Mastronarde's Introduction to Attic Greek, unit 9, exercise section III, #1.
The sentence (in English) is: With friends it is easy to endure evils.
Mastronarde's answer key translates it as: μετὰ τῶν φίλων ῥᾴδιον κακὰ φέρειν.
I translated it as (with proper accentuation and diacritics on-paper): Συν τοις φιλοις ραδιον κακα φερειν .
Two questions: (1) Is my translation workable? (2) Is there some other difference between the two in meaning? Does one emphasize a relation more than the other, or something like that?
When I was still using H&Q, I learned that σύν is a dative preposition of accompaniement, and I learned that μετὰ has the sense of accompaniement, but is genitive.
Difference between 'μετὰ' and 'σύν' - EtG translation
-
- Textkit Neophyte
- Posts: 6
- Joined: Sun Nov 19, 2017 7:57 am
-
- Textkit Zealot
- Posts: 2504
- Joined: Mon Aug 17, 2015 1:16 pm
Re: Difference between 'μετὰ' and 'σύν' - EtG translation
Your translation wasn't really wrong: the two prepositions are very close, and in fact συν + dative eventually displaced μετα + genitive. I think μετα + genitive would be closer to "in the company of" or "in the midst of" or perhaps "surrounded by", which would probably better fit the sentence to be translated. συν would maybe be closer to "with the help of". But that's just my intuition.
Here are links to the entries for these words in the Liddell Scott Jones lexicon, which gives the full range of meanings for both words:
συν:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/tex ... y%3Dsu%2Fn
μετα:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/tex ... %3Dmeta%2F
Here are links to the entries for these words in the Liddell Scott Jones lexicon, which gives the full range of meanings for both words:
συν:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/tex ... y%3Dsu%2Fn
μετα:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/tex ... %3Dmeta%2F
Bill Walderman
-
- Textkit Enthusiast
- Posts: 564
- Joined: Fri Oct 09, 2015 4:34 pm
Re: Difference between 'μετὰ' and 'σύν' - EtG translation
Shouldn’t this be exactly the other way around? The LS s.u. μετά:Hylander wrote:in fact συν + dative eventually displaced μετα + genitive.
The LS s.u. σύν:with gen. (in which use μετά gradually superseded σύν, q.u.)
Cf. Modern Greek με ‘with’.The prep. σύν gradually gave way to μετά with gen.
-
- Textkit Zealot
- Posts: 2504
- Joined: Mon Aug 17, 2015 1:16 pm
Re: Difference between 'μετὰ' and 'σύν' - EtG translation
Yes, you're right. Sorry.Shouldn’t this be exactly the other way around?
The signs read: ΤΑΧΥΤΗΤΑ ΕΞΕΤΑΖΕΤΑΙ ΜΕ ΡΑΔΑΡ, but the taxi driver assured me that the radar doesn't work.Cf. Modern Greek με ‘with’.
Bill Walderman
- ἑκηβόλος
- Textkit Zealot
- Posts: 969
- Joined: Wed Aug 07, 2013 10:19 am
- Contact:
Re: Difference between 'μετὰ' and 'σύν' - EtG translation
Yes. If you had written μετὰ τοὺς φίλους instead, that would have been wrong.Wishfulcrystal wrote:The sentence (in English) is: With friends it is easy to endure evils.
Mastronarde's answer key translates it as: μετὰ τῶν φίλων ῥᾴδιον κακὰ φέρειν.
I translated it as (with proper accentuation and diacritics on-paper): Συν τοις φιλοις ραδιον κακα φερειν .
Two questions: (1) Is my translation workable?
τί δὲ ἀγαθὸν τῇ πομφόλυγι συνεστώσῃ ἢ κακὸν διαλυθείσῃ;
- ἑκηβόλος
- Textkit Zealot
- Posts: 969
- Joined: Wed Aug 07, 2013 10:19 am
- Contact:
Re: Difference between 'μετὰ' and 'σύν' - EtG translation
μετά + genitive is preserved in some set (formal) phrases.Hylander wrote:Yes, you're right. Sorry.Shouldn’t this be exactly the other way around?
The signs read: ΤΑΧΥΤΗΤΑ ΕΞΕΤΑΖΕΤΑΙ ΜΕ ΡΑΔΑΡ, but the taxi driver assured me that the radar doesn't work.Cf. Modern Greek με ‘with’.
Interestingly, the preposition μετά + accusative with the meaning "after", or "beyond" has expanded in Modern Greek, with its use as an adverb becoming much more common than we see in earlier times, and now even as a conjunction.
As prefixed morphological units, συν- and μετα- are both still found extensively in Modern Greek. Despite that it is much reduced in its range of usages as an individual word (preposition), it is still found in the senses of togetherness, giving help to another, cooperation, etc. Likewise in the inherited word stock, μετα- retains the range of senses of change, repetition, sharing, etc. There don't appear to be striking surprises in those prefixed element patterns of usage for somebody with a classical background encountering Modern Greek.
τί δὲ ἀγαθὸν τῇ πομφόλυγι συνεστώσῃ ἢ κακὸν διαλυθείσῃ;