Thucydides 1.42.1.

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Paul Derouda
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Thucydides 1.42.1.

Post by Paul Derouda »

‘ὧν ἐνθυμηθέντες καὶ νεώτερός τις παρὰ πρεσβυτέρου αὐτὰ μαθὼν ἀξιούτω τοῖς ὁμοίοις ἡμᾶς ἀμύνεσθαι, καὶ μὴ νομίσῃ δίκαια μὲν τάδε λέγεσθαι, ξύμφορα δέ, εἰ πολεμήσει, ἄλλα εἶναι.

A small question about syntax: is πολεμήσει an impersonal construction, similar to ὕει "it's raining"? εἰ πολεμήσει "if there will be war"?

Thanks!

My reading project is advancing at a snail's pace...

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Re: Thucydides 1.42.1.

Post by mwh »

I don’t think it can be impersonal. As I read it, the subject will be the same as with αξιουτω and more immediately μη νομισῃ, similarly third person. Something like “if he finds himself at war”? But only Thucydides could write such a sentence, and only in a speech. For Thucydidean speeches a snail’s pace is the proper pace, and the only possible one.

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Re: Thucydides 1.42.1.

Post by RandyGibbons »

Likewise, I take νεώτερός τις to be the subject of ἀξιούτω, νομίσῃ, and πολεμήσει. (I like how the speaker switches from ἐνθυμηθέντες to νεώτερός τις.)

As a separate question, what is the construction and meaning of τοῖς ὁμοίοις ἡμᾶς ἀμύνεσθαι?

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Re: Thucydides 1.42.1.

Post by jeidsath »

Yeah, I'm confused too. After about 10 reads, I think it's this. Maybe it would be easier to understand in context:

The ones pondering these, and some younger person having learned them from an older, let him ask the like ones to defend us, and not think to say that these things are righteous, but if he will go to war, other things are advantageous.
“One might get one’s Greek from the very lips of Homer and Plato." "In which case they would certainly plough you for the Little-go. The German scholars have improved Greek so much.”

Joel Eidsath -- jeidsath@gmail.com

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Re: Thucydides 1.42.1.

Post by Paul Derouda »

Thanks. Somehow I found difficult the idea that "the younger one" should be the subject of πολεμήσει. But "if he finds himself at war" will do!
RandyGibbons wrote:As a separate question, what is the construction and meaning of τοῖς ὁμοίοις ἡμᾶς ἀμύνεσθαι?
τοῖς ὁμοίοις dative of instrument: "to defend us with the like", i.e. "to render us similar services as we did to you".

Joel, where'd you get "the ones" at the start? But I didn't get it myself without a translation, and I didn't get εἰ πολεμήσει even with one. Maybe like this:

"Pondering which (ὧν), let also (καί) the younger person, once he has learnt these things from an older, defend us with similar services [as we once did to you], and let him not think that although these things have been said according to justice, [his] advantage, if he finds himself at war, is something else." (Perhaps it would be more idiomatic English to say "his advantage, if he finds himself at war, lies somewhere else)

‘ὧν ἐνθυμηθέντες καὶ νεώτερός τις παρὰ πρεσβυτέρου αὐτὰ μαθὼν ἀξιούτω τοῖς ὁμοίοις ἡμᾶς ἀμύνεσθαι, καὶ μὴ νομίσῃ δίκαια μὲν τάδε λέγεσθαι, ξύμφορα δέ, εἰ πολεμήσει, ἄλλα εἶναι.

νεώτερός τις - Note this use of τις, which is pretty common (typically with the third person imperative, unless I'm wrong). It means something like "let any younger person", almost "let all younger people".

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Re: Thucydides 1.42.1.

Post by jeidsath »

Joel, where'd you get "the ones" at the start?
It's hardly worth explaining my reasoning for getting things wrong, but ὧν ἐνθυμηθέντες made me think that the subject of the sentence was meant to be plural and therefore καὶ νεώτερός τις was an aside that forced the number of ἀξιούτω by attraction.

ἀξιούτω makes more sense as "deem worthy" rather than request

τοῖς ὁμοίοις makes more sense as an instrumental dative of ἀμύνεσθαι rather than an indirect object of ἀξιούτω

But I'm not sure that I like "these things have been said according to justice"
“One might get one’s Greek from the very lips of Homer and Plato." "In which case they would certainly plough you for the Little-go. The German scholars have improved Greek so much.”

Joel Eidsath -- jeidsath@gmail.com

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Re: Thucydides 1.42.1.

Post by Paul Derouda »

Well, I posted an extremely difficult sentence without any context, so I'm not exactly blaming you for not understanding something I couldn't understand myself with the help of a translation..

There are a few very frustrating words in Greek that can mean almost anything according to context. ἀξιόω is one of them, δόξα is another and there are a few others... I'm never going to get a good grip of them!

Here's Thomas Hobbes' version, if it's any help:
"Which benefits considering, and the younger sort taking notice of them from the elder, be you pleased to defend us now in the like manner. And have not this thought: that though in what we have spoken there be equity, yet, if the war should arise, the profit would be found in the contrary."

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Re: Thucydides 1.42.1.

Post by RandyGibbons »

Paul, now that you've evidently got past it, what did you think of Thucydides' 'archaeology'? Did you find anything in particular that made it especially worth reading in the original?

Randy

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Re: Thucydides 1.42.1.

Post by Paul Derouda »

What I think? I'm not sure, I've read it in such short bits that I still don't have very good general picture... Should read it again, I guess.

