John W. wrote:PS - on Saturday morning I submitted a lengthy post offering some suggestions for Thucydidean study aids, but due to the vagaries of the posting system it has only just appeared; if anyone is interested, it is to be found on page 3 of this thread. Fortunately (and with thanks to those concerned) I can now post in real time!
pster wrote:John W. wrote:PS - on Saturday morning I submitted a lengthy post offering some suggestions for Thucydidean study aids, but due to the vagaries of the posting system it has only just appeared; if anyone is interested, it is to be found on page 3 of this thread. Fortunately (and with thanks to those concerned) I can now post in real time!
Thanks John. Very instructive. I will request an increase in my budget for Thucydides!
pster wrote:1.36.1
...γνώτω τὸ μὲν δεδιὸς αὐτοῦ ἰσχὺν ἔχον τοὺς ἐναντίους μᾶλλον φοβῆσον, τὸ δὲ θαρσοῦν μὴ δεξαμένου ἀσθενὲς ὂν πρὸς ἰσχύοντας τοὺς ἐχθροὺς ἀδεέστερον ἐσόμενον...
Morris writes:
τὸ δεδιός and τὸ θαρσοῦν: this use of neut. partics. and adjs. for abstract nouns (GMT. 108, 2, N. 4; H. 966 b; Kühn. 403 γ) is a favourite one with Thuc. It presents to the mind the abstract quality in operation, standing between e.g. τὸ δεδιέναι and ὅτι δέδιε. τὸ δεδιὸς αὐτοῦ: i.e. the fear which sees in himself no adequate strength. Opp. to this is τὸ θαρσοῦν μὴ δεξαμένου, i.e. the confidence that he has nothing to fear, which has led him to reject allies. The gen. δεξαμένου, like αὐτοῦ, properly depends on the partic., but has the effect of an abs. gen.—ἰσχὺν ἔχον: if it is backed by strength, i.e. if it leads him to secure the means of effective action.
-I don't understand what the ὂν is for; we have ἐσόμενον. How many copulas do we need?
-I don't understand Morris' comment, the bolded part. I thought αὐτοῦ was a genitive of possession. δεξαμένου doesn't seem to be a genitive of possession. So how exactly are they alike? And which partic. do they depend upon?
pster wrote:Thanks. δεξαμένου agreeing with αὐτοῦ certainly seems to be the party line. But, but, it somehow seems strange to me. I wouldn't say it is wrong. But I wouldn't say it is right either. What is the reason for it? We get the genitive αὐτοῦ because of possession. But why does δεξαμένου have to follow it? After all, the first time the man referred to by αὐτοῦ is referred to, it is at the very outset where we use the dative ὅτῳ. So me wants to ask why isn't it just as reasonable to expect or even require δεξαμένῳ? We can sharpen it a bit and ask: what would happen if the clause τὸ μὲν δεδιὸς αὐτοῦ ἰσχὺν ἔχον τοὺς ἐναντίους μᾶλλον φοβῆσον were absent? Is there a Smyth number? Somehow I would rather just think of it as a genitive absolute. How do we know it is not a genitive absolute? Cameron in his commentary says that it is sentence that merits close study, so that's what I'm trying to give it.
Paul Derouda wrote:Can you explain why οὐδέ is in this position? I think this is some special use of of φημί but I can't recall it, can you help me?
Paul Derouda wrote:At 1.38.2 we have:
ἡμεῖς δὲ οὐδ᾽ αὐτοί φαμεν ἐπὶ τῷ ὑπὸ τούτων ὑβρίζεσθαι κατοικίσαι, ἀλλ᾽ ἐπὶ τῷ ἡγεμόνες τε εἶναι καὶ τὰ εἰκότα θαυμάζεσθαι
Can you explain why οὐδέ is in this position? I think this is some special use of of φημί but I can't recall it, can you help me?
John W. wrote:Paul Derouda wrote:At 1.38.2 we have:
ἡμεῖς δὲ οὐδ᾽ αὐτοί φαμεν ἐπὶ τῷ ὑπὸ τούτων ὑβρίζεσθαι κατοικίσαι, ἀλλ᾽ ἐπὶ τῷ ἡγεμόνες τε εἶναι καὶ τὰ εἰκότα θαυμάζεσθαι
Can you explain why οὐδέ is in this position? I think this is some special use of of φημί but I can't recall it, can you help me?
Hi, Paul. I agree with Nate that you probably have οὔ φημι in mind, but I don't think that is what we have here.
The Corinthians have just quoted the Corcyraeans as saying that they were not sent out as colonists to suffer wrong (λέγοντες ὡς οὐκ ἐπὶ τῷ κακῶς πάσχειν ἐκπεμφθεῖεν). The Corinthians' response is: 'We, however, say that neither did we ourselves send them out as colonists so that we would be insulted by them...' (ἡμεῖς δὲ οὐδ᾽ αὐτοί φαμεν ἐπὶ τῷ ὑπὸ τούτων ὑβρίζεσθαι κατοικίσαι...). Thus οὐδ᾽('neither') responds to οὐκ in the previous sentence, and does not here negate φαμεν, but in fact οὐδ᾽ αὐτοί goes with κατοικίσαι, and is positioned early in the sentence for emphasis.
At least, that's my take on it - what do you and others think?
Best wishes,
John
pster wrote:I don't understand why αὐτοί is in the nominative. This is a indirect speech with an infinitive, so shouldn't it be in the accusative?
spiphany wrote:pster wrote:I don't understand why αὐτοί is in the nominative. This is a indirect speech with an infinitive, so shouldn't it be in the accusative?
A nominative + infinitive construction is used instead of an accusative + infinitive when the subject is the same as the main verb, as here.
