R. G. Bury, The Symposium of Plato

γονῆς...οὔτε λέγονται. This is a rash statement on the part of Phaedrus; for Alcaeus (fr. 13 Bgk.) makes Eros son of Zephyros and Iris; Simonides (fr. 43), son of Ares and Aphrodite; Euripides (Hippol. 534), son of Zeus; Sappho (fr. 132), of Gê and Uranos; Ibycus (fr. 31), of Chaos; see also the statements in 199 D, 203 ff. infra. On the other hand ignorance or doubt as to the parentage of Eros is expressed in Theocr. Id. XIII. 1, 2 οὐχ ἁμῖν τὸν Ἔρωτα μόνοις ἔτεχ᾽ ...ᾧτινι τοῦτο θεῶν ποκα τέκνον ἔγεντο; Anth. Pal. V. 176. 7—8 πατρὸς δ᾽ οὐκέτ᾽ ἔχω φράζειν τίνος: οὔτε γὰρ Αἰθήρ, | οὐ Χθών φησι τεκεῖν τὸν θρασύν, οὐ Πέλαγος. For the usual Greek assumption that the poets are religious teachers, cp. Ar. Ran. 1054 τοῖς μὲν γὰρ παιδαρίοισιν | ἔστι διδάσκαλος ὅστις φράζει, τοῖς ἡβῶσιν δὲ ποιηταί: and see Adam, R. T. G. pp. 9 ff.

ἰδιώτου. For this distinction between the prose-writer and the poet, cp. Phaedrus 258 D; Laws 890 A; Rep. 366 E. The term ἰδιώτης may be taken as a survival of the time when the poet alone had his work “published”—at religious festivals, theatrical shows, κῶμοι, etc.

Ἠσίοδος κτλ. The reference is to Theog. 116 ff. ἤτοι μὲν πρώτιστα Χάος γένετ᾽ , αὐτὰρ κτλ. Cp. Ar. Av. 693 ff. Χάος ἦν καὶ Νὺξ κτλ. The order of the text I have adopted, in the passage following, is that proposed by Schanz, except that he reads ὁμολογεῖ <ὅς> φησι, while Burnet, accepting the transposition, prints σύμφησι instead of ὁμολογεῖ φησι. Hug and others eject the clause φησι...Ἔρωτα as a marginal prose paraphrase of the words of Hesiod; since, as it stands in the traditional order, the clause is obviously tautologous: but tautology is in itself no objection, but rather characteristic of Ph.'s style (see Teuffel in Rhein. Mus. XXIX. p. 133); and there is force in Hermann's remark “aegre intelligo quomodo aliquis clarissimis poetae verbis (paraphrasin) addendam existimaverit, multoque verisimilius videtur Hesiodi locum...postmodo adscriptum...irrepsisse.” I bracket the clause as a gloss on ὁμολογεῖ. The clause Παρμενίδης...πάντων is rightly defended by Hug, against Voegelin and others, on the grounds that (1) οὕτω πολλαχόθεν in the following sentence is more appropriate after three than after two instances, and (2) Agathon in 195 C, when alluding to Phaedrus's speech, expressly mentions Ἡσίοδος καὶ Παρμενίδης. The authority of Hesiod is similarly cited by Plut. amat. 756 E.

Ἀκουσίλεως. Acusilaus of Argos, the “logographer,” about B.C. 475 (?), wrote in the Ionic dialect several books of Genealogies, largely based on Hesiod (see the fragg. in A. Kordt, De Acusilao, 1903). But the reputed work of A., extant in the time of Hadrian, was probably a forgery: a collector of myths is not, properly speaking, a “logographer” at all (see Jevons, Gk. Lit. p. 299). Cp. Clem. Alex. VI. ii. 26. 7 τὰ δὲ Ἡσιόδου μετήλλαξαν εἰς πεζὸν λόγον καὶ ὡς ἴδια ἐξένεγκαν Εὔμηλός τε καὶ Ἀκουσίλαος οἱ ἱστοριογράφοι. Hug, retaining the order of the MSS., would explain the fact that A. is put last as due to his being an ἰδιώτης, the others ποιηταί.

Παρμενίδης. See Parmen. frag. 132 (Karsten), R. and P. 101 A; Arist. Met. I. 4. 984^{b} 25; Plut. amat. 756 F. It is to be presumed that the famous Eleate relegated this theogony to his “Way of Opinion.” Cp. Spenser's lines (H. to Love), “Or who alive can perfectly declare The wondrous cradle of thine infancie... For ere this worlds still moving mightie masse Out of great Chaos ugly prison crept... Love... Gan reare his head, by Clotho being waked.”

τὴν Γένεσιν...μητίσατο. Hermann and Hug follow Stallbaum in supplying Γένεσις as the subject of μητίσατο: cp. Phaedo 94 D οὗ λέγει τὸν Ὀδυσσέα στῆθος δὲ πλήξας κραδίην ἠνίπαπε μύθῳ. For the personification of γένεσις, cp. Hom. Il. XIV. 201 Ὠκεανόν τε θεῶν γένεσιν καὶ μητέρα Τηθύν (cited by Plato in Theaet. 180 D, Crat. 402 B). Plutarch (loc. cit. differs by making Ἀφροδίτη the subject of μητίσατο. It is, of course, possible that another (suppressed) subject is intended; since we do not know what the context was in the original.