This is another attempt to develop mono-lingual helps for breaking down the syntax of difficult Greek sentences.Polybius 1:1: εἰ μὲν τοῖς πρὸ ἡμῶν ἀναγράφουσι τὰς πράξεις παραλελεῖφθαι συνέβαινε τὸν ὑπὲρ αὐτῆς τῆς ἱστορίας ἔπαινον, ἴσως ἀναγκαῖον ἦν τὸ προτρέπεσθαι πάντας πρὸς τὴν αἵρεσιν καὶ παραδοχὴν τῶν τοιούτων ὑπομνημάτων διὰ τὸ μηδεμίαν ἑτοιμοτέραν εἶναι τοῖς ἀνθρώποις διόρθωσιν τῆς τῶν προγεγενημένων πράξεων ἐπιστήμης.
If you can understand the above sentence, you don't need any help, mono-lingual or otherwise, and you can skip this post. If you cannot process the sentence at this point, I need you to be a guinea pig. As you read this post, don't look anything up in a lexicon and don't look at any English translation. I want to see if, after using these mono-lingual helps, you can understand a sentence you otherwise would not.
The basic structure of this sentence is a contrary-to-fact condition. We could begin with a simplified paraphrase of the core condition, leaving out all the extraneous stuff. (If you don't know what the word ἡ ἱστορία means, just transliterate it into English.)
εἰ οἱ γράφοντες πρὸ ἐμοῦ οὐκ ἔλεγον ὅτι ἡ ἱστορία καλόν ἐστιν, ἔδει ἂν με λέγειν ὅτι δεῖ ὑμᾶς ἀναγιγώσκειν τὴν ἱστορίαν.
But before we do even that, we could redo the syntax to show what a contrary-to-fact condition really is. (To that extent, perhaps, even the L1 meta-language "contrary to fact condition" could be eliminated and replaced with L2 Greek paraphrase.)
οἱ γράφοντες πρὸ ἐμοῦ εἶπον ὅτι ἡ ἱστορία καλόν ἐστιν. διὰ τοῦτο, οὐκ δεῖ με λέγειν ὅτι δεῖ ὑμᾶς ἀναγιγώσκειν τὴν ἱστορίαν.
This is basically what the sentence says. Maybe you should try to go back now and read the original again. Do you get a sense of the basic structure?
Now, I will "level up" the sentence to make it closer to the original, still leaving out all but the core syntactic elements. (παραλείπω means οὐ ποιῶ τι and προτρέπομαι means λέγω ὅτι δεῖ σε ποιῆσαί τι.) Again, don't look up these words in a lexicon. Rely for now on my mono-lingual glosses.
εἰ οἱ ἀναγράφοντες παρέλειπον τὸν ἔπαινον τῆς ἱστορίας, ἀναγκαῖον ἦν ἂν μὲ προτρέπεσθαι ὑμᾶς ἀναγιγώσκειν τὴν ἱστορίαν.
Go back and again and read the original. Do you see the core structure?
Now we have to deal with the main verb in the protasis. συνβαίνω plus the dative and an infinitive is an idiom. συνέβαινε ἐμοὶ λέγειν means ἐγὼ εἶπον. So, συνέβαινε τοῖς πρὸ ἡμῶν ἀναγράφουσι παραλελεῖφθαι τὸν ἔπαινον τῆς ἱστορίας means οἱ ἀναγράφοντες παρέλιπον τὸν ἔπαινον τῆς ἱστορίας. Except that παραλελεῖφθαι is a perfect infinitive, so that the συνβαίνω construction is really saying οἱ ἀναγράφοντες παραλελοίπασι τὸν ἔπαινον τῆς ἱστορίας.
I assume that you can figure out what πρὸς τὴν αἵρεσιν καὶ παραδοχὴν τῶν τοιούτων ὑπομνημάτων. I have already paraphrased it as ἀναγιγώσκειν τὴν ἱστορίαν. A more precise paraphrase:
προτρέπομαι πάντας πρὸς τὴν αἵρεσιν καὶ παραδοχὴν τῶν τοιούτων ὑπομνημάτων means θέλω πάντας λάμβανειν καὶ δέχεσθαι τὰ ὑπομνήματα τῶν γεγονομένων πάλαι, τούτ' ἐστιν, ἀναγιγνώσκειν τὴν ἱστορίαν.
