BMCR 2008.12.24, Giovan Battista D'Alessio, Callimaco

Giovan Battista D'Alessio (ed.), Callimaco: Inni; Epigrammi; Ecale;
Aitia; Giambi e altri frammenti, 4th edition, 2 vols. (Revised and
enlarged edition). BUR Classici greci e latini 1104-1105.  Milano:
Biblioteca universale Rizzoli, 2007.  Pp. 789.  ISBN 9788817170710.
EUR 21.50 (pb).

Reviewed by K. Spanoudakis, University of Crete ([email protected])
Word count:  1414 words
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This is the fourth edition (revised and enlarged) of an immensely
successful two-volume (I: Inni, Epigrammi, Ecale; II: Aitia, Giambi e
altri frammenti) edition of Callimachus in the Rizzoli series, offering
an introduction on the man and his poetic oeuvre, and a revised text
faced by Italian translation and equipped with ample annotation. The
first edition of this handsome set (subsequently reprinted as second
and third 'editions') appeared in 1996 and was warmly welcomed by
critics and specialists. It belongs to a string of handy works on
Callimachus which, due to the accretion of new findings, began to
appear again after an interval of some decades, in Italian,[[1]]
English (F. Nisetich, 2001: translation only), German (M. Asper, 2004)
and French (Y. Durbec, 2006: fragments only). Among these D'Alessio's
edition stands out for its accuracy, good taste and judgment, for a
number of magisterial notes (e.g. a possible context for the enigmatic
'son of Damasos' in Aetia inc. sed. fr. 33 Pf., and for quite a few
parallels drawn from archaic lyric, especially choral), many sensitive
to concerns of current research on Callimachus; and not least for some
brilliant new conjectures, to the extent that a knowledgeable reviewer
of the first edition found it necessary to remark that, along with
specialized commentaries, "it would be advisable for future readers of
Callimachus to keep D'Alessio's edition at hand to supplement the
earlier work".[[2]] Ten years later such a statement still holds true.

This fourth edition retains the virtues of the original edition and
imports a large number of corrections and updates derived from two main
sources: from reviews of the first edition and from important
publications that appeared in the meantime. In keeping with the policy
of the original edition, where the dubia were left out, D'Alessio
refrains from including fragments attributed to Callimachus by
conjecture (even when the attribution is entirely convincing),[[3]] but
a good ten pages at the end of the work are devoted to printing, with
translation and generous notes, two recently published new fragments.
These are a glossary on a lost elegy containing elementary comments
(PSI inv. 3191 first announced by G. Bastianini in L. Lehnus, al.,
Callimaque, Vandoeuvres-Gene\ve 2002, 271-5 and now published as P.
Horak 4 by G. Menci in H. Harrauerand R. Pintaudi (eds), Gedenkschrift
Ulrike Horak (P. Horak), I, Florence 2004, 19-31), and a new fragment
from the Victoria Berenices. The left half of the latter (PSI inv.
1923) was published by L. Ozbek (Comunicazioni dell'Istituto
Papirologico 'G. Vitelli' 6 [2005], 3-18) but it was soon realised that
PSI inv. 2002 was the right half of the same poem, now published in
toto by G. Bastianini as PSI XV 1500, Florence 2008 [non vidi]). These
fragments are here made accessible to a broader public for the first
time; it is, however, regrettable that for reasons of copyright only
the left half of the second fragment is printed by D'Alessio though
this is faced with a translation which renders the right half as well.
The first fragment suggests the probable context of fr. 641 Pf. and
partly cites fr. 506 Pf.; the second fragment partly cites fr. 674 Pf.

Both these new fragments are important and are likely to provoke
considerable further speculation, a specimen of which may even be
advanced right away. In the corrupt fr. 674 <greek>kei=non</greek>?
<greek>dwdeka/kis peri\</greek> +<greek>di/fron e)ph/gagen
o)/qmata</greek> +<greek>di/frou</greek>+ D'Alessio emends into
<greek>e)phga/get)</greek> [not <greek>e)ph/gageq)</greek> as it is
printed] <greek>o)/qmata ... di/fros</greek> meaning that the chariot
attracted the attention of the spectators twelve times. But the very
Callimachean wording 'set his eyes on' (or 'their eyes were set on'),
employed of Apollo in Hymn to Apollo 52, makes this unlikely and we
should rather revert to Pfeiffer's interpretation of a god casting a
favorable eye on a mortal, a common concept in Callimachus, cf. Aetia
frr. 1.37, 85.15, Hymn to Apollo l.l. For the corrupt
<greek>peri\</greek> +<greek>di/fron</greek> (accepted by Pfeiffer)
Heyne proposed <greek>peri\ nu/ssan</greek> which D'Alessio accepts. I
might hesitantly propose <greek>peri\ fitro\n</greek> of a god casting
an eye of protection on a racer as he turns his chariot around a log or
trunk serving, like the dry piece of wood in Iliad 23.327-8, as a
turning post, which is the most dangerous point in a chariot race, cf.,
for the word, Aetia fr. 177.2 = SH 259.2, fr. inc. auct. 785 Pf. In the
next line, for <greek>kai\ t[-</greek> perhaps a form of
<greek>t[os-</greek> 'and as many times' is to be restored.

