HYPERIDES IN THE ARCHIMEDES PALIMPSEST: PALAEOGRAPHY AND TEXTUAL
TRANSMISSION GIUSEPPE UCCIARDELLO1 Some introductory remarks Among
the newly discovered texts in the Archimedes palimpsest, 1 the
fragments of two lost speeches of Hyperides, the Against Timandros
( ) and the Against Diondas ( ), identified by Natalie Tchernetska,
2 deserve a special mention from several viewpoints. It has long
been assumed that Hyperides did not survive into the Middle Ages.
Now the editiones principes of these two speeches lead us to
dismiss this well-established conviction. 3 From this
starting-point we can now assert that:
My warmest thanks to C. Carey and M. Edwards for having invited
me to the colloquium. I wish to thank M. Cannat Fera for useful
remarks on different drafts, W. Noel for permission to reproduce
highlights from the digital images of the Archimedes palimpsest
project. I am also very grateful to P. Easterling and L. Horvth,
who sent me their papers on Hyperides transmission before
publication, and to M. Edwards who corrected the text and improved
the English. 1
Up to now scholars have been able to identify fragments from a
Menaion, from a commentary on Aristotles Categories (tentatively
ascribed to Alexander of Aphrodisias lost commentary), and from the
Life of St Pantoleon; there are still, perhaps, the remains of two
further books, not yet identified.
: ed. pr. in N. Tchernetska, New fragments of Hyperides from the
Archimedes Palimpsest, ZPE 154 (2005) 1-6; N. Tchernetska, E. W.
Handley, C. Austin, and L. Horvth, New readings in the fragment of
Hyperides Against Timandros from the Archimedes Palimpsest, ZPE 162
(2007) 1-4; on the text see L. Horvth, Note to Hyperides in
Timandrum, AAHung 48 (2008) 121-23; W. Luppe, Zwei Textvorschlge zu
Hypereides Rede im neu entzifferten Palimpsest-Codex, ZPE 167
(2008) 5; G. Thr, Zur phasis in der neuentdeckten Rede Hypereides
gegen Timandros, ZRG 125 (2008) 645-63, Zu und in Hypereides, Gegen
Timandros, AAHung 48 (2008) 125-37; : ed. pr. in C. Carey et al.,
Fragments of Hyperides Against Diondas from the Archimedes
Palimpsest, ZPE 165 (2008) 1-19 (Addendum in 166 [2008] 35-36); on
this text see L. Horvth, Dating Hyperides Against Diondas, ZPE 166
(2008) 2734, Hyperides Against Diondas (Addenda), ZPE 166 (2008)
3536; R. Janko, Some notes on the new Hyperides (Against Diondas),
ZPE 170 (2009) 16. On the transmission see P. Easterling, Fata
libellorum: Hyperides and the transmission of Attic oratory, AAHung
48 (2008) 11-17.3
2
The fact might incidentally give more weight to the
controversial sixteenth-century Hungarian accounts about the
existence of a Hyperides manuscript in the Matthias Corvinus
library and on the alleged fragments from Hyperides in the hands of
Pl Bornemissza, bishop of Nyitra: see L. Horvth, The lost medieval
manuscript of Hyperides, AAHung 38 (1998) 165-73 and The Hyperides
Corvinian codex (forthcoming).
BICS-52 2009 229
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1. All the ten Attic orators of the canonical list provided by
Pergamene erudition (Aeschines, Antiphon, Andocides, Demosthenes,
Dinarchus, Isocrates, Isaeus, Lysias, Lycurgus, and now also
Hyperides)4 were transliterated. 2. The palimpsest was used for
copying a euchologion (a prayer book) finished on 14 April 1229 by
Iohannes Myronas; 5 his handwriting suggests that he probably came
from the Salentine area. 6 3. As Stefano Parenti has recently
argued, the text of the euchologion does not match the
Constantinopolitan liturgical tradition; it can be traced back to
the Jerusalem area (albeit not directly to the St. Saba monastery).
7 4. This fact strongly suggests that the re-arrangement of the
previous codices and the making of the new manuscript may have
taken place in the Palestine area. 8
It might be the achievement of Apollodorus of Pergamon, a
first-century teacher of Caecilius of Caleacte (Quint. Inst.
9.1.12), author of a treatise on the charakteres of the ten Attic
orators: see R. Nicolai, La storiografia nelleducazione antica
(Pisa 1992) 250-339 (on the canon of the historians and orators);
P. E. Easterling, A taste for the classics, in Classics in
progress, ed. T. P. Wiseman (Oxford 2002) 21-37 (at 22-26). On the
canon of the orators some reservation in I. Worthington, The canon
of the ten Attic orators, in Persuasion: Greek rhetoric in action,
ed. I. Worthington (London 1994) 224-63.5 The name is common in the
Salentine area during the thirteenth century; see A. Jacob,
Lanthroponymie grecque du Salento mridional, MEFRM 107 (1995)
361-79 (at 368-69). As far as the surname is concerned, it is not
attested in the Salentine area during the same period (ibid.); in
the East, however, is widely diffused (see Prosopographisches
Lexikon der Palaiologenzeit, ed. E. Trapp [Wien 1976-99] nr.
19847-19858), thus I wonder if (rho is a certain reading) in the
palimpsest is nothing but a spelling variant of the more common .
4
S. Luc, Su due sinassari della famiglia C*: il Crypt. D.a. XIV
(ff. 291-292) e il Roman. Vallic. C 34iii (ff. 9-16), Archivio
Storico per la Calabria e la Lucania 66 (1999) 51-85. This
manuscript is now included in the updated list of Salentine
palimpsests provided in D. Arnesano, Libri inutiles in Terra
dOtranto. Modalit di piegatura dei bifogli nella realizzazione del
Laur. 87.21, in Libri palinsesti greci: conservazione, restauro
digitale, studio, ed. S. Luc (Roma 2008) 191-200 (at 200). The hand
can be compared with Barb. gr. 350, f. 119v (f. 119v is reproduced
in P. Canart, A. Jacob, S. Luc, and L. Perria, Facsimili di
manoscritti greci della Biblioteca Vaticana, 1. Tavole [Citt del
Vaticano 1998] tav. 72, nr. 100), a typikon written by Hierotheus
ieromonachus at St. Nicolas in Casole in 1205 (though phi and kappa
do not match Myronas handwriting). An interesting parallel is also
the Gospel Lectionary (twelfth/thirteenth century) written by
Nikolaos (subscription at f. 303r) in the Centre I. Duicev D ms.
gr. 350 (it is the upper script of a palimpsest: the lower script
is a Menaion written in a ninth-tenth century sloping majuscule):
see A. Durova, Rpertoire des manuscrits grecs enlumins (IXe Xe s.)
(Centre Ivan Dujcev, Sofia 2006) 130-43 and pl. 115-32; a full
description of the item in D. Getov, A catalogue of Greek
liturgical manuscripts in the Ivan Dujcev Centre for
Slavo-Byzantine Studies (Orientalia Christiana Analecta 279) (Roma
2007) 472-91 (at p. 490 he quotes a private communication by E.
Gamillscheg, who recognizes a resemblance of the upper script with
the so-called Epsilon-Style of Palestinian origin; this last issue
needs to be investigated more deeply).7 See S. Parenti, The
liturgical tradition of the Euchologion of Archimedes, Bollettino
della Badia Greca di Grottaferrata, s. III, 2 (2005) 69-87; a twin
of this euchologion is the Sinat. gr. 973 + Sankt Peterburg,
Rossijskaja Nacionalnaja Biblioteka, gr. 418, written by the priest
Auxentios in 1152/53 (see Luc, Su due sinassari della famiglia C*
[n. 6, above] 57). 8 See Parenti, The liturgical tradition of the
Euchologion of Archimedes (n. 7, above) 78. Other manuscripts in
Italo-Greek scripts realized in the Palestine area are listed in
Luc, Su due sinassari della famiglia C* (n. 6, above) 57 n. 20.
6
GIUSEPPE UCCIARDELLO: PALAEOGRAPHY AND TEXTUAL TRANSMISSION
231
5. We cannot rule out the possibility that the scribe might even
have re-used books carried away from his own country (the Salentine
area?); 9 at any rate, it is a reasonable assumption that all the
manuscripts (including our Hyperides) were at the same place in the
Palestine area when they were re-used for the palimpsest. 6.
Hyperides is preserved in 5 bifolia. In the editio princeps of the
Against Diondas we are told that all the folios come from a single
quire, probably a quaternion. 10 As observed by Pat Easterling, two
scribal errors in this speech, namely the confusion of alpha ~
omicronupsilon (p. 1.21) and mu ~ kappa (p. 2.31) lead us to
hypothesize a minuscule manuscript as the model from which our
manuscript was copied. 11 I am now going to focus on some
questions, mostly still open, raised by the new Hyperides. 2 Dating
and place of writing The dating and place of writing of Byzantine
manuscripts are highly-controversial issues. The provenance of a
manuscript can sometimes differ from its origin: the books could
travel alongside their owners. 12 Dating The handwriting is an
upright, small minuscule (sometimes sloping to the right) and
pending from the line. The overall quality is by no means
outstanding. Formal elements useful for the dating are: 13
See L. Perria and A. Luzzi, Ricerche sulla cultura greca nelle
province orientali dellimpero bizantino (VI-XIII secolo) (Messina
2001) 97; L. Perria, Libri e scritture tra Oriente bizantino e
Italia Meridionale, RSBN (= Giornata di studio in ricordo di Enrica
Follieri, Roma, 31 maggio 2002) 39 (2002) 157-87 (at 177), makes
the case of the copyist Bartolomaeus from Bruzzano (South Italy),
who wrote a section of Barb. gr. 319 (ff. 175-98; 205-14) during a
pilgrimage in the Holy Land between 1157/58 and 1167/68 (for more
details see P. Schreiner, Handschriften auf Reisen, Bollettino
della Badia Greca di Grottaferrata [= . Miscellanea di studi per il
LXX compleanno di mgr. Paul Canart, I, ed. S. Luc and L. Perria] 51
[1997] 145-65 [at 146-52]).10 11 9
Thus Carey et al., Fragments of Hyperides Against Diondas (n. 2,
above) 1-2.
See Easterling ap. Carey et al., Fragments of Hyperides Against
Diondas (n. 2, above) 15; noteworthy is the confusion in a
minuscule script between mu ~ kappa: it implies a model with a
kappa majuscule (see J. Bast, Commentatio palaeographica, in G. H.
