1 Der Gottheit lebendiges Kleid Orpheus Arabicus, or myths of weaving in Greco-Arabic philosophy In Lebensfluten, im Tatensturm Wall ich auf und ab, Webe hin und her! Geburt und Grab, Ein ewiges Meer, Ein wechselnd Weben, Ein glühend Leben, So schaff ich am sausenden Webstuhl der Zeit, Und wirke der Gottheit lebendiges Kleid. I recently had the pleasure of hearing a paper by Professor Donna Shalev of the University of Jerusalem1, which was devoted to a passage from the Life of Plato by the 13th century Islamic scholar and physician Ibn Abī Usaybī‘a, which, as far as I know, has never been fully translated into English2. The passage presents considerable difficulties, and so, with Professor Shalev's permission, I would like to offer my own interpretation of it. I'll start with a translation of the passage in question. Vol. I, p. 43 Müller Plato He is called Flāṭun, Aflāṭun, and Aflāṭūn ; according to Sulaimān Ibn Ḥassān, known as Ibn Juljul3, in his book, <he is called> Aflāṭun the Wise, of the people of the city of Athens, a Byzantine Greek philosopher and physician, knowledgable in geometry and the 1 Donna Shalev, “Platon écrivain : the notion and term ποικιλíα and its Nachleben in Arabic doxographical sources”, paper given at the annual meeting of the International Society for Neoplatonic Studies, Atlanta, June 25 2011. Muwaffaq al-dīn abū-l-Abbās Aḥmad ibn al-Qāsim ibn Ḫalīfa Ibn abī Uṣaybi‘a al-Ḫazrajī (died 1269 AD), ‘Uyūn al-anbā’ fī ṭabaqāt al-aṭibba’ (Sources and information on the generations of physicians), ed. A. Müller, Königsberg 1884. 2 Abū Dāwūd Sulaymān ibn Ḥasan Ibn Juljul (c. 944-994), a Cordoban physician, wrote his Ṭabaqāt al-aṭibbā’ wa-l-hukamā’ (Generations of physicians and Wise Men) in 987. I have used the edition by Fu’ād Sayyid, Cairo 1955, with modifications. 3 2 nature of numbers4. In medicine, he has a book addressed to his disciple Timaeus. He has books and poems in philosophy, and in composition5 he has a doctrine6 unprecedented among all those who preceded him. By its means he discovered the art of brocade7, which is the doctrine concerning the five compositional relations8, and apart from it there is no path to being among all the composite existents9. Once he achieved a thorough grasp of the science of the nature of numbers and the knowledge of the five compositional relations, he rose to the science of the entire world, and he came to know the locations10 of the parts in their composition and mixture, by the difference in their colors and pigments, and he combined them according to the relation. He thus arrived at the science of images11. He first established a motion for all motions, then he classified them by the numerical relation, and he composed the compound parts in accordance with it. He thus arrived at the science of forming images12, and there arose for him the art of brocade and the art of all that is composed by it, and he wrote a book on this. This passage, like the entire section in Ibn abī Uṣaybi‘a devoted to Plato13, is itself something of a brocade or a patchwork made up of quotations from various sources, some of which the author cites (Ibn Juljul), and some of which he does not (Book of the secrets of secrets). As far as its interpretation is concerned, Professor Shalev gave a translation of this 4 ṭabā’i‘ al-a‘dād. Cf. Macrobius, In somn. Scip., 2, 2, 8 : His geometricis rationibus applicatur natura numerorum. 5 fī al-ta’līf. On this term, see O. Wright, Epistles of the Brethren of Purity, On Music, an Arabic critical edition and English translation of Epistle 5, Oxford, 2010, p. 71 : “ ‘Composition’...provides an exact equivalence [sc. to al-ta’līf] that still fails to capture the implication that the underlying principle of composition should be an adherence to, and manifestation of, ideal proportions, thereby providing a human analogy to the pure ratios of the celestial realm that generate the music of the spheres”. 6 ‘original discussion’ Shalev. 7 ṣan‘a al-dībāj. ‘The art of [multipart] composition’ Shalev. 8 wa huwa al-kalām al-mansūb ilā al-ḫamsa al-nisab al-ta’līfiyya : ‘which is the dialogue related to the five divisions of composition’ Shalev. 9 ‘Beyond which there is no method of any creative composition’ Shalev. 10 mawāni‘ Müller : mawāqi‘ Sayyid. 11 ‘ilm al-taṣwīr. 12 ‘ilm taṣwīr al-taṣwīrāt Müller ; ‘ilm taṣwīr al-mutaṣawwarāt Sayyid. The reference may be to statues animated by theurgic means. According to Jābir ibn Ḥayyān, Kitāb al-tajmī‘ p. 350, 12 ff. Kraus, those who deal with the creation of artificial life are those who have given themselves the name of image-makers (muṣawwirūn). Kraus (Jābir ibn Ḥayyān. Contribution à l'histoire des idées scientifiques dans l'Islam. 2, Jābir et la science grecque, Paris 1986 [1st edition 1945], p. 123-124), believes the reference is to Porphyry. 13 The concluding section of the Life of Plato is, as Ibn abī Uṣaybi‘a reveals, taken from the Muḫtār al-ḥikam (‘Choicest maxims and best sayings’) of al-Mubaššir ibn Fātik, written in 1048-1049. Cf. F. Rosenthal, “AlMubashshir ibn Fâtik. Prolegomena to an abortive edition”, Oriens 13-14 (1960-61), 132-158, and for an English translation of the revelant part of Ibn abī Uṣaybi‘a's text, Rosenthal, The classical heritage in Islam, Berkeley 1975, p. 28ff. 3 passage that interpreted it as a description to Plato's literary activity: the five nisab ta’līfiyya, she believes, are literary genres (‘divisions of composition’ as she translates the term), while the ṣan‘a al-dībāj, which she translates as ‘the art of [multipart] composition’, refers to Plato's literary style. Despite Professor Shalev's learned arguments, I remain unconvinced, and would like to propose an alternative interpretation, focusing first on the meaning of the nisab ta’līfiyya, and then of the ṣan‘a al-dībāj. 1. The compositional proportions The Epistles of the Brethren of Purity (Rasā’il Ikhwān al-Safā’ wa Khullā al-Wafā’), an encyclopedic work dating from the period between 840 and 980, have long been neglected by Western scholars, owing to the paucity of translations and adequate editions. This situation has now begun to be remedied, thanks in particular to the critical edition with English translation in course of publication under the auspices of the Institute of Ismaili Studies14. To the best of my knowledge, however, Epistle 6, entitled “ On the science of arithmetical, geometrical, and harmonic proportion ”, has yet to be translated into English, so I begin with a summary of this interesting treatise15. According to the Iḫwān, the ratio of a smaller to a larger quantity is called iḫtilāf alaṣġar, and it designates the fractions 1/2, 1/3, 1/4, 1/5, 1/6, 1/7, 1/8, 1/9, as well as their compounds. Its study pertains to the calculators. The ratio of a larger to a smaller fraction, by contrast, is called iḫtilāf al-a‘ẓam ; its study pertains to the philosophers, and it is divided into five species of relation or proportion (nisba) : 1. the multiple relation (nisba al-ḍi‘f, Greek pollaplasios). Example : 2:1. 2. Superparticular (nisba al-miṯl wa-l-zā’id juz’an, Greek epimorioi16. Examples : 3:2, 4:3, 5:4, 6:5) ; 14 As of this writing, three volumes have so far appeared, encompassing Epistles 5 (On Music), 22 (The case of the animals), and 10-14 (On Logic). 15 16 I have used the Arabic text edited by Dieterici (1883). That is, proportions of the type (n+1): n. Cf. LSJ : “ Containing a whole + a fraction with 1 for its numerator ”. See Theon, p. 76, 21 ff. Hiller ; Nicomachus I, 19, p. 49, 1-4 Hoche : “ The superparticular ... is a number that contains within itself the whole of the number compared with it, and some one factor of it besides ”. 