0 оценок0% нашли этот документ полезным (0 голосов)
47 просмотров22 страницы
The "asclepius" is a treatise attributed to the divine and charismatic Apuleius. A recent article by V. Hunink rekindles controversy on the text. Brill is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Vigiliae Christianae.
The "asclepius" is a treatise attributed to the divine and charismatic Apuleius. A recent article by V. Hunink rekindles controversy on the text. Brill is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Vigiliae Christianae.
The "asclepius" is a treatise attributed to the divine and charismatic Apuleius. A recent article by V. Hunink rekindles controversy on the text. Brill is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Vigiliae Christianae.
Source: Vigiliae Christianae, Vol. 54, No. 4 (2000), pp. 396-416 Published by: BRILL Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1584609 Accessed: 23/04/2010 11:39 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=bap. Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission. JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org. BRILL is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Vigiliae Christianae. http://www.jstor.org THE ASCLEPIUS: THOUGHTS ON A RE-OPENED DEBATE BY MARIATERESA HORSFALL SCOTTI Pandora's box, again In a recent article, V. Hunink,' following a hint of B.L. Hijmans Jr.'s,2 rekindles controversy on the Asclepius. In the particularly complex field of authorship and attribution, startling novelties (which are often enough revivals of old theses) are in themselves by no means unwelcome: but when V. Hunink revives the assertion that Apuleius wrote the Asclepius, a detailed and systematic answer is required. This text is the Latin translation of a Greek treatise attributed, like a series of comparable Greek theosophic trea- tises, to the divine and charismatic figure of Hermes Trismegistos.3 The Asclepius is transmitted within a part of the corpus of Apuleius, of which two works are of doubtful authenticity. Inside the corpus, the sequence is main- tained, and not only by the best mss.:4 (a) fragments of the Florida, transmitted as 'prologue' to (b) the De deo Socratis,5 a speech which was to contain a first part in Greek, now missing, to which, probably, the last of the fragments alludes. ' Hunink (1996): in the course of the present paper, I will refer to this article with- out its date. 2 Hijmans (1987) 411f., restating the doubt expressed by F. Regen (1971) 10lf., who proposed a study, specifically, of Asclepius. 3 "Hermes fulfils both roles, that of revealing deity and that of inspired ancient sage", Wigtil (1984) 2289. For Hermes, Thot/Teuth/Tat, cf. Nock-Festugiere I (1945) Iff. and, more amply, Festugiere I (1944) 67ff., 309ff. 4 For the best mss. (B M V), cf. Beaujeu (1973) XXXVI-XXXVIII, Moreschini (1991) III, IVf., L.D. Reynolds in (ed. id.) Texts and transmission (Oxford 1983) 16f. The same order of works is also found in F (Florent. or Laurent., ex Marc. 284: cf. Beaujeu (1973) XIf.; Moreschini (1985) 276; id. (1991) IV, VII), in Paris. Lat. 6634 and in Vat. Urb. Lat. 1141 (cf. Moreschini (1985) 272ff.). 5 Beaujeu (1973) 161f. Cf. Hunink (1995) 292-312. That the prologue as transmit- ted is a unity and really does belong to the De deo S. are unacceptable propositions. ? Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2000 Vigiliae Christianae 54, 396-416 THE ASCLEPIUS: THOUGHTS ON A RE-OPENED DEBATE Presumably, therefore, it belonged to the original Forida, the more likely if Florida were indeed originally a miscellany of epideictic oratory,6 (c) Asclepir, (d) De Platone et eius dogmate,7 (e) De Mundo, a markedly enlarged translation of the pseudo-Aristotelian Ilepi Kc6aotbv. In its prologue the author addresses a 'son' called Faustinus, as in De Platone 2: not for this reason alone (d) and (e) are bound indis- solubly in the debate on authenticity, from which they emerge as pro- bably Apuleian.8 So why should not Asclepius, coming after the De deo S., be likewise Apuleian, as was indeed once thought?9 Challenging the view long domi- nant (from Reitzenstein to W. and J. Kroll, from Nock and Festugiere to Moreschini, not to mention Mahe and Wigtil, let alone older scholars),10 H. takes up the question, and goes over the varied arguments which had led scholars away from Apuleius and towards the fourth century (p. 289). With marked and persistent vis critica, H. sets about dismantling a view which for him (and Hijmans) rests on fragile foundations and tries to lend substance to an hypothesis of authorship which-while only apparently it is simple, even obvious in its possibility-is not, he claims, lightly to be rejected. However, much though one admires the obstinate effort H. devotes Interestingly, H. himself resorts to "a praefatio dealing with improvisation" and "a prae- locutio announcing the Latin part of the discourse" (p. 312), implying a preceding, lost Greek part. The preface as it stands is not explicable as an organic whole: cf. H. him- self (p. 298) and B.L. Hijmans Jr. (AJVRW I, 34, 2 (1994) 1771), who resorts to "some other collection of excerpts". Hard to see the need to conjure up a text so like Florida, when Flor. themselves are ready to hand! 6 Florida seems a literal translation of 'Av&rlpa, one of the titles of miscellaneous works listed by Gellius in the proem. to N'oct. At. (? 6). Hildebrand had proposed a close link between De deo S. and Flor. ((1842) XLIII), while Goldbacher, in his edition of Apuleius' Philosophica (Wien 1876), suggested a codex unicus at the beginning of the ms. transmission. Why, though, a (latin) unabridged oration in a collection of excerpts? Perhaps on account of Augustine's interest: cf. p. 406f. and my Apuleio tra magia e filosofia (1990), 31 ff. 7 See however the explicit to book 2 in the potiores. 8 Beaujeu (1973) IX-XXIX; cf. now Marchetta (1991), notably 88ff. for the "sepa- ratists"' arguments. 9 Notably Hildebrand (1842) I, LIff., as we shall see. Ascl. was included in some old Apuleian editions: those by Aldo (Venezia 1521), by B. Vulcanius (Paris 1601: be- cause of Aldo's auctority, its "recondita doctrina" and not coarse style), by G. Elmen- horstius (Frankfurt 1621). 10 For scholars 1600-1900, cf. p. 399ff. and nn. 18, 19. 397 MARIATERESA HORSFALL SCOTTI to the issue, one must admit (as H. does himself, p. 299) that the consi- derations he raises are scarcely decisive; even the least forceful, though, do have the merit of provoking a reconsideration of the whole question and of the Asclepius' actual character. Here I return to H.'s discussion, and hope to contribute some more precise and new elements to the linguistic analysis he has begun: above all to establish how much (not much!) there is of distinctively Apuleian in the language; on the other hand, to identify words and expressions foreign (or positively opposed) to Apuleius' usage,' and to consider terms which first appear slightly (or long) after Apuleius.'2 Though these points may not be in isolation decisive (p. 296 and n. 30), their force (and not theirs alone) is cumulative, given how little solid common ground between Apuleius and Asclepius has been established.13 If H. is right to object (p. 292f.) that Apuleius uses words which there- after reappear only in Christian authors,'4 the argument is itself ambigu- ous and is to be weighed further in the light of other perspectives and conclusions, whose importance will be the greater, the more they reveal linguistic usage not as the quirk of a recherche stylist but as part of a stand- ard practice. After all, how many texts should one attribute to Apuleius " Divinitas--e.g.