Tutorial Idea

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Bert
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Tutorial Idea

Post by Bert »

If one of the Greek gurus is able and willing to write a beginners tutorial on conditional clauses, (s)he will be guaranteed at least one reader.

chad
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Post by chad »

hi bert, until will, whiteoctave, skylax, paul &c writes such a tutorial, have a look at sidgwick's greek prose composition, just put online here at textkit yesterday. he explains conditional clauses really well (he explains everything well in those first 100 pages). :)

Emma_85
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Post by Emma_85 »

Hi Bert!
Hope this helps a bit. I don't know if this is what you had in mind, it's as short as possible (I always find that short answers are good just to get an overview of the topic):

There are three conditional clauses, the Eventualis, Potentialis and the Irrealis (sorry only know the Latin terms).
It might be best if someone just checks this, because although I know how to translate these clauses into German I’m not sure that I’m doing a good job of translating them into English :P .

For negation use μή in the clause and οὐ in the main sentence.

Eventualis:
The main body of the sentence is in future tense the clause is: ἐάν + conjunctive

e.g. ἐάν με ἀδικήσῃς, ἀγανακτήσω.
If you should do me wrong, I will (surely) be cross.

Potentialis:
The main body of the sentence is present or aorist tens and in the optative + ἅν , while the clause is εἰ + optative aorist/present.

e.g. Εἰ του κλέπτου κατηγοροῖ τις, κρίνοιτο ἄν.
If someone accused a thief, he (the thief) would be condemned.

Irrealis:
This is the more complicated one...
in the present: normally the main sentence is Imperfect Indicative + ἄν and the clause is εἰ + Imperfect Indicative. In some case though it’s the Aorist and not the indicative and still has a present tense meaning, so you just have see which translation is best.

e.g.: εἰ μή με ἠδίκεις, οὐκ ἠγανάκτουν ἄν.
If you weren’t doing me wrong, then I wouldn’t be cross with you.

the Irrealis of the past in normally:
main sentence is Aorist Indicative + ἄν and the clause is εἰ + Aorist Indicative
But again a sentence in the Imperfect tense might also have a past meaning.

e.g.: εἴ με ἠδίκησας, ἠγανάκτησα ἄν.
If you had done me wrong, then I would have been cross.

Most important thing to remember about the Irrealis is that it's in the Indicative, not the conjunctive like in Latin.

Bert
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Post by Bert »

Thanks Chad and Emma.
No need to apologize for not knowing the English terms, Emma. I am at fault for not knowing Latin.

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