Reading Thucydides 2014

[John W.]

"παλαίτατος is not one of the terms in his lists" The lists in sec. 1042 aren't exclusive by any means. The examples with πρῶτος are a template for παλαίτατος.

This isn't an instance of Thucydides' deliberately thorny style--this is just idiomatic Greek.

I agree with this.

If πρῶτος τῇ πόλει προσέβαλε can be translated (as by Smyth in section 1042) as 'he was the first to attack the city', then I really don't see why παλαίτατος ... ναυτικὸν ἐκτήσατο can't be rendered as 'he was the most ancient to acquire a navy'.

Ultimately one pays one's money and one takes one's choice, but section 1042 of Smyth, and the example with πρῶτος mentioned above, seem to me closer and more relevant to our Thucydides passage than does anything in section 1169, as well as offering a simpler solution which does not require the Greek to be recast.


John

[Qimmik]

How do you rewrite other examples in Smyth 1042?

ἀφικνοῦνται τριταῖοι "they arrive on the third day”

κατέβαινον σκοταῖοι "they descended in the dark'

If it's just a matter of how best to translate the Greek expression into idiomatic English, I don't have a problem with your choice. But when you write "I prefer to see implicit in Th. 1.4 a copula and relative pronoun similar to what we find in Smyth's second 1169 example," you're suggesting that there's a structure involving ἦν ὅς underlying or implicit in Thucydides' sentence--you're rewriting Greek to fit your English translation. Thucydides' sentence is perfectly logical and stands on its own.

In any event, Smyth in 1169 doesn't write that predicate adjectives used this way are implicitly a construction with a copula and a relative pronoun, he writes that predicate adjectives are equivalent to a copula and a relative pronoun. Moreover, the examples with πρῶτος in 1042 are also instances of predicate adjectives, as Smyth 913 makes clear, and in 1042 he doesn't see a need to imply a copula and a relative pronoun to make them logical. Take a look at 915, too.

I don't doubt that you've mastered formal semantics, and I don't want to belabor this point any further. However, I really think you're setting up obstacles for yourself by clinging to English ways of expressing things when you should be trying to assimilate Greek modes of expression.

[John W.]

If it's just a matter of how best to translate the Greek expression into idiomatic English, I don't have a problem with your choice. But when you write "I prefer to see implicit in Th. 1.4 a copula and relative pronoun similar to what we find in Smyth's second 1169 example," you're suggesting that there's a structure involving ἦν ὅς underlying or implicit in Thucydides' sentence--you're rewriting Greek to fit your English translation. Thucydides' sentence is perfectly logical and stands on its own.

In any event, Smyth in 1169 doesn't write that predicate adjectives used this way are implicitly a construction with a copula and a relative pronoun, he writes that predicate adjectives are equivalent to a copula and a relative pronoun. Moreover, the examples with πρῶτος in 1042 are also instances of predicate adjectives, as Smyth 913 makes clear, and in 1042 he doesn't see a need to imply a copula and a relative pronoun to make them logical. Take a look at 915, too.

I gave this some further thought last night and reached much the same conclusions. Both 1042 and 1169 are indeed dealing with predicate adjectives; however, as I said before, the form of our Thucydides passage seems much closer to the examples in 1042 than in 1169.

Rewriting examples (as Smyth does with one of those in 1169) in Greek which adheres more closely to an English idiom is purely a way of explaining the sense more clearly to the student; it doesn't mean that the expanded form was 'implicit' in what Thucydides himself wrote (or in what he was thinking at the time). We need to keep this distinction clear, as otherwise we will confuse ourselves, and incur much unnecessary labour, by believing that all non-English idioms in Thucydides have in effect to be explained away by rewriting them.

John

[Qimmik]

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[Qimmik]

'the other Th. passage. One striking difference between the passages is that the first has a proper name while the second doesn't. The "oldest Minos" requires massaging, while "oldest naval battle" doesn't.'

This may be what is troubling you. But Thucydides didn't write ὁ παλαίτατος Μίνως or ὁ Μίνως ὁ παλαίτατος--he wrote Μίνως . . . παλαίτατος . . . ἐκτήσατο. παλαίτατος is a predicate adjective, not an attributive adjective.

[Victor]

Apologies to Qimmik and John W. if I touch on ground they have already covered more fully.

Pster, as I'm sure you know, Greek didn't use punctuation as we do; it had next to none. If this text were in English and read
"For Minos first of all the people we know of by hearsay acquired a navy"
would you, having just read the sentence that ended the previous paragraph, and knowing from wider reading the extreme unlikelihood that Thucydides would be asserting that Minos is the most ancient person known, assume this sentence meant
"For Minos, first of all the people we know of by hearsay, acquired a navy"
or
"For Minos first, of all the people we know of by hearsay, acquired a navy"?

In the absence of punctuation, context and common sense would tell you it meant the second.

The Greek gives much less reason for hesitation; Thucydides had far stronger support from Greek idiom to underline the meaning he intended; for whilst the English sentence reads somewhat awkwardly (we don't know initially whether "first" is an adjective or adverb, and we would more naturally have framed the sentence "For Minos was the first person...who acquired"), Greek routinely used certain adjectives adverbially (just as Latin did) to extend the predicate as here.

So the false scent we pick up initially in the English sentence, and are intuitively predisposed perhaps to pick up also when we have got as far as Μίνως γὰρ παλαίτατος in the Greek, would simply not have given a Greek reader pause for thought as it does us. The Greek as it is written effortlessly conveys the meaning that Minos was the first person we know of who acquired a navy, and any tendency to believe that it might say otherwise simply reflects a failure to internalize one aspect of Greek idiom that happens to differ from the idiom or idioms you are used to working with.

[Markos]

1.4:
Μίνως γὰρ παλαίτατος ὧν ἀκοῇ ἴσμεν ναυτικὸν ἐκτήσατο...
In English, we would more often say something like: For Minos was the oldest of those whom we know to have established a navy...
If we wanted to translate this back into Greek, what would we say?

ἄγνωστός ἐστιν ὁ μὲν πρῶτος ναυτικοποιῶν. τῶν δ' εὐγνώστων Μίνως πρῶτος.

