Michael Hendry of Curculio is selling off a bunch of books, many of which look like they might be of interest to LH readers. I hope the sale is not compelled by circumstances (ferrea sed nulli vincere fata datur; des Schicksals Zwang ist bitter), but if it is, I hope the proceeds make it worthwhile. How can I not like a guy who writes posts like this?
The index of Albrecht Dihle’s Greek and Latin Literature of the Roman Empire from Augustus to Justinian (Routledge, 1994) includes one entry for Lucilius and one for Lukillios. Too bad they are actually three different people: five of the six page references under ‘Lucilius’ refer to the founder of Roman satire, while the sixth (page 93) refers to the addressee of Seneca’s letters, who lived (if he is not a fiction of Seneca) two centuries later. And shouldn’t the name of the Greek epigrammatist be spelled ‘Loukillios’ if it’s not Latinized as Lucillius? ‘Lukillios’ seems to fall between two stools.
Why, yes, it should, and yes, it does.
Some classicists insist on their own idiosyncratic transliterations in their books. For example, G.S. Kirk in his Iliad commentary insists on transliterating ypsilon as u and as a result has to transliterate omicron-ypsilon as ou. He’s also a kappa = k man. Whatever transliteration system you choose, there will be inconsistencies, resulting in grotesqueries like Backhos or in G.S.Kirk’s case, sentences about the Mycenaean era finds at Mukene.