-is absent in Apuleius and found 29 times in Ascl.: Ciceronian and then very common in Christian authors (see Gudeman, Thes.lL. V, 1, 1614, 69ff.). Peculiar to Ascl. is the active sense of incredibilis (ch. 28) and incredibilitas (ch. 27). For conflicting usage, cf. firequentatio (4x in Ascl.) against frequentia (7x in Met. and Flor.); musice (Ascl. 13, bis) against musica (9x in Apul.); deductio (Ascl. 25) against deductus (Met. 1, 16, 5); neglec- tus (Ascl. 24) against neg/lgentia (3x in Apul.); perseveratio (Ascl. 41) against perseverantia (4x in Plat. and Mund.). 12 Note-e.g.-idolum in the sense of "statue" (Ascl. 37; 38), a Greek, Christian term, deliberately different from class. statua/simulacrum/imago (Bannier, Thes.LL. VII, 1, 226, 26ff.). For Tertullian's insistence, cf. the index of Castorina's ed. of Spect. (Firenze 1961) and, on Idol., T.D. Barnes, Tertullian (Oxford 1971) 96-100. Creabilis (Ascl. 15) is then found in Jerome and Augustine (Wulff, Thes.lL. IV, 112, 75ff); dispensator, distributor (Ascl. 27) of divinity start respectively from Tertullian (Thes.l.L. V, 1, 1401, 5ff.) and Jerome, Ep. 108, 13, 2 (Vetter, Thes.l.L. V, 1, 1541, 66ff.). t3 It will be more and more clear in the working out of this paper. Not without in- terest is Nock's list of words ((1945) II 280f.) missing from Ascl., though mostly com- mon, and thus also Apuleian (igiur, rursus (-ur), diu, mox, inde, sane, adhuc). Cf. Beaujeu (1973) XVf for Redfors' lexical observations between Plat. and Mund. as against the rest of Apuleius: if no real conflict in the linguistic usages is noticed, there are pecu- liar expressions which occur in both groups. 14 See Bernhard (1927) 100; 315; 329; 337; 349 for a list of words found first in Apuleius and then in late authors. 398 THE ASCLEPIUS: THOUGHTS ON A RE-OPENED DEBATE just because he might have anticipated later usage? Consequently, lexico- graphical soundings, which may yield significant details, remain in them- selves valuable. That Apuleius liked such suffixes as -tor, -tio, -as, which occur in words of the Asclepius only attested, as I elsewhere observed, later than Apuleius (p. 293), is not an argument of independent weight: nouns in -tor and -tio are always widespread, while those in -as, frequent in Cicero, are typical of later Latin.'5 If I insist on linguistic annotations it is because they do seem altogether to lead to a powerful nexus of conclusions, despite H.'s fundamental scepticism-which does not prevent him from being axiomatic; this nexus weakens the appeal to "Apuleian stylistic originality", possible in itself, but not absolute and exclusive. Histoy of a debate The debate is old (if not always entirely exact in all its assertions) and it is a pity that H. has set it aside, given the importance of-e.g.-the usage of angelus and benedictio, raised centuries ago, and in Holland at that. The debate's history has much to teach us still, as does G.F. Hildebrand's conversion from a separatist position to a conviction of Apuleian author- ship,'6 on the basis of certain attractive linguistic details'7 (none however decisive), which gave him the impression that they must lead towards a peculiarly innovative author. Hildebrand quotes earlier opinions and dis- cussions, interesting though rather hasty, of linguistic and stylistic features,'8 of conclusions to be drawn from the ms. tradition, and of the silence both of Apuleius and of later authors. Augustine is crucial: we shall see (vd. more fully p. 406f.), he cites the text widely, but seems not to know the author's identity.'9 Bosscha, in his reprint of Oudendorp, remarks that he plunged into the Asclepius "nulla... praeiudicata opinione occupatus".20 He noted at once '5 Bernhard (1927) 100. 16 (1842) LIIff. I7 Ib. LIV: he speaks of "singularis ratio". 18 Citing Colvius (Leiden 1588), Wowerius (Basel 1606); cf. too J. Floridus (Paris 1688) I 14, P. Lambecius, Prodromus Historiae Literariae (..) (Leipzig-Frankfurt 1710) 131. 19 See Harlesius ap. Hildebrand (1842) L. 20 See L. Bosscha's "disputatio" on Apuleius in vol. III (appendices) of his reprint of Oudendorp (Leiden 1823) 517-521 (notably 518). 399 MARIATERESA HORSFALL SCOTTI certain rare terms which appeared to occur again in Apuleius. So-e.g.- humanitas in the sense of "human race" (Ascl. 4 (bis); 8; 10; 18; 23 (bis); 25; 38): not decisive, because already in ps. Quint. (Decl mai. 8), common in Tertullian and in Apuleius only at Plat. 1, 16 ? 215.21 Adunatus at Ascl. 2; 19; 25 is only a conjecture by Purser at Plat. 2, 24 ? 256. Neither sustollere (Ascl. 6) nor mutescere (Ascl. 25) actually occur in Apuleius; mutescere seems not attested before Lactantius and Paulinus.22 Likewise vivficare: Ascl. 6, 30 (bis); not in Apuleius, and then in Tertullian, Ambrose, Prudentius.23 The same goes for vivjficus (Ascl. 2), present in Ammianus,24 and vivescere (Ascl. 4), already found in Lucretius and Pliny.25 As we see, our modern lexico- graphical tools do strenghten Bosscha's general (if impressionistic) assertion that the dialogue's style seemed non-Apuleian. Hildebrand was rightly sceptical about the 'lack of Grecisms' which Bosscha attributed to the Ascl. as a distinctive feature against Apuleius: in Met. they are uncommon, apart from bks. 10 and 11 (there grecisms are largely of established literary character); in the De mundo, they are limited to the citation of certain terms in the original Greek!26 Coming to Ascl., we should up-end Bosscha's argument and note how singular it would be for Apuleius himself to use a syntactical calque like the gen. absolute numeri completi (Ascl. 27);27 so too the genitives dependent on consentaneus (Ascl. 1)28 and dominari (Ascl. 39),29 or the participle intellegens after videris (Ascl. 1).30 21 The Apuleian passage is not listed by Ehlers at Thes.L. VI, 3, 3076, 60ff. 22 Baer in Thes.lL. VIII, 1719, 42ff. 23 Frequent (vd. Cetedoc):-e.g.-Tert. Praescr. haer. 25; Prud. Apoth. 234; Ambr. Isaac v.an. 2, 4; id. Bon. mort. 7, 26. 24 Amm. 21, 1, 8. 25 Lucr. 4, 1068; 1138; Plin. JVat. 9, 160, etc. 26 Cf. Berhard (1927) 143ff. (Met.), 336 (Plat.), 330 (Mund.). 27 Hijmans (1987) 412 n. 59 would cite preceding corporis to justify the gen. abs.: un- convincing for Apuleius, no occasional writer. Gen. depending on a comparative (Ascl. I omnium ... divinior) is quite different: in Apul., but also in Christian writers (E. L6fstedt, Syntactica II 425). 28 hes.LL IV, 394, 20f.; cf. Thes.Graec.ling. (Stephanus, ed. Hase-Dindorf) I, 1240c (dcKXo,uoc0). 