INTRODUCTION 



they require. But some inconsistencies and uncer 

 tainties are inevitable. 



The resemblance of certain p^ssages in the Materia 

 Medica of Dioscorides to parts of the botanical books 

 of Plinv — even to some parts outside these books — is 

 so striking that there must be a close relation between 

 them. Scholars without hesitation use the Greek 

 text when passing judgment on the readings or 

 emendations of the manuscripts of Pliny. Many 

 times it is clear that Pliny either saw (or heard read) 

 Greek identical, or almost so, with our Dioscorides, 

 but blundered badly in translating his authority. 

 Among the cases of such blundering mentioned in 

 the footnotes to this volume there is a sti'iking 

 example in XXIII. § 7, where Pliny has cicatricibus 

 marcidis, ossibus purulejde limosis, but the text of 

 Dioscorides reads (V. 5) : Trpog . . . ovXa TrXadapd, 

 ajra woppoovvra. Here are confused ovXa (gums) 

 and ouAi^ (scar), and (unless with some editors we 

 read aurihus for the ossihus of the manuscripts) 

 cbra and oard. 



Now Pliny does not include Dioseorides among 

 his authorities. Is this an accidental omission ? 

 Pliny's pi"ide in acknowledging the sources from 

 which he derived his information makes this an 

 almost impossible explanation of the relationship 

 between the two authors. It is even more unHkely 

 that Dioscorides copied Pliny ; the discrepancies, 

 for one thing, are obviously the result of a mis- 

 understanding of Greek, not of Latin. 



There remains a third possibility. Both authors 

 may have a common source, fi'om which each made 

 large borrowings. It is thought that this common 

 source may have been Crateuas, of the first century 



