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← ExitStobaeus, Volume I

Reading language

Book I Chapter 53

Chapter 53 · Hearing

On hearing.²⁰¹⁶

1 · Cartilage suspended like a bell

⟨Aëtius.⟩

Empedocles holds that hearing occurs when a current of air strikes the cartilage, which he says hangs inside the ear, swinging and being struck like a bell.²⁰¹⁷

2 · The resonant hollow of the ear

Alcmaeon holds that we hear by means of the empty space inside the ear: this is what resounds when air enters, for all hollow things give out sound.²⁰¹⁸

3 · Air within the head

Diogenes holds that hearing occurs when the air in the head is struck and moved by sound.²⁰¹⁹

4 · Transmission to the governing parts

The followers of Plato hold that the air in the head is struck, then reflected back to the governing parts, and that the perception of hearing arises.²⁰²⁰

5.1 · The causes of hearing

Plato, in the Timaeus.

“For those investigating the perceptive part in us concerned with hearing, we must state the causes of the affections that occur in it.”²⁰²¹

5.2 · Sound and its movement through the body

“In general, then, let us define sound as a blow delivered by air through the ears to the brain and blood and transmitted as far as the soul; and hearing as the movement caused by that blow, beginning in the head and ending around the seat of the liver.”²⁰²²

5.3 · Pitch, texture, and loudness

“When this movement is swift, let us call the sound high-pitched; when slower, lower-pitched; when even, smooth; when the opposite, rough; when abundant, loud; and when the opposite, soft. Their concords must be discussed among the matters to be treated later.”²⁰²³

2016.The heading is absent from the witnesses FPL and supplied by the editor from Photius p. 112b32 and the Laurentian table of contents. The chapter brings together accounts of impact, resonance, and transmission. Decimal subdivisions within the longer excerpts are modern aids to comparison.

2017.The supplied Latin attribution covers excerpts 1-4: Aëtius IV.16.1-4, Diels p. 406, line 16. Pneuma here is a current or movement of air. The comparison is specifically to a suspended bell. Chondros is rendered cartilage without identifying it with a particular structure in modern anatomy.

2018.The explanation appeals to the resonance of a hollow space. Kenon here is the cavity within the ear; the following reference to entering air does not warrant treating it as an absolute vacuum. Diēchoun describes its sounding through or resounding.

2019.The Greek is an abbreviated report: hearing occurs is understood from the chapter’s subject. Phōnē can mean voice or sound; sound is used here because the mechanism is stated generally. No further account of the movement or its destination survives in this sentence.

2020.The attribution is to Plato’s followers. Anaklasthai suggests reflection or a bending back. The plural hēgemonika, governing parts, is retained rather than replaced with a single ruling faculty or a modern anatomical designation.

2021.The edition identifies Timaeus 67a-c. The printed opening to de, the part, and epizētousi, investigating, differ from the readings triton de, third, and episkopousi reported for Plato in the apparatus. The translation follows this printing and smooths its word order. Pathēmata are affections or experiences undergone by the perceptive part.

2022.The genitives brain and blood are taken as naming what receives the blow; air is its agent, and transmission reaches the soul. The report distinguishes the physical impact called sound from the resulting movement called hearing. The liver remains part of this ancient bodily account and is not replaced with a modern auditory destination.

2023.The English makes explicit the compressed connection between movement and the sound characterized by it. Oxys and barys concern pitch here; megas and smikros concern loudness. Symphōnia means concord or consonance. The closing promise of later treatment belongs to the quoted work. This completes chapter 53.