From: Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Date: Fri Aug 25 1995 - 11:06:56 EDT
At 11:56 PM 8/24/95, Greg Doudna wrote:
>Could someone assist with the following sentence from Josephus,
>Ant. 18.22?
>
>"zwsi de ouden parHllagmenws all' hoti malista em[ph]erontes
> dakwn tois pleistois"
>
>(The line closes Josephus's famous description of the Essenes.
>Feldman's Loeb ed. rendering is: "Their manner of life does
>not differ at all from that of the so-called Ctistae among
>the Dacians, but is as close to it as could be" [with an
>emendation of *pleistois* to *ktistais*].)
>
>I can see that parHllagmenws is an adverb modifying *zwsi*, "they
>live", from parallassw, "make things alternate, transpire"; the
>Middle Liddel gives a stem of parHllag- for both perfect
>and second aorist. From this stem it looks like an adverb has
>been formed from a middle participle (?). The sense then
>becomes something like "They live alternating in nothing but..."?
>
>empherontes seems to be a m pl middle ptcpl "being borne about".
>But I am having difficulty understanding the synactic connection
>with the folowing m pl genitive "dakwn".
>
>I would be very grateful if someone could explain the syntax of
>this sentence. (The reason for interest is the old suggestion
>of Dupont-Sommer to emend *dakwn* to *[za]douk[ai]wn*
>"Sadducees of the 'Many'".) Thanks very much!
Greg:
The unabridged L&S shows PARHLLAGMENWS used by the historians Polybius and
Diodorus Siculus in the sense "differently"--and yes, it does derive from
the MP ptc. of PARALLASSW. EMFERW here has the sense one also sees in the
adjective EMFERHS ('resembling'), to resemble, be like. DAKWN would
certainly work better with PLEISTOIS as a partitive (but it hardly makes
sense to talk about the Essenes resembling Dacians), but with KTISTAIS it
will work well enough as a simple possessive, if you recall that KTISTHS is
the regular term for "founder" or "establisher of a colony."
Is the MS tradition of Josephus (I ask from total ignorance) really so
corrupt as to admit of such wild guesses?
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University
One Brookings Drive, St. Louis, MO, USA 63130
(314) 935-4018
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu OR cwc@oui.com
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/
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