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A Displacement in the Text of the Cratylus

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Malcolm Schofield
Malcolm Schofield
Affiliation:
St. John's College, Cambridge
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Extract

In this paper I argue that the stretch of dialogue from 385 b 2–d 1 (Burnet's lineation) in the Cratylus does not belong where it is found in the MSS. (and consequently in our published texts), but fits rather between 387 c 5 and 387 c 6. I suggest further that at any rate my negative thesis receives some measure of support from the fragments of Proclus' commentary on the dialogue.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 22 , Issue 2 , December 1972 , pp. 246 - 253
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1972

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References

page 246 note 1 Kretzmann, N., ‘Plato on the Correctness of Names’, Amer. Phil. Q. viii (1971), 127Google Scholar

page 247 note 1 So e.g. Robinson, R., ‘A Criticism of Plato's Cratylus’, Essays in Greek Philosophy (Oxford, 1969), 123Google Scholar (reprinted from Phil. Rev. lxv [1956]);Google ScholarKretzmann, , loc. cit.Google Scholar

page 247 note 2 Loc. cit.

page 247 note 3 Op. cit. 127 n. 4.Google Scholar

page 248 note 1 See especially 435 a 5–d 1, with Kretz-mann, , op. cit. 137–8.Google Scholar Cf. also Robinson, , op. cit. 121–2.Google Scholar

page 248 note 2 As was pointed out by Vries, G. J. de, ‘Notes on some passages of the Cratylus’, Mnemosyne iv. 8 (1955)) 292.Google Scholar

page 249 note 1 I follow Stallbaum, Meridier, etc., in reading BW in preference to Burnet's unhappy compromise between this reading and T. The reading of T is to be rejected because of its un-Platonic and because of the inappropriateness of the variatio introduced by the compound verb. I would suppose that a subtle scribe glossed above the line by indicating that interpretation (b) of Socrates' suggestion (on which see below) was to be understood, and that at a later stage the gloss displaced the true reading. (But for another explanation see Stallbaum ad loc.) As at Polit. 263 d 5 would have the force ‘to assign names’ (Jowett's translation).

page 249 note 2 With this interpretation of Socrates' suggestion, ‘name’ would presumably be being used in a generic sense, so as to include adjectives and verbs as well as nouns. This is also the use in question, one supposes, at 385 c 8, where the name is said to be the smallest part of the sentence (in contrast to phrases and clauses, no doubt). As Kretz-mann says, ‘his [sc. Plato's] examples of onomata are mainly names, proper and common, but he does introduce adjectives (433 e) and infinitives (414 a–b) as well’ (op. cit. 126, n. 1). Cf. also Robinson, , ‘The Theory of Names in Plato's Cratylus’, Essays in Greek Philosophy, 100–3Google Scholar (reprinted from Rev. Int. Philos. 1955).Google Scholar

page 249 note 3 Robinson, , op. cit. 135.Google Scholar

page 249 note 4 Kretzmann believes that at 387 c 6–10 the ambiguity in as between imposing and using a name ‘seems to affec the argument’ (op. cit. 128 n. 5). Robinson thinks it unclear which of these senses (if not both) is in question (op. cit. 124). But Socrates does not begin to think about the making of names until 388 c 9 ff.