‘[Archeanassa, thou of Colophon]’

These lines are drafted in pencil in Nbk 15 but appear to have been cancelled (on the facing page are the starts of three lines, clearly cancelled: Thou hast vision, O where, and I stand upon the tower). They were first identified by Timothy Webb in BSM xiv 285 as an incomplete translation of an epigram attributed to Plato in Athenaeus, Deipnosophistae Book XIII (‘Concerning Women’) 589c–589d. The epigram is also cited in Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers iii 31 (and is reproduced in the ‘Bipont’ edition, Platonis Philosophi (1781) i, p. xx): ’Aρχεάνασσαν ἔχω τὴ ν ἐκ Koϕω̑νoς ἑταίραν, η̒̑ καì ἐπì ρ̒ υτίδων ἕζετo δριμὺς ἕρως α̑̓ είλοì νεότητoζ άπαντὴσαντε? ἐkείνηζ π ρω τoπ λόoν, δi’ ̔όσηζ ́ η λθετ ε π νρ kα ï̑ η ζ

(‘I have a mistress, fair Archeanassa of Colophon, on whose very wrinkles sits hot love. O hapless ye who met such beauty on its first voyage, what a flame must have been kindled in you!’)