basic grammar help

[godingly]

I'm trying to translate the following sentence (I've marked it in red arrows http://imgur.com/4yjEVof)
and I got: "on the one hand it [the Parthenon] is of Athena, and on the other hand virgins in it are weaving the dress of the goddess."

obviously this is a faulty translation - did I got the μεν δε structure right? what is the subject of the first part of the sentence? how would you translate it?

[jeidsath]

I thought that I would copy the text into this post:

Καὶ Ἀθήνη, ἡ ἄλλων τε πολλῶν καὶ τῶν Ἀθηναίων θεός, ἔχει πολλὰ καὶ καλὰ ἱερὰ ἐν τῇ ἠπείρῳ καὶ ἐν ταῖς νήσοις· τὸ δὲ μέγιστον τῶν τῆς θεοῦ ἱερῶν Ἀθήνησίν ἐστιν. ὁ δὲ ναὸς ὁ ἐνθάδε ἔτι καὶ νῦν θαυμάζεται ὁμοίως ὑπό τε ξένων καὶ ἀστῶν.

Οἱ δ’ Ἀθηναῖοι ἐπονομάζουσι τὴν θεὸν καὶ Παρθένον, τῇ δὲ Παρθένῳ τὰ Παναθήναια ἄγουσιν. ὁ δὲ τῆς θεοῦ Ἀθήνησι ναὸς ὀνομάζεται Παρθενών. τῆς μὲν γὰρ Παρθένου ἐστίν, παρθένοι δ’ ἐν αὐτῷ τὸν τῆς θεοῦ πέπλον ὑφαίνουσιν. Παναθηναίοις δὲ ἀνάγεται ὁ πέπλος τῇ θεῷ θαυμαζόμενος ὑπὸ τῶν πολλῶν θεωρῶν τῶν ἐν ταῖς ὁδοῖς.

As far as μὲν δὲ, it doesn't need to be rigidly translated "on one hand / on the other hand." Here it's signaling the contrast between Παρθένου and παρθένοι.

Is this from a reader or textbook? I'm curious which one it is.

EDIT: As is pointed out later in the thread, ὑφαίνουσιν, not ὑπαίνουσιν. The scribe was typing fast. The maidens were ὑφαίνουσαι (weaving) and were not ῥυπαίνουσαι (dirtying) the πέπλον of Athena.

[mwh]

You have the construction right, but you sacrifice the point when you translate της παρθενου as “Athena” instead of “the Virgin.” She’s Athena Parthenos, and that (says the text) is one reason her temple is called the Parthenon.

“For (on the one hand) it’s the Virgin’s, and (on the other) virgins weave the goddess’s robe in it.”

As jeidsath says, there’s no real need to translate the μέν. It just lets you know there’s a δέ coming up, giving the other reason for the “Parthenon” name. All you need in English (if you have to translate it at all—it's best if you don't) is “and” between the two clauses.

Athena Parthenos is sometimes said to be a cult title, but it’s not. It’s just a descriptor of this unsexy goddess who never had a lover. (She did once make a play for Paris Alexander’s favor, but lost out to Aphrodite. No surprise there.) The text makes the connection with the Panathenaia festival.

[Damian]

πέπλον ὑπαίνουσιν

Does anyone know why 'phee' turned to 'pi' in that verb? The verb is ὑφαίνω not ὑπαίνω.

[mwh]

It's just a typo, aka transmissional corruption. Nothing is said about the maidens peeing.

[Damian]

I would like to apologize for my improper combination of letters that led to an unpleasant result.

I have edit my last post.

[jeidsath]

My fault. I've fixed it in the above post. My aspirated pronunciation of θ,φ,χ has improved over time, but as you can see from mistakes like this, it's still a long way from perfect, even to my own ear. It comes out fairly frequently when I'm typing, especially with π/φ. Allen's advice to use a fricative pronunciation makes sense to me, though I'll continue to persevere.

I've always assumed that τ/θ, π/φ, and κ/χ substitutions are rare in the historical record, but I have never seen data. Maybe someone knows?

Speaking of dropped aspiration, I ran across this in the autobiography of G.K. Chesterton the other day:

There was a whole world in which nobody was any more likely to drop an h than to pick up a title. I early discovered, with the malice of infancy, that what my seniors were really afraid of was any imitation of the intonation and diction of the servants. I am told (to quote another hearsay anecdote) that about the age of three or four, I screamed for a hat hanging on a peg, and at last in convulsions of fury uttered the awful words, "If you don't give it me, I'll say 'at." I felt sure that would lay all my relations prostrate for miles around.