delos: annual Athenian voyage to, 247; Apollo’s birth on, 60, 61n67, 99n85, 139; stabilization of, 126, 244; trees of, 99 Delphi: Aesop and, 251; Apollo at, 134n88, 212, 262; in Persian Wars, 203; statue of Hermias at, 57n60; votive tripods at, 99n85 Demades, envy of Demosthenes, 243 Demeter: Egyptians’ sacrifice to, 261;

299 mysteries of, 83, 254; pursuit of Kore, 194; sanctuary at Eleusis, 31, 190n104, 194 —in Oration 6, 194; in Oration 8, 27; in Oration 23, 226; in Oration 44, 87–88 Democedes of Croton: Darius and, 139n100; in Persia, 84n45; and Pythagoras, 66–67, 84 —in Oration 34, 83–84; in Oration 64, 139 Democritus: Hermogenes’ study of, 267; in Oration 3, 175 Demophon, 197n121 Demosthenes: Alexander the Great and, 158; and comes Athenaeus, 233; Demades’ envy of, 243; on illness, 90; stylistic variety of, 100n86 —in Oration 1, 157, 158; in Oration 2, 158, 165–70; in Oration 28, 233; in Oration 68, 100 Deo. See Demeter Dia (island), 147n14 Dialexeis (discourses), 9, 10, 43, 111; to Ionians, 134–36; in Philippi, 43; to Salutius, 247–48; to students, 108 Dio Chrysostom, on Alexander, 78n25, 132n81 Diogenes, in Oration 10, 112–13 Dionysus: among the Ethiopians, 255; among the Indians, 122–23; Apollo as, 99n85; and Ariadne, 146n12; association with agriculture, 149; association with prophecy, 33n48; beauty of, 98; birthplace of, 126; cult at Athens, 268; dedicants to, 27n34; in Euripides, 244; in Lydia, 251, 255; at Mount Parnassus, 251; resurrections by, 180n76; Titans’ envy of, 91 —in Oration 8, 21, 27, 32; in Oration 9, 149; in Oration 18, 122–23; in Oration 44, 87–88; in Oration 45, 90–91; in Oration 48, 260; in Oration 68, 98 Dioscuri: birthplace of, 126; in Oration 8, 28; in Oration 9, 149 Diospontus (province), 151 Dodona, bronze gong at, 79 Drugs, Egyptian, 29, 77 Dryads, Apollo and, 95 Duris (writer), 268 Egypt: as consort of Nile, 88, 148; encomia of, 193; marvels of, 88–89; revolt against Persians, 206n138; students from, 69, 103, 110

300 Eleusis: fires of, 59, 136; Persian burning of, 190; sanctuary of Demeter at, 31, 190n104, 194; war with Athens, 197n121 —in Oration 6, 194; in Oration 8, 31; in Oration 29, 80; in Oration 34, 83; in Oration 69, 103 Elis, Philip’s conquest of, 163 Eloquence: of Aspasia, 153; Athenian, 97–98, 167, 235, 245, 246, 249; encouragement of, 23; of the Muses, 102–3; of Pericles, 26, 233, 247; practice in, 105, 137–38; of Spartan women, 229; and virtue, 112, 120 Encomia: for ancestors, 192–93, 195, 196, 200–201, 204, 206; for Athens, 162n22, 193–94; Himerius’s, 157; of places, 193; as progymnasmata, 157n8 Enipeus River, 149; in Oration 48, 263; Tyro’s love for, 150n19 Envy: in Homer, 102; of prosperity, 101 —in Oration 6, 197; in Oration 36, 243; in Oration 45, 90–91; in Oration 69, 101–2 Ephesus: cult of Artemis at, 135n90; students from, 124 Epicurus: on chaos, 174; denial of Providence, 171, 173–74, 175; doctrine of pleasure, 171n54; elimination of sacrifice, 173n58; Garden of, 172n56; Hermogenes’ study of, 267; impiety charges against, 172–73; in Oration 3, 159, 162n23, 171–76 Epithalamia, 9, 41, 82; bridal chamber in, 144; diction of, 14n49, 145; Eros in, 142; formal and relaxed, 142; gam;lioi logoi and, 144; Himerius’s, 9, 14n49, 41, 82, 141, 145–55, 272– 73; kateunastikoi logoi and, 144; Menander Rhetor on, 142, 143–44; parts of, 145; progeny in, 144; for Severus, 42, 141–55; spouses in, 145. See also Marriage Eretria, Persian conquest of, 199, 200 Erinyes: in Oration 4, 182; in Oration 8, 26, 27; sanctuary of, 28n36 Eros: in epithalamia, 142; faithlessness of, 117; in Oration 10, 113, 115, 117 Erotes, 260; on Cyprus, 121; in Fragment 1, 274; parentage of, 115n21 —in Oration 9, 146, 152, 154; in Oration 10, 115; in Oration 17, 121, 122; in Oration 48, 211, 259, 260 Erythrae, treaty with Hermias, 57n60

Index Eteocles and Polynices, 96n77, 197n121 Ethiopians: Dionysus among, 255; eastern and western, 137, 138n95; skill at archery, 137–38 Euboea, tyrants of, 164n27 Eucles, 225n77 Eumolpus, 196 Eunapius, 1n1, 3; aid from Prohaeresius, 70; on Himerius’s daughter, 19; on Julian, 5–6; on Libanius, 5; on prefect Anatolius, 4 Eupolis, 54n53 Euripides, portrayal of Dionysus, 244 Eurybiades, 248 Eurymedon River, in Oration 61, 93 Eurystheus, in Oration 6, 196 Eustathius, 274; Himerian fragments in, 272 Evagoras (Cyprian tyrant), 129–30 Excerpta Neapolitana (bibl. nat. gr. II C 32), 8, 74, 112, 213, 272 Extempore orations, 9 Fable, geographical categorization of, 94n73 Flavianus, Nicomachus, the younger (proconsul of Asia), 3, 212; career of, 213; enemies of, 243n150; family of, 221; imperial service of, 241–42; in Libya, 241, 242n147; paideia of, 216 —in Oration 12, 218–24; in Oration 36, 240–43; in Oration 43, 248– 49 Flavianus, Virius Nicomachus, 212 Fragment 1, 273–74; Aphrodite in, 274; Pan in, 274 Fragment 2, 274–75; Cyclops in, 274 Fragments 3–7, 275 Fragments 8–12, 276 Fragments 13–17, 277 Funeral competitions, 32, 33n48 Funeral orations: Aelius Aristides’, 161; in Athens, 161–62; Menander Rhetor on, 27n35, 161; for war heroes, 192–93, 200–201, 204, 206. See also Monodies Galateia, and Polyphemus, 154 Gallus, Caesar, 2, 94n72; in Fragment 1, 272, 273 Gelon, tyrant of Syracuse, 203 Glaucus (Olympic victor), 249; in Oration 13, 76 Gods: birthplaces of, 126; human guises of, 244, 245n157; at Marathon, 201n130; pleading and judging on

