From the book
Stobaeus, Volume II
John Stobaeus · Diotimos Editions · 2026
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At a Glance
- The wordThe family uses interweaving to explain how names and verbs form a statement. An ordered string of one class alone does not yet accomplish that work.
- In StobaeusThe Sophist distinguishes mere naming from an utterance that says something about action, inaction or being through a suitable combination of verbal elements.
- In this editionCombination explains the relation plainly; interweaving preserves its image. Mere sequence is insufficient, and not every arbitrary joining of words becomes a statement.
- A place to readChapter 4 · Excerpt 17 · Passage 3 Read the movement from a list of animal names to a smallest statement, where mixing a name with a verb makes an assertion possible.
- English renderings
- combination; interweaving; verbal weave
Meaning
Sumplokē is an interweaving or combination; sumplekein is to interweave, and plegma the resulting weave. The Sophist excerpt makes this image explain how speech achieves more than separate naming.
Use in the book
Names alone and verbs alone fail to produce a statement, even in orderly succession. When names and verbs fit together, their combination says something concerning what is or occurs. “A human being learns” supplies the minimal example. The sequel explains that this weave makes something clear about present, developing, past or future matters. Its unity is meaningful, not just acoustic continuity. The discussion returns at the end to the distinction between signs that fit and those that do not, so combination must be appropriate rather than an arbitrary joining of any words whatsoever.
The example is deliberately minimal. A list such as lion, deer and horse names possible agents but does not yet make clear what any agent does or is. Mixing names with verbs changes the utterance’s function, rather than simply increasing its length. The edition’s example, “a human being learns” (Chapter 4 · Excerpt 17 · Passage 3), supplies an agent and an activity in a single statement. The response accepts this as first and smallest. The passage thus analyzes what a statement accomplishes before evaluating the truth of any particular claim.
Places to read
Translation in this edition
Combination is clear in analysis; interweaving preserves the governing metaphor. Do not reduce the expression to a sequence, since mere sequence is precisely what the examples show insufficient.
συμπλοκὴ
Attested. Chapter 4 · Excerpt 17 · Passage 3; Wachsmuth II, printed p. 32.
λόγος ἐγένετο εὐθὺς ἡ τοιαύτη συμπλοκὴ
πλέγματι
Attested. Chapter 4 · Excerpt 17 · Passage 4; Wachsmuth II, printed p. 32.
τῷ πλέγματι τούτῳ τὸ ὄνομα ἐπεφθεγξάμεθα λόγον
Source note
Wachsmuth, volume II, printed p. 32. The lexical family is grouped transparently here. Its linguistic use differs from a physical composition of bodies, even where English combination could describe either.