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AN UNRECORDED USE OF THE WORD ΚΛΙΜΑΞ

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 February 2019

Petros Bouras-Vallianatos
Petros Bouras-Vallianatos*
Affiliation:
King's College London
*
petros.bouras-vallianatos@kcl.ac.uk
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Extract

My purpose here is to point out a use of the Greek word κλῖμαξ, lit. ladder, which has not been recorded in the lexica of ancient and medieval Greek. To be specific, the term is found twice in the Therapeutics, a work by the sixth-century a.d. author and practising physician Alexander of Tralles, in reference to a particular kind of composite drug. In the first case, the author refers to the so-called ‘ladder of Hermes’ (Ἑρμοῦ κλῖμαξ, Ther. 1.557.6) without providing any recipe. According to him, this is an antidote for the treatment of epilepsy and similar in action to the well-known theriac. However, in the second case referring to an antidote for the treatment of gout, the ‘so-called ladder’, he provides the following recipe (Ther. 2.571.16–26):

ἀντίδοτος ποδαγρικὴ ἡ καλουμένη κλῖμαξ.
ἀγαρικοῦοὐγ. α´
φοῦοὐγγ. β´
πετροσελίνουοὐγγ. γ´
μαίουοὐγγ. δ´
ὑπερίκουοὐγγ. ε´
γεντιανῆςοὐγγ. ς´
ἀριστολοχίαςοὐγγ. ζ´
κενταυρίουοὐγγ. η´
χαμαίδρυοςοὐγγ. θ´
μέλιτος τὸ ἀρκοῦν.
As evidenced, the term denotes a unique category of composite drugs in which the quantity of each subsequent ingredient is increased by one unit (1 ounce, 2 ounces, 3 ounces and so on), thus metaphorically alluding to an ascending scale.

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Shorter Notes
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 68 , Issue 2 , December 2018 , pp. 739 - 740
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 2019 

My purpose here is to point out a use of the Greek word κλῖμαξ, lit. ladder, which has not been recorded in the lexica of ancient and medieval Greek.Footnote 1 To be specific, the term is found twice in the Therapeutics, a work by the sixth-century a.d. author and practising physician Alexander of Tralles, in reference to a particular kind of composite drug.Footnote 2 In the first case, the author refers to the so-called ‘ladder of Hermes’ (Ἑρμοῦ κλῖμαξ, Ther. 1.557.6) without providing any recipe.Footnote 3 According to him, this is an antidote for the treatment of epilepsy and similar in action to the well-known theriac.Footnote 4 However, in the second case referring to an antidote for the treatment of gout, the ‘so-called ladder’,Footnote 5 he provides the following recipe (Ther. 2.571.16–26):

As evidenced, the term denotes a unique category of composite drugs in which the quantity of each subsequent ingredient is increased by one unit (1 ounce, 2 ounces, 3 ounces and so on), thus metaphorically alluding to an ascending scale.

References

1 Cf. e.g. LSJ, Dimitrakos, D. (ed.), Μέγα Λεξικὸν Ὅλης τῆς Ἑλληνικῆς Γλώσσης, 9 vols. (Athens, 1936–51)Google Scholar, LBG = Trapp, E. (ed.), Lexikon zur byzantinischen Gräzität, 8 vols. (Vienna, 1994–2017)Google Scholar and Montanari, F. (ed.), The Brill Dictionary of Ancient Greek (Leiden, 2015)Google Scholar, s.v. κλῖμαξ.

2 Alexander of Tralles is the author of three surviving works, viz. On Fevers (Febr.), Therapeutics (Ther.) and On Intestinal Worms (Verm.). On Alexander, see Puschmann, T., Alexander von Tralles: Original-Text und Übersetzung nebst einer einleitenden Abhandlung: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Medicin (Vienna, 1878–9), 1.75–108Google Scholar; and Guardasole, A., ‘Alessandro di Tralle’, in Garzya, A. (ed.), Medici Bizantini (Torino, 2006), 557–679Google Scholar, at 557–70.

3 The term was translated into German as ‘Hermes-Leiter’ by Puschmann (n. 2), 1.556.7, into French as ‘échelle de Mercure’ by Brunet, F., Œuvres médicales d'Alexandre de Tralles: le dernier auteur classique des grands médecins grecs de l'antiquité (Paris, 1933–7)Google Scholar, 2.195.4 and into Italian as ‘scala di Ermes’ by Guardasole (n. 2), 660.32 and n. 150.

4 On Alexander's therapeutic recommendations for epilepsy, see Bouras-Vallianatos, P., ‘Clinical experience in Late Antiquity: Alexander of Tralles and the therapy of epilepsy’, MedHist 58 (2014), 337–53Google Scholar, at 344–8. On theriac, see Boudon-Millot, V., ‘Aux origines de la Thériaque: la recette d'Andromaque’, Revue d'Histoire de la Pharmacie 58 (2010), 261–70CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5 Here the term is translated into German as ‘Leiter’ by Puschmann (n. 2), 2.570.21 and into French as ‘échelle’ by Brunet (n. 3), 4.254.19 and n. 92.