Index the Areopagus, 23n24, 30, 195; strife among, 123–24 Gorgias of Leontini, 56; in Oration 32, 239; in Oration 38, 245 Gorgonius (assessor in Armenia), 6 Governors: of Achaia, 207; as judges, 260n198; Menander Rhetor on, 224n72, 252n179. See also Officeholders, Roman Graces, 124n58; in Oration 8, 26; in Oration 9, 146, 154; in Oration 48, 270 Grammarians, 68n6 Greeks, under Roman Empire, 14 Gregory of Nazianzus, 109n4; in Athens, 4; Sozomen on, 5 Gyges (king of Lydia), gold of, 123 Gyndes River, Cyrus’s diversion of, 232 Hades, brides of, 27n35 Hagnon, 63; settlement of Amphipolis, 44 Hair, consecration of, 27n33 Halirrhothius, murder of, 195 Hamadryads, Apollo and, 95 Hazing rituals, 108n3 Hecatombion, month of, 254n182 Hedonism, Epicurean, 171n54 Helen of Troy: capture by Theseus, 28n38; family of, 29n38; in Homer, 77n24; Stesichorus’s slander of, 102n91 —in Oration 8, 28; in Oration 16, 77 Helios, in Oration 12, 224 Hellanicus, 268 Hellespont: Philip’s conquest of, 163; Xerxes’ bridging of, 164n28, 184n90, 185n93, 202, 203, 204n135 Hephaestus: in Oration 25, 229; in Oration 36, 242 Hera, 155n28; birthplace of, 126; kestos of, 256n189; as matchmaker, 149; in Oration 9, 144, 154; victims of, 146n13 Heracles: and Deianira, 152; descendants of, 124, 125, 194n114; in encomia, 193; and Iolaus, 132, 249; labors of, 149; and Theseus, 247, 268, 269n214 —in Oration 8, 26; in Oration 32, 239; in Oration 41, 62 Heraclids: Athenian aid to, 197n121; Eurystheus’s violence against, 196 Hermes: Athenian appellations of, 234n111; logios, 92n65, 140n101, 142, 145, 152n23, 234, 250n175, 260n198; as messenger of Zeus, 269; in Oration 32, 238; in Oration

301 38, 246; in Oration 47, 255; in Oration 64, 139 Hermias of Atarneus: Aristotle and, 43, 57, 58; death of, 58n61; treaty with Erythrae, 57n60 Hermogenes: On Issues, 20; Staseis, 159n12 Hermogenes (proconsul of Achaia): administration of justice, 260, 269–70; at Constantinople, 268; and Constantius, 266n208; in Corinth, 210–11, 259n195; eloquence of, 266–67; imperial service of, 209, 265, 266n208, 268; in Oration 48, 258–71; paideia of, 217; philosophical nature of, 264, 265–67; study of philosophy, 267– 68; support of Himerius, 217 Herodotus: Carian muse of, 63; in Oration 48, 268; on Xerxes, 119n38, 160 Heroes, Homeric: fatherlands of, 126, 139; as orators, 56n59. See also War heroes Hesiod: on good strife, 104n96; on Mount Helicon, 96; transformation from shepherd, 101n89 —in Oration 27, 126; in Oration 69, 101 Hesperides, meadows of, 220 Hesperus, in Oration 47, 258 Hieron: Pindar’s salute to, 49, 233, 249; and Simonides of Ceos, 235, 268 Himerius, 1; absences from Athens, 107– 8; academic violence against, 69, 101; accent-based prose of, 12n42; in Achaia, 4; as Areopagite, 1, 211, 230n96; Armenian property of, 6; arrival orations of, 35, 107–11, 118– 22, 123–25, 130–32; Athenian citizenship of, 1; Atticism of, 38; Basilius’s support for, 211, 217; birth of, 3; in Boeotia, 21, 22; categories of orations, 8–10; Cervonius’s support for, 211, 217; children of, 1, 19, 29n38; in Constantinople, 2, 58, 59; at Corinth, 4, 107, 118, 127; daughter of, 19, 29n38; desire for Athens, 108; dialexeis of, 9, 10, 43, 55, 108, 111, 136–39; diction of, 14; epithalamia of, 9, 14n49, 41, 82, 141, 145–55, 272–73; excerptors of, 7–8; extempore orations of, 9, 41, 55, 104, 139, 249; father of, 1, 20; Hellenism of, 1, 38, 46; Hermogenes’ support for, 217; imaginary themes of, 10, 14n48; influence of Aelius Aristides on, 22;

302 Himerius (continued ) interest in poetry, 14–16; at Julian the Apostate’s court, 2, 5–6, 13, 34, 58, 142; on Julian, 2, 37–38; laliai of, 9, 10, 70, 80, 87, 90, 104, 139; and Libanius, 6; manuscript tradition of, 7–8; meletai of, 9, 156–92; metaphors of, 10–11, 12, 14; Mithraism of, 35, 44, 58–59; musical metaphors of, 12, 15; orations at Constantinople, 3–4, 9, 34–36, 44–48, 58–65; oration at Philippi, 2, 13, 36, 37, 41, 43, 55– 58; oration at Thessalonica, 2, 13, 36–37, 48–54; orations on students, 11, 66, 68, 73, 77, 84–90, 107, 109, 118, 125–27; poetic tone of, 14–15; professional conflicts of, 22, 69, 101, 211–12; prolaliai of, 9, 10, 43, 244n155; propemptic orations of, 9, 67–68, 74, 111–12, 120–21, 211, 212, 213, 234, 240; protreptic orations of, 73, 74, 97; quarrel with Prohaeresius, 22; rejection of physical punishment, 71, 95n74, 110; religious language of, 11; studies at Athens, 4; in the Suda, 157; syntactic orations of, 107; teaching in Athens, 2, 3, 6; teaching in Constantinople, 3–4; theOriai of, 10; translations of, 16; as Triptolemus, 38, 60n65; understanding of paganism, 2; use of history, 12, 157–58; use of Homer, 15; use of myth, 12, 13– 14; use of stories, 13–14, 83; visits to Prusias, 87n54, 107, 108, 136; wife of, 1, 20. See also Fragments; Orations Hippias of Elis, 245 Hippodamia: in Oration 9, 147; Pelops’s love for, 143, 148n15 Hipponicus, house of, 140 Homer: Achilles in, 258; Alcinous in, 87n53; Athena in, 244; envy in, 102; Helen in, 77n24; Himerius’s use of, 15; kestos of, 256; Odysseus in, 258; as son of Meles, 135n90, 223; Sparta in, 61 Horses, Nisaean: in Oration 12, 224; in Oration 25, 232 Hyagnis, 219n49 Hymenaeus, 145 Hyperbolus, envy of Nicias, 243 Hyperboreans, Apollo among, 262, 263n204 Hyperides: in Oration 1, 157, 158; in Oration 6, 193n112

