Interpreting a Classic: Demosthenes and His Ancient Commentators

5. Commentary on Dem. 22 (P.Stras.inv. 84)

P.Stras.inv. 84 (Pack2 310) is a commentary on Dem. 22, Against Androtion , dating to the late first century c.e. The width of the papyrus varies from 8.1 to 10.0 cm; its length is 18.2 cm. The recto contains accounts from the first half of the century. The verso contains our text, a single column consisting of the ends of twenty-six lines; the restorations of the beginnings of these lines and the final entry are conjectural. Lines 3–26 are written by a second hand. The length of the undamaged lines is debated, with estimates for the portion in lacuna ranging from c. 22 to c. 32 letters; see the editions listed below. The debate over the nature of the text and the length of the original lines has led to some quite different restorations of the text. The most cautious edition and the one that has been used here is that of Wade-Gery and Meritt, though Sealey , “P.Strassburg,” 442– 43, questions their methodological assumption that one should try to restore the lost parts of lines with as few letters as possible (but see Wade-Gery and Meritt, 165 and n. 8). The surviving commentary consists of a series of discussions of eight lemmata from Dem. 22, as was first recognized by Wilcken, “Der Anonymus Argentinensis,” 375–77, and as has been correctly followed by all subsequent scholars. An earlier theory proposed by the first editor, B. Keil, had incorrectly regarded the text as an epitome of a history of the Periclean age. Of the massive, now mostly irrelevant commentary produced in support of that view, Meiggs, 516, aptly says: “Few first editext 5 Commentary on Dem. 22 (P.Stras.inv. 84) 175 tions have illustrated more nakedly the danger of going too far too fast.” Where they survive, the lemmata from Stras. 84 offer the unusual feature of not being direct quotations from Demosthenes, but rather paraphrases introduced by the word o{ti. In this context, the word o{ti seems to mean “(where Demosthenes says) that. . . .” The words following the word o{ti represent the gist of Demosthenes’ words but are not precise quotations; nor do they so closely resemble his words that one might think that the commentator had an unusual edition of Demosthenes in front of him. Two other explanations for the lemmata have been proposed. Laqueur thought that Stras. 84 was a “capitulatio” (summary or table of contents) of one of the books of Didymus’s On Demosthenes, adducing the column headers from Berol. 9780 in support of this view. See Laqueur, esp. 220–21. Besides the fact that he too readily attributes the original commentary behind Stras. 84 to the ubiquitous Didymus, Laqueur apparently does not realize that the column headers in Berol. 9780 —unlike the paraphrased lemmata in Stras. 84—indicate topics that are discussed therein by the commentator. Several of them cannot be directly related to topics raised by Demosthenes. For example, the header to col. 9 contains the words “That (o{ti) there are two men named Aristomedes , one from Pherae, the other an Athenian nicknamed ‘Brazen.’” To distinguish between two fourth-century men by the name Aristomedes was Didymus’s topic, not that of Demosthenes. The header to col. 10 reads: “That (o{ti) the speech is by Anaximenes.” This topic is, of course, not raised in the (spurious?) speech. Likewise with the header to column 13: “That (o{ti) the speech is not of one of the Philippics, but is otherwise by Demosthenes.” Laqueur’s view is incorrect. See Wade-Gery and Meritt, 168–69; followed by Arrighetti, 66 n. 30. Wilcken, “Der Anonymus Argentinensis,” esp. 377 and 415–18, argued that the word o{ti introduced quotations that our commentator excerpted from a lost original commentary. The word o{ti would then mean “(the commentator says) that. . . .” He argued that Stras. 84 is a series of excerpts taken from such a commentary, owing his inspiration for the theory of a lost, excerpted text to D-S1 and their treatment of Berol. 9780. Wade-Gery and Meritt, 166 –72, have to some extent followed Wilcken’s theory of excerption, noting that this excerptor seems to be especially interested in the constitutional history of Athens. However, unlike Wilcken, they correctly regard the introductory clauses as paraphrased lemmata from Demosthenes. Our commentator’s use 176 Texts, Translations, and Notes of paraphrased...