  The logical ‘surpassing’ expressed by the nomina transcendentia is the order of the predicables or universals described by Porphyry. If the relation between subject and predicate, Porphyry claims, is such that the predicate belongs to the essence of the subject, then it is either a genus, or species, or difference; if the predicate does not belong to the essence of the subject, it is either convertible with it, and then it is a property (proprium), or if not convertible, then it is an accident. Now the most universal are Aristotle’s ten categories, which Porphyry defines as “that above which there will be no other superordinate genus.” (Porph., Introduction 2.5) In answer to the question whether ‘being’, since it is said of everything, is not a genus common to the highest genera, Porphyry states that the ten categories are primarily diverse, and hence concludes to the equivocity of ‘being’.