132/9: Who hit whom?
Posted: Fri Jun 23, 2006 6:04 am
I'm having trouble with exercise 132, sentence 9, specifically:
οὐκ ἄξιον ἦν τῷ ὁπλίτῃ παίειν τὸν Περσικὸν τοξότην.
White's book was not the first Greek textbook I began studying, so admittedly my thinking may be influenced by outside sources here, but I am unsure of who hit whom. In infinitive construction, when the subject of the main clause is not the same as the subject of the subordinate clause, then the latter is placed into the accusative. Or is this a dative of agent with the direct object in the accusative as it normally is? (And does word order have anything to do with it - I know it does in English but in Greek I've seen sentences with the subject placed last so I'm unsure on that.)
Did the Persian archer strike the hoplite or vice versa?
οὐκ ἄξιον ἦν τῷ ὁπλίτῃ παίειν τὸν Περσικὸν τοξότην.
White's book was not the first Greek textbook I began studying, so admittedly my thinking may be influenced by outside sources here, but I am unsure of who hit whom. In infinitive construction, when the subject of the main clause is not the same as the subject of the subordinate clause, then the latter is placed into the accusative. Or is this a dative of agent with the direct object in the accusative as it normally is? (And does word order have anything to do with it - I know it does in English but in Greek I've seen sentences with the subject placed last so I'm unsure on that.)
Did the Persian archer strike the hoplite or vice versa?