Index Iacchus: in Oration 2, 166; in Oration 69, 103 Iamblichus, 135n90; birthplace of, 153n26; on Pythagoras, 266n208 Ibycus, in Oration 69, 102 Icarus, in Oration 48, 270 Identity, Greek, 14, 36n10 Iliou Persis, 120n39 Ilissus River: in Fragment 1, 274; students departing from, 104; in Oration 9, 150; in Oration 10, 118; in Oration 47, 254 Inachus, 61 Indians: Dionysus among, 122–23; as nomads, 138n95 Io, in Oration 41, 61 Iolaus: aid to Heracles, 249; imitation of Heracles, 132 Ion, 134 Ionia: colonization of Sicily, 135; Pythagoras in, 127; revolt (499 b.c.), 199n125; rivers of, 135; settlement by Athens, 124, 132, 133n84; students from, 111, 124–25, 132–34 Ionian Gulf, in Oration 12, 221 Ionians: ancestors of, 135, 136; characteristics of, 134; colonization of Asia Minor, 197n121; discourses to, 132– 36; enslavement to Persians, 198; exile to Athens, 196; luxury of, 135n89; in Oration 59, 133–34; in Oration 60, 134–36 Isaeus, teaching of Demosthenes, 233 Ismenias the piper, and Alexander the Great, 50 Isocrates: encomia for Athens, 162n22; Himerius on, 15; in Oration 33, 129–30; and Nicocles, 129n75, 130; school of, 108–9, 130 Ister River, in Oration 48, 271 Ithaca, Odysseus’s love for, 127, 128 Itys, in Oration 47, 254 Ixion, insolence of, 172 Jason, in Oration 31, 235 Jerome, Saint: on Prohaeresius, 5 Julian the Apostate (emperor), 209; academic pursuits of, 274n5; accession of, 94n72; admiration for Libanius, 5; arrival in Constantinople, 34; benefactions to Constantinople, 44; birthplace of, 60n65; as Caesar, 94n72; Eunapius on, 5–6; exile of, 60n65; as founder of Constantinople, 44–45, 63n70; in Fragment 1, 272; and Himerius, 2, 5–6, 13, 34, 58, 142; Himerius’s praise of, 44;

Index Mithraism of, 35, 58, 59nn63– 64, 62n69; in Oration 41, 59, 62; and Prohaeresius, 5; religiosity of, 62n69; and Salutius, 247n164 Julianus (sophist), 71–72 Justice: in Oration 38, 246; in Oration 46, 252; in Oration 48, 260, 270; in panegyrical orations, 215 Kithara (musical instrument), 28n37, 124; Achilles’, 123n56 Kore: abduction of, 194; in Oration 8, 27; worship at Eleusis, 31 Lachesis, spindle of, 240 Lade, island of, 231 Laelius, and Scipio, 248n165 Laliai (talks), 9, 10, 70, 80, 139; to students, 87, 90, 104 Leda, children of, 29n38 Leto, in Oration 64, 139 Libanius: on academic violence, 69; and Himerius, 6; Julian’s admiration for, 5; in oratorical contests, 157; protheOriai of, 10; on rhetorical education, 218; students of, 70; on summer training, 75; Works: Epistula 469, 6; Epistula 742, 6; Epistula 1230, 217–18 Libethrii, in Oration 46, 250 Licinius (emperor), 209, 210 Lopadiotes, 141n1; Lexicon, 8, 272 Lotus-eaters: in Oration 30, 127; in Oration 41, 65 Lycomedes, 252, 253n180 Lycurgus: Apollo’s aid to, 127n67; founding of Sparta, 63; house of, 140; mother of, 229; in Oration 27, 126–27 Lydia: Dionysus in, 251, 255; gold of, 123 Lyra (musical instrument), 28n37; of Achilles, 73, 123, 252; Chiron’s, 226–27, 230 Lysippus: depiction of Alexander, 235, 264; in Oration 13, 76 Macedonians, as tributaries of Athens, 164 Maeander River, in Oration 25, 231–32 Magna Graecia, in Oration 60, 135n90 Magnentius (usurper), 209 Marathon, battle of, 225n77; fallen soldiers at, 200–201; gods at, 201n130; painting of, 169n46, 201n129; Persian casualties at, 199n127; triremes at, 201 —in Oration 6, 200–201; in Oration 59, 133

303 Mardonius (satrap), 199n127 Marriage: contracting of, 143, 144–45, 153; cosmic origins of, 143, 148; in monodies, 27n35; myths of, 148–49; rhetoric and, 145. See also Epithalamia Marsyas, 219n49; Apollo’s defeat of, 146n12 Maximus (prefect of Egypt), 217 Maximus (philosopher), 34 Maximus (prefect of Rome), 208 Megarians, Athenian support for, 205 Melas River (Boeotia), 5, 21, 32 Melas River (Cappodocia), 5, 21, 110 Meles River (Ionia): as Homer’s father, 135n90, 223; in Oration 12, 223 Meletai (declamations), 9, 156–92; adultery in, 159; ancient critics of, 156n4; rich and poor in, 159 Memnon (statue): in Oration 19, 79; in Oration 44, 88; in Oration 62, 46 Menander Rhetor: on birthday orations, 70; on epithalamia, 142, 143–44; on funeral orations, 27n35, 161; on governors, 224n72, 252n179; on praise of cities, 51n47; on propemptic orations, 112; on syntactic oratory, 107 Metaphors, Himerius’s use of, 10–11, 12, 14 Midas: gold of, 247; in Oration 15, 121 Miletus, in Oration 25, 231 Miltiades: opposition to tyrants, 167; in Oration 42, 247 Minucianus: in Oration 7, 24; in Oration 8, 19, 20, 32 Mithraism: Himerius’s, 35, 44, 58–59; Julian’s, 35, 58, 59nn63–64, 62n69 Mnemosyne: in Oration 48, 270; in Oration 66, 96 Mnesaeus, 20 Momus, in Oration 68, 100 Monodies, 9; marriage in, 27n35; Menander Rhetor on, 27n35; precocity in, 22; purpose of, 22. See also Funeral orations Mount Argaeus, 104n94; students from, 103 Mount Arganthoneium, 104n94 Mount Athos, in Oration 5, 184, 185 Mount Cithaeron: in Oration 8, 27, 31; personification of, 96n76 Mount Helicon: Hesiod on, 96; in Oration 22, 80; in Oration 47, 256; in Oration 48, 259, 271; in Oration 62, 48; in Oration 66, 95–96; personification of, 96n76

304 Mount Hymettus: in Oration 3, 174; in Oration 48, 259 Mount Lycabettus, in Oration 33, 129 Mount Pangaeus (Thrace), 48n38 Mount Parnassus: assault on Persians, 174; Dionysus at, 251 Mount Pelion, swans of, 227 Mount Tmolus, in Oration 47, 255 Muses: birthplace of, 155n29; celebration of marriage, 149; at Constantinople, 48; eloquence of, 102–3; Ethiopic, 230; Herodotus’s, 63; parents of, 270n216; sacrifices to, 125; Simonides on, 48 —in Oration 22, 80; in Oration 47, 256; in Oration 48, 259, 260 Music: of auloi, 105n97, 124, 131; and eloquence, 78n25; influence on Alexander, 72, 77–78; of kitharai, 28n37, 123n56; 124; as metaphor, 12, 15; oratory and, 75, 118n35, 230; reed instruments, 92n66 —in Oration 8, 32; in Oration 9, 142– 43; in Oration 16, 77–78; in Oration 39, 49; in Oration 54, 130–31 Musonianus, Strategius (proconsul of Constantinople): in Oration 62, 38–39 Musonius (proconsul of Achaia): in Oration 20, 207, 224–25; in Oration 39, 39, 41, 49, 54n53 Musonius (Stoic philosopher), 20 Musonius (vicar of Macedonia), 13, 38; as Alcibiades, 53n50; in Oration 39, 39, 40–41, 43n25, 48, 52–53; teaching career of, 52n49 Musonius Rufus, 20 Mycale, Greek victory at, 205 Mysia, students from, 124 Myth, Himerius’s use of, 12, 13–14 Naiads, 247n162; in Oration 38, 246 Nature: in Oration 9, 148; in Oration 19, 79; in Oration 35, 85; precedence over art, 240 Nausicaa (Odyssey), 154n28 Naxos, Persian conquest of, 200 Neleus: descendants of, 125; in Oration 60, 136 Nereids, in Oration 12, 221 Nestor, eloquence of, 65 Nicagoras I, in Oration 8, 20 Nicagoras II, 20 Nicias: and Alcibiades, 40, 41, 43n25, 53; Calliopius as, 53n51; envy of, 243; in Oration 42, 247