[Qimmik]

I think Pster understands the meaning correctly, and that his translation is good, even if it isn't a literal, word-for-word translation of the Greek (and there's nothing wrong with that).

Where in my opinion he goes astray is in not recognizing that the predicate adjective παλαίτατος is simply an instance where as Victor says, "Greek routinely used certain adjectives adverbially (just as Latin did) to extend the predicate as here." Instead, Pster feels that implicit in the Greek sentence "Μίνως γὰρ παλαίτατος ὧν ἀκοῇ ἴσμεν ναυτικὸν ἐκτήσατο" is a sentence that reads like a translation from English: "Μίνως γὰρ παλαίτατος τούτων οὕς ἀκοῇ ἴσμεν ἦν ὅς ναυτικὸν ἐκτήσατο".

Pster, as I wrote previously, and as Victor notes, you need to internalize the Greek idiom; otherwise you will create difficulties for yourself as your reading progresses, especially when you encounter this idiom again with words not listed in Smyth, as you will repeatedly.

Maybe this will help you resolve your concerns over scope. If you wanted to say this: "Minos, the first person we know of, acquired a navy", you might say: Μίνως γὰρ παλαίτατος ὢν ὧν ἀκοῇ ἴσμεν ναυτικὸν ἐκτήσατο.

[Qimmik]

John, I responded to your message, but I can't tell whether it went through to you.

Bill

[John W.]

John, I responded to your message, but I can't tell whether it went through to you.

Bill

Thanks, Bill. Not yet, I'm afraid - but then my message to you took an age to leave my 'out' folder, so perhaps messages on here move at a somewhat glacial speed, and it may yet arrive.

All the best,

John

[mwh]

Just jumping in here. Haven't read quite all the above, but Qimmik seems to have it right. Cf. e.g. X prwtos/monos nautikon ekthsato, "X was the first/only one to get a navy." (lit. X first/only got a navy, but NB prwtos/monos not prwton/monon, i.e. he didn't get a navy first, before doing anything else, he got a navy before anyone else did; he didn't only get a navy, exclusive of other things, he alone got a navy, without others getting one). It's regular (and perfectly logical) Greek usage. Trans."M. was the oldest person we know of (lit. of whom we know by hearsay) to get a navy."
HTH.

[mwh]

Just jumping in here. Haven't read quite all the above, but Qimmik seems to have it right. Cf. e.g. X prwtos/monos nautikon ekthsato, "X was the first/only one to get a navy." (lit. X first/only got a navy, but NB prwtos/monos not prwton/monon, i.e. he didn't get a navy first, before doing anything else, he got a navy before anyone else did; he didn't only get a navy, exclusive of other things, he alone got a navy, without others getting one). It's regular (and perfectly logical) Greek usage. Trans."M. was the oldest person we know of (lit. of whom we know by hearsay) to get a navy."
HTH.

[John W.]

Although I'm now meant to be just proofreading my translation of Thucydides, in doing so I can't resist the temptation to revisit some problem passages (they're like old friends by now).

One such occurs in chapter 77 of Book 1, in the course of the Athenian speech in the Lacedaemonian assembly. The Lacedaemonians have already heard complaints from the Corinthians and their other allies about alleged mistreatment by the Athenians; some Athenian ambassadors, who happen to be in Lacedaemon on other business, then ask to address the assembly. Although the Athenians say they will not be defending themselves against specific allegations, but rather just showing 'that we do not hold our possessions unreasonably, and that our city is of some account', they do in fact go into quite a lot of detail, as here.

Anyway, the passage with which I'm struggling is as follows (1.77.1):

καὶ ἐλασσούμενοι γὰρ ἐν ταῖς ξυμβολαίαις πρὸς τοὺς ξυμμάχους δίκαις καὶ παρ᾽ ἡμῖν αὐτοῖς ἐν τοῖς ὁμοίοις νόμοις ποιήσαντες τὰς κρίσεις φιλοδικεῖν δοκοῦμεν.

My translation of this currently reads as follows:

'For even though we often come off worst in lawsuits against our allies which are conducted under international agreements, and in our own courts have instituted hearings of cases for the allies under impartial laws, we are thought to be litigious.'

There are two main schools of thought about this. One holds that two separate situations are being addressed, viz. (i) cases which are still tried in the courts of Athens' allies under international agreements; (ii) cases of specific types (e.g. particularly weighty matters) which have to be referred to the Athenian courts and heard there. This is how I've taken it in my translation.

The other school thinks that we are looking at a single situation, whereby, because of their difficulty in obtaining justice in allied courts, the Athenians transferred the hearing of all international cases to Athens. This is how Steven Lattimore takes it in his 1998 translation:

'For example, because our disadvantage in lawsuits against them in cases involving international agreements caused us to bring these cases here among our impartial laws, we are considered addicted to courtrooms.'

There seem to me two principal arguments against this last interpretation:

(i) in a lengthy note in A Historical Commentary on Thucydides, Gomme concludes that the evidence does not suggest that all such cases were in fact transferred to Athens;

(ii) if the meaning involves a sequential development as Lattimore implies, I would have expected ἐλασσούμενοι to be in a past tense rather than the present.

Against my interpretation it might be argued that only the second of the two aspects (viz. the establishment of courts at Athens) would seem relevant to the accusation of being litigious. In response, one might say that the fact that the Athenians frequently come off worst in cases tried abroad suggests that they would not be over-eager to institute such cases. Moreover, in Thucydides there is not always precise logical correlation between every specific point adduced and the general argument which is being made.

Some important linguistic issues to consider are as follows:

(a) Are the two instances of καὶ correlative, or is the first one (καὶ ἐλασσούμενοι ...) concessive ('even though ...')?

(b) Could γὰρ here be an example of the 'inverted' use of this word, and hence possibly translatable as 'since' or 'as'? If so, does that favour the Lattimore interpretation, in that ἐλασσούμενοι γὰρ could then mean 'since we are at a disadvantage...', and give the reason why the hearing of all such cases had been transferred to Athens? (There would still, however, remain my query regarding the tense of ἐλασσούμενοι, and I'm also not sure what the force of καὶ ... καὶ would be.)

