Socrates
Ion
[530a]

Socrates
Welcome, Ion. Where have you come from now, to pay us this visit? From your home in Ephesus?

Ion
No, no, Socrates; from Epidaurus and the festival there of Asclepius.

Socrates
Do you mean to say that the Epidaurians honor the god with a contest of rhapsodes also?

Ion
Certainly, and of music1 in general.

Socrates
Why then, you were competing in some contest, were you? And how went your competition?

Ion
We carried off the first prize, Socrates. [530b]

Socrates
Well done: so now, mind that we win too at the Panathenaea.2

Ion
Why, so we shall, God willing.

Socrates
I must say I have often envied you rhapsodes, Ion, for your art: for besides that it is fitting to your art that your person should be adorned and that you should look as handsome as possible, the necessity of being conversant with a number of good poets, and especially with Homer, the best and divinest poet of all, and of apprehending [530c] his thought and not merely learning off his words, is a matter for envy; since a man can never be a good rhapsode without understanding what the poet says. For the rhapsode ought to make himself an interpreter of the poet's thought to his audience; and to do this properly without knowing what the poet means is impossible. So one cannot but envy all this.

Ion
What you say is true, Socrates: I at any rate have found this the most laborious part of my art; and I consider I speak about Homer better than anybody, for neither [530d] Metrodorus3 of Lampsacus, nor Stesimbrotus4 of Thasos, nor Glaucon,5 nor any one that the world has ever seen, had so many and such fine comments to offer on Homer as I have.

Socrates
That is good news, Ion; for obviously you will not grudge me an exhibition of them.

Ion
And indeed it is worth hearing, Socrates, how well I have embellished Homer; so that I think I deserve to be crowned with a golden crown by the Homeridae.6

Socrates
Yes, and I must find myself leisure some time to listen to you; [531a] but for the moment, please answer this little question: are you skilled in Homer only, or in Hesiod and Archilochus as well?

Ion
No, no, only in Homer; for that seems to me quite enough.

Socrates
And is there anything on which Homer and Hesiod both say the same?

Ion
Yes, I think there are many such cases.

Socrates
Then in those cases would you expound better what Homer says than what Hesiod says?

Ion
I should do it equally well in those cases, Socrates, where they say the same. [531b]

Socrates
But what of those where they do not say the same? For example, about the seer's art, on which both Homer and Hesiod say something.

Ion
Quite so.

Socrates
Well then, would you, or one of the good seers, expound better what these two poets say, not only alike but differently, about the seer's art?

Ion
One of the seers.

Socrates
And if you were a seer, would you not, with an ability to expound what they say in agreement, know also how to expound the points on which they differ?

Ion
Of course.

Socrates
Then how is it that you are skilled in Homer, [531c] and not in Hesiod or the other poets? Does Homer speak of any other than the very things that all the other poets speak of? Has he not described war for the most part, and the mutual intercourse of men, good and bad, lay and professional, and the ways of the gods in their intercourse with each other and with men, and happenings in the heavens and in the underworld, and origins of gods and heroes? [531d] Are not these the subjects of Homer's poetry?

Ion
What you say is true, Socrates.

Socrates
And what of the other poets? Do they not treat of the same things?

Ion
Yes; but, Socrates, not on Homer's level.

Socrates
What, in a worse way?

Ion
Far worse.

Socrates
And Homer in a better?

Ion
Better indeed, I assure you.

Socrates
Well now, Ion, dear soul; when several people are talking about number, and one of them speaks better than the rest, I suppose there is some one who will distinguish the good speaker? [531e]

Ion
I agree.

Socrates
And will this some one be the same as he who can distinguish the bad speakers, or different?

Ion
The same, I suppose.

Socrates
And he will be the man who has the art of numeration?

Ion
Yes.

Socrates
And again, when several are talking about what kinds of foods are wholesome, and one of them speaks better than the rest, will it be for two different persons to distinguish the superiority of the best speaker and the inferiority of a worse one, or for the same?

Ion
Obviously, I should say, for the same.

Socrates
Who is he? What is his name?

Ion
A doctor.

