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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009
Having recently chosen to lecture on the Pythian Odes, and coming in due course to the ninth, I naturally consulted Dr. Farnell's translation and his article in the Classical Quarterly with regard to the puzzling question of the connexion in thought between lines 76–96 and the rest of the ode. Being more or less dissatisfied both with his views and with those of such other commentators as were known to me, I am now attempting to analyze the poem myself in hopes of showing that it is a more continuous whole than has been generally supposed.
page 156 note 1 The Works of Pindar, Vol. I. (Macmillan, 1930), p. 138Google Scholar; ‘Pindar, Athens and Thebes,’ in C.Q. IX. (1915), p. 193 sqqGoogle Scholar.
page 156 note 2 I have before me, besides the editions of Gildersleeve, Christ, and Sandys, which give between them a critical account of the views of earlier commentators, Wilamowitz-Moellendorf's, Pindaros (p. 263 sqq.)Google Scholar; the Italian translation, with notes, by G. Fraccaroli (nuova edizione, Milan, 1914 Vol. II., p. 153 sqq.); and Schroeder's, O. commentary (Pindars Pythien erklärt von Otto Schroeder, Teubner, 1922, p. 85 sqq.)Google Scholar.
page 156 note 3 So Farnell rightly. It is a curiosity of criticism that this perfectly plain meaning and natural metaphor (the poet compares himself to a charioteer or other driver refreshing his tired team after a race or journey) has been so misunderstood by more than one scholar. Sandys renders it ‘my thirst for song’; but a poet slaking his thirst for song would be composing, not ceasing to compose. Gildersleeve says ‘the poet finds that he is quenching the thirst of his muse’—i.e., I suppose, that he is satiated with composition; a most strained and unnatural interpretation. Hermann, followed by Christ, catches at the schoast's stupid paraphrase διψῶσαν ᾠδἠν and introduces into the text an equally stupid emendation, ἀοιδὰν διψάδ' Wilamowitx (p. 266) renders the passage ‘es mabnt mich jemand an die Verplichtigung, seinen Durst nach Liedern zu stillen.’ Schroeder is at least ingenious in supposing that τις means, not some person, Telesikrates or a friend, but one of the ‘songs’ or stories themselves which ‘thirsts’ to be told; but I see no reason for taking the passage in this way, although it is not an impossibility in Pindar.
page 158 note 1 See Gardner, E. N., Greek Athletic Sports and Festivals, p. 68Google Scholar.
page 158 note 2 see especially Olymp. XIII. 113, with the good comments of Wilamowitz, , pindaros, p. 369 sqqGoogle Scholar.
page 158 note 3 Schol. on line 89(156): δνλαδἠ καὶ τὰ Ίολάεια ἐνὶκησεν ὁ νικηφόρος. The note on 137 takes νιν to refer to καιρός.
page 158 note 4 Isthm. II. 18.
page 160 note 1 I. 8, 4. He does not actually mention the story of the fine.
page 160 note 2 See, for praise of quiet and dispraise of faction, Olymp. XII. 16; Pyth. VIII. I; Nem. IX. 29; Paean Ix. 15; frag. 106 (228).
page 160 note 3 The argumetns, which seem to put the matter beyond reasonable doubt, are marshalled by Farnell, , C.Q. IX., p. 197Google Scholar.
page 160 note 4 Plato, , Rep. I. 331AGoogle Scholar. Kephalos of course was a younger contemporary of Pindar himself. I need not mention the other Pindaric citations in Plato, which are fairly numerous.
page 160 note 5 See Knights 1264, Birds 926; the second of these, being at the City Dionysia, had not Aristophanes' own favourite audience, composed of sharp-writter Athenians only, but a composite one.
page 160 note 6 Hdt. III. 38, 4.
page 160 note 7 Isthm. II. 45.
page 161 note 1 Farnell, , op. cit., p. 196Google Scholar.
page 161 note 2 It will be seen that I agree here with Dr. Farnell's interpretation.
page 161 note 3 Hdt. IV. 159; 186, 2. See the various commentators and modern historians for discussion.
page 161 note 4 Ibid. 159, 4.