One thing that surprised me was his somewhat superstitious view of that earthquakes were particularly common during the war, given the general view that he rejects the idea that of supernatural forces affecting the course of history.

A question that particularly interests me is whether 1.21 does, indeed, specifically refer to Herodotus, as many scholars think. It's interesting, by the way, how he thinks that what makes poetic legends rather worthless are them being "unfalsifiable" (ἀνεξέλεγκτα).

21. ἐκ δὲ τῶν εἰρημένων τεκμηρίων ὅμως τοιαῦτα ἄν τις νομίζων μάλιστα ἃ διῆλθον οὐχ ἁμαρτάνοι, καὶ οὔτε ὡς ποιηταὶ ὑμνήκασι περὶ αὐτῶν ἐπὶ τὸ μεῖζον κοσμοῦντες μᾶλλον πιστεύων, οὔτε ὡς λογογράφοι ξυνέθεσαν ἐπὶ τὸ προσαγωγότερον τῇ ἀκροάσει ἢ ἀληθέστερον, ὄντα ἀνεξέλεγκτα καὶ τὰ πολλὰ ὑπὸ χρόνου αὐτῶν ἀπίστως ἐπὶ τὸ μυθῶδες ἐκνενικηκότα, ηὑρῆσθαι δὲ ἡγησάμενος ἐκ τῶν ἐπιφανεστάτων σημείων ὡς παλαιὰ εἶναι ἀποχρώντως. [2] καὶ ὁ πόλεμος οὗτος, καίπερ τῶν ἀνθρώπων ἐν ᾧ μὲν ἂν πολεμῶσι τὸν παρόντα αἰεὶ μέγιστον κρινόντων, παυσαμένων δὲ τὰ ἀρχαῖα μᾶλλον θαυμαζόντων, ἀπ᾽ αὐτῶν τῶν ἔργων σκοποῦσι δηλώσει ὅμως μείζων γεγενημένος αὐτῶν.

"On the whole, however, the conclusions I have drawn from the proofs quoted may, I believe, safely be relied on. Assuredly they will not be disturbed either by the lays of a poet displaying the exaggeration of his craft, or by the compositions of the chroniclers that are attractive at truth's expense; the subjects they treat of being out of the reach of evidence, and time having robbed most of them of historical value by enthroning them in the region of legend. Turning from these, we can rest satisfied with having proceeded upon the clearest data, and having arrived at conclusions as exact as can be expected in matters of such antiquity. [2] To come to this war; despite the known disposition of the actors in a struggle to overrate its importance, and when it is over to return to their admiration of earlier events, yet an examination of the facts will show that it was much greater than the wars which preceded it."

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Re: Thucydides 1.42.1.

Post by C. S. Bartholomew »

Paul Derouda wrote:What I think? I'm not sure, I've read it in such short bits that I still don't have very good general picture... Should read it again, I guess.

One thing that surprised me was his somewhat superstitious view of that earthquakes were particularly common during the war, given the general view that he rejects the idea that of supernatural forces affecting the course of history.

A question that particularly interests me is whether 1.21 does, indeed, specifically refer to Herodotus, as many scholars think. It's interesting, by the way, how he thinks that what makes poetic legends rather worthless are them being "unfalsifiable" (ἀνεξέλεγκτα).
Thomas Hobbes
21. Now he that by the arguments here adduced shall frame a judgment of the things past and not believe rather that they were such as the poets have sung or prose-writers have composed, more delightfully to the ear than conformably to the truth, as being things not to be disproved and by length of time turned for the most part into the nature of fables without credit, but shall think them here searched out by the most evident signs that can be, and sufficiently too, considering their antiquity: he, I say, shall not err.
Does being skeptical about poets, legends and folklore make one a modern positivist? While were being skeptical, I would suggest rendering ἀνεξέλεγκτα "unfalsifiable" runs a risk of transferring a Post enlightenment worldview to an ancient author.

Postscript:
I tried to read Thucydides 1.42.1 and ran into some of the same difficulties, not so much with syntax as with ambiguous words. The Syntax it Is difficult enough to be interesting.
C. Stirling Bartholomew

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Re: Thucydides 1.42.1.

Post by mwh »

The potential conflict between το δίκαιον and το ξύμφερον is of course a standing preoccupation of Thucydides, as of Plato in turn. Not so much in modern political discourse, where they tend to be collapsed, and any action undertaken in the national interest is ipso facto deemed justified.

For what it’s worth, Paul, I think the logografoi jibe at 1.21 has to be aimed in particular at Herodotus. Who else? And τὸ προσαγωγότερον τῇ ἀκροάσει is more than just “attractive.” It’s a description that would fit Orpheus, who drew all creatures to him and held them spellbound with his voice. Herodotus, like Homer and other poets, presupposes a listening audience. Thucydides is no story-teller, he composes text, to be grappled with by readers willing to engage with its difficulties on the page. Modern criticism has increasingly wanted to elide this distinction between them, which Thucydides rightly presents as fundamental.
(Oh, λογογράφοι: yes the logoi were written, but they were orally performed.)

As for their being ανεξελεγκτα, I fancy he means they just can’t be tested, they’re neither verifiable nor falsifiable. It wouldn’t make sense for him to discredit them as being unfalsifiable; he must mean they’re beyond verification (at best). Prior to Plato εξελέγχειν can mean simply to put to the test, rather than actually disprove or refute. Cf. Thuc’s use of ανελεγκτος. And Stirling, I don’t think you’d associate “unfalsifiable” with a “Post enlightenment worldview” if you considered the meaning of the word itself, or had read more Plato. The ancients were not so unlike moderns in their worldview as you seem to imagine

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