batch.motif.greek-plato-symposium-jowett-gutenberg-l1610-l1659
---
record_id: batch.motif.greek-plato-symposium-jowett-gutenberg-l1610-l1659
source_text_path: texts/public-domain/greek/project-gutenberg/symposium-jowett.md
passage_locator:
label: Symposium / SYMPOSIUM / INTRODUCTION. / SYMPOSIUM; lines 1610-1659
start: '1610'
end: '1659'
translation: Symposium
notes: Generated from OpenAI Batch run motif-extraction-2026-04-28-high-priority;
human review required.
canonical_text:
quote: divination is the peacemaker of gods and men
summary: The passage describes harmonious and wanton forms of love acting in seasons,
elements, health, disease, astronomy, sacrifice, and divination. It then shifts
to Aristophanes, whose hiccough is cured by sneezing, and to a joking exchange
with Eryximachus before Aristophanes’ speech.
language: English
quote_policy: quoted
literal_observations:
- id: obs:1
text: The course of the seasons is said to contain both principles of love.
category: setting
evidence_refs:
- ev:1
- id: obs:2
text: When hot and cold, moist and dry blend in temperance and harmony, they bring
health and plenty to men, animals, and plants.
category: relationship
evidence_refs:
- ev:1
- id: obs:3
text: Wanton love is described as destructive and injurious when it gains control
of the seasons.
category: attribute
evidence_refs:
- ev:1
- id: obs:4
text: Pestilence, diseases, hoar-frost, hail, and blight are attributed to excesses
and disorders in the elements of love.
category: sequence
evidence_refs:
- ev:1
- id: obs:5
text: Astronomy is defined here as knowledge of these excesses and disorders in
relation to heavenly revolutions and the seasons.
category: speech
evidence_refs:
- ev:2
- id: obs:6
text: Sacrifices and divination are described as an art of communion between gods
and men.
category: relationship
evidence_refs:
- ev:3
- id: obs:7
text: Divination is said to preserve good love, cure evil love, and act as peacemaker
between gods and men.
category: action
evidence_refs:
- ev:3
- id: obs:8
text: The good love perfected with temperance and justice is said to produce happiness,
harmony, and friendship with gods and with one another.
category: attribute
evidence_refs:
- ev:4
- id: obs:9
text: Aristophanes says his hiccough is gone after applying sneezing.
category: action
evidence_refs:
- ev:5
- id: obs:10
text: Eryximachus warns Aristophanes that he is making fun of him and may be laughed
at in return.
category: speech
evidence_refs:
- ev:6
figures:
- id: fig:1
name_or_label: Eryximachus
description: Named interlocutor who warns Aristophanes after Aristophanes jokes
about sneezing and bodily harmony.
role_refs:
- role:1
evidence_refs:
- ev:6
- id: fig:2
name_or_label: Aristophanes
description: Named interlocutor who says his hiccough is gone, jokes about sneezing,
and is about to speak.
role_refs:
- role:2
evidence_refs:
- ev:5
- ev:6
- id: fig:3
name_or_label: Love
description: A force described in harmonious, good, wanton, and evil forms, affecting
seasons, elements, ritual life, and relations among gods and men.
role_refs:
- role:3
evidence_refs:
- ev:1
- ev:3
- ev:4
- id: fig:4
name_or_label: gods
description: Divine beings described as partners in communion with men and as beings
with whom good love makes humans friends.
role_refs:
- role:4
evidence_refs:
- ev:3
- ev:4
- id: fig:5
name_or_label: men
description: Humans described as receiving health and plenty, participating in communion
with gods, and needing harmonious love in actions and relationships.
role_refs:
- role:5
evidence_refs:
- ev:1
- ev:3
- ev:4
- id: fig:6
name_or_label: animals and plants
description: Living beings described as receiving health and plenty under harmonious
elemental love and diseases or blight under disordered love.
role_refs:
- role:6
evidence_refs:
- ev:1
roles:
- id: role:1
label: dialogue interlocutor and admonisher
assigned_to:
- fig:1
basis: Eryximachus directly addresses Aristophanes and warns him about making fun.
evidence_refs:
- ev:6
- id: role:2
label: next speaker and comic respondent
assigned_to:
- fig:2
basis: Aristophanes follows, reports the end of his hiccough, laughs, and prepares
to speak.