29 Despite Hor. C. 3, 30, 1lf. (Daunus agrestium/regnauit populorum; cf. F. Muecke, Enciclopedia oraziana II (Roma 1997) 761), this is the language of Itala and Christian writers: E. Lbfstedt, Syntactica II 416, Thes.LL. V, 1902, 14ff., esp. 83ff. ("de potestate divina"); see L. Ziegler, Die lat. Bibeliibersetzungen (Miinchen 1879) 55. 30 Cf. LHS 364, citing Tert. Pudic. 1, nemo proficiens erubescit, influenced by biblical Greek, but also within the category of verba sentiendi et dicendi (ib. 388). 400 THE ASCLEPIUS. THOUGHTS ON A RE-OPENED DEBATE There is even what appears a certain case of a neuter plural noun gov- erning, more Graeco, a singular verb (18 omnia... quae est), not easily explained as a vulgarism imported by the mss., given also species... deorum... con- formata est (Ascl. 23), 'normalized' as confonnatae sunt in B2, which may well have been influenced by the Greek (e'i&lr), as Nock suggested.31 To return to Bosscha's list of words: Ascl. 17 inaltata occurs in the Vulgate and Paulinus,32 but was corrected to inhaata by Goldbacher (so Apul., Met. 2, 5, 4): inconclusive, therefore.33 Ascl. 31 ambitudo (of the motion of the stars) seems a hapax; likewise the inaversabilis of Ascl. 40 (where Nock's inaversibilis may be either a correction or a slip!); contrast the insolubilis of Ascl. 40, likewise an attribute of the ratio aeterna: found already in Seneca and Quintilian, it is familiar in Minucius Felix, Lactantius and the Vulgate.34 Nothing comparable to the participle salvatus (Ascl. 35; 41)35 is present in the parallel pap. Mimaut,36 and we should note the insistent use of salus in the sense of otrnpi[a at Met. 11, 2, 6f. But closely comparable uses of a tKelev/aqpi%va0t occur in Hermetic texts37 and-e.g.-Philo.38 The word in short belongs to a koine to which pagan and Christian texts adhere.39 Bosscha also says that the author of Ascl. uses inchoative verbs "ad fas- tidium usque"; he notes particularly 36 caelum umescens vel arescens velfrigescens vel ignescens vel sordescens: all classical words, but in Apuleius only ignescere 3 But he prefers to be cautious and prints the first est only: vd. (1945) 278f., 325. 32 Rubenbauer, Thes..L. VII, 1, 816, 55ff. 33 Transiet (Ascl. 28) for transibit does not count: Hildebrand compared Met. 6, 19, 6 redies; the phenomenon is not binding (Neue-Wagener III, 326-8). 34 Alt, Thesl.L. VII, 1, 45ff. 35 Scott (1926) and Mahe (1974) correct numine to lumine (Mah6 following the Coptic): attractive, notably if compared with the Ambrosian Epiphany liturgy (cf. P.A. Carozzi in Perennitas. Studi... A. Brelich (Roma 1979), 115-38), but Nock and Moreschini do still print the transmitted text. 36 Pap. Louvre 2391 fr.l, col. 18 (PGM Il 591f.). See Mahe (1974) 44f., Moreschini (1985) 79. Mahe remarks (p. 41): "En effet s'il est hors de doute que nos trois textes remontent finalement a une source commune redigee en grec, nous ne saurions tenir pour acquis a l'avance que le traducteur copte ou le traducteur latin, par exemple, ont travaille sur un texte grec en tous points identique a celui qui a servi de modele au copiste du papyrus grec". 37 Vd. Nock (1945) 400, n. 351, G. Foerster in Kittel-Friedrich, Theol. Worterb. des NT VII, 969f. 38 lb., 988f. 39 Ib., 1003. Cfr. (Itala) Rom. 13, 11, II Tim. 2, 10 (salus); lac. 2, 14 (salvare): later, ad abundantiam, in ecclesiastic writers, notably Jerome (Isai. 6, 16, 19; Ezech. 5, 16; Jaumw 1: salvatus referred to God's misericordia and gratia). 401 MARIATERESA HORSFALL SCOTTI (Mund. 3 ? 295; 5 ? 297; 15 ? 321) and clarescere (Met. 4, 19, 3; 5, 22, 2) recur; notice though that the accumulation of inchoatives, of a type very common in Apuleius, is exceptional for Ascl. The rest of Bosscha' list is of particular significance. First, benedictio: in Ascl.,4 but not in Apuleius; we may add a distinction in the use of benedicere: transitive in Ascl., but + dat. in Apuleius.4' Yet more singular is the case of angelus, which seems to show a sharp distinc- tion between usages in Ascl. and Apuleius; it deserved comment, but not such as that offered by Klotz in Thes.l.L.:42 he concentrates on the nocentes angeli of Ascl. 25 and takes the term in a negative sense, distinct from that of daemon, which recurs frequently in Ascl. 4-6, in the neutral sense of "being of superhuman character". Actually, at Ascl. 25, it is the participle that gives the expression its negative flavour. Lactantius comments, with a Christian bias, but quite correctly (Inst. 2, 15, 8), on a passage precisely from the Sermo perectus: quos (sc. daemonas) ideo Tismegistus ciyyXovu 7ovrlpovS appellat: adeo non ignorauit ex caelestibus deprauatos terrenos esse coepisse. The dae- mones that the Hermetic text quoted mentions are inimici et vexatores hominum, not far different from those of Ascl. 37 evocantes animas daemonum vel angelo- rum (a contrast thereupon amplified: per quas idola et benefaciendi et male vires habere potuissent, etc.). The distinction between good angeli and evil daemones was noted briefly by Bosscha, is recognised implicitly by Klotz,43 and Cetedoc now adds instances by the thousand. Bosscha finely noted that in the De deo S. (after all a work on demonology, in which the term daemon occurs some fifteen times) there is no use of angelus; bis, however, in Ascl. Suppose though that Apuleius had turned to translating Ascl. not before but after writing the De deo S.: even in this case, it is hard to credit that he did nothing to enrich at least the terminology of its central, complex con- cept,44 especially given that the speech would have had to be included presumably by him in the Florida,45 before the excerptor's work a mature miscellaneous collection of Apuleius' public production. 40 Ascl. 26: deus.. . fiequentibus laudum praeconiis benedictionibusque celebretur. 4 Ascl. 40: benedicentes deum; 41: solus deus est benedicendus; Flor. 20, 9: Carthagini benedicere. 42 II, 45, 24ff. 43 Ib. 44ff. 44 The expression Hos Graeci nomine daemonas nuncupant (6 ?133) could have been provocative, as well as augustius genus daemonun (16 ?154), that of S.'s custos or deus, very different from osores et amatores... deos (12 ?165). On the Latin side, vd. the termino- logical show at ch. 15 (cf. Regen (1971) 17, n. 54). 45 Just because the title does seem the exact translation of 'Av&npa (cf. n. 6); the 402 THE ASCLEPIUS THOUGHTS ON A RE-OPENED DEBATE When we turn to the distinction between the translator's technique in the De mundo (decidedly loose) and the distinctly literal approach of the Asclepius,46 Hildebrand noted that we should take account of different inten- tions, whence "diversus utriusque libri color, sententiarum coniunctio, enun- tiationum dispositio";47 such diversity might be explicable, had the dialogue been a youthful work, composed "stili exercendi causa", like the transla- tion of Phaedo and De Republica. To which we may answer that the Platonic translations were probably the fruit of an intellectual allegiance, just as the manner of the Asclepius seems to reveal the conviction of a believer.48 Hildebrand himself does not exclude that Ascl. might have been part of some real experience, falling indeed into self-contradiction when he admits that Apuleius' later silence may indicate a disciplina never entered "in sucum et in sanguinem". It is, however, most odd that the compelling loftiness of the treatise's message and (yet more) the influence that Ascl.'s consistent doctrine of the divinity of man would inevitably enough have exercised upon an author such as Apuleius, immersed as he was in Platonism, left no visible trace upon him, even given the relatively modest compass of the surviving works; he does after all revel elsewhere in such 'mysteries'. To return to Ascl.'s lexicon: Bosscha pointed out, among terms that sug- gested to him an author, if not Christian, then at least one familiar with Christian texts, Ascl. 37 mundanus homo, id est corpus. The indication, how- ever, is inexact, for the adjective means simply "belonging to the mundus" and is really little different from the mundanae conversionis of Plat. 1, 10 ? 