4 3. Superpartient (nisba al-miṯl wa-l-zā’id ajzā’an, Greek epimereis17. Examples : 5:318, 7:4, 9:5, 11:6, 13:719), 4. Multiple superparticular (nisba al-ḍi‘f wa-l-zā’id juz’an, Greek pollaplasiepimorios20. Examples : 5:2, 7:3, 9:421, 11:5), 5. Multiple superpartient (nisba al-ḍi‘f wa-l-zā’id ajzā’an, Greek pollaplasiepimerês22. Examples : 8:3, 11:423, 14:5, 17:6). These five varieties exhaust the possibilities for the relation between a larger and a smaller number. There follows in the Brethren's exposition the subsection entitled On Proportion (fī-lnisab), which begins as follows : Al-nisba hiya qadaru aḥad al- Proportion is the value of one of two muqdarayna ‘inda al-aḫar wa-l-nisba yuqāl amounts with regard to another26. Three ‘alā ṯalāṯa anwā‘ immā bi-l-kamiyya24 wa- species of proportion are spoken of : immā bi-l-kayfiyya25 wa-immā bi-humā quantitative, qualitative, and both together. jamī‘an fa-allatī bi-l-kamiyya yuqāl lihā To the quantitative one they attribute the 17 LSJ : Superpartient, of numbers of the form 1 + 2/x, 1 + 3/x, etc. Cf. Nicomachus I, 20 : “ It is the superpartient relation when a number contains within itself the whole of the number compared and in addition more than one part of it ”. 18 , According to Theo, there are two subspecies of superpartient ratios : those where the remainder is the same or similar, and those where it is other and different. 5:3 is an instance of the former variety (1+2/3). 19 7:4 and 11:6 are instances of a remainder that is other and different : 7:4 = 1 3/4 = (4/1 + 4/2 + 4/4) ; 11: 6 = (6/1 + 6/2 + 6/3). 20 LSJ : Containing a number a number of times with one aliquot part over (e. g. 10/3 = 3 1/3). Cf. Theon 78, 23ff. ; Nicomachus I 22. 21 7:3 : 7 = (2 X 3) + (1/3 X 3), a relation Theon calls diplasiepitritos ; 9:4 : 9 = (2 X 4) + (1/4 X 4), a relation called diplasiepitetartos. 22 LSJ : Containing a number a number of times with more than one aliquot part over (e.g. 11/3 = 3 2/3). Cf. Nicomachus I 23. 23 8:3 = 2 2/3, a relation Theo calls diplasios kai dis epitritos ; 11:4 can be analysed either as diplasios te kai hêmiolios kai epitetartos (2 X 4) + (4 X 1/2) + (4 X 1/4) or as diplasios te kai tris epitetartos (= 2 3/4). 24 Greek kata posotêta, used of an arithemetical progression with a common difference (D'Ooge et al., p. 266 n. 25 Greek kata poiotêta, used of a series of terms with similar ratios (D'Ooge et al., ibid). 26 Cf. Nicomachus, 2, 21, 2 : ἔστιν οὖν ἀναλογία κυρίως δυεῖν ἢ πλειόνων λόγων σύλληψις ἐς τὸ αὐτό. 1). 5 nisbah ‘adadiyya wa-allatī bi-l-kayfiyya arithmetical proportion, to the qualitative one yuqāl lihā nisba handasiyya wa-allatī bi- the geometrical proportion, and to the one humā jamī‘an yuqāl lihā nisba ta‘līfiyya that is both together they attribute the mūsīqiyya. compositional, musical proportion. It is clear from this text that for the Brethren of Purity, the expression nisba ta‘līfiyya, which occurs in our passage from Ibn Abī Usaybī‘a, designates the harmonic proportion. The Brethren go on to give an account of the three main proportions27, closely following Nicomachus of Gerasa, whose Introduction to Arithmetic was known in Arabic translation. The arithmetic proportion or mean, which is quantitative, corresponds to the natural series of numbers 1, 2, 3, 4...., because the same quantitative difference (viz., in this case, 1) exists between the members of the series. It is subdivided into continuous and disjunct proportions. Its peculiar characteristics are that its mean term is either half of or equal to the sum of the extremes28, that the ratio of each term to itself is equal to the ratio of the differences to each other ; that the product of the extreme terms is less than the square of the mean by the product of the differences29; and that the ratio between the smaller terms is larger than the ratio between the larger terms30. The geometrical proportion occurs when of three or more terms, as the greatest is to the next greatest, so the latter is to the one that comes after it31. The terms in the series differ not by the same quantity, but by the same quality, i.e. the same ratio. Examples include numbers that progress by the double ratio : 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32.... or by the triple ratio 1, 3, 9, 27, 81, 243, ..... 27 On these proportions or means, see Heath 1921, 85ff., Burkert 1972, 440f., Huffman 1993, 168f. 28 In the case of 1, 2, 3 : 2 = (1+3)/2. 29 For instance, in the case of 2, 3, 4 : 2 X 4 = 8 ; 32 = 9 ; 9-8 = 1 = 1 X 1. 30 Again, in the case of 2, 3, 4 : 3/2 > 4/3. 31 Thus, in the case of 3, 9, 27 : 27:9 = 9:3. Cf. Nicomachus II, 24. 6 The differences between the terms of the geometrical are in the same ratio to one another as the adjacent terms to one another32. In the case of the double ratio (1, 2, 4, 8....), the greater terms differ from the lesser by the lesser terms themselves33, and the difference between two consecutive terms is equal to the lesser term34. In continuous geometrical proportions, the product of the extremes is equal to the square of the mean35, while in the case of disjunct proportions or those with a greater but even number of terms, the product of the extremes equals that of the mean terms36. Finally, all terms in the geometrical proportion maintain the same ratio37. The harmonic proportion represents a combination of the arithmetical and geometrical proportion38, and is exemplified by the series 3, 4, 6 or 2, 3, 6. Here, the greater term is to the smallest (6:3 ; 6:2) as the difference between greatest and mean terms (6-4 = 2 : 6-3 = 3) is to the difference between mean and smallest term (4-3 = 1, 3-2 =1)39. In this proportion, unlike the mathematical one, the ratios among the greater terms are greater, and those among the smaller terms smaller. When a group of the three consecutive numbers in the various proportions are taken, we have the following relations between the mean term, on the one hand, and on the other the smallest and greatest terms : in the arithemetical proportion, the two differences are equal fractions of the mean term and different fractions of the extremes ; in the geometrical proportion they represent different fractions of both the mean term and the extremes, while in the harmonic proportion they are different fractions of the mean term but the same fraction of the extremes40. An additional property of the harmonic proportion is that when the extremes are added together and multiplied by the mean term, the result is twice the product of the extreme terms41. 32 Again, in the case of 3, 9, 27 : 27-9 = 18 ; 9-3 = 6 ; 18:6 = 27:9 = 9:3. 33 8-4 = 4 ; 4-2 = 2, etc. 34 In the series 2, 4, 8, 16..., the differences are 2, 4, 8..... ; see the table in D'Ooge et al., p. 271 n. 1. 35 In the case of 4, 8, 16 : 4 X 16 = 82. 36 In the series 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64 : 2 X 64 = 4 X 32 = 8 X 16, etc. 37 Again, in the series 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 64:32 = 4:2, etc. 38 Iḫwān, p. 341-342 Dieterici. 39 6:3 = [(6-4) : (4-3] ; 6:2 = [(6-3) : (3-2)]. Algebraicially, a : c = a—b : b — c. According to Proclus (In Tim., II, 19, 28 ff., the harmonic proportion is that in which the mean term exceeds and is exceeded by the same part of the extreme terms ; cf. Plato, Timaeus 36. 40 See the table D'Ooge et al., p. 275 n. 4. 41 2, 3, 6 : (2+6) = 8, 8 X 3 = 24 ; (2 X 6) X 2 = 24. 7 Finally, as the greatest term is to the smallest, so is the difference between the greatest and the next greatest or middle term to the difference between the least term and the middle term42. 2. Harmonic proporton and musical ratios According to the Greek mathematical tradition, It is from the harmonic proportion, that the musical ratios, or intervals (Greek diastêmata) are derived. These intervals are as follows43: 1. The most elementary musical proportion is the fourth (Greek dia tessarôn), in sesquitertian ratio (epitritos44). Example : 4:3. 2. Next comes the fifth (Greek dia pente), in sesquialter ratio (hêmiolios)45. Examples : 3:2 or 4:6. 