The Aldine editor, no doubt put off in part by the expressionhad the text printed as given by P , but punctuated with commas after and , so that could go withAccording to Elmsley, it was Musgrave who removed the comma after, adducing T. 276 to show taking a dative. But, continues Elmsley, the simple in this and other examples is taking a dative of the thing, never of the person. Accordingly he prints Pierson′s easy emendationproposed independently by Reiske and (...) printed almost simultaneously with Elmsley by Matthiae. The resulting reading has sufficiently satisfied all editors from then until the present day; there is not one, as far as I am aware, who does not print it. In our century the line has not been the object of any controversy. (shrink)

The problem of the genuineness of Antigone's lines Ant. 904–20 has never been satisfactorily resolved. The passage has been vehemently impugned for more than a century and a half; yet the majority of editors print it without brackets, and probably the majority of scholars accept it. This stalemate is aggravated by the manner in which the argument has traditionally been conducted.