Note 2290 — Chapter II
W. (William) Falconer translation
The words of Pindar are,
ἄμπνευμα σεμνὸν Ἀλφεοῦ, κλεινᾶν Συρακοσσᾶν θάλος, Ὀρτυγία.
The French translators have rendered them,
“Terme saint du tourment d’Alphée Bel ornement, de Syracuse Ortygia!”
And Groskurd,
“Ehrwürdige Ruhstatt Alpheos’. Ruhmzweig Syrakossai’s, o Du Ortygia.”
Liddell and Scott call ἀνάπνευμα a resting-place, referring to this passage, but I can see no reason for not allowing to it the signification most suitable to the passage. ἀναπνέω is, “to breathe again,” and, according to the supposition of the ancients, the Alpheus might justly be said to breathe again on appearing at Arethusa, after its passage beneath the bed of the sea from Greece. ἀναπνοὴ also, means “a recovering of breath.”