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Bellum Alexandrinum Cynthia Damon, et al. Society for Classical Studies TEI XML encoding: Samuel J. Huskey Programming for automatic generation of TEI XML: Virgina K. Felkner Coauthor of content related to section 2.5: Dallas Simons Coauthor of content related to sections 12.1–2 and 13.5: Tom Vozar Coauthor of content related to section 26.1–2: Marcie Persyn Coauthor of content related to sections 35.3 and 36.4–5: Maria Kovalchuk Coauthor of content related to sections 47.2, 49.1, and 49.2–3: Tim Warnock Coauthor of content related to section 60.2: Isabella Reinhardt Coauthor of content related to sections 63.5 and 66.3–4: Brian Credo Coauthor of content related to sections 67.1 and 68.1: Amelia Bensch-Schaus Coauthor of content related to sections 72.2–3 and 74.4: Wes Hanson First Edition The Digital Latin Library 650 Parrington Oval Carnegie Building 101 Norman OK 73071 USA The University of Oklahoma Norman, OK 2022 Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International Licence (CC BY-SA 4.0) Library of Digital Latin Texts Edited by Samuel J. Huskey 1 ​ Born digital. ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ 17.1–3 Cynthia Damon Hoc ne sibi saepius accidere posset, omni ratione Caesar contendendum existimauit ut insulam molemque ad insulam pertinentem in suam redigeret potestatem. (2) Perfectis enim magna ex parte munitionibus in oppido, et hanc et illam [urbe(m)] uno tempore temptari posse confidebat. (3) Quo capto consilio cohortes X et leuis armaturae electos quosque idoneos ex equitibus Gallis arbitrabatur in nauigia minora scaphasque imponit. In alteram insulae partem ​ distinendae manus causa constratis nauibus aggreditur praemiis magnis propositis qui primus insulam cepisset.“So that this could not happen to him repeatedly, Caesar thought that he ought to strive to bring the island and the jetty extending to the island into his power, whatever the cost. (2) For since he had mostly completed his works in the town, he was confident that an attempt could be made on both the latter and the former at the same time. (3) Having adopted this plan, he placed in small vessels and skiffs ten cohorts and the picked men belonging to his light-armed force and whichever of the Gallic horsemen he deemed suitable. On one side of the island he landed his footsoldiers, on the other side he attacked with decked ships in order to divide the (enemy) forces, with great rewards offered to whoever seized the island first.” et hanc et illam urbe(m) scripsimus | et illa in urbe MU | et illa in urbem STV | et illam (sc. insulam) et urbem Aldus (u. BC 3.112.6) | et insulam et urbem Jurinius | etiam illa (sc. mole) urbem Nipperdey | et illa (sc. insulam molemque) et urbem Gertz teste Klotz (cf. 24.4 illa et BG 1.27.4 ea) | et illas et urbem Fleischer 1878 || quosque Lipsius (cf. BC 3.103.1 et u. infra ad 17.3) | quos MUSTV, quod defendit Andrieu coll. 77.2 || in alteram] a- Aldus | alteramque Vascosanus (u. et infra) | et alteram Castiglioni | post partem lacunam indicauimus e.g. pedestres copias exponit, alteram partem supplendam || constratis MUS | constractis TVac | contractis Vc || praemiis ed. pr. (u. et supra) | praemiisque MUSTV Paragraphs 17–22 contain the narrative of a series of chaotic episodes that together amount to the aduersa summarized at 23.1 (Alexandrini cum Romanos et secundis rebus confirmari et aduersis incitari uiderent) and stand in contrast to the secunda represented by the naval battle of chapters 15–16. Despite the clear statement of Caesar’s objective at the outset (17.1 ut insulam molemque … in suam redigeret potestatem), the sequence of events is hard to discern, particularly in paragraphs 17 and 22.The objective itself is clear but the meaning of hoc is hard to discern. It obviously points to the immediately preceding 16.7: Reliquae propinquam fugam ad oppidum capiunt. Quas protexerunt ex molibus atque aedificiis imminentibus et nostros adire propius prohibuerunt. But the referent of oppidum could be either Alexandria itself (see below for the references) or the uicus oppidi magnitudine (BC 3.112.3) on the island. Schiller (1890b, 