(c) Do the words παρ᾽ ἡμῖν αὐτοῖς go together, or should αὐτοῖς be taken separately as meaning 'for them [i.e. Athens' allies]'?

Any thoughts on all this would be very much appreciated. While I've described my current interpretation above, I'm certainly not irrevocably wedded to it, and would be quite willing to think again in the light of your comments.

Best wishes,

John

[Qimmik]

John, could the second participial phrase introduced by καὶ be subordinate to the first, meaning "even when we brought the litigation in our own courts (παρ᾽ ἡμῖν αὐτοῖς; I think you're right that these words belong together) under impartial laws"?

And I wonder whether ποιήσαντες τὰς κρίσεις refers to the actual decision, rather than the filing of a complaint. κρίσις is the judgment or verdict, I think. Although I see that Lysias 13.35 uses the phrase κρίσιν . . . ἐποίουν to mean "brought a lawsuit," so maybe "instituted lawsuits" is correct.

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/tex ... ction%3D35

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/tex ... Dkri%2Fsis

The whole sentence would mean something like this:

For even though we often come off worst in lawsuits against our allies which are conducted under international agreements--even when we compelled the verdicts to be delivered in our own courts under impartial laws--we are thought to be litigious.

There's probably no way to be absolutely sure about a passage like this, of course. But Thucydides sometimes--in fact, often--deliberately disturbs strict parallelism.

Just a suggestion.

Bill

[John W.]

Bill - many thanks for your comments, and my apologies for not replying sooner.

I'm certainly attracted by your suggestion. One aspect I'm not quite sure about is whether we are likely to have one concessive clause following on immediately from another in this way. I can't think offhand of a precise parallel in Thucydides; that said, there is perhaps no prima facie reason why we can't have two consecutive concessives in the way you suggest.

I'll give it all some further thought in the light of your comments.

By the way, I see that Hammond's recent translation (in the Oxford World's Classics series) agrees with Lattimore:

'For example, finding ourselves disadvantaged against our allies in lawsuits regulated by treaty, we transferred judgement in such cases to Athens under our own impartial laws - and this is viewed as an addiction to litigation.'

Thanks again,

John

[mwh]

Here's a naïve and fairly non-committal initial shot at this sentence:
"For both (or even?) when we find ourselves worsted in suits [no play on worsted suits intended] against our allies held under international agreements and when we held the cases in our own courts under our impartial legal system, we are deemed litigious."

While still leaving plenty of room for debate about the sense, this takes the second και as a simple copula, putting the the two participial phrases in tandem as a pair. ["και can, of course, mean 'and'," Denniston was once heard observing to a pupil – or so the tale goes.] Qimmik proposes we take the second as grammatically subordinate to the first, but I'm ignoring that for now.

I agree that the tense of ελασσουμενοι tells against SL's interpretation. Perhaps not definitively, however. Couldn't the meaning be "When we began to find ourselves losing (pres.pple representing impf) … and (on that account) transferred the cases to our own impartial courts …"? –- No, that would require εδοκουμεν (which I guess we could write if we wanted to?!)

Following your general line of interpretation, then, could we perhaps more completely separate the lawsuits in the first part from those in the second? Could the 2nd part be quasi-parenthetical, tantamount to "(as well as holding our own cases and rendering our verdicts at Athens within our impartial legal system)"? This would leave the allies out of it. The aorist (rather than present representing imperfect) then becomes awkward, however.

Something that bothers me a bit, on any interpretation, is ομοιοις attributive, as if they had other laws that were not impartial. I suppose the implied contrast is with other states' laws, but still ….

My major puzzlement here is the logic, or the sequence of thought. Under any of these construals, how can they be deemed litigious? What you say on this point goes some way towards settling my unease, but for the Athenians to say they're thought litigious because (or although!) they lose cases and held cases at Athens still seems an extraordinarily strange thing to claim. And how can they claim (76 fin.) that any of this ought to earn them praise rather than adoxia? Because they treat their allies on equal terms, and are willing to put themselves at risk of losing cases? But wouldn't the ποιησαντες phrase rather undermine this? (if it's a matter of transferring cases involving the allies to Athens, that is)

To address directly the linguistic issues your raise:
(a) kai. I find I'm vacillating on this. And I'm not sure of the effect of holding up the γαρ. Does it tie the και more closely to ελασσουμενοι? That might support a concessive sense? But does "Even though we lose … we're deemed litigious" make sense? – Or could the και be neither anticipatory of the second και nor concessive, but simply (despite the separation) intensifying the γαρ?
(b) Would this be grammatical, with a mere participle?
(c) I'd think it extremely difficult to disconnect αυτοις from παρ’ημιν. (And wouldn't we expect it to come later in the phrase? or would it be quasi-enclitic and following Wackernagel's Law?) And doesn't παρ’ημιν need αυτοις anyway? ("in our own courts," where laws are impartial, not in our allies', biased against us as they are)

Qimmik's novel take on the passage seems tenable Greek to me (at least for Thucydides), and I suppose it gives sense of a kind. I'm still bothered by the overall reasoning, though.

I've been writing all this just thinking out loud, which is no doubt a very foolish thing to do. I should have mulled it all over first. I haven't consulted anything, and it's been quite a while since I read Thucydides. And I can't speak to the historical actualities. So these thoughts count for little if anything, but having written them I'll send them anyway. I discussed one or two problem passages with Steve Lattimore while he was preparing his translation, but not this one. He would be the best person to consult. He no longer does anything academic, but he might well take an interest in this.

[John W.]

mwh - this is just to thank you for your very helpful post. I'll ponder things further in the light of your (and Bill's) comments and see what develops.

Best wishes,

John

[John W.]

I've now had another think, with specific focus on the context.

Immediately before our passage, at the end of chapter 76, the Athenians have said:

'Thus we think that other people, if they took over our power, would show clearly whether we practise some moderation; however, in consequence of our very reasonableness, ill repute more than praise has unfairly accrued to us.'

It seems most likely that 77.1 must follow directly on from this, and give an instance of such unfairness: thus γὰρ would = 'for example'.

