There is a problem in §23 of Against Andokides, the sixth speech of the Corpus Lysiacum. The passage in question runs: κ δ᾽ ον τοτου το τιμματος δδετο γγς νιαυτν … ‘And as a result of the proposed penalty he was imprisoned for nearly a year …’. The speaker's context is as follows: he is castigating Andokides in connection with his trial in 400/399 for impiety and describing his lawless life since his part in the great scandals of 415, the (...) mutilation of the Herms and the profanation of the Mysteries. The problem in the text concerns the words νιαυτν ‘for nearly a year’, as the statement contradicts what we learn about Andokides' imprisonment in 415 from his own defence speech and above all from Thucydides. (shrink)

There is a problem in §23 of Against Andokides, the sixth speech of the Corpus Lysiacum. The passage in question runs: ⋯κ δ᾽ οὖν το⋯του το⋯ τιμ⋯ματος ⋯δ⋯δετο ⋯γγὺς ⋯νιαυτ⋯ν … ‘And as a result of the proposed penalty he was imprisoned for nearly a year …’. The speaker's context is as follows: he is castigating Andokides in connection with his trial in 400/399 for impiety and describing his lawless life since his part in the great scandals of 415, the (...) mutilation of the Herms and the profanation of the Mysteries. The problem in the text concerns the words ⋯νιαυτ⋯ν ‘for nearly a year’, as the statement contradicts what we learn about Andokides' imprisonment in 415 from his own defence speech and above all from Thucydides. (shrink)

When Seneca comes to describe the appearance of the monstrous bull which appears out of the sea to kill Hippolytus in answer to his father's curse, he uses a metaphor of birth: the sea's wave is said to be ‘heavy with burdened womb’ . If line 1016 is genuine – it was athetized by Leo – the sea is said to be ‘pregnant with a monster’ . The metaphor has not passed unnoticed in modern commentaries but it has not been (...) fully appreciated. I want to examine further linguistic aspects of the metaphor, and to consider its significance in its literary context. Seneca is a writer who likes – as he himself acknowledges – to re-work tradition: all the more significant, then, when he introduces a conspicuous metaphor into his text which does not appear to have literary antecedents. (shrink)