Index Nicocles (son of Evagoras), 129–30 Nightingale: in Attic myth, 56, 105; in Fragment 1, 273; song of, 106n100 Nike: as Athena, 94n72; in Oration 65, 94 Nile: as consort of Egypt, 88, 148; inundation of, 119, 211, 231, 258, 261– 62 —in Oration 14, 119; in Oration 48, 211 Niobe, 238n124 Ocean, marriage to Tethys, 148 Odysseus: and Antinoos, 138; in Homer, 258; love for Ithaca, 127, 128; and Nausicaa, 154n28; oratory of, 56; in Phaeacia, 87; resourcefulness of, 85; skill at archery, 138; virtue of, 248 —in Oration 39, 54; in Oration 40, 56; in Oration 44, 70, 87; in Oration 63, 138 Oedipus, on Cithaeron, 96n77 Officeholders, Roman: in Himerius’s orations, 216; honoring of sophists, 217–18; incorruptibility of, 216n38; Menander Rhetor on, 224n72; rhetorical training of, 217–18. See also Governors Olympias, marriage of, 150 Opportunity, personification of, 76 Oration 1 (Hyperides on Behalf of Demosthenes), 162–65; Aeschines in, 163–64; history in, 157–58; Philip of Macedon in, 158, 163–64; Pisistratus in, 165; theOria of, 158, 162–63; Xerxes in, 157, 164 Oration 2 (Demosthenes on Behalf of Aeschines), 158, 165–70; Alexander the Great in, 165, 166–67, 168–70; battle of Chaeronea in, 167, 168; Iacchus in, 166; Philip in, 167, 168; Xerxes in, 170 Oration 3 (Against Epicurus): Academy in, 172; Anaxagoras in, 175; Democritus in, 175; Hymettus in, 174; as judicial declamation, 159; Socrates in, 173; theOria of, 171 Oration 4 (Against a Rich Man), 176– 83; adultery in, 177, 179, 180, 181, 183; Erinyes in, 182; exposed children in, 178, 179; as judicial declamation, 159; murder in, 177, 179; painting in, 160, 182–83; Poenae in, 181, 182; rich and poor in, 159–60, 176–77, 182, 183; tokens of recognition in, 178, 180, 181, 183 Oration 5 (Themistocles against the

Index Persian King), 183–92; Apollo in, 191; Athena in, 190; Cyrsilus in, 188; as deliberative, 160; Mount Athos in, 184, 185; Poseidon in, 190; Themistocles in, 160; Thermopylae in, 185, 191; triremes in, 184, 185, 187, 189, 191 Oration 6 (The Polemarchic Oration), 161, 192–206; Amazons in, 196, 197; Athena in, 195; battle of Marathon in, 200–201; Darius in, 198; Eleusis in, 194; as encomium, 157; envy in, 197; Eurystheus in, 196; Hyperides in, 193n112; Persian Wars in, 161–62; piracy in, 196; Poseidon in, 195 Oration 7 (Plea for Rufinus), 19, 23–24, 28; Areopagites in, 23; Minucianus in, 24 Oration 8 (Monody for Rufinus), 5, 19– 20, 21–23, 24–33; Anaxagoras in, 26; Areopagus in, 28, 30; Cithaeron in, 27, 31; Demeter in, 27; Dionysus in, 21, 27, 32; Eleusis in, 31; Erinyes, 26, 27; Helen in, 28; influence of tragedy on, 22; Minucianus in, 19, 20, 32; Nicagoras in, 19, 20, 32; Trophonius in, 21, 22n13, 32, 33n48; underworld in, 32 Oration 9 (Epithalamium for Severus), 42, 141–55; Acheloüs in, 152; Achilles in, 143, 151; Androclus in, 151; Aphrodite in, 154; Apollo in, 146; bridal chamber in, 144; bridegroom in, 151–52; bride in, 144, 150–54; Chiron in, 147; Dionysus in, 149; Erotes in, 146, 152, 154; Graces in, 146, 154; Hera in, 144, 154; Hippodamia in, 147; Ilissus River in, 150; music in, 142–43; nature in, 148; Pan in, 147; Pelopidae in, 151; Poseidon in, 143, 147, 149; progeny in, 152; prooemium of, 142–43; protheOria of, 10, 142, 143, 145; Sappho in, 146, 147, 152, 153; spouses in, 143–44, 150, 151–52 Oration 10 (From the Speech Entitled Diogenes), 113–18; Alexander the Great in, 118; Cineas in, 117; Cleinias in, 113; Constans and Constantius in, 114n17; dialogue form of, 112–14; Diogenes in, 112– 13; Eros in, 113, 115, 117; Erotes in, 115; horn of Amaltheia in, 116; Ilissus River in, 118; Pericles in, 116; Plato in, 113; as propemptic, 74,

305 111–12; protheOria of, 112; Pyrrhus in, 117; Socrates in, 112, 115; Tartessus in, 116 Oration 11 (Farewell Talk to His Students), 107, 118 Oration 12 (To Nicomachus Flavianus), 3, 212–13, 218–24; Alpheus River in, 219; boundaries of Asia in, 222; Cimmerians in, 220; Corinth in, 220–21; Cyclops in, 222; Helios in, 224; Ionian Gulf in, 221; Meles River in, 223; Nereids in, 221; painting in, 219; Parrhasius in, 219; as propemptic, 212, 218, 220; Simonides in, 223; Telchines in, 222; Zeuxis in, 219 Oration 13.1–5 (From a Protreptic), 73, 76–77; Lysippus in, 76; Glaucus in, 76 Oration 13.6–8 (To Followers of Piso), 109, 118–19; Nile in, 119 Oration 14 (To the Newly Arrived Egyptian), 119–20; Nile in, 119; Themistocles in, 119 Oration 15 (From a Propemptic Oration), 111, 112, 120–21; Midas in, 121 Oration 16 (When Discord Arose within His School), 71, 72, 77–78; Alcibiades in, 72, 78; extempore delivery of, 77; Helen of Troy in, 77; music in, 77–78; students in, 11, 77; Xenophon in, 78 Oration 17 (At the Arrival of the Cyprians): Anacreon in, 121; Aphrodite in, 121–22; Erotes in, 121, 122; Sappho in, 121 Oration 18 (Addressed to the Cappadocian), 122–23; Dionysus in, 122–23 Oration 19 (Fine Things Are Rare Things), 78–80; Memnon in, 79; nature in, 79; Persians in, 74; satiety in, 73–74, 79–80; students in, 73 Oration 20 (To Musonius, Proconsul of Achaia), 207, 224–25; Cyrus in, 225; professional rivalry in, 212; Zephyr in, 224 Oration 21 (To Severus), 41, 73, 123–24, 141; Achilles in, 73, 123; student discord in, 73 Oration 22 (lalia), 80; Muses in, 80 Oration 23 (To Comes Ursacius), 213– 14, 225–27; Chiron in, 226–27; Demeter in, 226; Triptolemus in, 226 Oration 24 (To Severus), 42, 141, 214– 15, 227–29; Plato in, 228; Socrates in, 228; Solon in, 228

