24

Timokles

[2-4] Phld. Piet. 20,23 p. 87 Gomperz (=P. Here. 1428 col. 10 11. 24-5) [=XIII 29 Henrichs,
Cron, ercol. 5 (1975) 8-9]
έμοιγε τό Τιμοκλέους είρημένον έν Αίγύπτω δράματι περί τών έν τη χώρα θεών έπ'ι τούτους
έπέρχεται μεταφέρε[ι]ν · δπο[υ] γάρ, φησίν, εις - άν;
In my opinion, he is coming to apply to them what Timocles has said in his drama Egypt;
if, he says, people - a cat?

Metre lambic trimeter

Discussion Meineke III (1840) 590; Kock II (1884) 451; Bevilacqua 1939, 34-5;
Edmonds II (1959) 602-3; PCG VII (1989) 755; Obbink 2002, 183-222.
Citation context This fragment is cited by Athenaeus in his seventh book, in a
section devoted to the Egyptian religion, and in particular to the worship of eels
by the Egyptians (7.297c-300d). Before Timocles, Antiphanes’ fr. 145 (from Lycori)
and Anaxandrides’ fr. 40 (from Poleis) are cited.
Verses 2-4 are also cited by the Epicurean author Philodemus, in a context whe-
re the Stoic theology is criticized and the ineffectiveness of Stoic gods is stressed.
It has been suggested that in this particular context, Timocles’ fragment serves to
illustrate the assumption that the “established gods”, i. e. the Stoic gods, are unable
to deter people from wrongdoing.40 But it is better to assume that Philodemus’
point is that the Stoic gods are like the Egyptian animal divinities described by
Timocles: totally ineffectual and unable to deter people from wrongdoing, even
less respected than the conventional gods of standard Greek religion.
Text 1 πώς άν μέν ούν Both the sequence άν μέν ούν (unattested, to the best
of my knowledge, in the classical period; on the contrary, the sequence μέν άν ούν
is common) and the absolute σώσειεν seem difficult, and some attempts to improve
the text and provide the verb with an object have been made. Meineke’s με νυν
instead of the transmitted μέν ούν requires the alteration of the unexceptionable
ούν to νυν, and Richards πώς δή τιν’ άν is not convincing either. Kock’s τιν’ ούν
(cf. in v. 4 τίν’ ... έπιτρίψειεν άν) seems more attractive. On the other hand, σώ-
σειεν with an implied object is not impossible in the context of such “theological”
generalizations (cf. the omission of a specific subject of διδόασιν δίκην). Besides, a
tacit completion is possible, perhaps from the preceding (and not preserved) lines.

40 Cf. Henrichs 1974, 5-32; Obbink 210-11, who observes that Cicero’s dementia
Aegyptiorum (Nat. dear. 1.43) actually derives from his hasty reading of Philodemus’
passage as a reference to the impropriety of Egyptian religion.