Schaefer, Gregorii Corinthii et aliorum grammaticorum libri de
Dialectis Linguae Graecae [Leipzig 1811] 721-22; F. Ronconi, La
traslitterazione dei testi greci [Spoleto 2003] 128). In this case,
the exemplar from which this manuscript was copied was not in pure
minuscule, as the early ninth-century manuscripts, but it was
perhaps the product of a later age, when the re-introduction of
majuscule letters had been increased (see infra).12 Cf. Perria and
Luzzi, Ricerche (n. 9, above) 97-98 and Perria, Libri e scritture
tra Oriente bizantino e Italia Meridionale (n. 9, above) 177. 13
For the frequency of letter-forms and ligatures in the
tenth-eleventh century manuscripts I rely on the figures provided
by E. Follieri, La minuscola bizantina dei secoli IX e X, in La
palographie grecque et byzantine (Paris 1977) 139-65 (= Byzantina
et Italograeca. Studi di filologia e paleografia, ed. A. Acconcia
Longo, L. Perria, and A. Luzzi [Roma 1997] 205-48); P. Canart and
L. Perria, Les critures livresque des XIe et XIIe sicles, in
Paleografia e codicologia greca. Atti del II Colloquio
Internazionale (Berlino-Wolfenbttel, 17-21 ottobre 1983) I, ed. D.
Harlfinger and G. Prato (Alessandria 1991) 67-118 (= repr. in P.
Canart, tudes de Palographie et de Codicologie II [Citt del
Vaticano 2008] 933-1000); M. L. Agati, Nuove osservazioni sulla
minuscola bizantina del X secolo, Scriptorium 57 (2002) 199-224; P.
Orsini, . Le minuscole greche informali del X secolo, Studi
medievali 47 (2006) 549-87.
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Figure 1a: f. 138r+135v, l. 16 fin. -
Figure 1b: f. 145v+144r
Figure 1c: f. 137v+136v, l. 1
Figure 1d: f. 138r+135v
Figure 1e : 176v+173r, l. 7
Images the owner of the Archimedes Palimpsest. Reproduced by
courtesy of the copyright owner.
GIUSEPPE UCCIARDELLO: PALAEOGRAPHY AND TEXTUAL TRANSMISSION
233
1. Letter-forms: cf. in the shape of number three (cf. f.
145r+144v, l. 7 [-/]). 2. Size: the contrast between broad and
narrow letters is notable (see against in f. 138r+135v, l. 16 fin.
- [Figure 1a]; against the small majuscule in f. 138r+135v, l. 22
). 3. Shape: letter-forms are commonly rounded, even if they appear
to be more squeezed (cf. f. 138r+135v, l. 19 ) and angular (f.
145v+144r [Figure 1b]). 4. Ligatures: cf. the angular rho-omicron
(f. 137v+136v, l. 1 [figure 1c]), not widely attested before the
middle of the tenth century; 14 the double -- with the second
looking like gamma seems to be no more in use after 995 (f.
138r+135v, l. 1 ). 15 5. The use of majuscule:16 the enlarged
majuscule (sporadically in use between 910-950), (f. 138r+135v, l.
17 with the arms detached from the vertical stroke), (f. 138r+135v
in. ), (f. 138r+135v, l. 23 ), and the tall majuscule (f.
137v+136r, l. 1 [figure 1c]) attested from the middle of the tenth
century onwards.17 6. The ductus: ranges from a more calligraphic
(cf. f. 138r+135v [figure 1d]) to less formal degree (such as in
ff. 137r+136v; 138v+135r, ll. 16ff; 176v+173r, l. 7 [figure 1e]).
This cursive tendency resembles a large group of hands comparable
with the so-called Ephraim-script (middle of the tenth century
onwards). These elements lead us to insert this unpretentious hand
into a large group of rounded handwritings, more or less formal.
The calligraphic type is usually referred to as Perlschrift: it is
widespread between the tenth and the eleventh centuries. 18 Again,
(4) seems to point towards a dating not before the middle of the
tenth century. It is not easy to find suitable material for
comparison; among other manuscripts, I quote:
Albeit sporadically used in early ninth-century minuscule
manuscripts (thus P. Canart, La minuscule grecque et son ductus du
IXe au XVIe sicle, in Lcriture: le cerveau, loeil et la main, ed.
C. Sirat, J. Irigoin, and E. Poulle [Turnhout 1990] 307-20 [at 310]
[= repr. in P. Canart, tudes de Palographie et de Codicologie II
[Citt del Vaticano 2008] 881-94 [at 88h]]). See also Follieri, La
minuscola bizantina dei secoli IX e X (n. 13, above) 143
(=Byzantina et Italograeca 210).15 16 14
Cf. Orsini, (n. 13, above) 573.
For the use of the percentage of majuscule letters as a tool for
dating minuscule manuscripts see E. Follieri, La reintroduzione di
lettere semionciali nei pi antichi manoscritti greci in minuscola,
Bullettino dellArchivio Paleografico italiano 3.1 (1962) 15-36; R.
Valentini, La reintroduzione dellonciale e la datazione dei
manoscritti greci in minuscola, in Scritti in onore di Carlo Diano
(Bologna 1975) 455-70. Nevertheless, despite meticulousness in
collecting such data, I am not quite sure that such criteria could
lead to dating manuscripts with an unquestionable degree of
precision. See Orsini, (n. 13, above) 570.
17 18
For well-founded reservations on this terminology see G.
Cavallo, Metodi di descrizione della scrittura in paleografia
greca, Scrittura e Civilt 15 (1991) 21-30 (at 29); A. Iacobacci and
L. Perria, Il Vangelo di Dionisio (Roma 1998) 41.
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(i) Athos Lavra 70 (= 446) (finished on 30 August 984), a
commentary on Psalms (copied in the margins) alongside Actes Iviron
6 (a donation act of a chrysobollos by Basilius II from Athanasius
to Johannes Iberus, December 984), both written by Johannes from
Athos; 19 (ii) Coisl. 928 (second half of the eleventh century),
St. Maximos; 20 (iii) Ottob. gr. 422 (middle of the eleventh
century, written by Theophanes monk of Iviron), homilies and lives
of saints; 21 (iv) Athos Lavra 426 (1039, written in
Constantinople), 22 patristic biographies; (v) Sin. gr. 595
(written by two hands around 1000), 23 Menaion. Judging from these
examples, which can be dated around the eleventh century, with a
greater or lesser degree of confidence I agree with the dating
suggested by N. Tchernetska for our Hyperides: tenth-eleventh
century. In comparison with the other folios palimpsested
(Archimedes [second half of the tenth century], the liturgical
books [tenth century], the commentary on Aristotles Categories
[ninth century]), Hyperides handwriting seems to be the most
recent; what strikes me is the fact that all the books which were
re-used are not of great antiquity, as one might expect in a
palimpsest. Provenance Here the matter is more puzzling. I worked
only on the superb digital images put up on the website, 24 thus I
have not been able to detect any codicological hints (quality of
the parchment, ink, rules) which could be useful for my purposes.
Therefore, the writing is the only
See K. Lake and S. Lake, Dated Greek minuscule manuscripts to
the year 1200, Facs. I-X (Boston Mass. 1934-1939) III ms. 89, pl.
157; J. Irigoin, Pour une tude des centres de copie byzantins
(suite), Scriptorium 13 (1959) 177-209 (pl. 20); E. Lamberz, Die
Handschriftenproduktion in den Athosklstern bis 1453, in Scritture,
libri e testi nelle aree provinciali di Bisanzio, Atti del
Seminario di Erice (18-25 settembre 1988) I, ed. G. Cavallo, G. De
Gregorio, and M. Maniaci (Spoleto 1991) 25-78 (pl. 4). For the
document see J. Lefort, N. Oikonomids, D. Papachryssanthou, and H.
Mtrvli, Actes dIviron, I.1-2 (des origines au milieu du XIe sicle)
(Paris 1985) 135-40 and pl. XV-XVI. On this monk see Lamberz
(ibidem) 30-35, 74-75 (who argues for a Constantinopolitan origin
of his graphic education); P. Orsini, Quale coscienza ebbero i
Bizantini della loro cultura grafica?, Medioevo Greco 5 (2005)
215-48 (at 236-38); M. Losacco, Su alcuni codici crisostomici
affini alla produzione di Giovanni di Lavra, 4 (2007) 123-42.20 See
B. Crostini, Towards a study of the scriptorium of the monastery of
the Theotokos Evergetis: preliminary remarks, in The Theotokos
Evergetis and eleventh-century monasticism, ed. M. Mullett and A.
Kirby (Belfast Byzantine Texts and Translations, 6.1) (Belfast
1994) 17697 (at 183-84). The hand working at ff. 1-16 is a small
and rounded Perlschrift, rather conservative, with some elements
predating more evolved forms. 21 Plate in E. Follieri, Codices
graeci Bibliothecae Vaticanae selecti temporum locorumque ordine
digesti commentariis et transcriptionibus instructi (Citt del
Vaticano 1969) Tab. 27 (Ottob. gr. 422, f. 48v). For the book
production of Theophanes, who used a peculiar and unpretentious
Perlschrift (comparable with our folia to a certain extent) see
Irigoin, Pour une tude des centres de copie byzantins (suite) (n.
19, above) 200-04. 22 23 19
See Lake and Lake, Dated Greek minuscule manuscripts (n. 19,
above) III ms. 100, pl. 174-75.
Facs. in D. Harlfinger, D. R. Reinsch, and J. A. M. Sonderkamp,
with G. Prato, Specimina Sinaitica. Die datierten griechischen
Handschriften des Katharinen-Klosters auf dem Berge Sinai, 9. bis
12. Jahrhundert (Berlin 1983) pl. 52-53.24
At the address .
GIUSEPPE UCCIARDELLO: PALAEOGRAPHY AND TEXTUAL TRANSMISSION
235
available tool, though it is not sufficient, as the material for
comparison come from different areas. When the handwriting of a
manuscript seems in no way peculiar to a particular place, scholars
are uncertain whether it is from Constantinople or from the
peripheries (South Italy/Near East). Let me explore which of these
solutions turns out to be the most attractive. 1. South Italy. In
my opinion, it is hard to demonstrate that the manuscript
containing Hyperides comes from South Italy, as no palaeographical
or cultural evidence points to this area. From the palaeographical
viewpoint, eleventh-century rounded hands are well attested in the
West: see the so-called Rossano minuscule, attested in the
eleventh-twelfth centuries; later on, we find the Reggio script,
marked by a strong contrast between broad and narrow letters, which
seems to derive from the Rossano minuscule. 25 However, it is
disputed whether the latter is merely a local stylistic evolution
(from scripts previously attested in this area), or if it ought to
be linked with the influence of the Constantinopolitan Perlschrift.
26 Again, even if some folios of our Hyperides show resemblance
with scripts of a contrastive type (see supra), there is no
compelling proof for connecting the item with Italo-Greek
contrastive scripts (later evolved into the Reggio script). We also
have manuscripts in Perlschrift (of uncertain location) with
squeezed letter-shapes, strictly recalling the contrastive style of
the Reggio script: see Paris. gr. 1457 (Metaphrastes), written by
the monk Antonius at the end of the eleventh century (dating by H.