306 Oration 25 (To Scylacius, Proconsul of Achaia), 207, 209, 216, 229–33; Achilles in, 229–30; Chiron in, 230; Hephaestus in, 229; Maeander River in, 231–32; Miletus in, 231; Pelopidae in, 231; Themis in, 232 Oration 26 (To the Newly Arrived Ephesians, Mysians, and Fellow Citizens of the Speaker): Achilles in, 125; Ionians in, 111, 124–25; students in, 67 Oration 27 (To the Students from Prusias), 11, 109, 125–27; Cadmus in, 127; Hesiod in, 126; Lycurgus in, 126–27; Plato in, 127 Oration 28 (To Comes Athenaeus), 210, 233–34; Alcibiades in, 233–34; Demosthenes in, 233; Proteus in, 234; Sappho in, 233 Oration 29 (To Privatus), 80–82; Achilles in, 82; Ampelius in, 208; Anacharsis in, 68, 80–81; Eleusis in, 80; Polycrates in, 68, 81n39; Solon in, 81; students in, 68 Oration 30 (On Himerius’s Return from Corinth), 4, 107–8, 127–29; Lotuseaters in, 127; Pirene in, 128; satiety in, 128; Sirens in, 128; Xenophon in, 128 Oration 31 (To Publius Ampelius, Proconsul of Achaia), 208, 234–38; Jason in, 235; Philammon in, 235; as propemptic, 67–68, 211, 234; Sybaris in, 235 Oration 32 (To the Prefect Anatolius), 4, 215, 238–40; Achilles in, 238; Alcibiades in, 238; Anacharsis in, 239; Gorgias in, 239; Heracles in, 239; Hermes in, 238; Poseidon in, 238; Timotheus in, 239 Oration 33 (To Phoebus), 129–30; Isocrates in, 129–30; Mount Lycabettus in, 129 Oration 34 (To Arcadius), 13, 66, 82–84; Achilles in, 83; Democedes in, 83– 84; Eleusis in, 83; Himerius’s age at, 67; Solon in, 12, 83; students in, 66–7 Oration 35 (To the Students Who Came Over to Him), 67, 68, 84–87; Alcibiades in, 85; Apollo in, 86; Cimmerians in, 86; horn of Amaltheia in, 86; nature in, 85; Orpheus in, 85; Plato in, 85; Socrates in, 84, 85, 86; stylistic variety in, 67, 74 Oration 36 (To Nicomachus Flavianus),

Index 212, 240–43; Alexander the Great in, 243; Carthage in, 242, 243; envy in, 243; Hephaestus in, 242; Pericles in, 241; as propemptic, 213, 240; Themistocles in, 241 Oration 37 (Epithalamium for Panathenaeus), 141, 272–73; Bosporus in, 273 Oration 38 (To Cervonius, Proconsul of Achaia), 208, 244–47; Gorgias of Leontini in, 245; Hermes in, 246; Justice in, 246; Naiads in, 246; professional conflict in, 211–12; as prolalia, 244n155; Socrates in, 211–12 Oration 39 (Discourse in Thessalonica), 48–54; Achilles in, 52; Alcibiades in, 13, 40, 41, 43n25, 52, 53; Alcinous in, 39, 41, 54; Alcman in, 49–50; Anacreon in, 49; horn of Amaltheia in, 54; music in, 49; Musonii in, 39, 40–41, 43n25, 48, 49, 52–53, 54n53, 207; Odysseus in, 54; Pericles in, 40, 41, 52; Pieria in, 49; Simonides in, 49; Sirens in, 54; Themistocles in, 40, 41, 52; Xanthippus in, 49; Xerxes in, 50 Oration 40 (Discourse in Philippi), 41– 44, 55–58, 142; Aristotle in, 13, 43, 57; brevity of, 43; as dialexis, 43, 55; extempore delivery of, 41, 55; Odysseus in, 56; as prolalia, 43; Severus in, 41–43, 55, 141–42 Oration 41 (Delivered in Constantinople), 2, 3–4, 34–35, 58–65; Academy in, 64; Apollo in, 59, 60; Argo in, 64; audience of, 35; Bosporus in, 61; Constantinople in, 36, 37–38, 44–46, 63–65; Danaus in, 63; Heracles in, 62; Io in, 61; Julian in, 59, 62; Lotus-eaters in, 65; Plato in, 64; Pythagoras in, 64; Romulus in, 62; Triptolemus in, 60n65 Oration 42 (To Prefect Secundus Salutius), 3, 215, 247–48; Cephalus in, 247; as dialexis, 247; Miltiades in, 247; Nicias in, 247; Themistocles in, 247 Oration 43 (To Proconsul Nicomachus Flavianus ), 212, 213, 248–49; Academy in, 249; Peleus in, 248 Oration 44 (On the Birthday of One of His Students), 11, 87–90, 109n4; Alcibiades in, 89; Apis in, 88; Cyrus the Younger in, 69–70, 89; Demeter in, 87–88; Dionysus in, 87–88;

Index as lalia, 70, 87; Memnon in, 88; Odysseus in, 70, 87; seasons in, 87–88; Xenophon in, 69–70, 89 Oration 45 (Given upon His Student’s Recovery), 70–71, 90–91; Cimmerians in, 90; Dionysus in, 90–91; envy in, 90–91; as lalia, 90; Titans in, 90–91 Oration 46 (To Those Laying Snares for Himerius and Basilius), 208, 249– 53; Achilles in, 252; Agamemnon in, 252; Bacchae in, 251; extempore delivery of, 249; Justice in, 252; Libethrii in, 250; Pindar in, 251; professional conflict in, 212; Sappho in, 251; support for Himerius in, 211; Themis in, 252 Oration 47 (To Basilius during the Panathenaea), 208, 210, 253–58; Agamemnon in, 255–56; Anacreon in, 254; Aphrodite in, 254; Apollo in, 256; Bacchae in, 255; Bellerophon in, 257; Hermes in, 255; Hesperus in, 258; Ilissus River in, 254; Itys in, 254; Mount Helicon in, 256; Mount Tmolus in, 255; Muses in, 256; Simonides in, 257; Zeus in, 256 Oration 48 (To Hermogenes, Proconsul of Achaia), 258–71; Alcaeus in, 262– 63; Anacreon in, 259–60; Apollo in, 262; Bacchae in, 260; Castalian spring in, 271; Cayster River in, 261; Cephisus River in, 263; Cimmerians in, 270; Daedalus and Icarus in, 270; Dionysus in, 260; Enipeus River in, 263; Erotes in, 211, 259, 260; Graces in, 270; Herodotus in, 268; Ister in, 271; Justice in, 260, 270; Mnemosyne in, 270; Mount Helicon in, 259, 271; Mount Hymettus in, 259; Muses in, 259, 260; Nile in, 211; Philoctetes in, 258; philosophy in, 217; Plato in, 266, 267–68; Socrates in, 266; soul in, 263–64; Themis in, 260; Zephyr in, 261 Oration 49 (To Plocianus the Proconsul), 210 Oration 51 (To Praetextatus), 2, 210 Oration 52 (To the Emperor Julian), 34 Oration 54 (To Newly Arrived Students), 130–32; Achilles in, 132; Alexander the Great in, 131–32; music in, 130– 31; punishment in, 71, 131; Theseus in, 132

