{ΤΕΥ.} Ἐγὼ δέ γ' ἄνδρ' ὄπωπα μωρίας πλέων,
ὃς ἐν κακοῖς ὕβριζε τοῖσι τῶν πέλας.
Two problems. The Perseus analysis of the form πλέων is somewhat baffling. Here is an abbreviation of the data.
under: πλείων
πλέων adj sg fem nom comp
πλέων adj sg masc nom comp
under: πλέως
πλέων adj sg masc acc (and six others)
under: πλέω
πλέων part sg pres act masc nom
To make sense in Ajax 1150 the process of elimination appears to leave us with adj sg masc acc in agreement with ἄνδρ'. πλέων takes a genitive of the substance which fills, μωρίας, which precedes πλέων in accordance with Sophocles habit of stacking “modifiers” in front. I stumbled on this because a quick glance at LS-Intermediate gave πλέων as a nominative mas/fem singular. It also looks like a part sg pres act masc nom, or a genitive plural. The option acc masc sing was the least intuitively obvious, it didn’t jump out at me. But the syntax appears to require an acc masc sing and if I had been reading this fluently I would have without any conscious analysis supplied that solution.
The next problem:
What is the syntatic relationship between τοῖσι and κακοῖς?
Does it introduce a subordinate constituent? In other words, does τοῖσι τῶν πέλας function as a modifier attached to ἐν κακοῖς which is adverbial with ὕβριζε. What I am really asking is a Chomsky:1959 parsing tree question. Do we attached a branch on the tree below κακοῖς for τοῖσι τῶν πέλας? If the early-Chomsky gives you a headache, ignore it.
C. Stirling Bartholomew
Finglass translation:
“And I saw a man full of foolishness, who behaved with contempt amid his neighbor’s troubles.”