The ancient sense of cpvoeojc; ioTopla (96a8) is preserved, as Burnet says, in 'natural history', but this term is too narrow for the range of inquiries Socrates mentions.
Or perhaps (96d5) 'and so the little child had become a big man' (Hackforth). But top opiupdv avdpoinov is naturally taken as one phrase.
At 96e9 and throughout 97a—b 6uo has been translated as complement of yiyveodai. Up to 97a 1 this is clearly correct. From 97a4 onwards, however, it is uncertain whether Socrates is talking about 'the coming into being of two' (Hackforth) or about 'one' (or each of a pair of 'ones') 'becoming two' (Tredennick). See on 70c4—8 (p. 104) for the relation between a thing's coming to be F, and Fs coming to be. If 5i5o is a complement at 97b 1, what should be understood as subject of yiyveo6a.il What exactly has 'come to be two'? For this puzzle see on 96e6—97b7. The translation at 97b4, 'why it is that one comes to be', follows Burnet, Hackforth, and Bluck in taking ev as subject. It could be taken as complement by supplying 'things' as its subject—'how it is that things become one' (Tredennick), or by understanding yiyverai impersonally—'how there comes to be one'. See also 101b9—c5 and note 65.
More literally (97dl), 'in any other way'. But the implication that a thing's existence is also to be thought of as a way of 'acting or being acted upon' seems unnatural.
Literally (98e5), 'by the dog'. For this favourite Socratic oath see E. R. Dodds, ed. Gorgias 482b5.
More literally (99b4—5): 'most people, groping, as it were, in the dark' (Bluck). The translation follows an explanation of these lines, cited by Verdenius, as an allusion to blind man's buff. The blindfold player, after catching one of the others, has to 'paw him over' (\&i?Xa^af) and try to guess his name correctly. It is with him that most people are being compared in their mistaken assignment of the term airia.
The translation 'kneading-trough' follows the reading KapS&rtq? in Burnet's text at 99b8. In his note he prefers napSonuo, 'the lid of a kneading-trough'. This would fit Aristotle's account of the theory (De Caelo 294b 15). However, the kneading-trough itself, as a round, flat object, would illustrate the theory well enough.
npooyeuofiivr) may be retained at 100d6, if it is supposed that it has been assimilated to the preceding substantives (Bluck). The alternatives are to accept Wyttenbach's npooayopevopevr) (defended by Burnet), to read npooyevopevov (Hackforth), or to omit the word altogether (Archer-Hind). With Wyttenbach's conjecture, the question left open will be what the relation between Forms and particulars should be called. With any other reading the sense will be as given in the translation.
kvavTlos Xoyoq (101a6) has been translated 'contradiction'. It may mean simply 'an opposing statement', i.e. a denial that A is larger than B by a head. Or it may mean the paradox generated (101a6—b2) by saying that A is larger than B by a head.
ev and 8vo are clearly complements of eoeoOcu at 101c6—7. 8vo has also been taken as complement of yeveaQai at lOlcl and 101c5. But 'reason for the coming into being of two' or 'reason for there coming to be two' also seem possible in these lines. Cf.97a—b and note 58.
For ovaia (101 c3) see note 7.
exeodat has been translated 'hang on to' at lOldl and 101d3. As usually interpreted, it undergoes an abrupt shift of sense from 'hold firmly on to' to 'take issue with'. P. M. Huby (Phronesis 1959, 14. n.l) has suggested reading oxovpevoi; em for exopemq in 101 dl—'riding upon the safety of the hypothesis'—comparing 85dl. But 'exopevoq has occurred at 100d9 in precisely the sense required at lOldl, whereas L.SJ. give no parallel for that required at 101d3. If the text is to be emended, therefore, alteration of the latter passage, such as Madvig's e0oiro, seems preferable.
The meaning at 102d3 is uncertain. Socrates may be comparing his cumbersome style with that of a legal document (Archer-Hind), or with artificially balanced prose-writing (Burnet), or 'talking like a professor' (Bluck).
gkgIvo (102e5) has been expanded in translation to 'the large in us'. Hackforth translates: 'the Form that is tall can never bring itself to be short: and similarly shortness, even the shortness in us, can never consent to be or become tall' (emphasis added). The words italicized give the impression that the Forms Large and Small as well as 'the large and small in us' are being referred to. Yet these lines can be concerned only with the latter, since the suggestion at 103al that opposites must either withdraw or perish could not apply to the Forms themselves.
Much hinges on the grammar and text at 104dl—3. The translation takes on as subject of Kardoxy, on av Karaoxq as subject of avaynd^ei, a as object of awy/cafet, and abrov as referring to on. The alternative is to take on as object of KardaxQ, a as subject of apajKa^ei, and on av KaraoxQ as object of cwajKa^ei. abrou will then refer either to on (Hackforth) or to a (D. O'Brien, C.Q. 1967, 215-6). For the shift from plural to singular on the latter view cf.70e5, and see Burnet on 104d2. On the translation adopted avro is very hard to explain, and would be better emended to aura. If the original reading was aura, an attempt to correct it by a copyist who had misunderstood a... avajKa^ei could explain the readings avro in BT and abrols in W. avro may, however, be correct, and avrois due simply to dittography before ioxew. If so, O'Brien's or Hackforth's version of the sentence will be preferable. For the effect of these alternatives upon the argument see on 104c7—d4.
The MSS.' reading amcb at 104d3, retained by Burnet, is very difficult on any interpretation. It seems best either to omit it, as in the translation, or, if evavriov must have a dative, to read rco with Robin or av rep with Bluck.
No clear distinctions seem marked by Plato's usage of eЈ5oe, ISea, and nop fir}. At 104d9, as at 104b9, 104d2, 104d6, and 105dl3, tSea appears to be used as a variant for eЈ8o? as used at 104c7. Bluck (17, n.7) and Hackforth (150, n.l), both with reservations, suggest that etSoe on the one hand, and iSea and noptprj on the other, may be aligned with 'transcendent' and 'immanent' Forms respectively. But no safe inferences can, in fact, be drawn from the use of any one of these expressions.
The translation follows Burnet's text at 104e8, retaining to 'evavriov. Hackforth and Verdenius would bracket it, as a misguided gloss upon auro. See, however, D. O'Brien, C.Q. 1967,216.
The translation retains auro to em4>epov at 105a4, though it may be merely a correct gloss upon eKelvo. Tr\v evavrtdrriTa (a4—5), translated 'the quality opposed', seems a variant for f? 'evavria idea (104d9). emevai, though elsewhere rendered 'attack', has been translated 'enters' at 105a3—4, since in this context its subject seems not to be thought of as hostile to what it visits—cf. rjKew eiri at 105d3. The reference of the pronouns is very obscure. At 105a3, despite Burnet's note, e/cetvo has been taken as subject of be^aodai, and antecedent of o av 'em<j>ep"Q, and eivco with em<pepy (Verdenius). Thus, apparently, D. O'Brien (C.Q. 1967,214) and see J. Schiller, Phronesis 1967, 56. Bluck, however, would take 'eneiv<$ with evavriov: 'anything which brings with itself something opposite to that which it attacks never itself admits the opposite of what is thus brought'. But this interpretation would require that the referent of e<j>' on av avro ty be itself an opposite, which—on any interpretation of the argument—seems incorrect. For whether 6 av 'emfiepxi be construed as a Form or a particular, and whatever the meaning of emfyepew, the item visited will itself be a particular, and not the Form of an opposite.