See Smyth 1973
Bob Manske wrote:So that the deconvoluted structure is:
ἡμεῖς δἐ φαμεν = but in response we say
επὶ τῷ = about this subject
οὐδ᾽ αὐτοί κατοικίσαι = they did not go out as colonists
ὑβρίζεσθαι ὑπὸ τούτων = (for us) to be insulted by these guys
spiphany wrote:I would parse this a bit differently, actually.
οὐδ᾽ αὐτοί κατοικίσαι: nominative, meaning that the subject is the same as the introductory verb. "we did not colonize". The position of οὐδε with φαμεν rather than κατοικίσαι sounds odd to our ears, but it seems vaguely familiar to me; I'll see if I can find anything more concrete on where negation likes to be placed in Greek.
The rest of the sentence (I think) consists of two parallel clauses introduced by επι + an articular infinitive. One meaning of επι plus the dative is to express purpose. So:
επὶ τῷ ὑβρίζεσθαι = to be insulted
ἐπὶ τῷ ἡγεμόνες εἶναι καὶ θαυμάζεσθαι = to be those leading and to be admired
John W. wrote:Since there have been no posts on this thread for a month and a half, I thought I'd ask how people are getting on with their reading of Thucydides. I hope that the lack of posts means that things are going well!
With all good wishes,
John
pster wrote:Hey John! I'm glad you are around. I hadn't looked at the forum seriously in months and I came here today to ask the same question. For me, some really big things popped up that I had to do this year and so I had to put down the Thucydides. For example, I had no idea that I would be moving to another country when I started the thread! And I had no idea that I would be taking a three week vacation in March. I still anaged to work on some other languages, often because I need them to order my dinner! Too bad we don't need Attic to be understood at restaurants! Anyway, it is somehow easier for me to put aside Attic because I know that it is my main longterm commitment! Hehe. So anyway, I'm still somewhere in the early speeches. But I'm going to get back into it this week. I can only budget about 90 minutes a day, but that should be enough to fill the thread with questions! Where are you in the book John? I'm afraid to ask! And how about other folks?
pster wrote:There are two questions to restart the thread.
John W. wrote:Have any of you encountered this idiom in other contexts where expressions like ὅσα and ὡς πλείστῃ follow two words, and, while grammatically agreeing with the nearer of the two, seem to apply to both? Are there any helpful references to this idiom in grammatical texts with which you may be familiar? And do you have a view as to whether my proposal to take ὡς πλείστῃ with ναυσί as well as with στρατιᾷ is reasonable?
NateD26 wrote:It seems they share a similar construction, conjoining a couple of nouns
and being followed a relative which in the first sentence is attracted to the case of the latter noun,
but still referring to both, and in the second sentence the adjective is attracted in much
the same way. I don't see why your translation of the 2nd sentence is not the predominant one.
John W. wrote:Perhaps the fact that ὡς πλείστῃ is singular has deterred translators from taking it with ναυσί as well as with στρατιᾷ, but I don't think that is an overwhelming objection.
NateD26 wrote:I've added a similar addendum to my above post.
pster wrote:Thanks guys. Sorry I haven't responded to your generous help. I have just been buried under a mountain of things. On a brighter note, I have created 3000 virtual notecards for the vocabulary from Book I. I am going to try and master Book I inside and out, up and down. After that I will see how I want to handle the other seven books.
pster wrote:1.10 καὶ ὅτι μὲν Μυκῆναι μικρὸν ἦν, ἢ εἴ τι τῶν τότε πόλισμα νῦν μὴ ἀξιόχρεων δοκεῖ εἶναι,...
Why the singular ἦν?
Why the non-feminine, non-plural μικρὸν?
Is fem. pl. Μυκῆναι being assimilated to neut. nom.(acc.?) πόλισμα?
Thanks.
pster wrote:1.10 καὶ ὅτι μὲν Μυκῆναι μικρὸν ἦν, ἢ εἴ τι τῶν τότε πόλισμα νῦν μὴ ἀξιόχρεων δοκεῖ εἶναι,...
Why the singular ἦν?
Why the non-feminine, non-plural μικρὸν?
Is fem. pl. Μυκῆναι being assimilated to neut. nom.(acc.?) πόλισμα?
Thanks.
cb wrote:then for the number of ἦν, this agrees with μικρὸν, see smyth s949a, in particular the last e.g. in that section:
http://archive.org/stream/agreekgrammar ... 2/mode/2up
John W. wrote:The singular verb seems to be an example of agreement with the predicate - as Smyth (949a) notes, there's another one at Thucydides IV.102.3:
καὶ αὖθις ἑνὸς δέοντι τριακοστῷ ἔτει ἐλθόντες οἱ Ἀθηναῖοι, Ἅγνωνος τοῦ Νικίου οἰκιστοῦ ἐκπεμφθέντος, Ἠδῶνας ἐξελάσαντες ἔκτισαν τὸ χωρίον τοῦτο, ὅπερ πρότερον Ἐννέα ὁδοὶ ἐκαλοῦντο.
As Smyth implies, I suppose this construction may stem from the proximity of the verb to the predicate.
NateD26 wrote:Hi, John. What exactly is the difference between the three options?
Do you read (ii) as meaning they started making all sixty ships ready at the same time,
and they also sent them all at the same time?
How does τὰς αἰεὶ πληρουμένας, each as they were manned, fit into this reading?
I don't quite understand the nuance between (i) & (iii). Perhaps you could clarify a bit.
EDIT: I don't know whether or not this is relevant to this particular quote, but
perhaps this is an instance of parataxis mentioned in Smyth 2876.
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