Note 78 — Chapter X

Ἐπὶ πέλτης ἐπὶ ξύλου.] So stands the passage in Dindorf's text; but most editors, from Schneider downwards, consider ἐπὶ ξύλου to be a mere interpretation of ἐπὶ πέλτης, that has crept by some accident into the text, and either enclose it in brackets or wholly omit it. Πέλτη is said by Hesychius and Suidas to be the same as δόρυ or λόγχη: and Krüger refers to Philostratus, Icon. ii. 82, ἐπὶ τῆς πέλτης ἀετός. In Cyrop. vii. 1, 4, the insigne of Cyrus the elder is said to have been a golden eagle, ἐπὶ δόρατος μακροῦ ἀνατεταμένος. Πέλτη accordingly being taken in this sense, all is clear, and ἐπὶ ξύλου is superfluous. Kühner gives great praise to the conjecture of Hutchinson, ἐπὶ πέλτης ἐπὶ ξυστοῦ, who, taking πέλτη in the sense of a shield, supposed that the eagle was mounted on a shield, and the shield on a spear. But the shield would surely have been a mere encumbrance, and we had better be rid of it. Yet to take πέλτη in the sense of a spear, unusual in Xenophon, is not altogether satisfactory; and it would be well if we could fairly admit into the text Leunclavius's conjecture, ἐπὶ παλτοῦ.