daivid wrote:This is from Chariton 1.1
Ἑρμοκράτης, ὁ Συρακουσίων στρατηγός, οὗτος ὁ νικήσας Ἀθηναίους, εἶχε θυγατέρα Καλλιρρόην τοὔνομα, θαυμαστόν τι χρῆμα παρθένου καὶ ἄγαλμα τῆς ὅλης Σικελίας:
My best translation is this:
Hermocrates the Sicilian general the one who defeated the Athenians had a daughter, Kallirhoe by name, wonderous of maidens and an ornament of the whole of Sicily.
Hermokrates, a general of Syracuse, who defeated the Athenians, had a daughter Kallirhoe by name. A wonder of a maiden and an ornament for all Syracuse.
daivid wrote:My first question is what does τι χρῆμα add to the meaning?
Yeah you're seeing something which becomes increasingly common as ancient Greek developed into modern Greek but also had ancient antecedents which is ti + another word as an exclamation almost, but not quite with the force of English "what a bastard" sort of thing.
Here it is paired with a genitive in a common construction, Parse it like you would tis thnetwn (= a moral) or tis thewn (= a god) . See here:
http://www.ntgreek.org/pdf/genitive_case.pdf it actually kind of fits a few different types almost.
ti xrhma = what wonder = what a wonder + the genitive = what a wonder of a girl! but the languages don't match up well here, it's not supposed to sound Benny Hill like.
daivid wrote: My second is why is there a τ in front of τοὔνομα?
Article plus noun. It's ou either because parthenou was used earlier and that's the sound in the writers mind (analogy) or habit/phonology e.g how would you write ths plus onoma?