I'm inclining to take the first καὶ as concessive, and the second one as connective - or, perhaps better, as introducing an explanation of the first clause (ἐλασσούμενοι etc.). On this basis, and adopting a somewhat different interpretation of ἐλασσούμενοι, my latest tentative offering is as follows:

'For example, even though we settle for less than we might in cases against our allies under international agreements, and have instituted hearings of such cases in our own courts under equitable laws, we are regarded as litigious.'

Perhaps the point being made is that, given their power, the Athenians could extort far more than they actually settle for if they chose to set aside, or even distort, due process, whereas in fact they are studiously cultivating justice by having such cases heard in their own courts on an equitable basis.

After 77.1 the Athenians expand the thought: because they are seen to treat their subjects as equals before the law, those subjects feel aggrieved if they lose anything in a legal case; if, however, the Athenians had set aside all considerations of equity from the outset, and had simply operated on a basis of 'might makes right', their subjects would have accepted this, and would not have felt aggrieved as at losing out to an (in legal terms) equal.

With regard to the apparent disconnection between the points cited and the accusation of litigiousness, this is perhaps an instance (of which there are a number) of Thucydides' compressing the train of thought, or even omitting a stage altogether (I recall another one at the end of 4.85, in Brasidas' speech to the Acanthians). Perhaps the 'unpacked' meaning here is: 'Even though we do all this to ensure equity, we are nonetheless still criticised - not, it is true, for exercising arbitrary power, but instead for being litigious.' In other words, the Athenians can't (in their view) win: because they choose to work equitably through the courts, all this does is bring down upon them accusations of litigiousness!

Anyway, that's my latest - and, as always with Thucydides, highly provisional - shot at it.

Best wishes,

John

[John W.]

(Deleted for now - needs more work. J.)

[mwh]

Getting closer, I think (or am I too impressionable?). I agree altogether with your understanding of the rest of 77 and with the need for the sentence to make sense in the context of 76 fin. (a problems I raised in my previous) and with your overall contextualization of the target sentence.

But doesn't this mean that the participles are to be understood causal, not concessive?
"Because we get the worse of it in international courts (sc. and yet persist in our willingness to submit to them, rather than using our power) and held the cases in Athens under the same laws (sc. ditto), we're thought addicted to litigation."
This is the only way I can make sense of the apodosis. The thrust of the argument has to be that their (unfair) reputation for litigiousness is owed to their going to law (whether elsewhere or in Athens) rather than imposing their will by resorting to force. I'm with you on that. To say that they have that reputation even though they go to law would be totally illogical. That's what I was struggling with before.

Can elassoumenoi really mean "settl[ing] for less than we might"? (i.e. allowing ourselves to be worsted??). Surely it has to mean getting the worse of it, coming off worse, losing.

I earlier expressed misgiving about tois omoiois nomois. Can that really mean "under equitable laws," as you now translate it? Could it perhaps mean the same laws as we submit ourselves to in international courts (i.e. not under our own laws but under those of our "allies"), or the same laws as we apply to our own citizens? Even "impartial" seems a bit of a stretch.

Once again I write off the top of my head and without consulting any commentaries or other translations, and I may be totally off course. I first read Thucydides along with Crawley's translation, which I developed very great respect for. (I no longer have my copy, a first edition I believe, after lending it to someone who didn't return it.) I now think no less highly of Lattimore's. But with Thucydides, no-one can get everything right!

[John W.]

mwh - many thanks indeed for your further thoughts.

I'm still churning around with this passage. I now agree with you that ἐλασσούμενοι can't really be taken as 'settling for less than our due', but must mean something like 'suffer loss', or 'come off worst'; it's worth noting that just a little further on, in 1.77.4 we have ἤν τι ... καὶ ὁπωσοῦν ἐλασσωθῶσιν, which I have translated: 'if they should suffer any loss at all'.

With regard to ὁμοίοις, I'm pretty sure that elsewhere in Thucydides it is used in the sense of 'equitable', but I'll have to double check that. in any case, it could still mean 'the same' here as you suggest.

I see the attraction of your latest suggestion, and I'll give it further thought. With it, as with the concessive interpretation, there is still a stage of the thought process left out, but, as I've said before, that can happen in Thucydides.

Crawley's translation has many good qualities, though of the older ones I've found Dale's the most helpful - more literal, and with some useful notes. I like Lattimore's version very much too, though I have to say that it is marred by the number of seemingly inadvertent omissions - sometimes just a word or two, sometimes rather more (one of the worst is at 6.102, where the whole first sentence is missing). I don't know whether these omissions were ever corrected in a later printing.

Anyway, thanks again for you help; I'll keep thinking!

Best wishes,

John

[John W.]

My own translation currently stands as follows:

'For example, even though we often lose in lawsuits against our allies which are conducted under international agreements, and in our own courts have instituted hearings of cases under impartial laws, we are regarded as litigious.'

If this is on the right lines (of which I'm far from sure), the thinking would seem to be that, since the Athenians clearly have no advantage in lawsuits - abroad, because they often lose to their allies (perhaps because of bias in the allies' courts), and at home because their own laws ensure that they are on an equal footing with their allies in cases referred to Athens - they can have no incentive to constantly resort to legal channels, and so there can be no rational basis for regarding them as litigious. While this implied line of reasoning is I think possible, one would be more comfortable with a more transparent linkage between the first part of the sentence and the allegation of litigiousness.

I've recently found yet another interpretation in a piece by A.E. Raubitschek in The Speeches in Thucydides (ed. Philip A. Stadter, Chapel Hill, 1973), p. 44. Raubitschek translates our passage as follows:

'If in lowering ourselves, we arrange for trials under treaty provisions in cases against our allies and on the basis of legal equality in our own courts - we are called litigious.'

This takes ἐν ταῖς ξυμβολαίαις πρὸς τοὺς ξυμμάχους δίκαις and παρ᾽ ἡμῖν αὐτοῖς ἐν τοῖς ὁμοίοις νόμοις as parallel: the Athenians are then pointing out that they are lowering themselves (ἐλασσούμενοι) both by accepting treaty provisions with their (weaker) allies, and by treating these same allies as equals in their own courts in Athens. However, I would have expected a word order along the lines
ἐλασσούμενοι γὰρ καὶ ἐν ταῖς ξυμβολαίαις ... δίκαις καὶ παρ᾽ ἡμῖν αὐτοῖς ... if this was the intended sense (unless the first καὶ is trajected for some reason). This interpretation is nonetheless interesting, and further illustrates (if that is necessary) just how many potential takes on this sentence there are!