3. Then comes the octave (Greek dia pasôn) in double ratio46. Examples : 4:2, 6:3, followed by 4. The octave and fifth (Greek dia pasôn kai dia pente), in triple ratio47, Examples : 3:1, 6:2. Then comes 5. The double octave (Greek dis dia pasôn), in quadruple ratio48. Example : 4:1. Next comes 6. The tone or superoctave (Greek epogdoon, tonos), in a ratio of 9:849. Finally, there is 7. The semitone, which differs from the full tone as the difference between 256 and 243. The Pythagoreans called this interval diesis, Plato the leimma. 42 2, 3, 6 : 6:2 = (6-3 = 3) : (4-3 =1). 43 Cf. Aristoxenus, Elementa harmonica 2, 45-46 ; Nicomachus, Manuale harmonicum 6 ; Introductio arithmetica 2, 26 ; Theo Smyrnaeus, p. 56-58 Hiller ; Ps.-Plutarch, De musica 23, 1139C-F ; Ptolemy, Harmonics 1, 5 ; Chalcidius, In Tim. 45 ; Proclus, In Tim., 191D ; Boethius, De institutione musica I, 7 ; Cassiodorus, De artibus ac disciplinis liberalium litterarum, V, PL 70 col. 1209-10. 44 That is, an integer plus a number one third greater than it ; cf. Macrobius, In somn. scip., 2, 1, 15. 45 An integer plus a number one-half greater than it ; cf. Macrobius, In somn. scip., 2, 1, 16. 46 The combination of an integer and a number twice as great. Cf. Macrobius, In somn. scip., 2, 1, 17. 47 Cf. Macrobius, In somn. scip., 2, 1, 18. 48 Cf. Macrobius, In somn. scip., 2, 1, 19. 49 Cf. Macrobius, In somn. scip., 2, 1, 20. 8 It seems clear from this passage by the Iḫwān, supplemented by passages from Nicomachus, Theon, and Macrobius, that al-nisab al-ta’līfiyya mentioned by Ibn abī Uṣaybi‘a refer, not to kinds of literary composition as per Professor Shalev, but to the musical proportion or harmony of the Greco-Latin tradition. As to why there are precisely five such proportions, the tradition proposes at least two possible answers. They could refer either (i) to the five fractions designated as iḫtilāf al-a‘ẓam (multiple, superparticular, superpartient, multiple superparticlar, multiple superpartient), or (ii) Alternatively, it could designate the five musical intervals we have just examined (fourth, fifth, octave, octave and fifth, double octave). Macrobius comes down unambiguously in favor of the second alternative : And so the consonant chords are five in number, the fourth, the fifth, the octave, the octave and fifth, and the double octave50. We find exactly the same doctrine in the Greek tradition. Beginning his exposition of Timaeus 35A, Proclus writes : The Pythagoreans did not take the harmonic consonances from anywhere else than numbers, and not from all of them, but from the multiples and the superparticulars, saying that the fourth is in sesquitertian, the fifth in 51 sesquialter, the octave in double, the octave and fifth in triple, and the double octave in quadruple ratio . We thus end up with the following scheme of the five harmonic consonances : interval numerical ratio derivation composition numerical composition fourth 4:3 sesquitertian two tones plus one semitone 2 X 9:8 + 256:243 three tones plus one semitone 3 X 9:8 + 256:243 (epitritos) fifth 3:2 sesquialter (hemiolius) Macrobius, In somn. scip., 2, 1, 24 : Sunt igitur symphoniae quinque, id est, διὰ τεσσάρων, διὰ πέντε, διὰ πασῶν, διὰ πασῶν καὶ διὰ πέντε, καὶ δὶς διὰ πασῶν. Cf. C(h)alcidius, In Tim. ch. 35. 50 Proclus, In Tim., II, p. 167, 31-168, 5 Diehl : ... ὅτι τὰς ἐν τῇ ἁρμονίᾳ συμφωνίας οὐκ ἀλλαχόθεν ἢ ἐκ τῶν ἀριθμῶν ἐλάμβανον οἱ Π υ θ α γ ό ρ ε ι ο ι , καὶ ἐκ τούτων οὐ πάντων, ἀλλ’ ἐκ τῶν πολλαπλασίων καὶ τῶν ἐπιμορίων, τὸ μὲν διὰ τεσσάρων ἐν ἐπιτρίτῳ λέγοντες εἶναι, τὸ δὲ διὰ πέντε ἐν ἡμιολίῳ, τὸ δὲ διὰ πασῶν ἐν διπλασίῳ, καὶ τὸ μὲν διὰ πασῶν ἅμα καὶ διὰ πέντε ἐν τριπλασίῳ, τὸ δὲ δὶς διὰ πασῶν ἐν τετραπλασίῳ· 51 9 octave 2:1 double six tones 6 X 9:8 octave and fifth 3:1 triple nine tones plus one semitone 9 X 9:8 + 256:243 double octave 4:1 quadruple twelve tones 12 X 9:8 Pythagoras and the blacksmiths Few anecdotes in musical history are more familiar than the one that has Pythagoras, tired from a long day of meditating on the causes of the harmony of the celestial spheres, walking past a smithy, and being intrigued by the sounds made by the blacksmith's various hammers striking a hot piece of iron52. He noted that sound they made were harmonious, producing intervals of the octave, the fifth and the fourth. At home, Pythagoras experimented with lighter and heavier hammers, and concluded that these harmonious intervals were due to the ratios between the weights of the hammer-heads. He next experimented with stringed instruments, hanging weights on animal guts and sinews in the same proportion as those he had discovered held among the hammerheads. The upshot of Pythagoras' experiments was said to have been the “ perfect harmony ” embodied in the series 6, 8, 9, 1253, of which 12:6 forms the octave (2:1), 12:8 the fifth (3:2), and 12:9 the fourth (4:3). Crucially, this series represents a combination of the arithmetic mean (9 = (6+12)/2) and the harmonic mean (8 = 2 X (6X12)/6+12). Musical intervals and proportion in Plato's Timaeus The most famous application of these principles in ancient philosophy is a passage from Plato's Timaeus, which Macrobius, in his Commentary on Scipio's Dream, goes on to discuss 52 My account follows Macrobius, In somnium Scipionis, 2, 1 9 ff. Cf. the parallel versions in Iamblichus, De vita pythagorica, 26, 115-21 ; In Nicomachi Arithmeticam introductionem, p. 121-122 Pistelli ; Boethius, De institutione musica, I, 10 ; Theo Smyrnaeus, p. 56 Hiller ; Censorinus, De die natali 10 ; Chalcidius, In Tim. 45. The story is necessarily apocryphal, since it is not borne out by the laws of physics ; cf. Burkert 1972, 375 ff. 53 It is worth noting, however, that according to Iamblichus (In Nicom. arith., 118.19 ff.), Pythagoras brought the knowledge of this series from Babylon to Greece. 10 right after reporting the anecdote of Pythagoras and the blacksmiths. At 35a ff, Timaeus begins his discussion of the construction of the World Soul : Midway between the substance that is indivisible and remains always the same, and that which comes to be in conjunction with bodies and is divisible, he blended a third form of substance compounded out of both, that is to say, out of the Same and the Other ; and in like manner he brought it into being it midway between the indivisible one and the one that is divisible in accordance with bodies. And he took the three of them, and blent them all together into one form, by forcing the nature of the Other into union with the Same, since it was difficult to mix. [35b] And when he had mixed them with substance and had made of them one out of three, again he began to distribute the whole into an appropriate number of portions ; and each portion was a mixture of the Same, of the Other, and of substance. This is how he began to divide : first he took away one part from the whole, then another, double the size of the first, then a third, hemiolic with respect to the second and triple the first, then a fourth, double the second, then a fifth, three times the third, then a sixth, eight times the first, then a seventh, twenty-seven times the first. Next he filled out the double and triple intervals, once again cutting off parts from the material and placing them in the intervening gaps, so that in each interval there were two means, the one exceeding (one extreme) and exceeded (by the other extreme) by the same part of the extremes themselves, the other exceeding (one extreme) and exceeded (by the other) by an equal number. From these bonds within the previous intervals there arose hemiolic, epitritic and epogdoic intervals ; and he filled up all the epitritics with the epogdoic kind of interval, leaving a part of each of them, where the interval of the remaining part had as its boundaries, number to number, 256:243. And in this way he had now used up all the mixture from 54 which he cut these portions . Despite the difficulties raised by this enigmatic text, ancient commentators such as Macrobius were able to broadly agree on its basic meaning. Plato's Demiurge divides the worldsoul into two numerical series : the double sequence 1, 2, 4, 855, and the triple series 1, 3, 9, 2756, thus leaving him with the series 1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 9, 27. Between each term in this series, he then inserts two means : the arithmetical mean and the harmonic mean. When applied to the interval between 1 and 2, for instance, this algorithm generates the series 1, 4/3 (harmonic mean), 3/2 (arithmetical mean), 2. Finally, each of the 4/3 intervals thus created was to be filled with two intervals of 9:8 and a remainder of 256:243. When interpreting these figures, the Neoplatonists, followed by some modern commentators, went on to develop some extremely abstruse mathematical calculations, but we shall not follow them here. At the end of the chapters he devotes to the musical structure of World Soul in Plato's Timaeus, Macrobius57 writes: 54 Translation A. Barker, Greek musical writings. 