Diotimos Library · Greek Antiquity Collection · Bilingual Edition
Stobaeus, Volume II
Greek and English with an introduction and explanatory footnotes.
Explore the LexiconSwipe or use the arrow keys.
Facing Pages · Branch 45 of 516
Book II Chapter 4 · II.4.15.1–II.4.15.2
Ancient Greek
p. 86Πλάτωνος ἐκ τοῦ Φιλήβου
Ἐπειδὴ φωνὴν ἄπειρον κατενόησεν, εἴτε τις θεός, εἴτε καὶ θεῖος ἄνθρωπος, ὡς ὁ λόγος ἐν Αἰγύπτῳ Θεὺθ τινὰ τοῦτον γενέσθαι λέγων, ὃς πρῶτος τὰ φωνήεντα ἐν τῷ ἀπείρῳ κατενόησεν, οὐχ ἓν ὄντα, ἀλλὰ πλείω· καὶ πάλιν ἕτερα, φωνῆς μὲν οὔ, φθόγγου δὲ μετέχοντα τινός, ἀριθμὸν δέ τινα καὶ τούτων εἶναι· τρίτον δὲ εἶδος γραμμάτων διεστήσατο τὰ νῦν λεγόμενα ἄφωνα ἡμῖν· τὸ μετὰ τοῦτο διῄρει τά τε ἄφθογγα καὶ ἄφωνα μέχρι καὶ ἑνὸς ἑκάστου καὶ τὰ φωνήεντα καὶ τὰ μέσα κατὰ τὸν ⟨αὐτὸν⟩ τρόπον, ἕως ἀριθμὸν αὐτῶν λαβὼν ἑνί τε ἑκάστῳ καὶ ξύμπασι στοιχεῖον ἐπωνόμασε.
Πλάτωνος ἐκ τοῦ Φιλήβου · συνέχεια
Καθορῶν δὲ ὡς οὐδεὶς ἡμῶν οὐδ’ ἂν ἓν αὐτὸ καθ’ αὐτὸ ἄνευ πάντων αὐτῶν μάθοι, τοῦτον τὸν δεσμὸν αὖ λογισάμενος ὡς ὄντα ἕνα καὶ πάντα ταῦτα ἓν πως ποιοῦντα, μίαν ἐπ’ αὐτοῖς ὡς οὖσαν γραμματικὴν τέχνην ἐπεφθέγξατο προσειπών.
Stobaeus, Volume II: Book II Chapter 4
p. 87Plato from the Philebus · 1
When vocal sound was recognized as unlimited, whether by a god or a divine man—whom the Egyptian story calls a certain Theuth—he first discerned that the vowels within this unlimited range were more than one. He also discerned others which partook not of voice but of a certain sound, and that these too had a definite number. As a third class of letters he distinguished what we now call mutes. Next he divided the soundless, voiceless letters down to each individual one, and the vowels and the intermediate sounds in the ⟨same⟩ way, until, having grasped their number, he gave each and all the name “element.”112
Plato from the Philebus · 2
Seeing that none of us could learn even one of them by itself without all the others, and reckoning in turn that this bond was one and somehow made all of them one, he declared that there was a single art concerned with them, and named it the art of letters.113
Socrates
Reading Stobaeus, Volume II · Book II Chapter 4 · II.4.15.1–II.4.15.2
Ask about a concept, passage, contradiction, or connection.
Socrates will begin with this book and its sources.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.