evidence_refs:
- ev:5
- ev:6
- id: role:3
label: cosmic, ritual, and ethical force
assigned_to:
- fig:3
basis: Love is said to affect elements, seasons, sacrifices, divination, happiness,
harmony, and relations with gods and men.
evidence_refs:
- ev:1
- ev:3
- ev:4
- id: role:4
label: divine partners in communion
assigned_to:
- fig:4
basis: Sacrifice and divination are called communion between gods and men, and good
love makes humans friends with the gods.
evidence_refs:
- ev:3
- ev:4
- id: role:5
label: human participants and beneficiaries
assigned_to:
- fig:5
basis: Men receive health and plenty, participate in sacrificial and divinatory
communion, and are affected by harmonious or impious love.
evidence_refs:
- ev:1
- ev:3
- ev:4
- id: role:6
label: living recipients of seasonal effects
assigned_to:
- fig:6
basis: Animals and plants are said to benefit from harmonious elemental blending
and suffer diseases or blight from disorder.
evidence_refs:
- ev:1
symbols:
- id: sym:1
label: harmonious love
literal_form: harmonious love blending hot and cold, moist and dry in temperance
and harmony
associated_figures:
- fig:3
taxonomy_refs: []
evidence_refs:
- ev:1
- id: sym:2
label: wanton or evil love
literal_form: wanton love and evil love associated with excess, disorder, pestilence,
disease, and impiety
associated_figures:
- fig:3
taxonomy_refs: []
evidence_refs:
- ev:1
- ev:3
- id: sym:3
label: seasons and elemental mixture
literal_form: course of the seasons; hot and cold, moist and dry
associated_figures:
- fig:3
- fig:5
- fig:6
taxonomy_refs:
- seasonal_cycle
evidence_refs:
- ev:1
- ev:2
- id: sym:4
label: sacrifice and divination
literal_form: all sacrifices and the whole province of divination as communion between
gods and men
associated_figures:
- fig:3
- fig:4
- fig:5
taxonomy_refs:
- sacrifice
- sacred_exchange
evidence_refs:
- ev:3
- id: sym:5
label: sneezing as bodily cure
literal_form: sneezing applied to cure Aristophanes’ hiccough
associated_figures:
- fig:2
taxonomy_refs: []
evidence_refs:
- ev:5
scenes:
- id: scene:1
label: Seasonal harmony and disorder
summary: The speaker explains that harmonious blending of elemental opposites in
the seasons brings health and plenty, while disordered love brings pestilence,
disease, frost, hail, and blight.
figure_refs:
- fig:3
- fig:5
- fig:6
symbol_refs:
- sym:1
- sym:2
- sym:3
evidence_refs:
- ev:1
- ev:2
- id: scene:2
label: Ritual mediation between gods and men
summary: Sacrifice and divination are presented as practices concerned with preserving
good love, curing evil love, and maintaining peaceful communion between gods and
men.
figure_refs:
- fig:3
- fig:4
- fig:5
symbol_refs:
- sym:1
- sym:2
- sym:4
evidence_refs:
- ev:3
- ev:4
- id: scene:3
label: Hiccough cured and comic exchange
summary: Aristophanes reports that sneezing cured his hiccough, jokes about bodily
harmony, and exchanges warnings and laughter with Eryximachus before speaking.
figure_refs:
- fig:1
- fig:2
symbol_refs:
- sym:5
evidence_refs:
- ev:5
- ev:6
candidate_motifs:
- id: motif:1
label: Dual loves as ordering and disordering powers
taxonomy_refs:
- duality
basis: The passage contrasts harmonious or good love with wanton or evil love across
seasons, ritual life, piety, and human-divine relations.
evidence_refs:
- ev:1
- ev:3
- ev:4
confidence: high
cautions: The contrast is philosophical and rhetorical rather than a narrative myth
episode.
- id: motif:2
label: Seasonal cycle governed by elemental harmony
taxonomy_refs:
- seasonal_cycle
basis: The seasons and elemental opposites are described as producing health and
plenty when harmonized and disease or blight when disordered.
evidence_refs:
- ev:1
- ev:2
confidence: high
cautions: The passage gives a cosmological explanation, not a personified seasonal
myth narrative.
