βουθερεῖ: only here. Hesychius gives the right sense,—“ἐν ᾧ βόες θέρους ὥρᾳ νέμονται”. A poet might feel that a simple compound of “βοῦς” and “θέρος” would suffice for a picturesque epithet of “λειμών”: i.e., ‘the meadow of the oxen's summer’ would readily suggest ‘the meadow which is the summer pasture of oxen.’ Those who object to such a compound seem to try it by the standard of prose.—Hesychius adds to his explanation of “βουθερεῖ”: “καὶ βουθόρῳ τὸ αὐτό”. Wecklein adopts this, as=‘in which oxen jump about’: but surely they must be “οἰστροπλῆγες” to behave so. The word occurs only in Aesch. Suppl.301“βουθόρῳ ταύρῳ” (=qui vaccam salit).—The “λειμών” was in the plain of Malis, between Trachis and the Malian Gulf: cp. 194 n.
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Sophocles: The Plays and Fragments, with critical notes, commentary, and translation in English prose. Part V: The Trachiniae. Sir Richard C. Jebb. Cambridge. Cambridge University Press. 1902.
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