Posts by Don

Non fui, fui, non sum, non curo

#549. Lessons From the World’s Longest Scientific Study of Happiness | Dr. Robert Waldinger — Ten Percent Happier

Dr. Robert Waldinger talks about his new book The Good Life: Lessons From the World’s Longest Scientific Study of Happiness, which explores lessons from the…

www.tenpercent.com

10% Happier podcast episode.

Lots about the importance of friends and relationships to one's happiness and well-being plus it's never too late to start which also sounds like Epicurus

"Elegance" is probably not the best translation of καθαριος so I should stop using it. Here is the LSJ entry:

Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, κα^θάρ-ειος

Here's Saint-Andres note to his translation:

Quote

Translating this phrase as "an elegance in simplicity" ties it to other statements Epicurus makes about both living beautifully (e.g., Vatican Saying #17) and living simply or naturally (e.g., Vatican Saying #21).

For reference, here are those two. They don't use καθαριος but hint at that sentiment:

VS17. It is not the young man who is most happy, but the old man who has lived beautifully; for despite being at his very peak the young man stumbles around as if he were of many minds, whereas the old man has settled into old age as if in a harbor, secure in his gratitude for the good things he was once unsure of.

VS21. Nature must be persuaded, not forced. And we will persuade nature by fulfilling the necessary desires, and the natural desires too if they cause no harm, but sharply rejecting the harmful desires.

PS: I'd encourage anyone who's interested to take a look at the καθαρειος definition above and the two below and post how they would translate this opening phrase:

"There is (καθαρειος) even in (choose 1: A. λεπτότης or B.λιτοτης)..."

A. λεπτότης

Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, λ , λεπτό-ρρυ^τος , λεπτότης

B. λιτοτης

Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, λ , λι?́ταργ-ος , λι_τότης

I'd be particularly interested if Joshua or some of our other poets wanted to take a stab at it.

Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, μεθόριος

The LSJ accepts Usener 's corrections (see link), but I'm becoming more skeptical. I need to emphasize that the word "limit" in Usener/ Bailey comes from their "correcting" the clearly legible manuscript word καθαριος (katharios) to μεθόριος (methorios).

So, Usener is "correcting" TWO words out of the initial five. They're swapping out 40% of the first five words to make it say what they want!

Manuscript: ἔστι καὶ ἐν λεπτότητι καθάριος

Usener: ἔστι καὶ ἐν λιτότητι μεθόριος

Manuscript: There is elegance (καθάριος) even in meagerness (λεπτότητι)...

Usener: There is a limit (μεθόριος) even in frugality (λιτότητι)...

So even if I accepted frugality instead of thinness/meagerness, I have a hard time accepting the word limit. If I accepted λιτοτητι "frugality" I'd still come up with "There is elegance/refinement even in frugality..."

Plus, καθαρειος "refinement, elegance" is the opposite of λιτοτης "frugality, simplicity". And that sounds to me like something Epicurus would write, with using opposites to make some wordplay. Which is inadvertently what I wrote instead of sticking to meagerness!

There is elegance even in simplicity. The one who is unable to consider this is nearly equivalent to the who falls down because of a lack of limits.

My paraphrase would be something like: There is nothing wrong with frugal, simple living. In fact, it has its own sense of elegance and refinement. If one doesn't grasp this, that person is nearly the same as one who gets cast down in life for having no limits to his desires.

Kalosyni : You bring up a good point about manuscripts. I tried to dig up everything I could find on Vat.gr.1950 that contains the Vatican Sayings:

DigiVatLib

The manuscript is contained in (and was found in) Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana (the Vatican Library) at shelfmark Vat.gr.1950.pt.2 (Vatican, Greek manuscript No. 1950, part 2).

Manuscript content is dated between 1301-1350 CE.

Height: 243

Width: 165

The binding: The paper boards are covered with brown leather and are marked with straight lines. On the back are printed in gold the shields of Pope Paul VI and Eugenius Tisserant cardinal librarian.

Codex was among those who were rescued by the French in 1797 and restored in 1815 (v. seal of Bibl. Nat. Paris in ff. 1r and 545ν).

Codices Vaticani Graeci. Codices 1745-1962, recensuit P. Canart, t. I, Codicum enarrationes, in Bibliotheca Vaticana 1970 (Bibliothecae Apostolicae Vaticanae codices manu scripti recensiti), pp. 762-766.