307 Oration 59 (To Ionian Guests), 132–34; Apollo in, 134; Areopagus in, 133; Athens in, 133; as ecphrastic, 111; Marathon in, 133 Oration 60 (To Ionian Guests), 134– 36; Artemis in, 135; as dialexis, 111, 134; Magna Graecia, 135n90; Neleus in, 136; Pindar in, 12, 111, 136 Oration 61 (As Studies Began), 68–69, 91–93; Eurymedon River in, 93; sculptors in, 92; sophists in, 92 Oration 62 (For a Constantinopolitan Student), 4, 38–39, 46–48; Apollo in, 38; as dialexis, 43; Memnon in, 46; Mount Helicon in, 48; Musonianus in, 38–39; Pieria in, 48; Poseidon in, 46, 47; Sirens in, 46; Symplegades in, 47 Oration 63 (After Himerius’s Return from Prusias), 107, 108, 136–39; as dialexis, 108, 136; Odysseus in, 138 Oration 64 (Delivered at Himerius’s School), 139–40; Apollo in, 139; Athens in, 140; Democedes in, 139; extempore delivery of, 139; Hermes in, 139 Oration 65 (To Those Involved in a Conflict), 72, 73, 93–94; Achilles in, 72, 93; Agamemnon in, 13, 72, 93; Nike in, 94 Oration 66 (To Rebellious Students): Apollo in, 71, 94–95; Mnemosyne in, 96; Mount Helicon in, 95–96 Oration 67 (To the Followers of Quintianus), 71 Oration 68 (On the Need to Be Favorably Disposed to Variety), 97–101; Amphion in, 75, 101; Apollo in, 99; Demosthenes in, 100; Dionysus in, 98; Momus in, 100; Phidias in, 98; Protagoras in, 100; Proteus in, 100; as protreptic, 73, 74, 97; students in, 73, 74 Oration 69 (Delivered after His Wound Healed), 68–69, 101–4; Anacreon in, 102; Eleusis in, 103; envy in, 101–2; Hesiod in, 101; Iacchus in, 103; Ibycus in, 102; poetry in, 15, 102; Sardanapalus in, 101; students in, 103 Oration 70 (After His Return from Corinth), 4 Oration 72 (In Sparta), 4, 36n7 Oration 73 (On Publicly Announced Lectures), 75

308 Oration 74 (On Training), 104–6; Apollo in, 105–6; extempore delivery of, 104; Panathenaea in, 105; as protreptic, 73; seasons in, 105; summer training in, 75; Timagenidas in, 104–5 Oration 75 (Delivered at Corinth), 4 Oratory: of arrival, 35, 107–11, 119– 22, 123–25, 130–33; birthday, 11, 69–70, 87–90; calming quality of, 78; contests in, 4, 6, 157, 215n31; of departure, 66, 107–8, 111–12, 118; dialexeis, 9, 10, 43, 55, 108, 111, 134, 136, 247; ecphrastic, 111; epideictic, 9; epithalamia, 9, 14n49, 41, 82; extempore, 9, 41, 55, 104, 139, 249; as feasts, 227n87; fees for, 101n89; fortifying power of, 127n67; funeral, 161–62, 192–93, 200–201, 206; language of love in, 49n42; and music, 75, 118n35, 230; and painting, 225; panegyrical, 23, 215, 216; propemptic, 9, 67–68, 74, 111–12, 113n15, 120–21, 211, 212, 213, 234, 240; protheOriai in, 10, 112, 142, 143, 145; protreptic, 73, 74, 97; public announcement of, 75; syntactic, 107; theOriai in, 10. See also Laliai; Meletai Oreithyia, Boreas and, 153, 223n70 Orestes, absolution of, 195 Orpheus: death of, 102n90; envy of, 102; and the Libethrii, 250; in Oration 35, 85 Pactolus River (Lydia), 123n54; gold of, 255 Paganism, Himerius’s understanding of, 2 Paideia: encouragement of, 23; of officeholders, 216, 217 Painting: of Aegean Sea, 219; ecphrases of, 160, 219n48; encaustic, 182n83, 264n206; Himerius on, 16n52; of Marathon, 169n46, 201n129; and oratory, 225; at Sicyon, 235n116; of tragedy, 182–83 —in Oration 4, 160, 182–83; in Oration 12, 219 Palamedes, 102 Pamphylia: Cimon’s defeat of, 92–93; Greekness of, 92–93 Pan: Apollo’s defeat of, 146n12; birthplace of, 126; in Fragment 1, 274; at Marathon, 201n130; in Oration 9, 147 Panathenaea festival: procession of, 257;

Index sacred trireme of, 257; season of, 253n182 —in Oration 47, 210; in Oration 74, 105 Panathenaeus, epithalamium for, 141, 272–73 Panathenaeus (proconsul of Achaia), 141n2 Panegyrics, 23, 215; purpose of, 216. See also Encomia Paralus (son of Pericles), 120n40 Parrhasius, in Oration 12, 219 Parthenon, 236 Patroclus, 238, 249 Peace of Callias, 205n137 Pegasus, 256 Peleus: arming of Achilles, 252; choice of tutor, 83; in Oration 43, 248 Pelopidae: in Oration 9, 151; in Oration 25, 231 Peloponnesian War, 63n70, 206n138 Pelops: chariot of, 148n15; descendants of, 88; horses of, 239; love of Hippodamia, 143, 148n15; in Oration 9, 147 Pentheus, 96n77 Pericles: eloquence of, 26, 233, 247; envy of, 243; opposition to tyrants, 167; persuasiveness of, 241; sons of, 120n40 —in Oration 10, 116; in Oration 36, 241; in Oration 39, 40, 41, 52 Perseus, descendants of, 88 Persians: archers, 74, 79, 202, 204; conquest of Thebes, 203; Egyptian revolt against, 206n138; Ionian enslavement to, 198; in Oration 19, 74 Persian Wars: Athenian leadership in, 198–99; burning of Eleusis in, 190; casualties in, 190, 199; Delphi in, 203; Eretria in, 199, 200; Greek victories during, 203–5; Naxos in, 200; pretext for, 199; sea battles in, 164n29, 184, 185, 188, 189, 191, 202, 203; Thebes in, 191n108 —in Oration 5, 183–92; in Oration 6, 161–62, 198–205 Phaeacia: gardens of, 86; Odysseus in, 87 Phalaris, and Pythagoras, 265–66, 266n208 Phasis River, in Oration 12, 222 Phidias: in Oration 68, 98; sculptures of Athena, 234; statue of Zeus, 240; workshop of, 140 Philammon (son of Apollo), in Oration 31, 235 Philip II of Macedon, 55; alliance with