201 ("revolution of the mundus") or from the mundanas varietates of Mund. 29 ? 355, or from the mundano fastigio of Mund. 33 ? 362; yet, that oversteps the typically Platonic dichotomy: mundus corresponds to corruptible matter and the text looks to man's return, as a whole (totus), improved (melior) by separation from the body, to the heavens after death. The correspond- ing Greek term ijT/0uctKOV (cf. Ascl. 7; 14 for explicit references to the equivalence), gives us pause for thought: how likely is it that an author as present division in books is too brief to be the excerptor's work and that means that both it and the title survive from the original. 46 Though comparison with the Coptic version-scrupulously faithful towards the original-tends to show up the Latin as an 'adaptation' (Mahe (1974) 52)-it must be said that so far as we can tell the translator's liberties are precisely enough defined; Wigtil (1984) 2294 talks of "deep respect for the source text on the part of the trans- lator" and adds the significant detail: "even the clausulae of the version imitate the source, often sentence by sentence". 47 (1842) LIII. 48 Cf. Wigtil (1984) 2292f. 403 MARIATERESA HORSFALL SCOTTI careful and linguistically rich as Apuleius should have rendered iTXn by that same term mundus that he uses for K6ogo; (again explicit at Ascl. 10 ut ex hac divina compositione mundus, Graece rectius K6oago;, dictus esse videatur)? A play between mundus = "world" and mundus = "man" follows (is novit se, novit et mundum): interesting, but potentially confusing, for mundus proves to have dis- tinct senses and reveals a lack of lexical resources; the author indeed almost at once distinguishes: there are two images of the divine, mundus et homo.49 More appositely, Bosscha points to dominor + gen., for which he com- pares Tert. Apol. 26 (numquam dominanr eius); numerous other parallels, all Christian, can be drawn from Thes.l.L.50 Hildebrand's position I pass to Hildebrand's linguistic remarks and update the more pertinent. Conversatio he claims to be 'Apuleian' for conversio (e.g. Ascl. 36; Ascl. 30, where the text is uncertain and recent editors print conversione, I leave out of consideration): only Met. 9, 6, 2 really supports his case, praeter impedi- mentum conversationis nostrae nihil praestat amplius (sc. dolium). Here-contrast those passages where c. has the force of "familiarity, intimacy"-the sense is "coming and going", not all that far from Ascl. 36, above: but no proof of identity of authorship!5' lubere + ut (Ascl. 41 iusserit ut... dicamus) is scarcely significant, being already common in Cicero.52 That the terms innominis and omninominis (Ascl. 20) derive from multinominis (epithet of Isis at Met. 11, 22, 6) by analogy is no more than a pretty hypothesis: the coinages at Ascl. 20 are amply justified by the closely-reasoned context, in which nomen is a key term.53 Among the constructions which seemed to Hildebrand "specially wor- thy" of Apuleius' genius, no room remains for those which a proper study of the context reveals as normal (e.g. 11 (ad fin.) naturae ... puros... resti- tuat), or for those lacking any real point of comparison and hailed on grounds of "preference" or instinct alone! At Ascl. 20 voluntatis praegnans suae 49 ... non ignarus se etiam secundum esse imaginem dei cuius sunt imagines duae mundus et homo. 50 See above, p. 400 and n. 29. 51 Cf. Cael. Aur. Acut. 2, 37, 194: lecti latitudo atque spatium tantum probatur, quantum sufficiat aegro alterna conversatione alterius loci frigus accipere, Lommatzsch, Thes.l.L. IV, 850, 60. Thes. distinguishes conversatio from conversare (what interests us). 52 Kuhlmann, Thes.LL. VII, 2, 580, 29ff; cf. Apol. 63 iussi curriculo iret aliquis. 53 Thes.l.L. IX, 2, 603, 60 (Baer) refers to Corp. Herm. V, 10 (ov6oraa EiXs tT`avWxa ... 6v6ogaxa o ei 5C). 404 THE ASCLEPIUS: THOUGHTS ON A RE-OPENED DEBATE is memorably put but in no way anomalous. Dominor + dat. (27 terrae vero et man dominatur) is regular at least from Itala and Irenaeus.54 The verb is equally common + gen.,55 at the same period; such fluctuation looks the natural product of an age which accepts both usages as tolerable. Contigit /contingit + acc. + inf. (Ascl. 22 unde contingi in multis remanere mali- tiam; tia contigit mundi corporibus commixta remanere; 37 unde contingit ab Aegyptiis haec sancta animalia nuncupani) is attested from Tertullian and Gaius on,56 while the construction with ut + subjunc., standard in Apuleius,57 occurs once only in Ascl. (32 et sic contingit hominibus ut. . . videamus). The rare cons- truction of comitor + dat. (Ascl. 14 et mundo comitabatur spiritus), absent in Apuleius, is already found in Cicero, but reappears only late.58 Venerari as passive (Ascl. 25 omnium quae venerari laudari amari denique a videntibus possunt) is indeed found in Apuleius,59 but also in Ambrose.6 The oddity of credulitas "de eo cui de re persuasum est"6' requires pro- per discussion. The definition as given suits well enough two passages of Met. which Hildebrand does not cite,62 which are sharply different from Ascl. 29 unus enim quisque pietate, relgione, prudentia, cultu et veneratione dei clarescit quasi oculis vera ratione perspecta etfiducia credulitatis suae tantum inter homines quan- tum sol lumine ceteris astris antistat, where "persuasion" is clearly religious (as guaranteed by the context). Here again comparison with late and Christian usage is significant.63 The corpulentus of Ascl. 27 (locus... ab omnibus rebus corpulentis alienus) means simply "corporeal": so Tertullian, Chalcidius, Augustine;64 "corpulent", how- ever, at Met. 7, 23, 2 and 8, 26, 5. Despite Hildebrand's best efforts, there- fore (and it is a pity that lexicography does not attract Hunink), nothing specially Apuleian emerges in Ascl.'s terminology. One detail of substance, 4 Thes..L. V, 1, 1904, 43ff.; Aen. 3, 97 cunctis dominabitur oris renders II. 20, 307. $5 Cf. n. 29 supra. 56 Thes.L. IV, 719, 75ff. 57 Common from Plaut.: Spelthahn, Thes..L. IV, 720, 4ff. 8 Bannier, Thes.LL. III, 814, 79ff. (bis in Tusc.; Juvencus, Augustine). 59 Met. 11, 2, 2. 60 Ambr. Ep. 17, 1. 61 Hildebrand (1842) LIV. 62 Met. 2, 27, 6facti verisimilitudine ad criminis cedulitatem impelli; 9, 21, 7 ad credulitatem delapsus Barbarus: with partic., the trick into which the subject falls is stressed. 