476

Eupolis

θύειν μέλλεις;, “Aren’t you about to sacrifice a suckling pig?”; Henioch. fr.
2.2 ό δ’ ’ίσως γαλαθηνόν τέθυκε τον χοίρον λαβών, “perhaps he’s taken the
suckling pig and sacrificed it”; Polemon fr. 86 θύουσι δέ και τούς γαλαθηνούς
όρθαγορίσκους, “they also sacrifice suckling porkers”; Allen 1933; Olson 1998
on Ar. Pax 386-7b (on piglets as sacrificial victims)), although (1) the adjective
is elsewhere consistently used only of people who have lost their teeth, sc.
from old age (Ar. Ach. 715; Pl. 266; Poll. 2.96, citing Phryn. Com. fr. 85 and
Eub. fr. 144; cf. Ar. V. 165 with Biles-Olson 2015 ad loc.·, Pherecr. fr. 79); (2) a
δέλφαξ is properly a mature pig, as distinguished from a δελφάκιον or χοίρος
(“piglet”; note esp. Ar. Ach. 786 νέα γάρ έστιν· άλλα δελφακουμένα, “Because
she’s young; but once she’s become a delphax...” (of a supposed “piglet”)); and
(3) piglets—unlike e. g. human babies—already have teeth when they are born.
I accordingly print Kock’s δέλφακ’ ένδον (cf. Ar. Pl. 819-20 και νυν ό δεσπότης
μέν ένδον βουθυτεΐ / ύν, “and now my master is sacrificing a pig inside the
house (complex)”; Men. Pk. 995-6 ό δ’ [ ... ] / μάγειρος ένδον έστί· την ύν
θυέτω, “The cook is inside (the house complex); let him sacrifice the pig!”),
which is only slightly further from the paradosis but much easier sense.288
δελφακίδιον (an unattested but unproblematic form) would scan, but would
require that καλήν in 2 be corrected to καλόν, removing the one reasonably
secure point in regard to the text, viz. that Eupolis used δέλφαξ as a feminine.
Interpretation Rejecting a hypothesis advanced by another speaker, perhaps
about the content and character of the sacrifice in question or some other sac-
rifice the speaker might have been attending, or perhaps about some entirely
different phenomenon for which this is the correct explanation (e. g. “Were
you at the market?”, sc. “and thus out of my sight because you were there?”).
The imperfect έθυον treats the sacrifice as underway rather than completed,
so it may simply have been background action to whatever was actually at the
center of the discussion. For a possible context, cf. Hsch. ε 6393 Εστία θύομεν·
ήσάν τινες θυσίαι, άφ’ ών οΰχ οΐόν τε ήν μεταδούναι ή έξενεγκεΐν (“We are
sacrificing to Hestia: there were certain sacrifices, portions of which could not
be shared or brought out of the house”).
1 και μάλα καλήν suggests a boast or perhaps a defensive response
(there was nothing wrong with the offering, whatever the other party may
believe or have implied, or it was at least as good as the one the speaker missed
elsewhere). For μάλα serving to intensify an adjective, cf. fr. 109.1 μάλα καλήν
τε κάγαθήν with n.

"88 Solutions to the problem involving a trisyllabic adjective require a split anapaest
and must thus be rejected out of hand.