Thoughts on Antiquity, Patristics, putting things online, information access, and more
I’ve been scanning some stuff that I can’t really discuss in the evenings this week, but have been very, very impressed with the character recognition quality of Abby Finereader 9. It is very nearly perfect, and such an improvement on previous OCR software.
The only thing that I wish it could handle is English translation with embedded accented characters — strange names like `Abu and words like šeikh (=sheikh).
I’ve no real idea, I have to say. I’d always vaguely assumed so, and apparently scholars have always thought so. But today I saw a BMCR review here by someone who thinks not, reviewing a book by an ally. I’m a little wary of the ideology on display; the review makes it look a bit agenda-driven.
But I wonder what the facts are. My instinctive reaction is to ask to see the evidence from primary sources. The review tells me that Strabo says something or other about it at Corinth, in book 12. Unfortunately the Lacus Curtius translation hasn’t got that far yet. What we need is a data set online. Then we can assess the matter for ourselves.
Thanks to Roman History Books blog for this one.
Reading of Jim West’s trip to Egypt reminded me that I was looking for somewhere to go just before Christmas, to fight off the winter blues. I was thinking about flying out to Khartoum. After all, the location is right for sunshine in December, and spending a week in a good hotel relaxing wouldn’t be very arduous.
I came across the Tripadvisor website, for “Sudan”. This site is quite useful for hotel reviews, although for Luxor some of the hotel-keepers have started to game the system with fake reviews. (You can tell, because they’re tiny places no-one has ever heard of!) But the reviews for Sudan were enlightening.
You see, I reasoned that the rulers of Sudan, as in any third-world country, enjoy acquiring foreign aid. Those Mercedes-Benzes cost hard currency, after all! So they would need to have at least one good hotel for all the fat-cats to stay in, while being wined and dined, preparatory to handing over money exacted from poor people in rich countries to the rich people who keep poor countries poor (as the saying has it). If so, I too could stay in it.
The results are pretty awful. There is the al-Rotana, which seems the probable hotel that I had in mind, charging $200 a night. But look at the rest!!?!
The best hotel is apparently run by Greeks, which will amuse those who have read the “River War” by Winston Churchill. Churchill, who was going up the Nile with Kitchener against the dervishes, and indeed G. W. Steevens in his “With Kitchener to Khartoum”, makes regular mentions of Greek hoteliers as the only source of civilisation! Perhaps the Sudan has slumped back into the state that it was in a century ago — the victim of 50 years of failed policies.
PS: I looked at the UK Foreign Office advice here. The list of disease outbreaks was pretty interesting. You know, I don’t really want to experience all that…
PPS: I’ve been laughing all evening about the hotel reviews, which were in order of preference. Most countries list hotels by resort. This one contains the only 14 hotels in the country. The first one sounded rather dodgy. The second was the corporate one I referred to. But the review of third one started witha single word, doubtless written with a shudder of memory: “horrible”. One can imagine the pale and desperate frame of mind of the ‘guest’ in which that was the first word that came to mind. What hotel number 14 was like I cannot imagine!
I know that various people are interested in the translation of Agapius, so they may be pleased to learn that I am still working on this. In fact I did some more this afternoon. What a pleasant change it was, after fighting with Firmicus Maternus.
There must be something wrong with the text of the latter, I think. Comparing my own effort to that of Clarence Forbes, the ACW translator, I noticed a distinct tendency to paraphrase at points. He had to fight with the text to get some sense out of it at various points.
But I’ve ordered the French edition of Turcan, and with luck that will address some of the textual issues. In the mean time, it is nice to work on a translation that doesn’t involve squeezing your mind or feel like chopping wood; where you can just translate like breathing.
Agapius has an interesting comment on the book of Ruth:
In year 5 of the same [=Samson], the story of Ruth the Moabite took place, i.e. originating from the tribe of Moab. Boaz married her and fathered by her Obed, grandfather of the prophet David. The story of Ruth contains 246 verses; her book is so beautiful, that it was translated from Greek into Arabic.
Agapius is one of the earliest Christian Arabic writers, so it seems that Ruth was translated earlier still. Note that the translation was from the Septuagint.
Blogger Jim West is off to Egypt, it seems. I hope we get to travel with him, vicariously. Cairo should be nice at this time of year. He’s also going on a Nile cruise, from Aswan to Luxor. I’ve never been to Aswan myself — although I would like to. I feel faintly envious.
In the mean time, here’s a shot of the west bank of the Nile at Luxor, taken from the Jollie Ville hotel in the evening. Somewhere in that mountain are the tombs of the kings.
I’m surrounded by photocopies; parts of books, articles, etc. Filing cabinets, boxes of photocopier paper. But really, they aren’t convenient. I can’t carry them around with me. I don’t look at them often.
Today I ordered a Fujitsu Scansnap S300 document reader. It’s designed to take bunches of photocopies and turn them into PDF’s. It’s not really a scanner, as I understand it — it has no TWAIN driver. It’s portable, mobile, and can be powered from a USB port (although it works better from mains).
