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Socrates. Let us, then, consider the reason for this. Does he not himself indicate the reason most admirably? For he says— He alone defended their city and long walls.Hom. Il. 22.507But the verb is in the second person, addressed by Hecuba to Hector after his death. Therefore, as it seems, it is right to call the son of the defender Astyanax (Lord of the city), ruler of that which his father, as Homer says, defended.
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Hermogenes. That is clear to me.
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Socrates. Indeed? I do not yet understand about it myself, Hermogenes. Do you?
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Hermogenes. No, by Zeus, I do not.
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Socrates. But, my good friend, did not Homer himself also give Hector his name?
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Hermogenes. Why do you ask that?
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Socrates. Because that name seems to me similar to Astyanax, and both names seem to be Greek. For lord (ἄναξ) and holder (ἕκτωρ) mean nearly the same thing, indicating that they are names of a king; for surely a man is holder of that of which he is lord; for it is clear that he rules it and possesses it and holds it. Or does it seem to you that there is nothing in what I am saying, and am I wrong in imagining that I have found a clue to Homer’s opinion about the correctness of names?
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Hermogenes. No, by Zeus, you are not wrong, in my opinion; I think perhaps you have found a clue.
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Socrates. It is right, I think, to call a lion’s offspring a lion and a horse’s offspring a horse. I am not speaking of prodigies, such as the birth of some other kind of creature from a horse, but of the natural offspring of each species after its kind. If a horse, contrary to nature, should bring forth a calf, the natural offspring of a cow, it should be called a calf, not a colt, nor if any offspring that is not human should be born from a human being, should that other offspring be called a human being; and the same applies to trees and all the rest. Do you not agree?
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Hermogenes. Yes.