ἀλλ᾽ αὐτόν: εἰσὶ, etc., is the traditional reading, on which ἀλλ᾽ αὑτόν was a variant, adapted, seemingly, to the fatuous interpretation, “"Nay, you will hurt yourself"” (see cr. n.). It is a robust faith which can accept ἀλλ᾽ αὐτόν as an aposiopesis. ἀλλ᾽ ἔασον, "Nay, allow (him to come)," is perhaps the best remedy, since we can suppose αὐτόν to have been an explanatory gloss which supplanted the verb. For the synizesis cp. O. T. 1451 “ἀλλ᾽ ἔα με”, n. ἀλλ᾽ ἔα αὐτόν as = uu- is surely impossible for tragedy. Musgrave's ἀλλ᾽ εἶξον is intrinsically preferable to either, but leaves the corruption unexplained. I had thought of αἰδοῦ νιν ("have compassion on him"). If “αὐτόν” had supplanted “νιν, ΑΙΔ” might have become “ΑΛΛ”.
This text is part of:
Sophocles: The Plays and Fragments, with critical notes, commentary, and translation in English prose. Part II: The Oedipus Coloneus. Sir Richard C. Jebb. Cambridge. Cambridge University Press. 1899.
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