Contents (with folio/page numbers):280r-340v: Xenophon, 427/26-c. 353 a.C. Xenophontis Memorabilia

341r-392v: Aurelius Antoninus, Marcus, imperatore romano, 121-180 <Marci Aurelii Antonini imperatoris in semetipsum libri XII>

392v-399r: Epictetus, sec. I-II Epicteti enchiridii paraphrasis christiana

401r-v: Epictetus, sec. I-II <Excerpta rhetorica>

401v-404v: Epictetus, sec. I-II <Florilegium seu gnomologium Epicureum>

408r-518v: Maximus Tyrius, sec. II <Maximi Tyrii dissertationes>

518v-540v: Albinus Smyrnaeus, sec. II Albini (Alcinoi cod.) epitome doctrinarum Platonis

542r-545v: Aristoteles, 384-322 a.C. Aristotelis de motu animaliunm

PS. I noticed that folios/pages 401v-404v has "Epictetus, sec. I-II <Florilegium seu gnomologium Epicureum>" which seems to be a misprint because it's corrected to Epicurus in parentheses. Not sure what's going on there, because those are the Vatican Sayings pages.

Quote from Cassius

the relevant text appears clearly awkward so as to indicate corruption

That's a slippery slope. Where does one just ignore the manuscripts and substitute whatever, one wants to be there?

Well, it comes down to where you decide if you're going to trust the manuscript and use λεπτότητα "elegance" or whether you're going to correct the scribe like Bailey and Usener and substitute λιτότης "limit".

And it's not elegant as in fancy. It's elegant as in not fussy. I like the connotation of the economy of movement or elegance of the surgeons hands.

Quote from Pacatus

Don How would you, personally, render V63 in English? Maybe taking a stab at both formal equivalence and a more dynamic rendering?

Be careful what you ask for...

TLDR: Here’s my attempt at a translation, a little literal, a little paraphrase:

There is elegance even in simplicity. The one who is unable to consider this is nearly equivalent to the one who falls down because of a lack of limits.

If you’re interested in how that was arrived at, feel free to read on:

I realize this post is WAY too much information and far into the weeds; but, as requested, I’m sharing my translation of VS63; however, in deference to observation by Little Rocker and my response, I’m going to “show my work” so everyone can see what I don’t know and what I had to look up.

First, we have to determine the Greek text I'm going to work with.

Muehli:

ἔστι καὶ ἐν λεπτότητι καθαριότης, ἧς ὁ ἀνεπιλόγιστος παραπλήσιόν τι πάσχει τῷ διʼ ἀοριστίαν ἐκπίπτοντι.

Usner:

ἔστι καὶ ἐν λιτότητι μεθόριος, ἧς ὁ ἀνεπιλόγιστος παραπλήσιόν τι πάσχει τῷ διʼ ἀοριστίαν ἐκπίπτοντι..

Vat.gr.1950 manuscript clearly has:

ἔστι καὶ ἐν λεπτότητι καθάριος, ἧς ὁ ἀνεπιλόγιστος παραπλήσιόν τι πάσχει τῷ διʼ ἀοριστίαν ἐκπίπτοντι.

First phrase:

ἔστι καὶ ἐν λεπτότητι καθάριος,...

There is a word καθαρειος (kathareios) which would have been pronounced as, and was later spelled καθαριος (katharios). However, καθάρειος is an adjective per LSJ:

Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, κα^θάρ-ειος

With various (although similar) meanings: cleanly, neat, tidy; decent, respectable (men) > οι καθαρειοτεροι; daintiness (of food); purity. There’s also the connotation of the “economy of movement (in a surgeon's hand)” so there’s an idea of economy, of doing what’s only necessary only. That kind of elegance or refinement which is an interesting spin.

Muehli used καθαριότης in his transcription to change the adjective to a noun, but that is clearly not what is written in the manuscript. Saint-Andre accepts Muehli’s transcription and adds the note “καθαριότης means purity, cleanliness, neatness, scupulousness, integrity, elegance, refinement, simplicity, frugality, economy, etc.”