Hunger).27 As for the cultural argument, very few classical
manuscripts can be referred to South Italy with a certain degree of
confidence, despite previous views supporting massive classical
book production in this area. 28 These few items are school texts,
such as lexica and grammars; in addition, we have novels or
entertaiment readings (Aesop, Achilles Tatius, Physiologus). 29 At
a medium educational level we can put items such as Paris. gr.
3032, a collection of
25
On the Reggio script cf. recently M. Re, Lo stile di Reggio
ventanni dopo, in LEllenismo italiota dal VII al XII seclo. Alla
memoria di Nikos Panagiokatis (Atti del Convegno, Venezia, 13-16
novembre 1997) (Atene 2001) 99-124; P. Degni, Sullo stile di
Reggio: lapporto delle testimonianze documentarie, Archivio storico
per la Calabria e la Lucania 69 (2002) 57-81; M. Re, Considerazioni
sullo stile di Reggio, 2 (2005) 303-11.
26 It is a controversial issue: see S. Luc, Rossano, il Patir e
lo stile rossanese. Note per uno studio codicologicopaleografico e
storico-culturale, RSBN 22-23 (1985-1986) 93-170 (with several
arguments for a local evolution of these scripts); G. Breccia,
Dalla regina delle citt. I manoscritti della donazione di Alessio
Comneno a Bartolomeo da Simeri, BBGG (= . Miscellanea di studi per
il LXX compleanno di mgr. Paul Canart, I, ed. S. Luc and L. Perria)
51 (1997) 209-24 (suggesting a Constantinopolitan influence). 27
RGK (= Repertorium der griechischen Kopisten, 800-1600, parts 1-3,
Wien 1989) 2A Nr. 36; see facs. of f. 56r in RGK 2C Taf. 20. H.
Hungers remarks on this handwriting run as follows: eine gewisse
Nhe zu Stil von Reggio (RGK 2B, p. 20). 28
See the important, although controversial, sketch provided by G.
Cavallo, La trasmissione scritta della cultura greca antica in
Calabria e in Sicilia tra i secoli X-XV. Consistenza, tipologia,
fruizione, Scrittura e Civilt 4 (1980) 157-245; some valuable
classical manuscripts, of doubtful origin, are claimed to be
Italo-Greek by J. Irigoin, Lapport de lItalie mridionale la
transmission des textes classiques, in Histoire et culture dans
lItalie Byzantine. Acquis et nouvelles recherches, ed. A. Jacob,
J.-M. Martin, and G. Noy (Rome 2006) 5-20 (at 11-14).
See the fresh and updated overview provided by S. Luc, Note per
la storia della cultura greca della Calabria Meridionale, Archivio
Storico per la Calabria e la Lucania 74 (2007 [2008]), pp. 43-101
(at 54-60); on the issue see also S. Luc, Dalle collezioni
manoscritte di Spagna: libri originari o provenienti dallItalia
greca meridionale, RSBN n.s. 44 (2007) 39-96 (at 62-64).
29
236
BICS-52 2009
rhetorical handbooks (Hermogenes and his commentators), which
might have been produced in the South Italy. 30 However, some
manuscripts, which are authoritative for the textual transmission
of rare classical authors (such as Paris. suppl. gr. 388 containing
Theognides, Dionysius Periegetes, Colluthus) and previously thought
to be Italo-Greek items, have now been referred with strong
arguments to a Constantinopolitan milieu. 31 2. Palestine. As we
have seen, our manuscript is likely to have moved to Palestine,
before its re-using. Are we entitled to argue for a Near East
origin? I find this suggestion, although fascinating, far from
convincing. Several books claimed to have originated in this area
show no peculiar hint, from a palaeographical point of view; 32
this fact might well account for the unremarkable appearance of the
handwriting of the Hyperides. Anyway, more compelling reservations
from a cultural point of view strongly suggest that we should
dismiss this solution. Book production implies patronage and people
eager to acquire books. In this case, who transcribed or requested
a copy of a manuscript containing Hyperides in Palestine between
the tenth and the eleventh centuries? Greek culture flourished in
Palestine during the seventh/eighth centuries, 33 as Cyril Mango
and Lidia Perria have convincingly demonstrated. The circulation of
Greek manuscripts (especially philosophical and scientific texts)
in the East is also assured so far by the translations into Syriac
and Arabic; indeed, it is worth stressing how there is no proof of
local translations of rhetors and orators. 34 After the eighth
century the scarcity of evidence does not allow us to get a
clear-cut picture of the cultural environment. The extant book
production, which can be referred to the tenth and the eleventh
centuries, mostly relies on liturgical books copied for the
religious needs of the local Greek-Arabic monks. In the present
state of our knowledge, the only profane manuscripts produced in
Palestine seem to be a schoolcopy of Homer, Iliad (equipped with
paraphrasis), a copy of the Herbary by Pedanius Dioscorides, and
some juridical and medical books. 35 Again, we have two interesting
palimpsests from Jerusalem, which were produced there by taking
apart manuscripts bearing classical texts, namely:
30 Status quaestionis in C. Frstel and M. Rashed, Une recontre
dHermogne et de Cicron dans lItalie mdivale, 3 (2006) 361-71.
F. Ronconi, Il codice parigino Suppl. gr. 388 e Mos del Brolo da
Bergamo, Italia Medievale e Umanistica 47 (2006) 1-24; also Luc,
Note per la storia della cultura greca della Calabria Meridionale
(n. 29, above) 59 n. 46.32 33 34
31
See Perria, Libri e scritture tra Oriente bizantino e Italia
Meridionale (n. 9, above) 169-70. Survey in Perria and Luzzi,
Ricerche (n. 9, above) 96-99.
See the valuable book by D. Gutas, Greek thought, Arabic
culture: the Graeco-Arabic translation movement in Baghdad and
early Abbasid society (2nd-4th/8th-10th c.) (London 1998) (for a
table of the Greek works translated into Arabic see pp. 227-30).
For Syriac translators cf. now also A. Corcella, Due citazioni
dalle Etiopiche di Eliodoro nella Retorica di Antonio di Tagrit,
Orientalia christiana periodica 74 (2008) 389-416 (at 408-09). Cf.
G. Cavallo, . Riflessioni su cultura del centro e cultura delle
periferie a Bisanzio, in Byzantina-Metabyzantina. La pripherie dans
le temps et l'espace (Actes de la 6e sance plniere du XXe Congrs
international des tudes byzantines) (Paris 2003) 77-106 (at 93); L.
Perria and A. Luzzi, Manoscritti greci delle province orientali
dellimpero bizantino, in Atti del VI Congresso Nazionale
dellAssociazione italiana di studi bizantini (Catania-Messina 2-5
ottobre 2000), ed. T. Creazzo and G. Strano, = SicGymn n.s. 57
(2004) 667-90. A new attribution (the Scorial. R-III-1, medical
collection) to the Palestine area is in M. Ceresa and S. Luc,
Frammenti greci di Dioscoride Pedanio e Aezio Amideno in unedizione
a stampa di Francesco35
GIUSEPPE UCCIARDELLO: PALAEOGRAPHY AND TEXTUAL TRANSMISSION
237
(a) the well-known Jerusalem palimpsest of Euripides (Hieros.
Bibl. Patriarch. 36+Sankt Peterburg, Rossijskaja Nacionalnaja
Biblioteka, gr. 261); it is written in an informal handwriting of
the tenth century resembling the so-called Ephraim script; 36 (b)
the Libanius-Heliodorus palimpsest (Hierosol. S. Crucis 57); it is
formed by two manuscripts which were re-used for making a Gospel in
the late twelfth century: judging from the only available
reproduction (concerning Libanius), the handwriting should probably
be assigned to the eleventh century. 37 At any rate, we do not know
whether these classical manuscripts were in fact produced in the
Palestine area or elsewhere. As for the Euripides palimpsest, its
Ephraim-script occurs in Coisl. 51, written with a high degree of
confidence in Palestine. 38 This fact suggests that such cursive
scripts were attested in this area, but it is not a conclusive
proof for supporting a local production of this manuscript. On the
other hand, however, we should keep in mind that other attributions
of profane books to this area, suggested in more recent years, seem
to be even more doubtful. 39 Thus, in the current state of our
evidence, there is no firm proof supporting a Near East origin of
the Hyperides. 3. Constantinople. As was pointed out by Natalie
Tchernetska, the Hyperides folios show 32 lines written in one
column, resembling the so-called 32 line-manuscripts of historical
writers and Plutarch, studied by the late Jean Irigoin. Irigoin
claimed that these manuscripts were produced at Constantinople
between the tenth and the eleventh centuries, probably for an
outstanding patronage. 40 Of course, we cannot take for granted
that the 32 line-format was used exclusively by scribes working for
Imperial circles in the late tenth century; it is conceivable that
this format mirrored a more ancient minuscule model. Similarly, the
32 line-format of our Hyperides might derive from its model.
Zanetti (Roma 1576), in Miscellanea Bibliothecae Apostolicae
Vaticanae XV (Citt del Vaticano 2008) 191-229 (at 207).36 37
See Cavallo, 96-97; Perria and Luzzi, Ricerche (n. 9, above)
98-99.
According to the plate (from f. 31r) published in A.
Papadopoulos-Kerameus, Ierosolymitike Bibliotheke, III (En
Petroupolei 1897) 114, we have to reckon with an informal minuscule
sloping to the right, probably of the eleventh century. As far as
Heliodorus is concerned, there seems to be no plate in the extant
collections of specimina. For the circulation of some ancient
novelists such as Heliodorus in the East see the valuable study by
Corcella, Due citazioni dalle Etiopiche di Eliodoro nella Retorica
di Antonio di Tagrit (n. 34, above). Thus Perria and Luzzi,
Manoscritti greci delle province orientali dellimpero bizantino (n.
35, above) 676.
38 39
See e.g. Bodl. Barocc. 50. Despite current views on its
Italo-Greek provenance, mainly supported by Irigoin (cf. lastly
Irigoin, Lapport de lItalie mridionale la transmission des textes
classiques [n. 28, above]), F. Ronconi, La miscellanea che non
divenne mai silloge: il caso del Bodl. Barocci 50, in Selecta
colligere II, ed. R. M. Piccione and M. Perkams (Alessandria 2005)
295-353, argues for a Palestinian origin, but I share the doubts
about this claim cast by some scholars: see F. Pontani, rev. of
Selecta colligere II in JHS 127 (2007) 176-77 (at 177); Luc, Note
per la storia della cultura greca della Calabria Meridionale (n.
