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προσκεφαλαίου τε καὶ δίφρου: virtually a hendiadys, as Hartman remarks, comparing Homer Il. IX 200 εἷσεν δ᾽ ἐν κλισμοῖσι τάπησί τε πορφυρέοισιν. It is somewhat fanciful to suppose (with Hartman) that Plato throughout this picture was thinking of the aged Nestor seated among his sons (Od. III 32 ff.). τινος adds a touch of vagueness: ‘a sort of combination of cushion and chair’ (Tucker).

τεθυκὼς γάρ explains ἐστεφανωμένος: “coronati sacrificabant, ut satis constat” Stallbaum. The God to whom Cephalus had been sacrificing was doubtless Ζεὺς ἑρκεῖος, whose altar stood in the αὐλή.

οὐδὲ -- Πειραιᾶ. A negative must be supplied, “ut amice expostulabundus cum Socrate senex hoc dicere videatur: tu neque alia facis, quae debebas, neque nostram domum frequentas. Simili ellipsi nostrates: Du kommst auch nicht oft zu uns” (Schneider). οὐδέ is ‘also not’: for exx. see Riddell Digest of Platonic Idioms § 141 and Jebb on Soph. O. C. 590 f. οὐδέ in οὐδὲ πάνυ ῥᾴδιον IX 587 C is another instance, in which, as here, the idiom has a kind of colloquial effect. Stallbaum takes οὐδέ with θαμίζεις “ne ventitas quidem ad nos, h. e. raro sane domum nostram frequentas”; but his equation hardly holds good, and is not justified by Xen. Symp. 4. 23. where οὐδέ coheres closely with the emphatic σοῦ. Others have suspected corruption, proposing οὔ τι (Ast, cf. Od. V 88 πάρος γε μὲν οὔ τι θαμίζεις), οὐ δέ (Nitzsch), or οὐ δή (Hartman). οὔ τι is very unlikely; for θαμίζω is not exclusively a poetic word (cf. Laws 843 B), and we need not suppose that Plato is thinking of Homer. I agree with Hartman that οὐ δέ is improbable: δέ is not sufficiently explained by saying that it is “adversative to the idea contained in ἠσπάζετο” (J. and C., with Schneider Additamenta p. 2). None of the cases quoted by Sauppe Ep. Crit. ad G. Hermannum p. 77 (Ar. Knights 1302, Hdt. IX 108, Theogn. 659, 887, 1070 and Callinus I 2) seem to me to justify the change of οὐδέ to οὐ δέ. Hartman's correction is better: but I believe the text is sound.

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  • Commentary references from this page (3):
    • Aristophanes, Knights, 1302
    • Sophocles, Oedipus at Colonus, 590
    • Xenophon, Symposium, 4.23
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