2, Harmonic and acoustic theory, Cambridge 1989, p. 59-60. For interpretations of this passage, see especially Brisson 1998, §4.2, pp. 314 ff. (although the author's contention that Plato did not intend to emphasize the musical structure of the world soul strikes me as utterly implausible). 55 That is, 1, 1 X 2, 22, 23. 56 That is, 1, 1 X 3, 32, 33. 57 Macrobius, In Somn. Scip. II, 3, 15, translation W. H. Stahl : Hanc Platonicorum persuasionem Porphyrius libris suis inseruit, quibus Timaei obscuritatibus nonnihil lucis infudit : aitque, eos credere, ad imaginem 11 Porphyry includes this conviction of the Platonists in his books which pour light upon the obscurities of the Timaeus ; he says they believed that the intervals in the corporeal universe, which were filled with sesquitertians, sesquialters, superoctaves, half-tones, and a leimma, followed the pattern of the soul's fabric (ad imaginem contextionis animae), and that harmony was thus forthcoming, the proportional intervals of which were interwoven (contexta) into the fabric of the Soul and were also injected into the corporeal universe which is quickened by the Soul. With its metaphors of weaving applied to musical/mathematic harmonic intervals, this fragment from Porphyry's lost Commentary on the Timaeus seems to contain all the elements sufficient to explain the strange “five compositional relations” which Ibn Abī Uṣaybi‘a attributes to Plato : they are none other than the five main consonances or harmonic intervals of Greek music, in accordance with which Plato's Demiurge constructs the World Soul in the Timaeus. II. The dībāj It may be that the aforementioned passage from Plato's Timaeus, together with its interpretations as reported by Porphyry, suffices to explain our entire text. What remains somewhat mysterious, however, in Ibn Abī Uṣaybi‘a's account is the emphasis on the ‘art of brocade’, with its clear reference to weaving. The Arabic word dībāj means “a certain kind of cloth or garment (..) and particularly a name for that which is variegated, decorated, or embellished (...) a kind of woven stuff, variegated, or diversified, with colours”58. The word is Persian in origin, meaning ‘pannus sericus versicolor59’ or ‘brocade’60, but like its Arabic adaptation the Persian term can also mean the preface to a literary work61. contextionis animae haec esse in corpore mundi intervalla, quae epitritis, hemioliis, et epogdois, hemitoniis complentur, et limmate ; et ita provenire concentum ; cujus ratio in substantia animae contexta, mundano quoque corpori, quod ab anima movetur, inserta est. Note that we once again have an enumeration of five musical proportions, although not coincide completely with the ones discussed above. 58 E. W. Lane, An Arabic-English Lexicon, London 1863, Book I, p. 843. 59 Ioannes Augustus Vullers, Lexicon Persico-Latinum etymologicum, Bonn 1835, vol. I, p. 946. 60 J. Shakespear, A dictionary, Hindustani and English, with a copious index, fitting the work to serve, also, as a dictionary of English and Hindustani, 3rd ed., much enl., London 1834, p. 601. 61 ‘id, quod in fronte libri scriptum est, praefatio, a verbis coloribus distinctis sic dicta’, Vullers loc. cit. 12 In his Arabic translation of the Pentateuch (Gen. 37:23), Saadia ben Joseph Gaon (892942) renders the term for Joseph's famous ‘coat of many colors’62 (Hebrew kethonet pasim, khitôn poikilos in the Septuagint, tunica polymita in the Vulgate) by the Arabic tūnia dībāj or jabba dībāj63. This provides an additional confirmation of Professor Shalev's richly documented assertion that the Arabic dībāj is equivalent to the Greek poikilos, ‘variegated’. Until now, however, this observation has not enabled a satisfactory understanding of our passage, as we can see from the way scholars have interpreted it. The earliest association of Plato with the art of dībāj seems to be found in the pseudoAristotelian Secret of secrets (Sirr al-asrār)64, a work purporting to consist in advice from Aristotle to Alexander that bears striking resemblances to the Encyclopedia of the Brethren of Purity. In Book II of this work, we find a parallel to our passage from Ibn Abī Uṣaybi‘a, as we can see from the table : Secret of Secrets, p. 85 Badawī Ibn Juljul ‘alima al-fāḍil Aflāṭūn mawāqi‘ alajzā’ al-mu’talifāt bi-iḫtilāf alwānihā ‘inda taṣawwurhā65 bi-l-nisab alta’līfiyya fa-qamat lahu ṣinā‘a al-dībāj wa ‘arifa mawāqi‘ al-ajzā’ al-mu’talifāt al-mumtazijāt bi-iḫtilāf alwānihā wa aṣbāġihā, wa i’tilāfihā ‘alā qadr al-nisba, fa- 67 62 In Patristic thought, Joseph's poikilos khitôn was brought into relation with the ‘coats of skin’ (dermatinoi khitônes) with which God clothed Adam and Eve upon their expulsion from the Garden (Genesis 3:21) ; both were considered types of the incarnation of the Word. The idea that the human soul clothes itself in various khitônes of matter as it descends to earth through the celestial sphere is also common in Neoplatonism ; cf. Jean Pépin, La tradition de l'allégorie de Philon d'Alexandrie à Dante. t. II : Études Historiques, Paris : Études Augustiniennes, 1987, ch. VI, p. 137 ff. 63 See David M. Freidenreich, “The use of Islamic sources in Saadiah Gaon's ‘Tafsīr’ of the Torah”, Jewish Quarterly Review 93 3/4 (2003), 353-395, p. 383 & n. 69. 64 Ed. A. Badawī 1954. The work's full title is Kitāb al-Siyāsa fi tadbīr al-riyāsa. There is an English translation, probably by Ismail Ali, in R. Steele's edition of Roger Bacon's recension of the Secretum secretorum, cf. M. Manzalaoui 1974 65 Badawi and Manzaloui report the mss reading as tṣwr, which could be vocalized as the verbal form taṣawwara, ‘to imagine, to conceive’, or as the maṣdar (quasi-infinitive) of the 5th form taṣawwur, ‘imagination, notion, conception’, which I have chosen. Note that the parallel passage in Ibn Juljul/ Ibn Abī Uṣaybi‘a speaks of taṣwīr, maṣdar of the second form of ṣwr, with the meaning ‘façonner, former une chose de telle ou telle façon...lui donner une forme...tracer, peindre (des figures, des tableaux)...images, tableaux, figures représentées par la peinture” (Kazimirski). 