Socrates
And so we may state, in general terms, that the same person will always distinguish, given the same subject and several persons talking about it, [532a] both who speaks well and who badly: otherwise, if he is not going to distinguish the bad speaker, clearly he will not distinguish the good one either, where the subject is the same.

Ion
That is so.

Socrates
And the same man is found to be skilled in both?

Ion
Yes.

Socrates
And you say that Homer and the other poets, among whom are Hesiod and Archilochus, all speak about the same things, only not similarly; but the one does it well, and the rest worse?

Ion
Yes, and what I say is true.

Socrates
And since you distinguish the good speaker, [532b] you could distinguish also the inferiority of the worse speakers.

Ion
So it would seem.

Socrates
Then, my excellent friend, we shall not be wrong in saying that our Ion is equally skilled in Homer and in the other poets, seeing that you yourself admit that the same man will be a competent judge of all who speak on the same things, and that practically all the poets treat of the same things.

Ion
Then what can be the reason, Socrates, why I pay no attention when somebody discusses any other poet, and am unable to offer any remark at all of any value, [532c] but simply drop into a doze, whereas if anyone mentions something connected with Homer I wake up at once and attend and have plenty to say?

Socrates
That is not difficult to guess, my good friend; anyone can see that you are unable to speak on Homer with art and knowledge. For if you could do it with art, you could speak on all the other poets as well; since there is an art of poetry, I take it, as a whole, is there not?

Ion
Yes. [532d]

Socrates
And when one has acquired any other art whatever as a whole, the same principle of inquiry holds through all the arts? Do you require some explanation from me, Ion, of what I mean by this?

Ion
Yes, upon my word, Socrates, I do; for I enjoy listening to you wise men.

Socrates
I only wish you were right there, Ion: but surely it is you rhapsodes and actors, and the men whose poems you chant, who are wise; whereas I speak but the plain truth, as a simple layman might. [532e] For in regard to this question I asked you just now, observe what a trifling commonplace it was that I uttered—a thing that any man might know—namely, that when one has acquired a whole art the inquiry is the same. Let us just think it out thus: there is an art of painting as a whole?

Ion
Yes.

Socrates
And there are and have been many painters, good and bad?

Ion
Certainly.

Socrates
Now have you ever found anybody who is skilled in pointing out the successes and failures among the works of Polygnotus7 son of Aglaophon, but unable to do so with the works of the other painters; [533a] and who, when the works of the other painters are exhibited, drops into a doze, and is at a loss, and has no remark to offer; but when he has to pronounce upon Polygnotus or any other painter you please, and on that one only, wakes up and attends and has plenty to say?

Ion
No, on my honor, I certainly have not.

Socrates
Or again, in sculpture, have you ever found anyone who is skilled in expounding the successes of Daedalus8 son of Metion, or Epeius9 son of Panopeus, [533b] or Theodorus10 of Samos, or any other single sculptor, but in face of the works of the other sculptors is at a loss and dozes, having nothing to say?

Ion
No, on my honor, I have not found such a man as that either.

Socrates
But further, I expect you have also failed to find one in fluting or harping or minstrelsy or rhapsodizing who is skilled in expounding the art of Olympus11 [533c] or Thamyras,12 or Orpheus,13 or Phemius,14 the rhapsode of Ithaca, but is at a loss and has no remark to offer on the successes or failures in rhapsody of Ion of Ephesus.

Ion
I cannot gainsay you on that, Socrates: but of one thing I am conscious in myself—that I excel all men in speaking on Homer and have plenty to say, and everyone else says that I do it well; but on the others I am not a good speaker. Yet now, observe what that means.

