Page - 400 - in The Complete Plato

SOCRATES: Son of Hipponicus, you ask a solemn question; there is a serious and also a facetious explanation of both these names; the serious explanation is not to be had from me, but there is no objection to your hearing the facetious one; for the Gods too love a joke. Dionusos is simply didous oinon (giver of wine), Didoinusos, as he might be called in fun,—and oinos is properly oionous, because wine makes those who drink, think (oiesthai) that they have a mind (noun) when they have none. The derivation of Aphrodite, born of the foam (aphros), may be fairly accepted on the authority of Hesiod. HERMOGENES: Still there remains Athene, whom you, Socrates, as an Athenian, will surely not forget; there are also Hephaestus and Ares. SOCRATES: I am not likely to forget them. HERMOGENES: No, indeed. SOCRATES: There is no difficulty in explaining the other appellation of Athene. HERMOGENES: What other appellation? SOCRATES: We call her Pallas. HERMOGENES: To be sure. SOCRATES: And we cannot be wrong in supposing that this is derived from armed dances. For the elevation of oneself or anything else above the earth, or by the use of the hands, we call shaking (pallein), or dancing. HERMOGENES: That is quite true. SOCRATES: Then that is the explanation of the name Pallas? HERMOGENES: Yes; but what do you say of the other name? SOCRATES: Athene? HERMOGENES: Yes. SOCRATES: That is a graver matter, and there, my friend, the modern interpreters of Homer may, I think, assist in explaining the view of the ancients. For most of these in their explanations of the poet, assert that he meant by Athene ‘mind’ (nous) and ‘intelligence’ (dianoia), and the maker of names appears to have had a singular notion about her; and indeed calls her by a still higher title, ‘divine intelligence’ (Thou noesis), as though he would say: This is she who has the mind of God (Theonoa);—using alpha as a dialectical variety for eta, and taking away iota and sigma (There seems to be some error in the MSS. The meaning is that the word theonoa = theounoa is a curtailed form of theou noesis, but the omitted letters do not agree.). Perhaps, however, the name Theonoe may mean ‘she who knows divine things’ (Theia 400