Looking at syntax alone, ignoring all the sorts of things that classics scholars focus on in poetry and drama, rejecting conjectural emendation and leaving the text as it stands, κάτοιδα looks like the main verb, ὁμήγυριν an object of κάτοιδα and ἄστρων νυκτέρων limit ὁμήγυριν. τοὺς φέροντας looks like a second object of κάτοιδα but ἀστέρας might be a delayed second object with several modifiers stacked in front of it.
Do you mean τοὺς φέροντας is a different object, in addition to ὁμήγυριν, or an apposition it?
I’m not sure but it seems Smyth has taken τοὺς φέροντας as an apposition:
…I have learned to know well the gathering of the night’s stars, those radiant
potentates conspicuous in the firmament, [5] bringers of winter and summer
to mankind [the constellations, when they rise and set].
We don’t know our night sky anywhere near as well as the ancients. But I don’t think that all the stars bring seasonal changes, only some of them. Not the North Star, for example. So I don’t like Smyth’s reading. CSB’s first reading seems to be on the right track, except I am at least for the moment inclined to see ἀστέρας as a third object. If all of these sets of stars were exactly the same, then strict apposition would be fine. But given that I doubt that they are, I am inclined to see the three (at least two) sets as three different (but overlapping) direct objects. This passage made me realize that the category of apposition–like countless other categories, but unlike most gramatical categories–suffers from vagueness. But to keep the discussion on track I won’t elaborate.
I have a question though about commas. Suppose you don’t like where the commas are. What are you to conclude?
The living editors didn’t do a good job.
The editors in Byzantium didn’t do a good job.
One doesn’t question the editors in Byzantium because they knew what they were doing, so you must be at fault.
Do scholars ever argue about better placement of commas? Seems pretty clear that a few commas could make or break a reading/interpretation.
The Greek NT (UBSGNT3/4) has a punctuation apparatus and yes scholars do argue about everything imaginable including punctuation, accents, breathings, you name it.
If we allow the first suggestion, that ἀστέρας is the second object, with all the modifiers
stacked in the couple of lines before it, what difficulties does it present? Would the meaning
be ambiguous or nonsensical (I don’t know my way around the constellations so I wouldn’t know)?
Or would it be a stretch, grammar wise?
In regard to SYNTAX, I don’t think ἀστέρας is difficult no matter how you construe a series of accusatives all referring more or less to the same referent. If a given accusative constituent is a second or third direct object or in apposition to the direct object, this doesn’t cause a problem with syntax. Nor does it create problems with translation or exegesis. There is a syntax problem on live seven, at the end. The placement of τῶν is weird, truly strange.
Yeah, I meant the second suggestion. My apologies.
I agree about the strange placement of τῶν. Robert Browning (1889) read it as Stars…and the uprisings of them, as though it were αὐτῶν (or maybe it’s a
demonstrative use of the article?). Smyth was more loose in his approach, with [the constellations, when they rise and set].
Not sure how to translate it myself. Quite an odd construction.
In light of the thread about καί and Smyth’s treatment of it as sometimes adding an example or
subgroup rather than connecting two distinct head groups, perhaps it’d easier to take ἄστρων
κάτοιδα νυκτέρων ὁμήγυριν as presenting a collective general group, and then further specifying
it to those constellations that indicate the seasonal changes.
The first καὶ might be adverbial, it struck me that way when I first read it.
Translation is constrained by the target language, not really a Greek issue.
The second καὶ clearly joins two constituents χεῖμα καὶ θέρος.
This is M.L. West’s idea of this passage according to his Studies in Aeschylus, ch. 7. (Though I’m not sure of his punctuation; obviously it has to be changed somehow, but he doesn’t mention it - this is my attempt) He, like others, would prefer conjectural emendation and to have the problematic ἀστέρας replaced by a participle. I don’t know what reading he has in his edition of the text.
What I’m wondering is how he translates this, either “I have learnt to know the assembly of the stars of night, both the winter- and the summerbringing bright potentates standing out amid the sky, as I watch their settings, and the risings of others”; or “I have learnt to know the assembly of the stars of night as I keep my eye on both the winter- and summer-bringing (etc.) whenever they set, and the risings of others”.
For one, I still like “specifically those that bring winter and summer”, because the first καὶ seems too strong to me compared to the second to mean “both…and” (I can’t give a better explanation for this feeling). Also, I like pster’s idea that not all stars bring seasonal changes.
Second, how does he extract the meaning “and the risings of others” from ἀντολάς τε τῶν?
Interesting and rather fitting emendation. But why do you read ἀντολάς τε τῶν as “and the risings of others” and not “of them/these”? Felton notes the frequent use of the article for a pronoun (though
there are no references to back that up; see Pelie for a few).
If we do leave it as is with ἀστέρας, Headlam & Pearson read this seemingly
unnecessary repetition as a common feature of Tragedy, of laying out in simple terms
the metaphorical or ornate descriptions in the previous lines, or “producing the effect of Bathos”,
as Sidwick put it.
I guess it would make sense to read it this way. The guard is well-versed in the constellations
of which the setting of some and the rising of others indicate the seasonal changes.
Just a guess that I put 90 seconds of work into: The article, as demonstrative, according to LSJ, means “that”, and consequently not “this”. And so with the demonstrative, Aeschylus is saying “those”. Now if that reference to “those” amounts to a purposeful non-reference to “these”, that would leave us with “others”. A fuller judgement would seemingly require an examination comparing and contrasting the demonstratives in play when the article was used as demonstrative. Was the article in someway an emphatic rejection of “this”? If Aeschylus wanted to say “these” would a different demonstrative have been required by the semantic/pragmatic practice in that milieu?
The distinction you’re trying to make between “this/these” and “that/those” is not particularly relevant
to Greek because the demonstrative pronouns were often used interchangeably.
In addition, the pronoun Felton mentioned is not demonstrative but personal. 3rd person plural αὐτῶν,
and making it refer to anything other than ἀστέρας is rather a stretch.
West used “others” for more fluid and clear translation (it’s obvious that when some rise,
others set and vice versa), not because it has to correspond word-for-word to the text at hand.
Ya, sure. But how do you know which pronoun Felton is referring to? I don’t doubt you since you have a better handle on grammar than I do. But does he say so elsewhere? Or are we just supposed to know?
Also, Nate, I wanted to ask you which of the commentaries on archive.org you think is the best? Some of them seem rather cursory. Do you have a favorite?
My grammar or handle of Greek is definitely not better than yours, Paul’s and the others here.
And I should have been more careful in my phrasing of the previous post. I can’t know for sure
but it seems to be his meaning, at least from the context of line 7.
I haven’t checked them all, to be honest. I’m not sure I’ll have the time during the next 3 weeks
to be active in the group. From the ones I did browse, Sidwick has always been stellar in my
book and Headlam & Pearson’s commentary is very thorough.
I looked up both Goodwin’s and Smyth’s grammar and couldn’t find a justification for this translation “of others”. I can just make my own guesses. If West is right, maybe the point is the choice of τῶν instead of αὐτῶν. The latter replaced the former diachronically, but this doesn’t mean that at any synchronic point in time the words meant the same; there was always a contrast, while the meaning of the words slowly shifted. So, τῶν here is not just a poetic way to say αὐτῶν nor quite the same as the Homeric τῶν, but rather deliberately chosen here instead of αὐτῶν because “those” is meant, not “these”.