66 The mss. offer mṣwrāt. The active form muṣawwir means ‘painter, sculptor, artist’ (Lane) ; as one of the names of God, it means ‘The Fashioner, He-who-gives-Form’ (cf. Qur’ān 59:24) 67 mawāni‘ 13 wa jamī‘ al-muṣawwirāt66 waṣala bi-ḏalika ilā ‘ilm al-taṣwīr, fa-waḍa‘a awwalan haraka jāmi'a li-jamī‘ al-harakāt, 68 ṯumma faṣalahā bi-l-nisba al-‘adadiyya, wa waḍa‘a al-ajzā’ al-mu’talifa ‘alā ḏalika, fa69 ṣāra ilā ‘ilm taṣwīr al-mutaṣawwarāt , faqāma lahu sinā‘a al-dībāj wa sinā‘a kulli mu’talif bihi. wa-allafa fī ḏalika kitāban. If we find this passage from the Secret of secrets hard to understand, we are not alone, as becomes obvious from the translations scholars have offered of it : Philippus Tripolitanus Et per istam viam et inquisicionem cognovit peritissimus doctor noster Plato naturam parcium compositarum rerum ex contrariis qualitatibus et coloribus in sua generacione per comparacionem ad res compositas, et per hoc habuit scienciam de sideribus70 comatis71 Manzalaoui 1974 Plato learned the positions of the constituent elements in their different kinds, and at the moment of their shaping, together with the ratios in which they are combined ; he was thus able to construct his system of order [?] and forms Ismail Ali 1920 And it was through it that the learned Plato came to know the situations of the parts of the compounds with the differences of their colours (qualities) at their conception according to their composing relations. Hence he discovered the art of painting on silk and drawing of pictures The Arabic phrase ṣanā‘a al-dībāj wa jamī‘ al-muṣawwirāt has thus been variously understood as referring to comets, to a system of order and forms, or to painting on silk and drawings. The commentators are quite frank in admitting their perplexity : Steele judges that “ The Arabic is quite unintelligible in this connexion, whether it refers to the art of ‘ painting on silk ’ (Eastern text) or of weaving, ‘ the fringed garment known as the dibaj’ (Western text) ”, while Manzalaoui72 refers to it as a “ most obscure sentence ”, in which the “ peripheral sense in which some of the Arabic words seem to be used gives the Arabic text the air of being translated literally from another language ”. Manzalaoui gives his own interpretation with the utmost diffidence : he suggests, implausibily, that it might be based on Plato's Republic VII, 540A-B, 68 ṣnfahā. 69 al-taṣwīrāt 70 De ydeis et rebus 71 Vel, formatis 72 Manzalaoui 1974, p. 209f. 14 and also, closer to the mark, that “ the teachings of the Timaeus may also lie behind this obscure passage ”. How can we explain such perplexity ? The most obvious culprit is an ambiguity that is inherent in the Arabic language. Like all Semitic languages, Arabic constructs its lexicon on the basis of trilateral roots, and the Arabic root ṣwr (sad waw ra) connotes, according to Lane, ‘A. form, fashion, figure, figure, shape or semblance’ or ‘B. an effigy, an image, a statue, or a picture’. It derivative meanings include ‘a mental image (...) idea’ and ‘the essence of a thing ; that by being which a thing is what it is’. Hence, the noun al-ṣūra, plural al-ṣuwar is, among many other meanings the standard Arabic translation for Platonic Forms or Ideas. The terms we find in our passages from the Secret of Secrets and from Ibn Juljul/Ibn Uṣaybi‘a - taṣawwurhā, muṣawwirāt, taṣwīr, mutaṣawwarāt - all derive from this same root ṣwr, and thus all connote the notions of form (Platonic or otherwise), conception and imagination, painting, sculpture and other forms of image-making that inhere in that root. What all these meanings seem to have in common is the sense of an image or form. When combined with the notion of weaving or embroidery which, as we have seen, is implied by the term dībāj, we come up with a reasonably coherent image of a garment with picture painted or embroidered on it. But what could such a garment possibly have to do with Plato? Weaving in Greek literature, mythology, and philosophy The use of metaphors of weaving to designate compostional activity, whether literary or musical, is as old as Greek literature itself73. In the Iliad, Nestor ‘weaves counsel74’ (mêtin huphainein, 7, 324, 9, 93), while Penelope's suitors do the same in the Odyssey (4, 678), as does Odysseus himself when plotting to save his companions from the Cyclops (9, 422). The same metaphor occurs in the Hesiodic Shield75, in Bacchylides76, Oppian77, Nonnos78, and the Orphic 73 On the use of the verb hupainein in literary and rhetorical contexts, see already Chr. Augustus Lobeck, Aglaophamus sive De theologiae mysticae graecorum causis libri tres, Regensberg 1829, vol. I, p. 379 & n. [k]. 74 Translation Lattimore. Oddly, the same translator translates the very same expression in the Odyssey by “plotted”, then by “combining all my resources and treacheries” respectively. 75 Fragment 195, 28 ed. Merkelbach-West. 76 Dithyramb 3, 51-52 ed. Irigoin. 77 Halieutica 4, 77, ed. Mair, and often in the Cynegetica. 15 Argonautics79. The metaphor of weaving songs is absent from Homer80, but occurs in Callimachus81, Porphyry82, Nonnos83, and the Orphic Hymns84. Weaving was never a prestigious occupation in Greek society and culture, particularly for men85. Yet it did play a role in the religious life of the polis. At several festivals, women wove peploi, robes or mantles, for various divinities : for Athena in the Panathenaia at Athens86, for Hera at Elis87, for Apollo at Amyclae88. There was a clearly a socio-political aspect to such ceremonies of collective weaving, especially in the Classical period, and it has been well discussed by Scheid and Svenbro89, among others. Less often discussed, at least in recent literature, are the philosophical and more specifically cosmological implications of the images associated with weaving in general and the peplos, pharos, or khitôn in particular. Yet these were not absent from Greco-Roman culture. In his idiosyncratic but rich work Weltmantel und Himmelszelt, the Austrian-Jewish scholar Robert Eisler, who later survived the camps of Dachau and Buchenwald, collected and discussed a number of literary and iconographical testaments to such mythical images. They 78 Dionysiaca 36, 443 ; 37, 316 ; 395 ed. Keydell. 79 Orphica Argonautika, 842 ed. Dottin. 80 If Eisler (1910, vol. 1, p. 241-242 n. 2 ; 243-244 n. 3) were correct in ascribing to Alkman (7th cent. BC) the expression melos khordêisin hupainein, this would of course be the oldest attestion of the metaphor. In fact, however, the phrase comes from a description of a statue of Alcman by the poet Christodorus of Thebes (5th-6th cent. AD), as preserved in the Greek Anthology (2, 1, line 397 ed. Beckby). 81 Fr. 26 Pfeiffer. 82 In the oracle on the death of Plotinus, Vita Plotini 22, 14. 83 Dionysiaca 19, 100. 84 Orphic Hymn 51, 20 ed. Quandt. 85 Cf. G. S. Kirk, J. E. Raven, & M. Schofield, The presocratic philosophers, Cambridge 19832, p. 61 ; West, 1971, p. 54f. 86 The presentation of the peplos to the ancient xoanon of Athena Polias is represented in the middle of the east frieze of the Parthenon ; cf. Burket, 1985 232 ; L. Deubner, Attische Feste2, Berlin 1966, 30-35. The Scholiast to Aristophanes' Birds 827 refers to this robe as a peplos...pampoikilos. Women set to work weaving the peplos nine months previously at the festival of the Khalkeia, and the robe was washed in the sea at the festival caled Plynteria. 87 Woven by sixteen women every four years, according to Pausanias 5, 16, 2. 88 Pausanias 3, 16, 2. 89 The craft of Zeus. Myths of weaving and fabric, translated by Carol Volk, Cambridge-London, Harvard University Press, 1996. 16 range from the shining cloak (argês khitôn) of the Orphics90 and the Orphic-Homeric myth of Persephone weaving at her loom91, to the girdle, necklace and robe of Harmonia92, the Christian legend of St. Agatha, and even the Virgin Mary weaving the seamless robe in which Christ was crucified93. In the time allotted to me here, I can only discuss a few of these examples. Persephone and the Orphic peplos We are all familar with the Homeric Hymn to Hades, in which Persephone, virginal daughter of Demeter, is picking flowers in a meadow when, suddenly Hades, Lord of the Underworld, surges forth from his subterranean domain in his terrible chariot and abducts the girl, taking her back to the underworld to be his bride. Persephones' grieving mother Demeter wanders the earth in search of her daughter, and finally goes on strike, causing all plant growth, food production, and therefore sacrifices to the gods, to cease on Earth. Zeus finally brokers a deal between the two parties, in which Persephone will spend half the year below ground as bride of Hades, and half above ground, reunited with her mother. The Orphics had a different story to tell. In fact, they seem to have taught two separate traditions. According to one account, Zeus himself comes to his daughter Persephone in the form of a snake94, and impregnates her95. The fruit of this monstruous union is none other than Dionysus/Zagreus, who is later torn to pieces, boiled, roasted and devoured by the Titans at Hera's instigation. According to another version, Persephone is carried off by Hades in his chariot, as in the Homeric/Eleusinian tradition, although there are a number of differences in 90 OF 60 = Damascius, De princ. I, 316, 18 Ruelle. CF. Eisler I, p. 105, who compares the Orphic mythological figures Nux astrokhitôn and Mênê astrokhitôn (Orphic Argonautica, 513, 1028 ed. Dottin). 