The Magnitude of the Indian Elephants in the Battles of Raphia (Polybius V 84.5-6) and Magnesia (Livy XXXVII 39.13). Where is the Mistake?
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.3989/emerita.2020.01.1940Keywords:
Indian elephants, African elephants, μέγεθος, magnitudo, privative oppositionAbstract
Until Africa was colonised, there was a general consensus that the Indian elephants of Antiochus III, which defeated Ptolemy IV’s Libyan ones in the battle of Raphia (217 B.C.) as described by Polybius, were far greater in size. Livy confirms this in his account of the battle of Magnesia (190 B.C.). Despite this, the use of the word μέγεθος suggests a different meaning than magnitude, and so Polybius did not make a mistake, as suspected, after all. Whilst the Roman historian refers to the great individual size of each species of elephant, the Greek is referring to the scale of the elephantry itself. The key to this interpretation lies in the double value of the unmarked term in the privative opposition between μέγεθος and πλῆθος, magnitudo and multitudo. The first two terms represent, in addition to individual size specifically, the generic concept of magnitude.
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