Stobaeus, Volume II

Name: Stobaeus, Volume II
Author: John Stobaeus

Greek and English with an introduction and explanatory footnotes.

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Stobaeus, Volume IIBook II Chapter 8 · II.8.42.14–II.8.42.15

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Book II Chapter 8 · II.8.42.14–II.8.42.15

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Ancient Greek

p. 632

Πορφυρίου — συνέχεια

II.8.42.14

Εἰ μή τις τὴν μὲν κατὰ τὴν σπορὰν ὡροσκοπίαν τοῦ ἀνθρώπου ἢ κυνὸς ἑλέσθαι ἐμφαίνειν τὸν κλῆρον εἴποι, τὴν δὲ τῆς ἐκ γαστρὸς ἐκτροπῆς ὡροσκοπίαν τοῦ δευτέρου βίου καὶ ἐπὶ τῷ προαιρεθέντι ἐνδεικνύναι τὴν αἵρεσιν.

Πορφυρίου — συνέχεια

II.8.42.15

Ἀλλ’ ὅτι μὲν ἐκ τῶν παρ’ Αἰγυπτίοις παραδεδομένων ἡ τοῦ μύθου πλάσις ἐσκευώρηται, συγχωρήσειεν ἄν τις· εἰ δὲ κατ’ αὐτὰ τὰ νοήματα κατὰ μέρος τῷ Πλάτωνι διεσκευάσθη, χαλεπὸν τὸ ἀποφήνασθαι.

Stobaeus, Volume II: Book II Chapter 8

p. 633

Porphyry continued

II.8.42.14

Or someone might say that horoscopic observation at conception reveals the lot for choosing a human life or a dog’s,⁸⁸⁵ while horoscopic observation at emergence from the womb indicates the choice of the secondary life in addition to the one already chosen.⁸⁸⁶

Porphyry continued

II.8.42.15

But one might concede that the shaping of the myth drew upon traditions handed down among the Egyptians. Whether Plato elaborated it in detail according to these very conceptions, however, is difficult to pronounce upon.⁸⁸⁷

885.Εἰ μή τις, unless someone should say, introduces an alternative to the preceding account. The English Or someone might say conveys that qualification without turning it into an unqualified doctrine. Σπορά is conception, literally sowing; emergence from the womb follows ἐκ γαστρὸς ἐκτροπή.

886.Ὡροσκοπία concerns determining or observing the ascendant. The alternative assigns different roles to the observations at conception and birth: the primary kind of life and the secondary life added to it. Compare Ptolemy’s On Conception and Birth (Tetrabiblos III.2 in Hübner’s edition; included in III.1 in Robbins’s). That discussion also distinguishes the two occasions for astrological judgment, but does not establish an identical doctrine or direct dependence.

887.This explicit reservation limits the whole proposed parallel. Porphyry distinguishes a possible Egyptian background for the shaping of the myth from the harder claim that Plato followed the particular astrological conceptions just set out. Neither the concession nor the final uncertainty warrants presenting that detailed derivation as established history.

About This Reading Edition

The complete surviving text of Stobaeus’s second book, through II.46.22, in Ancient Greek and English, with an introduction and 1,541 explanatory notes. All forty-six chapter headings remain, including the notices for chapters whose texts are missing.

Historical Text and Translation

Greek: Curt Wachsmuth, Ioannis Stobaei Anthologii libri duo priores, volumen II (Berlin: Weidmann, 1884), printed p. 1 and pp. 3–264. The supplied edition preserves consequential editorial signs, reconstructed joins, qualified attributions, and missing-text notices. English translation, introduction, and explanatory notes: Diotimos Editions, 2026.

About Diotimos Editions

This historical edition credits Diotimos Editions as its English translator.

Rights

Stobaeus’s ancient Greek work and Wachsmuth’s 1884 edition are in the public domain. The supplied English translation, introduction, and explanatory notes are published with the site owner’s authorization.