John

[mwh]

Just a couple of helpless notes before I give up on this.

I still have great difficulty making sense of this sentence if the participles are taken as concessive. I really don't see how they can be anything other than causal, or at any rate neutral, circumstantial. Raubitschek seems to have taken the same view (since the condition implied by his "If" has clearly been satisfied), and so of course did Lattimore, despite his effectively subordinating elassoumenoi to poihsantes.

I'm still far from clear about en tois omoiois nomois, with the article. By "impartial" I guess you're taking omoioi to mean "the same for everyone, us and them alike", which seems perfectly acceptable in itself, but it's the attributive position of omoiois that slightly bothers me. Your "under impartial laws" seems more a translation of en omoiois nomois (or omoiois en nomois or en nomois omoiois), without article. I could understand en tois (sc. hmeterois) nomois omoiois (ousi), omoiois predicative, stressing that Athenian laws are impartial, but as the phrase stands "impartial" doesn't really seem to work (our impartial laws as distinct from our non-impartial ones?!). Maybe the difficulty I'm seeing is unreal, but this is what makes me wonder whether it rather means "the same laws" (or at least similar ones) –- raising the question the same as what? the same as are operative under the international agreements?? I'm handicapped by my ignorance of the actualities.

I don't know the Dale translation, and in fact no other besides the Penguin (which doesn't seem to me as bad as is sometimes made out). Lattimore's omissions, obviously inadvertent, I expect were made good in the second printing, but since I have only the first I can't check.

[John W.]

mwh – many thanks. Although I know you’ve withdrawn from the discussion, I thought I’d record my latest musings.

I now incline to agree with you that the participles cannot viably be possessive. We would expect 77.1 to follow on in sense from 76.4 - ἡμῖν δὲ καὶ ἐκ τοῦ ἐπιεικοῦς ἀδοξία τὸ πλέον ἢ ἔπαινος οὐκ εἰκότως περιέστη, ‘however, in consequence of our very reasonableness, ill repute more than praise has unfairly accrued to us’. What we really require at the start of 77.1 is an example of Athenian ἐπιείκεια; the ἀδοξία would then in turn be illustrated by the charge of φιλοδικεῖν.

I’m starting to think that Raubitschek may in fact be on the right lines, though I’m not necessarily convinced by the parallelism he finds between ἐν ταῖς ξυμβολαίαις πρὸς τοὺς ξυμμάχους δίκαις and παρ᾽ ἡμῖν αὐτοῖς ἐν τοῖς ὁμοίοις νόμοις, with ποιήσαντες τὰς κρίσεις applying to both (one of the many problems in trying to interpret Thucydides is recognising, on the one hand, his love of balance, and on the other hand, his fondness for some degree of variation, and then working out into which category any given passage falls).

Factoring all that in, my latest attempt at this work in progress is (with the Greek requoted first for convenience):

καὶ ἐλασσούμενοι γὰρ ἐν ταῖς ξυμβολαίαις πρὸς τοὺς ξυμμάχους δίκαις καὶ παρ᾽ ἡμῖν αὐτοῖς ἐν τοῖς ὁμοίοις νόμοις ποιήσαντες τὰς κρίσεις φιλοδικεῖν δοκοῦμεν.

‘For when we actually (καὶ) diminish our status (ἐλασσούμενοι) by engaging in legal actions under international agreements against our allies, and by having arranged for hearings of cases against them in our own courts to take place under equitable[?] laws, we are regarded as litigious.’

The idea that the first καὶ emphasises ἐλασσούμενοι is found in Forbes’ 1895 edition of Book 1, citing the preceding καὶ ἐκ τοῦ ἐπιεικοῦς (76.4) as a parallel.

With regard to ἐν τοῖς ὁμοίοις νόμοις, the possibilities include the following:

(i) the article might be emphasising that the laws are well known or familiar to the audience, as perhaps it does in ἐν ταῖς ξυμβολαίαις ... δίκαις;

(ii) as you suggest, it could mean that the same laws apply both in the allied courts and in Athens;

(iii) Raubitschek takes it as meaning that, even when the Athenians have a ‘home advantage’, they apply the same laws to their allies as to themselves.

For the moment I’ve left ‘equitable’ in my translation, though I am attracted by your option (ii). That, of course, depends on whether we are talking about a single type of case, or whether the ξυμβολαίαις ... δίκαις are being distinguished from cases involving the allies which have to be referred to Athens under different legal provisions. I too don’t know enough about the realities to be able to decide on this; more research, I fear, beckons.

Best wishes,

John

[mwh]

Thanks for posting your follow-up, John. By "possessive" I take it you mean "concessive."
For what it's worth (very little, I fear):

1. "when we … diminish our status by engaging in" seems a bit of stretch for elassoumenoi en (particularly for the en), however attractive on its own terms.

2. You are now making the poihsantes phrase grammatically subordinate to elassoumenoi, and in parallel (kind of!) with the simple prepositional phrase en tais … dikais. I can't say Thucydides couldn't do that, but I find it difficult without some particular pointer to this construal, such as <kai> en tais or en <te> tais. Even then I'd find the degree of imbalance disconcerting. You elide the imbalance with your "by engaging … and by having arranged."

3. "hearings of cases against them":
(i) <the> cases? Of course the main question here is the relation between the dikai and the kriseis, which I can't answer.
(ii) I take it "against them" is your own interpretive expansion, or are you detaching autois from par'hmin (which would seem pretty well impossible to me)?

I'm sorry all I can do is criticize! If a case-closed cogent reading strikes me overnight I'll let you know. Don't hold your breath.

All best,
Michael

[John W.]

Michael – many thanks. I am sorry for continuing to drag you down in this maelstrom with me.

Yes, I did mean ‘concessive’ – my apologies for the slip.