63 Seee .g.-the passages from Arob. and Chalcid. cited in Thes.L. IV, 1151, 31ff. (and those-ib., 41ff.-specifically Christian) by Lommatzsch, who wrongly classifies Ascl. s.v. "facilitas credendi, imprudentia, superstitio", 1151, 8. 64 Lommatzsch, Thes..L IV, 998, 70ff. 405 MARIATERESA HORSFALL SCOTTI though, in passing: angry deities (Isis in particular) are (Ascl. 37) ab hominibus utraque natura facti atque compositi; contrast both Apuleius' entirely 'ethereal' demonology and vision of Isis as poor Lucius' portus quietis at the end of Met., when Isiac initiation represents a decisive triumph over the storms of fortune.65 Dr. Hunink and St. Augustine After the historic objections to the non-Apuleian authorship of Asclepius (never hitherto answered!), let us pass to recentiora. Hunink's own critique begins from the evidence of Augustine, which he judges overrated (p. 290); however, the fact that Augustine "does not mention Apuleius as author of the Asclepius" is hardly to be considered a simple argumentum ex silentio, given that Augustine clearly does distinguish Apuleius from the translator (never identified) of Hermes Aegyptius' words, cited for comparison with the De deo S. (Civ. 8, 23, 1 - 26, 3) on demonology (8, 23, 1: huius Aegyptii verba, sicut in nostram linguam interpretata sunt, ponam). H. does suggest (p. 291) that differences of context might have let Augustine to think of two distinct authors for De deo S. and Ascl., but it is wrong to say "it seems that he did not realise or did not even know that Ascl. is a translation", to reach the conclusion that Augustine is unreliable because he did not recognise the debt of Ascl. to its Greek original. Augustine, though, will presumably have learned enough of Hermetism in his Manichaean past66 and cites with proper precision the text on which he will dwell, in the language he and his readers know best. The author he does not name, for it was not transmitted; he therefore does not know it and will not guess! H., however, presupposes "a rather close connec- tion" (p. 290) between the De deo S. and the Ascl. in Augustine's library, as though the works had been compared simply because they stood close together, because from the same hand. Such argument minimises Augustine's technical competence; he gives no hint of any preceding connexion between the two works. H. also appeals to the "time" factor: the passage of 250 years will have obscured the authorship (perhaps implicit) of the trans- lation. If, though, such authorship had always been hidden under the label of "Hermes", it cannot ever have been clearly recognisable. So how did 65 Cf. Moreschini (1985) 193, n. 66. 66 Cf. A. Gonzilez Blanco, A)VRW II, 17, 4 (1984) 2253; S.N.C. Lieu, Manichaeism in Mesopotamia and the Roman East (Leiden 1994) 41f. 406 THE ASCLEPIUS: THOUGHTS ON A RE-OPENED DEBATE the two works ever come together? It seems worth mentioning, as I did in the paper H. cites,67 the exact sequence De deo S. /Ascl. not only in Augustine's citations but also in a good part of the ms. tradition. We can- not but think of a link.68 H., who misses this singular coincidence and its implications and minimises the possible place of De deo S. within the Florida,69 remarks only that the position of Ascl. not at the end (a sort of appendix) but "within" the Philosophica supports its authorial unity with the remain- der (p. 290). Once granted, though, Augustine's role in the transmission, it seems likely that, neither forgetful of his Manichaean experience nor devoid of documentation, he compared Hermes' words and the De deo S.- using distinct ms. sources; it was then his polemic juxtaposition of the texts that somehow settled their sequence in the ms. tradition. A writer so pre- cise and polemical as Augustine, with such a varied training, can hardly have stumbled through his bibliographical researches, given the excellence of the library (and its staff) at his disposal, just with a view to strengthen the thread of his polemic, notably over the thirteen years of composition of the De ciitate Dei.70 The evidence of the transmission In the obscurity of the first stages of Apuleius' transmission, it does seem that the presence of passages of the Florida right at the beginning of the Philosophica is a strong argument for a unified tradition. In the mare mag- num of Apuleius' lost works we can hardly undervalue the fact-to restate what I have said elsewhere-that Augustine reveals that what he knows are the texts that we have. The De Platone, not named, is no real objec- tion: it may well have been used.71 As for the Florida (after all in origin a collection of speeches), note that the speech Pro statua sibi apud Oeenses 67 (1990) 312. 68 No contrary textual indications: cf. Beaujeu (1973) XXXV ("on peut dire que notre meilleur manuscrit du De Deo Socratis est le fameux Corbeiensis du VIPI s."); Nock (1945) 264ff. 69 See p. 396f. 70 Cf. B. Altaner, Die Bibliothek des hl.Augustinus, Th. Rev. 44 (1948) 73-8 Augustinusstudien 174-8; id., In der Studierstube des heiligen Augustinus, Amt und Sendung ed. E. Kleineidam - O. Kuss - E. Puzik (Freiburg 1950) 427ff. = Kine patristische Schnften, 52ff; J. Scheele, Buch und Bibliothek bei Augustinus, Bibliothek u. Wissenschafi 12 (1978) 61ff. (esp. 67). 71 Cf. my article (1990) 318. 407 MARIATERESA HORSFALL SCOITI locanda,72 in addition to the De deo S., was mentioned. The De deo S.'s trans- mission-which surely sprang from just the collection mentioned and ob- tained precedence over the rest, of which only short passages survive- confirms the importance of Augustine's role. It is worth pausing here over the inscriptio: in the chief mss. (B M V) "INCIPIT ERMU TRISMEGISTON DEHLERA AD ASCLEPIUM ADLOCUTA FELICITER". Note the mix of Greek (garbled) and Latin: 'Eplxgo is shortened, Tptoagyio'aou confused; iepa clearly followed, but the sense and context have been lost. Latin is added, in agreement; the dep. adloquor becomes passive and a clumsy hand has inserted de.73 It is the pres- ence of so much Greek that may point to an early date; note the name of a Greek oracular deity which hides a translator unconcerned with recog- nition and the Greek definition of the text's "sacrality". Such details do not conflict with the insertion of Greek words in the translation, but there is no trace of that inventive mastery which Apuleius himself would have unfailingly imposed! Some confirmation from Augustine, Civ. 8, 23, 1: Hermes Aegyptius, quem Trismegiston vocant; ib.: cum Asclepius, ad quem maxime loquebatur, ei respondisset. We are here close enough to the way in which the Greek original (or its close kin) is mentioned by ps.Anthimus (Nock (1945) 305 Hermes (pad?ict... Tpoq 'AlcKTlntO v TOV iarpov) and by Cyril and Stobaeus (Nock (1945) 333, 336 ?K TCiv np6S 'AoaKXTrt6v). This assumes further significance when contrasted with Lactantius, who helps us return to a lost AOyoq TxXeito; (so lohannes Lydus, Nock (1945) 334), which he renders (Div. Inst. 2, 15, 7) as Sermo perfectus.74 Though Ascl. contains in its proem a hint 72 Aug. Ep. 138, 19. According to H. (1997) 59, n. 2 a court speech. But that is no necessary deduction from Augustine's brief, sharp remark: qui sacerdos provinciae pro magno fiuit, ut munera ederet venatoresque vestiret et pro statua sibi apud Oeenses locanda ... adversus con- tradictionem quorundam civium litigaret? Quod posteros ne lateret, eiusdem litis orationem scriptam memoriae commendavit. The more so, if Apuleius's witticisms at Flor. 7, 9ff.; 9, lff., 11 are properly valued: lis does not necessarily mean "case" and "dispute" will do as well (cf. Steinmann, Thes.iL. IV, 1499, 64ff.)