J. Adam, A. M. Adam, Commentary on Plato, Protagoras
J. Adam & A. M. Adam, Ed.

62. οἶμαι δὲ καὶ Πρόδικον τὸν Κεῖον. Contrast Crat. 402B οἶμαι δὲ καὶ Ἡσίοδος. Either construction is admissible. Prodicus of Ceos is repeatedly mentioned in the Platonic writings. A fellow-citizen of the poet Simonides (below, 339E, he professed like Gorgias and Hippias to educate young men (Apol. 19E, Theages, 127E, Rep. X. 600C) and received very large sums in return for his instruction together with the gratitude of his pupils. On one occasion, when in charge of a political mission from Ceos, he is said to have won great reputation in the βουλή at Athens for his conduct of public business, and to have given at the same time private lectures, which were popular and well paid (Hipp. Maior, 282C). He laid great stress on the importance of using words in their correct sense (ὀρθότης ὀνομάτων): see below, 337A 358A and Euthyd. 277E, Charm. 163D, Lach. 197D; cf. also Phaedr. 267B; but this was only taught (we are told) in his 50-drachma lecture; the impecunious Socrates had only paid one drachma and was not quite master of this subject (Crat. 384B). Socrates is fond of professing himself a pupil of Prodicus, e.g. below, 341A Meno, 96D, Charm. 163D. Prodicus wrote eulogies of Heracles and others (Symp. 177B): the substance, if not the actual words, of his Apologue of Heracles at the cross-roads is given by Xenophon, Mem. II. 1. 21. A scholiast on Rep. X. 600C says the Athenians put him to death by hemlock for corrupting the youth, but there is no other authority for this unlikely story. Cf. Zeller, I⁴, 952 ff.