On reflection I agree with all you say regarding my latest stab at this sentence. Specifically:

1 – Yes, I was stretching ἐλασσούμενοι rather (too) far in an attempt to reach a more satisfactory overall sense. But really it ought to mean something like ‘incurring losses’ or ‘being at a disadvantage’.

2 – I too feel the lack of some coordinating signpost such as τε ... καὶ if two elements are to be subsumed under ἐλασσούμενοι. I was trying to circumvent this, but I don’t think one can, and it is a strong objection to my (and Raubitschek’s) take on the sentence. As I recall, Poppo (in his editio maxima) raised a similar objection back in 1831 to an attempt by Bloomfield (in his translation of 1829) to do something similar.

3 – Yes, ‘against them’ is (now) my own expansion. I did at one stage follow some scholars in detaching αὐτοῖς from παρ᾽ ἡμῖν, but I’ve abandoned that.

One final shot for now, factoring in your previous comments on ἐν τοῖς ὁμοίοις νόμοις, but otherwise reverting to one of the two main interpretations I identified at the outset:

‘For example, because we were at a constant disadvantage (ἐλασσούμενοι) in legal actions against our allies conducted under international agreements, and so transferred the hearings of such cases to our own courts under the same laws, we are regarded as litigious.’

The reference to ‘the same laws’ could then mean that the cases were heard under the same laws as would have applied under the international agreements if the cases had been heard in the courts of the allied states in question, but without any anti-Athenian bias in the actual hearings, from which the Athenians were (allegedly) suffering when the cases were heard elsewhere. The weakness of this is (at least) threefold:

(i) the role of the first καὶ on this interpretation – what does it add to the sentence?

(ii) the relevance to the charge of φιλοδικεῖν – unless the fact of the Athenians’ bringing all such cases into their own courts could serve as the basis for such a charge;

(iii) the lack of external evidence that the Athenians did in fact transfer all such hearings to their own courts.

So back to the drawing board yet again, probably.

Finally, there’s certainly no need to apologise for offering your critique – it’s much appreciated, and with this sentence one certainly needs all the help one can get!


Best wishes,

John

[Qimmik]

ἐν τοῖς ὁμοίοις νόμοις

This brings to mind the beginning of Demosthenes' speech On the Crown, 18.2, where he reminds his audience of their sworn obligation τὸ ὁμοίως ἀμφοῖν ἀκροάσασθαι, "to hear both sides impartially." Admittedly, this was written 70-80 years after Thucydides, but this language is apparently a "verbatim quotation" of the heliastic oath jurors were required to swear. See Yunis' note ad loc. in the Cambridge Greek and Latin Classics edition of On the Crown (2001), citing Bonner and Smith, The administration of justice from Homer to Aristotle (1938), vol. 2, 152-5. So there is good authority for taking ὁμοίοις to mean "impartial."

Bill

[mwh]

You seem to have ended up basically agreeing with Lattimore after all! The objection to that was the tense of elassoumenoi, which you now deal with that by taking it to be imperfective (as I imagine SL did too). That's what I suggested in my first post on this, only to withdraw it immediately but too hastily I now think. (I thought it would require edokoumen rather than dokoumen, but I suppose it doesn't really.) I suggested inceptive, you iterative; I suppose either is a possible way of reading it.

As to the initial kai, again in my first post I wrote "I'm not sure of the effect of holding up the γαρ. Does it tie the και more closely to ελασσουμενοι?" I've just done a quick TLG search for other instance of kai X gar in Thuc and find just two others (not counting instances where the gar belongs to an embedded sentence), 7.48.5 kai xrhmasi gar … and 8.109.1 kai entauqa gar …. It looks to me as if in each case the deferment of gar serves to decouple it from the kai, so that kai functions independently of the gar. In 7.48 I'd take it as coordinating with the upcoming kai's (a chain of 3 participial phrases), while in 8.109 it clearly belongs with entauqa ("for there too …"). In our sentence it seems we are free to take it either specifically with elassoumenoi or as correlative with the second kai, or however else we'd like. If we have to choose, I'd hesitantly incline to the first, giving a bit of punch to the participle. Anything in Denniston?

The relevance to the filodokein charge – wasn't this satisfactorily accounted for in earlier posts, where it was related to the overall Athenian argument about their goodness in preferring to pursue the legal route rather than just imposing their will by force as they could have done without incurring such ill will?

Your current interpretation seems to me perfectly viable in itself, but I see no hope of attaining certainty without better knowledge of the historical actualities – which I have not investigated at all. "transferring," for instance, is unsupported by the Greek itself, as is the relationship between the two participles. Hinc illae lacrimae.

Michael

PS Posted this before seeing Qimmik's helpful note.

[John W.]

Bill, Michael - many thanks indeed for your very helpful posts. Partly under their influence, I've now tweaked my last version so that it stands as follows:

'For example, because we were at a constant disadvantage in lawsuits against our allies under international agreements, and so instituted hearings of such cases in our own courts under impartial laws, we are regarded as litigious.'

That's probably about as far as one can pursue it at present - certainty does indeed seem unachievable in this (as in so many other Thucydidean) instances - though if either of you (or anyone else) has any further flashes of insight, I'd naturally love to hear them.

By the way, I did have a look at Denniston re καὶ ... γὰρ, but couldn't find anything to take us beyond what had already been discussed.

Thanks again to both of you for your patience and help.

With all good wishes,

John

[mwh]

Very glad to have been of help. This has been a most interesting thread.

So there finally turns out to be no substantive difference between you and SL at all, unless one counts your "under impartial laws" vs. his "under our impartial laws"! He really is very good.

Best,
Michael

[John W.]

Another Thucydidean passage on which I’d be grateful for your views. This time, it’s in 1.122.4. The Corinthians are speaking in an assembly of the allies at Lacedaemon, and are trying to convince their allies to go to war against the Athenians. They are arguing that the policy of ‘allowing a tyrant city [ = imperial Athens] to be established in Hellas’ is most unwise:

καὶ οὐκ ἴσμεν ὅπως τάδε τριῶν τῶν μεγίστων ξυμφορῶν ἀπήλλακται, ἀξυνεσίας ἢ μαλακίας ἢ ἀμελείας. οὐ γὰρ δὴ πεφευγότες αὐτὰ ἐπὶ τὴν πλείστους δὴ βλάψασαν καταφρόνησιν κεχωρήκατε, ἣ ἐκ τοῦ πολλοὺς σφάλλειν τὸ ἐναντίον ὄνομα ἀφροσύνη μετωνόμασται.

