The Classical Quarterly
- The Classical Quarterly / Volume 33 / Issue 3-4 / October 1939, pp 163-165
- Copyright © The Classical Association 1939
- DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0009838800022357 (About DOI), Published online: 11 February 2009
Research Article
An Inelegant Greek Verse
O. J. Todda1
a1 The University of British Columbia.
Herodotus tells us in book vii, ch. 220, that the Pythian priestess gave the Spartans a warning couched in hexameters, of which the second line begins ἢ μ
γα 
στυ ρικυδς. To this text the admirable commentary of How and Wells takes exception in the following note: ‘The synizesis στυ ρικυδς is intolerable. Read δμ' ρικυδς, στυ being a gloss, H. Richards, Cl. Rev. xix. 345.’ Doubtless this union of vowels is harder than that of υω in 
ρινων (Eur. Iph. Taur. 1456) or in γενων and δυωδεκμηνον, accepted by Christ in his edition of Pindar (Pyth. iv. 225; [Nem.] xi. 10). Let us grant that from the point of view of elegance it is even intolerable; the question still remains, should the line be altered?
