Dicaearchus Messenius = Heraclides Criticus, add another edition

[nevenjovanovic]

Another edition could be added for Heraclides Criticus (tlg1405), associated to Dicaearchus Messenius (tlg0066). Several exemplars of the edition are available on archive.org: https://archive.org/search.php?query=dicaearchi - since a selection from Heraclides is included in Reclam's Die griechische Literatur in Text und Darstellung, Bd. 4: Hellenismus, I thought it would be nice if the entry for Dicaearchus / Heraclides had more information (people could want to look them up in Perseus). The title of Dicaearchus' edition cited under his Fragmenta should be corrected - it says " Descriptio Graeci", which should be "Descriptio Graeciae". To me it is somewhat confusing that Heraclides C. is associated to Dicaearchus M., but Heraclides does not turn up in a search for Dicaearchus M. in the Perseus Catalog.

[AlisonBabeu]

Hi Neven,

I'm so glad you found this issue. I was confused at first looking at for the authority record for Heraclides Criticus because no editions are listed under the authority record, even though the edition from Geographi Graeci Minores is attributed to him in the TLG. When I look at the actual MODS record for this edition, I discovered the problem.

Both authors were cataloged in this edition, using the following,

<mods:name authority="naf" type="personal" authorityURI="http://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/" valueURI="http://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/no98129188">
    <mods:namePart>Dicaearchus</mods:namePart>
    <mods:namePart type="termsOfAddress">Messenius</mods:namePart>
    <mods:namePart type="date">4th cent. B.C.</mods:namePart>
    <mods:role>
      <mods:roleTerm authority="marcrelator" type="text">attributed author</mods:roleTerm>
    </mods:role>
  </mods:name>
  <mods:name authority="naf" type="personal" authorityURI="http://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/" valueURI="http://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/n2007020565">
    <mods:namePart>Heraclides,</mods:namePart>
    <mods:namePart type="termsOfAddress">Criticus</mods:namePart>
    <mods:role>
      <mods:roleTerm authority="marcrelator" type="text">creator</mods:roleTerm>
    </mods:role>
  </mods:name>

In addition, both TLG ids, tlg1405 and tlg0066 were encoded in the record. Unfortunately, we haven't quite yet figured out how to make our indexing software associate more than one ID with a work (and perhaps it shouldn't but that's another Github issue), so in this case it found the first TLG for Dicesarchus and ignored the secondary one.

I'll fix the typos and enter separate editions under Heraclides Criticus that will hopefully make information about these authors clearer to users.

Alison

[ChiaraPalladino]

This is precisely one of those issues I talked about yesterday. The original reason for the confusion is that the work named "Descriptio Graeciae" is a compositum of four fragments transmitted under the name of Dicaearchus. First of all, it is not Dicaearchus but at least two different authors: one is Heraclides Criticus, the other, edited separately since Müller's Geographi Graeci Minores, is Dionysius of Calliphon, whose fragment is clearly different from the others as it is in trimeters. However, it has the same title of "Descriptio Graeciae", also named "Periegesis" (http://catalog.perseus.org/catalog/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0069.tlg001).

Second, there is an imprecision in the entry for Dicaearchus: the "Fragmenta" edited by Langlois (0066.001) are actually the whole work that we have (under the name) of Dicaearchus, including the "Descriptio Graeciae". But what Müller published in the GGM is not the "Fragmenta" but just the "Descriptio Graeciae" (aka Pseudo Dicaearchus). So first of all I would correct the title of this entry: http://catalog.perseus.org/catalog/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0066.tlg001.opp-grc2.

