Giving old meaning to “homecoming”

Lately, I’ve been rediscovering my inner classics-geek. I guess it might be obvious from the contents of this blog, between those Monday Morning Montaigne snippets and my return to the Iliad.

During the weekend, I opened up the Poetics so I could try to make a smartass point about Alcestis & Admetus (for That Thing I’m Trying To Write). I never had a productive time with Aristotle, but I’m trying to convince myself that this was partly because of the tiny typesetting of the Penguin editions I used to read.

Last night, I got a brochure in the mail from my graduate school, the inestimably important (to me) St. John’s College. The college is launching a continuing education program for alumni, consisting of weekend (or slightly longer) sessions on some of the great books.

The first offering, Aristotle & Aquinas on the Unity of Intellect, didn’t appeal to me too much, but the second one, a 4-day session in June on the Odyssey, made me wince and got the wheels turning in my head: “Hmm. . . if I get ahead on my Top Pharma Companies report a bit, I can afford to head down to Annapolis Thursday morning and get home Sunday night. . .”

I saved the flyer. This morning, when I looked it over, I noticed something strange. See, this being St. John’s, the program is named after the port where Socrates and his buddies had the conversation that comprises The Republic. It’s a typically intelligent gesture for a place that New York magazine once called “a school for hyperliterate misfits.”

That said, the school is referring to the program as “Pireaus”, and that’s what struck me as odd. I had to run downstairs to my library to check that I wasn’t misremembering, but as far as I can tell, it’s supposed to be “Piraeus”, not “Pireaus”. That’s how Bloom has it, and that’s how Jowett has it. Unfortunately, I can’t find my Greek/English lexicon down there (I’ve got a ton of books, okay? And, yes, I do own a Greek/English lexicon), and don’t have a Greek version of The Republic around.

So, can anyone (that means you, brother) get me a ruling on why they’re called it Pireaus?

(Now if I can just make an early start on those Top Company reports. . .)