Proclus: Commentary on Plato's Timaeus, Vol. II

IX

CAPVT PRIMVM

Chapter One

Paris, National Library Greek 1840 [MEDICEAN REG. 2213] (cf. H. Omont, Inventaire II p. 151) largest format 33.7 x 23.6 cm, paper, written in the 16th century, 158 folios: nineteen gatherings of four and one gathering of three (δ), the numbers of which (^on beta^on gamma^on) were written in the bottom margins by the scribe himself, but most of them were lost through the binding and cutting of the sheets. Since the letters are very small, especially at the beginning, the number of lines per page varies between 38 and 33. The text breaks off at fol. 156^r, with the line unfinished. A certain recent hand added in the lower margin: decem fere folia desunt about ten folios are missing; different from this, on fol. 158^u he wrote: Πρόκλου Πλατωνικοῦ Διαδόχου τῶν εἰς τὸν Τίμαιον τοῦ Πλάτωνος τὰ τρία, ὧν τὸ τρίτον ἀτελὲς καὶ πλέον οὐδέν Of the Platonist Proclus, Successor, the three books on Plato's Timaeus, of which the third is incomplete and nothing more, another, more recent, noted a little below εἴκοσι τετράδια twenty gatherings.

Contained in the codex, which is superior in completeness, are the first three books up to p. 228 A καὶ τὸ ὅλον and the whole. We would judge that the large lacuna from which the Paris manuscript suffers, from p. 163, 29 | ἑνοειδῶς in a unitary manner to p. 186, 6 δήπου καὶ indeed and |, arose from the loss of one gathering of the archetype, especially since at the end of the codex two gatherings of the exemplar seemed to have been transposed because from p. 215 C αὐτοκίνητον self-moving | ἡ μὲν γὰρ εὐθεῖα for the straight line up to the end of the codex are handed down in this order — following the word αὐτοκίνητον (p. 215 C) are p. 221 E | ἄλλου μίαν φορὰν another one revolution up to p. 228 A καὶ τὸ ὅλον and the whole, and these words are followed by p. 215 C ἡ μὲν γὰρ εὐθεῖα for the straight line to p. 221 E τὴν αὑτῶν κίνησιν οἱ δὲ their own motion, and the (the last words of the codex) — if the Vatican Palatine codex 121 did not forbid it; having consulted that, it must be determined that two gatherings of the archetype were lost, and four were transposed.

Although the iota which we call subscript is usually absent, ἀπαισόμεθα (i. ἀπασόμεθα we will feast) is correctly handed down twice in P alone (p. 196, 29; 201, 7). Both Plato's lemmata and the passages of poets and writers are adorned with the " mark by individual verses. Where ἀπο(ρία) doubt and λύ(σις) solution are sometimes read in the margin, rarely the numbers α β γ are adjacent, looking to the disposition of the context. In the same place, the scribe sometimes restores a truer reading, but the scholia are entirely lacking.