My current translation of this is:

‘And we do not know how this policy can be free from the three greatest disasters: stupidity, weakness and indifference. For surely you have not avoided those failings but have gone on to that attitude of contempt which has harmed more peoples than anything else, and which, from bringing about the ruin of many, has been renamed folly.’

It is the bit in bold which is the real problem, and especially the force of οὐ γὰρ δὴ. Denniston (The Greek Particles, 2nd edn, p. 243) gives the general sense of οὐ γὰρ δὴ as ‘certainly not’ (or ‘certainly not, at any rate’), but for our present passage translates as ‘Surely you have not avoided these three errors only to fall into a fourth ...’ A similar use is found in 5.111.3:

οὐ γὰρ δὴ ἐπί γε τὴν ἐν τοῖς αἰσχροῖς καὶ προύπτοις κινδύνοις πλεῖστα διαφθείρουσαν ἀνθρώπους αἰσχύνην τρέψεσθε.

‘Surely you will not fall back on that sense of honour which, in dangers that threaten disgrace and are foreseen, destroys men most of all.’

This has influenced my rendering of 1.122.4. However, another school of thought takes οὐ γὰρ δὴ there in its more usual sense and translates along the lines of:

‘For you have certainly not avoided these failings by proceeding to that attitude of contempt ...’

Partly because of 5.111.3, this has hitherto seemed to me a less likely interpretation; it is, however, favoured by a number of commentators, and I’m now starting to wonder if it actually makes more sense in the context. In the previous sentence the Corinthians have said: ‘And we do not know how this policy can be free from the three greatest disasters: stupidity, weakness and indifference.’ Given this, it would perhaps be something of a non sequitur for them to then say that the allies have actually avoided these three failings after all (but have fallen into a fourth). But I suppose that it would still make sense if the statement about avoiding the three failings was purely ironical (i.e. the Corinthians are really implying that the allies have in fact not avoided them at all).

Anyway, as always I’d welcome your thoughts on this.


Best wishes,

John

[mwh]

Sorry John I have no time for this right now, and am taking myself off the boards at least for the time being. They're just too distracting!
Maybe later.
Best,
Michael

[pster]

John,

So many heavy hitters around here, I didn't to get in the way! But since nobody wants to address your latest query, and since I am committed to this thread for the very long haul, I thought I'd look into it. Cameron would approve of your translation as he thinks that Marchant has it right:

(Marchant) οὐ γὰρ δὴ πεφευγότες αὐτά—the rendering ‘we cannot suppose that you have avoided these evils only to’ etc. (Classen, Croiset, Forbes, etc), meaning by irony ‘we suspect that you have,’ cannot be right, since the previous sentence distinctly says, ‘you have not escaped all three of these ξυμφοραί.’ Hence we must transl. (with Kruger, Bohme, Steup): ‘For it is not the case that you are free from these errors in assuming that contempt which has proved ruinous to so many (δή strengthens πλείστους), and which from its tendency to trip men up, has received instead (sc. from prudent men) the opposite name of folly.’ Nothing is gained by preserving the jingle in καταφρόνησις and αφροσύνη, because (1) to a Greek writer such a jingle has some rhetorical merit; in English it is detestable and pointless; (2) though ἀφροσύνη is spoken of as the opposite (ἐναντίον) of καταφρόνησις, it is really only different, but early Greek thinkers on the meaning of terms often confuse the contiary with the contradictory. τὸ ἐναντίον ὄνομα is internal accus. to μετωνόμασται.

I can't look at the Hornblower at the moment, but I'll find out what he thinks this week.

[mwh]

Just poking my head in here again. The argument against Denniston's (et al.'s) interpretation seems to me to carry great weight. But I note the competing translations both (or all) appear to take the negative as applying only to the participle. Could it perhaps apply to both the participle and the main verb? "For certainly it's not the case that having avoided these afflictions you've passed into contemptuousness aka folly" i.e. "For it's certainly not the case that you've managed to avoid these afflictions and have passed into contemptuousness aka folly!" But I can't say I'm at all happy with this, nor however am I happy with a construal that implies that they have proceeded to an attitude of contempt: how so? They've been guilty of axunesia or malakia or ameleia (as amply indicated in the preceding part of the speech)—but now's the time to look forward rather than back and to take collective action. I just don't see how the bit about katafronesis/afrosunh fits into this train of thought. If the argument was that they were contemptuous (sc. of Athens?), I could understand it: "We don't see how all this can have been free of axunesia/malakia/ameleia; because you certainly can't have proceeded to that oh-so-pernicious contemptuousness without having fallen prey to these afflictions." But that doesn't seem in line with the Corinthians' line of argument. I expect I'm just being thick-headed. If this point didn't bother Marchant (whose note seems excellent to me) probably it shouldn't bother me. -- Again, this is just off the top of my (thick) head.

?Interesting that the three are presented as alternatives (h not kai). Why? Each entails the others, or you can take your pick, they all effectively amount to the same thing?

Michael

[pster]

I'm impressed by the Corinthians' tone at 1.69 where they are pretty rough with the Spartans. So that would support the Kruger, Bohme, Steup, Marchant camp. But there they are really talking about much older events such as the rebuilding of the walls.

And more importantly, now when I reread both the Corinthians' speeches--I actually reread all of Book I just for you John --I don't think that they are being rough with the Spartans here. They are talking about the future. Bad things will happen to those who are foolish, cowardly, negligent, or contemptuous. Contemptuous can be ruled out. So, if action is not taken against Athens, one of the other three will be in play and the talk of the town. (Not the most dazzling rhetoric I agree.)

I haven't read Classen, Croiset, Forbes, but I wouldn't describe this/my reading as ironic, as Marchant does. No decision has been taken. We are mid-debate. I don't know why ἀπήλλακται is perfect. But Marchant seems to get carried away when he says, " the previous sentence distinctly says, 'you have not escaped all three of these ξυμφοραί.'" What about the previous sentences? τάδε refers to what is previous to the previous sentence and there the concern is with possible future outcomes.