-a sense well suited to a contradictio (Hoppe, Thes.l.L. IV, 755, 47ff.). 73 Rohde (Rh. Mus. 37 (1882) 146, n. 2) thought of an original Pip[Xoq iepa; cf. Moreschini (1991) 39. But how is the 'agreement' of iepa with adlocuta (in all appear- ance a neuter) to be explained? Cf. too K. McNamee, Abbreviations in Greek literary papyri, BASP Suppl. 3 (1981) 15f., against the palaeographical explanation of the pas- sage to de. 74 The fact that Lactantius cites, when not directly the Greek, a Latin version other than ours (cf. Epit. 37, 4 cuius verba de Graeco conversa subieci) is not decisive in fixing a terminus post quem for Ascl., as H. rightly notes. 408 THE ASCLEPIUS. THOUGHTS ON A RE-OPENED DEBATE of the lost title's "perfection" (1: divino sermoni ... eique tali qui merito omnium antea a nobis factorum vel nobis divino numine inspiratorum videatur esse religiosa pietate divinior), neither our title nor Augustine (ike some other witnesses) show any specific knowledge of the title A6yoS tiXLtog. We must conclude either that AscL's original had already lost its title or that at some stage in the ms. transmission a tide was constructed deriving from the content. The first hypothesis seems quite improbable, if we must return to the c. 2 for a A6toy T?XItoq (as some think possible) and imagine (so H., though he acknowledges the date is early) that it immediately attracted the eclec- tic curiosity of Apuleius (p. 292). Likewise, the apocalyptic tone, which for Wigtil75 seems to indicate some lapse of time between original and trans- lation, does not bother H. (p. 296), who simply refers to Met. 11, where, however, there is nothing comparably apocalyptic present in the text. Were the original Ao6yo' xrxeito c. 2 (difficult!), then we would have to suppose it had lost its real title at some point between Apuleius and Augustine, and had acquired another substituted by conjecture. If, though, Ascl. had been preserved among Apuleius' works, so as to reach Augustine alongside De deo S., it could hardly have escaped attribution to Apuleius, except on the unlikely hypothesis of some anonymous copyist or librarian well acquainted with the conventions of Hermetic titulature! If, however, Ascl. belongs to a Hermetic context, then the composite title is explicable, on both the hypotheses advanced. Augustine had good reason (the Manichaean link) for associating Ascl. and Apuleius; no trace of any such reason is present elsewhere. That removes H.'s a priori arguments, such as Apuleius' interest in the mysteries (cf. Apol. 55, but note too the plangores relished by Aegyptia numina at De deo S. 14 ? 148f., contrasted with the mysteriorum silentia, ib., and with the spread of the Hermetic 'Word'), some links with magic in Ascl. (H., p. 293 with n. 31), an interest in Mercury (Apol. 63; 31; 48; H., p. 294) and in Aesculapius (Flor. 18, 37; Apol. 55; De deo S. 15 ? 154). Although we might at that point wonder whether the different ways in which the two deities are mentioned in Ascl. and Apuleius do not assume a certain importance. Let us think now about literary definitions. When Apuleius, at Flor. 9, 27-9 declares the variety of his interests, offering a list (incomplete: haec et alia) of the genres he has attempted, tam graece quam latine, he also men- tions dialogos laudatos philosophis. And why, asks H. (p. 296), should not Ascl. have come under this heading? Unverifiable: comprehensible, yes, but 75 (1984) 2284. 409 MARIATERESA HORSFALL SCOTTI incompatible with the way Ascl. refers to itself: as divinus sermo (1); religio- sissimus senno (ib.); tractatus (ib., bis): to publish this tractatus as common knowl- edge (multorum conscientia), tota numinis maiestate plenissimus as it is, would be a mark of impiety: explicitly, therefore, for a circle of adepts. Note also tractatus, again (10), disputatio (7) and (8) audi ergo, Asclepi: this call shows that disputatio implies not a general discussion but the intellectual difficulty of the topic (whence too conquirere, ch. 7). In the same direction, moreover, the adlocuta of the inscriptio. Apuleius, 'Apuleian' or later: problems of idiom Given the fragility of the 'external' arguments for Apuleian authorship, discussion of the translator's technique and of certain linguistic features likewise does not favour the conclusions H. draws-not without original and provocative propositions. In principle, H. is right, as I have said (p. 398), to claim against me that Apuleius' exuberance of expression may admit terms hitherto unknown, which later appear in Christian texts: but we can- not resolve a question of abstract possibility. In positive terms, 'Apuleian affinities' and the general lines of the lexicographical argument require careful clarification. As for the translation's technique, "free translation" (H., p. 295), to bring Ascl. into harmony with De mundo, is hardly decisive: the freedom of the De mundo is quite another matter.76 In his comparison of the last prayer of Ascl. (41) with the text of pap. Mimaut (where the adaptation to magical ends is notable), Moreschini observes the general fidelity of the Latin ver- sion, which underlines expressions of religious piety.77 In the De mundo a bare dozen phrases translated literally have been noted, while leaps of expression have eliminated some 1/5 of the Greek, though the overall bulk is much lengthened by additions, literary echoes, and superfluous refinements of sound and rhythm.78 In Ascl. there are some efforts after refinement, well noted by H. (p. 297), but with excessive insistence on their presumed 'Apuleian' provenance. H. mentions, as a case of divergence from the orig- inal and (likewise) evidence for Apuleius' hand, a passage (Ascl. 21) less than convincing: we do not have the original and cannot assess the trans- lator's interpretation! In any case, if something can be said, the content is 76 Cf. 397 above. 