But Greek could turn adjectives into nouns to mean something like “that which is …” or “one who is…”

So, I could arguably come up with something like:

*There is refinement even in X … or Elegance is even in…X

Now, the X is the λεπτότητι / λιτότητι issue. I am reluctant to rethink the manuscript. However, my resolve wavered when I read in that definition linked above that καθάρειος is the opposite of λιτότης! This is the word that Usener uses to “correct” the manuscript. This is exactly the kind of wordplay I’d expect from Epicurus, too. But, let’s look at the actual word *in* the manuscript.

λεπτότητι is the dative of λεπτότης “thinness, opp. παχύτης (“thickness”); fineness, delicacy, opp. πάχος (“thickness”), thinness, meagreness, of body; metaphorical, subtlety.”

Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, λεπτότης

Now, reviewing the Wiktionary entry for Usener’s λιτότης, λιτότητι is the dative singular. The meaning per LSJ is “plainness, simplicity” but LSJ also has that pesky “cj. for λεπτότης in Epicur.Sent.Vat.63.” meaning they thought it was the *wrong* word and that it was substituted for λεπτότης in the manuscript. But I’m not seeing that in Vat.gr.1950, and I’m not aware of any other list or text that includes this exact saying. I’m assuming LSJ is simply taking Usener et al.’s word for it? If anyone has any idea where this saying might show up in the manuscript tradition elsewhere, please share.

So, IF I take the manuscript literally, I get:

*There is elegance even in meagreness…

Paraphrase nominalizing the adjective?? *One who displays elegance even in meagreness…???

Okay, so there are the first five words!

ἧς is (per Wiktionary) the genitive singular for “who, which, that” and with the next two words - ὁ ἀνεπιλόγιστος - I can put together:

*..for the one who is inconsiderate or thoughless; …for the one who is unable to consider…

** There is elegance even in simplicity for the one who is unable to consider …

The next word παραπλήσιόν (according to Wiktionary) can either by an Attic spelling of πᾰρᾰπλήσῐος or the accusative of the word. LSJ provides various related meanings, including “coming alongside of : hence, coming near, nearly resembling ; of numbers, nearly equal, about as many ; of size, about as large ; of age, about equal.” So, the general meaning is “nearly equal” or “resembling.”

Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, παραπλήσιος

τι “something”

πάσχει is the 3rd person singular active indicative (he/she/it) of πασχω and means “undergoes, experiences (vs. acting), experiences something, has something happen to one.”

τῷ διʼ ἀοριστίαν ἐκπίπτοντι. This appears to be a dative phrase with an embedded prepositional phrase inside it: τῷ (διʼ ἀοριστίαν) ἐκπίπτοντι. Let’s tackle τῷ ἐκπίπτοντι first. Ἐκπίπτοντι is a dative (to be expected from τῷ) present active participle of εκπιπτω, meaning “falling out of…; being thrown down…” It is a passive sense opposed to “throwing or casting out” (εκβαλλω).

Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, ἐκπίπτω

The full LSJ definition has some interesting connotations, including “to be cast ashore” or “fall from a thing, i.e. be deprived of it.”

The prepositional phrase is διʼ ἀοριστίαν which appears to mean “because/for the sake of of illimitability.” LSJ specifically cites “illimitability” as the sense used in VS63. The word ἀοριστίαν has the sense of lack of limit or even indefiniteness or even indecision. So, the whole phrase appears to be something like:

***...for the one who is falling down because of lack of limits”

That is REALLY bad English, but if you’ve stuck with me this far, hold tight.

Review:

ἔστι καὶ ἐν λεπτότητι καθάριος, ἧς ὁ ἀνεπιλόγιστος παραπλήσιόν τι πάσχει τῷ διʼ ἀοριστίαν ἐκπίπτοντι.

Here’s my attempt at a translation, a little literal, a little paraphrase:

There is elegance even in simplicity. The one who is unable to consider this is nearly equivalent to the who falls down because of a lack of limits.

With that, I’m bringing in the scholarly translations to compare results and refine my own. In light of ALL that above, I’m inclined to agree with the direction of Saint-Andre and Long & Sedley:

Saint-Andre: There is an elegance in simplicity, and one who is thoughtless resembles one whose feelings run to excess.

Long and Sedley: There can be refinement even on slender means, and one who fails to take account of it is in a similar position to someone who goes astray through ignoring limits.