Socrates
I do observe it, Ion, and I am going to point out to you [533d] what I take it to mean. For, as I was saying just now, this is not an art in you, whereby you speak well on Homer, but a divine power, which moves you like that in the stone which Euripides named a magnet,15 but most people call “Heraclea stone.” For this stone not only attracts iron rings, but also imparts to them a power whereby they in turn are able to do the very same thing as the stone, [533e] and attract other rings; so that sometimes there is formed quite a long chain of bits of iron and rings, suspended one from another; and they all depend for this power on that one stone. In the same manner also the Muse inspires men herself, and then by means of these inspired persons the inspiration spreads to others, and holds them in a connected chain. For all the good epic poets utter all those fine poems not from art, but as inspired and possessed, and the good lyric poets likewise; [534a] just as the Corybantian16 worshippers do not dance when in their senses, so the lyric poets do not indite those fine songs in their senses, but when they have started on the melody and rhythm they begin to be frantic, and it is under possession—as the bacchants are possessed, and not in their senses, when they draw honey and milk from the rivers—that the soul of the lyric poets does the same thing, by their own report. For the poets tell us, I believe, that the songs they bring us are the sweets they cull from honey-dropping founts [534b] in certain gardens and glades of the Muses—like the bees, and winging the air as these do.17 And what they tell is true. For a poet is a light and winged and sacred thing, and is unable ever to indite until he has been inspired and put out of his senses, and his mind is no longer in him: every man, whilst he retains possession of that, is powerless to indite a verse or chant an oracle. Seeing then that it is not by art that they compose and utter so many fine things about the deeds of men— [534c] as you do about Homer—but by a divine dispensation, each is able only to compose that to which the Muse has stirred him, this man dithyrambs, another laudatory odes, another dance-songs, another epic or else iambic verse; but each is at fault in any other kind. For not by art do they utter these things, but by divine influence; since, if they had fully learnt by art to speak on one kind of theme, they would know how to speak on all. And for this reason God takes away the mind of these men and uses them as his ministers, just as he does soothsayers and godly seers, [534d] in order that we who hear them may know that it is not they who utter these words of great price, when they are out of their wits, but that it is God himself who speaks and addresses us through them. A convincing proof of what I say is the case of Tynnichus,18 the Chalcidian, who had never composed a single poem in his life that could deserve any mention, and then produced the paean19 which is in everyone's mouth, almost the finest song we have, simply—as he says himself—“an invention of the Muses.” For the god, as it seems to me, [534e] intended him to be a sign to us that we should not waver or doubt that these fine poems are not human or the work of men, but divine and the work of gods; and that the poets are merely the interpreters of the gods, according as each is possessed by one of the heavenly powers. To show this forth, the god of set purpose sang the finest of songs through the meanest of poets: [535a] or do you not think my statement true, Ion?

Ion
Yes, upon my word, I do: for you somehow touch my soul with your words, Socrates, and I believe it is by divine dispensation that good poets interpret to us these utterances of the gods.

Socrates
And you rhapsodes, for your part, interpret the utterances of the poets?

Ion
Again your words are true.

Socrates
And so you act as interpreters of interpreters?

Ion
Precisely. [535b]

Socrates
Stop now and tell me, Ion, without reserve what I may choose to ask you: when you give a good recitation and specially thrill your audience, either with the lay of Odysseus20 leaping forth on to the threshold, revealing himself to the suitors and pouring out the arrows before his feet, or of Achilles21 dashing at Hector, or some part of the sad story of Andromache22 or of Hecuba,23 or of Priam,24 are you then in your senses, or are you carried out of yourself, and does your soul in an ecstasy suppose [535c] herself to be among the scenes you are describing, whether they be in Ithaca, or in Troy, or as the poems may chance to place them?

Ion
How vivid to me, Socrates, is this part of your proof! For I will tell you without reserve: when I relate a tale of woe, my eyes are filled with tears; and when it is of fear or awe, my hair stands on end with terror, and my heart leaps. [535d]

Socrates
Well now, are we to say, Ion, that such a person is in his senses at that moment,—when in all the adornment of elegant attire and golden crowns he weeps at sacrifice or festival, having been despoiled of none of his finery; or shows fear as he stands before more than twenty thousand friendly people, none of whom is stripping or injuring him?

Ion
No, on my word, not at all, Socrates, to tell the strict truth.