29, above) 60 n. 47 and 101 (the latter points to a
Constantinopolitan origin). Accordingly, we should suspend
judgement on this issue for the time being.40
Cf. J. Irigoin, Les manuscrits de Plutarque 32 et 22 lignes, in
Actes XIVe Congrs International des tudes byzantines (Bucarest,
6-12 sept. 1971) III (Bucarest 1976) 83-87 (repr. in La tradition
des textes grecs. Pour une critique historique [Paris 2003] 329-35)
and Les manuscrits dhistoriens grecs et byzantins 32 lignes, in
Studia codicologica, ed. K. Treu (Texte und Untersuchungen 124)
(Berlin 1977) 237-45 (repr. in La tradition des textes grecs. Pour
une critique historique [Paris 2003] 295-309).
238
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From a cultural and historical view-point, Constantinople is a
much more suitable place for a minuscule Hyperides to be copied.
During the first Byzantine Renaissance in the ninth century onwards
we find some scholars and intellectual readers looking for old and
unusual texts of ancient authors. The book production of classical
texts is well-attested. Thus, Hyperides might have been copied at
Constantinople or nearby. 3 New questions This last point leads us
to explore other questions closely linked to each other: did this
manuscript contain only Hyperides and how many speeches were
copied? What do these folios tell us about Hyperides circulation at
Byzantium? What was the arrangement of Hyperides speeches in the
palimpsest? Is there a relationship between the new find and
Photius highly controversial account of Hyperides? What follows is
an attempt to give an answer to these questions and to draw a fresh
picture of the textual transmission of the Attic orators with the
help of the new Hyperides. 1. Did this manuscript contain only
Hyperides? How many speeches were copied? First of all, I would pay
attention to the textual transmission of the other Attic orators.
All (or almost all) of Demosthenes and Isocrates have come down to
us, because they served as stylistic models in the schools. As for
Aeschines, we have three speeches, which are the only extant
genuine works circulating during the Roman age. 41 It is the same
for Andocides. The extant corpus of the other orators is much more
reduced and the textual transmission depends on a few items, which
can be dated between the tenth and the fourteenth centuries. The
most relevant are (see table 1): 42 (i) Coisl. 249, written by two
hands of the tenth century, 43 contains all of Aeschines (1-3)
alongside Gorgias Helen, Lysias Epithaphios, and a corpusculum of
late antique authors
41 For Aeschines reputation in antiquity see J. F. Kindstrand,
The stylistic evaluation of Aeschines in antiquity (Uppsala
1982).
For claritys sake I shall not take into account the textual and
philological relationships of the manuscripts, as this topic falls
ouside the purpose of the present paper: a first account can be
found in some recent studies on the textual transmission of the
orators (e.g. for Lysias see G. Avezz, Lisia, Contro Eratostene
[Padova 1992] 29-51; and C. Carey, Lysiae orationes cum fragmentis
[Oxford 2007] xi-xviii; for Alcidamas R. Mari, Alkidamas: ber
diejenigen, die schriftliche Reden schreiben, oder ber die
Sophisten. Eine Sophistenrede aus dem 4. Jahrhundert v. Chr.
eingeleitet und kommentiert [Mnster 2002] 10-12, who is greatly
indebted to G. Avezz, Alcidamante. Orazioni e frammenti [Roma 1982]
xix-xxv). Analogously, I refer to the catalogues of each collection
for a detailed description of the items. My own concern here is
simply to explore how some orators were transmitted and how their
speeches have been assembled together into a coherent set of texts
(corpus or corpuscula). The selection of manuscripts under
discussion is merely subjective: I have omitted other relevant
items of the first half of the fourteenth century such as Vat. gr.
2207, on which see G. Avezz, Il Ms. Vaticano Gr. 2207 nella
tradizione dellEpitafio lisiano e degli oratori attici minori, BIFG
3 (1976) 184-220; I. Prez Martn, El Patriarca Gregorio de Chipre
(ca. 1240-1290) y la trasmisin de los textos clsicos en Bizancio
(Nueva Roma 1) (Madrid 1996) 332, 336, 242-43, 351; full
description in S. Lilla, Codices Vaticani Graeci. Codices 2162-2254
(Citt del Vaticano 1985) 168-74.43 Cf. M. L. Sosower, Palatinus
Graecus 88 and the Manuscript Tradition of Lysias (Amsterdam 1988).
One of these hands has been identified by Nigel Wilson also in Vat.
gr. 1298 (Aelius Aristides); see N. G. Wilson, Scholars of
Byzantium (London 1983) 140.
42
GIUSEPPE UCCIARDELLO: PALAEOGRAPHY AND TEXTUAL TRANSMISSION
239
(Marinos of Neapolis, Vita Procli, and some works by Sinesius).
44 The physical composition of this item is puzzling. It is worth
taking into account an old hypothesis of Avezz, according to which
this manuscript was assembled by two different sections produced
separately: the latter might have contained a larger rhetorical
anthology than the one transmitted in Pal. gr. 88, with some texts
now lost in Coisl. (except Lysias Epithaphios), but copied into the
Vat. gr. 2207 (Alcidamas, Antisthenes, Demades, Gorgias Helen). 45
(ii) Heid. Pal. gr. 88 (written around the middle of the eleventh
century) 46 is formed by two corpuscula: 1. a rhetorical anthology
with two speeches of Lysias (On the killing of Eratosthenes and the
Epitaphios), two speeches of Alcidamas (On the sophists and
Odysseus), two speeches of Antisthenes (Ajax and Odysseus), the
mutilated text of Demades (On the twelve years); 2. 29 speeches of
Lysias (originally thirty) with Gorgias Helen as a tailpiece. 47
(iii) the codex Crippsianus (Burney 95), written at Constantinople
during the first part of the fourteenth century by the so-called
Metochitesschreiber (now to be identified with Michael
Klostomalles); 48 it contains what survived of the other orators:
Andocides (4 speeches), Isaeus (11 speeches), Dinarchus (3
speeches), Antiphon (6 speeches), Lycurgus (the Against Leocrates
alone); then, we have 2 speeches of Gorgias (Helen and
44
A summary description in R. Devreesse, Bibliothque Nationale,
Dpartement des Manuscrits: Catalogue des manuscrits Grecs II, Le
Fonds Coislin (Paris 1945) 228-29.
45
See Avezz, Il Ms. Vaticano Gr. 2207 nella tradizione
dellEpitafio lisiano e degli oratori attici minori (n. 42, above).
Although this reconstruction has later been dismissed (cf. Avezz,
Lisia, Contro Eratostene [n. 42, above] 26ff.), I regard it as
still worth noticing. On this issue see also G. Cavallo,
Conservazione e perdita dei testi greci: fattori materiali,
sociali, culturali, in Societ romana e impero tardoantico, IV,
Tradizione dei classici, trasformazioni della cultura, ed. A.
Giardina (Roma-Bari 1986) 83-172 (= Dalla parte del libro. Storie
di trasmissione dei testi classici [Urbino 2002] 49-175) (at 126 [=
112]). Cavallo, Conservazione e perdita dei testi greci: fattori
materiali, sociali, culturali (n. 45, above) 127-30 (= 113-16);
Avezz, Lisia, Contro Eratostene (n. 42, above) 29ff.
46
47
See Sosower, Palatinus Graecus 88 and the Manuscript Tradition
of Lysias (n. 43, above) for a description and history of this
item.
48 A full study of this hand is provided by G. Prato, I
manoscritti greci dei secoli XIII e XIV: note paleografiche, in
Paleografia e codicologia greca. Atti del II Colloquio
Internazionale (Berlino-Wolfenbttel, 17-21 ottobre 1983) I, ed. D.
Harlfinger and G. Prato (Alessandria 1991) 131-49 (repr. in Studi
di paleografia greca [Spoleto 1994] 115-32). The identification of
the Metochitesschreiber with the imperial notary M. Klostomalles
was first proposed by Erich Lamberz; see E. Lamberz, Das Geschenk
des Kaisers Manuel II. an das Kloster Saint-Denis und der
Metochitesschreiber Michael Klostomalles, in . Studien zur
byzantinischen Kunst und Geschichte. Festschrift fr Marcell Restle,
ed. B. Borkopp and T. Steppan (Stuttgart 2000) 155-65; see also M.
Menchelli, Appunti su manoscritti di Platone, Aristide e Dione di
Prusa della prima et dei Paleologi. Tra Teodoro Metochite e
Niceforo Gregora, SCO 47/2 (2000) 141-208 (at 170-75 and pl. 12 for
other attributions of manuscripts to this hand); E. Lamberz,
Georgios Bullotes, Michael Klostomalles und die Byzantinische
Kaiserkanzlei unter Andronikos II. und Andronikos III. in den
Jahren 12981328, in Lire et crire Byzance, ed. B. Mondrain (Paris
2006) 33-64 (at 44-47); G. De Gregorio, La scrittura greca di et
paleologa (secoli XIII/XIV). Un panorama, in Scrittura memoria
degli uomini. Atti della giornata di studi in ricordo di G.
Cannataro (Bari 2006) 81-138 (at 95-97). At any rate, we are still
lacking a detailed philological description of many items copied by
Klostomalles.
240
BICS-52 2009
Palamedes), 1 piece of Alcidamas (the Odysseus alone), 3
declamations of Lesbonax and the ascribed to Herodes Atticus. 49
(iv) Bodl. Auct. T.2.8 is a twin of Burney 95; 50 it bears only a
selection from the same model as Burney 95: Dinarchus (3), Antiphon
(6) and Lycurgus (1). 51 (v) Ambros. gr. 230 is a composite
manuscript, 52 in which we find two codicological unities: 1. (ff.
1-88r; 90-101v, fifteenth century), with a Patristic section,
Aelius Aristides (speeches 38-39), Lysias Epitaphios, Gorgias
Helen, Aelius Aristides (speech 19, the monody for Smyrna), 53 the
2 extant speeches of the second-century sophist Polemon 54 ; 2.
(ff. 89 + 102-118, end of the thirteenth century) with Andocides (3
and 4) and Isaeus (1-2). Table 1. Some manuscripts of the Attic
oratorsCoisl. gr. 249 Aeschines (1-3) Gorgias (Helen) Lysias (2)
Pal. gr. 88 Lysias (1-2) Alcidamas (On the sophists Odysseus)
Antisthenes (Ajax Odysseus) Burney 95 Andocides (1-4) Isaeus (1-11)
Dinarchus (1-3) Bodl. Auct. T.2.8 Dinarchus (1-3) Antiphon (1-6)
Lycurgus (Against Leocrates) Ambros. gr. 230 Aristides (38-39)
Lysias (2) Gorgias (Helen)
Description in Summary catalogue of Greek manuscripts in the
British Library (compiled by T. S. Pattie and S. McKendrick) 1-
(London 1999) 58-59.50 49
Copied by the same scribe as Vat. gr. 626 (written in 1306/07),
according to Wilson, Scholars of Byzantium (n. 43, above) 229, with
whom I agree: facs. in A. Turyn, Codices Graeci Vaticani saeculis
XIII et XIV scripti annorumque notis instructi (In civitate
Vaticana 1964) 107-08 and pl. 86.185d.