Now: the "Descriptio Graeciae" was notoriously not Dicaearchus. Therefore the problem comes at the attribution assumed by the editors each time. Besides Dionysius of Calliphon, who is relatively safe, the other three fragments of the Descriptio have been variously identified as one Athenaeus or Heraclides Criticus. Langlois, and especially Müller, give an alternative attribution to this unknown Athenaeus, for whom the Catalog has no entry. The manuscript tradition has the Greek "title" of "Athenaiou skommata kai hodoi kai periplous", on which this attribution is based. On the other hand, recent editors have taken these three fragments and attributed them to Heraclides. I'm talking about Pfister, Die Reisebilder des Heraklides (https://books.google.it/books/about/Die_Reisebilder_des_Herakleides.html?id=aloRAQAAMAAJ&redir_esc=y) and Arenz, Über die Städte in Hellas (https://books.google.it/books/about/Herakleides_Kritikos_%C3%9Cber_die_St%C3%A4dte_i.html?id=GHJiAAAAMAAJ&redir_esc=y).

An entire monography on Heraclides is not enough to cover the problem. So, to sum up the very essential lines, the situation is as follows: 1) There is one work, named overall "Descriptio Graeciae", in the manuscript tradition. This work was attributed to Dicaearchus. It includes four fragments. 2) Of these four fragments: one, in giambic trimeters, is attributed to Dionysius Calliphontis under the title of "Descriptio Graeciae" or "Periegesis": http://catalog.perseus.org/catalog/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0069.tlg001 3) The other three fragments have been edited as "Descriptio Graeciae" of "Ps. Dicaearchus". Langlois, who published them in the "Fragmenta" (http://catalog.perseus.org/catalog/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0066.tlg001.opp-grc2), mentions the alternative attribution to an otherwise unknown Athenaeus (no Catalog entry), and so does Müller in the GGM, publishing the "Descriptio" only (http://catalog.perseus.org/catalog/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0066.tlg001.opp-grc2). 4) More recently, the same three fragments have been attributed to Heraclides Criticus (http://catalog.perseus.org/catalog/urn:cite:perseus:author.1651), with the editorial title of "On the cities of Greece". We have no work entry for him.

I think that the best way to handle this mess is to use the "Associated Author", and to explain the whole situation as a note on each author. And to create an entry for Athenaeus and one for Heraclides' work.

And I should mention that the attribution to Heraclides Criticus has already been put into serious doubt and the issue is going to get more complicated in the next few years...

[nevenjovanovic]

Wonderful explanation by @ChiaraPalladino -- thanks, Chiara. Of course, such issues arise in only ca. 5% of cases, but these are the interesting ones, prosopographically and bibliographically speaking. It would be a shame to leave this knowledge unwritten. How about a proposal then to add to Perseus a functionality to write and peer-review notes such as Chiara's, to present the notes as bona fide scholarly publications (with persistent identifiers, of course), and then to link to them from the catalog page for respective authors, works, and editions? Apart from the authors and the reviewers, what would be needed for this functionality would be a clear workflow, such as the beautiful one for adding MADS and MODS to the catalog.

[AlisonBabeu]

I'm sorry to return to this so late. I updated a number of authority records and created a work record for Heraclides Criticus that is in catalog_pending. I do have one question @ChiaraPalladino, I have not found any good sources of information about this Athenaeus in order to create an authority record for him. I found a cross reference in the TLG to Heraclides Criticus (with no ID for Athenaeus), and also no mentions of him in the VIAF, Smith's Dictionary, or even Brill's New Pauly. Any suggestions would be most welcome.

[ChiaraPalladino]

The most updated discussion on Athenaeus is in D. Marcotte, Les Géographes grecs - Introduction (http://www.lesbelleslettres.com/livre/?GCOI=22510100488710) , XXVIII-XXX, and specifically on the "Skommata", CXXII-CXXIII. However, I do think that Mueller was the most exhaustive: Geographi Graeci Minores vol. I, pp. LI-LIII ("De Athenaeo vel Incerto Atheniese", https://archive.org/stream/geographigraeci00philgoog#page/n67/mode/2up). Given the ambiguity and possibly fictitious character of this "author", I am not surprised that there is no trace of him in online catalogs/dictionaries. I have quickly checked RE as well but couldn't find anything significant.

If we could create a work record only instead of an author record perhaps it would be safer, but I'm not sure it would be clearer...