Gildersleeve 597 remark 1

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Constantinus Philo
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Gildersleeve 597 remark 1

Post by Constantinus Philo »

Protogenes si Ialysum illum suum caeno oblitum videret, magnum credo acciperet dolorem. Cic., Att., II, 21, 4. Here imfp subj in both parts of the conditional sentence indicates past unreal condition because as Gild. says it is a representation. Why representation?
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seneca2008
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Re: Gildersleeve 597 remark 1

Post by seneca2008 »

Did you read the note on 654?
Persuade tibi hoc sic esse, ut scribo: quaedam tempora eripiuntur nobis, quaedam subducuntur, quaedam effluunt. Turpissima tamen est iactura, quae per neglegentiam fit. Et si volueris attendere, maxima pars vitae elabitur male agentibus, magna nihil agentibus, tota vita aliud agentibus.

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Re: Gildersleeve 597 remark 1

Post by Constantinus Philo »

yes, but it is difficult for me to see any speaker's words here.
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Re: Gildersleeve 597 remark 1

Post by Constantinus Philo »

would the speaker's words be something like: si illum meum caeno oblitum viderem, magnum credo acciperem dolorem. I d like to say also that most French scholars do not use repraesentatio but explain it as style indirect libre. In this very example, for instance, Thomas says that imperfect subjunctive originally indicated possibility in the past before it developed the meaning of impossibility of the present, so the remnants of this old use are still frequent in Cicero.
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Re: Gildersleeve 597 remark 1

Post by talus »

This post proposes how it is that videret and acciperet convey Representatio.
To see why this protasis/apodosis is an instance of Representatio we have to look at the context of the conditional
within the full Latin sentence, specifically the part which immediately precedes the conditional.
The sentence reads
nam quia deciderat ex astris, lapsus potius quam progressus videbatur, et, ut Apelles si Venerem, aut Protogenes si Ialysum illum suum caeno oblitum videret, magnum, credo, acciperet dolorem for because he did sink so low from starlike heights, he seemed rather in freefall than in forward momentum, and, as Appelles if he should see his Venus, or Protogenes his own well-known Ialysus smeared with mud, he would, I believe, be the recipient of considerable anguish
We see here that the observer (in this case Cicero as narrator and we as reader) begins in his own present viewing the past as past (deciderat, videbatur) and then switches the viewpoint to an unreal present (videret, acciperet). This switch to the present is the Representatio of the past as if present.
The use of the term "imperfect" subjunctive to refer to the present can be confusing to a beginning student because
of the word "imperfect," which we first learn in the indicative refers to the past. G&L §597, on unreal conditional sentences,
states that the unreal conditional which is unfulfilled or now impossible is expressed by the imperfect subjuntive and stands in opposition to a present Real.
A reader will want to distinguish the ins and outs of the Ideal Condition (as in G&L §596) which uses tenses for different purposes from the Unreal Condition.
This is confusing enough and nonintuitive enough that one can review the grammars on the subjunctive mood to find all the uses, in all the conexts, to which tenses of the subjunctive are put and make a spreadsheet.
[Note on oblitum: This is one of those infrequent instances where the Perseus Latin Word Study Tool fails.
The Tool shows oblitum as past participle of obliviscor, with no other options. In our sentence oblitum is past perfect of oblino, oblinere, daub, smear.]

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