Stephanus of Byzantium
Stephanos of Byzantium (medium Greek Στέφανος Βυζάντιος ) Stephanos Byzantios, also known as Stephanus byzantinus, was a late ancient Greek grammarian, who was probably in the early period of Emperor Justinian I at the University of Constantine Opel.
Life
His life data are not precisely known. He was the author of a comprehensive geographic, but preserved only in part lexicon called Ethnic (Greek Ἐθνικά ) in 50 to 60 books, are obtained by the older material about ancient geography ( place names and their linguistic determination), oracle and miracle stories. The work is, apart from a few fragments, only in an epitome, an extract obtained, which had made loud Suda an otherwise unknown grammarian Hermolaos. This Hermolaos devoted his Epitome Justinian. Whether this is meant by Justinian I or Justinian II, is controversial. But probably had Stephanos in the early 6th century.
The main fragments of the original work have been preserved in Constantine Porphyrogenitus, De imperio administrando. Another important fragment of article Δύμη until the end of Δ, exists in manuscript in the library Seguerischen. Konstantinos Porphyrogenitus was probably the last to heranzog the complete works, Suda and Eustathius of Thessalonica already used the Epitome.
The quality is rather staggering, yet provide the excerpts a not unimportant source of, mainly because of their information on geography, mythology and religion of ancient Greece. Therefore, the work contains some very valuable information. However, there was hardly Stephanos to topographic or geographic accuracy, but rather he pursued philological interests: More important than the location of a place it was apparently the exact name and its (supposed) etymology. The main value that has his work for modern research, therefore, is in the traditional by Stephanos or Hermolaos quotes from today otherwise lost older works.
Stephanos plays in Article Gothoi (gamma 104) on another book authored by him at work, apparently a historical chronicle. This, however, is completely lost.
In modern times, the Ethnic Stephanos were received as antiquarian source and witness of the late antique lexicography. The first printed edition appeared in 1502 at Aldus Manutius in Venice. Later editions of Wilhelm Xylander (1568), Abraham van Berkel ( 1674, 1688) and Jakob Gronovius (1688 ) contained valuable conjectures and comments, but have not the complex manuscript tradition meet. The output of Anton Westermann ( 1839) was merely an annotated reprint of Gronovius text. A critical edition, which was based on the collation of three important witnesses to the text, presented in 1849 August Meineke. The commentary, which he originally wanted to reloading, never appeared. His edition long remained fundamentally, especially as the editorial projects of Benedict Niese and Felix Jacoby were not realized.
The crucial issue is worked out by Margarethe Billerbeck in Fribourg ( Switzerland ). It is based on preparatory work by Felix Jacoby, Ernst Grumach and Rudolf Keydell and places for the first time in front of the text after a thorough review of all relevant text generation, including translation and notes. So far (as of November 6, 2012 ), two volumes of this edition appeared, which include the letters Α Ι up.
Expenditure
- Margarethe Billerbeck (Ed. ): Stephani Byzantii Ethnica ( = Corpus Historiae Fontium Byzantinae ). Bdf. 1 et seq. de Gruyter, Berlin 2006ff.
- Augustus Meineke: Stephani Byzantii Ethnicorum quae super sunt. Berlin 1849.