Socrates
And are you aware that you rhapsodes produce these same effects on most of the spectators also? [535e] Ion. Yes, very fully aware: for I look down upon them from the platform and see them at such moments crying and turning awestruck eyes upon me and yielding to the amazement of my tale. For I have to pay the closest attention to them; since, if I set them crying, I shall laugh myself because of the money I take, but if they laugh, I myself shall cry because of the money I lose.

Socrates
And are you aware that your spectator is the last of the rings which I spoke of as receiving from each other the power transmitted from the Heraclean lodestone? [536a] You, the rhapsode and actor, are the middle ring; the poet himself is the first; but it is the god who through the whole series draws the souls of men whithersoever he pleases, making the power of one depend on the other. And, just as from the magnet, there is a mighty chain of choric performers and masters and under-masters suspended by side-connections from the rings that hang down from the Muse. One poet is suspended from one Muse, another from another: [536b] the word we use for it is “possessed,” but it is much the same thing, for he is held. And from these first rings—the poets—are suspended various others, which are thus inspired, some by Orpheus and others by Musaeus25; but the majority are possessed and held by Homer. Of whom you, Ion, are one, and are possessed by Homer; and so, when anyone recites the work of another poet, you go to sleep and are at a loss what to say; but when some one utters a strain of your poet, you wake up at once, and your soul dances, [536c] and you have plenty to say: for it is not by art or knowledge about Homer that you say what you say, but by divine dispensation and possession; just as the Corybantian worshippers are keenly sensible of that strain alone which belongs to the god whose possession is on them, and have plenty of gestures and phrases for that tune, but do not heed any other. And so you, Ion, when the subject of Homer is mentioned, have plenty to say, but nothing on any of the others. And when you ask me the reason [536d] why you can speak at large on Homer but not on the rest, I tell you it is because your skill in praising Homer comes not by art, but by divine dispensation.

Ion
Well spoken, I grant you, Socrates; but still I shall be surprised if you can speak well enough to convince me that I am possessed and mad when I praise Homer. Nor can I think you would believe it of me yourself, if you heard me speaking about him.

Socrates
I declare I am quite willing to hear you, but not until [536e] you have first answered me this: on what thing in Homer's story do you speak well? Not on all of them, I presume.

Ion
I assure you, Socrates, on all without a single exception.

Socrates
Not, of course, including those things of which you have in fact no knowledge, but which Homer tells.

Ion
And what sort of things are they, which Homer tells, but of which I have no knowledge? [537a]

Socrates
Why, does not Homer speak a good deal about arts, in a good many places? For instance, about chariot-driving: if I can recall the lines, I will quote them to you.

Ion
No, I will recite them, for I can remember.

Socrates
Tell me then what Nestor says to his son Antilochus, advising him to be careful about the turning-post in the horse-race in honor of Patroclus.

Ion
“Bend thyself in the polished car slightly to the left of them;26 and call to the right-hand horse ” [537b] “and goad him on, while your hand slackens his reins. And at the post let your left-hand horse swerve close, so that the nave of the well-wrought wheel may seem to come up to the edge of the stone, which yet avoid to touch.” Hom. Il. 23.335 ff.

Socrates
Enough. Now, Ion, will a doctor or a charioteer be the better judge [537c] whether Homer speaks correctly or not in these lines?

Ion
A charioteer, of course.

Socrates
Because he has this art, or for some other reason?

Ion
No, because it is his art.

Socrates
And to every art has been apportioned by God a power of knowing a particular business? For I take it that what we know by the art of piloting we cannot also know by that of medicine.

Ion
No, to be sure.

Socrates
And what we know by medicine, we cannot by carpentry also?

Ion
No, indeed. [537d]

Socrates
And this rule holds for all the arts, that what we know by one of them we cannot know by another? But before you answer that, just tell me this: do you agree that one art is of one sort, and another of another?

Ion
Yes.

Socrates
Do you argue this as I do, and call one art different from another when one is a knowledge of one kind of thing, and another a knowledge of another kind? [537e]

Ion
Yes.

Socrates
Since, I suppose, if it were a knowledge of the same things—how could we say that one was different from another, when both could give us the same knowledge? Just as I know that there are five of these fingers, and you equally know the same fact about them; and if I should ask you whether both you and I know this same fact by the same art of numeration, or by different arts, you would reply, I presume, that it was by the same?

