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[191] “ὅτι διήιρηκε χρόος ἀντὶ τοῦ χρώς: διὸ βαρυτονητέον. καὶ ὅτι τὸ εἴσατο νῦν ἀντὶ τοῦ ἐφάνη”, So An.also “οὕτως αἱ Ἀριστάρχου χρόος ὡς λόγος: βούλεται δὲ διηιρῆσθαι τὴν εὐθεῖαν. Ζηνόδοτος δὲ γράφει χρὼς εἴσατο”, Did. “ὁ δὲ Ἡρωδιανὸς καὶ εὐθεῖαν καὶ γενικὴν δέχεται” (regards as possible) “τὴν χροός, προκρίνει δὲ τὴν γενικήν”, Schol. T. A nom. “χρόος” is entirely without analogy, and we are reduced to a choice between “χρώς” and “χροός”. In favour of the latter is not only the consensus of MSS., but the evident fact that Ar.'s authorities were so strongly in the same direction that he preferred the supposition of an unknown form of the nom. to the easy adoption of Zen.'s reading. On the other hand arises the question whether his authorities were competent witnesses as to a primitive distinction between “οο” and “ω”. In the oldest alphabet both would be given by O, and the distinction can only go back to the transliteration of the poems. The choice therefore lies open to us. If we read “χροός” we may take the gen. as dependent upon “εἴσατο”, on the analogy of “τυχεῖν” and other verbs of attaining. In Od. 22.89 we have “Ὀδυσῆος ἐείσατο”, which is rather different, coming under the category of verbs of aiming. “ἀλλήλων ἐφίκοντο,” 13.613, and “ὅθι οἱ καταείσατο γαίης,” 11.358, are nearer. We should then have a ‘vague local’ gen., ‘reached not the region of the flesh.’ It might seem possible to join “χροός” as a partitive gen. with “πηι”, but this use, though common enough in later Greek, is hardly Homeric; see on 3.400 and 11.358 (cf., however, Od. 1.425, Od. 2.131, Od. 4.639). It must further be remembered that “εἴσατο” in the sense reached had an initial “Ϝ” (see on 4.138 and Ahrens Beitr. p. 95). These difficulties and doubts are at once removed if we adopt the Zenodotean “χρώς”, and take “εἴσατο”, with Ar., in the sense of “ἐφάνη”. La R. objects that we should need an imperf., not an aor., as 22.324 “φαίνετο”. But the difference between the two is merely that the aor. means ‘the flesh never shewed itself,’ the imperf. ‘was not visible.’

The Iliad, edited, with apparatus criticus, prolegomena, notes, and appendices. Walter Leaf. London. Macmillan. 1900.

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