So, all we have left is the last clause of the sentence:
διὰ τὸ μηδεμίαν ἑτοιμοτέραν εἶναι τοῖς ἀνθρώποις διόρθωσιν τῆς τῶν προγεγενημένων πράξεων ἐπιστήμης.
We have an articular infinitive and a genitive of comparison. (I'm not sure if there is any point in trying to avoid this much L1 meta-language.) As we have said many times, neither of these constructions is all that difficult in itself, but when combined with all the other difficult syntax, one's brain crashes and we have a failure to process. Also, we have another factor here--something that David has pointed out in previous posts--that often makes Greek sentences hard to process: We have a slightly different meaning to ἕτοιμος than the standard gloss we tend to learn for it. Here is really means something like καλός, and therefore in the comparative μείζων. διόρθωσις τοῖς ἀνθρώποις means something like βοήθεια τοῖς ἀνθρώποις, ὠφέλιμον τοῖς ἀνθρώποις. So, simplifying the syntax and vocab, the last phrase means something like:
διότι οὐκ ἔστιν μηδεὶς μείζων βοήθεια τοῖς ἀνθρώποις ἢ ἡ ἱστορία.
So, again, here is the original:
Polybius 1:1: εἰ μὲν τοῖς πρὸ ἡμῶν ἀναγράφουσι τὰς πράξεις παραλελεῖφθαι συνέβαινε τὸν ὑπὲρ αὐτῆς τῆς ἱστορίας ἔπαινον, ἴσως ἀναγκαῖον ἦν τὸ προτρέπεσθαι πάντας πρὸς τὴν αἵρεσιν καὶ παραδοχὴν τῶν τοιούτων ὑπομνημάτων διὰ τὸ μηδεμίαν ἑτοιμοτέραν εἶναι τοῖς ἀνθρώποις διόρθωσιν τῆς τῶν προγεγενημένων πράξεων ἐπιστήμης.
and here is my simplified paraphrase:
εἰ συνέβαινε τοῖς πρὸ ἡμῶν γράφουσι περὶ τῶν ἔρων τῶν ἀνθρώπων παραλελεῖφθαι τὸν ἔπαινον τῆς ἱστορίας, ταχὺ ἔδει ἂν μὲ λέγειν ὑμῖν ὅτι δεῖ ὑμᾶς λάμβανειν καὶ δέχεσθαι τὰ ὑπομνήματα τῶν γεγονομένων πάλαι, τούτ' ἐστιν, ἀναγιγνώσκειν τὴν ἱστορίαν.
If there is someone on this forum who was unable to read the passage without these helps, and can now read and understand it, without having looked anything up in a lexicon, and without having looked at a translation, then this method is vindicated. If there is not, it is not.
Now, in wrapping this up, I want to change gears and try another method that David came up, "structure mimicry" or the "syntactic skeleton." This method is sort of the opposite of the paraphrase. In a paraphrase, you preserve the meaning but often change the grammatical structure. In a syntactic skeleton, you preserve the grammatical structure but change the meaning. A Christian preacher, mimicking the syntax of Polybius, might say:
εἰ μὲν τοῖς πρὸ ἐμοῦ κρηρύσσουσι τὸ εὐαγγέλιον ἀμελήκεναι συνέβαινε τὸ τοῦ ἐυαγγελίου κήρυγμα, ἴσως ἀναγκαῖον ἦν ἂν τὸ παρακαλεῖν πάντας πρὸς τὴν αἵρεσιν καὶ παραδοχὴν τῆς ἐν Ἰησοῦ πίστεως διὰ τὸ οὐδὲν μεῖζον εἶναι τοῖς ἀνθρώποις ὠφέλιμον τῆς ἐν τῷ κυρίῳ πίστεως
Or, here is an even more basic mimicry of the BASIC syntax of the sentence, the skeleton of the skeleton, if you will, with the meaning having to do with Plato and Socrates.
εἰ μὲν τῷ Πλάτονι παραλελεῖφθαι συνέβαινε τὸν ὑπὲρ τοῦ Σωκράτους ἔπαινον, ἴσως ἀναγκαῖον ἦν τὸ ἐπαινεῖν τὸν Σωκράτη διὰ τὸ οὐδένα ἀνθρώπον σοφῶτερον εἶναι.
Now, go back and reread the original again. Part of David's idea is that seeing the skeleton with different flesh on it causes you to grasp the structure in a way that is also an alternative to non-target language grammatical analysis. To really apply David's method, you should WRITE, not just READ, your own syntactic skeleton of the sentence.