Ion
Yes. [538a]

Socrates
Then tell me now, what I was just going to ask you, whether you think this rule holds for all the arts—that by the same art we must know the same things, and by a different art things that are not the same; but if the art is other, the things we know by it must be different also.

Ion
I think it is so, Socrates.

Socrates
Then he who has not a particular art will be incapable of knowing aright the words or works of that art? [538b]

Ion
True.

Socrates
Then will you or a charioteer be the better judge of whether Homer speaks well or not in the lines that you quoted?

Ion
A charioteer.

Socrates
Because, I suppose, you are a rhapsode and not a charioteer.

Ion
Yes.

Socrates
And the rhapsode's art is different from the charioteer's?

Ion
Yes.

Socrates
Then if it is different, it is also a knowledge of different things.

Ion
Yes.

Socrates
Now, what of the passage where Homer tells how Hecamede, [538c] Nestor's concubine, gives the wounded Machaon a posset? His words are something like this: “Of Pramneian wine it was, and therein she grated cheese of goat's milk with a grater of bronze; and thereby an onion as a relish for drink. ”Hom. Il. 11.639-4027 Is it for the doctor's or the rhapsode's art to discern aright whether Homer speaks correctly here or not?

Ion
For the doctor's.

Socrates
Well now, when Homer says: [538d] “And she passed to the bottom like a plummet which, set on a horn from an ox of the field, goes in haste to bring mischief among the ravenous fishes— ”Hom. Il. 24.80-82.28 are we to say it is for the fisherman's or for the rhapsode's art to decide what he means by this, and whether it is rightly or wrongly spoken?

Ion
Clearly, Socrates, for the fisherman's art.

Socrates
Then please observe: suppose you were questioning me and should ask: [538e] “Since therefore, Socrates, you find it is for these several arts to appraise the passages of Homer that belong to each, be so good as to make out those also that are for the seer and the seer's art, and show me the sort of passages that come under his ability to distinguish whether they are well or ill done”; observe how easily and truly I shall answer you. For he has many passages, both in the Odyssey, as for instance the words of Theoclymenus, the seer of the line of Melampus, to the suitors: [539a] “Hapless men, what bane is this afflicts you? Your heads and faces and limbs below are shrouded in night, and wailing is enkindled, and cheeks are wet with tears: of ghosts the porch is full, and the court full of them also, hastening hell-wards 'neath the gloom: and the sun is perished out of heaven, and an evil mist is spread abroad; ”Hom. Od. 20.351-5729 [539b] and there are many passages in the Iliad also, as in the fight at the rampart, where he says:“For as they were eager to pass over, a bird had crossed them, an eagle of lofty flight, pressing the host at the left hand, ” [539c] “and bearing a blood-red monster of a snake, alive and still struggling; nor had it yet unlearnt the lust of battle. For bending back it smote its captor on the breast by the neck, and the bird in the bitterness of pain cast it away to the ground, and dropped it down in the midst of the throng;” “and then with a cry flew off on the wafting winds.” Hom. Il. 12.200-7This passage, and others of the sort, are those that I should say the seer has to examine and judge.

Ion
And you speak the truth, Socrates.

Socrates
And so do you, Ion, in saying that. Now you must do as I did, and in return for my picking out from the Odyssey and the Iliad the kinds of passage that belong severally to the seer, [539e] the doctor, and the fisherman, you have now to pick out for me—since you are so much more versed in Homer than I—the kinds which belong to the rhapsode, Ion, and the rhapsode's art, and which he should be able to consider and distinguish beyond the rest of mankind.

Ion
What I say, Socrates, is—“all passages.”

Socrates
Surely you do not say “all,” Ion! Can you be so forgetful? And yet forgetfulness would ill become a rhapsode. [540a]

Ion
Why, how am I forgetting?

Socrates
Do you not remember that you said that the art of the rhapsode was different from that of the charioteer?

Ion
I remember.

Socrates
And you also admitted that, being different, it would know different things?