I hope this all helps others to see how Long & Sedley and Saint-Andre arrived at their translations. One big change in theirs compared to others is acceptance or not of Usener's change to λιτότητι which means "austerity, frugality, frugalness, thrift." Whether one accepts what's easily read in the manuscript or whether one want to "correct" the manuscript is going to change VS63 dramatically!

These links could be of interest:

Internet Archive: Digital Library of Free & Borrowable Books, Movies, Music & Wayback Machine

Google Scholar

PS: The links are to Diels' works on Internet Archive and Google Scholar. Just realized there was no automatic description on those.

Reviews

The Invention and Gendering of Epicurus, by Pamela Gordon

The Invention and Gendering of Epicurus, by Pamela Gordon

www.academia.edu

Review of The Invention and Gendering of Epicurus, by Pamela Gordon

Review of The Invention and Gendering of Epicurus, by Pamela Gordon

www.academia.edu

Oh, and Anderson's site is the only English version of Usener's Epicurea that I know of...

Epicurus: Fragments - translation

However, Bailey follows Usener's Epicurea format quite closely... although Usener didn't include the Vatican Sayings because they weren't discovered until after Epicurea's publication! Bailey includes this in this preface:

Vatican Gnomologium. This is contained in Codex Vaticanus gr. 1950, a MS. of the fourteenth century. It was first published by C. Wotke, with some notes by Usener and Gomperz in Wiener Studien, vol. x (1888). Von der Muehll has collated the MS. again from photographs and in some cases has cor- rected the readings reported by Wotke. In the majority of these excerpts the text is fairly sound, but there are some in which it still remains very uncertain.

Here are the Weiner Studien papers from 1888 by Wotke, Usner, and Gomperz:

Wiener Studien : Schenkl, Karl, 1827-1900, ed : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

Book digitized by Google from the library of the University of Michigan and uploaded to the Internet Archive by user tpb.

archive.org

And here is Usener's VS63 and footnotes:

Wiener Studien : Schenkl, Karl, 1827-1900, ed : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

Book digitized by Google from the library of the University of Michigan and uploaded to the Internet Archive by user tpb.

archive.org

He does state that the manuscript says εν λεπτοτητι καθαριος in the footnote but has his "corrected" text in the body of the paper.

Quote from Cassius

I never tracked it down further - it has just seemed that everybody who is anybody in the world of Epicurus cites Usener.

Yep. He's the U in Usener Fragment

Quote from Cassius

Do I recall correctly that Usener wrote in German? I presume that now given our internet reach we have the ability to ask Martin and possibly others as well for assistance in understanding Usener's own notes on these issues?

Or are you already able to consult Usener?

He actually wrote in Latin:

Hermann Usener Epicurea ( 1887) : Hermann Usener (editor) : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

Epicurea is a collection of texts, fragments and testimonies by Epicurus composed by Hermann Usener in 1887

archive.org

I've been using Bailey and Usener interchangeably since I think Bailey was a protege of his?

Quote from Little Rocker

Don, I love how you produce posts like the ones above and then say you're no good at such things.

I am just painfully aware of what I don't know when it comes to ancient Greek. I don't want to succumb to the Dunning-Kruger Effect or to pretend I'm fluent. I often feel like I know just enough to get myself into trouble!! Then the curiosity and enthusiasm take hold, all caution goes out the window, and I end up posting deep dives into manuscripts and paleography... but ask me to conjugate a verb past the present indicative or decline a noun into all its various permutations, and I'm going to have to look it up!

Quote from Kalosyni

So we probably should be careful with "translations" like this?

Not necessarily, but it pays to be cautious. Especially when someone is using only the English and is not comparing those to the original.

There are methods of translation called dynamic and formal equivalence:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_and_formal_equivalence#%3A%7E%3Atext%3DFormal_equivalence_approach_tends_to%2Cbut_with_less_literal_accuracy.?wprov=sfla1

The dynamic tries to convey the sense or meaning, the formal tries to be more word for word. Both are valid, but it's always better to translate from the original and to consciously decide which method you're going to use.

One thing I find annoying about Bailey is that he says outright "I do not understand the meaning of λεπτότης here." So instead trying to understand, he just decides it's the *wrong* word and fits in one he understands that's similar spelling.

