Νέστωρ
Nestor
Translated by Robert Dyer5 Nov 2001Vetting: high6 revisions
Translation
of Laranda, in Lycia,1 an epic poet, the father of the poet Pisander.2 He was born in the time of the Emperor Severus. [He wrote] a missing-letter Iliad. In similar fashion Tryphiodorus3 wrote an Odyssey. There is in the first book no letter alpha to be found and likewise, rhapsody by rhapsody, its letter of the alphabet left out. [He wrote] Metamorphoses, as did Parthenius of Nicaea,4 and other things.
Greek original · Adler’s text
Νέστωρ, Λαρανδεύς, ἐκ Λυκίας, ἐποποιός, πατὴρ Πεισάνδρου τοῦ ποιητοῦ, γεγονὼς ἐπὶ Σευήρου τοῦ βασιλέως· Ἰλιάδα λειπογράμματον ἤτοι ἀστοιχείωτον· ὁμοίως δὲ αὐτῷ ὁ Τρυφιόδωρος ἔγραψεν Ὀδύσσειαν· ἔστι γὰρ ἐν τῇ πρώτῃ μὴ εὑρίσκεσθαι ἄλφα καὶ κατὰ ῥαψῳδίαν οὕτως τὸ ἑκάστης ἐκλιμπάνειν στοιχεῖον. Μεταμορφώσεις, ὥσπερ καὶ Παρθένιος ὁ Νικαεύς, καὶ ἄλλα.
Betacode
*ne/stwr, *larandeu/s, e)k *luki/as, e)popoio/s, path\r *peisa/ndrou tou= poihtou=, gegonw\s e)pi\ *seuh/rou tou= basile/ws: *)ilia/da leipogra/mmaton h)/toi a)stoixei/wton: o(moi/ws de\ au)tw=| o( *trufio/dwros e)/grayen *)odu/sseian: e)/sti ga\r e)n th=| prw/th| mh\ eu(ri/skesqai a)/lfa kai\ kata\ r(ayw|di/an ou(/tws to\ e(ka/sths e)klimpa/nein stoixei=on. *metamorfw/seis, w(/sper kai\ *parqe/nios o( *nikaeu/s, kai\ a)/lla.
Notes (4)
- For Lucius Septimius Nestor (lived under Septimius Severus, emperor AD 193-211) and his marble tablets at Ostia see OCD(4) p.1350. In a "missing-letter Iliad" (
leipogra/mmatos , "lipogrammatic," ora)stoixei/wtos ) the title letter of each book or "rhapsody" is avoided throughout the text of the book; thus no alpha is to be found in the text of the first book, titled in Homeric fashion alpha.
Two elegies in the Greek Anthology (9.129 and 364; cf. 128, 536) may be examples of his Metamorphoses, also mentioned here. - 1Laranda is actually in Lycaonia. See generally OCD(4) pp.868-9. ↩
- 2Author of an epic in 60 books, Heroic Marriages of the Gods. See pi 1466, and OCD(4) p.1151, s.v. 'Pisander(3)'. This late poet is not to be confused with the early epic poet, Pisander of Rhodes (pi 1465); cf. F. Vian, Quinte de Smyrne (1959) 99-100. ↩
- 3tau 1111, tau 1112. ↩
- 4pi 664. ↩
Neighbouring entries
Revision history6 revisions · last 19 May 2016
- codings — David Whitehead
- updated some refs — David Whitehead
- another keyword; tweaking; raised status — David Whitehead
- betacode typo — Catharine Roth
- Cosmetics and brief addition — Robert Dyer
- augmented notes and keywords; cosmetics — David Whitehead
- Translated — Robert Dyer