Hyphenation in LSJ

John Chadwick wrote in the 'Case for Replacing LSJ' (BICS 11 (1994): 2):
"One of the worst features of the 9th edition was certainly not the decision of the editors at all, but of the publisher. Every user must curse many times a day the idea of saving a little space by grouping words in long paragraphs. It would matter less that each lemma does not appear at the same point in the column, if at least it were given in full in bold type. Alas, the lemma is often reduced to three letters, two or even one letter, which not even bold type can render easily visible to the searching eye. In a lecture given in Oxford in 1948 R. W. Chapman, the Secretary to the Delegates of the Clarendon Press, under whom the project was launched, had the effrontery to claim credit for this astonishing lack of perceptivity. But this passage of his lecture was wisely omitted from the published text. What other damage he may have inflicted, I do not know."

This Chapman can also be found in the app.crit. to the OCT of Plato's Laws...


The run of words ὑπάλ-ειμμα, -ει-πτος, -ειπτρον, -ειπτρίς, -είφω, -ειψις (p. 1851) frames the problem neatly. Such hyphenation follows the formation of the words (ὑπ-, ἀλειπ-) nor their syllabification (ὑ-πα-λειμ-μα, etc.).

Such printing also obscures the accentuation in the ὑπάλ-, when followed by -ειπτρίς and -είφω, gives inexplicable, unnecessary, and impossible doubling of the accent on a single word (no enclitics are involved).

If that is possible, why should ὑπαλγέω, ὑπαλεαίνω, and ὑπαλεύομαι (all hyphenless) not be grouped under ὑπαλ- also, except on the criterion of a shared root and thus meaning? Cf. the ὑο- words which share a root, but have a range of meanings depending on the second element. Better still would be to divide at ὑπ-αλγέω, -αλεαίνω, -αλειμμα, etc.

The syllabification is a puzzling facet, since no less/other than H. Stuart Jones wrote 'Appendix V: Division of Greek Words', p. 75 in Horace Hart (M.A. Printer to the University of Oxford), Rules for Compositors and Readers at the University Press, 19th edn. (5th for publication): London and Oxford, 1905.

Based on papyri of Bacchylides, Thucydides, and Hypereides, he gives three exceptions to the rule that a syllable ends in a vowel:
(1) the consonant is doubled: Συρακούσ-σας, πολ-λῷ,  'and so' Βάκ-χος, Σαπ-φώ, Ἀτ-θίς;
(2) the first consonant is a liquid or nasal (or, according to some, a <σ>): ἄμ-φακες, ἐγ-χέσπαλον, τέρ-πον, πάν-τες, ἄλ-σος; ἄν-θρωπος, ἐρ-χθέντος, ἀν-δρῶν; but βά-κτρον, κάτο-πτρον, ἐχ-θρός; θέλ-κτρον, Λαμ-πτραί.
(3) Compounds. 'For modern printing the preference must be to divide the compounds παρ-όντος, ἐφ-ῃρημένος, but ἀπέ-βη may stand as well as ἀπ-έβη.'

A different issue surfaces in αἰνό-δακρυς, ὁ, = foreg., IG12(7).115 (Amorgos) [2nd/1st c. BCE]. Note the absence of an indication of inflection (-υος cf. πολύ-δακρυς) and a date for the inscription. The foreg(oing) is αἰνο-γόνος child of praise, which is a very different meaning. Was there ever an entry for *αἰνο-δάκρυος with which 'foreg.' would have been appropriate? Cf., e.g., πολυ-δάκρυος, but note that there '= sq.' directs the reader to πολύ-δακρυς for the meaning.

Patterns of naming

For shared elements in the names of fathers and sons, see Thucydides 1.29.2, which lists the following Corinthians:  

Ἀριστεύς ὁ Πελλίχου, 

Καλλικράτης ὁ Καλλίου, 

Τῑμά̄νωρ ὁ Τῑμάνθους,  

Ἀρχέτῑμος ὁ Εὐρυτί̄μου, 

and Ἰσαρχίδᾱς ὁ Ἰσάρχου. 

The last, with the patronymic suffix, is of particular interest: either Isarchosson son of Isarchos or Isarchos Jr the son of Isarchos Sr.

Note too: a Syracusan called Hermocrates, who was the son of Hermon (Th.4.58.1).

One very early Rhodian inscription reads as follows (LSAG 356.15 adds a few details):
Εὐθυτίδα | ἠμὶ λέσχα |το̑ Πραξσιόδο | τοὐφύλο τοὐφυλίδα.
(with the instances of crasis resolved: το̑ Εὐφύλο το̑ Εὐφυλίδα).

That is, Euthytidas the son of Praxiodos, the son of Euphylos, the son of Euphylosson (or, M(a)cEuphylos). These names are not reported from any other text.