91 Although attested only in the later Orphic Rhapsodies, this theme may already have been present in the poem enitled Peplos, which Epigenes (4th cent. BC) ascribed to the Pythagorean Brontinus of Metapontum or Croton, the contemporary of Alcmaeon. See West 1983, 9f. 92 Cf. Eisler 1910, 159 ff., who interprets Harmonia as the “Near Eastern Mother of the Gods, Mistress of the cosmic Philia that holds the world together”. 93 Eisler 1910, 188 ff., citing Euthymius and the Venerable Bede. 94 Zeus had already assumed serpent form to copulate with his mother Rhea/Demeter, a union that resulted in the birth of Persephone (OF 153). 95 OF 195. Cf. Burkert, 1985 297 ; West, 1983, 97-98 ; Bernabé, 2003 177. 17 detail between the Orphic and Homeric tales96. What both accounts seem to have in common, however, is that they both depict Persephone as engaged in weaving some kind of embroidered garment before she is violently interrupted, either by her uncle Hades or by her own father Zeus. The figure of Persephone assumed tremendous importance in early Orphic religion97, as is attested by the gold lamellae98, in which she plays the role of “ judge in the ultimate decision over the soul's destiny99 ” and is addressed as “ pure one, queen of the subterranean beings ”100. It is hard not to agree with scholars such as Alberto Bernabé, editor of the new Teubner edition of the Orphic fragments, who reminds us that the ancient Great Mother of the Aegean was later adored by the Greeks in the figures of Aphrodite, Demeter, and Persephone (...) death, for the Orphic initiate, is the beginning of eternal life, and (...) both, life and death, are not always antithetical (...). In sum, the womb of Persephone is simultaneously the womb of the earth, also used as a reference to the innermost part of the infernal regions, the protective womb of the mother or nursemaid in which the child takes refuge, and the maternal womb from which the initiate hopes to be reborn, transfigured and divinized. Given the extraordinary importance of Persephone in Orphic religion, it comes as no surprise that the robe she was weaving in the Orphic tradition was no ordinary garment. Instead, it was a work of cosmological significance, on which the Maiden had embroidered the models of everything contained in the sensible world : elements, plants, and animals of the earth, sky and sea, as well as the celestial realm. As such, it served as the equivalent of the paradigm or Living Being of Plato's Timaeus : that is, the plan or blueprint101 according to which the world was created. For the Neoplatonists, the fact that Persephone was interrupted before she could 96 Cf. L. Malten, “ Altorphische Demetersagen ”, Archiv für Religionswissenschaft 12 (1909) 417-446. In Homer (H), the rape takes place in Sicily, in Orpheus (O) it happens in Eleusis. In H., Demeter in her quest is received by king Keleus, his wife Metaneira, and their servant Iambe : in O. by the poor farmer Dysaules, his wife Baubo, and their sons Triptolemus and Eubuleus. In H., Demeter is relieved from her grief and made to smile by the jokes of Iambe ; in O., Baubo hoists up her skirt and displays her genitals in order to make Demeter laugh. 97 Pindar fr. 133 Sn.-M. 98 99 The earliest of these lamellae dates from c. 400 B.C. Cf. Bernabé-Jiménez § 0.2. Cf. Bernabé-Jiménez § 1.6 ; 2.3. 100 “I come from among the pure, pure, queen of the subterranean beings (....) Now I come as a supplicant before chaste Persephone, to see if she, the benevolent one, will send me to the domain of the limpid ones ”. Fourth-century B.C. tablets from Thurii, L9-10 in Bernabé-Jiménez. 101 The question of whether the peplos is a blueprint or model for the world or the world itself may be a category mistake. As H. Fränkel has stressed (Dichtung und Philosophie des frühen Griechentums, Munich 19693, p. 280) : “in the author's [sc. Pherecydes’] primitive mode of thought, image and object coincide with one another”. 18 complete her weaving explained the imperfections of the sensible world, presumably including the existence of evil102. This tale may have been recounted in a separate Orphic poem entitled Peplos. The relevant fragments have been published by Kern no. 192 of his Orphicorum fragmenta103. I've provided a translation of these and a few other texts in your handout. Pherecydes and the weaving of Zas Finally, the Presocratic philosopher Pherecydes of Syros (mid-sixth century BC) presents another myth in which a work of weaving plays a crucial role. In the fragmentarily preserved remains of his work that seems to have been entitled “ the mixing of the gods in five nooks ”, Pherecydes wrote of three eternal, primordial divinities, Chronos, Zeus (whom he called Zas) and Khthoniê, “the earthy one”. Chronos, the god of time, creates by pathenogenesis the three elements fire, wind, and water. Zas, for his part, weds Kthoniê in a fragment preserved in a thirdcentury AD papyrus discovered in 1897. On the third day, Zas presents his bride with a great, beautiful garment (pharos), on which earth, the ocean (which Pherecydes calls Ogenos) and the ‘mansions of the ocean’ have been embroidered. She accepts, thereby being transformed into Gê. Because of the lack of context, these fragments, like most of those we have left from the Presocratics, are awfully hard to interpret, and modern scholars have proposed a wide range of suggestions104. I'd like to suggest the following interpretation : prior to her investiture with the embroidered robe, Kthoniê is the more-or-less undifferentiated element Earth, or perhaps more specifically the underworld. When she accepts Zas' gift of the robe, with its depictions of the earth's surface, the ocean, and all the creatures dwell in them, she becomes Gê or Gaia, the earth qua habitable. The close parallel to the Orphic account here leaps to the eye. In both cases, a divine figure - Persephone for the Orphics, Zas for Pherecydes - weaves a garment containing images of everything in the phenomenal world. In some way or another, this work of weaving epitomizes 102 103 104 Eisler, 1, 247-248 See also Bernabé, Hieros logos, p. 178-180 ; West, Orphic Poems 9 ff., 97, 245 ff. See especially Schibli, West, Schwabl, von Fritz. 19 or pre-figures the whole of sensible reality105, not unlike the way in which the Paradigm or Living Being serves Plato's Demiurge as a kind of blueprint for creation. Conclusion To sum up : just as we found that the origin of Ibn Abī Uṣaybi‘a's five compositional relations is likely to have been the five harmonic intervals of Plato's Timaeus, so the mysterious “art of dībāj” mentioned by the same Arabic author is likely to have is proximate origin in Platonic metaphors of weaving, but its more distant origin in the Pherecydean/Orphic myth of a cloak of cosmic significance, embroidered by a divinity with the forms of all phenomenal realities. I hope that these proposals may shed new light on this obscure passage from Arabic philosophical literature, which does not seem to have been understood previously. Yet these results leaves open far more questions that it answers, including the following : To what extent, and at what date, were the texts ascribed to Pherecydes and/or Orpheus avalaible to Islamic scholars ? What are the relations between two early texts in which we have found parallel orientations : the Book of Secrets and the Encyclopedia of the Brethren of Purity ? What are the Greek sources of this complex of works ; in particular, might a lost work by Porphyry, perhaps his commentary on the Timaeus, have played a role in transmitting myths of cosmogonic weaving to the Arab world ? 