A brief description in H. O. Coxe, Catalogi codicum
manuscriptorum Bibliothecae Bodleianae pars prima recensionem
codicum graecorum continens (Oxford 1853) 766-67. This manuscript
shows one or more codicological unities written in different ages
and places and assembled in ancient times: for this codicological
terminology I rely on J. P. Gumbert, Codicological units: towards a
terminology for the stratigraphy of the non-homogeneous codex, in
Il codice miscellaneo. Tipologie e funzioni (Atti del Convegno
internazionale, Cassino 14-17 maggio 2003) = Segno e Testo 2 (2004)
17-42; M. Maniaci, Il codice greco non unitario. Tipologie e
terminologia, ibidem 75-107; P. Degni, I manoscritti dello
scriptorium di Gioannicio, Segno e Testo 6 (2008) 179-248 (at 223).
It is noteworthy that Aristides in his monody followed a stylistic
habit quite different from other speeches, according to E. Norden,
La prosa darte antica dal VI secolo a.C. allet della rinascenza,
edizione italiana a cura di B. Heinemann Campana, I-II (Roma 1986)
I.430-31; thus this text could find its way into an anthology as an
example of a different style of writing.54 For the career of
Polemon see S. Swain, Polemons Physiognomy, in S. Swain, ed.,
Seeing the face, seeing the soul, Polemons Physiognomy from
classical antiquity to medieval Islam (Oxford 2007) 125-201 (at
126-31). 53 52
51
GIUSEPPE UCCIARDELLO: PALAEOGRAPHY AND TEXTUAL TRANSMISSION
[Alcidamas 1-2?] [Antisthenes 1-2?] [Demades?] Demades (On the
twelve years) Lysias (3-31) Gorgias (Helen) Antiphon (1-6) Lycurgus
(Against Leocrates) Gorgias (Helen Palamedes) Alcidamas (Odysseus)
Lesbonax (3 speeches) Herodes Atticus(?) (1 speech) Aristides
(18)
241
Polemon (2 speeches) Andocides (3-4) Isaeus (1-2)
[Gorgias, Helen?]
older rhetoricians (Alcidamas, Antisthenes, Gorgias) Attic
orators of the canon (Antiphon, etc.) Attic orators not in the
canon (Demades) Atticistic rhetors of the Second Sophistic Sections
of mss. sharing the same model
Table 2. Loss and survivalAntiquity (Ps.Plut. Vitae decem orat.)
Antiphon 60 (35 genuine) Andocides 4 Lysias 425 (233 genuine)
Isocrates 60 (25/28 genuine) Isaeus 64 (50 genuine) Aeschines 4 (3
genuine) Lycurgus 15 Demosthenes 65 Hyperides 77 (52 genuine)
Dinarchus 64 Middle Ages/ways of selection 6 3 31 21 11 3 1 61 2 3
Speeches concerning homicide (an entire section of a late antiquity
edition?) almost the corpus ? almost the corpus of genuine speeches
Speeches concerning inheritance (section of a late antiquity
edition?) all corpus ? almost the corpus (?) speeches concerning
the Harpalus affair
What can we infer from these figures? 1. The quantity of the
extant speeches is quite different (see Table 2). As we have said,
Demosthenes or Isocrates (with their large corpora), Aeschines
(3/3) and Andocides (3/4) survive almost entirely. As far as the
others are concerned, the remains are the result of a selection.
Sometimes it is easy to detect how this process took place: in the
Burney 95 Antiphons speeches involve homicide, Isaeus speeches
concern inheritance. They are probably sections of ancient editions
thematically arranged. Again, the three extant speeches
242
BICS-52 2009
of Dinarchus involve the Harpalus affair. As regards Lysias, it
was not easy to reduce a huge corpus of 233 genuine speeches; thus,
the selection might even have happened by chance. Leaving aside the
corpora of Demosthenes, Isocrates, and Lysias who formed the more
substantial part of a manuscript, the speeches of the other orators
were transcribed together with other authors. In Coisl. 249
Aeschines was linked to a philosophical miscellany of late
antiquity; in Pal. gr. 88, Burney 95, Bodl. Auct. T.2.8 and Ambros.
gr. 230 we have sections of what Friedrich Blass called the
rhetorical anthology, assembled for the schools: it contained
selected pieces of older rhetoricians (Alcidamas, Antisthenes, and
Gorgias in Pal. gr. 88 and Burney 95), five Attic orators
(Antiphon, Andocides, Isaeus, Lycurgus, Dinarchus in Burney 95 and
partially in Bodl. Auct. T.2.8 and Ambros. gr. 230), Demades,
Lysias Epitaphios, and a choice of Atticistic rhetors of the
so-called Second Sophistic (Lesbonax, Herodes Atticus in Burney 95;
Aelius Aristides and Polemon in Ambros. gr. 230). The latter were
included in the canonical list of authors recommended at Byzantium
as models of style, alongside the old Attic orators. According to
several sources this second canon included Dio Chrysostom, Aelius
Aristides, Philostratos, Herodes Atticus, Lesbonax, Polemon,
Adrianus and Callinicus. 55 Such a rhetorical anthology could have
been assembled in the eleventh century or even earlier (during the
Byzantine Renaissance, according to Blass and Avezz; other scholars
such as Dover have suggested late antiquity), 56 as we find some
sections of it in Pal. gr. 88 (written around the middle of the
eleventh century). Even if the five Attic orators are a
self-contained textual unity, I find no reason to deny their
insertion in this anthology in the Middle Ages. Nigel Wilson
suggests that their reappearance in Burney 95 is perhaps due to a
lucky find by a scholar of the late thirteenth century, 57 given
the scarcity of Byzantine witnesses to these orators: this may be
true. Nevertheless, we can rule out that this lucky find involves
an old majuscule manuscript: Burney 95 shows minuscule mistakes and
this fact implies a minuscule manuscript as the model from which
the text of these five Attic orators ultimately derives. 58 2.
These short collections did not become standard unities which were
fully copied into new manuscripts. As has recently been pointed
out, we are generally lacking in comprehensive transcriptions of
texts from a miscellaneous manuscript into a new one; Byzantine
scribes usually copied sections of the corpuscula which they found
in the
Cf. A. Meyer, Psellos Rede ber den rhetorischen Charakter des
Gregorios von Nazianz, BZ 20 (1911) 27-100 (at 70-83). Leaving
aside authors such as Aelius Aristides (see L. Quattrocelli,
Ricerche sulla tradizione manoscritta di Elio Aristide. Per una
nuova datazione del Laur. 60, 8, Scriptorium 60.2 [2006] 202-26 and
Aelius Aristides reception at Byzantium. The case of Arethas, in
Aelius Aristides between Greece, Rome, and the gods [Columbia
Studies in the Classical Tradition vol. 33], ed. W. V. Harris and
B. Holmes [Leiden-Boston 2008] 279-94), a proper and careful study
of the manuscript tradition of these sophists has not yet been
fulfilled; for some of them (as Callinichus and Adrianus) it is
still in its infancy (E. Amato, Un nuovo testimone delle
Declamationes di Adriano di Tiro, Primum legere 2 [2003] 263-67 is
a first attempt to list the manuscripts). See K. J. Dover, Lysias
and the corpus Lysiacum (Berkeley-Los Angeles 1968) 2; Avezz,
Lisia, Contro Eratostene (n. 42, above) 15ff.57 58 56 55
Wilson, Scholars of Byzantium (n. 43, above) 229. See W. Wyse,
The speeches of Isaeus (Cambridge 1904) xlvi-xlvii.
GIUSEPPE UCCIARDELLO: PALAEOGRAPHY AND TEXTUAL TRANSMISSION
243
models. 59 For instance, in Pal. gr. 88 we have the two
declamations of Alcidamas, On the Sophists and Odysseus; in Burney
95 the scribe copied only the Odysseus. 60 3. What strikes me is
the fate of Lycurgus. The anthology in Burney 95 (and in its Oxford
twin, Bodl. Auct. T.2.8) carries only one speech, the Against
Leocrates. The indirect tradition has given us scattered fragments
of 14 speeches at least. It is worth observing that Photius
(Bibliotheca 268) claimed to have not read anything of Lycurgus,
because time does not allow us to read his speeches. 61 Bevegni has
recently argued that the passage could be an allusion to the
scarcity of Lycurgus corpus in the ninth-century libraries. 62 4.
In this anthology there is no room for Hyperides. Why? Are we
forced to argue that not one of Hyperides speeches survived in the
model of this anthology? Did it happen by chance? Or perhaps
Hyperides was no longer available at the time when this anthology
was arranged? This is the state of our evidence. It is very meagre.
We have only a few relevant items on which the transmission of the
Attic orators entirely relies. But it does not mean that there
could be no other manuscripts with other arrangements, involving a
more comprehensive selection of texts than the one which has come
down to us. 63 There are in fact some clues for arguing missing
links in the transmission: (i) Arethas, the tenth-century bishop of
Caesarea, seems to have been acquainted with Lesbonax various
rhetorical meletai 64 and Antiphons Tetralogiae; 65 three
declamations of Lesbonax are extant in Burney 95; nevertheless,
Arethas might have known some more speeches. 66
59 60
See F. Ronconi, I manoscritti greci miscellanei. Ricerche su
esemplari dei secoli IX-XII (Spoleto 2008).
The habit of copying selected pieces from a model could even be
due to material circumstances, such as the relationship between the
textual unities in the antigraphon and the space available in the
new item: see Gumbert, Codicological units: towards a terminology
for the stratigraphy of the non-homogeneous codex (n. 52, above);
Ronconi, I manoscritti greci miscellanei (n. 59, above) 11-32. For
some scholars, however, the omission was deliberate: the scribe
planned to arrange a miscellany with forensis speeches on Trojan
subjects (thus leaving aside a text such as the speech On the
sophists which fell outside the subject): see Avezz, Alcidamante
(n. 42, above) xx. On the Odysseus see now also N. OSullivan, The
authenticity of [Alcidamas] Odysseus: two new linguistic
considerations, CQ 58 (2008) 638-47.61 62
... .
C. Bevegni, rev. of J. Schamp, Les vies des dix orateurs
attiques (Fribourg 2000) QS 55 (2002) 233-42 (at 240). See Avezz,
Lisia, Contro Eratostene (n. 42, above) 19.
63 64
Schol. Luc. de salt. p. 189, 11-15 Rabe, ] , .65
Letter 69 to Leon VI (II p. 91, 10-11 Westerink) .