- id: motif:3
label: Ritual communion between gods and humans
taxonomy_refs:
- sacrifice
- sacred_exchange
basis: Sacrifice and divination are explicitly described as communion between gods
and men and as means to preserve good love and heal evil love.
evidence_refs:
- ev:3
confidence: medium
cautions: The passage does not describe a specific sacrifice or reciprocal exchange
event; it defines ritual function generally.
- id: motif:4
label: Knowledge that diagnoses and heals cosmic or religious imbalance
taxonomy_refs:
- wisdom
basis: Astronomy and divination are described as forms of knowledge that understand
disorders in seasons or human loves and work to heal them.
evidence_refs:
- ev:2
- ev:3
confidence: medium
cautions: The available evidence supports a wisdom or knowledge pattern, but not
a discrete wisdom tale.
- id: motif:5
label: Comic bodily cure through sneezing
taxonomy_refs: []
basis: Aristophanes reports that his hiccough was cured by sneezing and jokes that
the body’s harmony may have a love of such noises and ticklings.
evidence_refs:
- ev:5
confidence: medium
cautions: This is a comic dialogue transition rather than a major mythic motif.
comparison_claims: []
evidence:
- id: ev:1
type: summary
locator: lines 1610-1620
quote_or_summary: The seasons contain both principles; harmonious blending of hot/cold
and moist/dry brings health and plenty, while wanton love brings pestilence, disease,
hoar-frost, hail, and blight.
source_text_path: texts/public-domain/greek/project-gutenberg/symposium-jowett.md
rights_note: Public domain source; excerpt summarized.
- id: ev:2
type: summary
locator: lines 1620-1623
quote_or_summary: Knowledge of elemental excesses and disorders in relation to heavenly
revolutions and seasons is termed astronomy.
source_text_path: texts/public-domain/greek/project-gutenberg/symposium-jowett.md
rights_note: Public domain source; excerpt summarized.
- id: ev:3
type: quote
locator: lines 1623-1633
quote_or_summary: Sacrifices and divination are described as the art of communion
between gods and men; divination is called “the peacemaker of gods and men.”
source_text_path: texts/public-domain/greek/project-gutenberg/symposium-jowett.md
rights_note: Public domain source; short quotation used.
- id: ev:4
type: summary
locator: lines 1633-1640
quote_or_summary: Good love perfected with temperance and justice has great power,
produces happiness and harmony, and makes humans friends with gods and one another.
source_text_path: texts/public-domain/greek/project-gutenberg/symposium-jowett.md
rights_note: Public domain source; excerpt summarized.
- id: ev:5
type: summary
locator: lines 1641-1646
quote_or_summary: Aristophanes says his hiccough is gone after sneezing and jokes
about whether bodily harmony has a love of noises and ticklings.
source_text_path: texts/public-domain/greek/project-gutenberg/symposium-jowett.md
rights_note: Public domain source; excerpt summarized.
- id: ev:6
type: summary
locator: lines 1647-1659
quote_or_summary: Eryximachus warns Aristophanes about making fun of him; Aristophanes
laughs, prepares to speak, and is told he may be called to account.
source_text_path: texts/public-domain/greek/project-gutenberg/symposium-jowett.md
rights_note: Public domain source; excerpt summarized.
confidence:
extraction: high
motif_candidates: medium
comparison_claims: uncertain
notes: Literal dialogue content is clear. Motif labels are limited to patterns directly
supported by this philosophical passage; no cross-tradition comparison claims
were made.
reviewer_status:
status: needs_review
reviewer: ''
reviewed_at: ''
notes: Machine-generated draft from OpenAI Batch; not human-reviewed.
extracted_by: openai_batch:gpt-5.5
extracted_at: '2026-04-28'
notes: |-
Only supplied passage and metadata were used. Taxonomy references are restricted to available motif family refs where directly supported.
batch_run_id=motif-extraction-2026-04-28-high-priority
custom_id=motif_extract:greek-plato-symposium-jowett-gutenberg__l1610-l1659
passage_sha256=05ed15ca05a056ff1cbff03b2a40580801c887da75f7a3e16b1276200f95aabc