Ion
Yes.

Socrates
Then by your own account the rhapsode's art cannot know everything, nor the rhapsode either.

Ion
Let us say, everything except those instances, Socrates. [540b]

Socrates
By “those instances” you imply the subjects of practically all the other arts. Well, as he does not know all of them, which kinds will he know?

Ion
Those things, I imagine, that it befits a man to say, and the sort of thing that a woman should say; the sort for a slave and the sort for a freeman; and the sort for a subject or for a ruler.

Socrates
Do you mean that the rhapsode will know better than the pilot what sort of thing a ruler of a storm-tossed vessel at sea should say?

Ion
No, the pilot knows better in that case. [540c]

Socrates
Well, will the rhapsode know better than the doctor what sort of thing a ruler of a sick man should say?

Ion
Not in that case either.

Socrates
But he will know the sort for a slave, you say?

Ion
Yes.

Socrates
For instance, if the slave is a cowherd, you say the rhapsode will know what the other should say to pacify his cows when they get fierce, but the cowherd will not?

Ion
That is not so.

Socrates
Well, the sort of thing that a woman ought to say—a spinning-woman—about the working of wool? [540d]

Ion
No.

Socrates
But he will know what a man should say, when he is a general exhorting his men?

Ion
Yes, that sort of thing the rhapsode will know.

Socrates
Well, but is the art of the rhapsode the art of the general?

Ion
I, at any rate, should know what a general ought to say.

Socrates
Yes, since I daresay you are good at generalship also, Ion. For in fact, if you happened to have skill in horsemanship as well as in the lyre, you would know when horses were well or ill managed: [540e] but if I asked you, “By which art is it, Ion, that you know that horses are being well managed, by your skill as a horseman, or as a player of the lyre?” what would your answer be?

Ion
I should say, by my skill as a horseman.

Socrates
And if again you were distinguishing the good lyre-players, you would admit that you distinguished by your skill in the lyre, and not by your skill as a horseman.

Ion
Yes.

Socrates
And when you judge of military matters, do you judge as having skill in generalship, or as a good rhapsode?

Ion
To my mind, there is no difference. [541a]

Socrates
What, no difference, do you say? Do you mean that the art of the rhapsode and the general is one, not two?

Ion
It is one, to my mind.

Socrates
So that anyone who is a good rhapsode is also, in fact, a good general?

Ion
Certainly, Socrates.

Socrates
And again, anyone who happens to be a good general is also a good rhapsode.

Ion
No there I do not agree.

Socrates
But still you agree that anyone who is a good rhapsode [541b] is also a good general?

Ion
To be sure.

Socrates
And you are the best rhapsode in Greece?

Ion
Far the best, Socrates.

Socrates
Are you also, Ion, the best general in Greece?

Ion
Be sure of it, Socrates and that I owe to my study of Homer.

Socrates
Then how, in Heaven's name, can it be, Ion, that you, who are both the best general and the best rhapsode in Greece, go about performing as a rhapsode to the Greeks, but not as a general? [541c] Or do you suppose that the Greeks feel a great need of a rhapsode in the glory of his golden crown, but of a general none at all?

Ion
It is because my city,30 Socrates, is under the rule and generalship of your people, and is not in want of a general; whilst you and Sparta would not choose me as a general, since you think you manage well enough for yourselves.

Socrates
My excellent Ion, you are acquainted with Apollodorus31 of Cyzicus, are you not?

Ion
What might he be?

