While reading fragments of Hellenistic poetry today, I ran across this bit from Εὐφόριον:
καὶ ταύτην τὴν Κορινθίαν Σαρωνίδα καλοῦσιν,
ὡς μὲν Εὐφορίον φησὴν,
ἐπειδὴ Σάρων τις κυνηγὸς ἐπιδιώκων <σῦν> ἐκεῖθεν κατεκρημνίσθη εἰς θάλασσαν, καὶ δία τοῦτο Σαρωνικὸν κληθῆναι τὸ πέλαγος.
Which I translate as:
And this Corinthian [sea] they call Saronic, as Euphorion says,
Since Saron, a certain hunter, chasing [something]
was flung down the cliff into the sea,
and therefore the sea came to be called Saronic.
Lightfoot (Hellenistic Collection) fills in the “something” with “a boar.” Do any of you know why? What about this texts could have suggested a boar?
While this has nothing to do with the text, it is certainly an interesting story to read alongside Jesus casting demons into swine who then run into the sea.
Agreed, Wray. Even more so if Lightfoot is right.
It is certain that Lightfoot has got it all wrong, as Pausanias relates the story in book 2.30.7, stating that Saron chased a deer, following it into the sea.
Jelle Abbenes (Dutch translator of Pausanias).
Right. And Lightfoot points out that Pausanias says it was a deer, so where did Lightfoot get the boar?