Index Thebes, 166; conquests of, 163, 166, 167, 168; Greek allies of, 163; marriage of, 150 —in Oration 1, 158, 163–64; in Oration 2, 167, 168 Philippi: antiquity of, 55, 56n57; Attic dialect in, 37, 55; Hellenism of, 36; Himerius’s oration at, 2, 13, 36, 37, 41, 43, 55–58, 142 Philippopolis, 42 Philoctetes, 259n195; in Oration 48, 258 Philolaus, in Oration 35, 85 Philomela, 106n100, 263n204 Phocion, in Oration 42, 247 Phocis, Philip’s conquest of, 163, 164, 166, 168 Phoebus (son of proconsul Alexander), in Oration 33, 109–10, 129 Phoenix (teacher of Achilles), 68, 82, 274n5 Phormion, 206n138 Photius: excerpting of Himerius, 7–8; Himerian fragments in, 272; on Himerius’s meletai, 156–57; on Oration 5, 160 Phrygia, pipers of, 219 Phrynichus (sophist), 105n99 Physiognomy, science of, 264n205 Pieria: in Oration 39, 49; in Oration 62, 48 Pillars of Heracles, 26 Pindar: on Apollo, 254; on Athens, 37, 46; salute to Hieron, 49, 233, 249; on Theron, 246 —in Oration 39, 49; in Oration 46, 251; in Oration 60, 12, 111, 136 Pipers, Phrygian, 219 Piracy, in Oration 6, 196 Pirene (Corinth), in Oration 30, 128 Pirithous: in Oration 43, 248n165; in Oration 54, 132 Pisidia, Scylacius in, 207 Pisidians: enslavement of, 231; plundering by robbers, 232 Pisistratus (tyrant), in Oration 1, 165 Piso, followers of, 109, 118 Plataea (Boeotia): aid to Athens, 200n128, 204; destruction of, 57n59; Gorgias at, 56; Persian destruction of, 187 Plato: athletic training of, 266; early interests of, 85n49; Hermogenes’ study of, 267; Phaedrus, 115n19; study of Pythagoras, 268; travels of, 267–68 —in Oration 10, 113; in Oration 24, 228; in Oration 27, 127; in Oration 35,

309 85; in Oration 41, 64; in Oration 48, 266, 267–68 Pleiades, setting of, 105 Plocianus (proconsul), 210 Plutarch: Rufinus’s descent from, 19, 20, 24, 32 Poenae: in Oration 8, 27 Poetry: Himerius’s interest in, 14–16 Poets, fatherlands of, 126 Polycrates of Samos: Anacreon and, 81, 233; in Oration 29, 68, 81n39; Suda on, 81n39 Polydeuces, 29n38 Polyphemus, 154 Poseidon: contention with Athena, 81, 123–24, 133n86, 190, 195; cult at Isthmus of Corinth, 256; descendants of, 231; epithalamium for Pelops, 147; love for Athens, 238; marriage of, 47, 149; oracles of, 109; and Pelops, 143, 148n15 —in Oration 5, 190; in Oration 6, 195; in Oration 9, 143, 147, 149; in Oration 32, 238; in Oration 62, 46, 47 Poverty: in Oration 3, 175; in Oration 4, 159–60, 176–77, 182, 183 Praetextatus, Vettius Agorius: Himerius’s oration to, 2, 210 Praxiteles, workshop of, 140 Priscus (philosopher), 34 Privatus, in Oration 29, 67, 68, 80 Procne, 106n100, 255n185 Prodicus of Ceos, 245 Progymnasmata (exercises), 156; encomia as, 157n8 Prohaeresius: aid to Eunapius, 70; and Constans, 60n65; death of, 2; exile of, 22n16; Jerome on, 5; and Julian, 6; nationality of his students, 109n4; quarrel with Himerius, 22 Prolaliai, 9, 10, 43, 244n155 Prosperity, envy of, 101 Protagoras, in Oration 68, 100 Proteus: in Oration 28, 234; in Oration 31, 237; in Oration 68, 100 Prusias ad Hypium (Bithynia), 1–2; Himerius’s visits to, 87n54, 107, 108, 136; students from, 124, 125 Pyrrho, 267 Pyrrhus, in Oration 10, 117 Pythagoras: and Abaris, 122n52; birthplace of, 127, 135n90; Democedes and, 66–67, 84; and Phalaris, 265– 66, 266n208; Plato’s study of, 268; in Oration 32, 239; in Oration 41, 64

310 Pythian Games, in Oration 26, 125 Python, 50n44 Quintianus (student?), 71 Red Gulf, in Oration 12, 222 Rhodians, showering of gold on, 223n71 Rich and poor: in meletai, 159; in Oration 4, 159–60, 176–78, 182, 183 Roman empire, Greeks under, 14. See also Governors; Officeholders, Roman Romulus, in Oration 41, 62 Rufinus (son of Himerius), 1; age at death, 5; before the Areopagites, 21, 22–23, 30; citizen’s rights of, 19, 20–21, 24; courage of, 29; death of, 21; dedication to Dionysus, 27, 33n48; eloquence of, 23, 25–26, 28; funeral competitions for, 32; libations to, 32; maternal ancestry of, 19–20, 23, 24; piety of, 23, 28; selfcontrol of, 29; wedding grove of, 30 Sacred War, Third, 166n35 Salamis, battle of, 119, 203; triremes in, 169; Xerxes’ escape after, 204n136 Salmoneus, arrogance of, 172 Salonius (secretary), 2, 3 Sappho: in Oration 9, 146, 147, 152, 153; in Oration 17, 121; in Oration 28, 233; in Oration 46, 251 Sardanapalus: luxury of, 102n90; in Oration 69, 101 Sardis, burning of, 199 Sarpedon (secretary), 2, 3 Satiety: produces arrogance, 80n35; in Oration 19, 73–74, 79–80; in Oration 30, 128; in Oration 32, 239 Satyrus: in Oration 15, 121; in Oration 45, 91 School, Himerius’s: arrivals at, 66, 107–11, 119–25, 130–32; auditorium of, 75, 100, 108; beginning of year, 91–92; daily life at, 9, 75; departures from, 66, 107–8, 111– 12, 118; initiation into, 131. See also Students, Himerius’s Schools: declamations in, 156; discord among, 71–72 Scipio, and Laelius, 248n165 Scylacius (proconsul of Achaia): as Aeacid, 231n100; under Constantius, 208; in Oration 25, 207, 229– 33; in Pisidia, 207; support of Himerius, 230n96; uprightness of, 216; vicariate of Asia, 207 Scythians, in Fragment 7, 275

Index Seasons: in Oration 44, 87–88; in Oration 68, 98; in Oration 74, 105 Secundus Salutius, Saturninus: imperial service of, 247n164; oration to, 3, 215, 247–48 Seven Sages, 264 Severus (pupil of Himerius), 13, 109; conflicts of, 111; eloquence of, 147; epithalamium for, 41–42, 141–55; family of, 151; governorships of, 214; homeland of, 228; justice under, 228; paideia of, 216; son of, 228; vicariate of Pontus, 214 —in Oration 9, 141, 142; in Oration 21, 41, 73, 123–24, 141; in Oration 24, 42, 141, 214–15, 227–29; in Oration 40, 41–43, 55, 141–42 Sicily, colonization by Ionians, 135 Sicyon, painting at, 235n116 Silenus, in Oration 45, 91 Similes, in Himerius’s orations, 10–11 Simonides of Ceos: on Dionysus, 254; and Hieron, 235, 268; on the Muses, 48 —in Oration 12, 223; in Oration 39, 49; in Oration 47, 257; in Oration 62, 48 Sirens: in Oration 30, 128; in Oration 39, 54; in Oration 62, 46 Skepticism, 267n211 Socrates: and Alcibiades, 125, 269n214; Apollo’s oracle on, 246; appearance of, 245, 246n159; and Delphic oracle, 212; love of eloquence, 245; and Plato, 266; sophists’ slander of, 244n155, 245–46; students of, 84 —in Oration 3, 173; in Oration 10, 112, 115; in Oration 24, 228; in Oration 35, 84, 85, 86; in Oration 38, 211– 12; in Oration 48, 266 Soldiers. See War heroes Solon, 161; at Aeschylus’s plays, 66, 67, 83; travels to Lydia, 83 —in Oration 24, 228; in Oration 29, 81; in Oration 34, 12, 83 Sophists: choice of, 82–83; honoring of, 217–18; in loco parentis role, 70; slander of Socrates, 244n155, 245– 46; use of physical punishment, 71n10 Soul: in Oration 48, 263–64; parts of, 86 Sparta: Athenian victories over, 205; attack on Athens, 197, 198; eloquence of women in, 229; encomia of, 193; founding of, 63; Himerius on, 36n7; Himerius’s oration in, 4; in Homer, 61; martial character of,