105 Cf. M. Detienne & J.-P. Vernant, Les ruses de l'intelligence : la Mètis des grecs, Paris 1974, p. 134 n. 14 : in Pherecydes, Zas bestows upon Chthoniê an emboidered pharos “pour que, s'en étant recouverte, elle porte brodées sur sa vêture l'ensemble des formes qui constituent le monde organisé ”. 20 M. Chase Uvic seminar Sept. 30, 2011 Texts for Der Gottheit lebendiges Kleid Text 1 Ibn abī Uṣaybi‘a, ‘Uyūn al-anbā’ fī ṭabaqāt al-aṭibba’ (Sources and information on the generations of physicians), ed. A. Müller, Königsberg 1884, vol. I, p. 43 Plato He is called Flāṭun, Aflāṭun, and Aflāṭūn ; according to Sulaimān Ibn Ḥassān, known as Ibn Juljul112, in his book, <he is Aflāṭun al-ḥakīm min ahl madīna called> Aflāṭun the Wise, of the people of athīnā, rūmī, faylasūf yūnānī, tibbī. ‘ālim bi- the city of Athens, a Byzantine Greek l-handasa106 wa ṭabā’i‘ al-a‘dād, wa lahu fī philosopher and physician, knowledgable in al-ṭibb kitāb ba‘aṯahu107 ilā Ṭīmāūs tilmīḏihi, geometry and nature of numbers113. In wa lahu fī-l-falsafa kutub wa-aš‘ār108, wa medicine, he has a book addressed to his lahu fī al-ta’līf kalām lam yasbaqahu aḥad disciple Timaeus. He has books and poems in ilayhi, istanbaṭa bihi ṣan‘a al-dībāj, wa philosophy, and in composition114 he has a huwa al-kalām al-mansūb ilā al-khamsa al- doctrine115 unprecedented among all those nisab al-ta’līfiyya allati lā sabīl ilā wujūd who preceded him. By its means he ghayrihā fī jamī‘ al-mawjūdāt al-mu’talifāt, discovered the art of brocade116, which is the fa-lammā aḥāṭa ‘ilman bi-ṭabā’i‘ al-a‘dād doctrine concerning the five compositional wa ma‘rifa al-ḫamsa al-nisab al-ta’līfiyya, relations117, and apart from it there is no path 106 bi-l-handasiyya Müller, bi-l-hay'at Sayyid 107 ba‘aṯahu Müller, ba‘aṯa bihi Sayyid 108 asfār Sayyid, aš‘ār Müller 21 istašrafa ilā ‘ilm al-‘ālam kullihi, wa ‘arifa to being among all the composite existents118. mawāqi‘109 al-ajzā’ al-mu’talifāt al- Once he achieved a thorough grasp of the mumtazijāt bi-iḫtilāf alwānihā wa aṣbāghihā, science of the nature of numbers and the wa i’tilāfihā ‘alā qadr al-nisba, fa-waṣala bi- knowledge of the five compositional ḏalika ilā ‘ilm al-taṣwīr, fa-waḍa‘a awwalan relations, he rose to the science of the entire ḥaraka jāmi‘a li-jamī‘ al-ḥarakāt, ṯumma world, and he came to know the locations119 ṣanafahā110 bi-l-nisba al-‘adadiyya, wa of the parts in their composition and mixture, waḍa‘a al-ajzā’ al-mu’talifa ‘alā ḏalika, fa- by the difference in their colors and ṣāra ilā ‘ilm taṣwīr al-mutaṣawwarāt111, fa- pigments, and he combined them according qāma lahu ṣinā‘a al-dībāj wa sinā‘a kull to the relation. He thus arrived at the science mu’talif bihi. wa-allafa fī ḏalika kitāban. of images120. He first established a motion for all motions, then he classified them by the numerical relation, and he composed the 109 mawāqi‘ Sayyid, mawāni‘ Müller 110 ṣanafahā Müller, faṣalahā Sayyid 111 al-taṣwīrāt Müller, al-mutaṣawwarāt Sayyid. Abū Dāwūd Sulaymān ibn Ḥasan Ibn Juljul (c. 944-994), a Cordoban physician, wrote his Ṭabaqāt al-aṭibbā’ wa-l-hukamā’ (Generations of physicians and Wise Men) in 987. I have used the edition by Fu’ād Sayyid, Cairo 1955, with modifications. 112 ṭabā’i‘ al-a‘dād. Cf. Macrobius, In somn. Scip., 2, 2, 8 : His geometricis rationibus applicatur natura numerorum. 113 114 fī al-ta’līf. On this term, see O. Wright, Epistles of the Brethren of Purity, On Music, an Arabic critical edition and English translation of Epistle 5, Oxford, 2010, p. 71 : “ ‘Composition’...provides an exact equivalence [sc. to alta’līf] that still fails to capture the implication that the underlying principle of composition should be an adherence to, and manifestation of, ideal proportions, thereby providing a human analogy to the pure ratios of the celestial realm that generate the music of the spheres”. 115 ‘original discussion’ Shalev. 116 ṣan‘a al-dībāj. ‘The art of [multipart] composition’ Shalev. 117 wa huwa al-kalām al-mansūb ilā al-ḫamsa al-nisab al-ta’līfiyya : ‘which is the dialogue related to the five divisions of composition’ Shalev. 118 ‘Beyond which there is no method of any creative composition’ Shalev. 119 mawāni‘ Müller : mawāqi‘ Sayyid. 120 ‘ilm al-taṣwīr. 121 ‘ilm taṣwīr al-taṣwīrāt Müller ; ‘ilm taṣwīr al-mutaṣawwarāt Sayyid. The reference may be to statues animated by theurgic means. According to Jābir ibn Ḥayyān, Kitāb al-tajmī‘ p. 350, 12 ff. Kraus, those who deal with the creation of artificial life are those who have given themselves the name of image-makers (muṣawwirūn). Kraus (Jābir ibn Ḥayyān. Contribution à l'histoire des idées scientifiques dans l'Islam. 2, Jābir et la science grecque, Paris 1986 [1st edition 1945], p. 123-124), believes the reference is to Porphyry. 22 compound parts in accordance with it. He thus arrived at the science of forming images121, and there arose for him the art of brocade and the art of all that is composed by it, and he wrote a book on this. Text 2 Orphicorum fragmenta no 192 Kern = 286 Bernabé Porphyry, De antro nympharum, 14, p. 66, 13-19 Nauck καὶ χιτών γε τὸ σῶμα τῇ ψυχῇ ὃ And the body is, for the soul it has donned, a ἠμφίεσται, θαῦμα τῷ ὄντι ἰδέσθαι, εἴτε cloak, truly a marvel to behold, whether one πρὸς τὴν σύστασιν ἀποβλέποις εἴτε πρὸς considers its structure or its connection to the τὴν πρὸς τοῦτο σύνδεσιν τῆς ψυχῆς. soul. Thus, in Orpheus, too, Kore, who is in οὕτω καὶ παρὰ τῷ Ὀρφεῖ ἡ Κόρη, ἥπερ charge of all that is sown, is traditionally ἐστὶ παντὸς τοῦ σπειρομένου ἔφορος, working at the loom, since the ancients called ἱστουργοῦσα παραδίδοται, τῶν παλαιῶν the heavens, too, a cloak, as if it were the καὶ τὸν οὐρανὸν πέπλον εἰρηκότων οἷον garment of the celestial gods. θεῶν οὐρανίων περίβλημα. Proclus, In Tim. 41b-c, vol. III, p. 223 Diehl καὶ διὰ ταῦτα ἄρα Ὀ ρ φ ε ὺ ς τὴν This is why Orpheus says that the lifeτῶν μεριστῶν ζωοποιὸν αἰτίαν ἄνω bestowing cause of divisible things remains μένουσαν καὶ ὑφαίνουσαν τὸν above and weaves the world of the celestial διάκοσμον τῶν οὐρανίων νύμφην τε εἶναί beings, and that she is a bride, insofar as she 23 φησιν ὡς ἄχραντον (...) καὶ μένειν ἐν is immaculate (...) and she remains in her οἰκείοις ἤθεσι, προελθοῦσαν δὲ ἀπὸ τῶν own way of being, but when she goes forth ἑαυτῆς οἴκων ἀτελεῖς τε καταλείπειν τοὺς from her own houses she leaves her webs ἱστοὺς καὶ ἀναρπασθεῖσαν ἁρπάζεσθαι καὶ unfinished and is snatched away, and once γαμεῖσθαι καὶ she is snatched away she is married, and γαμηθεῖσαν γεννᾶν, ἵνα ψυχώσῃ καὶ τὰ once she has been married she gives birth, so ἐπείσακτον ἔχοντα ζωήν· τὸ γὰρ ἀτελές, that she may animate those things that have οἶμαι, τῶν ἱστῶν ἐνδείκνυται κἀκεῖνο τὸ life adventitiously as well. For I think that μέχρι τῶν ἀιδίων ζῴων ἀτελὲς εἶναι τὸ the fact that the webs are unfinished indicates πᾶν. διὸ καὶ ὁ Πλάτων that the universe is imperfect as far as the παρακελεύεσθαί φ η σ ι [41 D] τὸν ἕνα imperfect living beings. This is why Plato δημιουργὸν τοῖς πολλοῖς ‘προσυφαίνειν also says that the one Demiurge orders the τὰ θνητὰ τοῖς ἀθανάτοις’, ἀναμιμνήσκων many gods to “weave mortal things together πως ἡμᾶς, ὅτι τῆς τοῦ παντὸς ὑφαντικῆς with immortal”, reminding us that the life ζωῆς τελείωσίς ἐστιν ἡ προσθήκη τῶν that weaves the universe has as its perfection θνητῶν, καὶ τῆς Ὀρφικῆς θεομυθίας καὶ the addition of mortal beings, providing