See Bechtel (1917: 214) for other names from θυ- 'sacrifice': Θύτᾱς (Roman imperial: Θύτης), Εὐθύτης, Πολυθύτᾱς (IG VII 2775 (undated), which is suspiciously non-Boeotian in its spelling: *Πολου-θούτᾱς, cf. Πολου -κράτεις, -κλεῖς, etc. and cf. τὺ σιουνθύτη masc.nom.pl. a:-stem 'the fellow-sacrificers' ), and Θυσί-λεως (2x at Sinope, Scythia Minor, mid-Hellenistic).

There was also Δημοσθένης Δημοσθένους (demotic Παιανιεύς: Plu.Dem.20) and Phocus, son of Phocion the Good (Plu.Phoc.20.1-2, 30.1, and 36.3), apparently named after his grandfather. P.Oxy. I 119 is the letter of Theon Jr (Theonatos) to Theon Sr. These onomastic apples did not fall far from their trees.

On the subject of names, Kallis can be a male or female personal name.
Εὐρυσθεύς, which has no historical bearers, looks like it is a short form of Εὐρυσθένης.

Plurals of personal names in Latin

OLD s.v. Thūȳdidēs cites a plural ~ās from Cicero's Orator 32. Section 30 is cited for Thūȳdidēus (-īus) '(masc. as sb.) an imitator of Thucydides'.

[30] Ecce autem aliqui se Thucydidios esse profitentur: novum quoddam imperitorum et inauditum genus. Nam qui Lysiam sequuntur, causidicum quendam sequuntur non illum quidem amplum atque grandem, subtilem et elegantem tamen et qui in forensibus causis possit praeclare consistere. Thucydides autem res gestas et bella narrat et proelia, graviter sane et probe, sed nihil ab eo transferri potest ad forensem usum et publicum. Ipsae illae contiones ita multas habent obscuras abditasque sententias vix ut intellegantur; quod est in oratione civili vitium vel maximum. [31] Quae est autem in hominibus tanta perversitas, ut inventis frugibus glande vescantur? An victus hominum Atheniensium beneficio excoli potuit, oratio non potuit? Quis Porro umquam Graecorum rhetorum a Thucydide quicquam duxit? "At laudatus est ab omnibus." Fateor; sed ita ut rerum explicator prudens severus gravis; non ut in iudiciis versaret causas, sed ut in historiis bella narraret; [32] itaque numquam est numeratus orator, nec vero, si historiam non scripsisset, nomen eius exstaret, cum praesertim fuisset honoratus et nobilis. Huius tamen nemo neque verborum neque sententiarum gravitatem imitatur, sed cum mutila quaedam et hiantia locuti sunt, quae vel sine magistro facere potuerunt, germanos se putant esse Thucydidas. Nactus sum etiam qui Xenophontis similem esse se cuperet, cuius sermo est ille quidem melle dulcior, sed a forensi strepitu remotissimus.

Yonge: "But some people—quite a new and unprecedented body of ignorant men—profess themselves imitators of Thucydides. Now those who take Lysias for their model are copying a great lawyer; not indeed the greatest and most dignified of speakers, but still subtle and elegant, and a man who may well hold his ground in all forensic discussions. But Thucydides, indeed, relates affairs of history, and battles, and wars with great dignity and excellence; but nothing can be borrowed from him for forensic or statesmanlike purposes of oratory. And those very speeches which he gives have many obscure and hard sentences in them, so as scarcely to be intelligible; and that is the greatest possible fault in an oration addressed to a man’s fellow-citizens. But how is it that there is such a perverseness of taste in men, that after they have got corn they persist in feeding on acorns? Shall we say that the food of men could be found out by the assistance of the Athenians, but that eloquence could not? Moreover, [390] which of the Greek rhetoricians ever drew any of his rules from Thucydides? Oh, but he is praised universally. I admit that; but it is on the ground that he is a wise, conscientious, dignified relater of facts; not that he was pleading causes before tribunals, but that he was relating wars in a history. Therefore, he was never accounted an orator; nor, indeed, should we have ever heard of his name if he had not written a history, though he was a man of eminently high character and of noble birth. But no one ever imitates the dignity of his language or of his sentiments; but when they have used some disjointed and unconnected expressions, which they might have done without any teacher at all, then they think that they are akin to Thucydides. I have met men too who were anxious to resemble Xenophon; whose style is, indeed, sweeter than honey, but as unlike as possible to the noisy style of the forum.".

Pl.Tht.169b (Ἡρακλέες τε καὶ Θησέες) crossed my path again this week.

"Probably the most difficult sentence in Thucydides' history"

So Rusten's note on II.42.4 from Flashar (die Epitaphios des Perikes 1969: 29) with Dover (Thucydides 9-10) and Dionysius of Halicarnassus (de Thuc. idiom. 16 [1.436 Usener-Radermacher]) in agreement. Rusten discusses this sentence further in HSCP 90 (1986) 49-76.