The last decade, compared to previous ones, has seen no large increase
in new fragments of Callimachus, but it has seen considerable progress
in the classification and contextualization of existing material. An
idea can be gleaned by modifications adopted in this new edition
compared to the first. In fr. 1.1 D'Alessio now prints as the first
word of the Aetia <greek>polla/ki</greek> once surmised by the critical
acumen of Edgar Lobel and now confirmed by the scholium Ma  Odyssey
2.50a1 (I.238 Pontani). D'Alessio rightly emends the text in Iambi fr.
202.17 fin.; he now prints his own excellent restitution of Aetia fr.
43.41[[4]] (but <greek>ne/a</greek> in this verse is not translated and
<greek>fqinopwri/des</greek> is misaccentuated: in such cases the
"limitazioni ... di tempo" evoked by the author in the new preface are
resurgent). In Hymn to Apollo 76 he now renders <greek>ou(=los</greek>
with "vigoroso", not "integro" (a correction prompted by E. Dettori,
GIF 51 [1999], 333) and in Hymn to Zeus 41 <greek>ui(wnoi/</greek> with
'nipoti' not 'figli' (a correction prompted by E. Magnelli, QS 51
[1999], 234). A large number of new notes, mostly on the fragments, are
now added to, or even supplant earlier comments.[[5]]

Important bibliographical updates are given in the "Premessa alla
quarta edizione", but what is now obsolete remains intact in the rest
of the book: e.g., p. 50 where there is a reference to Kerkhecker's
"work in progress for an Oxford PhD", or p. 540 where Cameron's
Callimachus and his Critics (1995) is said to be "in corso di stampa"
and information about it is drawn from P. Knox, ZPE 96 (1993), 175-8.
D'Alessio resists the expunction of a probably false reference to
Mimnermus in Iambi fr. 203.7 (cf. also his p. 317 n. 10) but now erases
the false supplement of Aetia fr. 1.11 fin. <greek>a[i( kata\
lepto\n</greek> for a blank space and declines to introduce into his
text any of the proposals advanced so far. In other instances his
conservatism seems less justified. In Aetia fr. 1.3-4 E. Lobel's
<greek>basil[h/wn</greek> / <greek>prh/xi]as</greek> derives solid
support from Dioscorides AP 11.195.5-6 = HE 1695-96, cf. E. Lelli,
SemRom 3 (2000), 73-6. In the same fragment verse 10 init. D'Alessio
leaves a blank space for the monosyllable missing although he himself
has made the strongest case for Housman's <greek>dru=n</greek>.[[6]] In
Hymn to Delos 41 he fails to print O. Schneider's <greek> a)pe\c
*)/Anqao </greek> (unfortunately not recorded by Pfeiffer) which has
now been shown to be all but certain.[[7]] D'Alessio, following Hollis,
prints fr. 705 Pf. as Hecale fr. 174 but in a good note remarks that
the fragment may actually belong to the Aetia, a supposition which has
now been made very plausible by L. Lehnus, ZPE 142 (2003), 32, who
adduces Bacchylides fr. 4 Maehler to support the ascription.

Although there is much that has been corrected, not all slips of the
first edition have been removed. On p. 440 "W. G. Arnott in A. S.
Hollis, Essays ... presented to Sir Kenneth Dover" should read "A. S.
Hollis in E. Craik (ed.), Owls to Athens. Essays etc. ". On p. 556 "H.
Erbse, Hermes 83 [1955], 417 n.0" has not been corrected. As in the
first edition, page numbers are missing from several pages (e.g. 51;
94-5; 418-9; 498-9): certainly the author is not to be blamed for that.

Students of Callimachus look forward to more: A. S. Hollis' updated
Hecale, with translation and Addenda, has been announced for the first
quarter of 2009. Massimilla's Aetia III-IV is imminent. A new edition
of the Aetia with commentary has long been promised by A. Harder as has
a complete Teubneriana of Callimachus by L. Lehnus. It may take some
more time until the last two appear: who would draw his nets when fish
keep coming in? But in the meantime D'Alessio's Callimaco is to be kept
at hand. Material from it will no doubt find its rightful place in
forthcoming literature on Callimachus, thus securing a lasting impact
for his significant contribution to Callimachean studies.


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Notes:


1.   Another Italian edition with revised text is in preparation by E.
Magnelli for Mondadori publishers, due to appear in the fourth quarter
of 2009.

2.   A. Harder, Mnemosyne iv 55 (2002), 611. Selections of D'Alessio's
original conjectures are also provided by B. Acosta-Hughes, CJ 97
(2001-02), 400; E. Dettori, GIF 51 (1999), 329-33; E. Magnelli, QS 50
(1999), 233-4.

3.   Most of these attributions are collected in H. Lloyd-Jones,
Supplementum Supplementi Hellenistici, Berlin-New York 2005, 23-36, cf.
C. Meliado\, Gnomon 80 (2008), 491-2.

4.   D'Alessio in A. Casanova, G. Bastianini (eds), Callimaco:
cent'anni di papiri, Florence 2006, 101-17.

5.   Cf. (I do not aim at completeness) 88 n. 26; 241 n. 38; 366 nn. 1,
2; 371 nn. 8, 10; 378 n. 26; 415 n. 102; 471 n. 44; 473 n. 48; 491 n.
84; 497 n. 97; 553 n. 11; 585 n. 27; 682 n. 12; 771 n. 145.

6.   D'Alessio in A. Martina, A.-T. Cozzoli (eds), Callimachea, Rome
2006, 138-50. There are, of course, other supporters of this
supplement, including this reviewer.

7.   Cf. fr. 703 and see L. Lehnus, ZPE 131 (2000), 25-6; H.
Lloyd-Jones, The Further Academic Papers, Oxford 2005, 223.