542) opts for the latter: “er wollte verhindern dass das Feind auf der Insel wieder eine Zuflucht finden könnte,” but the aedificia imminentia mentioned at 16.7 underlie the later comparison between the island and the city (18.1 etsi erat non dissimile atque Alexandriae genus aedificiorum, ut minora maioribus conferantur, turresque editae et coniunctae muri locum obtinebant) and therefore ought to refer to the city. This would suggest that hoc refers to protexerunt ex molibus atque aedificiis imminentibus et nostros adire propius prohibuerunt, not to taking refuge. Crucial bits of information have been omitted or lost from the text, and it is not always easy to decide between omission and loss. The present passage contains two such gaps. The first gap is easy to see, if not to fix: the phrase uno tempore suggests that two or more simultaneous actions are in prospect here, and yet in the sentence as transmitted the only action mentioned is an attack on a vaguely defined illa: perfectis … munitionibus in oppido et illa in urbe(m) uno tempore temptari posse confidebat (sc. Caesar). This sentence has other problems as well: The two branches of the tradition are split between in urbe (MU) and in urbem (STV). The latter, which makes poor sense with temptari, seems likely to have been archetypal, with in urbe as an innovation based on in oppido. The antecedent of illa is obscure. Some editors take it to be the island and the jetty together and replace in with et to produce the two actions called for by uno tempore: Caesar projects simultaneous attacks on the island with its adjoining jetty and the city of Alexandria.Andrieu prints et illa et urbem and calls this repair “grammaticalement très satisfaisante” (p. 78) but translates et illam et urbem: “il comptait pouvoir se porter contre l’ile en même temps que contre la ville.” The et … et construction is well paralleled in the Bellum Alexandrinum (3.1 uno … tempore et nostras munitiones infestabant et suas defendebant, 7.3 cum uero uno tempore et natio eorum et natura cognoscatur, 17.4 Vno enim tempore et ex tectis aedificiorum propugnabant et litora armati defendebant), but there are no good parallels in the corpus for a neuter plural pronoun with two feminine antecedents.According to Pinkster (2015, 1258), the construction occurs only from Sallust onwards. The best one can do is point to 24.4 si illa sentiret, where the antecendent of illa is vague, and BG 1.27.4 dum ea conquiruntur, where the antecedent of ea is the preceding obsides arma seruos. Fleischer fixes the problem with the obvious illas, but this form leaves the origin of in obscure (1878, 279). Nipperdey takes the antecedent of illa to be molem and construes the pronoun as an ablative: Caesar projects an attack on Alexandria from the jetty. Nipperdey obtains the two actions required here by emending et to etiam and excising in: etiam illa urbem uno tempore temptari posse confidebat. With this reading the possibility of attacking the city is an afterthought to the aforementioned project of attacking the island and jetty, which does not work very well with uno tempore.As Larsen notes, however, this ablative is “nimis audax, nec sine difficultate uerbis perfectis … oppido interiectis in illa audiri potest moles” (1886, 13). Hoffmann 1890 simplifies the construction, if not the transmission history, by adding ex before illa. The word urbem is awkward since Incertus has just referred to Alexandria with in oppido.Kraffert’s suggestion (1882, 76) that the urbs is the settlement on Pharus (see above ​) while oppidum is Alexandria seems far-fetched. Oudendorp suggests emending in urbem to in turrem “sc. in molem in qua erat turris,” but a reference to the lighthouse, which Caesar already controls (BC 3.112.5), seems unhelpful and the expression is implausibly indirect. It is true that he uses both urbs (1.5, 2.2, 2.3, 2.4, 3.1, 5.2, 5.3, 6.1, 12.4, 13.2) and oppidum/oppidani (1.2, 1.4, 1.5, 2.1, 7.2, 15.8, 18.3, 19.2, 19.3, 19.5, 32.1, 32.3, 32.4) when speaking of Alexandria, sometimes in close proximity (1.5), but the terms are never elsewhere close together in a passage where anything other than Alexandria itself