77 Moreschini (1985) 79f. 78 Beaujeu (1973) 113f. 410 THE ASCLEPIUS THOUGHTS ON A RE-OPENED DEBATE consistent and the use of euphemistic language to describe the sexual union of man and woman is entirely in keeping with the strongly marked mys- tic vision of the act. H.'s reference to Apol 33-4 (p. 295) for the ability "to create decent and chaste Latin words" is off course, given the long lit- erary tradition of sexual euphemism (vd. Adams). From these chapters there emerges a taste for language anatomical (interfeminium), unusual, entic- ing (veretilla79/virginal, later defined, despite the struggle for modesty, manina obscena).80 When Apuleius refers to the accusation hic etiam pro gravitate vitio mihi vortebat, quod me nec sordidiora dicere honeste pigeret, he probably adds ho- neste to the charge, transforming the attack (alleged impropriety of the object mentioned)8' into paradox (his honestas, not likely to have been admitted by his accusers). This lawyer's joke on his own skill in delicate treatment of risque topics hardly serves to claim as Apuleian (so H.) a passage of dis- tinctly different character. If the 'eroticism' of Ascl. had a more colourful tone and richer imagery (it does not), we might want to compare it rather with the loftily unchaste Anechomenos.82 Passing to idiom, H. notes a series of "new or rare" words, formed with prefixes or suffixes that Apuleius likes: careful enquiry undoubtedly damps the enthusiasm and somewhat points out a distance (cf. also supra, p. 398). None of the five instances of dispensator is in the practical sense of "admin- istrator" found at Mund. 26 ? 347 (dispensatores pecuniae); they refer rather to divinities or vital forces, such as the sun or the world (29; 30) and are close to usage in Tertullian and later.83 In one of the two cases in ch. 27, d. is linked with distributor. for H., a sign of originality, but distributor is an attribute of godhead from Jerome and Augustine.84 In ch. 29 it follows frequentator, the latter used in the grammarian Servius and bis in Isidore, Orig.:85 does that look like Apuleian originality? Note too frequentatio, quater: ch. 9, as Servius, Augustine (and others) in the sense of "frequent action"; the other passages (ch. 3 is the oddest) bear the sense of "accessio, con- 79 As H. himself remarks ((1997) on Apol. 34, 5), the term is linked to veretrum, a rare term for the male organ. 80 Cf. spuria etfascina at ch. 35, with H.'s note (1997) II 113. 81 Primarily, Venus' pose, as H. (on Apol 34, 1) guesses, but the charge of sordidiora seems to stretch at will to the fish his opponent has such trouble in naming. 82 Anech. 9 dant crebros ictus is no basis for a connexion; cf. SJ. Harrison, Henn. 120 (1992) 83ff. 83 Gudeman, Thes.lL. V, 1, 1401, 5ff. 84 Vetter, Thes.l.L V, 1, 1549, 66ff. 85 Vollmer, Thes.l.L VI, 1305, 46ff. 411 MARIATERESA HORSFALL SCOTTI ventio frequens", not found before the Panegyrici.86 Vutritor (ch. 27) is clas- sical (e.g. Stat. Theb. 10, 228);87 imitator bis in AscL, in the once common sense (so Cic.)88 of "qui aemulatur" at Ascl. 8, in a subtler sense (implying the reproduction of a model), but not rare at all,89 at Ascl. 33. Validitas (Ascl. 33) is found in Ambrose90 in the same sense of physical strength; Apuleius uses valetudo! Rotunditas (Ascl. 17; 40) is far from significant: found indeed at De deo S. prol. 3 ? 108, but also in authors as Vitruvius or Pliny the Elder.91 Though instances of multfarius (Ascl. 12) begin from Itala (Eph. 3, 10), and continue through-e.g.-Tertullian (of sapientia Dei, which Jerome calls multiplex)92 and Irenaeus (1, 4, 1 = 1, 7, 7H),93 multifornis is perfectly classical: Ascl. 3494 uses it just as does Cic. (Acad. 1, 26), of qualitates, in conjunction with variae.95 Omnformis is trickier: quinquies in Ascl., twice (19 and 35) with a sense the context suggests to be active (the diversifying role of the divine power's fonae);96 aside from this isolated sense, which reflects the translator's perplexity when faced by an ambiguity in the original's tavTx6,oppog, it is used elsewhere of species (3 and 34) or imagines (36), and analogies exist in-e.g.-Chalcidius,97 Prudentius (Perist. 10, 33998 of machina, that is mundus, a divine creation like the species of Ascl. 34)99 and Paulinus of Nola (Epist. 8, 3), who uses it of the divine harmony. As elsewhere, significant analogies not just of form but of content. H. might have found interesting the use of receptrix and restitutrix (Ascl. 2: terra sola in se ipsa 86 U. Leo, 7hes.LL VI, 1304, 40f. 87 PHI 5.3 s.v. 88 0. Prinz, Thes.LL. VII, 1, 431, 70ff. 89 Ib. 432, 24ff 90 Ambr. Abr. 2, 11, 84 refers to the male (virili validitate) and not to corpora in general. 9' PHI 5.3 s.v. 92 Hier. Eph. 2, PL 26, 515A multiplex quippe sapientia Dei, quae sermone Graeco roAXvoAOiK'1o et, ut ita dicam, multifari appellatur. 93 Gruber, Thes.lL. VIII, 1583, 81ff. 94 ... et variae et multiformes qualitates. 95 ... variae ortae sunt et quasi multformes qualitates. Cf. Gruber, Thes.l.L VIII, 1585, 55ff. 96 Ascl. 19 horum (sc. Horoscoporum) ouotiapXq vel princeps est quem navco6oppov vel omni- formem vocant, qui diversis speciebus diversas formas facit; Ascl. 35 sed immutatur ille omntformis quem diximus deus. 97 Cf. Baer, Thes.LL IX, 2, 590, 43ff. 98 Verbo creavit omniformem machinam. 99 With Ascl. 3 mundus autem praeparatus est a deo receptaculum omnformium specierum; cf. ib. 34: Omnia enim ab eo et in ipso et per ipsum (sc. deum)... et omniformes species etc. 412 THE ASCLEPIUS: THOUGHTS ON A RE-OPENED DEBATE consistens omnium est receptrix omniumque generum, quae accepit, restitutrix): the first is used similarly in Mund. 19 ? 333 (receptrixque sit naturarum..., of civilis ratio), while the three instances in the Verines imply complicity:'00 it seems, though, that in Cicero the dependent genitives (furtorum ac praedarum) inten- sify a term whose more neutral use cannot be an Apuleian invention. There is epigraphic evidence for restitutrix, in the sense of "restorer";'?0 the verb restituo ("return") is found in Plautus, Cicero, Livy...:102 a range which reduces the allegedly Apuleians originality of the 'coinage'. Irrationabilitas (ch. 26 inreliio, inordinatio, i.) deserves separate discussion; H. (n. 56) draws attention to "a typical phrase with three very rare words, closely parallel to the Apuleian adjectives inrelgiosus, inordinatus and irra- tionabilis". The analogy looks good, but is by no means decisive: inreligiosus is attested in Pliny'03 and is common in Christian authors;'04 inordinatus is found in Cicero, Twnaeus and Livy, not to mention post-Apuleian texts;'05 irrationabilis runs from Quintilian to the Christians.106 Inreligio is the rarest of these words: Thes.l.L. notes two c. 4-5 instances;'07 for inordinatio, Schmidt in Thes.LL. suggests the parallel of Plat. 2, 17 ? 244 iniuriam inordinatam pas- sionem et aegritudinem mentis esse ait: distinctly limited and circumscribed, as against the general censure suggested in Ascl., which we find again in later texts, from Ambrosiaster on.108 Of the eighteen words H. indicates, only three are not attested else- where: alongside praestitor,'09 is the hapax tributor, used of mundus (ch. 27, governing omnium quae mortalibus videntur bona); likewise ambitudo (ch. 31 tern- pus autem, quod definiri potest vel numero vel alternatione vel alterius per ambitudinem reditu, aetenum est. note the translator's pursuit of the one unambiguous term, corresponding to Virgil's nomina mill.) and omninominis (ch. 20, in paradoxical opposition to in-nominis). Clearly, no precise conclusions: not so much 'Apuleian' inventivity as the translator's need to find precise equivalents. 100 Cic. Verr. 2, 4, 17; 4, 150; 5, 160 (Messana .. praedarum ac firtorum receptrix, etc.). Il0 OLD cites-e.g.-Ann. Epigr. 26, 89 Isidi reginae restitutrici salutis suae. 102 OLD s.v. restituo, ? 