Still less have I attempted to discuss questions of critical scholarship.  Sometimes where there are more than one plausible reading I have signified which I adopt; once only (Ol. 2. 56.) I have ventured on an emendation of my own.  For the most part I have, as was natural, followed the text of Boeckh and Dissen.

In the spelling of names I remain in that inconsistency which at present attaches to most modern writers who deal with them.  Olympus, Athens, Corinth, Syracuse, and the like are naturalized among us by long familiarity; it seems at present at least pedantic to change them.  In the case of other less familiar names I have concurred with the desire, which seems in the main a reasonable one, that the names of Hellenic persons and places should be reproduced, as far as possible, without Latin mediation.

Of the Fragments I have translated six of the longest and most interesting.  They are 289 in all, but the greater part are not longer than a line or two, and very many even shorter.

The odes are unequal in poetical merit, and many readers may not unreasonably wish to have those pointed out which, in the judgement of one acquainted with all, are among the best worth reading; though of course the choice of individual readers will not always be the same.  To those therefore who would wish to begin with a selection, the following may be recommended as at any rate among those of preeminent merit:  Pyth. 4, 9, 1, 10, 3; Ol. 7, 6, 2, 3, 13, 8, 1; Nem. 5, 10; Isthm. 2, 7; all the Fragments translated.

In the arrangement of the odes I have adhered to the traditional order.  I should much have liked to place them in what must always be the most interesting and rational arrangement of a poet’s works, that is, in chronological order.  This would have been approximately possible, as we know the dates of the greater part of them.  But convenience of reference and of comparison with the Greek text seems to supply a balance of reasons on the other side.  Subjoined however is a list of the odes in their probable chronological order so far as it can be obtained.

Pythian    10-------------B.C. 502.
"           6-------------    "   494.
"         12-------------    "   494 or 490.
"           7-------------    "   490.
"           3-------------    "   486 or 482. 
Olympian 10 } ----------     "   484.
"     11 } ----------     "   484. 
Isthmian    5
Nemean     5
Isthmian    7 ------------     "  480. 
Isthmian    3
Pythian      8--------------   "  478.
"          9--------------   "  478.
"        11--------------   "  478.
"          2--------------   "  477. 
Olympian 14--------------   "  476.
"       }-----------------    "  476.
"       }-----------------    "  476. 
Pythian      1
Nemean     1---------------  "  473. 
Olympian   1---------------  " 472.
"         12--------------  "  472. 
Nemean      9
Isthmian     2
Olympian    6--------------  "  468. 
Pythian       4 }-------------  "  466.