To me, this looks like κ_θαριος but what that second letter is...? According to a search in LSJ for words with that ending, the only word that fits the letters is καθάριος. But according to LSJ, καθάριος refers to "purgative medicine, POxy.116.15 (ii A.D.)" but that appears to be from the 2nd c. AD/CE! So, it appears von der Muehli is trying to correct for grammar and "correcting" to καθαριότης. "

Saint-Andre's note to VS63 reads:

[63] The phrase ἐν λεπτότητι καθαριότης is somewhat obscure; καθαριότης means purity, cleanliness, neatness, scupulousness, integrity, elegance, refinement, simplicity, frugality, economy, etc., while λεπτότης means thinness, meagreness, fineness, delicacy, subtlety, etc. Can there be a purity in meagreness, a scrupulousness in delicacy, an integrity in fineness, a frugality in subtlety? Translating this phrase as "an elegance in simplicity" ties it to other statements Epicurus makes about both living beautifully (e.g., Vatican Saying #17) and living simply or naturally (e.g., Vatican Saying #21).

Have we brought up the Epicurus Wiki VS63:

Vatican Saying 63 - Epicurus Wiki

There is [due measure] even in frugality (and) he who (is) thoughtless [about this] suffers [somewhat as badly].

Here is Vatican Saying 63 as contained in the early 14th century manuscript, Vat.gr.1950.pt.2, folio 404r.

VS63 starts at the red epsilon (Eστι...) and ends at the end of the line before red alpha (Aκολουθεῖν) that starts VS64. This is *the* source of our discussion.

The first controversy seems to have to do with the disagreement between Usener/Bailey/Bignone and von der Muehli.

Bailey (using Usener) transcribes the manuscript as:

von der Muehli transcribes it as (click here to link to the book on Hathitrust )

with the following footnote (following the 10):

noting that Usener "corrects" the text of the manuscript to λιτοτητι καθαριος.

Von der Muehli, on the other hand, transcribes the manuscript as λεπτοτητι καθαριοτης.

To my eye, the manuscript itself clearly agrees with von der Muehli's transcription of λεπτοτητι

Usener appears to be "outhinking" the scribe who copied the manuscript on that specific word; however, the second word appears to agree with Usener/Bailey because the ending is clearly ...ριος but the previous letter looks like an theta alpha (...θα...) so it looks like ...θαριος. But what are those first two letter? That's the rub.

It might be handy to have a chart of ancient Greek miniscule. Click here to go with the handy chart at Wikipedia.

and here is a link to a collection of ancient Greek ligatures.

Here is where the scholarship above my pay grade comes in!! The reason Usener/Bailey and von der Muehli can disagree on what the manuscript is *supposed* say is that they're trying read into the possible transcription mistakes that the scribe could have done in copying the text from a source to vat.gr.1950.

Let's at least examine those two words that are in disagreement: λιτοτητι and λεπτοτητι.

λιτοτητι the dative of λιτότης "plainness, simplicity"

Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, λι_τότης

Note that the LSJ definition even gives "for λεπτότης in Epicur.Sent.Vat.63." so it appears they accept that λιτότης is supposed to be λεπτότης in VS63. So...

λεπτότης "thinness: fineness, delicacy, leanness"

Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, An Intermediate Greek-English Lexicon, λᾶας , λεπιδόομαι , λεπτότης

So, Saint-Andre follows von der Muehli *and*, more importantly to me, the actual text of the source manuscript.

ἔστι καὶ ἐν λεπτότητι καθαριότης, ἧς ὁ ἀνεπιλόγιστος παραπλήσιόν τι πάσχει τῷ διʼ ἀοριστίαν ἐκπίπτοντι.

The issue for me lies in the fact that if we follow the manuscript on λεπτότητι, why aren't we following the manuscript text on the second word ending with ...θαριος?

More to come (no doubt), but I want to save here before I lose all this!

Quote from Cassius

Quote from Pacatus

63. There is an elegance in simplicity, and one who is thoughtless resembles one whose feelings run to excess. (Trans. Peter Saint-Andre, Monadnock Valley Press; this one seems to be somewhat in contradiction to the others.)

Oh no, I hope you copied that wrong from St Andre - but I suspect you did not!

And *that* , ladies and gentlemen, is why we delve into the Greek.

I found von der Muehli's work but it'll have to wait until this evening... Consider this a teaser

Here's Horace's Satire 1.1:

Horace (65 BC–8 BC) - The Satires: Book I Satire I