is in view.The referent of oppidum at 16.7 (reliquae [sc. naues] propinquam fugam ad oppidum capiunt) is unclear (see note ​). Aldus proposed a relatively simple solution to the problem(s) of illa and provided the desired doubling: et illam et urbem uno tempore temptari posse confidebat. This repair implies a corruption originating in an easy misreading of illam as illa in. The expression in urbe, parellel to in oppido, made the second et superfluous, hence its omission. Some qualms remain, however. First, the antecedent of illam is still unclear: insula or moles? (Jurinius proposed emending illa in to insulam to bring clarity on this point.) More substantially, the idea of attacking the city is irrelevant to the objective announced at the start of the paragraph, which targets the island and jetty. What Incertus says about Alexandria is that Caesar’s fortifications there are nearly complete, and the munitiones in question serve to protect against attacks, in line with Caesar’s overall strategy of keeping his troops safe until reinforcements arrive (BC 3.112.5–6, BAlex 1.1–2), not to support attacks. And in fact no attacks in or against the city itself are mentioned in the remaining portions of the Alexandrian war.Larsen’s explanation, “neque hoc quisquam miretur, cur in iis, quae sequuntur, nullam urbis (i.e. Alexandriae) oppugnationem diserte commemoret Hirtius, assidue enim in urbe pugnabatur, etiamsi aliis locis fortunam experiebantur Romani, idque ex B. Alex. XV, 2 apparet” (1886, 14), does not square well with temptari. The fighting in chapters 17–22 is concentrated on the island and the jetty, and the military actions thereafter occur well outside of the city, in Pelusium, at the tip of the Delta, and near the Nile. Attempts on the problem of urbem have been made via emendations to temptari: Jurinius for example proposed emending it to tutari. But the idea of protection is at odds with both the general context of attack and the expression uno tempore.And anyway tueri would be the mot propre: (cf., e.g., BC 2.10.1, 2.32.3, 3.23.2, 3.111.6, Hirt. 8.34.4). Vielhaber (1869, 556), starting with Nipperdey’s text, altered temptari to intrari (etiam illa [sc. mole] in urbem intrari), and this text is further modified by Kraffert (et [= etiam] in illa [sc. insula] urbem intrari). Given the military objective announced at the beginning of the chapter, it seems unwise to tamper with temptari. Tempto is used with a variety of objects, among them places (loca, BG 7.86.4; Galliam Italiamque, BC 1.29.3) and fortifications (moenia oppidi, BC 3.40.1; opera nostra, BG 7.73.1, cf. 7.84.2).Schiller (1890b, 542) supplies one from a different category in an implausibly elaborate repair: … munitionibus [in oppido] et in illa (sc. insula) et in urbe uno tempore fortunam temptari posse confidebat. Another approach would be to assume that the missing parallel for et illa(m) was lost in an eye-skip from et to et. The pronoun’s obscurity would be clarified if what was lost was hac or hanc. Incertus’ usage elsewhere suggests that et ha(n)c preceded et illa(m) (cf. 6.3 haec propior … illa inferior, 13.1 has … illas, 19.2 hunc … illum). As between the accusative and the ablative, the accusative seems preferable given the aforementioned objections to seeing urbem as a subject for temptari. This leaves the problem of urbe(m): where did it come from? Perhaps it was spawned when the final m of illam was misread as in (as was mentioned above), or perhaps — after the loss of et hanc — urbem was added as a gloss for the now lonely illam based on an antithesis with in oppido. With these repairs the sentence reads: Perfectis enim magna ex parte munitionibus in oppido, et hanc et illam urbem uno tempore temptari posse confidebat. For since he had mostly completed his works in the town, he was confident that an attempt could be made on both the latter (sc. the jetty) and the former (sc. the island) at the same time. As the narrative continues, Caesar attacks the island (17–18) then the jetty (19–21). This does not square perfectly with uno tempore, but the misfit is at least partly a result of the gaps in the narrative in the following sentence