This is my sense at the moment. Tomorrow I'll shift my focus from Book I as a whole to just 1.122 and see what I think.

[John W.]

pster, Michael - this is just an interim quickie to thank you very much indeed for your comments and to apologise for my delay in responding. I've been down with flu for some time, and haven't yet fully emerged from it, so Thucydides has been a bit taxing for me of late. I'm trying to gradually re-engage with him now, though, so I'll have a proper look at your comments and get back to you.

With all good wishes,

John

[pster]

Well, Hornblower has basically nothing whatsoever to say about any of this. He has a few remarks about the kind of folly involved at the very end. I could never be a classicist. I don't know how there could be a debate between two camps that isn't addressed in a 2000 page 3 volume commentary. Frankly, it seems quite absurd. I better stop there.

[John W.]

Well, Hornblower has basically nothing whatsoever to say about any of this. He has a few remarks about the kind of folly involved at the very end. I could never be a classicist. I don't know how there could be a debate between two camps that isn't addressed in a 2000 page 3 volume commentary. Frankly, it seems quite absurd. I better stop there.

pster - thanks very much indeed for taking the trouble to check. I'll try to get my head around all this again over the weekend.

To be honest I'm not entirely surprised re Hornblower; despite enthusiastic reviews of his commentary in some quarters it seems to me overrated. As Donald Lateiner pointed out in his review of one volume of it, all too often the commentary consists of little more than a quote from Hornblower's own revision of the Jowett translation (which he asserted would see the light of day in the Oxford World's Classics series - in fact, the latter has published a new translation by Martin Hammond). Hornblower frequently seems impatient of textual or grammatical discussion of difficult passages; perhaps this is because he's partly aiming at a Greekless audience, but, as you say, in a commentary of this size (and cost!) one expects something better. I've always found the older Oxford commentary by Gomme et al. far more helpful with problem passages - even if Gomme himself was sometimes a bit too keen to resolve difficulties by assuming that they were the result of textual corruption.

Anyway, thanks again for checking!

Best wishes,

John

[GJCaesar]

This seems like an interesting topic . In the future, I might join in one of your reading groups!

Concerning the commentaries on Thucydides: I honestly think my Greek Syntax teacher (on university) should write a purely grammatical commentary on Thucydides. He might not have the best knowledge about the culture and history in general, but man, he knows his stuff. He can literally derive every word back to PIE and he is just an authority when it comes to phrase structure and everything. Too bad he writes articles rather than commentaries. When I read some Thucydides last year, I had the same problem as John W. Sometimes, Hornblower just skips complete passages, which on first sight do seem rather important to get the whole picture. But more commentators seem to get the hang of this. Like they are almost too lazy to think it all through just a bit more detailed. Ah well .. I've always liked Burnett. His Plato commentaries are phenomenal.

[pster]

OK, take all of this with a big grain of salt because I'm just an amateur.

But I note the competing translations both (or all) appear to take the negative as applying only to the participle. Could it perhaps apply to both the participle and the main verb?

This seems quite correct to me given the full sweep of the passage. Unless somebody has some grammatical principle or Smyth number that tells us what the negation applies to.

It is the bit in bold which is the real problem, and especially the force of οὐ γὰρ δὴ. Denniston (The Greek Particles, 2nd edn, p. 243) gives the general sense of οὐ γὰρ δὴ as ‘certainly not’ (or ‘certainly not, at any rate’), but for our present passage translates as ‘Surely you have not avoided these three errors only to fall into a fourth ...’

I don't understand why you write "but" here. The difference between "certainly" and "surely" doesn't seem to me to be in play.

What I don't like about Denniston and most of the translations that are bouncing around is the past tense "avoided". That is what strikes me as unjustified. Both the participle πεφευγότες and the finite verb κεχωρήκατε are perfects. The perfect is a primary tense. He is talking about two present states. The particple refers to the present state of having fled. The finite verb refers to the present state of having made room for. To keep our heads clear, I think that for the purposes of this debate it is helpful to translate these by present tense verbs. The best I have handy are "being free (of)" and "accomodate". Anybody who thinks that they have a satisfactory interpretation of this passage has to explain why exactly T uses perfects.

OK, next. What do we have? For, it is certainly not the case that being free of these (three things) you are accomodating that contempt which has harmed so many... Notice, notice, that βλάψασαν is aorist. So here T is clearly marking past events. The contrast with the perfects is quite explicit!

Well, what of Marchant's emphatic italics? He wrote, "the previous sentence distinctly says, ‘you have not escaped all three of these ξυμφοραί.’" But is Marchant right? I don't think so.

καὶ οὐκ ἴσμεν ὅπως τάδε τριῶν τῶν μεγίστων ξυμφορῶν ἀπήλλακται, ἀξυνεσίας ἢ μαλακίας ἢ ἀμελείας.

Lo and behold! Another perfect! Conveniently for his interpretation, Marchant goes for an English past tense translation. But if we want to really focus on the tenses, we need to do ἀπήλλακται justice. I'm just going to mark the desiderative nature of this by the adverb "optimally". The active present would be "to optimally set free x from y". The passive would be "to optimally be set free from y". The perfect passive would be "to optimally be free from y". So what Thucydides actually says is more like:

And we do not know how these things are optimally free from the three greatest disasters: stupidity, weakness and indifference.

I opt for the literal "these things", but John's "this policy" is just fine.

So we have no reason whatsoever to bring in the past tense for any of this.

Hobbes doesn't use the past tense in his translation. And rightly so, because he understands that the perfects in these sentences are marking the fact that the Corinthians are talking and have been talking about the outputs, inputs, and dynamics of present possible courses of action.

I think it is helpful to forget about the intracacies of a couple of sentences and reread the whole speech. Certainly, certainly, for a writer like T, the forest has to matter as much as the trees. The past tense business seems totally unjustified!

I am sorry if I am totally wrong. But I can only spend an hour a day on this stuff and that's how it looks under that time constraint!