Herodotus, 3/98: "tuderuntque"?

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Carolus Raeticus
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Herodotus, 3/98: "tuderuntque"?

Post by Carolus Raeticus »

Salvete,

I am currently correcting some typos (my own, I am afraid) in my transcription of Herodot's Histories. I also stumbled upon one in the book itself (in 3/98):
"Hi Indi vestem gestant ex scirpo; quam, postquam scirpum e flumine demessuerunt tuderuntque, plectunt deinde in storae modum, et tamquam thoracem induunt."
I am pretty sure that it should read tunderuntque, what do you think?

Valete,

Carolus Raeticus
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Barry Hofstetter
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Re: Herodotus, 3/98: "tuderuntque"?

Post by Barry Hofstetter »

Clearly. Also, there is no verbal tud- root in Latin which would give rise to such a form.
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mwh
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Re: Herodotus, 3/98: "tuderuntque"?

Post by mwh »

Surely tuderunt is correct, used as the perfect (unreduplicated). It's the perfect that's called for, so present-stem *tunderunt is out of the question, while tuderunt is morphologically unexceptionable. Cf. e.g. fundo, fudi.

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Barry Hofstetter
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Re: Herodotus, 3/98: "tuderuntque"?

Post by Barry Hofstetter »

Ah, I'm always telling students to "know the principal parts of your verbs, they're your friends" and I missed it here.

tundō ~ere, tutudī, tūnsum (tūsum) tr. [root Indo-European *(s)teud-, with nasal infix: cf. Sanskrit tudáti, Gothic stautan] FORMS: perfect attested in VAR. L. 9.99, but not found in extant literature.

Glare, P. G. W. (Ed.). (2012). Oxford Latin Dictionary (Second Edition, Vol. I & II). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

And L&S:

tundo, tŭtŭdi, tunsum, tŭssum, and tusum (v. Neue, Formenl. II. 568), 3 (old collat. form of the Perf. tuserunt, Naev. 1, 1: tunsi, acc. to Diom. p. 369 P.; inf. tundier, Lucr. 4, 934),

Lewis, C. T., & Short, C. (1891). Harpers’ Latin Dictionary (p. 1916). New York; Oxford: Harper & Brothers; Clarendon Press.

So the extraordinarily slim lexical evidence would indicate either tutuderunt, tuserunt, or tunserunt.
N.E. Barry Hofstetter

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Re: Herodotus, 3/98: "tuderuntque"?

Post by anphph »

It's not an ancient ext, so I think it's just more likely that the translator from Greek into Latin was reminded that the perfect of a far more common word like the compound contundere was contudisse and thought about using the uncompounded version, forgetting that the perfect of tundere has, as a rule, reduplication.

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Re: Herodotus, 3/98: "tuderuntque"?

Post by Carolus Raeticus »

Hm...this seems to be more complicated than expected. In that case I won't amend "tuderuntque" but instead add a "[sic]" afterwards to make it clear that this is the spelling used in the original text.

Thank you for your help.

Carolus Raeticus
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Re: Herodotus, 3/98: "tuderuntque"?

Post by mwh »

It’s really not that complicated. In extant classical literature the perfect of the simplex happens not to be found (except that the reduplicated form tetudi is once adduced in Varro’s linguistic work on Latin as analogous to pepugi), but as anphph indicates it’s well attested in the compounds, contudi retudi obtudi etc., and fundo fundere fudi is exactly analogous. So there’s no need to add “[sic]” to tuderuntque. The translator knew his Latin.

(Tunderunt, by contrast, is a monstrous non-form. The lesson for Barry should be Know some morphology, it’s your friend.)


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Barry Hofstetter
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Re: Herodotus, 3/98: "tuderuntque"?

Post by Barry Hofstetter »

mwh wrote: Tue Dec 18, 2018 7:17 pm It’s really not that complicated. In extant classical literature the perfect of the simplex happens not to be found (except that the reduplicated form tetudi is once adduced in Varro’s linguistic work on Latin as analogous to pepugi), but as anphph indicates it’s well attested in the compounds, contudi retudi obtudi etc., and fundo fundere fudi is exactly analogous. So there’s no need to add “[sic]” to tuderuntque. The translator knew his Latin.

(Tunderunt, by contrast, is a monstrous non-form. The lesson for Barry should be Know some morphology, it’s your friend.)
Certissime, mi vir bone. However, I also trust that Varro knew his morphology.

γνῶθι μορφολόγιον.

Edit: And I like that "monstrous non-form." I plan to use that. You do have a way with words... :lol:
N.E. Barry Hofstetter

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