8. 103 Plin. Ep. 4, 1, 5. '4 Ruhstaller, Thes..L. VII, 2, 395, 80ff. 105 Schmidt, Thes..L. VII, 1, 1759, 31ff. 106 Ruhstaller, Thes.LL. VII, 2, 384, 76ff. o07 Passages of Eusebius of Emesa and of the Opus imperf. in Matth.: cf. Ruhstaller, Th..L. VII, 2, 395, 14ff. 108 Thes.LL. VII, 1, 1759, Iff. 109 Thes.l.L X, 2, 902, 66ff (Pade): instances in Marius Victorinus and Rufinus. 413 MARIATERESA HORSFALL SCOTTI Another perplexing comparison concerns the metaphorical sense of glutinum: at Anechomenos 12 in the phrase Veneris glutino and at Ascl. 39 haec itaque eiLappdevr et necessitas ambae sibi invicem individuo conexae sunt glutino. Really, this is closer to Cypr. Epist 66, 8: cohaerentium sibi invicem sacerdotum glutino copulata (sc. ecclesia).1"0 Depon. auxiliari (Ascl. 38) can hardly be called "Apuleian" just because rare; called "cotidiani sermonis vox" by Munscher (Thes.l.L.), it is found in a range of authors, from republican to Christian."' Nor can the presence of archaic optatives (vocassis, Ascl. 1; putassis, Ascl. 38) reasonably be taken as pointing to Apuleius: they raise the tone and carry a legal solemnity."2 H. offers a list of "Apuleian favourites" (p. 298 with n. 56). Singillatim once in Ascl.; sexies in the rest of Apuleius (including once in the Iepi epPlTveit0;). And what of 17 instances in Cicero, not to mention a gener- ous spread in-e.g.-Caesar, Tacitus, Suetonius?"3 The case of curiositas, a real key-word in Met., is more interesting, and the issue is not simple: the word appears once in Cic. Att.,"4 and is therefore not an Apuleian coinage; common too in Tertullian, sometimes in a negative sense."5 The con- demnation found at Ascl. 14 is also found in the Corpus Hermeticum."6 The sharp distinction between vera, pura sanctaque philosophia and sophistarum cal- liditas which "deceives" men and instils in the spirit an importuna curiositas is hardly in keeping with what Flor. retails in favour of the Sophists."7 As for omnifariam (ch. 16), is the figure of 4 instances in Apuleius, as against one in Gellius and one in Tertullian,"8 really significant? If pass. vege- tar is found in Gellius,"l9 viduani is in Horace and Columella;'20 perfruor is '10 Blatt in Thes.Ll. VI, 2, 2117, Iff. "' Minscher, Thes..L. II, 1616, 78ff. 112 Cf. Leumann, Laut- u. Formenlehre (1977), 222. Cetedoc offers Ambr. Fid. 1, 11 (averruncassit), and a number of late hagiographic texts. "3 PHI 5.3 s.v. 114 Cic. At. 2, 12, 2. 115 Cf. J.H. Waszink, ed. Tert. De anima, 107f.; for curiositas in Apul. Met., cf. Antonie Wlosok's illuminating pages Zur Einheit der Metamorphosen des Apuleius, Philol. 113 (1969) 71ff., now in English translation: (ed. SJ. Harrison) Oxford readings in the Roman novel (Oxford 1999) 142ff 116 Nock (1945) 370, n. 122. 17 Cf. Flor. 9, 15ff. (esp. 9, 24) and 18, 19 on Hippias and Protagoras; amusing, at 18, 21ff, the subtle dialectic struggle between the latter and a pupil keen to astutia. 118 Baer, Thes..LL IX, 2, 589, 20ff "9 Gell. 17, 2, 1. 120 Hor. C. 2, 9, 8, Colum. Arb. 1, 5, 1 and ter in the R.R. (PHI s.v.). 414 THE ASCLEPIUS. THOUGHTS ON A RE-OPENED DEBATE common in Cicero, Livy, Valerius Maximus, Seneca Ep. and Pliny.121 Against medela once in Ascl. (m. vitiorum, ch. 22),122 H. sets ten instances in Apuleius: but the transferred sense occurs only at Met. 10, 19, 3 and also-e.g.-in Gellius (20, 1, 22), in Tertullian and often thereafter.123 So too, proximitas (bis in Ascl., bis in Apuleius): there are cases in Vitruvius and Quintilian, as also in Terentianus Maurus and Servius.'24 Conclusions To conclude: obliged though we are to H. for the intellectual challenge offered, his argument, not lacking in interest and appeal, does not unfor- tunately convince; unless I am much mistaken, it does not hold in the face of a linguistic analysis (in addition to other details): sadly systematic and traditional it may be, but the Ergastulum's training is not soon forgotten, nor safely thrown over.125 BIBLIOGRAPHY Editions and commentaries Apuleius: J. Beaujeu: Apulee, Opuscules philosophiques (Du dieu de Socrate, Platon et sa doctrine, Du monde) et fagments (Paris 1973); G.F. Hildebrand: L. Apuleii Opera omnia ...), I-II (Leipzig 1842); V. Hunink: Apuleius of Madauros, Pro se de magia (Apologia), I-II (Amsterdam 1997); C. Moreschini: Apulei Platonici Madaurensis Opera quae supersunt, IIIe De philosophia libri (Stuttgart-Leipzig 1991) (including Asclepius). Asclepius: A.D. Nock - A.-J. Festugiere: Corpus Hermeticum. Tome II (Paris 1945), 257-401; W. Scott - A.S. Ferguson: Hermetica. The ancient Greek and Latin writings which contain religious or philosophic teachings ascribed to Hermes Trismegistos, III (Oxford 1926). Other references J.N. Adams, The Latin Sexual Vocabulary (London 1982); M. Bernhard, Der Stil des Apuleius von Madaura. Ein Beitrag zur Stilistik des Spatlateins (Stuttgart 1927); 121 Delhey, Thes.LL X, 1, 1409, Iff. 122 Thes.l.L. VIII, 518, 49f. notes the interesting parallel with Chalc. Comm. 267, p. 298, 10. 123 Thes.LL. VIII, 518, 45ff. 124 PHI 5.3 s.v. 125 I thank my husband Nicholas Horsfall for translating and editing the Italian original. 415 MARIATERESA HORSFALL SCOTI L. Delatte, S. Govaerts, J. Denooz, Index du Corpus Henneticum (Lessico intellettuale europeo 13) (Roma 1977); J.P. Festugiire, La rivdtation d'Hemrs T?ismngiste, I-IV (Paris 1944, 1949, 1953, 1954); B.L. Hijmans Jr., Apuleius Philosophus Platonicus, AArRW II, 36, 1 (1987) 395- 475; M. Horsfall Scotti, Apuleio tra magia e filosofia: la riscoperta di Agostino, Dicti studiosus. Scitti difilotogia offerti a Scevola Mariotti dai suoi allievi (Urbino 1990); V. Hunink, The Prologue of Apuleius' "De Deo Socratis", Mnem. s. IV, 48 (1995), 292-312; V. Hunink, Apuleius and the "Ascdepius", frig. Christ. 50 (1996), 288-308; W. Kroll, Hermes Tnismegistos, RE, VIII, 792-823; J. Kroll, Die Lehren des Hermes Trismegistos (Beitrage zur Geschichte der Philosophie des Mittelalters 12) (Munster 1914); J.P. Mahe, La pri&ee d'action de graces du codex VI de Nag Hamadi et le "Discours Parfait", ZPE 3 (1974), 40-60; A. Marchetta, L'autenticit4 apulsiana del "De mundo" (L'Aquila-Roma 1991); C. Moreschini, Dall' 'Asclepius" al "Crater Hermetis". Studi sull'ermetismo latino tardo- antico e rinascimentale (Pisa 1985) (including text and translation of the Asclepius); W.A. Oldfather, H.V. Canter, B.E. Perry, Index Apuleianus, Middletown, CT 1934; F. Regen, Apueius philosophus Platonicus. Untersuchurgen zur 'Apologie" ("De magia") und zu "De mundo" (Berlin/New York 1971); R. Reitzenstein, Zum Asclepius des Pseudo-Apuleius, ARW 7 (1904), 393-441; D. Wigtil, Incorrect Apocalyptic: the Hermetic "Asclepius" as an improvement on the Greek original, ANRW II, 17, 4 (1984) 2282-97. Dipartimento di filologia greca e latina. MARIATERESA HORSFALL SCOrrI UniversitA di Roma "La Sapienza". via Roma libera 10 sc. A int. 26 00153 ROMA (Italia) 416
Neville Goddard Master Course to Manifest Your Desires Into Reality Using The Law of Attraction: Learn the Secret to Overcoming Your Current Problems and Limitations, Attaining Your Goals, and Achieving Health, Wealth, Happiness and Success!