The nature of the Plague described by Thucydides in Book 2, chapter 49, has long been discussed both by medical and by classical scholars. Of numerous suggested identifications none has found general approval; and it is doubtful whether any opinion is more prevalent today than that the problem is insoluble. The classical scholar is handicapped by his ignorance of medical science; his medical colleague has often been led astray by translations deficient in exactitude if not disfigured by error. The difficulties are great enough: but there is one indispensable preliminary task which can be undertaken with some prospect of success. If Thucydides' description is to be compared with modern records, it is necessary first to determine what the Greek words mean; and that can only be done by determining how far the Greek is expressed in the technical terms of contemporary medical science. It is obvious that Thucydides required a special vocabulary for this part of his work; and in fact over forty words in chapters 49 and 50 are unexampled elsewhere in his History, and a dozen more are used in meanings unexampled elsewhere. It is certain that a number of medical treatises were in circulation in Thucydides' lifetime, and that a more or less standard vocabulary had been or was being established. Now if it can be shown that the great majority of the terms employed by Thucydides in ch. 49 recur, apparently with the same meanings, as standard terms in the contemporary doctors, our second task—the comparison of Thucydides' description with modern records—will become a more rational undertaking than it was before, no longer the doubtful speculation which many of the modern doctors suppose it to be, thinking as they do that they have to deal with a layman's generalities expressed in literary language.

What seems to be the prevailing doctrine of the particle num is thus set forth in the most recent of major Latin grammars:

‘num ist wahrscheinlich die unerweiterte Form von nunc … num diente also zunächst dazu, dieFragein der lebendigen Rede lebhaft an die Situation anzuknüpfen; es steht oft in erregten Erkundigungsfragen mit unentschiedener Erwartung (z. B. Pit. Merc. 173 obsecro, num nauis periit ?:: saluast nauis); auch bejahende Antwort wird vielfach erwartet … Der in der klassischen Sprache alleinherrschende Gebrauch in Fragen mit erwarteter Antwort ‘nein’ setzte sich zunächst in lebhaften Fragen der Entrüstung oder des Erstaunens fest wie Pit. Asin. 619 sed num fumus est haec mulier quam amplexare?’

In modern work on the Parmenides it is commonly supposed that in the First Part of the dialogue Plato's main concern is criticism of his own (or Socrates') doctrine of Forms, or of some formulations of that doctrine, and that the criticisms have some sort of validity and are in some degree ‘damaging’ to the doctrine. It is thus often assumed that Plato's purpose is to make the reader ask himself, ‘Where is Plato (or Socrates) wrong? Where is his doctrine of Forms, or his statement of it, inadequate?’ This is no doubt due partly to the fact that no reply is offered to the criticisms, and partly to the fact that they are put into the mouth of Parmenides, for whom (it is alleged) Plato had a very great respect. Nevertheless, Plato can hardly have had a greater respect for Parmenides than he had for Socrates; and therefore on general grounds it is at least as likely that he intends us to ask ourselves the question, ‘Where is Parmenides wrong, or inadequate?’ It is, of course, obvious that Socrates is represented as a young man, who, in his enthusiasm for a new doctrine which he has invented himself, has not thought out all the difficulties involved in it or prepared replies to all the possible criticisms. Yet again, on general principles it is not likely that Plato would have written a dialogue primarily to represent Parmenides' position as substantially more satisfactory than that of Socrates (or himself). It is therefore of the first importance not merely to have clearly in our minds the nature and purpose of the doctrine of Forms, but also to examine carefully the basis of the criticisms which Parmenides is made to bring against Socrates, and the methods by which Parmenides conducts his arguments.

The object of this article is to examine the letter from which Plutarch quotes in the above passage from the twenty-eighth chapter of his life of Alexander; to attempt to prove, particularly by a comparison of the letter with the Sidypafifia sent in 319 B.C. by Polyperchon to the Greek cities, that it is a genuine part of Alexander's correspondence; and further to consider what light the letter, if genuine, throws upon the person of Alexander himself.

Of the early Roman historians who wrote in Greek, A. Postumius Albinus was not necessarily alone in realizing that his Greek was not the best Greek; while, on the other hand, Cato and those who followed the new fashion of writing in Latin would have resented, we may assume, could they have foreknown, the statement of Q,. Catulus in Cicero's De Oratore that they had no literary or rather ‘oratorical’ merit; though Cato might have approved Catulus' caustic comment on Roman historical writing, ‘Satis est non esse mendacem’. That an historian should not, consciously and deliberately, lie all second-century historians would no doubt have agreed; and they would have endorsed Polybius' condemnation of masquerading as history in a story whose falseness was self-evident, because it assumed, on the part of the young sons of senators at Rome, a gravitas such as no young boy could possibly possess.

Eunapius makes it clear in his Lives of the Philosophers, published some time after A.D. 396, that he had already published the major part of his historical work, and that he was contemplating extending its scope. He refers to the Gothic invasion of Greece in 395, and states that he has already recorded some of the disasters which befell about that time, and that he hopes to relate others (52/476).

This passage was attributed to Menander Protector by Bernhardy, who, influenced apparently by Men. Prot. fr. 43 (F.H.G. iv. 245), suggested that here the name disguised the of Menander. This explanation, besides interfering with the text without due cause, ignores altogether the name .

In fact, the incident occurs a century earlier, in the period A.D. 467–70. Anagastes is then found in Roman service in Thrace during the reign of Leo (cf. Priscus, frs. 38–39, F.H.G. iv. 108–9). Moreover, the name of Anagastes is linked with an easily recognized variant of in Jo. Ant., fr. 205 (F.H.G. iv. 616):

I Wish to reply to some of the objections raised by Mr. A. Hudson-Williams in Class. Quart., vol. xlvi (1952), p. 27, to my notes on Martial in vol. xliv. In two places, on pp. 17 and 22, he corrects an error of mine, and in one or two other of his remarks he may well be right; but in many cases he does nothing more than repeat the traditional interpretation of a passage without commending it any more effectively than the editors do. I do not think there would be much profit in restating my view on all these passages, but there are some points I wish to make in reply.

This is the reading of the manuscripts with the punctuation given it in the Delphin, Loeb, and Teubner editions. But the future (adfore) does not give the sense required. Adrastus is gazing with horror at the two young men who have arrived on his doorstep, realizing that they are the lion and the boar of Apollo's oracle (cf. 395–7 ‘cui Phoebus generos … fato ducente canebat saetigerumque suem et fulvum adventare leonem’). The whole force of the blow lies in the fact that they have actually arrived. The Delphin editor solves the problem by saying that adfore means adesse, the Loeb by translating ‘that they had come’. Gruter suggested ac fore, and Garrod accepted this, putting a comma after ductos. But I do not see how this helps. I suggest that the reading of the manuscripts is correct, provided that we take adfore with quos … ediderat; i.e. put a comma after ductos and supply esse. The presence of three verbs, adfore, portendi, and ediderat, may seem a little clumsy, but each has its point; and the future is now natural, depending upon portendi: ‘he realized that the clear will of heaven had brought to his house the sons-in-law of whom Apollo had announced that their future arrival was destined by fate.’