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ὌΡΧΙΣ: TESTICLE, TESTICULATE AND GLANS PENIS*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 March 2017

Joseph Cotter
Joseph Cotter*
Affiliation:
Penn State University
*
jpc4@psu.edu
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Extract

Goffredo Coppola, the Italian editor of this papyrus, supposed that τὸν ὄρχιν (the testicle) = τοὺς ὄρχεις; but he was puzzled when no likely erotic word seemed available to finish the line. He suggested φαλ[ῆς, from φαλός = λευκός (‘white’) to be followed by some metaphorical word for penis such as κέρκου. Romagnoli noted that it made no sense to have the testicle(s) dependent on the penis, and argued that Hipponax here intended ὄρχις to refer metaphorically to the glans penis; therefore, he emended to καί μοι τὸν ὄρχιν τῆς φαλ[ῆς ἐκλέψασα (= peeling back the penis’ foreskin); but his feminine form τῆς φαλ[ῆς is unlikely given the masculine form τοῦ φάλεω in Hipponax fr. 21 W. Medeiros suggested ὄρχις, sing. = ὄσχη ‘scrotum’; West actually exalted the role of the testicle by emending to τῆς φαλ[άκρης ἕλκουσα ‘pulling my testicle by the bald spot’; but it is not obvious why hitting the testicles merits such attention in a narrative fixed on the failure to attain an erection.

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Shorter Notes
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 67 , Issue 1 , May 2017 , pp. 285 - 286
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Copyright © The Classical Association 2017 

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Footnotes

*

I am grateful to the anonymous reader for helpful comments.

References

1 Pace LSJ Greek-English Lexicon Supplement ὄρχις 1, line 1, after ‘testicle’, add ‘τὸν ὄρχιν’ Hipponax 14A3D3.

2 Kühner, R. and Blass, F., Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache (Hanover, 1890–1892)Google Scholar, T. 2, 1:13 list nouns in the singular used to represent parts of the body which naturally exist as duals.

3 Coppola, G., ‘Un nuovo frammento dei Giambi di Ipponatte’, RFIC 6 (1928), 500–6Google Scholar, at 504 confesses: ‘non conosco parola cominciante per φαλ che esprima il concetto richiesto dal precedente ὄρχιν e sia feminile’.

4 Romagnoli, E., I poeti lirici (Bologna, 1931), 231 Google Scholar.

5 Medeiros, W. de S., Hipónax de Éfeso. Fragmentos dos Iambos (Coimbra, 1961), 105 Google Scholar.

6 West, M.L., Studies in Greek Elegy and Iambus (New York, 1974), 145 CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Sommerstein, A.H., Aeschylus Fragments (Cambridge, MA, 2008)Google Scholar, 51 n. 4 notes that ‘φαλακρὸν could mean either “bald head” or “glans penis” (= φαλλὸν ἄκρον); the former interpretation is supported by Sophocles fr. 171 (the smiling baby Dionysus caressing Silenus’ nose and then moving his hand up towards Silenus’ φαλακρόν), the latter by Aristophanes, Clouds 538–9 (a stage phallus ἐρυθρὸν ἐξ ἄκρου) and the ambiguity was probably designed.’

7 The connection with the story of Oenothea and Encolpius, the scapegoat, in Petronius (137–8) is discussed by Latte, K., ‘Hipponacteum’, Hermes 64 (1929), 385–8Google Scholar, Masson, O., Les Fragments du Poète Hipponax (Paris, 1962), 150–1Google Scholar, and Miralles, C. and Pòrtulas, J., The Poetry of Hipponax (Rome, 1988), 71–119 Google Scholar.

8 Gutiérrez, D., ‘Comentario y traducción de un fragmento de Hiponacte’, Anales de Filología Clásica 25 (2012), 61–78 Google Scholar, at 65.

9 Pace Hansen, P.A. and Cunningham, I.C., Hesychii Alexandrini lexicon, vol. 4 (Göttingen, 2009)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, glosses φ 103 and φ 104, and Allen, A., ‘Cootish semantics’, Glotta 92 (2016), 16–17 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

10 Cotter, J., ‘Φαληρίς: Coot, plant, phallus’, Glotta 90 (2014), 105–13CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

11 Holwerda, J., Scholia in Aristophanem, vol. 2.3 in Aves (Groningen, 1991), 94 Google Scholar.

12 Beekes, R., Etymological Dictionary of Greek (Leiden, 2010)Google Scholar, 1.1116.

13 Boardman, J., ‘The phallos-bird in archaic and classical Greek art’, Revue Archéologique 2 (1992), 227–42Google Scholar, at 228 fig. 1.

14 Holwerda, J., Scholia in Aristophanem, vol. 4.2 (Groningen, 1960), 553 Google Scholar.

15 Hodges, F.M., ‘The ideal prepuce in ancient Greece and Rome’, Bulletin of the History of Medicine 75 (2001), 375–405 CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed, at 394.