Index 97n79; surrender at Sphacteria, 54n51; Xerxes’ embassy to, 204n135 Spartans, kings’ descent from Heracles, 194n114 Sphacteria, battle of, 54n51, 205 Stesichorus of Himera, 271n218; illness of, 102; palinodes of, 261n201; slander of Helen, 102n91 Stoicism, Hermogenes’ study of, 267 Stories, Himerius’s use of, 13–14, 83 Students: under grammarians, 68n6; laziness of, 69n8; Libanius’s, 70; practice by, 105–6, 108, 137–38; of Socrates, 84; summer training of, 75 Students, Himerius’s: absence from lectures, 93; academic exercises for, 75; amusements of, 103; arrivals of, 66, 107–11, 119–25, 130–32; birthdays of, 11, 69–70, 87–90; Cappadocian, 110, 122; as chorus, 11; Cyprian, 110, 121; departures of, 66, 107–8, 111–12, 118; discord among, 71–73, 77, 93–94; disruptive, 71, 94; Egyptian, 103, 110; emulation among, 131; Ephesian, 124; epithalamia for, 141, 142–55; Galatian, 103; head of, 90n62; homelands of, 69, 103–4, 109, 110–11; illnesses of, 70–71, 90; Ionian, 111, 124–25, 132–34; from Mysia, 124; from Prusias, 124, 125; punishment of, 71, 95n74, 110; recruitment of, 67, 68 —in Oration 16, 11, 77; in Oration 19, 73; in Oration 26, 67, 124–25; in Oration 27, 11, 109; in Oration 29, 68; in Oration 34, 68; in Oration 35, 67, 84; in Oration 45, 70–71, 90; in Oration 61, 69; in Oration 68, 73, 74; in Oration 69, 103 Suda: on Ameinias, 1; Hermias in, 57n60; Himerius in, 157; Polycrates in, 81n39; Xerxes in, 204n135 Swans: of Apollo, 105–6, 224, 262, 271; of Mount Pelion, 227; song of, 137, 224, 254, 261 Sybaris: cuisine of, 86, 235; in Oration 31, 235 Symplegades, in Oration 62, 47 Syrinx (pipe), 124; in Oration 54, 131 Tantalus, recklessness of, 172 Tartessus, in Oration 10, 116 Teacher-pupil relations, erOs in, 112 Telchines, 222. See Titans Telephus (son of Heracles), 124n60 Tereus, 255n185

311 Tethys, marriage to Ocean, 148 Thales, Alcaeus on, 233 Thebes: alliance with Philip, 166; conquest by Persians, 203; famous sights of, 140; founding of, 194n114; support for Xerxes, 191n108; walls of, 127 Themis: in panegyrical orations, 215; in Oration 25, 232; in Oration 38, 246; in Oration 46, 252; in Oration 48, 260 Themistius: Oration 27, 38; panegyric for Valentinianus Galates, 23n21; prefect of Constantinople, 45; protheOriai of, 10; as “secretary,” 2–3 Themistocles: and Eurybiades, 248; in Oration 5, 160, 183–92; in Oration 14, 119; in Oration 36, 241; in Oration 39, 40, 41, 52; in Oration 42, 247 Thermopylae, battle of, 169; in Oration 5, 185, 191 Theron, Pindar on, 246 Thersites, 102 Theseia festival, 277n13 Theseus: capture of Helen, 28n38; descendants of, 231; early leader of Athens, 63; and Heracles, 247, 268, 269n214; and Pirithous, 132, 248n165 Thessalonica: agorai of, 37, 51; Greek language in, 37, 51; Hellenism of, 36, 37; Himerius’s oration at, 2, 13, 36–37, 48–54; neighbors of, 51 Thirty Tyrants, 206n138 Thisbe: Asopus’s love for, 150n19; marriage of, 149 Thrace: borders of, 42n23; threat to Athens, 196, 197 Thrasymachus, slander of Socrates, 245 Tiber River, in Oration 37, 272–73 Timagenidas: house of, 140; in Oration 74, 104–5 Timasarchus (Olympic victor), 249 Timotheus (musician), 72, 77–78, 212, 218; in Oration 32, 239 Titans: envy of Dionysus, 91; Zeus’s torture of, 91n63; in Oration 45, 90–91 Tithonus, transformation to cicada, 80n36 Tragedy: influence on Oration 8, 22; painting of 182–83 Training, academic: importance of, 104– 6, 108 Triptolemus: chariot of, 226n84; Himerius as, 38, 60n65; in Oration 23, 226; in Oration 41, 60n65

312

Index

Triremes: Apollo’s oracle on, 184, 187, 192n110; at battle of Marathon, 201; at battle of Salamis, 169; sacred, 257; Xerxes’, 202, 203 —in Oration 5, 184, 185, 187, 189, 191 Trophonius, in Oration 8, 21, 22n13, 32, 33n48 Troy, walls of, 127 Tydeus, 96n77 Tyndareus, 29n38 Tyro, love for Enipeus, 150n19 Tzetzes, John: on Himerius, 2–3 Underworld, in Oration 8, 32 Ursacius (comes), 213–14, 225–27; and Abaris, 216, 226; fatherland of, 214 Valens (emperor), 209 Valentinianus Galates, Themistius’s panegyric for, 23n21 Valerius Maximus (consul), 208, 209 Violence, academic, 69, 101 Virtue: eloquence and, 112, 120; wisdom and, 174–75, 176 War heroes, 161, 192–93; in Persian Wars, 190 War heroes, deceased: drink-offerings to, 192; funeral orations for, 192–93, 200–201, 204, 206; at Marathon, 200–201 Wisdom, and virtue, 174–75, 176 Women, Spartan: eloquence of, 229

Text Display Compositor Printer and binder Indexer

Xanthippus (son of Pericles), 120n40; in Oration 39, 49 Xenophon: eloquence of, 89; Hieron, 269n214; in Oration 16, 78; in Oration 30, 128; in Oration 44, 69–70, 89 Xerxes, 119n38; Athenian advocates of, 186, 187, 188; bridging of Hellespont, 164n28, 184n90, 185n93, 202, 203, 204n135; embassy to Greece, 204n135; escape after battle of Salamis, 204n136; hatred of Athens, 201–2; Herodotus on, 119n38, 160; plane tree of, 192; relations with Athens, 184, 186, 188, 189–90, 191, 205; Theban support for, 191n108; triremes of, 202, 203 —in Oration 1, 157; in Oration 2, 170; in Oration 5, 160, 183–92; in Oration 39, 50; in the Suda, 204n135 Zacharias (student of Choricius), 142 Zeno, Hermogenes’ study of, 267 Zephyr: in Oration 20, 224; in Oration 47, 254; in Oration 48, 261 Zeus: birthplace of, 126; descendants of, 231; hospitality of, 56; and Io, 61; Lycaean, 50; Olympian, 239–40; and Prometheus, 100; as shower of gold, 223n71; teleios, 149; torture of Titans, 91n63 Zeuxis, in Oration 12, 219

10/13 Sabon Sabon Integrated Composition Systems IBT Global Roberta Engleman