Names of Romans in Josephus are notoriously liable to corruption. Two minor characters in his account of the assassination of Caligula have so far defied plausible emendation, ‘Timidius’ in A.J. 19.33–4 and ‘Bathybius’ in 19.91. The sources of Josephus’ account of this dramatic episode were unquestionably high class—two, rather than one, Latin historians, as Wiseman has demonstrated, the main one (rather than the only one) being Cluvius Rufus, the other possibly Fabius Rusticus.

The most recent and by far the best edition of this work is that of H. M. Hine (Stuttgart/Leipzig, 1996), to which I refer for full bibliographical information. Many passages of the text are most helpfully discussed in the same scholar's Studies in the Text of Seneca's Naturales Quaestiones (Stuttgart/Leipzig, 1996).

ut nubes infici possint, … sol ad hoc apte ponendus est; non enim idem facit undecumque effulsit, et ad hoc opus est radiorum idoneus ictus.

Seneca is dealing with rainbows. Hine (Studies, 24–5) shares Axelson's suspicion of ictus, but is unhappy both with Axelson's situs (‘seems too static a word for the sun's rays’) and with my tractus, ‘direction’ (‘in this sense seems to be used only of concrete physical objects’); very tentatively he suggests angulus. Much more credible palaeographically and still yielding good sense and a good clausula would be i<mp>etus, a noun which is very common in this work of Seneca's.

Hostius fuit Quadra obscenitatis in scaenam usque perductae.

The process of giving greater credence to the codices has been constant in editions of Apuleius from the last century to the present day. Accordingly, the following suggestions are proposed.

I

et statim miser ut cum ilia adquieui, ab unico congressu annosam ac pestilentem con<dicionem> contraho.

And at the very moment when I—wretch that I am!—lay with her, from that one relationship, I contracted this interminable and miserable condition.

condicionem contraho scripsi: con contraho Fø: coniunctionem c. Chodaczek: consuetudinem c. van der Vliet: contagionem c. Lütjohann: cladem c. Helm: luem c. Heinsius: contraho adfectionem Novák con dittographiam putans, cf. 8.14.1 (187.22): noxam ante annosam Giarratano, post annosam Birt

In this case, where a word is obviously missing and the mysterious con appears, there are two general possibilities for correcting the text: con may be taken as a dittograph for contraho or considered to be part of the missing word. Another approach would be to interpret contraho differently: the verb can apply to a disease (as proposed by Lütjohann and Heinsius—followed by Hildebrand—no doubt swayed by pestilentem), harm or misfortune (meaning: ‘draw misfortune upon oneself’, as in the later sentence nequam tibi lingua intemperante noxam contrahas [Helm, Giarratano, and Birt]), a custom (more or less following van der Vliet and Novák) or marriage (Chodaczek). The solutions offered by van der Vliet, in particular, and Novák are reasonable: other commentators have been led astray by the sentence I have quoted, assuming that what is missing is something like ‘harm', ‘misfortune’.

It is usually assumed that Apuleius gave one of his characters the name ‘Thrasyllus’ because of its etymological connection with θρασ. Indeed it is singularly appropriate and Apuleius himself draws attention to the fact: Thrasyllus, praeceps alioquin et de ipso nomine temerarius… (Met. 8.8). However, it does not follow that a name with such an etymological significance can have no other connotations: in this note I suggest that there is a further frame of reference behind ‘Thrasyllus’ and that Apuleius may have expected his readers to realize this.

Right so far as Homer is concerned, and Paulus, a poet of Justinian's court best known for his epic poem (modelled after Homer) composed on the occasion of the rededication of the Church of St Sophia, clearly evokes Callinus. But the commentators have overlooked the pointed use of μχρι(ς) τυος + the present indicative in Achilles Tatius’ τᾰ κατᾰ Λευκππην κα κλειοøντα. Examination of the examples there suggests that Achilles Tatius could make greater demands on his readers than is sometimes generally assumed for the Greek novelists.

Little, if anything, in Justin scholarship has been as controversial as the dating of the so-called Epitome of the Philippic History of Pompeius Trogus. Suggested dates have varied from the time of Antoninus Pius through the third century to the end of the fourth. The latter was proposed in 1988 by Sir Ronald Syme, but has in fact received little support in subsequent literature on Justin, which has tended to accept the earlier dating (late second/early third centuries). An exception is T. D. Barnes, who has voiced support for a later dating based on a linguistic parallel to Justin in the Historia Augusta.

Barnes observes that Oscar Hey, author of the article ducatus in TLL (5.2129.30–2131.42), drew attention to the similarity between Justin 30.2.5 Agathocles regis lateri iunctus civitatem regebat, tribunatus et praefecturas et ducatus mulieres ordinabant and HA Heliog. 6.2 militaribus… praeposituris et legationibus et ducatibus venditis. Hey, he notes, refers at the head of that particular section of the article (Section 2 [2130.5–63]) to Seeck's article on dux. Seeck had demonstrated—and this is now taken for granted by scholars—that from the time of Diocletian dux is used technically as a formal title, and, in drawing attention to the parallel between HA Heliog. 6.2 and Justin, Hey must have been intimating that Justin is, like the author of Heliog. 6.2, using ducatus as a (post-Diocletianic) formal title. He then seems to suggest that Hey was right and Justin is to be dated to at least some time after 260.