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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009
So Diggle's recent text and apparatus criticus; so too its predecessor in the Oxford series (Murray). Advocates of πντα δ' ξεῖλον ϕ ϕβον have, however, been in a considerable majority, and include Porson, Elmsley, Bothe, Weil, Wecklein, Nauck, Paley, Verrall, Meridier, and, more recently, Schiassi (1967) and Ebener (1972). But Page's objection (ad loc.) cannot be lightly dismissed: ‘With ϕ ϕβον here, σο must be understood; and the ellipse seems intolerable.’ To this I would add what appears to have been largely disregarded, namely that the contextual and thematic significance of δμον is an even stronger argument in its favour. Medea is ἄπολις (255, cf. 645–53 [ἄπολις 646], 386), having lost not only her home in Colchis (31–5, 166–7, 798–801) but also her new home in Corinth (139, 275–81, 359–60, 435–8). In a sense the fate cruelly forced upon the daughters of Pelias by Medea (487 πντα τ' ξεῖλον δμον) is now visited upon Medea herself, who finds herself deserted and alone (513). This isolation brings with it the realization that to those to whom she should be ϕίλη she is now χθρ (her family in Colchis, 506–8), while those whom she should be able to regard as ϕλoι are now χθρ (Jason, 467; even her children, 36, 112–14, 116–17; cf. the pointed, programmatic νν δ' χθρ πντα κα νοσεῖ τ ϕλτατα in 16). Her response? As Medea had done in Iolcus, so δμον τε πντα συγχασʼ Ἰονος | ἔξετιτι γαας κτλ. (794–5; cf. 114 πς δμος ἔρροι).
1 ϕβον is assumed in the translations of Warner, Coleridge, and Hadas-McLean, while G. Zuntz in his study of the textual tradition of Euripides (An Inquiry into the Transmission of the Plays of Euripides [Cambridge, 1965], p. 267)Google Scholar seems also to accept ϕβον as the true reading.
2 For the thematic use of οἶκος δμος πλις, and TTOXIS in Med. see now McDermott, Emily A., Euripides' Medea: the Incarnation of Disorder (University Park, PA, 1989), pp. 81–106.Google Scholar
3 On the use of this theme elsewhere in tragedy see Garvie, A. F., Aeschylus, Choephori (Oxford, 1986), p. 103 (on line 234)Google Scholar, and his general index under ‘relationships: of ϕλος treated as χθρς’.
4 On this kind of corruption see West, M. L., Textual Criticism and Editorial Technique (Stuttgart, 1973), p. 21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
5 On the confusion of disyllables in general (not necessarily at line-end) see Bond, G. W., Euripides, Heracles (Oxford, 1981), on lines 80, 484, 548Google Scholar; also Renehan, R., Greek Textual Criticism (Cambridge, MA, 1969), p. 18 (confusion at line-end).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
6 For further examples from Euripides, see Bond, op. cit. (n. 5), p. 190 n. 2; and for some comments on the substitution of synonyms in the text of Euripides, see Zuntz, op. cit. (n. 1), pp. 265–7.
7 My thanks to the journal's anonymous referee for generous advice in the writing of this note; and to Professor Martin Cropp for supplying valuable bibliographical assistance.