Socrates
A man whom the Athenians have often chosen as their general, though a foreigner; [541d] and Phanosthenes32 of Andros, and Heracleides33 of Clazomenae, whom my city invests with the high command and other offices although they are foreigners, because they have proved themselves to be competent. And will she not choose Ion of Ephesus as her general, and honor him, if he shows himself competent? Why, you Ephesians are by origin Athenians,34 are you not, and Ephesus is inferior to no city? [541e] But in fact, Ion, if you are right in saying it is by art and knowledge that you are able to praise Homer, you are playing me false: you have professed to me that you know any amount of fine things about Homer, and you promise to display them; but you are only deceiving me, and so far from displaying the subjects of your skill, you decline even to tell me what they are, for all my entreaties. You are a perfect Proteus in the way you take on every kind of shape, twisting about this way and that, until at last you elude my grasp in the guise of a general, so as to avoid displaying your skill [542a] in Homeric lore. Now if you are an artist and, as I was saying just now, you only promised me a display about Homer to deceive me, you are playing me false; whilst if you are no artist, but speak fully and finely about Homer, as I said you did, without any knowledge but by a divine dispensation which causes you to be possessed by the poet, you play quite fair. Choose therefore which of the two you prefer us to call you, dishonest or divine.

Ion
The difference is great, Socrates; for it is far nobler to be called divine. [542b]

Socrates
Then you may count on this nobler title in our minds, Ion, of being a divine and not an artistic praiser of Homer.

1 “Music” with the Greeks included poetry.

2 The Athenian festival of the Great Panathenaea was held every fourth year, and the Small Panathenaea probably every year, about July.

3 A friend of the philosopher Anaxagoras who wrote allegorical interpretations of Homer in the first part of the fifth century B.C.

4 A rhapsode, interpreter of Homer, and historian who lived in the time of Cimon and Pericles.

5 Perhaps the Homeric commentator mentioned by Aristotle, Poet. 25. 16.

6 There was a society or clan in Chios called Homeridae (“sons of Homer”), but the name seems to be used here and elsewhere in Plato for any persons specially devoted to Homer's poetry. See Jebb, Homer, p. 78.

7 A celebrated painter who came from Thasos and adorned public buildings in Athens about 470 B.C. Cf. Gorg. 488 B.

8 According to legend, the first sculptor: cf. Euthyphro 11, Meno 97 D.

9 The maker of the wooden horse at Troy (Homer, Od. 8.493).

10 A metal-worker (Herodot. 1. 51, 3. 41).

11 One of the mythical inventors of music: cf. Symp. 215 E.

12 A Thracian Bard.

13 A Thracian Bard.

14 The minstrel who was forced to sing to the suitors of Penelope (Od 1. 154, 22. 330).

15 Probably referring to Magnesia in Caria, south of which was one of the many places called Heraclea. Μαγνῆτις λίθος occurs in a fragment of Euripides' Oeneus.

16 The Corybantes were priests of Cybele or Rhea, mother of Zeus and other Olympian gods, and she was worshipped with wild music and frenzied dancing which, like the bacchic revels or orgies of women in honor of Dionysus, carried away the participants despite and beyond themselves. Cf. Eurip. Bacchae.

17 A beginning of this comparison appears in Aristophanes' praise of the early tragedian Phrynichus—“he sipped the fruits of ambrosial lays, ever bringing away sweet song.” Aristoph. Birds 750f.

18 Nothing else is known of this poet.

19 A hymn in honor of a god, usually Apollo.

20 Od. 22.2ff.

21 Il. 22.312ff.

22 Il. 6.370-502; 22.437-515.

23 Il. 22.430-36; 24.747-59.

24 Il. 22.408-28; 24.144-717.

25 A legendary bard to whom certain oracular verses were ascribed.

26 i.e. one of the two white stones, set up at each end of the course, which had been mentioned six lines before.

27 The quotation, as Plato indicates, is not accurate. Machaon was the son of Asclepius and physician to the Greeks at Troy. Nothing is known of “Pramneian wine,” except that it was “thick and nutritious” (Athen. 1.10b).

28 The nature of this device is still in dispute. Plutarch (De sollertia animal. 977) supports Aristotle's view that the horn acted as a sheath to protect the line from being bitten through by the fish.

29 Melampus, the ancestor of Theoclymenus (cf. Hom. Od. 15.225-56), was supposed to have been the first mortal who possessed the gift of prophecy.

30 Ephesus.

31 Nothing else is known of this general.

32 Captured the Thurian admiral Dorieus, 407 B. C.

33 Nothing else is known of this general.

34 Androclus of Attica founded Ephesus as the Ionian city known to the Greeks of Plato's time.