us τῶν ἀτελῶν ἱστῶν ἐξηγητικὰς ἐννοίας with interpretative concepts of the Orphic παρεχόμενος. divnne mythology and the incomplete webs. Proclus, In Crat. 387c, § 52-53, p. 22, 2 Pasquali (καὶ γὰρ αὕτη καὶ πᾶς αὐτῆς ὁ For she [sc. Persephone] and her entire χορὸς ἄνω μενούσης ὑφαίνειν λέγονται chorus, who remain above, are said to weave τὸν διάκοσμον τῆς ζωῆς), the ordely arrangement of life Damascius, In Parm., vol. II, p. 200, 14 Ruelle τῆς παρ’ Ὀρφεῖ κορικῆς ...starting out from the hypercosmic ὑπερκοσμίου πεπλοποιίας ὁρμηθέντες (ἐν confection of the peplos by Kore, in which 24 ᾗ τὰ μιμήματα τῶν νοερῶν εἰδῶν the imitations of the intellective forms are ἐνυφαίνεται), woven Text 3 Nonnos, Dionysiaca 6, 145 ff. : Translation Rouse, LCL ἀμφὶ δὲ καρχαρόδοντα γένυν The girl busied herself in carding fleeces of πεπόνητο σιδήρου wool under the sharp teeth of the iron comb. εἰροκόμῳ ξαίνουσα περὶ κτενὶ She packed the wool on the distaff, and the λήνεα κούρη, ἠλακάτῃ twirling spindle with many a twist and jerk δ’ ἐνέλισσε· ran round and round in dancing step, as the πολυστροφάδεσσι δὲ ῥιπαῖς εἰλυφόων threads were spun and drawn through the ἄτρακτος ἕλιξ fingers. She fixed the first threads of the βητάρμονι παλμῷ νηθομένων warp which begins the cloth, and gave them ἐχόρευε μίτων a turn round the beam, moving from end to κυκλούμενος ὁλκῷ· end to and fro with unresting feet. She wove καὶ ποσὶ φοιταλέοισι παλίνδρομος away, plying the rod and pulling the bobbin ἄκρον ἀπ’ ἄκρου πρωτοπαγῆ along through the threads, while she sang ποίησε διάσματα, over the cloth to her cousin Athena the clever φάρεος ἀρχήν, ἱστῷ δ’ ἀμφὶς ἕλισσεν· ὕφαινε δὲ κερκίδι κούρη πηνίον ἐξέλκουσα παρὲκ μίτον, ἀμφὶ δὲ πέπλῳ γνωτὴν ἱστοτέλειαν ἑὴν ἐλίγαινεν Ἀθήνην. webster 25 Text 5 Claudianus, De raptu Persephonae I, 246 ff. Translation Platnauer, LCL ipsa domum tenero mulcens Proserpine herself, soothing the house with Proserpina cantu inrita texebat rediturae munera matri. sweet song, was sewing all in vain a gift against her mother's return. In this cloth she hic elementorum seriem sedes que embroidered with her needle the series of paternas elements122 and the dwelling of the Father of insignibat acu, ueterem qua lege the gods and picture how mother Nature123 tumultum separated124 elemental chaos, and how the discreuit Natura parens et semina first principles of things sprang apart, each to iustis its proper place - those that were light being discessere locis: quidquid leue, fertur born aloft, the heavier ones falling to a in altum; centre. The air grew bright and fire chose the in medium grauiora cadunt; incanduit pole as its seat. Here flowed the sea ; there aer; hung the earth suspended. Many were the egit flamma polum; fluxit mare; terra colours she employed, tricking the stars with pependit. gold and flooding the sea with purple. The nec color unus inest: stellas accendit shore she embossed with precious stones and in auro, cunningly employed raised threadwork to ostro fundit aquas. attollit litora imitate the swelling billows. You might have gemmis thought you saw the seaweed dashed against fila que mentitos iamiam caelantia the rocks and heard the murmur of the fluctus hissing waves flooding up the thirsty sands. arte tument. credas inlidi cautibus Five zones she added, indicating that the 122 “concourse of atoms” Platnauer : but there is no reason to suspect the underlying cosmology here is that of Democritus or Epicurus. Quite the contrary! Instead, the underlying physics here are Aristotelian : the four elements are arranged from top to bottom in the order earth, water, air and fire, and they constantly change into one another. 123 Natura parens : see, with Eisler (p. 210 n. 5), the Orphic Phusis pammêtôr, and Johannes Protospatharius, Commentary on Hesiod's Works and Days 777, ed. Gaisford, Poetae minores Graeci, vol. 2. Leipzig, p. 453, 18-19 : “ Homer says that Nature is a woman, weaving the web with sea-purple threads ”. 124 “ordered” Platnauer : but discernere means not “to order” but “to separate”. The original chaos (tumultus) must first be separated into its constituent parts beforre it can be set in order. 26 algam centre was the torrid zone by emboidering it et raucum bibulis inserpere murmur with red yarn : its desert confines were harenis. addit parched and the thread she used was dried by quinque plagas: mediam the sun's unfailing heat. On either side lay the subtegmine rubro two habitable zones, blessed with a mild obsessam feruore notat; squalebat climate fit for the life of man. At the top and inustus bottom she set the two frozen zones, limes et adsiduo sitiebant stamina portraying eternal winter's horror in her sole; weaving and the gloom of never-ceasing uitales utrimque duas, quas mitis cold. Further she emboidered the accursed oberrat seat of her uncle, Dis, and the nether gods, temperies habitanda uiris; tum fine her destined fellows. Nor did the omen pass supremo unmarked, for prophetic of the future her torpentes traxit geminas bruma que cheeks grew wet with sudden tears. perenni She had begun to trace Ocean's glassy foedat et aeterno contristat frigore shallows at the tapestry's farthest edge, but at telas. that moment the doors opened, she saw the nec non et patrui pingit sacraria Ditis goddesses enter, and she left her work fatales que sibi Manes; nec defuit unfinished omen, praescia nam subitis maduerunt fletibus ora. coeperat et uitreis summo iam margine texti Oceanum sinuare uadis; sed cardine uerso cernit adesse deas inperfectum que laborem deserit.... 27 Text 6 Pherecydes, fr. B2 Diels/Kranz = Trans. Schibli B. P. Grenfell & A. S. Hunt, eds., Greek Papyri, Series II, Oxford 1897 col. 1 αὐ>τῶι ποιοῦσιν τὰ οἰκία ...for him [Zas] they fashion the place both πολλά τε καὶ μεγάλα. ἐπεὶ δὲ many and great ; and when they had ταῦτα καὶ accomplished all these things, also the χρήματα καὶ θεράποντας καὶ necessities and manservants and midservats θεραπαίνας καὶ τἆλλα ὅσα δεῖ and as many other things as are necessary, πάντα, ἑτοῖμα they perform the wedding. And when it is the γίγνεται, τὸν γάμον ποιεῦσιν. third day of the wedding, then125 Zas fashions κἀπειδὴ τρίτη ἡμέρη γίγνεται a robe both big and beautiful, and on it he τῶι embroiders Earth and Ogenos and the abodes ἐξετέλεσαν ἐπεὶδὴ γάμωι, πάντα πάντα τότε Ζὰς ποιεῖ φᾶρος μέγα τε καὶ καλὸν καὶ ἐν αὐτῶι Ὠγηνὸν ποικίλλει καὶ Γῆν τὰ of Ogenos.. καὶ Ὠγηνοῦ δ ώ μ α τ α ... col. 2 Col. 2 βουλόμενος> γὰρ σέο ....since I wish marriages to be yours, I τοὺς γάμους εἶναι τούτωι σε honour you with this. Receive my salutation τιμῶ. σὺ δέ μοι χαῖρέ τε καὶ and be my consort’. These they say were the σύνισθι. φασιν first anakalypteria, and hence arose the πρῶτον custom for both gods and men. And she ταῦτά ἀνακαλυπτήρια γενέσθαι· ἐκ τούτου δὲ ὁ responds, receiving the robe from him... νόμος ἐγένετο καὶ θεοῖσι καὶ ἀνθρώποισιν. ἀμείβε>ται ἡ δέ δεξαμ<ένη μι<ν εὑ τὸ φ ᾶ > ρ ο ς ... 125 The passage from here to the end of col. I is quoted by Clement of Alexandria, Stromata 6, 2, 9, 4. 28 29 M. Chase Uvic seminar Sept. 30 2011 Bibliography Bernabé, Alberto, Hieros logos. Poesía órfica sobre los dioses, el alma y el más allá, Madrid : Ediciones Akal, 2003 (Akal/Clásica 68. Clásicos Griegos), Bernabé, A., & Jiménez San Cristóbal, A. I., Instrucciones para el Más Allá. Las laminillas órficas de oro, Madrid 2001. English : Instructions for the Netherworld. 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Facts and problems”, Oriens 23/24 (1974), 147-257. Scheid, John, & Jaspar Svenbro, The craft of Zeus. Myths of weaving and fabric, translated by Carol Volk, Camridge, Mass. 1996. Schibli, Herman S., Pherekydes of Syros, Oxford 1990. Steele, Robert, ed., Secretum secretorum cum glossis et notulis (= Opera hactenus inedita Rogeri Baconi, 5), Oxford 1920. West, M. L., Early Greek philosophy and the Orient, Oxford 1971. ____, The Orphic Poems, Oxford 1983.