and at 17.6. The second gap pertains to the two-pronged attack itself. In the passage as transmitted we hear that Caesar, hoping to split the enemy force, sent decked ships to attack one part of the island, and that he encouraged the men in his own divided force to compete with one another for the rewards that would be given to whichever group first took control of the island: In alteram insulae partem distinendae manus causa constratis nauibus aggreditur praemiis magnis propositis qui primus insulam cepisset. The construction in … insulae partem … aggreditur is problematic — although for a similar anacoluthon see 26.2 — but the bigger problem here is the absence of any reference to the other part of the island, presumably the part that the large force of men (ten cohorts plus light infantry and select cavalry, presumably on foot) embarked on the smaller vessels and skiffs was to attack. Since this area is the focus of the main battle narrative starting at 17.5, its omission here is odd. Aldus repaired the smaller problem by excising the unwanted preposition, Oudendorp by converting it into an adverb, inde. Vascosanus, who accepted Aldus’ emendation, addressed the larger problem by adding a connective before alteram and repunctuating so as to join this sentence to its predecessor: … cohortes X … in nauigia minora scaphasque imponit: in alteramque insulae partem distinendae manus causa constratis nauibus aggreditur praemiis magnis propositis qui primus insulam cepisset.Vascosanus’ repair presupposes the loss of -que, which may be related to the appearance of a surplus -que later in the sentence: praemiis ed. pr. : praemiisque MUSTV. Castiglioni combined the two approaches, replacing in with et: … cohortes X … in nauigia minora scaphasque imponit et alteram insulae partem distinendae manus causa constratis nauibus aggreditur praemiis magnis propositis qui primus insulam cepisset. With both repairs the fact that the ten cohorts (etc.) make an attack elsewhere has to be deduced from alteram. The innovations implicit in these repairs are not impossible, but they are not particularly plausible, either. Furthermore, there are no good parallels for the elision of the second alter- in the corpus. The closest is 1.5 ex altera oppidi parte auxilia ferri posset, but there the solo altera depends on the preceding in duas partes esset urbs diuisa.Similarly 34.3 legiones … duas … quarum altera. The closest parallel for our passage is probably BG 7.44.3–4, but there the reference of the solo ad alteram oppidi partem is defined by contrast with Caesar’s own position. Another approach is to assume another eye-skip here resulting in a lacuna that one might fill thus: … cohortes X … in nauigia minora scaphasque imponit. In alteram insulae partem pedestres copias exponit, alteram partem distinendae manus causa constratis nauibus aggreditur praemiis magnis propositis qui primus insulam cepisset. This supplement makes use of the transmitted preposition in and provides a second alteram, thereby specifying the attack’s two approaches, which the enemies withstand pariter in 17.4 (ac primo impetum nostrorum pariter sustinuerunt). Its language has acceptable parallels, too, since Incertus uses the expression copiae pedestres twice, once in an antithesis with naval forces (44.1 partim classe per se, partim pedestribus copiis per barbaros, cf. also 64.1), and mentions troop landings twice (10.2 remiges in terram … exposuisset, 19.3 cohortium instar in terram exposuerat). But at least two aspects of the supplement give pause. First, the hypothesized skip goes from partem to partem, yet the second partem is unnecessary and probably unwanted: in comparable constructions Incertus omits the second substantive (1.5 alterius rei … alterius, 11.4 una hostium triremis … altera, 19.5 altero opere effecto … alter instituto, 28.3 unum latus … alterum). However, the pleonasm is paralleled at BG 1.2.3 una ex parte … altera ex parte (cf. also BG 4.3.3). Second, one misses the connective provided by earlier repairs. So the supplement can only be offered exempli gratia. On balance, however, it seems better to indicate a gap than to apply a superficial repair.