I think that I would be better off if my photocopies were in electronic form. If I can turn the page images into PDF’s, then I can carry them around on a disk. I can email them to myself, if I need to. I can read them in the evenings in a hotel, access them at lunchtime in the office, and so on. And I can get some floor-space back!
Once they’re in PDF form, I can run Abbyy Finereader 9 on them. That will give a rough output, which will allow me to do electronic searches. So I can have all the articles that I have, on a portable disk, and just search them when someone asks me a difficult question.
You know; do I really need to buy any more academic books? After all, we don’t sit down and read them cover to cover, do we? So… why have paper, if we can convert them to PDF easily and make them searchable in the process?
Only a preview, but quite an extensive one, here.
The Daily Mail has the story of a bookshop chain that are installing these machines here:
It promises to bring the world of literature to the ordinary book-buyer at the touch of a button.
In the time it takes to brew a cappuccino, this machine can print off any book that is not in stock from a vast computer database.
The innovation, launched by book chain Blackwell yesterday, removes the need to order a hard-to-find novel, or the wait to buy one that has sold out.
It is always good to have a clear idea of how a book comes into our hands.
In 1562 Mattias Flacius, who was writing a church history in the Lutheran interest, happened upon a handwritten medieval book at Minden in Germany, which contained an ancient text previously unknown. The work was De errore profanum religionem (On the error of pagan religion) by Firmicus Maternus, and was dedicated to the emperors Constantius II and Constans.
Recognising an unpublished text, he sent it to Strasburg, where it was printed with his corrections and notes. Unfortunately he did his work so poorly that the text was unintelligible in parts. This was a problem, since the Minden manuscript disappeared soon after Flacius used it.
In 1603 Johannes Wouwer printed another edition at Froben, with his own emendations on the Flacius edition. This became the basis for study for the next two centuries, and various editions were based on this.
In 1856 Conrad Bursian determined from a catalogue that a manuscript must exist in the Vatican, in Ms. Palatinus Latinus 165. A collation was obtained and used.
The Vatican manuscript is now the only handwritten copy known to have survived the Dark Ages and the Middle Ages. It was written in Germany in the 9-10th centuries, and is mutiliated at the beginning.
It contains notes in the hand of Flacius, which shows that this is the “Minden” manuscript. The Palatine collection in the Vatican comes from Germany. It consists of manuscripts from the Rhineland Palatinate, from Heidelberg. Flacius himself may have removed the book from the monks of Minden — he removed books from Fulda — or the Elector Palatine may have done so. The collection was transferred to the Vatican at the end of the Thirty Years War. The book has lost some leaves after folio 4, including an important passage on Mithras.
These notes culled from the introduction to the Teubner text by Ziegler, available on Google books, 1905
In chapter 3 of his De errore profanum, Firmicus Maternus apparently discusses Attis, although without naming him. Supposedly it says:
In the first half of the fourth century CE, Firmicus Maternus reports that “he whom they had buried a little while earlier [Attis] had come to life again.” (from here)
There seems to be no English translation online. I’ve made one here from the 1905 edition.
III. (1) The Phyrgians who live at Pessinus around the banks of the river Gallus, assign first place to the earth over the other elements, and this they profess (volunt) is the mother of all things. Then, so that they also might have for themselves an order of annual sacred events, they have consecrated the love affair of a rich women, their queen, who chose to punish tyrannically the scorn of an adolescent lover, with annual lamentations. And to satisfy the irate woman, or to find consolation for her remorse, he whom they had buried a little earlier, they claim that he had come back to life. And as the soul of the woman burned with the impatience of excessive love, they built temples to the dead youth. Then they profess that the priests appointed should undergo from themselves what the angry woman had done because of the injury to her scorned beauty. So in the annual sacred rites in honour of the earth the pomp of his funeral is organised, and when men are persuaded that they are honouring the earth, they are (in fact) venerating the death and funeral of a wretch.
(2) Here also, most sacred emperors, in order to shield this error, they profess that these natural sacred rites are also arranged rationally. They profess that the earth loves its fruits, they profess that Attis is exactly this, which is born from fruits; however the punishment which he sustained, this they profess is what the reaper with his scythe does to the ripe fruits. They call it his death when the collected seeds are stored; life again, when the sown seeds sprout in the turning of the years.
(3) I would like them now to reply to my inquiry, why have they associated this simple (story of) seed and fruit with a funeral, with death, with scorn, with punishment, with love? Was there not anything else that might be said? Was there not anything else that poor mortals might do in grateful thanks to the highest God for the crop? So that you can give thanks for the reborn crop, you howl; so that you rejoice, you weep. And you, when you see the true reason, you do not finally repent of doing this, but you do this, so that busyied with the turning seasons, you still flee from life, you pine for death.
