Entry copied from
delta 1029. (For
Ion see generally
iota 487.)
This ridiculous compound adjective, here in the accusative plural, is intended by
Aristophanes (
Peace 831) to parody the compounds invented by the dithyrambic poets (
delta 1029; cf. Dunbar [below] 669), and neither implies nor deserves any single translation.
Editors worry over the reading, somewhat pointlessly. The mss reading in
Aristophanes has -aueri- instead of -aneri-, and Dindorf emended this to to -auri- (
e)ndiaeriaurinhxe/tous). This word may be divided as if from the words for 'midday, air, breeze, swimmer'
e)/ndion, a)hr, au)/ra, nhxe/ths, with an attractive trochaic jingle: endi- aeri- auri- nêche-tous; it is thus translated in LSJ, "floating in midday airy breezes." It may be preferable to take
auri- from the dialect adverb for swiftly: "swiftly swimming in the midday air." In any case it is an example of a word invented to mimic the actions of the dancers and accompanying music (cf. note on
delta 1029).
This meaning does not suit the sentence in which it occurs. Trygaeus reports seeing the souls of two or three dithyrambic poet teachers who "were hovering collecting preludes, certain .... ones." The verse relates to similar images in
Birds 1373-1409. The "preludes" (see
alpha 1810 for the correct meaning of this term) that the poets are catching should be described in the adjective in some amusing way, for the adjective is not only an example of an absurd word but descriptive of what bird-like souls, hovering in the air, might be hunting. I suspect that neither we nor the first audience can figure out a meaning for this word, and that may well be the point.
The word whose primary sense here is dithyrambic "preludes" (
a)nabolh/, see
alpha 1799,
alpha 1810) is capable of many other meanings, and there may be a play on another sense such as the gushing up of water, a cloak thrown over the shoulder, or, suggested by the last entry at
alpha 2209, a rhetorical figure (
sxh=ma).
The headword of
delta 1029 as transmitted is
diqurambodida/skaloi (cf.
kappa 2647).