66
On his library see Wilson, Scholars of Byzantium (n. 43, above)
120-35 and the survey in A. Bravo Garca, Aretas, semblanza de un
erudito byzantino, Erytheia 6 (1985) 241-54.
244
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(ii) the twelfth-century scholar Johannes Tzetzes claimed in his
Chiliades to have read various speeches by Alcidamas; 67 nowadays,
Alcidamas is known only for the two declamations inserted in the
rhetorical anthology. In my opinion, there is no need to disregard
Tzetzes: even if his reputation was not always good, 68 we cannot
rule out the possibility that he might have had access to a
manuscript with several speeches of Alcidamas. 69 (iii) As far as
Gorgias is concerned, a notice reported by Fabricius deserves
mention: according to Konstantinos Laskaris, a Florentine
manuscript would have contained three of Gorgias speeches. 70 In
the present state of our evidence, the item seems to have got lost;
nevertheless, it reinforces the suspicion that the amount of
selected texts that have come down to us might even be more
substantial than one could guess. We can now examine two
theoretical models for reconstructing the Hyperides manuscript from
which the Archimedes folios ultimately derive: (a) a manuscript
carrying a substantial corpus of speeches (such as those of
Demosthenes, Lysias, or Isocrates) with other items as tailpieces;
71 (b) the anthological model: a choice of Hyperides speeches
inserted into a rhetorical anthology circulating in the Byzantine
age, like those containing Antiphon and other orators. On the one
hand, we could even surmise the existence of a manuscript with
Hyperides as magna pars; analogously, we should thus be entitled to
argue for the circulation of similar manuscripts containing as many
speeches of Dinarchus (or Lycurgus) as Hyperides. The evidence,
however, makes scenario (a) very doubtful, as I shall try to
demonstrate in what follows.
67
J. Tzetzes, Chiliades (11, 750-51 Leone), / .
68 Leaving aside some much-controversial cases about Tzetzes
reliability (as his claim to have known 52 Euripidean plays, on
which see however E. Magnelli, Un nuovo indizio (e alcune
precisazioni) sui drammi alfabetici di Euripide a Bisanzio tra XI e
XII secolo, Prometheus 29 (2003) 193-212 [at 194-95]), there are in
general good reasons to re-evaluate Tzetzes as a trustworthy
scholar: cf. M. J. Luzzatto, Tzetzes lettore di Tucidide (Bari
1999). 69 70
Avezz, Lisia, Contro Eratostene (n. 42, above) 23-24.
J. A. Fabricius, Bibliotheca Graeca, sive Notitia scriptorum
veterum graecorum, quorumcumque monumenta integra, aut fragmenta
edita extant: tum plerorumque e mss. ac deperditis, 1-12 (Hamburgi
1707-1728, reprint Hildesheim 1966-1970) II.806, Gorgiae orationes
tres legisse se Florentinae in Bibliothecae S. Marci...testatur K.
Lascaris. This missed item is not reported in J. Stolpe, Les
manuscrits de Gorgias, Eranos 68 (1970) 55-60. I hope to
investigate the issue in a separate paper. P. Easterling, Fata
libellorum: Hyperides and the transmission of Attic oratory (n. 2
above) 14-15. For the sake of this argument it it interesting to
quote what Gregorios of Cyprus wrote to the protovestiarissa
Theodora Rhaoulaina, the daughter of John Kantakouzenos and Eirene
Palaiologina (about 1242-1300: see M. L. Agati, Una dotta copista e
bibliofila: Teodora Raulena, in La civilt bizantina. Donne, uomini,
cultura e societ. Enciclopedia di Tematica Aperta [Jaca Book,
Marzorati, Milano 2001] 390-94): , o (edition in S. Kugas, Zur
Geschichte der Mnchener Thukydideshandschrift Augustanus F, BZ 16
[1907] 592-603 [at 598]).71
GIUSEPPE UCCIARDELLO: PALAEOGRAPHY AND TEXTUAL TRANSMISSION
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The survival of a text is closely related to the need for it at
different educational levels and for the Byzantine imitation of
language and style. The Byzantines believed in a cultural
continuity between past and present. They faced the past with an
imitative attitude. 72 Among the orators, the best-acclaimed models
were Demosthenes and Isocrates. In various passages Michael Psellus
recommended a set of authors as models: he mostly quotes
Demosthenes or Isocrates, sometimes Lysias, Antiphon and Isaeus; 73
in the essay he recalls Lysias, Demosthenes, and Isocrates as
models of style; 74 in the essay on Gregorius style he quotes
Isocrates and Demosthenes, but also Polemon, Herodes Atticus, and
Lollianus among the new orators of the Second Sophistic. 75 The
balance of evidence seems to match the manuscript tradition: apart
from Demosthenes, 76 Isocrates, and the Lysian corpus, we find only
a few references to other orators, which have come down to us
through an anthological selection. It seems likely that the
available copies of Demosthenes or Isocrates were closely related
to their demand and usefulness for students and well-accomplished
readers. Of course, we cannot entirely dismiss the possibility that
manuscripts containing a substantial selection of Hyperides
speeches were still available in Byzantium, as the result of a
fortuitous discovery of a late antique manuscript. Nevertheless, I
find it more attractive, to hypothesize a minuscule model
containing selected orators, including Hyperides (scenario b).
Thus, Hyperides might have got lost by chance. The manuscript from
which our 5 ff. derives might be linked with the model from which
Burney 95, Bodl. Auct. T.2.8 and Ambros. gr. 230 ultimately derive.
The content of these manuscripts is the upshot of a process of
selection taken up at multifarious levels. We cannot be sure that
Michael Klostomalles copied in Burney 95 all the speeches available
in his model; a speech of Alcidamas is lacking. We can suppose
either that it was entirely due to a conscious omission or that the
speech was already missed in the antigraphon. I would highlight a
point of detail in the mise en page of Burney 95, which has escaped
scholarly attention until now: 77 at ff. 1-76v, ll. 1-3 (Andocides
1-4, Isaeus 1-11) Klostomalles used a 34-39-line format with a
reduced interlinear space. Afterwards, f. 76v is blank: the
following set of texts (Dinarchus, Antiphon, etc.) starts at f.
77r; then, the layout shifts between 30-32 lines and the
handwriting is larger than in the previous ff.
72 This issue is now investigated by A. Kaldellis, Hellenism in
Byzantium: the transformations of Greek identity and the reception
of the classical tradition (Cambridge 2007). 73
Psellos, Theologica 68 (pp. 52-53 Gautier) , [...].
M. Psellos, On the style of some texts (cf. J. F. Boissonade, De
operatione daemonum [Norimbergae 1838] 50): , ... . See Psellos, On
the style of Gregorios the Theologian (edition in Meyer, Psellos
Rede [n. 55, above] 48): ... . For this treatise see also Wilson,
Scholars of Byzantium (n. 43, above) 169-72.76 On the reception of
Demosthenes in the Byzantine world see now L. Pernot, LOmbre du
tigre. Recherches sur la rception de Dmosthne (Napoli 2006). 77
75
74
These observations rest on a personal inspection of Burney 95
(July 2009).
246
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Why did Klostomalles leave unwritten f. 76v? And why did he
change the layout? Perhaps because, as I suspect, he was copying
from two different models at least; if so, could the second model
have been a manuscript with a 32-line format which Klostomalles
aimed to respect? Therefore, if we cannot take for granted that
Klostomalles copied his model (or models) in its (or their)
entirety, we are entitled to surmise that he could even have
omitted a set of texts of some authors such as Hyperides. Let us
compare the habit of the scribe of Ambros. gr. 230: he arranged a
rhetorical miscellany with authors of the Second Sophistic (Aelius
Aristides, Polemon) and a reduced selection of Attic orators (2
speeches by Andocides and Isaeus); the latter were drawn from the
same model used by Klostomalles.78 2. What do these folios tell us
about Hyperides circulation at Byzantium? Transliteration and
copying activity do not mean circulation and intensive reading of
Hyperides. On the one hand, we have the minuscule folios in the
palimpsest; on the other, evidence for a direct reading of
Hyperides during the Byzantine age is disappointing. We have
already stressed how Hyperides was not recorded among the models of
style at Byzantium. Leaving aside quotations in grammatical and
lexicographical works, Byzantine writers such as Arethas, Psellos,
Johannes Tzetzes, or Eustathius seem unaware of Hyperides. 79 What
does this mean? During the ninth-century Byzantine Renaissance we
find some scholars and intellectual readers looking for old and
rare texts. Some of them seem to have been rescued and
transliterated. However, some of these copies were left
unproductive for a long time: here I can briefly refer to only
three famous cases. (a) Some manuscripts of the so-called
philosophical collection (otherwise referred to as Allens
scriptorium), a particular set of items carrying mainly
Neoplatonical commentaries: in two mss. of the group, Marc. gr. 196
and 246 we find Olympiodorus commentary on Gorgias, Alcibiades I
and Phaedo by Plato, together with Damascius commentary on
Parmenides and Simplicius commentary on Aristotles Physics (5-8).
We would like to know more about the scholar collecting these
texts: at any rate, their arrangement seems to be related to
well-educated intellectual circles. 80 What is striking is the fact
that these texts copied during the ninth century seem to have gone
into hibernation for some centuries: in the present state of our
evidence, we have no direct copies until the fourteenth
century.
78
Incidentally, I note how the selection produced by the scribe of
Ambros. gr. 230, who used the same model as Klostomalles, is
restricted to Andocides and Isaeus. If I am right in suggesting at
least two different models employed by Klostomalles, the one shared
by the two scribes might have contained a harsh selection of Attic
orators, or even only Andocides and Isaeus assembled with texts of
other genres. After the third-fourth century AD, only two
quotations from late antique commentators of Hermogenes might
derive from a direct reading of Hyperides, as I shall argue in
another paper still in progress.
79
On the 17 manuscripts of the philosophical collection, after the
seminal paper by L. Perria, Scrittura e ornamentazione nei codici
della collezione filosofica, RSBN 28 (1991) 45-111, see now G.
Cavallo, Qualche riflessione sulla collezione filosofica, in The
libraries of the Neoplatonists. Proceedings of the Meeting of the
European Science Foundation Network Late antiquity and Arabic
thought: patterns in the constitution of European culture,
Strasbourg, March 12-14, 2004 (Philosophia antiqua 107), ed. C.
DAncona Costa (LeidenBoston 2007) 155-65; Ronconi, I manoscritti
greci miscellanei (n. 59, above) 33-75.
