IV.  Some other Learned Men have likewise been mistaken in Particulars with regard to Sophocles.  In the Synopsis of his Life, we find these Words; +Teleuta de meta Euripiden eton [st]’+. Meursius, as well as Camerarius, have expounded This, as if Sophocles surviv’d Euripides six Years.  But the best Accounts agree that they died both in the same Year, a little before the Frogs of Aristophanes was play’d; scil. Olymp. 93, 3.  The Meaning, therefore, of the Passage is, as some of the Commentators have rightly observ’d; That Sophocles_ died after Euripides, at 90 Years of Age._ The Mistake arose from hence, that, in Numerals, +stigma’+ signifies as well 6 as 90.

    [Sidenote:  Father Brumoy mistaken.]

V. The Learned Father Brumoy too, who has lately given us three Volumes upon the Theatre of the Greeks, has slipt into an Error about Sophocles; for, speaking of his Antigone, he tells us, it was in such Request as to be perform’d Two and Thirty times; Elle fut representee trente deux fois. The Account, on which This is grounded, we have from the Argument prefix’d to Antigone by Aristophanes the Grammarian:  and the Latin Translator of this Argument, probably, led Father Brumoy into his Mistake, and he should have referr’d to the Original.  The Greek Words are; +lelektai de to drama touto triakoston deuteron+. i. e. “This Play_ is said to have been the Thirty Second, in Order of Time, produced by_ Sophocles.”

The Mistakes, that I have mentioned, (tho’ they necessarily lead into Error, from the Authority with which they come into the World;) yet are such, ’tis obvious, as have been the Effects of Inadvertence; and therefore I do not quote them to the Dishonour of their Learned Authors.  I shall point out Two or Three, which seem to have sprung from another Source:  either a due Want of Sagacity, or an absolute Neglect of literal Criticism.

    [Sidenote:  Sir George Wheler corrected.]

VI.  Sir George Wheler, who, in his JOURNEY into GREECE, has traded much with Greek Antiquities and Inscriptions, and who certainly was no mean Scholar, has shewn himself very careless in this Respect.  When he was at Sardis, he met with a Medal of the Emperor Commodus seated in the Midst of the Zodiack with Celestial Signs engraven on it; and, on the other Side, a Figure with a Crown-Mure with these Letters about it, +Sardis Asias, AUDIAS, Hellados, 1’ metropolis+:  __Sardis_, the first Metropolis of Asia, Greece, and Audia._—­But where and what Audia was, (says He) I find not.  Now is it not very strange, that this Gentleman should not remember, that Sardis was the Capital City of Lydia; and, consequently, that for +AUDIAS+ we should read +LYDIAS+?  Tho’ my Correction is too obvious to want any Justification, yet, I find, it has One from the Learned Father [D]_Harduin_; who produces another Coin of Sardis (in the French King’s Cabinet) which bears the very same Inscription, only exhibited as it ought to be.