(4) Let them tell me, how it benefits the crop, that they renew their tears with yearly howlings, that they groan over the calamities of a reborn corpse, which they say is arranged for a natural reason. You mourn and you wail, and you cover your mourning with another excuse. The farmer knew when he could furrow the earth with a plow, when he could sow the furrows with grain, he knew when to gather the crop ripened by the heat of the sun, he knew when to tread out the dried crop. This is the natural reason, these are the true sacrificial rites, which are carried out by the yearly labour in men of healthy minds. The divinity asks for this simplicity, that men should follow the laws ordained of the seasons (temporum) in collecting crops. Why do they try to explain this order by wretched fictions of a death? Why is that shielded with tears, which does not need to be shielded? From which let them admit of necessity, that these rites are not held in honour of the crops, but in honour of an unworthy death.
(5) When they say that the earth is the mother of all the gods, and they allot the chief roles to this element, indeed it is mother of their gods, — this we don’t deny or refuse, because from it they are always making their bunch of gods, whether of stone or wood. The sea flows around the whole earth, and again it is held tight by the circle of the encircling embracing Ocean. The heavens also are covered by the lofty dome, blown through by winds, splashed by rains, and in fear, as shown by tremors of unremitting motion. What remains to you, who cultivate these things, consider; when your gods reveal their weakness to you in daily declarations.
Here is the Latin, from the 1905 Teubner of Ziegler from Archive.org (tided up a bit):
III. Phryges qui Pessinunta incolunt circa Galli fluminis ripas, terrae ceterorum elementorum tribuunt principatum, et hanc volunt omnium esse matrem. Deinde ut et ipsi annuum sibi sacrorum ordinem facerent, mulieris divitis ac reginae suae amorem quae fastus amati adulescentis tyrannice voluit ulcisci, cum luctibus annuis consecrarunt, et ut satis iratae mulieri facerent, aut ut paenitenti solacium quaererent, quem paulo ante sepelierant revixisse iactarunt, et cum mulieris animus ex inpatientia nimii amoris arderet, mortuo adulescenti templa fecerunt. Tunc quod irata mulier pro iniuria spretae fecerat formae, hoc ordinatos a se pati volunt sacerdotes. Sic annuis sacris cum honore terrae istius funeris pompa conponitur, ut cum persuaderetur hominibus quod colant terram, miseri funeris venerentur exitium. Hic quoque sacratissimi imperatores ut error iste celetur, etiam haec sacra physica volunt esse ratione conposita. Amare terram volunt fruges, Attin vero hoc ipsum volunt esse, quod ex frugibus nascitur, poenam autem quam sustinuit hoc volunt esse, quod falce messor maturis frugibus facit. Mortem ipsius dicunt, quod semina collecta conduntur, vitam rursus quod iacta semina annuis vicibus reconduntur. Vellem nunc mihi inquirenti respondeant, cur hanc simplicitatem seminum ac frugum, cum funere, cum morte, cum fastu, cum poena, cum amore iuncxerunt? Itane non erat aliud quod diceretur? Itane non erat quod in agendis deo summo pro frugibus gratiis faceret misera mortalitas? Ut gratias pro renatis frugibus agas ululas, ut gaudeas plangis, nec te cum veram rationem videris, hoc aliquando fecisse paenituit, sed hoc agis ut annuis luctibus occupatas vitam semper fugias mortem requiras. Dicant mihi quid hoc frugibus profuit, ut fletus suos annuis ululatibus renovent, ut renati funeris calamitatibus ingemescant, quod dicant physica ratione conpositum? Lugetis et plangitis, et luctus vestros alia ratione celatis. Novit agricola quando terram aratro dimoveat, novit quando sulcis frumenta committat, novit quando maturatas solis ardoribus colligat segetes, novit quando tostas terat fruges. Haec est physica ratio, haec sunt vera sacrificia, quae ab sanae meniis hominibus annuo labore conplentur, hanc simplicitatem divinitas quaerit, ut homines in colligendis fructibus ordinatis temporum legibus serviant. Cur huic ordini miserae mortis figmenta quaesita sunt? Cur celatur lacrimis quod celari non debuit? Unde confiteantur necesse est, haec sacra non in honorem frugum sed in honorem esse conposita mortis alienae. Nam quod terram matrem esse omnium deorum dicunt qui huic elemento primas tribuunt partes, vere deorum suorum mater est, nec abnuimus aut recusamus, quia ab hac collectos deos suos aut lapideos faciunt semper aut ligneos. Terram omnem circumfluunt maria, et rursus inclusa Oceani ambientis circulo stringitur, caeli etiam rotunda sublimitate operitur, perflatur ventis aspergitur pluviis, et timorem suum assidui motus tremoribus confitetur. Quid vos maneat qui haec colitis considerate, cum dii vestri infirmitatem suam vobis cottidianis confessionibus prodant.
I always sigh on seeing so large a chunk of Latin.
This is a very different earth cult to the one represented in the other sources.