Pythagoras: His Life and Teaching, a Compendium of Classical Sources (58 page)

p. 161

The literal meaning is “whole of limb, not dismembered.” Cf. Liddell Scott, A
Greek-English Lexicon
p. 1218a.

p. 162
[“central oarsman”].

This refers to the central oarsmen of the style of Greek warship called the “Trireme” (
) The ship had three rows of oarsmen. The rowers with the longest oars who sat in the mid-most point of the boat. Used in the same sense as
. (Cf. Liddell Scott, A
Greek-English Lexicon
, pp. 1106b, 1107a.)

p. 162
[“hurled forth”].

The notion is that the Triad (Hecate) is hurled forth and joined with another Triad to form the Hexad. Cf. Thomas Taylor,
Theoretic Arithmetic
p. 198.

p. 163
“The Unwearied.”

An epithet of Pallas Athena. Cf. Liddell Scott, A
Greek-English Lexicon, p.
273b,

p. 164
Tritogenia

Literally, “daughter of a mighty father,” an epithet of Athena. Thus also “Tritogenia” (Greek
), “Trito-born,” explained in antiquity as either the lake Tritonis (
) in Libya from which Athena was said to have been born. Another explanation is from Triton, a spring in Arcadia. Yet another is from the word
an Aeolic word for
“head,” thus “head-born.” Cf. Liddell Scott, A
Greek-English Lexicon
, p. 1823b.

p. 164
[“Blue-eyed”].

Another epithet of Athena. From Pausanias'
Description of Greece
(1.14.6), “I was not surprised that an image of Athena stood beside Hephaestus;
but observing that Athena's image had blue eyes, I recognized the Libyan version of the myth. For the Libyans say that she is a daughter of Poseidon and the Tritonian lake, and that she, like Poseidon, has blue eyes.” (Frazer,
Pausanias's Description of Greece
, Vol. 1, p. 21). The belief that the Greeks understood the epithet
to mean “blue-eyed” is strengthened by this passage in Pausanias. Cf. Frazer,
Pausanias's Description of Greece
, Vol. 2, p. 128 for his commentary on Pausanias' 1.14.6.