80
GIUSEPPE UCCIARDELLO: PALAEOGRAPHY AND TEXTUAL TRANSMISSION
247
Neither can we find traces of intensive reading of these
commentaries by ninth- and tenthcentury Byzantine writers. Interest
in Neoplatonical texts (transliterated among many others between
the ninth and the eleventh centuries) revived only during the
eleventh century; 81 they seem to have been out of fashion for a
long time. 82 According to Leo Westerink these manuscripts migrated
to the West very quickly, 83 or were soon laid aside somewhere in
institutional libraries until they re-surfaced some centuries
later. 84 (b) One of the most ancient copies of Demosthenes is
Paris. gr. 2394 (ninth-tenth century): there is no scholarly
consensus about its origin: some have suggested South Italy, others
the metropolitan area. Its handwriting shows strong similarities
with the socalled Anastasius-Type, which flourished in the
Greek-Italy area and around the capital. 85 During the Nicaean age,
Paris. gr. 2394 was housed in a monastery, which can
Thus L. Westerink, Das Rtsel des untergrndigen Neuplatonismus,
in Philophronema. Festschrift fr Martin Sicherl zur 75. Geburtstag,
Von Textkritik bis Humanismusforschung, ed. D. Harlfinger
(PaderbornMnchen-Wien-Zrich 1990) 105-23 (at 105-09). As for
Proclus, the textual transmission was even more complex, because he
was left neglected for his strong anti-Christian position until the
thirteenth century: see M. Cacouros, Deux pisodes inconnus dans le
rception de Proclus Byzance aux XIIIe XIVe sicles: la philosophie
de Proclus rintroduite Byzance grce lHypotypsis. Nophytos Prodomnos
et Kntostphanos (?) lecteurs de Proclus (avant Argyropoulos) dans
le xnon du Kralj, in Proclus et la thologie platonicienne. Actes du
Colloque de Louvain (1998) en lhonneur de H. D. Saffrey et L. G.
Westerink, ed. A.-Ph. Segonds and C. Steel (Leuven-Paris 2000)
589-627. See Westerink, Das Rtsel des untergrndigen Neuplatonismus
(n. 81, above) 123. One can compare the fate of Plato: Arethas in
the tenth century copied, read and noticed his Dialogues (in Oxon.
Bodl. Clark. 39). Later on, no Byzantine scholar wrote commentaries
on him until Psellus; for some time the Dialogues seem to have been
out of fashion. A new stimulating attitude towards the classical
inheritance seems to have been developed only in the eleventh
century onwards, especially with Psellus: see J. Duffy, Hellenic
philosophy in Byzantium and the lonely mission of Michael Psellos,
in Byzantine philosophy and its ancient sources, ed. K.
Ierodiakonou (Oxford 2002) 139-56 (at 154), His minor philosophical
treatises show an intimate familiarity with several commentators
including Philoponus and Olympiodorus Psellus picks up from where
the Alexandrians left off in the seventh century. The importance of
Psellus as teacher and tutor of higher education during the
eleventh century is stressed by E. V. Maltese, Michele Psello
commentatore di Gregorio di Nazianzo: note per una lettura dei
theologica, in Syndesmos. Studi in onore di Rosario Anastasi, II
(Catania 1994) 289-309 (at 297-99).83 In the Salentine area, as
suggested by the appearance of some Latin notes added by the
thirteenth-century abbot of Casole, Nicholas-Nectarius: see M.
Rashed, Nicolas dOtrante, Guillaume de Moerbeke et la Collection
philosophique, Studi Medievali 43 (2002) 693-717; on
Nicholas-Nectarius see also G. De Gregorio, Tardo medioevo
greco-latino: manoscritti bilingui dOriente e dOccidente, in Libri,
documenti, epigrafi medievali: possibilit di studi comparativi.
Atti del Convegno internazionale di studio dellAssociazione
italiana dei paleografi e diplomatisti, Bari (2-5 ottobre 2000),
ed. F. Magistrale, C. Drago, and P. Fioretti (Spoleto 2002) 17-135
(at 94-104); A. Jacob, Autour de Nicholas-Nectaire de Casole, in
Vaticana et medievalia: tudes en lhonneur de Louis Duval-Arnould,
ed. J.-M. Martin, B. Martin-Hisard, and A. Paravicini Bagliani
(Firenze 2008) 231-51. 84 85 82 81
L. Westerink, The Greek commentaries on Plato's Phaedo
(Amsterdam 1976-77) 31-32.
Cf. L. Perria, La minuscola tipo Anastasio, in Scritture, libri
e testi nelle aree provinciali di Bisanzio, Atti del Seminario di
Erice (18-25 settembre 1988), ed. G. Cavallo, G. De Gregorio, and
M. Maniaci (Spoleto 1992) 271-318; and, ead., A proposito del
codice S di Demostene, RCCM 34 (1994) 235-57 (focused on Paris. gr.
2394). Perria argued for a Constantinopolitan origin of this type
of writing and of this manuscript itself; nevertheless, her view
was strongly disputed by other scholars supporting an Italo-Greek
origin: see M. Re and E. Gamillscheg, Ein Handschriftenfragment
(saec. IX/X) im tipo Anastasio aus Sizilien, Codices Manuscripti
37/38 (2001) 7-9; and more recently I. Hutter, La dcoration et la
mise en page des manuscrits grecs de lItalie mridionale. Quelques
observations, in Histoire et culture dans lItalie Byzantine. Acquis
et nouvelles
248
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be located in Asia Minor (near Sosandras) and there it remained
out of use until the end of the thirteenth century, when a copy if
it was made (it is now Laur. C.S. 136). 86 (c) Burney 95 was
donated by Johannes Cantacuzenus to the Vatopedi Library around
1335; 87 it was left unproductive, until Janus Laskaris
commissioned a copy at the end of the fifteenth century (it is now
Laur. pl. 4.11). 88 These cases strongly illustrate how books
produced at Constantinople or nearby appeared later in provincial
monasteries as a result of legacies or donations. In the same way,
we could surmise that a manuscript with a selection of Hyperides
might have been carried away from Constantinople and stored
elsewhere, perhaps in a monastery library in the Palestine area,
where it was later reused. 89 3. What was the arrangement of the
surviving speeches of Hyperides in the Archimedes palimpsest? Up to
now there has been no satisfactory answer to this question. The two
fragmentary speeches found in the palimpsest belong to two
different types of action. Thus, they might have been singled out
as models for different types of prosecution. The Against Timandros
is a prosecution against a guardian. The Against Diondas is
Hyperides defence on a charge of illegal legislation (graphe
paranomon) brought by Diondas. This indictment was presented
against the support given by Hyperides to the proposal of a crown
to Demosthenes. It is telling to observe how this speech is closely
connected in some points with Demosthenes defence of Ctesiphon
against Aeschines. In their studies on the transmission of the
orators and the criteria for selecting the speeches, Kenneth Dover
and Luciano Canfora have paid attention to the thematic connections
between speeches of different orators, 90 some of which I tabulate
in table 3:
recherches, ed. A. Jacob, J.- M. Martin, and G. Noy (Rome 2006)
69-93 (at 73-83), for an updated survey of this issue and
references to the previous bibliography.86
The exact venue of this monastery has not yet been clarified:
see H. Ahrweiler, Lhistoire et la gographie de la rgion de Smyrne
entre les deux occupations turques (1081-1317), particulirement au
xiiie sicle, Travaux et Mmoires 1 (1969) 1-178 (at 89-91, 94-96).
Cf. Lamberz, Das Geschenk des Kaisers Manuel II. an das Kloster
Saint-Denis und der Metochitesschreiber Michael Klostomalles (n.
48, above).
87
See K. K. Mller, Neue Mittheilungen ber J. Laskaris und die
Mediceische Bibliothek, Zentralblatt fr Bibliothekswesen 1 (1884)
333-412; G. Avezz, : per lidentificazione di Andronico Callisto
copista. Con alcune notizie su Giano Lascaris e la biblioteca di
Giorgio Valla, Atti e Memorie dellAccademia Patavina, Scienze
Lettere e Arti 102 (1989-1990) 75-93 (discussion of selected
points, not directly related to this item). For Laskaris first trip
to Greece (July 1490, but the visit to Athos during this journey is
disputed) and the second one (Athos, after December 1491 when he
met Meemet II at Constantinople) see J. Speake, J. Laskaris visit
to Mt. Athos in 1491,GRBS 34 (1993) 325-30 (at 327); D. Speranzi,
Per la storia della libreria medicea privata. Il Laur. Plut. 58, 2,
Giano Laskaris e Giovanni Mosco, Medioevo e Rinascimento n.s. 18
(2007) 181-215 (in particular see pp. 203-06 on the Laur. pl.
4.11). For the history of the arrival of Burney 95 in the West
Wyse, The speeches of Isaeus (n. 58, above) viii-xii is still
valuable.89 A similar case study is the newly discovered Thucydides
codex, one of the few manuscripts of classical authors kept in the
Athos monastery libraries (see E. K. Litsas, Palaeographical
researches in the Lavra Library on Mount Athos, Hellenika 50 [2000]
217-30). 90 See Dover, Lysias and the corpus Lysiacum (n. 56,
above) 10-11; L. Canfora, Le collezioni superstiti, in Lo spazio
Letterario della Grecia Antica, vol. II. La ricezione e
lattualizzazione del testo, ed. G. Cambiano,
88
GIUSEPPE UCCIARDELLO: PALAEOGRAPHY AND TEXTUAL TRANSMISSION
249
Table 3 - The thematic connectionsOrators Lysias 6 (Against
Andocides) Andocides 1 (On the Mysteries) [Andocides] 4 (Against
Alcibiades) [Lysias] 14-15 (Against Alcibiades) Isocrates 16 (On
the chariot) Demosthenes 18 (On the Crown) Aeschines 3 (Against
Ctesiphon, 330/29 BCE) Hyperides, Against Diondas (334/33 BCE)
Demosthenes 19 (On the false Embassy) Aeschines 2 (On the false
Embassy) Subject same trial c Alcibiades
crown for Demosthenes
Embassy trial
Some speeches in the Lysian corpus were probably selected
because they were thematically connected with extant speeches of
other authors. Again, it is worth observing how Aeschines 1-3 are
sometimes included in the same manuscripts containing Demosthenes
18-19. The Against Diondas involves the Crown trial on Hyperides
(and Demomeles) proposal (early August 338), 91 , the same subject
as Demosthenes 18 and Aeschines 3 (even if these latter were based
upon the proposal of Ctesiphon). As hypothetical as it may be, we
are tempted to surmise that the survival of the Against Diondas is
closely related to this Demosthenic connection. Thus, there could
be a manuscript containing a set of texts involving the same
matter, namely Demosthenes 18-19, Aeschines 1-3, and Hyperides,
Against Diondas. 4. Is there a relationship between the new find
and Photius highly controversial account of Hyperides? Let me
report what we find in Bibliotheca 266: I have read several of
Hyperides speeches. 52 are believed to be genuine, 25 are doubtful.
