La tradizione indiretta dei frammenti 390 e 391 R. dei Manteis di Sofocle da Alessandria a Bisanzio (con un sondaggio sul cod. Lips. gr. 2)

Abstract

This article sets out to reconstruct the long and intricate road which has brought down to us two Sophoclean trimeters containing the proper name Πολύϊδος and once featuring in this poet’s now lost play Manteis (frr. 390 and 391 in Radt’s edition). Its main contention is that the two lines were selected for quotation – and thus saved from oblivion – by the grammarian Aelius Herodianus (2nd c. AD); he included them in his discussion of the correct spelling of Πολύϊδος (with ι, not with ει) in his lost work Orthography. It is argued that Herodianus’ entry on Πολύϊδος built on previous Alexandrian scholarship (now largely lost) on the seer’s name and that it was, in its turn, used as a source, direct and/or indirect, by the Byzantine testimonies of the Sophoclean fragments. While trying to demonstrate this, the article revives R. Reitzenstein’s old hypothesis that portions of Herodian’s Orthography are reflected in the orthographic palimpsest known as Lips. 2.