The total amount is 77. 92 How can we evaluate this controversial
statement? Chapters 259-68 of the Bibliotheca deal with the Ten
Attic Orators and derive from a valuable ancient source, now lost,
which was used by the Ps.-Plut. Vitae decem oratorum, as one can
easily see by comparing the two texts: in fact the chapter devoted
to Hyperides is nothing but a biography including the number of 77
speeches ascribed to him and circulating during antiquity. What is
more dazzling is the incipit: . 93 The new find in the palimpsest
might support this claim. To my mind,
L. Canfora, and D. Lanza (Roma 1995) 95-250 (at 183-84); and now
S. C. Todd, A commentary on Lysias, speeches 1-11 (Oxford 2007)
22-25.91 92
On this dating see Horvth, Dating Hyperides Against Diondas (n.
2, above).
Bibl. 266 (495b, 2-5 Henry): . , .93 Cf. e.g. W. T. Treadgold,
The nature of the Bibliotheca of Photius (Washington D.C. 1980)
48-51, 160-62. A. Nogara, Note sulla composizione e la struttura
della Biblioteca di Fozio, Patriarca di Costantinopoli, I, Aevum 49
(1975) 213-42, is a full study on this topic.
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there is no way to demonstrate a convincing connection between
Photius and the new Hyperides. Let me summarize what we know about
Photius Bibliotheca: 1. This work is a collection of : they are
excerpta and personal remarks on 386 works ranging from Herodotus
up to some writers of Photius age. 2. It is likely to be the result
of individual or collective readings made by Photius and his
friends over time, before and during his ecclesiastic career. 94 3.
For many authors (87) and texts (61 titles) Photius is the only
extant source. 4. Which was the library used by Photius? Some
scholars have assumed that he had the Imperial library at his
disposal; but I find it more conceivable that he may have had
access to some manuscripts kept in various libraries, not in
Constantinople alone. 95 Nicetas David Paphlagon, in his biography
of Photius opponent, the patriarch Ignatius, claimed that the books
flowed to him (sc. Photius) like a river from everywhere. 96 5.
Since these books were read by Photius and his reading club, 97 his
remarks are not of great value as far as book circulation is
concerned. We are dealing with private storage and reading. After
Photius we find no more traces of some of these texts. The
Patriarch is likely to have read rarities from Constantinople or
elsewhere, which could even have been kept in monastery libraries.
6. A crucial passage in this story is Photius first exile from
Constantinople after his deposition (in 867 he was ejected from the
Patriarchal chair and banished into exile near the Bosphorus); the
books were taken away from him. He spoke about this setback in his
quaestio ad Amphilochium 148: he complains that he is forced to
work with his alone. 98 Again, in his letter 98 he beseeches the
Emperor to give the books back. 99
Despite opposing views see K. Alpers, Klassische Philologie in
Byzanz (review of N. G. Wilson, Scholars of Byzantium), CPh 83
(1988) 342-60 (at 357) it seems to me conceivable that the making
of the Bibliotheca had been a life-work and that some substantial
additions were inserted during the second patriarchate (877-886;
cf. F. Halkin, La date de composition de la Bibliothque de Photius
remise en question, AB 81 [1963] 414-17): see Bibl. 252 (Life of
Gregory the Great) which could only have been written after 876,
because it was based upon Johannis Immonides Vita Gregorii I papae
(BHL 3641-3642; text in PL 75, 59-242), which was completed in 876
(cf. V. Maraglino, Reconsidering the date of Photius Bibliotheca:
the biographical tradition of Gregory the Great in chapter 252,
Anc. Soc. 37 [2007] 265-78). Other clues pointing towards a late
dating are stressed in C. Mango, The availability of books in the
Byzantine Empire, AD 750-850, in Byzantine books and bookmen. A
Dumbarton Oaks colloquium (Washington DC 1975) 29-45 (at 37-43),
and A. Markopoulos, New evidence on the date of Photios
Bibliotheca, in History and literature of Byzantium in the 9th-10th
centuries (Aldershot 2004) 1-18. On this issue see also L. Canfora,
Le cercle des lecteurs autour de Photius: une source contemporaine,
REB 56 (1998) 269-73 ; and id. Il rogo dei libri di Fozio, in
Fozio. Tra crisi ecclesiale e magistero letterario. Atti del
Seminario, Rovereto 29 marzo 1999, ed. G. Menestrina (Brescia 2000)
17-28.95 96 94
Canfora, Le collezioni superstiti (n. 90, above) 64 n. 77.
Nicetas Paphlagon, Vita Sancti Ignatii Constantinopolitani
Archiepiscopi (PG 105, 509B): . On this point see Canfora, Le
cercle des lecteurs autour de Photius: une source contemporaine (n.
94, above).98 Photius, Amphilochia 148 (p. 166 Westerink): , ... ,
. 97
GIUSEPPE UCCIARDELLO: PALAEOGRAPHY AND TEXTUAL TRANSMISSION
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This sudden removal could perhaps explain the ultimate loss of
several rare texts which Photius claimed to have read, 100 among
which we can also insert Hyperides. Of course, we cannot dismiss
the alternative possibility that Photius did not really own all the
books which he wrote about in the Bibliotheca: he might only have
checked or read some books kept in monasteries or private
libraries, 101 which were no longer available to him when he jotted
his schedaria down. Chapters 259-68 are in fact biographies of the
ten orators; 102 no excerpta or summaries of any speeches are
quoted. We might argue that Photius wrote this section when the
originals were no longer at his disposal, thus being unable to
transcribe more or less substantial excerpta from the speeches. It
would be tempting to connect Photius manuscript with the direct
ancestor of the new Hyperides. As fascinating as it may be, I find
this view not well-founded. In fact, we have no idea about the
Hyperides manuscript used by Photius. As regards Andocides and
Aeschines, Photius himself quotes 4 and 3 speeches respectively;
thus he claims to have read as many speeches as those circulating
later on. When he turns to discuss Antiphon, Lysias, Isaeus,
Hyperides, and Dinarchus, he makes use of the following utterance:
(-)... . What does mean? 103 What is striking is that these authors
are exactly the same as those suffering harsh selection since
antiquity. Again, leaving aside Lysias, the other orators are
likely to have been circulating only in a rhetorical anthology. As
a matter of fact, Photius may well have read Hyperides in a
miscellaneous anthology or he might even have had access to a late
antique copy containing more speeches than those in fact
circulating in a later rhetorical miscellany. For the time being, I
think it is safer to regard Photius account as a unique witness
which should not be linked with the debated issue on the real
circulation of Hyperides at Byzantium. 4 Some final remarks Summing
up: (i) We might argue for the making of a minuscule manuscript
containing Hyperides speeches between the tenth and the eleventh
centuries in the metropolitan area. (ii) Leaving aside Demosthenes,
Isocrates, and the Lysian corpus, our evidence about the survival
of the Attic orators is strongly limited. We have only few
manuscripts from which more recent copies derived.
Photius, Epistula 98 (I p. 133 Laourdas-Westerink): , ; ;... ; ,
, , , ;100 101 102 103 99
Canfora, Le collezioni superstiti (n. 90, above) 47ff. See G.
Cortassa, I libri di Fozio: il denaro e la gloria, Medioevo Greco 6
(2006) 105-21 (at 110). On this list see R. M. Smith, A new look at
the canon of the ten Attic orators, Mnemosyne 48 (1995) 66-79.
According to Claudio Bevegni, si ricava limpressione che indichi
un numero, per cos dire, medio o medio-alto di orazioni rispetto al
totale (rev. of Schamp, Les vies des dix orateurs attiques [n. 62,
above] 241).
252
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(iii) Transliteration and copying activity do not imply broad
circulation and intensive reading. As far as I know, Hyperides and
other Attic orators like Dinarchus or Lycurgus left no traces in
Byzantine literature. 104 (iv) Like Lycurgus or Dinarchus, it is
likely that a corpus of Hyperides (at least two speeches) was
copied between the tenth and eleventh centuries within an oratory
or rhetorical collection. (v) The presence or the absence of these
authors in different manuscripts is the outcome of a more or less
conscious process of selection. The selection may even have
happened by chance. Lycurgus, who remained unknown to Photius, was
copied in Burney 95 and Bodl. Auct. T.2.8 (only one speech); in
Ambros. gr. 230 the scribe copied only a selection of Isaeus and
Andocides from the same model as Burney 95. (vi) Likewise,
Hyperides was copied in an eleventh-century manuscript; this item
might have been unproductive from a philological point of view,
because it moved soon to a Palestinian monastery, where it was
later re-used for the palimpsest. (vii) Photius might have read a
manuscript with selected speeches of Hyperides, but we cannot take
it for granted that this item was an ancestor of our manuscript: we
are unaware of the origin of Photius manuscript, and besides, we
have no means of knowing the ultimate fate of many of his books.
(viii) Therefore, I do not think that Hyperides was a
well-circulated author in Byzantium during the Middle Ages; he
survived to a somewhat limited extent, perhaps in a rhetorical
anthology. 105 Agathias in the sixth century wrote that Blessed are
they whose memory is enshrined in wise volumes and not in empty
images (transl. by W. R. Paton). 106 Among the Blessed we can now
also insert Hyperides: the manuscript of the Against Diondas and
Against Timandros was both a grave and a chest, where he remained
unnoticed until its recent and unpredictable resurrection.
Dipartimento di Scienze dellAntichit, Universit di Messina
104
The view endorsed by L. Canfora (Le collezioni superstiti [n.
90, above] 169-70; and id. Dispersione e conservazione della
letteratura greca, in I Greci. Storia, cultura, arte, societ, ed.
S. Settis, 3. I Greci oltre la Grecia [Torino 2001] 1073-1106 [at
1099-1100]) and C. R. Cooper (Dinarchus, Hyperides and Lycurgus,
transl. I. Worthington, C. R. Cooper, and E. M. Harris [Austin
2001] 67) about the knowledge of Hyperides Deliakos by Maximos
Planudes (cf. Rh. Gr. 5.481 Walz) is hardly tenable: I find it more
conceivable that the monk relied on selected passages from this
speech he came across through Syrianus commentary on
Hermogenes.
If we rely on the Hungarian data about the survival of Hyperides
until the sixteenth century (cf. what Brassicanus reports in the
Introductory letter to his edition of Salvianus de gubernatione
Dei: et oculata fide vidimus integrum Hyperidem cum locupletissimis
scholiis, librum multis etiam censibus redimendum), we can image a
manuscript containing a rhetorical anthology with a selection of
Hyperides speeches in the first folios; what does not strike me as
entirely convincing is the alleged presence of an overwhelming bulk
of scholia (cum locupletissimis scholiis), which clashes with the
absence of traces left by Hyperides at Byzantium. On these
Hungarian data see Horvth, The Hyperides Corvinian codex (n. 3,
above).106
105
AP 4.4.9-10: , / .